How Gregory's character is revealed in Fomin's gang. Grigory Melekhov in search of the truth
Cossack Grigory Melekhov is one of the central characters of the historical epic novel by Mikhail Sholokhov “Quiet Don”. The storyline of this work is based on his life path, the formation and formation of Melekhov as a person, his love, successes and disappointments, as well as the search for truth and justice.
Difficult life trials befall this simple Don Cossack, because he finds himself in a whirlwind of bloody events of the early twentieth century: the First World War, revolution, civil war in Russia. The millstones of war into which the main character finds himself “grind” and cripple his soul, forever leaving their bloody mark.
Characteristics of the main character
(Pyotr Glebov as Grigory Melekhov, still from the film "Quiet Don", USSR 1958)
Grigory Panteleevich Melekhov is the most ordinary Don Cossack. We first meet him at the age of twenty in his native Tatar village of the Cossack village of Veshenskaya, located on the banks of the Don River. The guy is neither from a rich nor from a poor family, one might say he is average, but he lives in prosperity, he has a younger sister Dunya and an older brother Peter. A quarter Turkish through his grandmother, Melekhov has an attractive and slightly wild appearance: dark skin, a hooked nose, jet-black curly hair, expressive almond-shaped eyes.
At first, Grigory is shown to us as an ordinary guy living on a farm. He has certain household responsibilities and is immersed in his worries and daily activities. He doesn’t particularly worry about his life; he lives as the traditions and customs of the Cossack village dictate. Even the violent passion that flared up between the young Cossack and his married neighbor Aksinya does not change anything in his life. At the insistence of his father, he marries the unloved Natalya Korshunova, and, as is customary among young Cossacks, begins preparations for military service. It turns out that during this period of his quiet and measured life, he weakly and mechanically fulfills what is destined for him, and does not decide anything special in his life.
(Melekhov at war)
However, everything changes when Melekhov finds himself on the battlefields of the First World War. Here he shows himself as a brave and brave warrior, a defender of the Fatherland, for which he receives the well-deserved rank of officer. However, in his soul Melekhov is the most ordinary worker, accustomed to working on the land, taking care of his farm, but war comes and not a shovel, but a gun is placed in his hands, calloused from work, and he is ordered to destroy the enemy. For Gregory, the first killed Austrian came as a real shock, and his death was a tragedy that he experienced again and again. He begins to be tormented by questions about the meaning of the war, why people kill each other and who needs it, what is his personal role in this bloody chaos? So he begins to grow up and live a more conscious life. Little by little his soul hardens and is tempered by difficult trials, but still in its depths he retains both conscience and humanity.
Life throws him from one extreme to another; in the civil war he fights either on the side of the whites, or joins the Budennovsky detachment, or in bandit formations. He no longer just goes with the flow, but confidently and consciously seeks his path in life. Distinguished by his sharp mind and observation, the “honest to the core” Melekhov immediately sees the deception and empty promises of the Bolsheviks, the bestial cruelty of the bandits and cannot in any way understand the “truth” of the officer-nobles. Only one thing matters to him in this crazy chaos of a fratricidal war, this is his father's house and his usual, peaceful work in his native land.
(Evgeny Tkachuk plays Grigory Melekhov, still from the film "Quiet Don", Russia 2015)
As a result, he escapes from Fomin’s disgusted gang and dreams of returning home and living a quiet life with Aksinya, without killing anyone, but simply working on his land. It is precisely for her that he is ready to shed the last drop of blood, to kill anyone who encroaches on her. This is how the war once changed an ordinary hard worker, who keenly felt the beauty of the surrounding nature and sincerely felt sorry for the duckling he accidentally killed.
On the way home, a huge emotional shock awaits him: Aksinya dies from a bullet, his love collapses, his hope for a happy and free life dies. Crushed and unhappy, he finally reaches the threshold of his home, where he is met by his surviving son and the land, waiting for its owner.
The image of the hero in the work
(Gregory with his son)
The whole truth of that terrible and bloody time in the history of the Cossack Don was shown by the outstanding Soviet writer Mikhail Sholokhov in the image of a simple Cossack Grigory Melekhov. All his contradictions, complex spiritual tossings and experiences are described by the author with amazing psychological authenticity and historical validity.
It is impossible to say unequivocally that Melekhov is a negative or a positive hero. Sometimes his actions are terrible, and sometimes they are noble and generous. A simple Cossack and hard worker, accustomed to working from morning to night, he becomes a hostage to those bloody historical events that the entire Russian people experienced. The war broke and maimed him, took away his closest and dearest people, forced him to do terrible things, but he did not break and managed to retain in himself those particles of goodness and light that were once in him. In the end, he understands that the most important value for a person is his family, home and native land, and weapons, murder and death cause only disgust and horror in him.
The image of Melekhov, a simple “peasant farmer in uniform,” embodies the long-suffering fate of the entire simple Russian people, and his difficult life path is a path of struggle, quest, tragic mistakes and bitter experience, and finally knowledge of the truth and oneself.
Retelling plan
1. History of the Melekhov family.
2. Meeting of Grigory Melekhov and Aksinya Astakhova, Stepan’s wife.
3. The story about Aksinya.
4. The first date of Gregory and Aksinya.
5. Husband Stepan finds out about his wife’s infidelity. Gregory's father wants to marry his son to Natalya.
6. Grigory marries Natalya Korshunova.
7. Pedigree of the merchant Mokhov.
8. Gathering of the Cossacks.
9. Aksinya and Grigory resume their relationship and leave the farm.
10. Natalya lives with her parents. Wants to commit suicide.
11. Aksinya gives birth to a girl from Gregory.
12. Gregory enlisted in the army's 12th Cossack regiment.
13. Natalya survived. Hoping for her husband's return, she lives with his family.
14. Gregory’s service in the army. His injury.
15. The daughter of Gregory and Aksinya dies. Aksinya meets Listnitsky.
16. Gregory finds out about this and returns to his wife.
17. The attitude of the Cossacks to the February Revolution. Events at the front.
18. Bolshevik coup in Petrograd.
19. Grigory goes over to the side of the Bolsheviks.
20. The wounded Gregory was brought home.
21. The situation at the front.
22. Cossack meeting. Cossacks enlist in the regiment to fight the Reds. The commander is Pyotr Melekhov, Gregory's brother.
23. Civil war on the Don.
24. Gregory fights with the Red Guards. He returns home without permission. Pyotr Melekhov also runs away from the regiment.
25. Red troops in the village.
26. Soviet power on the Don.
27. Developments of events at the front.
28. Grigory returns home and quarrels with Natalya. The connection between Gregory and Aksinya is renewed.
29. Gregory agrees to lead the breakthrough to the Don.
30. Upper Don uprising. The battle of the Cossack army with the Red Guards.
31. Battle near Ust-Medveditskaya.
32. Grigory comes home three days after his wife’s death. He's going to the front in two weeks.
33. Red offensive.
34. Grigory, sick with typhus, goes home. He calls Aksinya with him on retreat, but she falls ill with typhus and remains behind.
35. Gregory returns home. There is Soviet power on the farm.
36. Grigory ends up in Fomin’s gang.
37. Gregory, having arrived at the farm, invites Aksinya to escape. She dies.
38. Returning home.
Retelling
Book I. Part I
Chapter 1
Pedigree of the Melekhov family: Cossack Prokofy Melekhov, after the end of the penultimate Turkish campaign, brought home, to the village of Veshenskaya, a captive Turkish woman. They had a son, named Panteley, who was as dark and black-eyed as his mother. He married a Cossack woman named Vasilisa Ilyinichna. Pantelei Prokofievich's eldest son, Petro, took after his mother: he was short, snub-nosed and fair-haired; and the youngest, Gregory, more closely resembled his father: the same dark, hook-nosed, wildly handsome, and the same furious temperament. In addition to them, the Melekhov family consisted of his father’s favorite Dunyasha and Petrova’s wife Daria.
Chapter 2
Early in the morning, Panteley Prokofievich and Grigory go fishing. The father demands that Grigory leave Aksinya Astakhova, the wife of Melekhovo’s neighbor Stepan, alone. Later, Grigory and his friend Mitka Korshunov go to sell the caught carp to the rich merchant Mokhov and meet his daughter Elizaveta. Mitka and Lisa come to an agreement about fishing.
Chapters 3, 4
The morning after the games in the Melekhovs' house. Petro and Stepan are leaving for camps for military training. Gregory and Aksinya meet on the Don. The beginning of a thunderstorm. Grigory and Aksinya are fishing, the first steps towards their rapprochement.
Chapters 5 and 6
Stepan Astakhov, Petro Melekhov, Fedot Bodovskov, Hristonya, Tomilin go to the camp gathering places and sing a song. Overnight in the steppe. Christoni's story about the excavation of a treasure.
Chapter 7
The fate of Aksinya. When she was sixteen years old, she was raped by her father, who was then killed by the girl's mother and brother. A year later, at the age of seventeen, she was married to Stepan Astakhov, who, not forgiving the “insult,” began beating Aksinya and going to jail. Aksinya, who did not know love, developed a reciprocal feeling (although she did not want it) when Grishka Melekhov began to show interest in her.
Chapters 8-10
Dividing the meadow by farmers. A race is being held between Mitka Korshunov and the centurion Listnitsky. Gregory and Aksinya meet on the road. Meadow mowing begins. The first date of Grigory and Aksinya. Soon Aksinya meets Grigory. They do not hide their connection, and rumors about them spread around the village. “If Gregory had gone to the poor woman Aksinya, pretending to be hiding from people, if the poor woman Aksinya had lived with Gregory, keeping it in relative secrecy, and at the same time not refusing others, then there would have been nothing unusual in this, lashing the eyes. The farm would talk and stop. But they lived, almost without hiding, they were knitted by something more, unlike a short connection, and therefore in the farm they decided that this was criminal, immoral, and the farm died in a vile wait: Stepan will come and untie the knot." Panteley Prokofievich talks about With Aksinya, he decides to quickly marry Grigory to Natalya, Mitka Korshunov’s sister.
Chapter 11
Life in a military camp. Stepan is told about Aksinya’s connection with Grigory.
Chapter 12
Aksinya, without hiding, meets with Grigory. The farmers condemn them. She invites Grigory to escape from the farm, but he refuses.
Chapter 13
Stepan has a quarrel with Pyotr Melekhov. They return home from military training and on the way there is another quarrel.
Chapter 14
Aksinya goes to Grandma Drozdikha to bewitch Grigory. Stepan, having returned, begins to brutally beat Aksinya, and, having fought with the Melekhov brothers, becomes their sworn enemy.
Chapter 15
Pantelei Prokofievich is wooing Natalya, but the final decision has not yet been made.
Chapter 16
Stepan is tormented by Aksinya’s betrayal and beats her. Aksinya and Grigory meet in sunflowers, and he invites her to end their relationship.
Chapters 17-19
Wheat mowing begins. Matchmaking gives positive results - Natalya Korshunova falls in love with Grigory. Pre-wedding preparations in the Korshunovs' house. Meetings between Gregory and Natalya.
Chapters 20-23
The sufferings of Aksinya and Gregory. The wedding of Grigory and Natalya, first in the Korshunovs’ house, then at the Melekhovs’.
Part II
Chapters 1, 2
Pedigree of the merchant Mokhov, his household. In August, Mitka Korshunov meets Elizaveta Mokhova, they agree on a fishing trip. And there Mitka rapes her. Rumors begin to creep around the farm, and Mitka goes to woo Elizabeth. But the girl refuses him, and Sergei Platonovich Mokhov unleashes the dogs on Korshunov.
Chapter 3
Natalya's life in the Melekhovs' house. Grigory remembers Aksinya. Stepan broke all relations with his neighbors.
Chapter 4
Shtokman arrives at the farm and Fedot Bodovskov meets him.
Chapter 5
Grigory and his wife are going to mow. There is a fight at the mill (Mitka Korshunov beats up the merchant Molokhov), which is stopped by Shtokman. Grigory admits to Natalya that he does not love her.
Chapter 6
During interrogation by an investigator, Shtokman says that in 1907 he was in “prison for riots” and served exile.
Chapter 7
Winter is coming. A gathering of Cossacks, at which Avdeich tells how he caught the robber.
Chapter 8
Life in the Melekhovs' house after the meeting. During a trip to buy firewood, the Melekhov brothers meet Aksinya. Aksinya’s connection with Gregory is renewed.
Chapter 9
In Shtokman's house there is a reading on the history of the Don Cossacks. Valet, Christonya, Ivan Alekseevich Kotlyarov and Mishka Koshevoy arrive.
Chapter 10
Grigory and Mitka Korshunov take the oath. Natalya wants to return to live with her parents. There is a quarrel between Grigory and Pantelei Prokofievich, after which Grigory leaves the house to go to the Koshevs. Gregory and Aksinya meet and decide to leave the farm.
Chapters 11-13
At the merchant Mokhov, Grigory meets the centurion Listnitsky and accepts an offer to work as a coachman on his Yagodnoye estate. Aksinya is hired as a cook for yard and seasonal workers. Aksinya and Grigory leave the farm. Natalya returns to live with her parents.
Chapter 14
Listnitsky's life story. Life of Gregory and Aksinya in a new place. From the very first days, Listnitsky begins to show interest in Aksinya.
Chapter 15
Natalya's life in her parents' house, Mitka's bullying. Conversation between Natalya and Pantelei Prokofievich.
Chapter 16
Valet and Ivan Alekseevich continue to go to Shtokman, who tells them about the struggle of capitalist states for markets and colonies as the main reason for the impending world war. Ice movement along the Don.
Chapter 17
Returning from Millerovo, Grigory hunts a wolf, and then meets Stepan.
Chapter 18
Gatherings with the Korshunovs' neighbor Pelageya. Natalya writes a letter trying to get Grigory back. Having received the answer, she suffers even more and tries to commit suicide.
Chapters 19-20
Conversation between Stepan and Gregory. Aksinya tells Grigory that she is expecting a child from him. Petro comes to visit his brother. Aksinya begs Grigory to take her with him to mow and on the way home she gives birth to a girl.
Chapter 21
Morning in Listnitsky's house. In December, Gregory is called to military training; unexpectedly Panteley Prokofievich comes to see him. Grigory leaves for work; On the way, his father tells him that Natalya survived. At the review, they want to enroll Gregory in the guard, but due to non-standard external characteristics (“Gangster mug... Very wild”), he is enrolled in the army’s Twelfth Cossack Regiment. On the very first day, Grigory begins to have friction with his superiors.
