Who is Anna Scherer. Salon A.P. Scherer in War and Peace. Motivation for learning activities
The salon of Anna Pavlovna Scherer resembles masks pulled together by decency. We see beautiful ladies and brilliant gentlemen, bright candles are a kind of theater in which heroes, like actors, perform their roles. At the same time, each performs not the role that he likes, but the one in which others want to see him. Even their phrases are absolutely empty, meaningless, since they are all prepared and do not come from the heart, but are spoken according to an unwritten script. The main actors and directors of this performance are Anna Pavlovna and Vasily Kuragin.
However, with all this, the description of Scherer's salon is an important scene in the novel, not only because it helps us understand the whole essence of the secular society of that time, but also because it introduces us to some of the main characters of the work.
It is here that we meet Pierre Bezukhov and Andrei Bolkonsky and understand how different they are from other heroes. The principle of antithesis used in this scene by the author makes us pay attention to these characters, take a closer look at them.
Secular society in the salon resembles a spinning machine, and people are spindles that, without stopping, make noise from different directions. The most obedient and beautiful puppet is Helen. Even the expression on her face completely repeats the emotions on the face of Anna Pavlovna. Helen does not utter a single phrase for the whole evening. She's just adjusting her necklace. There is absolutely nothing hidden behind the external beauty of this heroine, the mask on her is held on even more tightly than on other heroes: it is an “unchanging” smile and cold diamonds.
Among all the women who are represented in the salon of the maid of honor, only the wife of Prince Andrei, Lisa, who is expecting a child, is pretty. We even imbue her with respect when she moves away from Hippolyte. However, Lisa also has a mask that has become so attached to her that even at home she speaks with her husband in the same playful and capricious tone as with the guests in the salon.
A stranger among those invited is Andrei Bolkonsky. When he narrowed his eyes, he looked around the society, he found that before him were not faces, but masks, whose hearts and thoughts were completely empty. This discovery makes Andrey close his eyes and turn away. Only one person in this society is worthy of Bolkonsky's smile. And this same person Anna Pavlovna hardly deserves attention, meeting with a greeting that applies to people of the lowest class. This is Pierre Bezukhov, the “Russian bear”, who, according to Anna Pavlovna, needs “education”, and in our understanding, deprivation of a sincere interest in life. Being the illegitimate son of Catherine's nobleman, he was deprived of a secular education, as a result of which he sharply stood out from the general mass of salon guests, but his naturalness immediately disposes him in relation to the reader and evokes sympathy. Pierre has his own opinion, but nobody in this society is interested in it. Here, in general, no one has their own opinion, and it cannot be, because all representatives of this society are unchanged and self-satisfied.
The author himself and his favorite characters have a negative attitude towards secular society. L. Tolstoy unmasks the actors of the Scherer Salon. Using the methods of contrast and comparison, the author reveals the true essence of the characters. He compares Prince Vasily Kuragin with an actor, and his manner of speaking with a wound clock. The new guests of the salon act at Tolstoy as dishes that are served at the table. First, Anna Pavlovna "serves the table" as a viscount, then as an abbot. The author consciously uses the technique of reducing images, emphasizing the predominance of physiological needs in members of secular society over more important - spiritual ones. The author makes us understand that he himself is on the side of naturalness and sincerity, which certainly had no place in the salon of the maid of honor.
This episode plays an important role in the novel. This is where the main storylines begin. Pierre sees his future wife Helen for the first time, Prince Vasily decides to marry Anatole to Princess Marya, and also to attach Boris Drubetskoy, and Andrei Bolkonsky decides to go to war.
The beginning of the novel has much in common with the epilogue. At the end of the epic, we meet the young son of Andrei Bolkonsky, who was invisibly present in the first scene of the work. And again, disputes about the war begin, as if in continuation of the theme of Abbot Morio about the eternity of the world. It is this theme that L. Tolstoy reveals throughout his novel.