Part III
Chapter 1
Natalya returns to live with the Melekhovs. She still hopes for Gregory's return to the family. Dunyashka starts going to the games and tells Natalya about her relationship with Mishka Koshev. An investigator arrives in the village and arrests Shtokman; During a search, illegal literature is found on him. During interrogation, it turns out that Shtokman is a member of the RSDLP. He is taken away from Veshenskaya.
Chapter 2
Gregory's life in the army. Watching the officers, he feels an invisible wall between himself and them; this feeling is intensified by the incident with Prokhor Zykov, who was beaten by a sergeant during training. Before the beginning of spring, the entire platoon of Cossacks, brutalized by boredom, rape Franya, the manager’s young maid; Gregory, who tried to help her, is tied up and thrown in the stable, promising to kill him if he lets slip.
Chapter 3-5
The Melekhovs and Natalya are mowing. The war begins, the Cossacks are taken to the Russian-Austrian border. The old railway worker’s remark to the new recruits is expressive: “My dear... beef!” In his first fight, Gregory kills a man, and his image disturbs Gregory.
Chapters 6-8
Petro Melekhov, Anikushka, Hristonya, Stepan Astakhov and Tomilin Ivan are going to war. Battles with the Germans.
Chapters 9, 10
For his feat, Kryuchkov is awarded George. Gregory's regiment, withdrawn from the battles, receives reinforcements from the Don. Grigory meets his brother, Mishka Koshevoy, Anikushka and Stepan Astakhov. In a conversation with Petro, he admits that he is homesick. Petro advises to beware of Stepan, who promised to kill Gregory in the first battle.
Chapter 11
Near the murdered Cossack, Grigory finds a diary, which describes the latter’s affair with the degenerate Elizaveta Mokhova.
Chapters 12, 13
A Cossack nicknamed Chubaty ends up in Grigory’s platoon; mocking Gregory’s experiences, he says that killing an enemy in battle is a holy thing. War with Hungary. Grigory is seriously wounded in the head.
Chapters 14, 15
Evgeny Listnitsky decides to transfer to the active army. He writes to his father: “I want a living action and... if you want, a feat.” Meeting between Listnitsky and the regiment commander. Podesaul Kalmykov advises him to make an acquaintance with volunteer Ilya Bunchuk. Meeting of Listnitsky and Bunchuk.
Chapters 16, 17
The Melekhovs receive news of the death of Grigory, and twelve days later from Peter’s letter it turns out that Grigory is alive, moreover, he was awarded the St. George Cross for saving a wounded officer and was promoted to junior officer.
Chapters 18, 19
Natalya decides to go to Yagodnoye and begs Aksinya to return her husband. Life of Aksinya. Natalya comes to her, but she drives her away, saying that she will not give Grishka back. “At least you have children, but I have him,” Aksinya’s voice trembled and became muffled and lower, “the only one in the whole wide world!” First and last..."
Chapter 20, 21
On the eve of the next offensive, a shell hits the house where Prokhor Zykov, Chubaty and Grigory are staying. Grigory, wounded in the eye, is sent to a hospital in Moscow.
Chapter 22
On the Southwestern Front, during an attack near Listnitsky, a horse was killed, and he himself received two wounds. Tanya, the daughter of Gregory and Aksinya, falls ill with scarlet fever and dies. Soon Listnitsky arrives on vacation, and Aksinya becomes attracted to him.
Chapter 23
Grigory in the hospital meets another wounded man named Garanzha. In conversations with the Cossack, he speaks disparagingly about the autocratic system and reveals the real reasons for the war. Grigory agrees with him in his heart.
Chapter 24
Gregory is sent home. He learns about Aksinya's betrayal with Listnitsky. The next morning, Grigory beats the centurion with a whip and, abandoning Aksinya, returns to his family, to Natalya.
Book II. Part IV
Chapters 1, 2
Dispute between Bunchuk and Listnitsky. Listnitsky reports that he is conducting Bolshevik propaganda. Bunchuk deserts. Propaganda leaflets appear. They conduct a search of the Cossacks. In the evening the Cossacks sing a song. Bunchuk makes new documents.
Chapter 3
Hostilities. Meeting of Ivan Alekseevich and Valeta; It turns out that Shtokman is in Siberia.
Chapter 4
Grigory remembers Aksinya. In one of the battles, he saves the life of Stepan Astakhov, which, however, did not reconcile them. Gradually, Grigory begins to develop friendly relations with Chubaty, who is inclined to deny the war. Together with him and Mishka Koshev, Grigory takes part in the “arrest” of wormy cabbage soup and takes them to his hundredth commander. During the next offensive, Grigory is wounded in the arm. “Just as a salt marsh does not absorb water, so Gregory’s heart did not absorb pity. With cold contempt he played with someone else’s life and with his own life, which is why he was known as brave - he won four St. George’s crosses and four medals.”
Chapter 5
Life in the Melekhovs' house. In the fall, Natalya gives birth to twins. Peter hears rumors about the infidelity of Daria, who cohabited with Stepan Astakhov. One day Stepan goes missing. Panteley Prokofievich tries to rein in his daughter-in-law, but this does not lead to anything good.
Chapter 6
The February Revolution causes restrained anxiety among the Cossacks. Mokhov demands an old debt from Pantelei Prokofievich. Mitka returns.
Chapter 7
The life of Sergei Platonovich Mokhov. Listnitsky returns from the front. He tells the merchant Mokhov that as a result of Bolshevik propaganda, the soldiers turned into gangs of criminals, unbridled and wild, and the Bolsheviks themselves are “worse than cholera bacilli.”
Chapters 8-10
The situation at the front. The commander of the brigade where Petro Melekhov serves calls on the Cossacks to stay away from the turmoil that has begun. Daria comes to Peter. Listnitsky is assigned to the pro-monarchist 14th Regiment. Soon, in connection with the July events, he was sent to Petrograd.
Chapters 11-14
General Kornilov is appointed supreme commander. Listnitsky's conversation with the officers. Cossack Ivan Lagutin. Meeting of Listnitsky and Kalmykov. The situation at the front. Kornilov arrives in Moscow.
Chapters 15-17
Ivan Alekseevich makes a coup in his regiment and is appointed centurion; he refuses to go to Petrograd. The situation at headquarters after the breakdown of the armed coup. Bunchuk comes to the front to campaign for the Bolsheviks and runs into Kalmykov. The deserter arrests Kalmykov in order to then shoot him.
Chapters 18-21
Army of General Krymov. His suicide. In Petrograd, Listnitsky witnesses the Bolshevik revolution. Liberation of the generals in Bykhov. Retreat of the 12th Regiment. Having received news of the change of power, the Cossacks return home.
Part V
Chapter 1
Ivan Alekseevich, Mitka Korshunov, Prokhor Zykov return from the front, followed by Petro Melekhov.
Chapter 2
The fate of Gregory. A turning point in his worldview. It becomes known that he went over to the side of the Bolsheviks, already with the rank of platoon officer. After the coup, he is appointed to the post of commander of hundreds. Gregory falls under the influence of his colleague Efim Izvarin, who advocates complete autonomy for the Don Army Region. In November of the seventeenth, Grigory met Podtelkov.
Chapters 3-7
Events in Novocherkassk. Bunchuk leaves for Rostov, where he meets Anna Pogudko. Attack on Rostov. Fights in the city.
Chapter 8
Life in Tatarskoye. Ivan Alekseevich and Christonya go to a congress of front-line soldiers and meet Grigory there.
Chapters 9, 10
Transfer of power to the Military Revolutionary Committee. Representatives of the Military Revolutionary Committee arrive in Novocherkassk. Speeches by delegates. Podtelkov is elected chairman, and Krivoshlykov - secretary of the Cossack Military Revolutionary Committee, which declared itself the government on the Don.
Chapters 11, 12
Chernetsov's detachment defeats the forces of the Red Guards. Escape of Izvarin from the regiment. Gregory, at the head of two hundred, goes into battle and is wounded in the leg. Chernetsov, along with four dozen young officers, was captured. All are brutally killed by order of Podtelkov, despite the opposition of Grigory and Golubov.
Chapters 13 and 14
Panteley Prokofievich brings the wounded Grigory home. His father and brother disapprove of his Bolshevik views; Grigory himself, after the massacre of Chernetsov, is experiencing a mental crisis.
Chapter 15
Declaration of the Don Revolutionary Committee. News arrives about Kaledin's suicide.
Chapters 16 and 17
Bunchuk is suffering from typhus. Anna takes care of him. After his recovery, they first travel together to Voronezh and then to Millerovo. From there Anna leaves for Lugansk.
Chapters 18-20
The situation at the front. Arrival of General Popov, meeting of generals. Golubov's detachment captures Novocherkassk. Golubov and Bunchuk arrest the leaders of the Military Circle. Bunchuk meets Anna. Bunchuk's work in the Revolutionary Tribunal under the Don Revolutionary Committee. In a few months he will refuse to work there.
Chapters 21, 22
Cossacks march from neighboring farms, defeat the detachment. Overthrow of the Soviets. Life in Tatarskoye. Valet calls on the Cossacks to go to the rescue of the Red Guard units, but only persuades Koshevoy; Grigory, Khristonya and Ivan Alekseevich refuse.
Chapter 23
A Cossack meeting is being held on the Maidan. The visiting centurion agitates the Cossacks to assemble a detachment to fight the Reds and protect Veshki. Miron Grigorievich Korshunov, the father of Natalya and Mitka, is elected ataman. Pyotr Melekhov is appointed to the position of commander. Prokhor Zykov, Mitka, Khristonya and other Cossacks enlist in the regiment, but they are convinced that there will be no war.
Chapters 24, 25
The Cossacks return to Tatarsky, but soon the order to march comes again. Anna receives a mortal wound in battle and dies in the arms of Bunchuk.
Chapters 26, 27
The situation at the front. Podtelkov's expedition. On the way, Podtelkov hears about rumors about him in Ukrainian settlements.
Chapters 28, 29
Podtelkov's detachment is captured. Podtelkov stipulates the terms of surrender, to which Bunchuk objects. The prisoners are sentenced to death, Podtelkov and Krivoshlykov are sentenced to hanging. Moods on the night before the execution.
Chapters 30, 31
A detachment under the command of Pyotr Melekhov arrives at the farm. Mitka, who volunteered to join the firing squad, kills Bunchuk. Before the execution, Podtelkov accuses Grigory of treason; in response, Grigory recalls the massacre of Chernetsov’s detachment: “Do you remember the battle near Glubokaya? Do you remember how the officers were shot... They shot on your orders! Now it's getting back at you! You’re not the only one to tan other people’s skins!” Mishka Koshevoy and Valet are caught by the Cossacks; Jack is killed, and Mishka, in the hope of reform, is sentenced to punishment with whips.
Book III. Part VI
Chapter 1
April 1918. There is a civil war on the Don. Pantelei Prokofievich and Miron Korshunov are elected delegates to the military circle; General Krasnov becomes military chieftain.
Chapters 2, 3
The situation on the Don. Petro Melekhov leads the Tatar Cossacks against the Reds. In a conversation with Grigory, he tries to find out his brother’s mood, to find out if he is going to return to the Reds. Koshevoy’s mother begs that instead of being sent to the front, Mishka be appointed a flock worker. Mishka Koshevoy is haunted by conflicting thoughts; a conversation takes place with Soldatov.
Chapter 4
Krasnov arrives in the village of Manychskaya, where a meeting of the Don government is taking place.
Chapter 5
Listnitsky's shattered arm is amputated. Soon he marries the widow of a deceased friend and returns to Yagodnoye. Aksinya tries to please the new owner, but Listnitsky asks her to leave the farm.
Chapters 6 and 7
Stepan Astakhov comes from German captivity, meeting Koshevoy in the steppe. He goes to Aksinya and persuades her to return home.
Chapters 8, 9
Fights of Gregory's hundred with the Red Guards. For his humane attitude towards prisoners, Gregory is removed from command of the hundred, he again takes over the platoon. Panteley Prokofievich comes to Grigory’s regiment and engages in looting there.
Chapters 10-12
Hostilities. During the retreat, Gregory voluntarily leaves the front and returns home. A military mission arrives in Novocherkassk. Cossacks and officers are separated by an invisible wall of hostility. Petro Melekhov flees the regiment.
Chapters 13-15
The Melekhovs decide to wait out the Reds' offensive without leaving the village. The whole village is waiting for the arrival of the Reds. Their relative Makar Nogaitsev comes to the Melekhovs.
Chapters 16 and 17
Red troops enter the village. Several Red Army soldiers come to billet with the Melekhovs, one of whom begins to seek a quarrel with Grigory. Panteley Prokofievich mutilates the horses of Peter and Grigory so that they would not be taken away. Life in the rear.
Chapters 18, 19
A gathering gathers on the farm, and Avdeich is elected as atamans. The Cossacks surrender their weapons. Rumors are spreading across the Don about emergency commissions and tribunals administering quick and unjust justice to the Cossacks who served with the whites, and Petro seeks intercession from the head of the district revolutionary committee, Yakov Fomin.
Chapters 20, 21
Ivan Alekseevich quarrels with Grigory, who does not want to recognize the merits of Soviet power; Koshevoy offers to arrest Grigory, but he manages to leave for another village.
Chapters 22, 23
According to the list compiled by Koshev, Miron Korshunov, Avdeich Brekh and several other old men are arrested. Shtokman appears in Veshenskaya. News arrives about the execution of the Cossacks. Yielding to Lukinichna’s persuasion, Petro digs up Miron Grigorievich’s corpse from the common grave at night and brings the corpse of Miron Grigorievich to Korshunov.
Chapter 24
A gathering takes place in Tatarskoye. Shtokman comes and announces that those executed were enemies of Soviet power. Panteley and Grigory Melekhov and Fedot Bodovskov are also on the execution list.
Chapters 25, 26
Ivan Alekseevich and Koshevoy, having learned about Grigory’s return, discuss his future fate; Grigory, meanwhile, runs away again and hides with relatives. Pantelei Prokofievich, who suffered from typhus, fails to avoid arrest.
Chapters 27-29
Riots begin in Kazanskaya. Antip Sinilin, son of Avdeich Brekh, participates in the beating of Koshevoy; he, having rested with Stepan Astakhov, disappears from the farm. Having learned about the beginning of the uprising, Gregory returns home. Koshevoy gets to the Ust-Khoperskaya village.
Chapters 30, 31
Two hundred Cossacks are formed in Tatarskoe, and one of them, led by Gregory, captures Likhachev, who is brutally killed.
Chapters 32-34
The battle of the Cossacks with the Reds near Elantsy. Petro, Fedot Bodovskov and other Cossacks, defeated by the Reds, deceived by the promise to save their lives, surrender, and Koshevoy, with the tacit support of Ivan Alekseevich, kills Petro; Of all the Cossacks who were with him, only Stepan Astakhov and Antip Brekhovich managed to escape. Carts with killed Cossacks arrive in Tatarsky. Daria's grief and funeral.
Chapters 35-37
Gregory is appointed commander of the Veshensky regiment, and after this - commander of one of the rebel divisions. Avenging his brother's death, he stops taking prisoners. In the battles near Sviridov and for Karginskaya, his Cossacks crushed squadrons of the red cavalry. In an effort to get rid of black thoughts, Grigory begins to drink and go to the pits.
Chapters 38-40
The situation at the front. Conversation between Grigory and Kudinov. The situation in Ust-Khoperskaya. Conversations between Shtokman and the Red Guards.
Chapters 41, 42
Stanitsa Karginskaya. Gregory's plan to defeat the Reds. Gregory's drunkenness. Talk of a coup. Gregory's memories of Aksinya.
Chapters 43, 44
Life of the Cossacks. In the battle near Klimovka, Grigory cuts down three Red Guards, after which he experiences a severe nervous attack.
Chapter 45, 46
The next day, Grigory goes to Veshenskaya, on the way he frees from prison the relatives of the Cossacks who left with the Reds, who were arrested by Kudinov. Life in Tatarskoye. Gregory returns home. Natalya learns about her husband’s numerous infidelities, and a quarrel occurs between them.
Chapter 47, 48
The battle of the Moscow regiment with the rebels. Meanwhile, the Serdobsky regiment, where Koshevoy, Shtokman and Kotlyarov serve, in its entirety goes over to the side of the rebels; Even before the riots begin, Shtokman manages to send Mishka with a report to headquarters.
Chapter 49
A rally takes place on the square, during which Shtokman is killed, and Ivan Alekseevich, along with other communists of the regiment, is put under arrest.
Chapters 50, 51
Gregory and Aksinya meet by chance. Panteley Prokofievich witnesses this meeting. In Aksinya, a long-term feeling for Gregory awakens; that same evening, taking advantage of Stepan’s absence, she asks Daria to call Gregory for her. Their connection is renewed. The next morning he had a conversation with Natalya. Grigory goes to Karginskaya, where he learns about the transfer of the Serdobsky regiment to the rebels. He immediately rushes to Veshki to save Kotlyarov and Mishka and find out who killed Petro.
Chapters 52-55
Bogatyrev arrives in Ust-Khoperskaya. A meeting and disarmament of Serdob residents is taking place. The prisoners, beaten beyond recognition, are driven to the Tatarsky farm, where they are met by the revenge-seeking relatives of the Cossacks who died along with Pyotr Melekhov. The situation at the front.
Chapter 56
Daria blames Ivan Alekseevich for the death of her husband and shoots him, Antip Brekhovich helps finish off Kotlyarov. An hour after the beating of the prisoners, Grigory appears on the farm, driving his horse to death.
Chapters 57, 58
The situation at the front. Conversation between Grigory and Kudyakov. Having agreed to lead the breakthrough to the Don, Grigory decides to take Aksinya with him and leave Natalya and the children at home.
Chapters 59-61
Retreat of the rebel troops. Road along Big Thunder. Crossing the Don rebels. Preparations for battle. The landmarks begin to come under intense artillery fire. The Reds are preparing to cross the Don in the area where the Gromkovskaya hundred are located, where Grigory immediately goes.
Chapters 62-63
Aksinya settles in Veshki and finds Gregory. The life of Gregory and Aksinya. He meets with his father and finds out that Natalya is suffering from typhus.
Chapters 64, 65
Conversation between Kudinov and Grigory. Koshevoy arrives in Tatarskoye. He kills grandfather Grishaka, avenging Ivan Alekseevich and Shtokman. He comes to the Melekhovs, wants to meet Dunyasha, but does not find her at home.
Book IV. Part VII
Chapter 1
Upper Don uprising. Then relative calm. Stepan meets with his wife, she thinks about Gregory. A few days later he returns to Veshki.
Chapters 2, 3
To the complete surprise of the Cossacks of the Gromkovo hundred, occupied exclusively with moonshine and women, a Red Guard regiment crosses the Don. The Gromkovites run in panic to Veshenskaya, where Grigory manages to pull up the cavalry hundreds of the Kargin regiment. He soon learns that the Tatars have abandoned their trenches. Trying to stop the farmers, Gregory whips Christonya, who is walking at an unbridled camel gallop; goes to Pantelei, who runs tirelessly and briskly. Having quickly gathered and brought the farmers to their senses, Gregory orders them to join the Semyonov hundred. The Reds are on the offensive; The Cossacks force them to return to their original positions with machine-gun fire.
Chapter 4
Natalya's recovery after typhus. To Ilyinichna’s horror, the talkative Mitashka informs the Red Army soldier who came into the house that his father commands all the Cossacks. On the same day, the Reds are knocked out of Veshki and Panteley Prokofievich returns home.
Chapters 5, 6
Breakthrough of the front. Cossack patrol. Grigory comes to Yagodnoye and buries grandfather Sashka.
Chapter 7
General Sekretev arrives in Veshenskaya. A banquet is held in his honor. Having left there, Grigory comes to visit Aksinya and finds Stepan alone. Returning home, Aksinya willingly drinks to her lover’s health.
Chapter 8
Gregory looks for Prokhor and finds him at the same table with Stepan. At dawn, Grigory arrives home. He talks to Dunyasha and orders her to leave even thoughts about Koshevoy. Grigory experiences a surge of tenderness for Natalya. The next day, tormented by vague forebodings, he leaves the farm.
Chapters 9, 10
Battle near Ust-Medveditskaya. At night, Gregory has a terrible dream. At dawn, Grigory, together with his chief of staff, is summoned to a meeting with General Fitzkhalaurov. During the reception, a clash occurs between Gregory and the general. When he returns to his place, there is a confrontation with officers on the road.
Chapter 11
Battle for Ust-Medveditsa. After this skirmish, a strange indifference takes possession of Gregory; For the first time in his life, he decides to withdraw from direct participation in the battle.
Chapter 12
Mitka Korshunov arrives at the Tatarsky farm. Now he is in a punitive detachment, in a short time he has risen to the rank of sub-coordinator. First of all, having visited his native ashes, he goes to stay with the Melekhovs, who cordially welcome the guest. Having made inquiries about the Koshevoys and found out that Mishka’s mother and children remained at home, Mitka and his comrades kill them. Having learned about this, Panteley Prokofievich drives him out of the yard, and Mitka, having returned to his punitive detachment, sets off to restore order in the Ukrainian settlements of the Donetsk district.
Daria goes to the front to deliver ammunition and returns in a depressed state. The commander of the Don Army, General Sidorin, arrives at the farm. Pantelei Prokofievich brings bread and salt to the general and representatives of the allies, and Daria, along with other Cossack widows, is awarded the St. George medal and given five hundred rubles.
Chapters 13, 14
Changes in the life of the Melekhovs. Daria clashes with her father-in-law over a reward; she categorically refuses to give up the money she received “for Peter,” although she gives Ilyinichna forty rubles for the wake of the deceased. Daria admits to Natalya that during her trip she contracted syphilis and, since this disease is incurable, she is going to commit suicide. Daria, not wanting to suffer alone, tells Natalya that Grigory got back together with Aksinya.
Chapter 15
Red retreat. Soon after this, Gregory is removed from the post of division commander and, despite his requests to be sent to the rear for health reasons, he is appointed centurion of the 19th regiment.
Chapter 16
After a conversation with Daria, Natalya lives like in a dream. She tries to find out something from Prokhor’s wife, but she doesn’t say anything, and then Natalya goes to Aksinya. Having gone with Ilyinichna to weed the melons, Natalya tells her mother-in-law about everything. Exhausted and sobbing, Natalya tells Ilyinichna that she loves her husband and does not wish him harm, but she will no longer give birth to him: she has been pregnant for three months and is going to go to Grandma Kapitonovna to free herself from the fetus. That same day, Natalya sneaks out of the house and returns only in the evening, bleeding. An urgently called paramedic cannot help. Natalya says goodbye to the children. Soon she dies.
Chapters 17, 18
Grigory arrives on the third day after Natalya’s funeral. In his own way, he loved his wife, and now his suffering is aggravated by guilt for this death. He only talks to Aksinya once. Grigory becomes close to the children, but after two weeks, unable to bear the melancholy, he returns to the front.
Chapters 19, 20
On the way, he and Prokhor now and again encounter Cossacks carrying carts with loot, and deserters: the Don Army is disintegrating at the moment of its greatest success. The situation of the Don region.
Chapters 21, 22
Soon after Gregory's departure, Daria drowned herself in the Don. Funeral. Ilyinichna forbids Mishatka to visit Aksinya, and a quarrel occurs between the women. In August, Pantelei Prokofievich was called to the front, he deserted, but was soon caught. The trial of the deserters took place, and immediately after it Melekhov ran home again. At home they decide to leave Veshki.
Chapters 23, 24
Red advances. Defeat of the Volunteer Army. The Melekhovs return to Tatarsky in two weeks. Gregory, who is sick with typhus, is brought from the front.
Chapters 25, 26
Having recovered, Grigory shows interest in the household and talks with the children. Panteley Prokofievich is leaving. Grigory meets with Aksinya and calls her to retreat with him. Evacuation begins in Veshenskaya. Gregory meets Prokhor. Grigory, together with Aksinya and Prokhor, leave the farm. On the way, Aksinya falls ill with typhus, and Grigory is forced to leave her.
Chapter 27
The end of the war. Grigory and Prokhor go to Kuban. Arriving in Belaya Glina at the end of January, he learns that Panteley Prokofievich died of typhus the day before. Having buried his father, Gregory himself falls ill with relapsing fever and remains alive only thanks to the devotion and dedication of Prokhor.
Chapters 28, 29
On the way they meet Ermakov and Ryabchikov. Having moved to Novorossiysk, they try to evacuate by ship to Turkey, but, seeing the futility of their attempts, they decide to stay home.
Part VIII
Chapter 1
Having recovered, Aksinya returns home; Concern for Grigory’s life brings her closer to the Melekhovs. It becomes known that Stepan has left for Crimea, and soon Prokhor, who has lost his arm, returns and reports that he and Grigory entered the Cavalry, where Grigory took command of the squadron.
Chapters 2, 3
The Cossacks return to the farm. Ilyinichna is looking forward to her son, but Mishka Kosheva comes to the Melekhovs instead. Ilyinichna sends him away, but he continues to come. Rumors about Koshevoy and Dunyasha begin to circulate around the village. In the end, Ilyinichna agrees to his marriage with Dunyasha and soon dies, without waiting for Gregory to return.
Chapter 4
Koshevoy stops farming, believing that Soviet power is still in danger, mainly because of elements such as Grigory and Prokhor Zykov. Mishka believes that Gregory’s service in the Red Army does not wash away his guilt for participating in the white movement, and upon returning home he will have to answer for the rebel uprising. Soon Mishka is appointed chairman of the Veshensky Revolutionary Committee.
Chapters 5, 6
Life in Tatarskoye. Conversations of old people. Gregory's return home with a Cossack woman. Meeting with Prokhor and Aksinya. A conversation with Koshev convinces him that his plans are unrealizable.
Chapter 7
Having visited Prokhor, Grigory learns about the uprising that has begun in the Voronezh region and understands that this could threaten him, a former officer and rebel, with trouble. In between, Prokhor talks about the death of Evgeny Listnitsky, who shot himself because of his wife’s infidelity. Yakov Fomin, whom he met in Veshki, advises Grigory to leave the house for a while, since arrests of officers have begun.
Chapters 8, 9
Relations between Gregory and Aksinya. Having taken the children, Grigory goes to live with Aksinya. Thanks to his sister, he manages to avoid arrest and escape from the farm.
Chapters 10-12
By force of circumstances, Grigory ends up in Fomin’s gang. Meeting Kaparin. Fomin is going to destroy the commissars and communists and establish his own, Cossack power, but these good intentions do not find support among the population, who are even more tired of the war than of the Soviet regime.
Chapter 13
Gregory decides to leave the gang at the first opportunity. Having met a farmer he knows, he asks to convey his regards to Prokhor and Dunyashka, and to tell Aksinya to wait for his soon return. Meanwhile, the gang suffers defeat after defeat, and the fighters are engaged in looting with might and main. Soon the red units complete the rout, and out of the entire Fominsk gang, only five people remain alive. Among them are Grigory and Fomin himself.
Chapters 14, 15
The fugitives settle on a small island opposite the Rubezhnoye farmstead. They decide to cross the Don. Conversation between Gregory and Kaparin. Fomin kills Kaparin. At the end of April they cross the Don to merge with Maslak’s gang.
Chapter 16
Gradually, about forty people from various small gangs join Fomin, and he invites Grigory to take the place of chief of staff. Grigory refuses and soon runs away from Fomin.
Chapter 17
Arriving at the farm at night, he goes to Aksinya and calls her to leave for Kuban, temporarily leaving the children in the care of Dunyasha. Having abandoned her home and household, Aksinya leaves with Grigory. Having rested in the steppe, they are about to move on when they come across an outpost on their way. The fugitives manage to escape pursuit, but one of the bullets fired after them mortally wounds Aksinya. Shortly before dawn, without regaining consciousness, she dies in Gregory’s arms. Grigory, “dead with horror, realized that it was all over, that the worst thing that could happen in his life had already happened.” Having buried Aksinya, Gregory raises his head and sees above him the black sky and the dazzlingly shining black disk of the sun.
Chapter 18
Having wandered aimlessly across the steppe, he decides to go to the Slashchevskaya oak grove, where deserters live in dugouts. From Chumakov, whom he met there, Grigory learns about the defeat of the gang and the death of Fomin. For six months he lives, trying not to think about anything and driving away poisonous melancholy from his heart, and at night he dreams of children, Aksinya and other deceased loved ones. At the beginning of spring, without waiting for the amnesty promised for the First of May, Grigory decides to return home. Approaching his home, he sees Mishatka. The son is all that still unites Gregory with the earth and with the entire huge world shining under the cold sun.