Leo Tolstoy begins the work "War and Peace" with the episode "Anna Pavlovna Sherer's Salon", in which he describes how the lady-in-waiting of Empress Maria Feodorovna, the secular unmarried lady Anna Sherer, receives guests in her salon, most of whom are well-known noble nobles from the capital . They came to Anna Scherer not for close and warm communication in an informal setting, but, as is customary, to go out into the world, for strict formalized communication with each other, establishing connections and obtaining personal benefits. Anna Pavlovna also treats all guests differently, there are higher-ranking guests who deserve a more respectful greeting, and there are less famous, "less secular" and influential people, such as, for example, Pierre Bezukhov, who are not entitled to such a greeting.
Anna Scherer makes sure that the conversations in the salon are conducted in the right way and on the right topics. She "serves" especially interesting guests, and any word spoken out of time makes her think that the evening is ruined. Pierre Bezukhov's expression of his frank and naive thoughts causes her fear for the evening and irritation. The salon is dominated by French speech, characteristic of aristocrats and high society. The whole essence of the salon is, as it were, in its own glorification and the receipt of benefits by each participant.
In the episode "Name Day at the Rostovs", the Rostov family hosts guests on the occasion of the name day of mother Natalya Rostova and her fifteen-year-old daughter Natasha. Natalya Rostova is about the same age as Anna Sherer, but unlike her, she is married and has several children. She loves her family. The atmosphere during the holiday is more informal, the guests speak more colloquially, in Russian, so one of the main guests, Marya Dmitrievna, always expresses herself only in Russian and quite frankly, without hiding her true thoughts. The guests who come to the Rostovs do not have the goal of personal enrichment and profit, the Rostovs do not have a hierarchy in greetings, as in the Sherer salon, all guests are treated equally and quite warmly.
Thus, Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy contrasts these two episodes with each other, in them he shows different types of nobles of his time, shows the reader the contrast between sincere and "real" Moscow with its warm receptions and cold, "artificial" Petersburg, with its inhabitants of the capital's salons. seeking to benefit from any acquaintance. One of the most striking manifestations of this "artificiality" is Tolstoy's numerous comparisons of Helen Kuragina, one of the most important ladies of the Scherer salon, with a marble statue, and the warmth and sincerity of the Rostov holiday is reinforced by the presence of children on it, which we do not see in Anna Pavlovna's salon. These two episodes show the reader the whole essence of the two most important and completely different families found in the novel - the Kuragins and the Rostovs, to whom Pierre Bezukhov will gravitate in different parts of the work.
Topic: "Meeting in the salon of Anna Pavlovna Sherer" (based on the epic novel by L.N. Tolstoy "War and Peace")
Target: to acquaint students with the principles of the image of L.N. Tolstoy of high society.
- educational: 1) to acquaint students with the methods of depicting L.N. Tolstoy of high society; 2) determine the role of the episode "In the salon of A.P. Scherer" in the composition of the novel.
- developing: 1) to develop the ability to compare, compare similar episodes of various literary works; 2) develop the creative abilities of students; 3) contribute to the formation of the information culture of schoolchildren.
- educational: 1) to bring up a negative attitude of children to hypocrisy, dishonesty; 2) to continue the formation of group work skills, to cultivate respect for the opinions of other people.
Equipment: to the first chapters of the novel illustrations, a table covered with a tablecloth. Video of the beginning of the novel in French. Entry currently hidden from students: The method of "tearing off all and all kinds of masks." Presentation.
Lesson type: The lesson is a dialogue with research elements.
DURING THE CLASSES:
Anna Pavlovna's evening was started.
The spindles from different sides evenly and not
silent noise.
L. Tolstoy
Properly tightened masks ...
M. Lermontov
During the classes
Organizing time.
Motivation for learning activities
Audio recording. Music sounds (polonaise)
Guys, while listening to the audio recording, what did you imagine?
Answers: This music was often played at the balls of the 19th century. The ball began with a polonaise.
Teacher's word.
The purpose and objectives of the lesson are announced, the topic, epigraph and plan are written down.
State the aims and objectives of the lesson:
Who is Anna Scherer? Why did secular society gather at her place?
Who was going to the salon? For what purpose?
How did they behave?
Bottom line: Why does L.N. Tolstoy begin the novel from the evening in the salon of A. Sherer?
III. Work on the topic of the lesson.
"The salon has already begun!" (A candlestick is placed on a table covered with a tablecloth, candles are lit).