Spring has come to the Don.
On a foggy morning, Aksinya went out onto the porch for the first time after recovery and stood for a long time, intoxicated by the mash-like sweetness of the fresh spring air. Overcoming nausea and dizziness, she reached the well in the garden, left the bucket, and sat down on the well frame...
Aksinya spent several days waiting for Grigory to appear, but then she learned from neighbors who came to the owner that the war was not over, that many Cossacks from Novorossiysk left by sea for the Crimea, and those who remained went to the Red Army and mines.
By the end of the week, Aksinya firmly decided to go home, and then she soon found a traveling companion. One evening, a small, stooped old man entered the hut without knocking. He bowed silently and began to unbutton the dirty English overcoat that sat baggy on him, torn at the seams.
What is it, good man, you didn’t say “hello”, but are you settling down for a residence? - asked the owner, looking at the uninvited guest in amazement.
And he quickly took off his overcoat, shook it at the threshold, carefully hung it on a hook and, stroking his short-cropped gray beard, smiling, said:
Forgive me, for Christ’s sake, dear man, but in these days I’m trained like this: first undress, and then ask to rest, otherwise they won’t let you in. People have become rude these days and are not happy about guests...
Where are we going to put you? You see, we live closely,” the owner said more peacefully.
I need space as big as my nose. Here, at the threshold, I’ll curl up and fall asleep.
Who are you going to be, grandpa? Refugee? - the hostess was curious.
That's right, there is a refugee. I ran, I ran, I reached the sea, and now I’m slowly going from there, I’m tired of running... - answered the talkative old man, squatting down at the threshold.
Together with the old man, who turned out to be her fellow countryman, Aksinya went to her native farm.
About three weeks later Aksinya arrived home. She cried tears in the empty smoking area and began to settle down. Ilyinichna came to her to find out about Grigory, but Aksinya could do little to console the old woman. From that day on, the relationship between the Melekhovs and Aksinya changed: they were united, even related, by concern for their loved one.
The day after Aksinya’s arrival, Dunyasha told her that her mother had been acting strange lately: she was indifferent to the death of Pantelei Prokofievich, was very worried about Grigory, and began to devote less time to her grandchildren. Aksinya kissed Dunyashka and advised her to occupy her mother with something, to distract her from gloomy thoughts. Dunyashka asked Aksinya to help with the work, and she readily agreed.
After sowing, Aksinya set to work on the farm: she planted watermelons in the melon patch, coated and whitewashed the kuren, and, as best she could, covered the roof of the barn with the remaining straw. The days passed in work, but Aksinya did not leave Aksinya for an hour. Aksinya remembered Stepan with reluctance and for some reason it seemed to her that he would not return, but when one of the Cossacks came to the farm, she first asked: “Have you seen my Stepan?” - and only then, carefully and gradually, she tried to find out something about Gregory. Everyone in the village knew about their connection. Even the women who were eager for gossip stopped gossiping about them, but Aksinya was ashamed to express her feelings, and only occasionally, when the stingy servant did not mention Grigory, she, squinting her eyes and noticeably embarrassed, asked: “But our neighbor, Grigory Panteleevich, didn’t have you ever met? His mother is worried about him, she’s all dried up...”
But none of the farm Cossacks had heard anything about either Stepan or Gregory. Only at the end of June, Stepan’s colleague came to Aksinya and said that he had left for Crimea. And a week later, Prokhor Zykov returned to the farm, having lost his right arm. Prokhor said that he and Grigory entered Budyonny’s 14th division; Melekhov was given a hundred (squadron); Having gone over to the side of the Reds, Gregory changed; He’s not thinking about vacation, he’s going to serve until he’s atoned for his past sins.
By the summer, the surviving Cossacks who had gone on retreat returned to Tatarsky. Ilyinichna still missed Grigory and was waiting for him to come home. The time for mowing was approaching, and in the Melekhov household there was no one to even sharpen a rake.
But it was not Grigory who had to manage the Melekhov base... Before the meadow mowing, Mishka Koshevoy came to the farm from the front from the front. He spent the night with distant relatives and the next morning came to the Melekhovs. Ilyinichna was cooking when the guest, having politely knocked on the door and not receiving an answer, entered the kitchen, took off his old soldier’s cap, and smiled at Ilyinichna:
Hello, Aunt Ilyinichna! Didn't you wait?
Hello. And who are you for me to wait for you? Is our fence a cousin of the wattle fence? - Ilyinichna answered rudely, looking indignantly into Koshevoy’s hated face.
Not at all embarrassed by this reception, Mishka said:
So it’s a fence... After all, they were acquaintances.
That's all.
Yes, you don’t need more to come and visit. I didn't come to you to live.
“This would be lacking,” Ilyinichna said and, without looking at the guest, began to cook...
You are a murderer! Murderer! Get out of here, I can't stand to see you! - Ilyinichna insisted...
Ilyinichna remained silent, but, seeing that the guest had no intention of leaving, she said sternly:
Enough! I have no time to chat with you, you should go home.
“I have houses like a hare’s towers,” Mishka grinned and stood up.
Hell, he could have been put off by all these little things and conversations! He, Mishka, was not so sensitive as to pay attention to the offensive antics of the enraged old woman. He knew that Dunyashka loved him, but he didn’t give a damn about the rest, including the old woman...
After he left, Ilyinichna led the children into the yard and said, turning to Dunyashka:
So that he never steps foot here again. Understood?
Dunyashka looked at her mother without blinking. Something inherent in all Melekhovs appeared for a moment in the frantic squinting of her eyes when she, as if biting off every word, said:
No! He will walk! Don't order! Will! - And, unable to bear it, she covered her face with her apron and ran out into the hallway.
Ilyinichna, panting heavily, sat down by the window and sat for a long time, silently shaking her head, fixing her unseeing gaze somewhere far into the steppe, where the silver edge of young wormwood under the sun separated the earth from the sky.
Mishka began to help with the housework: he repaired the fence, caulked the cracked longboat on which they carried hay from beyond the Don, and decided to help with the mowing. Suddenly he was struck down by a fever. Ilyinichna gave Mishatka a blanket to cover the sick man who was shaking with chills, but then she saw that Dunyashka had already covered Mishka with her sheepskin coat. After the attack, Mishka continued to tinker around the house, and in the evening Ilyinichna invited him to the table.
Ilyinichna began to surreptitiously observe Koshev and only then saw how terribly thin he had become during his illness. Under the dusty tunic, the half-arches of the collarbones were sharply and convexly outlined, the sharp corners of the broad shoulders, sharp from thinness, hunched over with protrusions, and the Adam’s apple overgrown with reddish stubble looked strange on a childishly thin neck... The more Ilyinichna peered into the stooped figure of the “murderer”, into his waxen face , the more strongly I felt a feeling of some kind of internal discomfort, duality. And suddenly, unbidden pity for this man she hated - that aching maternal pity that conquers even strong women - awoke in Ilyinichna’s heart. Unable to cope with the new feeling, she pushed Mishka a plate filled to the top with milk and said:
Eat big, for God's sake! You are so thin that it makes you sick to look at... Also, groom!
There was talk around the village about Koshevoy and Dunyashka. But Ilyinichna did not agree to give up her daughter for the “murderer,” but Dunyashka threatened that she would leave with Koshev. Ilyinichna humbled herself and blessed her daughter.
No matter how hard Mishka tried, no matter how hard he tried to persuade the bride to refuse the wedding, the stubborn girl stood her ground. Mishka had to reluctantly agree. Mentally cursing everything in the world, he prepared for the wedding as if he were going to go to execution. At night, priest Vissarion slowly surrounded them in an empty church. After the ceremony, he congratulated the newlyweds and said edifyingly:
Here, young Soviet comrade, is how it happens in life: last year you burned my house with your own hands, so to speak, you set it on fire, and today I had to marry you... Don’t spit in the well, they say, because it might come in handy. But still, I am glad, sincerely glad that you have come to your senses and found your way to the Church of Christ.
Mishka could no longer bear this. He was silent in church the entire time, ashamed of his spinelessness and indignant at himself, but then he furiously glanced sideways at the vindictive priest, and in a whisper, so that Dunyashka would not hear, answered:
It’s a pity that you ran away from the farm then, otherwise I, you long-maned devil, would have burned you and the house down! Do you understand, okay?
The priest, stunned by surprise, blinking frequently, stared at Mishka, and he pulled his young wife by the sleeve and said sternly: “Let’s go!” - and, loudly stamping his army boots, he went to the exit.
At this sad wedding they didn’t drink moonshine and didn’t sing songs. Prokhor Zykov, who was a friend at the wedding, spat for a long time the next day and complained to Aksinya:
Well, girl, there was a wedding! Mikhail blurted out something in church that made the old man’s mouth turn to one side! And at dinner, did you see what happened? Fried chicken and sour milk... at least put out a drop of moonshine, damn it! Grigory Pantelevich would have seen how his sister was wooed!.. He would have grabbed his head! No, girl, it's a coven! I don’t go to these new weddings now. At a dog wedding it’s even more fun, there’s at least the dogs tearing fur one on one, there’s a lot of noise, but here there’s no drinking, no fighting, damn them! Believe me, I was so upset after this wedding that I didn’t sleep all night, lay there, choked, when, tell me, they let a handful of fleas under my shirt...
From the day when Koshevoy settled in the Melekhovo kuren, everything on the farm went differently: in a short time he straightened the fence, transported and stacked steppe hay on the threshing floor, skillfully completing the combed stack; in preparation for harvesting grain, he rebuilt the shelves and wings on the lobogreka, carefully cleared the current, repaired the old winnowing machine and repaired the horse harness, since he secretly dreamed of exchanging a couple of bulls for a horse, and more than once told Dunyashka: “We need to get a horse. The lamented ride on these clawed apostles." In the storeroom he somehow accidentally found a bucket of whitewash and ultramarine and immediately decided to paint the shutters, gray from dilapidation. The Melekhovsky kuren seemed to look younger, looking at the world through the bright blue eye sockets of the windows.
Mishka turned out to be a zealous owner. Despite his illness, he worked tirelessly. Dunyashka helped him in any matter.
In the short days of her married life, she had become noticeably prettier and seemed to have more strength in her shoulders and hips. Something new appeared in the expression of her eyes, in her gait, even in the manner of straightening her hair. The awkward angularity of her movements, the childish swing and liveliness that was previously characteristic of her have disappeared. Smiling and quiet, she looked at her husband with loving eyes and did not see anything around. Young happiness is always invisible...
After the wedding, Ilyinichna felt useless and lonely, she wanted only one thing: to wait for Grigory, hand over the children to him, and then die peacefully. In the summer we received a letter in which Grigory promised to come on leave by the fall. Two weeks later, Ilyinichna became completely ill; before her death, she asked Dunyashka to take care of the children until Grigory returned.
In the evening, when Dunyashka and her husband fell asleep, she gathered the last remnants of her strength, got up, and went out into the yard. Aksinya, who had been looking for the missing cow from the herd until late, was returning home and saw how Ilyinichna, slowly walking and swaying, walked to the threshing floor. “Why did she, being sick, go there?” - Aksinya was surprised and, carefully walking to the fence bordering the Melekhovsky threshing floor, looked into the threshing floor. There was a full month of light. A breeze came from the steppe. The application of straw cast a thick shadow over the bare current, knocked out by stone rollers. Ilyinichna stood, holding the fence with her hands, looking into the steppe, where, like an inaccessible, distant star, the fire made by the mowers flickered. Aksinya clearly saw Ilyinichna’s swollen face, illuminated by the blue moonlight, and a gray strand of hair escaping from under the old woman’s black shawl.
Ilyinichna looked for a long time into the twilight blue steppe, and then quietly, as if he was standing right next to her, she called:
Grishenka! My dear! - She paused and said in a different, low and dull voice: “My little blood!”
Aksinya shuddered all over, overcome by an inexplicable feeling of melancholy and fear, and, sharply recoiling from the fence, went towards the house.
That night Ilyinichna realized that she would soon die, that death had already approached her bedside...
Three days later she died. Ilyinichna’s peers washed her body, dressed her as a mortal, and laid her on the table in the upper room. In the evening Aksinya came to say goodbye to the deceased. She hardly recognized in the prettier and stern face of the dead little old woman the appearance of the former proud and courageous Ilyinichna. Touching her lips to the cold yellow forehead of the deceased, Aksinya noticed a familiar, unruly gray strand of hair escaping from under her white head scarf and a tiny round shell of the ear, just like a young woman’s.
With Dunyashka's consent, Aksinya took the children to her place. She fed them - silent and frightened by a new death - and put them to bed with her. She experienced a strange feeling as she hugged the quiet children of her loved one, clinging to her on both sides. In a low voice, she began to tell them fairy tales she had heard in childhood, in order to somehow entertain them, to take them away from the thought of their dead grandmother. Quietly, in a sing-song voice, she finished telling the tale about the poor orphan Vanyushka...
And before she had time to finish the story, she heard the even, measured breathing of the children. Mishatka lay on the edge, pressing his face tightly to her shoulder. Aksinya carefully straightened his tilted head with a movement of her shoulder and suddenly felt such a pitiless, cutting melancholy in her heart that a spasm seized her throat. She cried heavily and bitterly, shuddering from the sobs that shook her, but she could not even wipe away her tears: Gregory’s children were sleeping in her arms, and she did not want to wake them.
After Ilyinichna’s death, Koshevoy cooled down on farming. Dunyashka asked why her husband was working so coldly; aren't you sick? But Mishka was worried that he started farming too early - not all the enemies of Soviet power had been broken. He was unhappy that former whites, having served in the Red Army, became clean before the law. Mishka was convinced that they should be dealt with by the Cheka. The next morning Mishka went to Veshenskaya to undergo a medical examination in order to serve in the army again. But the doctor declared him unfit for military service. Then Mishka went to the district party committee, from where he returned as chairman of the farm revolutionary committee. He “appointed” the teenager Obnizov, who was considered literate, as his secretary. First of all, Mishka went to the deserter Kirill Gromov and arrested him, but Kirill managed to escape. Mishka shot at him, but missed.
Several Cossacks who came home without documents disappeared from Tatarskoe after this incident and went on the run. Mishka found out that Gromov had joined Makhno’s gang and threatened to kill Koshevoy. But he himself was going to not miss the “counter” a second time. Life in Tatarskoye was sad at that time. There were no essential goods: kerosene, matches, salt, tobacco. The old people blamed the Soviet government for everything, and Mishka tried to blame everything on the bourgeoisie, who robbed Russia, took all the supplies to Crimea and transported the products abroad; I told the old people how the whites burned state property and blew up factories during their retreat.
Mishka somehow came to an agreement with the old people, but at home, and again because of the salt, he had a big conversation with Dunyashka. In general, something went wrong in their relationship...
It began on that memorable day when, in the presence of Prokhor, he started talking about Gregory, and this little disagreement was not forgotten. One evening Mishka said at dinner:
Your cabbage soup is unsalted, mistress. Or under-salting on the table, and over-salting on the back.
There will be no over-salting under this government. Do you know how much salt we have left?
Two handfuls.
This is bad,” Mishka sighed.
Good people went to Manych in the summer to buy salt, but you still had no time to think about it,” Dunyashka said reproachfully.
What would I drive? Harnessing you in the first year of marriage is somehow inconvenient, and the bulls are not worthy...
Leave the jokes for another time! This is how you eat unsalted food - then make a joke!
Why are you mad at me? In fact, where will I get this salt for you? This is the kind of people you women are... At least burp, and give it to you. And if it is not there, this salt, be it thrice damned?
People rode bulls to Manych. Now they will have salt and that’s all, and we will chew the unleavened and the sour...
We’ll get by somehow, Dunya. Salt should arrive soon. Do we not have enough of this goodness?
You have a lot of everything.
Who has it, you?
The Reds.
What are you like?
This is what you see. They babbled and babbled: “We will have a lot of everything, but we will all live smoothly and richly...” This is your wealth: there is nothing to add salt to the cabbage soup!
Mishka looked at his wife in fear and turned pale:
What are you doing, Dunyakha! How do you play guitar? Is it really possible?
But Dunyashka took the bit between her teeth: she, too, turned pale with indignation and anger and, already starting to scream, continued:
Is that allowed? Why did you poke your eyes out? Do you know, Chairman, that people’s gums swell without salt? Do you know what people eat instead of salt? They dig soil in the salt licks, walk around the Nechaev Kurgan and put this soil in cabbage soup... Have you heard about this?
Dunyashka clasped her hands:
Do you need to worry about this somehow?
Well, worry about it!
I’ll survive, but you... But your whole Melekhov breed has thrown itself out...
What breed is this?
Backline, that's what it is! - Mishka said dully and got up from the table. He looked at the ground, without raising his eyes to his wife; his lips trembled finely as he said: “If you say that, you and I won’t live together, then you know that!” Your words are the enemy's...
Dunyashka wanted to object, but Mishka squinted his eyes and raised his hand clenched into a fist.
Shut up!.. - he said muffledly.
Dunyashka looked at him without fear, with undisguised curiosity, and after a while she calmly and cheerfully said:
Well, okay, damn what they started blabbering about... We can live without salt! “She was silent for a while and with a quiet smile, which Mishka loved so much, said: “Don’t be angry, Misha!” If you get angry with us women, you won’t have enough hearts for everything. You never know what you can say out of stupidity... Are you going to drink the broth or give you sour milk?
Despite her youth, Dunyashka was already wise from life experience and knew when to persist in a quarrel, and when to reconcile and retreat...
About two weeks after this, a letter arrived from Gregory. He wrote that he was wounded on the Wrangel front and that after recovery he would, in all likelihood, be demobilized. Dunyashka informed her husband about the contents of the letter and carefully asked:
When he comes home, Misha, how will we live then?
Let's go to my house. Let him live here alone. We will divide the property.
We can't be together. Apparently, he will take Aksinya.
Even if it were possible, I wouldn’t live with your brother under the same roof,” Mishka said sharply...
Dunyashka didn’t ask anything else. In the morning, after milking the cow, I went to Aksinya:
Grisha will arrive soon, I came to please you.
Aksinya silently put the cast iron and water on the stove and pressed her hands to her chest. Looking at her flushed face, Dunyashka said:
Don't be too happy. Mine says that he cannot escape trial. What they will be sentenced to - God knows.
Aksinya’s eyes, moist and shining, flashed for a second with fear.
For what? - she asked abruptly, and she herself was still unable to drive the belated smile from her lips.
For the uprising, for everything.
Nonsense! They won't judge him. He, your Mikhail, doesn’t know anything, and a healer has been found!
Maybe they won't. - Dunyashka was silent, then said, suppressing a sigh:
He’s angry with his little brother... This makes my heart so heavy - I can’t say it! I'm sorry brother, it's scary! He was wounded again... That's how awkward his life is...
If only he would come, we’ll take the children and hide somewhere,” Aksinya said excitedly...
As a demobilized commander, Grigory returned home on a common cart with horses, but at the first Cossack farm he was forced to change it to a cart with oxen, since all the horses were left in the Kuban during the retreat. He was given a young widow woman as his guide. On the road, lying on the cart, Gregory remembered the bulls that he had to work with as a child and then when he grew up. He was pleased to think about work and home, about everything that did not relate to the war. He finished fighting and went home to live peacefully with Aksinya and the children. While still at the front, he decided to take Aksinya into his house so that she would become a mistress and mother to his children.
Grigory dreamed with pleasure of how he would take off his overcoat and boots at home, put on his spacious boots, tuck his trousers into white woolen stockings according to Cossack custom, and, throwing a homespun jacket over his warm jacket, go to the field. It would be nice to take the chipigs with your hands and follow the plow along the wet furrow, greedily taking in with your nostrils the damp and insipid smell of loosened earth, the bitter aroma of grass cut with a ploughshare. In foreign lands, both the earth and the grass smell differently. More than once in Poland, Ukraine and Crimea he rubbed a bluish panicle of wormwood in his palms, sniffed it and thought sadly: “No, not that, it’s someone else’s...”
By morning, Grigory appeared in Tatarskoye.
Koshevoy returned from a trip to the village in the evening. Dunyashka saw through the window how he drove up to the gate, quickly threw a scarf over his shoulders, and went out into the yard.
Grisha came this morning,” she said at the gate, looking at her husband with anxiety and expectation.
“With joy,” Mishka answered restrainedly and slightly mockingly.
He entered the kitchen with his lips firmly pressed together. The nodules played under his cheekbones. Polyushka, carefully dressed by her aunt in a clean dress, perched on Grigory’s lap. Grigory carefully lowered the child to the floor and walked towards his son-in-law, smiling and extending his large dark hand. He wanted to hug Mikhail, but he saw coldness and hostility in his unsmiling eyes and restrained himself.
Well, hello, Misha!
Hello.
It's been a long time since we've seen each other! It's like a hundred years have passed.
Yes, a long time ago... Welcome to your arrival.
Thank you. Are you related, then?
I had to... Why is that blood on your cheek?
Eh, empty, I cut myself with a razor, I was in a hurry.
They sat down at the table and silently looked at each other, feeling alienated and awkward. They still had to have a big conversation, but that was impossible now. Mikhail had enough restraint and calmly spoke about the farm, about the changes that had taken place in the farm...
Having fed the children and put them to bed, Dunyashka put a large plate of boiled lamb on the table and whispered to Gregory:
Brother, I’ll run after Aksinya, won’t you have anything against it?
Grigory nodded his head silently. It seemed to him that no one noticed that he had been in tense anticipation all evening, but Dunyashka saw how he became alert at every knock, listened and glanced sideways at the door. Positively nothing could escape the overly penetrating eyes of this Dunyashka...
A latch clanged in the hallway. Grigory shuddered, Aksinya crossed the threshold and said indistinctly: “Hello!” - and began to take off her scarf, gasping for breath and not taking her wide, shining eyes off Grigory. She walked to the table and sat down next to Dunyashka. Tiny snowflakes melted on her eyebrows and eyelashes, on her pale face. Closing her eyes, she wiped her face with her palm, took a deep breath, and only then, overpowering herself, looked at Grigory with deep eyes darkened with excitement.
One-bag! Ksyusha! We retreated together, together we fed the lice... Although we abandoned you in the Kuban, what could we do? - Prokhor held out a glass, splashing moonshine on the table. - Drink to Grigory Pantelevich! Congratulate him on his arrival... I told you that he would return safe, and here he is, take him for twenty rubles! He sits like he's bloated!
He's already got enough, neighbor, don't listen to him. - Grigory, laughing, pointed with his eyes at Prokhor.
Aksinya bowed to Grigory and Dunyashka and only slightly lifted her glass from the table. She was afraid that everyone would see how her hand was shaking...
Aksinya did not stay as a guest for long, exactly as long as, in her opinion, decency allowed. During all this time, she only glanced at her lover a few times, and then only briefly. She forced herself to look at the others and avoided Gregory's eyes, because she could not pretend to be indifferent and did not want to reveal her feelings to strangers. Only one glance from the threshold, direct, filled with love and devotion, caught Grigory, and that, in fact, said it all. He went out to see Aksinya off...
In the entryway, Grigory silently kissed Aksinya on the forehead and lips and asked:
How are you, Ksyusha?
Oh, you can’t tell me everything... Will you come tomorrow?
I'll come...
Having seen off Aksinya, Grigory returned home. Soon the guests dispersed, and Grigory was left alone with Mikhail. Mishka admitted that he was not happy about Gregory’s return; they still remained enemies. Melekhov wanted to come to a peaceful agreement with Mishka and tried to explain that he did not leave with the rebels of his own free will. Mishka, who was hostile, was sure that if some kind of mess happened, Grigory would again go over to the side of the enemies. But Melekhov said that he was tired of the war, that he wanted to live near the farm, with the children. He convinced Koshevoy that he would not go against the authorities until they took him by the throat - “If they take him, I will defend myself!”, but Koshevoy did not believe a single word of his. Grigory asked how he was going to live further. And Mishka replied that he wanted to fix up his house and move there. Melekhov agreed: they cannot live together - “You and I will not have harmony.” Mikhail demanded that Grigory go to Veshenskaya to register the next day, but Melekhov wanted to rest for at least a day. Mishka promised that if Grigory did not act kindly, he would force him away.
Dunyashka, who got up early in the morning, was surprised to see Gregory leaving the house.
Grigory went outside. By morning it had thawed a little. The wind blew from the south, humid and warm. Snow mixed with the ground stuck to the heels of the boots. Walking slowly towards the center of the farm, Grigory carefully, as if in a foreign area, looked at the houses and barns familiar from childhood. On the square were the blackened ruins of merchant houses and shops burned by Koshev last year, the dilapidated church fence gaped with gaps. “We need bricks for the stoves,” Grigory thought indifferently...
Grigory carefully opened the gate of the Zykovsky base, which was hanging on one hinge. Prokhor, wearing trampled round felt boots and a fur cap pulled down to his eyebrows, walked to the porch, carelessly waving an empty milk bucket...
And in the army and all the way I thought about how I would live near the land, how I would rest with my family from all this devilry. It's a joke - I haven't gotten off my horse for eight years! In my sleep, almost every night I dream about all this beauty: now you kill, now they kill you... But apparently, Prokhor, it won’t work out my way... Apparently, others, not me, will have to plow the land and take care of it ...
Aren't you afraid that this is... that they'll go to jail? - asked Prokhor.
Grigory perked up:
This is exactly what I'm afraid of, boy! I haven’t been in prison for a long time and I’m afraid of prison worse than death. Apparently, I’ll have to try this goodness too.
You shouldn’t have gone home,” Prokhor said regretfully.
Where was I supposed to go?
I would have leaned down somewhere in the city, waited until this mess settled down, and then I would have walked.
Gregory waved his hand and laughed:
This is not for me! Waiting and catching up is the most hateful thing. Where would I go from having children?
He said it too! Did they live without you? Then he would take them and his dear...
Prokhor walked him to the porch and whispered in the hallway:
Oh, Pantelevich, make sure they don’t join you there.
“I’ll take a look,” Grigory answered restrainedly.
By noon he arrived at Veshenskaya.
In Veshenskaya, Grigory met Fomin, a friend of his brother, who advised Melekhov to hide, because officers were being arrested: the Soviet government did not believe them. But Grigory said that he had nowhere to run, he returned home. After this meeting, Melekhov decided to find out everything completely: “It’s time to finish, there’s no point in delaying it! If you knew how to misbehave, Grigory, you also know how to answer!”
Around eight o'clock in the morning Aksinya raked up the heat in the stove, sat down on a bench, wiping her flushed, sweaty face with a curtain. She got up before dawn in order to get rid of cooking early - she cooked noodles with chicken, baked pancakes, poured dumplings generously with kajmak, and set them to fry; she knew that Grigory loved fried dumplings, and prepared a festive dinner in the hope that her lover would dine with her...
She somehow sat at home until lunch, but then she couldn’t stand it and, throwing a white goat’s-down scarf over her shoulders, she went to the Melekhovs. Dunyashka was at home alone. Aksinya greeted and asked:
Didn't you have lunch?
With such homeless people you will have lunch on time! The husband is in the Council, and Grisha went to the village. I've already fed the kids, I'm waiting for the big ones.
Outwardly calm, without any movement or word showing the disappointment that befell her, Aksinya said:
And I thought you were all assembled. When will Grisha... Grigory Panteleevich return? Today?
Dunyashka glanced quickly at her dressed-up neighbor and reluctantly said:
He went to register.
When did you promise to return?
Tears sparkled in Dunyasha’s eyes; stammering, she said reproachfully:
Also, I found time... I dressed up... But you don’t know - he might not come back at all.
Why won't he come back?
Mikhail says that he will be arrested in the village... - Dunyashka began to cry with stingy, angry tears, wiping her eyes with her sleeve, and shouted: - Damn her, such is life! And when will all this end? He left, but the kids, tell me, they went crazy, they don’t let me go: “Where did daddy go and when will he come?” Do I know? I saw them off to the base, and my whole heart ached... And what kind of damned life is this! There is no peace, even if you scream!..
If he doesn’t return by nightfall, I’ll go to the village tomorrow and find out. - Aksinya said this in such an indifferent tone, as if we were talking about something very ordinary that was not worth the slightest excitement.