"It's snowy, it's snowy all over the earth
To all limits.
The candle burned on the table
The candle was burning.
Like a swarm of midges in summer
Flying into the flame
Flakes flew from the yard
To the window frame
(B.Pasternak)
teacher's word
Let's see who flocked to the candlelight in the salon of Anna Pavlovna Sherer.
Film fragment
1. Method "Snowball"
Questions: Who is Anna Scherer? How did Leo Tolstoy present it to us in the novel? (lines from the work)
Answer: maid of honor and close associate of the Empress Maria Feodorovna.
2. Work in pairs
Filling in the table
Status
Visit purpose
Behavior
Anya and Asan - Prince Vasily and Helen
Xenia and Guliza - Princess Drubetskaya
Mustafa and Guzel: Andrey Bolkonsky and Liza Bolkonskaya
Vlad and Vanya: Pierre Bezukhov
The important and bureaucratic prince Vasily has influence at court, as his “stars” speak of. He came to find out whether the issue of appointing Baron Funke as first secretary to Vienna had been resolved, as he was busy with this position for his son Hippolyte. In the salon of Anna Pavlovna, he has another goal - to marry another son of Anatole to a rich bride, Princess Marya Bolkonskaya.
Ellen is a beauty. Her beauty is dazzling (brilliant necklace). The daughter of Prince Vasily did not utter a word in the salon, she only smiled and repeated the expression on Anna Pavlovna's face. She was learning to respond appropriately to the viscount's story. Helen called for her father to go to the ball to the English envoy.
He speaks out of place, but is so self-confident that no one can understand whether he is smart or stupid.
Princess Bolkonskaya feels at home in the salon, so she brought a reticule with work. She came to see her friends. He speaks in a capriciously playful tone.
Prince Andrei has “two faces” (sometimes a grimace, then an unexpectedly kind and pleasant smile), “two voices” (he says sometimes unpleasantly, sometimes affectionately and gently), so his image is associated with a mask. He came for his wife. There is no goal: a bored look, like Onegin's. Prince Andrei is tired of everything here. He decided to go to war and would later say to Pierre: “I am going because this life that I lead here, this life is not for me!”
Princess Drubetskaya, noble, but impoverished. She came to secure a place for her son Boris. She has a teary face. When she addresses Prince Vasily, she tries to smile, “while there were tears in her eyes,” therefore, a scarf.
Pierre is a newcomer to Anna Pavlovna's salon, and indeed to the salon in general. He spent many years abroad, so everything is interesting to him. He looks at the world naively enthusiastically, therefore - glasses. The young man came here hoping to hear something clever. He speaks animatedly and naturally.
Conclusion:
Conversation.
We hear the characters, and they speak French.
Doesn't it bother you that there is a war with Napoleon, and in St. Petersburg the highest nobility speaks French?
This is where France and Napoleon are separated.
Why does L. Tolstoy introduce French speech?
So it was accepted. Knowledge of the French language was mandatory for a nobleman.
So, before us are educated people. It can be assumed that in French we will hear philosophical thoughts about life, witty remarks, interesting conversations ...
Well, education, knowledge of foreign languages is not always a sign of intelligence, decency, internal culture. Perhaps L. Tolstoy introduces French speech in order to show that an inner emptiness is hidden behind the external gloss of some heroes.
Hero portraits.
Have you ever been to a salon? L.N. Tolstoy invites us. Let's try to get to know the characters.
Quiz-quiz “Whose face is this?”
“She got up with the same unchanging smile ... with which she entered the living room.”
"The face was hazy with idiocy and invariably expressed self-confident obscenity."
(Hippolytus)
“With a grimace that spoiled his handsome face, he turned away…”
(Prince Andrew)
“... a bright expression of a flat face.”
(Prince Vasily)
“The restrained smile that constantly played on his face…”
(Anna Pavlovna)
Do we have faces or masks? Prove it.
Before us are masks, since their expression does not change during the evening. L. Tolstoy conveys this with the help of the epithets “unchanging”, “invariably”, “constantly”.
V. Reflection
Pierre expects something outstanding from the salon, Prince Andrei has long disliked all this. And how does L. Tolstoy relate to the salon of Anna Pavlovna? Why was there a chair for the aunt?