Marveling at her calmness, Dunyashka sighed:
Now, apparently, we can’t wait for him. And on the mountain he came here!
Nothing is visible yet! Stop screaming, otherwise the children will think... Goodbye!
Gregory returned late in the evening. After staying at home for a while, he went to Aksinya.
The anxiety in which she spent the whole long day somewhat dulled the joy of the meeting. By the evening Aksinya felt as if she had been working all day without straightening her back. Depressed and tired from waiting, she lay down on the bed and dozed off, but when she heard footsteps under the window, she jumped up with the vivacity of a girl.
Why didn’t you say that you would go to Veshki? - she asked, hugging Gregory and unbuttoning his overcoat.
I didn’t have time to say anything, I was in a hurry.
And Dunyashka and I screamed, each separately, thinking - you won’t come back.
Grigory smiled reservedly.
How are you doing there? Did you manage everything?
Everything is fine.
Where did Dunyashka get the idea that you should definitely be arrested? She scared me to death too.
Grigory winced and threw down his cigarette in annoyance.
Mikhail played into her ears. He’s the one who comes up with everything and calls trouble on my head.
Aksinya approached the table. Gregory took her hands.
“And you know,” he said, looking up into her eyes, “my affairs are not very elegant.” I myself thought, as I walked into this Politburo, that I would not leave there. After all, I commanded a division during the uprising, a centurion by rank... Such people quickly get their hands on...
Aksinya listened carefully to his story, then gently released her hands and walked away to the stove. Adjusting the fire, she asked:
In a week I have to go check in again.
Do you think they'll take you after all?
As you can see - yes. Sooner or later they will take it.
What are we going to do? How will we live, Grisha?
Don't know. Let's talk about this later. Do you have water to wash your face?
They sat down to dinner, and Aksinya again regained that full-fledged happiness that she had experienced in the morning...
In essence, a person needs very little to be happy. Aksinya, in any case, was happy that evening.
It was difficult for Melekhov to meet with Koshev, and probably for Mishka too. Koshevoy tried to quickly repair his decaying hut, for which he hired two carpenters.
After returning from Veshenskaya, Grigory went to the farm revolutionary committee, showed Koshevoy his military documents marked by the military registration and enlistment office and left without saying goodbye. He moved to Aksinya, took with him his children and some of his property. Dunyashka, seeing him off to his new residence, burst into tears.
“Brother, don’t hold your heart on me, I’m not guilty of you,” she said, looking pleadingly at her brother.
For what, Dunya? No, no, no, no,” Grigory reassured her. - Come and visit us... I’m one of your relatives left, I always felt sorry for you and still feel sorry for you... But your husband is another matter. We will not ruin our friendship with you.
We'll leave the house soon, don't be angry.
No! - Grigory said annoyedly. - Live in the house until spring. You are not a hindrance to me, and Aksinya and I have enough space with the guys...
To tell the truth, he didn’t care where he lived, as long as he lived in peace. But he did not find this peace of mind... He spent several days in depressing idleness. I tried to make something on Aksinya’s farm and immediately felt that I couldn’t do anything. There was no soul for anything. Painful uncertainty tormented and interfered with life; Not for one minute did he leave the thought that he could be arrested, thrown into prison - this is at best, or even shot.
Grigory decided that he would no longer go to Veshenskaya; on the day when he had to go for re-registration, he would leave the farm, but where - he still didn’t know. He decided not to tell Aksinya about his intention for now - he didn’t want to upset her. Gregory had little contact with the Cossacks; he was tired of talking about politics and surplus appropriation. Rumors circulated around the farm, but Gregory, who did not want to complicate his already joyless life, did not enter into dangerous conversations.
We had to go to Veshenskaya on Saturday. Three days later he was supposed to leave his native farm, but it turned out differently: on Thursday night, when Grigory was about to go to bed, someone sharply knocked on the door. Aksinya went out into the hallway. Grigory heard her ask: “Who’s there?” He did not hear an answer, but, driven by a vague feeling of anxiety, he got out of bed and went to the window. A latch clanged in the hallway. Dunyashka entered first. Grigory saw her pale face and, without asking anything, took his hat and overcoat from the bench.
Brother...
What? - he asked quietly, putting on his overcoat in his sleeves.
Gasping, Dunyashka hurriedly said:
Brother, leave now! Four horsemen from the village came to us. They were sitting in the upper room... They spoke in a whisper, but I heard... I stood under the door and heard everything... Mikhail says - you need to be arrested... He tells them about you... Go away!
Grigory quickly stepped towards her, hugged her, and kissed her firmly on the cheek.
Thanks, Sister! Go, otherwise they will notice that you have left. Goodbye. - And turned to Aksinya: - Bread! Hurry! Not a whole one, it's a piece of cake!
So his short peaceful life ended... He acted as in battle - hastily, but confidently; He went into the upper room, carefully kissed the sleeping children, and hugged Aksinya.
Goodbye! I'll send word soon, Prokhor will say. Take care of the children. Lock the door. If they ask, tell him he took you to Veshki. Well, goodbye, don’t worry, Ksyusha! - Kissing her, he felt the warm, salty moisture of tears on his lips...
In the late autumn of 1920, in connection with surplus appropriation, fermentation began again in the ranks of the Don Cossacks; in some places, small armed gangs began to appear, consisting mainly of local Cossack residents who had not so long ago fought on the side of the whites. The gangs attacked food surplus workers, killed them, and took away their bread. The Soviet government tried to fight the bandits, but attempts to destroy the gangs, as a rule, were unsuccessful. Fomin, who led the security squadron, gravitated more and more towards the rebels every day. After a trip home, having learned that his bread was also being taken away, Fomin decided to openly oppose Soviet power. It didn’t take long to convince the fighters - almost everyone had a grudge against Soviet power lurking in their hearts. At the end of January, the Fomintsy rose up in an organized manner, but they could not take Veshenskaya; a machine-gun platoon held the defense.
The night passed peacefully. On one edge of Veshenskaya there were rebel squadrons, on the other - a punitive company and the communists and Komsomol members who joined it. Only two blocks separated the opponents, but neither side dared to launch a night attack.
In the morning, the rebel squadron left the village without a fight and went in a south-easterly direction.
The first months after leaving home, Grigory lived with relatives in Verkhne-Krivsky, and then in Gorbatovsky farms.
He lay in the upper room all day long and only went out into the yard at night. It all looked like a prison. Grigory was languishing from melancholy, from oppressive idleness. He was irresistibly drawn home - to the children, to Aksinya. Often, during sleepless nights, he put on his overcoat with a firm decision to go to Tatarsky - and every time, after thinking about it, he undressed and fell face down on the bed with a groan.
But the owner asked Gregory to leave, explaining that he could not support a parasite in such a difficult time. He sent Melekhov to the Yagodny farm, to the matchmaker. Before Grigory had time to leave the farm, he was detained by Fomin’s horsemen.
Fomin informed Grigory that he and his fighters had rebelled against Soviet power, against the commissars and the surplus appropriation system, and said that the Cossacks were generally afraid to rise up, although some volunteers joined him. Gregory had nowhere to go, and he agreed to join Fomin’s gang.
Fomin's fighters drove around the villages, trying to win over the Cossacks to their side. Occupying a farm or village, Fomin ordered a meeting of citizens to be convened. Speaking, he or his fighters called the Cossacks to arms, talked about the difficulties that fell on the shoulders of the Cossacks along with the establishment of Soviet power, and promised to free them from surplus appropriation. But the Cossacks did not want to fight, they did not believe that the uprising could change the situation. Gregory understood “that it would not be possible to raise the Cossacks and that this Fominsk undertaking was doomed to inevitable failure.”
With the onset of spring, the number of people in the Fominsk gang noticeably decreased - working time was approaching, the Cossacks were reaching out to the ground. But Grigory remained in the gang - he didn’t have the courage to return home. He was clearly aware that at the first serious clash with the Reds the gang would be completely defeated, and yet he decided to stay. I hoped to hold out until the summer, and then go to Tatarsky, pick up Aksinya and the children and move south with them.
Before the ice drift, Fomin decided to move to the left side of the Don, where it was possible to more reliably hide from persecution in the forests. Having crossed the Don, the gang went in the direction of the Elanskaya village. Fomin, occupying the farmstead, no longer convened meetings of citizens - he realized that it would not be possible to convince the Cossacks to come over to his side. He became noticeably darker, discipline fell, and incidents of robbery and looting became more frequent. Melekhov threatened Fomin that if the looting did not stop, he would leave with half the Cossacks. Fomin did not agree with Gregory’s position, but still punished the robbers the next morning. One of them, who did not want to part with the loot, was shot dead.
Fomin's gang was pursued by a mounted detachment of Reds. It became more and more difficult to hide every day - spring work was going on in the fields, people were working everywhere. The rebels had to leave at night. From an intelligence report, Fomin learned that they were being pursued by an equestrian group of the smart and assertive Cossack Yegor Zhuravlev, almost twice the size of the gang. Therefore, Fomin more often avoided battle, hoping to suddenly attack the group and destroy it. But his calculations did not come true. The Red Army soldiers captured a gang sleeping in the parking lot and shot it with machine guns. Grigory, Fomin and several other people barely escaped with their feet.
The gang was almost completely destroyed, only five people survived. They were pursued to the Antonovsky farm, then the chase stopped, and the fugitives disappeared into the forest surrounding the farm. The survivors settled on a wooded island in the middle of the Don.
They lived somehow: they ate meager grub, which Fomin’s cousin delivered to them on a boat at night, they ate from hand to mouth, but they slept to their heart’s content, placing saddle pillows under their heads. At night they took turns on guard duty. No fire was lit for fear that anyone would discover their whereabouts.
Washing the island, hollow water quickly flowed south. She made a menacing noise, breaking through the ridge of old poplars that stood in her way, and quietly, melodiously, calmly babbled, swaying the tops of the flooded bushes.
Grigory soon got used to the incessant and close sound of water. He lay for a long time near the steeply cut bank, looking at the wide expanse of water, at the chalk spurs of the Obdon mountains, drowning in a lilac sunny haze. There, behind this haze, was his native farm, Aksinya, the children... His sad thoughts flew there. For a moment, longing flared up in him and burned his heart when he remembered his family, a dull hatred for Mikhail boiled up, but he suppressed these feelings and tried not to look at the Obdon mountains, so as not to remember again. There was no need to give free rein to the evil memory. It was hard enough for him without it. Even without this, his chest hurt so much that sometimes it seemed to him as if his heart was flayed, and it was not beating, but bleeding. Apparently, the wounds, the hardships of the war, and typhus had taken their toll: Grigory began to hear the annoying beating of his heart every minute. Sometimes the cutting pain in his chest, under his left nipple, became so unbearably sharp that his lips immediately dried out, and he could hardly restrain himself from groaning. But he found a sure way to get rid of the pain: he lay down with the left side of his chest on the damp ground or wet his shirt with cold water, and the pain slowly, as if reluctantly, left his body.
At the end of April, those who survived the defeat of the Fominsk army crossed the Don and went by cart to Yagodny, where they acquired horses and moved to the southwest. The Fomintsy drove around for a long time in search of Maslak’s gang, but they ran into the Reds and rode for three days, trying to break away from the chase. When the Reds fell behind, they stopped to feed the horses on the slope of a deep ravine.
Gregory lay with his legs spread wide, leaning on his elbows, and with greedy eyes he looked around the steppe wreathed in a sunny haze, the blue guard mounds on the distant ridge, the iridescent flowing haze on the edge of the slope. For a minute he closed his eyes and heard the close and distant singing of larks, the light tread and snorting of grazing horses, the clinking of bits and the rustling of the wind in the young grass... He experienced a strange feeling of detachment and tranquility, pressing his whole body against the hard earth. It was a feeling he had known for a long time. It always came after an experience of anxiety, and then Grigory seemed to see everything around him anew. It was as if his vision and hearing were sharpened, and everything that had previously gone unnoticed, after the excitement he experienced, attracted his attention...
About two hours later they mounted their horses again, trying to reach the familiar farmsteads of the Elanskaya village by nightfall.
During a week and a half of wandering, about forty people joined the Fominsk people. Almost all of them had recently been part of various gangs engaged in robbery and looting. In two weeks, Fomin made an extensive circle throughout all the villages of the Upper Don, after which the gang already numbered about one hundred and thirty sabers.
In the depths of his soul, Fomin still considered himself a “fighter for the working people,” and although not as often as before, he said: “We are the liberators of the Cossacks...” The stupidest hopes stubbornly did not leave him... He again stood through his fingers look at the robberies committed by his comrades, believing that all this is an inevitable evil that must be put up with, that over time he will get rid of the robbers and that sooner or later he will still be a real commander of the rebel units, and not the chieftain of a tiny gang.. .
Almost everyone who joined Fomin’s gang was well dressed and armed, almost everyone had good horses. But the situation in the area has changed noticeably. Where Fomin had previously been greeted hospitably, the gates were now closed. Seeing him, people ran away in different directions. Gregory firmly decided to leave the gang.
Long before dawn he galloped into the meadow opposite Tatarsky. Having crossed the Don, he urged the horses to keep them warm. He left the horses in the ditch and went to Aksinya’s hut.
He stood on the heap. Aksinya's bare hands clasped his neck. They trembled and beat so much on his shoulders, these dear hands, that their trembling was transmitted to Gregory.
Ksyusha... Wait... I’ll take the rifle,” he stammered, barely audible.
Holding his hat with his hand, Grigory stepped through the window sill and closed the window.
He wanted to hug Aksinya, but she fell heavily on her knees in front of him, hugged his legs and, pressing her face to her wet overcoat, shook all over with suppressed sobs. Grigory picked her up and sat her down on the bench. Bowing to him, hiding her face in his chest, Aksinya was silent, often shuddered and clenched the lapel of her greatcoat with her teeth in order to muffle her sobs and not wake up the children.
Apparently, she, too, who was so strong, was broken by suffering. Apparently, she had lived a miserable life these months... Grigory stroked her hair, which was scattered over her back, and her forehead, hot and wet with sweat.
After allowing Aksinya to cry, Grigory began asking her about the children, about Dunyashka. Aksinya, smiling, said that Dunyashka and the children were alive and well, Mishka Koshevoy had been in Veshki for two months, serving in some unit.
Mishatka and Porlyushka, scattered about, slept on the bed. Grigory bent over them, stood a little and walked away on tiptoe, silently sat down next to Aksinya...
I'm after you. They probably won't catch you! Will you go?..
Yes. Where am I going with you?
Let's leave it to Dunyashka. Then we will see. Then we'll take them too. Well? Are you going?..
What did you think? - Aksinya suddenly said loudly and fearfully pressed her hand to her lips and looked at the children. - What would you think? - she asked in a whisper. - Is it sweet for me alone? I’ll go, Grishenka, my dear! I’ll walk, I’ll crawl after you, and I won’t be left alone anymore! I have no life without you... It’s better to kill, but don’t leave again!..
She pressed Gregory tightly to her. He kissed her and glanced sideways at the window. Summer nights are short. We must hurry...
He took a pouch out of his hat and began to roll a cigarette, but as soon as Aksinya left, he hurriedly went to the bed and kissed the children for a long time, and then he remembered Natalya and remembered a lot more from his difficult life and began to cry.
Having crossed the threshold, Dunyashka said:
Well, hello, brother! Nailed to the house? No matter how much you wander across the steppe... - and she began to lament. - The children waited for their parents... While their father was alive, they became orphans...
Gregory asked Dunyashka to take the children, and she agreed.
Dawn had just broken when, having said goodbye to Dunyashka and kissed the children who had not woken up, Grigory and Aksinya went out onto the porch. They went down to the Don, walked along the shore to the ravine...
But I’m still afraid - is this a dream? Give me your hand, I’ll touch it, otherwise I have no faith. “She laughed quietly and pressed herself against Grigory’s shoulder as she walked.
He saw her eyes, swollen from tears, shining in the sun, her cheeks pale in the pre-dawn twilight. Smiling affectionately, he thought: “She got ready and went, as if on a visit... Nothing frightens her, what a good woman!”
As if answering his thoughts, Aksinya said:
You see how I am... I whistled like a little dog and I ran after you. It’s love and longing for you, Grisha, that’s how they twisted me... I just feel sorry for the kids, but I won’t even say “oh” about myself. I will go with you everywhere, even to death!
Mounting their horses, they rode to Sukhoi Log. Grigory fell asleep, Aksinya was guarding the horses.
A little later, Aksinya quietly stood up and crossed the clearing, lifting her skirt high, trying not to get it wet on the dewy grass. Somewhere far away a stream beat against the stones and rang. She went down into the teklina ravine, covered with mossy stone slabs covered with greenery, drank cold spring water, washed herself and wiped her flushed face dry with a handkerchief. A quiet smile never left her lips, her eyes shone with joy. Gregory was with her again! Again, the unknown beckoned her with illusory happiness... Aksinya shed many tears during sleepless nights, suffered a lot of grief in recent months...
Just yesterday she was cursing her life, and everything around her looked gray and joyless, like on a stormy day, but today the whole world seemed jubilant and bright to her, as if after a blessed summer shower. “We will find our share too!” - she thought, absentmindedly looking at the carved oak leaves that flashed under the slanting rays of the rising sun.
Fragrant, colorful flowers grew near the bushes and in the sun. Aksinya picked a large armful of them, carefully sat down next to Gregory and, remembering her youth, began to weave a wreath. It turned out elegant and beautiful. Aksinya admired it for a long time, then stuck several pink rosehip flowers into it and placed it at Gregory’s head.
Around ten o'clock Gregory woke up, and they had breakfast.
After breakfast they lay down on the spread out overcoat. Grigory fought in vain against sleep, Aksinya, leaning on her elbow, told how she lived without him, how much she suffered during this time. Through his irresistible slumber, Grigory heard her even voice and was unable to lift his heavy eyelids...
Gregory fell asleep again, and Aksinya dozed off. Late at night they left Sukhoi Log. After a two hour drive we descended to Chir. At the farmstead, three horsemen called out to them.
Four from the outpost of the food detachment that had recently settled down for the night silently and slowly walked towards them. One stopped to light a cigarette and lit a match. Gregory forcefully pulled Aksinya's horse with a whip. He rushed and immediately took to the quarry. Silence lasted for languid seconds, and then an uneven, rolling volley struck, flashes of fire pierced the darkness. Grigory heard the burning whistle of bullets and a drawn-out cry:
In the gun-oh-oh!
About a hundred yards from the river, Grigory caught up with a gray horse that was leaving at a sweeping pace, and when he caught up, he shouted:
Bend down, Ksyusha! Bend lower!
Aksinya pulled on the reins and, throwing herself back, fell on her side. Gregory managed to support her, otherwise she would have fallen.
Were you hurt?! Where did it go?! Speak up!... - Gregory asked hoarsely.
She was silent and leaned more and more heavily on his hand. As he galloped, hugging her to him, Grigory gasped and whispered:
For God's sake! Just a word! What are you doing?!
But he did not hear a word or a groan from the silent Aksinya.
About two versts from the farm, Grigory turned sharply off the road, went down to the ravine, dismounted and took Aksinya into his arms, carefully laying her on the ground...
Aksinya died in Gregory's arms shortly before dawn. Consciousness never returned to her. He silently kissed her lips, cold and salty from blood, carefully lowered her onto the grass, and stood up. An unknown force pushed him in the chest, and he backed away, fell backward, but immediately jumped to his feet in fear. And he fell again, painfully hitting his naked head on a stone. Then, without rising from his knees, he took his saber out of its sheath and began to dig a grave. The ground was wet and yielding. He was in a hurry, but the suffocation was pressing on his throat, and to make it easier to breathe, he tore his shirt. The early morning freshness cooled his chest, damp with sweat, and it became less difficult for him to work. He raked out the earth with his hands and hat, without resting for a minute, but by the time he dug a waist-deep grave, it took a lot of time.
He buried his Aksinya in the bright morning light... He said goodbye to her, firmly believing that they would not part for long...
There was no need for him to rush now. It was all over.
As if awakening from a heavy sleep, he raised his head and saw above him the black sky and the dazzlingly shining black disk of the sun...
Like a steppe scorched by fires, Gregory’s life became black. He lost everything that was dear to his heart. Everything was taken from him, everything was destroyed by the ruthless steppe. Only the children remained. But he himself still frantically clung to the ground, as if, in fact, his broken life was of some value to him and to others...
Having buried Aksinya, he wandered aimlessly across the steppe for three days, but did not go home or to Veshenskaya to confess. On the fourth day, having abandoned his horses in one of the farms of the Ust-Khoperskaya village, he crossed the Don and went on foot to the Slashchevskaya oak grove, on the edge of which Fomin’s gang was first defeated. Even then, in April, he heard that deserters lived sedentary in the oak grove. Gregory went to them, not wanting to return to Fomin.
For several days he wandered through a huge forest. He was tormented by hunger, but he did not dare to go anywhere to find housing. With the death of Aksinya, he lost both his reason and his former courage.
At the end of the fifth day, deserters found Gregory and brought him to their dugout, identified him and accepted him without much argument.
Having lost track of the days, Grigory lived in the forest until October, and then became homesick for his home and children. During the day he was silent, and at night he often woke up in tears - he dreamed of loved ones who were no longer alive. After living in the forest for another week, Gregory began to get ready to go home. The Cossacks stopped him and said that by May 1st they would receive an amnesty, but he did not want to wait. The next day, Grigory approached the Don, drowned his weapon in the ice hole and crossed the river on the ice.
From afar, he saw Mishatka on the descent to the pier and barely restrained himself from running towards him.
Mishatka broke off the ice icicles hanging from the stone, threw them and carefully watched how the blue fragments stretched down the mountain.
Grigory approached the descent and, breathless, hoarsely called out to his son:
Mishenka!.. Son!..
Mishatka looked at him in fear and lowered his eyes. He recognized his father in this bearded and scary-looking man...
All the kind and tender words that Grigory whispered at night, remembering his children there in the oak grove, have now flown out of his memory. Kneeling down, kissing his son’s pink, cold hands, he repeated in a choked voice only one word:
Son... Son...
Then Gregory took his son in his arms. With dry, frenziedly burning eyes, eagerly peering into his face, he asked:
How are you here? Auntie, Porlyushka - alive and well?
Still not looking at his father, Mishatka quietly answered:
Aunt Dunya is healthy, but Porlyushka died in the fall... From swallowing. And Uncle Mikhail is at work...
Well, the little that was left in his life that still connected him with the earth and with this whole huge world shining under the cold sun has come true.
Book Four
Part Eight
Aksinya returned to her native farm again. Fear for Gregory brought her closer to Ilyinichna: they were both waiting for news about him, equally afraid for him. Ilyinichna greatly misses her son and grieves for him more than for her dead husband. Dunyasha began to invite Aksinya to visit in order to amuse her mother with conversations. The Cossacks passing through the village could not report anything about the fate of Gregory. Finally, Prokhor Zykin brought the news. He reported that Melekhov enlisted in the Red Army and went to fight against the White Poles.
Ilyinichna began to prepare for the meeting of her son, which, as the old woman believed, would be soon. Mishka Koshevoy showed up at the farm. Ilyinichna greeted him coldly. She was against his visits, but Dunyasha insisted that Koshevoy continue to appear in their kuren. Mishka little by little helped the women with housework. Gradually Ilyinichna became attached to him.
Soon the wedding took place. Dunyasha insisted on the wedding in the church, which ruined the mood of both young people. The wedding was quiet and boring, Ilyinichna had a hard time with the appearance of a stranger in the house, she felt lonely and superfluous in her own home. The old woman would have prayed for death, but she wanted to wait for Gregory. Luckily for her, one day Prokhor brought the news that Gregory was coming on leave in the fall. Ilyinichna shared her joy with Aksinya. Then the old woman got worse, and she despaired of waiting for her son: she realized that she would die earlier. And so it happened. Grishka’s children were taken in by Aksinya, who buried Ilyinichna.
Mishka Koshevoy was exhausted from boredom on the farm. He quickly became tired of housekeeping; he wanted to return to the front, where the struggle against Wrangel, Makhno and other anti-Soviet forces was unfolding. Koshevoy, in disputes with Prokhor, expresses the idea that those who fought on the side of the whites should be punished, even if they later went over to the reds and atoned for their guilt with blood. Soon Mishka was appointed chairman of the local revolutionary committee, and Koshevoy decided to restore order on the farm. First of all, he went to Kirill Gromov, whom he wanted to arrest, since he suspected him of possessing weapons. Gromov escaped, despite Mishka’s efforts to detain him.
Koshevoy lived in constant fear for his life; he was seriously afraid of Gromov’s attack. In addition, many Cossacks grumbled at the Soviet regime, since life on the farm was poor - there were not enough basic necessities. Mishka shouted at the dissatisfied or deceived them, talking about the atrocities of the whites that he had invented, leaving the country without salt, matches, railways, etc. Mishka also had a big quarrel with Dunyasha: she didn’t like his words against Gregory , and now she clung to Koshevoy’s every word. Koshevoy hastened to write her down as an enemy of the Soviet regime.
Melekhov was returning on a bull cart to his native farm. In his thoughts, he either turned to his childhood, or to Aksinya, whom he firmly decided to take into his house so that she would look after the children. Grigory walked part of the way out of impatience. Mishka greeted Melekhov with restraint, postponing the important conversation for later. In the meantime, it was decided to celebrate the return of Gregory, for... why Prokhor Zykin and Aksinya were invited to visit. When the guests left, Mikhail and Gregory started talking about their future lives. Koshevoy openly said that he did not trust the former “con-tra” and demanded that he urgently register with the Revolutionary Committee.
Melekhov learns from Prokhor about an uprising nearby - against the Bolsheviks and the surplus appropriation system. This worries Gregory, since he is sure that he can be accused of being the instigator. Grigory envies those for whom everything was clear and understandable since 1917, who did not hesitate in their choice. By noon he showed up at the village to register, but at first he didn’t want to go through all the authorities, fearing arrest. In the end, the Cossack changed his mind, deciding to hold himself accountable for his deeds.
Aksinya, dressed up to meet Melekhov, comes to Dunyasha’s house. She weeps and tells Astakhova that Grigory may not return from the village. Aksinya leaves the kuren and returns home. But Gregory still came, albeit late in the evening. Having looked home, he almost immediately went to Aksinya.
Grigory showed Koshevoy the documents drawn up according to the form and no longer communicated with him. Soon Melekhov had to say goodbye to his sister. He left her his father’s kuren, and he decided to move with the children to Aksinya. Having moved to Astakhova, he never found peace in family life and household chores. Grigory tried not to meet with his neighbors, so as not to blurt out too much and not incur suspicion. One night, Grigory’s sister comes running to warn him about the impending arrest. Melekhov quickly gets ready and leaves the house.
Soon, an uprising broke out again on the Don, organized by Cossacks dissatisfied with the surplus appropriation system. One of its most active organizers turned out to be Melekhov’s former friend Yakov Fomin, who commanded the red squadron. Under the influence of Fomin’s propaganda, the entire drone squadron declared war on the commissars involved in production layout.
Grigory lived for some time with distant relatives of Aksinya, and then moved to the Yagodny farm. Halfway along the way, he was intercepted by Red Army soldiers, who turned out to be Fomin’s men. Yakov told Gregory about his uprising. Melekhov agreed to join the gang, despite his disgust at the methods by which Fomin restored order in the area.
Fomin traveled around the villages and tried to attract the Cossacks to his side, but his agitation had no effect. Hungry, war-weary people for the most part did not agree to support the gang. At first, Yakov calmly endured the refusals, but then increasingly threatened the Cossacks. In response, the Cossacks either remained sullenly silent or chuckled. The Cossack women openly made fun of the Fominsk residents and were rude to them.
In the spring the gang began to melt away. People who saw the futility of the struggle were drawn to the ground. The Fomintsy decided to retreat at the first opportunity and merge with another, larger gang. Grigory was tired of the current situation; he saw that he found himself among the robbers. Soon, due to Fomin’s shortsightedness and incompetence as a commander, his detachment was surrounded and almost completely destroyed. Grigory managed to remove only a few people from the encirclement. Those who survived agreed to dismount and take refuge in the forest and then go to the Rubezhny farm.
Fomin’s closest ally, the former Socialist Revolutionary Kaparin, frightened by the upcoming difficulties, suggests that Melekhov kill Fomin and the others in order to then surrender to Soviet power: Fomin’s blood will serve as an excuse for Kaparin and Grigory. Grigory does not agree to the deal and, for the sake of his own safety, disarms Kaparin. The Fomintsy, having guessed everything, killed Kaparin that same night.