Auntie just… the place. She is not interested in anyone. Each guest repeats the same words in front of her.
Why was Pierre given a careless bow?
The salon has its own hierarchy. Pierre is illegitimate.
Why is Princess Drubetskaya sitting next to an unwanted aunt?
She is a beggar. She has been given mercy. People in a secular society are valued by wealth and nobility, and not by personal merits and demerits.
Why is the rare word “flu” used and rare guests present?
The salon claims originality, but all this is just an external gloss, like French speech, and behind it is emptiness.
Discussion and recording of the “method of tearing off all and sundry masks”.
We hardly see sincere, living people, so today we have things on a beautiful table with a beautiful candlestick. The writer speaks about the lack of spirituality in most of the guests and in the hostess herself.
And why is Pierre's pince-nez not next to these things?
He is a stranger in the cabin.
The significance of the action in the cabin for the further development of the plot.
Here Pierre saw Helene, who would later become his wife.
They decide to marry Anatoly Kuragin to Marya Bolkonskaya.
Prince Andrew is preparing to go to war.
Something will resolve the not very warm relationship between Prince Andrei and his wife.
Prince Vasily decides to attach Boris Drubetskoy.
VI. Lesson summary
Well done boys! You did a great job today in class. Let's once again, according to the plan, remember what we learned in the lesson.
(1. Excessive use of French speech is a negative characteristic of high society. As a rule, Tolstoy uses French where there is falseness, unnaturalness, lack of patriotism.
2. To expose the falseness of high society, Tolstoy uses the method of "tearing off all and sundry masks."
3. A negative attitude towards the Scherer salon and its guests is expressed through the use of such techniques as comparison, antithesis, evaluative epithets and metaphors.)
Have we reached the goal set at the beginning of the lesson?
Write down your homework.
VI . Homework: Read v.1, part 1, ch. 6 - 17. Analyze the episode "Natasha Rostova's Name Day".
“Masks pulled together by propriety” - the words of M. Lermontov are recalled when we read the pages of L. Tolstoy's novel, which tells about the Scherer salon.
Bright candles, beautiful ladies, brilliant gentlemen - this is how they seem to talk about a secular evening, but the writer creates completely different images: a spinning machine, a set table. Almost every one of those present hides behind the mask that others want to see on him, pronounces phrases that "and does not want to be believed." An old play is being played before our eyes, and the leading actors are the hostess and the important Prince Vasily. But it is here that the reader gets acquainted with many of the heroes of the work.
“Spindles from different sides evenly and incessantly rustled,” writes L. Tolstoy about people. No, puppets! Helen is the most beautiful and obedient of them (the expression on her face reflects, like a mirror, the emotions of Anna Pavlovna). The girl does not utter a single phrase for the whole evening, but only straightens the necklace. The epithet “unchanging” (about a smile) and the artistic detail (cold diamonds) show that behind the stunning beauty - empty! Helen's radiance does not warm, but blinds.
Of all the women presented by the author in the salon of the maid of honor, the most attractive is the wife of Prince Andrei, who is expecting a child. She commands respect when she moves away from Hippolyte ... But a mask has grown to Lisa: she speaks with her husband at home in the same capriciously playful tone as with Scherer's guests.
Bolkonsky is a stranger among those invited. One gets the impression that when he squinted around the whole society, he saw not faces, but penetrated into hearts and thoughts - “closed his eyes and turned away.”
Prince Andrei smiled at only one person. And Anna Pavlovna greeted the same guest with a bow, "referring to people of the lowest hierarchy." The illegitimate son of Catherine's grandee appears to be a kind of Russian bear who needs to be "educated", that is, deprived of a sincere interest in life. The writer sympathizes with Pierre, comparing him with a child whose eyes were running wide, like in a toy store. The naturalness of Bezukhov scares Sherer, she makes us smile, and insecurity makes us want to intercede. This is what Prince Andrei does, saying: “How do you want him to answer everyone all of a sudden?” Bolkonsky knows that no one in the salon is interested in Pierre's opinion, people here are smug and unchanged ...