XVMaterial from the site
Fomin freely crosses the Don, where one Cossack joins his detachment. The Fomintsy finally decide to merge with the famous Maslak gang. In search of this gang, I had to travel through quite a few villages and run into a Red Army scam and a police detachment. During the persecution, one of the Fomints (Sterlyadnikov) was wounded in the leg, and the wound became inflamed. Sterlyadnikov asked to kill him, which played into Fomin’s hands. The wounded soldier was finished off by his comrade Chumakov, who was very worried about this.
A week and a half later, forty more Cossacks joined Fomin’s detachment, and the gang began to engage exclusively in robbery. Fomin, however, proved to his close comrades that this was a temporary state and that they were actually fighting for the happiness of the working people. Grigory secretly prepares everything to leave the gang. On one of the night trips he managed to carry out his plan.
Melekhov reappeared at his native farm. He sneaked into Aksinya’s house unnoticed and invited her to go with him to Kuban away from danger. Aksinya agreed to this, deciding to temporarily leave the children to Dunyasha. While crossing at one of the farms on their way, Melekhov and Aksinya ran into a police post. Aksinya was mortally wounded. Grigory took her to the forest, where the woman died in the Cossack’s arms without regaining consciousness.
From that day on, Melekhov wandered aimlessly across the steppe for three days. In the forest, he found the refuge of deserters and settled with them. Later, Chumakov was among them, telling Grigory about the death of Fomin. Soon Chumakov left “to enjoy an easy life,” and after him Melekhov left the forest and went to his native farm. Here he learned that he had lost his daughter, who died of scarlet fever. All that remained for Gregory was the opportunity to stand at the gates of his house and hold his son in his arms, which is what he dreamed of in his youth.
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The purpose of the lesson: to show the inevitability of the tragic fate of Grigory Melekhov, the connection of this tragedy with the fate of society.
Methodological techniques: checking homework - adjusting the plan drawn up by the students, conversation according to the plan.
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Methodological development of a lesson on the topic “The fate of Grigory Melekhov as a path to finding the truth.” Grade 11
The purpose of the lesson: to show the inevitability of the tragic fate of Grigory Melekhov, the connection of this tragedy with the fate of society.
Methodological techniques: checking homework - adjusting the plan drawn up by the students, conversation according to the plan.
During the classes
Teacher's word.
Sholokhov’s heroes are simple, but extraordinary people, and Grigory is not only brave to the point of despair, honest and conscientious, but also truly talented, and not only the hero’s “career” proves this (a cornet from ordinary Cossacks at the head of a division is evidence of considerable abilities, although such cases were not uncommon among the Reds during the Civil War). This is confirmed by his collapse in life, since Gregory is too deep and complex for the unambiguous choice required by time!
This image attracts the attention of readers with its features of nationality, originality, and sensitivity to the new. But there is also something spontaneous in him, which is inherited from the environment.
Checking homework
Approximate plot plan for “The Fate of Grigory Melekhov”:
Book one
1. Predetermination of tragic fate (origin).
2. Life in my father's house. Dependence on him (“like dad”).
3. The beginning of love for Aksinya (thunderstorm on the river)
4. Skirmish with Stepan.
5 Matchmaking and marriage. ...
6. Leaving home with Aksinya to become farm laborers for the Listnitskys.
7. Conscription into the army.
8. Murder of an Austrian. Losing a foothold.
9. Wound. News of death received by relatives.
10. Hospital in Moscow. Conversations with Garanzha.
11. Break with Aksinya and return home.
Book two, parts 3-4
12. Etching the truth of Garanji. Going to the front as a “good Cossack.”
13.1915 Rescue of Stepan Astakhov.
14. Hardening of the heart. Chubaty's influence.
15. Premonition of trouble, injury.
16. Gregory and his children, desire for the end of the war.
17. On the side of the Bolsheviks. The influence of Izvarin and Podtelkov.
18. Reminder about Aksinya.
19. Wound. Massacre of prisoners.
20. Infirmary. “Who should I lean against?”
21. Family. "I am for Soviet power."
22. Unsuccessful elections to detachment atamans.
23. Last meeting with Podtelkov.
Book three, part 6
24. Conversation with Peter.
25. Anger towards the Bolsheviks.
26. Quarrel with father over stolen goods.
27. Unauthorized departure home.
28. The Melekhovs have Reds.
29. Dispute with Ivan Alekseevich about “male power.”
30. Drunkenness, thoughts of death.
31. Gregory kills the sailors
32. Conversation with grandfather Grishaka and Natalya.
33. Meeting with Aksinya.
Book four, Part 7:
34. Gregory in the family. Children, Natalya.
35. Gregory's dream.
36. Kudinov about Gregory’s ignorance.
37. Quarrel with Fitzkhalaurov.
38. Family breakdown.
39. The division is disbanded, Gregory is promoted to centurion.
40. Death of wife.
41. Typhoid and recovery.
42. Attempt to board a ship in Novorossiysk.
Part 8:
43. Grigory at Budyonny's.
44. Demobilization, conversation with. Mikhail.
45. Leaving the farm.
46. In Owl's gang, on the island.
47. Leaving the gang.
48. Death of Aksinya.
49. In the forest.
50. Returning home.
Conversation.
The image of Grigory Melekhov is central in M. Sholokhov’s epic novel “Quiet Don”. It is impossible to immediately say about him whether he is a positive or negative hero. For too long he wandered in search of the truth, his path. Grigory Melekhov appears in the novel primarily as a truth-seeker.
At the beginning of the novel, Grigory Melekhov is an ordinary farm boy with the usual range of household chores, activities, and entertainment. He lives thoughtlessly, like grass in the steppe, following traditional principles. Even love for Aksinya, which has captured his passionate nature, cannot change anything. He allows his father to marry him, and, as usual, prepares for military service. Everything in his life happens involuntarily, as if without his participation, just as he involuntarily dissects a tiny defenseless duckling while mowing - and shudders at what he has done.
Grigory Melekhov did not come into this world for bloodshed. But harsh life placed a saber in his hardworking hands. Gregory experienced the first shed of human blood as a tragedy. The image of the Austrian he killed later appears to him in a dream, causing mental pain. The experience of war completely turns his life upside down, makes him think, look into himself, listen, and take a closer look at people. Conscious life begins.
The Bolshevik Garanzha, who met Gregory in the hospital, seemed to reveal to him the truth and the prospect of change for the better. “Autonomist” Efim Izvarin and Bolshevik Fyodor Podtelkov played a significant role in shaping the beliefs of Grigory Melekhov. The tragically deceased Fyodor Podtelkov pushed Melekhov away, shedding the blood of unarmed prisoners who believed the promises of the Bolshevik who captured them. The senselessness of this murder and the callousness of the “dictator” stunned the hero. He is also a warrior, he killed a lot, but here not only the laws of humanity are violated, but also the laws of war.
“Honest to the core,” Grigory Melekhov cannot help but see the deception. The Bolsheviks promised that there would be no rich and poor. However, a year has already passed since the “Reds” were in power, and the promised equality is not there: “the platoon leader is in chrome boots, and the Vanyok is in windings.” Grigory is very observant, he tends to think about his observations, and the conclusions from his thoughts are disappointing: “If the gentleman is bad, then the boorish gentleman is a hundred times worse.”
The civil war throws Grigory either into the Budennovsky detachment or into the white formations, but this is no longer thoughtless submission to the way of life or a coincidence of circumstances, but a conscious search for the truth, the path. He sees his home and peaceful work as the main values of life. In war, shedding blood, he dreams of how he will prepare for sowing, and these thoughts make his soul warm.
The Soviet government does not allow the former ataman of the hundred to live peacefully and threatens him with prison or execution. The surplus appropriation system instills in the minds of many Cossacks the desire to “re-conquer the war”, to replace the workers’ government with their own, the Cossack’s. Gangs are forming on the Don. Grigory Melekhov, hiding from persecution by the Soviet regime, ends up in one of them, Fomin’s gang. But bandits have no future. For most Cossacks it is clear: they need to sow, not fight.
The main character of the novel is also drawn to peaceful labor. The last test, the last tragic loss for him is the death of his beloved woman - Aksinya, who received a bullet on the way, as it seems to them, to a free and happy life. Everything died. Gregory's soul is scorched. There remains only the last, but very important thread connecting the hero with life - this is his home. A house, a land waiting for its owner, and a little son - his future, his mark on the earth.
The depth of the contradictions through which the hero went through is revealed with amazing psychological authenticity and historical validity. The versatility and complexity of a person’s inner world is always the focus of M. Sholokhov’s attention. Individual destinies and a broad generalization of the paths and crossroads of the Don Cossacks allow us to see how complex and contradictory life is, how difficult it is to choose the true path.
What is the meaning of Sholokhov when he speaks of Gregory as a “good Cossack”? Why was Grigory Melekhov chosen as the main character?
(Grigory Melekhov is an extraordinary person, a bright individuality. He is sincere and honest in his thoughts and actions (especially in relation to Natalya and Aksinya (see episodes: last meeting with Natalya - part 7, chapter 7; Natalya’s death - part 7, chapter 16 -18;death of Aksinya). He has a responsive heart, a developed sense of pity and compassion (duckling in the hayfield, Franya, the execution of Ivan Alekseevich).
Grigory is a person capable of action (leaving Aksinya for Yagodnoye, breaking up with Podtelkov, clashing with Fitzkhalaurov - part 7, chapter 10; decision to return to the farm).
In which episodes is Gregory’s bright, extraordinary personality most fully revealed? The role of internal monologues. Does a person depend on circumstances or make his own destiny?
(He never lied to himself, despite doubts and tossing (see internal monologues - part 6, chapter 21). This is the only character whose thoughts are revealed by the author. War corrupts people and provokes them to commit acts that a person would never normally do did not commit. Gregory had a core that did not allow him to commit meanness even once. A deep attachment to home, to the land is the strongest spiritual movement: “My hands need to work, not fight.”
The hero is constantly in a situation of choice (“I’m looking for a way out myself”). Turning point: dispute and quarrel with Ivan Alekseevich Kotlyarov, Shtokman. The uncompromising nature of a man who never knew the middle. Tragedyas if transported into the depths of consciousness: “He painfully tried to understand the confusion of thoughts.” This is not political vacillation, but a search for truth. Gregory yearns for the truth, “under the wing of which everyone could warm themselves.” And from his point of view, neither the whites nor the reds have such truth: “There is no truth in life. It is clear that whoever defeats whom will devour him. And I was looking for the bad truth. I was sick at heart, I was swaying back and forth.” These searches turned out to be, as he believes, “in vain and empty.” And this is also his tragedy. A person is placed in inevitable, spontaneous circumstances and already in these circumstances he makes a choice, his destiny.) “What a writer needs most,” said Sholokhov, “he himself needs, is to convey the movement of a person’s soul. I wanted to talk about this charm of a person in Grigory Melekhov...”
Do you think the author of “Quiet Flows the Flow” manages to “convey the movement of the human soul” using the example of the fate of Grigory Melekhov? If so, what do you think is the main direction of this movement? What is its general character? Does the novel's protagonist have what you might call charm? If so, what is its charm? The main problematic of "Quiet Don" is revealed not in the character of one, even the main character, which is Grigory Melekhov, but in the comparison and contrast of many, many characters, in the entire figurative system, in the style and language of the work. But the image of Grigory Melekhov as a typical personality, as it were, concentrates the main historical and ideological conflict of the work and thereby unites all the details of a huge picture of the complex and contradictory life of many characters who are bearers of a certain attitude towards the revolution and the people in a given historical era.
How would you define the main issues of “Quiet Don”? What, in your opinion, allows us to characterize Grigory Melekhov as a typical personality? Can you agree that it is in it that “the main historical and ideological conflict of the work” is concentrated? Literary critic A.I. Khvatov states: “Grigory contained a huge reserve of moral forces necessary for the creative achievements of the emerging new life. No matter what complications and troubles befell him and no matter how painfully what he did under the influence of a wrong decision fell on his soul, Gregory never looked for motives that weakened his personal guilt and responsibility to life and people.”
What do you think gives a scientist the right to claim that “a huge reserve of moral forces was hidden in Gregory”? What actions do you think support this statement? What about against him? What “wrong decisions” does Sholokhov’s hero make? In your opinion, is it generally acceptable to talk about the “wrong decisions” of a literary hero? Think about this topic. Do you agree that “Gregory never looked for motives that weakened his personal guilt and responsibility to life and people”? Give examples from the text. “In the plot of the combination of motives, the inescapability of love that Aksinya and Natalya give him, the immensity of Ilyinichna’s maternal suffering, the devoted comradely loyalty of fellow soldiers and peers are artistically effective in revealing the image of Gregory,” especially Prokhor Zykov. Even those with whom his interests intersected dramatically, but to whom his soul was revealed... could not help but feel the power of his charm and generosity.”(A.I. Khvatov).
Do you agree that a special role in revealing the image of Grigory Melekhov is played by the love of Aksinya and Natalya, the suffering of his mother, as well as the comradely loyalty of fellow soldiers and peers? If so, how does this manifest itself in each of these cases?
With which of the heroes did Grigory Melekhov’s interests “dramatically intersect”? Can you agree that even these heroes reveal the soul of Grigory Melekhov, and they, in turn, were able to “feel the power of his charm and generosity”? Give examples from the text.
The critic V. Kirpotin (1941) reproached Sholokhov's heroes for primitivism, rudeness, and “mental underdevelopment”: “Even the best of them, Grigory, is slow-witted. A thought is an unbearable burden for him.”
Are there any among the heroes of “Quiet Don” who seemed to you rude and primitive, “mentally undeveloped” people? If so, what role do they serve in the novel?Do you agree that Sholokhov’s Grigory Melekhov is a “slow-witted” person, for whom thought is an “unbearable burden”? If yes, give specific examples of the hero’s “slow-mindedness,” his inability, and unwillingness to think. The critic N. Zhdanov noted (1940): “Gregory could have been with the people in their struggle... but he did not stand with the people. And this is his tragedy.”
In your opinion, is it fair to say that Gregory “did not stand with the people”? Are the people only those who are for the Reds?What do you think is the tragedy of Grigory Melekhov? (This question can be left as homework for a detailed written answer.)
Homework.
How do the events that gripped the country compare with the events in Grigory Melekhov’s personal life?