L. Tolstoy, like his favorite heroes, treats them negatively. Tearing off the masks, the author uses the method of comparison and contrast. Prince Vasily is compared with an actor, his manner of speaking is with a wound clock. The metaphor “she served her guests first the viscount, then the abbot” evokes an unpleasant feeling, which is intensified by the mention of a piece of beef. “Reducing images,” the writer speaks of the predominance of physiological needs over spiritual ones, when it should be the other way around.
“His smile was not the same as that of other people, merging with an unsmile” - and we understand that the characters in the salon are divided according to the principle of antithesis and that the author is on the side of those who behave naturally.
This episode plays an important role in the novel: the main storylines are tied here. Prince Vasily decided to marry Anatole to Marya Bolkonskaya and attach Boris Drubetskoy; Pierre saw his future wife Helene; Prince Andrew is about to go to war.
Anna Pavlovna Sherer is the first heroine that we meet on the pages of the novel "War and Peace." Anna Sherer is the mistress of the most fashionable high-society salon in St. Petersburg, the maid of honor and close associate of Empress Maria Feodorovna. Political news of the country is often discussed in her salon, and it is considered good form to visit this salon. Like all court ladies, Anna Scherer loves intrigues, prone to gossip, so many people like her company, because you can find out all the news from her and have a good rest. She is very sweet and tactful, the meaning of life lies only in the existence of a salon in which she is respected for her hospitality, although many of her guests did not know about her true face or did not want to think about it.
Anna Scherer is forty years old, she has a good education, she is fluent in French, but she does not have a brilliant mind, and in her conversations there is never sincerity and participation in the lives of friends. During the war, only patriots gathered at Anna Pavlovna's, but she presented all the news of the battles in such a way that the guests, having discussed the disasters of the country, would no longer think about the consequences.
The hypocrisy and cynicism of the heroine led to the impression that she was a lady interested in the life of society and worried about the future of the country, although if the French had won the war, her salon would continue to receive guests, if only the patriotic mood had changed.
In "War and Peace", it would seem that the scene in Scherer's salon, which opens the work, is by no means repeated. It's just that we kind of plunge into the thick of things, immediately find ourselves among the heroes of the book, captured by the flow of life. But the meaning of the scene is not only in this. In it, of course, although not as clearly as in the first episodes of Dostoevsky's novel, all the main problems of the work are outlined, the very first words that sound in the salon are discussions about Napoleon, about wars, about the Antichrist. In the future, this will find a continuation in Pierre's attempt to kill Napoleon, in his calculations of the numerical value of the name of this "Antichrist". The whole theme of the book is war and peace, the true greatness of man and false idols, divine and diabolical.
Let's go back to Dnna Pavlovna's salon. The main thing for us is to trace how the main lines of the characters in the book are tied in this first scene. Pierre, of course, will become a Decembrist, this is clear from his behavior from the very first pages. V. Kuragin is a sly man, somewhat reminiscent of Famusov, but without his warmth and eloquence, which, however, Griboedov portrayed not without sympathy ... The St. Petersburg public is still not a Moscow nobility. Vasily Kuragin is a prudent, cold rogue, although he is a prince, he will continue to look for clever moves "to the cross, to the town." Anatole, his son, whom he mentions in a conversation with Scherer, "a restless fool", will cause much grief to Rostov and Volkonsky. Other children of Kuragin - Ippolit and Helen - are immoral destroyers of other people's destinies. Helen is already in this first scene far from being as harmless as it might seem at first glance. There was not yet a shadow of coquetry in her, but she is fully aware of her beauty, “giving everyone the right to admire? Significant detail! Her smile is “unchanging” (the most terrible thing that can be in a person, according to Tolstoy, is his spiritual immobility), and Helen’s expression completely depends on the expression on Anna Pavlovna’s face - Tolstoy specifically emphasizes this. Three women in the salon, Scherer, Helen and Lisa, play the role of three parks, goddesses of fate. M. Gasparov interestingly compares Sherer's "spinning workshop" with the work of goddesses spinning the thread of human destiny. Another motif linking War and Peace with antiquity is the ancient beauty of Helene. The same antique beauty makes her look like a soulless statue.