War is a difficult and terrible time in the life of any people. It is during the period of world confrontations that the fate of the nation is decided, and then it is very important not to lose self-esteem, self-respect, and love for people. In a time of difficult trials, during the Great Patriotic War, our entire country has risen to defend our homeland against a common enemy. For writers, poets, and journalists at that time it was important to support the morale of the army and to help morally the people in the rear.

A.T. During the Great Patriotic War, Tvardovsky became an exponent of the spirit of soldiers and ordinary people. His poem “Vasily Terkin” helps people survive a terrible time, believe in themselves, because the poem was created during the war, chapter by chapter. The poem “Vasily Terkin” was written about the war, but the main thing for Alexander Tvardovsky was to show the reader how to live in times of difficult trials. That's why main character his poem, Vasya Terkin, dances, plays musical instrument, preparing dinner, joking. The hero lives in war, and for the writer this is very important, since in order to survive, any person needs to love life very much.

The composition of the poem also helps to reveal military theme works. Each chapter has a complete structure, complete in thought. The writer explains this fact by the peculiarities of wartime; Some readers may not live to see the release of the next chapter, and for others it will not be possible to receive a newspaper with a certain part of the poem. The title of each chapter (“Crossing”, “About the reward”, “Two Soldiers”) reflects the event described. The connecting center of the poem becomes the image of the main character - Vasya Terkin, who not only raises the morale of soldiers, but also helps people survive the difficulties of wartime.

The poem was written in difficult wartime field conditions, so the writer took the language of the work from life itself. In “Vasily Terkin” the reader will encounter many stylistic turns inherent in colloquial speech:

- It’s a pity, I haven’t heard from him for a long time,

Maybe something bad happened?

Maybe there's a problem with Terkin?

There are both synonyms and rhetorical questions and exclamations, and folklore epithets and comparisons characteristic of a poetic work written for the people: “bullet-fool.” Tvardovsky brings the language of his creation closer to folk models, to living speech structures that are understandable to every reader:

Terkin said at that moment:

“It’s over for me, it’s over for the war.”

Thus, the poem, as if in a leisurely manner, tells about the vicissitudes of war, making the reader an accomplice of the events depicted. The problems raised by the writer in this work also help to reveal the military theme of the poem: attitude towards death, the ability to stand up for oneself and others, a sense of responsibility and duty to the homeland, the relationship between people at critical moments in life. Tvardovsky talks with the reader about painful issues, using a special artistic character - the image of the author. Chapters “About Myself” appear in the poem. This is how the writer brings his main character closer to his own worldview. Together with his character, the author empathizes, sympathizes, feels satisfied or indignant:

From the first days of the bitter year,

In the difficult hour of our native land,

Not joking, Vasily Terkin,

You and I have become friends...

The war described by Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky in the poem does not seem to the reader a universal catastrophe, an unspeakable horror. Because the main character works - Vasya Terkin - is always able to survive in difficult conditions, laugh at himself, support a friend, and this is especially important for the reader - it means there will be a different life, people will start laughing heartily, singing songs loudly, making jokes - he will come Peaceful time. The poem “Vasily Terkin” is full of optimism, faith in a better future.

The name of Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky, the greatest Soviet poet, laureate of the Lenin and State Prizes, is widely known in our country.

Freedom, humor, truthfulness, daring, naturalness of immersion in the elements folk life and folk speech conquered and are conquering Tvardovsky’s readers.

His poems enter the consciousness of the reader from childhood: “The Country of Ant”, “Terkin in the Other World”, “House by the Road”, “Beyond the Distance”, lyrics, etc.

Alexander Tvardovsky is one of the most dramatic figures in literature and Soviet reality of the mid-20th century, a great national poet.

Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky was born in 1910 in one of the farms in the Smolensk region, into a peasant family. For the formation of the personality of the future poet, the relative erudition of his father and the love of books that he brought up in his children were also important. “Whole winter evenings“,” writes Tvardovsky in his autobiography, “we often indulged in reading a book out loud. My first acquaintance with “Poltava” and “Dubrovsky” by Pushkin, “Taras Bulba” by Gogol, the most popular poems by Lermontov, Nekrasov, A.K. Tolstoy, Nikitin happened in exactly this way.”

In 1938, something happened in Tvardovsky’s life an important event- He joined the ranks of the Communist Party. In the fall of 1939, immediately after graduating from the Moscow Institute of History, Philosophy and Literature (IFLI), the poet participated in the liberation campaign Soviet army to Western Belarus (as a special correspondent for a military newspaper). The first meeting with the heroic people in a military situation was great importance for the poet. According to Tvardovsky, the impressions he received then preceded those deeper and stronger ones that washed over him during the Second World War. Artists drew interesting pictures depicting the unusual front-line adventures of the experienced soldier Vasya Terkin, and poets composed text for these pictures. Vasya Terkin is a popular character who performed supernatural, dizzying feats: he mined a tongue, pretending to be a snowball, covered his enemies with empty barrels and lit a cigarette while sitting on one of them, “he takes the enemy with a bayonet, like sheaves with a pitchfork.” This Terkin and his namesake - the hero of Tvardovsky's poem of the same name, who gained nationwide fame - are incomparable.

For some slow-witted readers, Tvardovsky will subsequently specifically hint at the deep difference that exists between the real hero and his namesake:

Is it now possible to conclude

What, they say, grief is not a problem,

What guys got up and took

A village without difficulty?

What about constant luck?

Terkin accomplished the feat:

Russian wooden spoon

Killed eight Krauts!

The first morning of the Great Patriotic War found Tvardovsky in the Moscow region, in the village of Gryazi, Zvenigorod district, at the very beginning of his vacation. In the evening of the same day he was in Moscow, and a day later he was sent to the headquarters of the Southwestern Front, where he was to work in the front-line newspaper “Red Army”.

Some light on the poet’s life during the war is shed by his prose essays “Motherland and Foreign Land,” as well as the memoirs of E. Dolmatovsky, V. Muradyan, E. Vorobyov, 0. Vereisky, who knew Tvardovsky in those years, V. Lakshin and V. Dementiev , to whom Alexander Trifonovich later told a lot about his life. Thus, he told V. Lakshin that “in 1941, near Kiev... he barely escaped the encirclement. The editorial office of the Southwestern Front newspaper, where he worked, was located in Kyiv. It was ordered not to leave the city until last hour... The army units had already retreated beyond the Dnieper, and the editorial office was still working... Tvardovsky was saved by a miracle: the regimental commissar took him into his car, and they barely jumped out of the closing ring of German encirclement.” In the spring of 1942, he was surrounded for the second time - this time near Kanev, from which, according to I. S. Marshak, he emerged again “by a miracle.” In mid-1942, Tvardovsky was moved from the Southwestern Front to the Western Front, and now, until the very end of the war, the editorial office of the front-line newspaper “Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda” became his home. It became the home of the legendary Tyorkin.

During the war years, A. Tvardovsky created his most famous poem “Vasily Terkin”. His hero has become a symbol of the Russian soldier, his image is an extremely generalized, collective, folk character in its best manifestations. And at the same time, Terkin is not an abstract ideal, but a living person, a cheerful and crafty interlocutor. His image combines the richest literary and folklore traditions, and modernity, and autobiographical features that make him similar to the author (it is not for nothing that he is from Smolensk, and in the monument to Terkin, which has now been decided to be erected on Smolensk soil, it is not at all by chance decided to indicate the portrait resemblance of the hero and its creator).

They say that they were going to erect or have already erected a monument to the fighter Vasily Terkin. A monument to a literary hero is a rare thing in general, and especially in our country. But it seems to me that Tvardovsky’s hero rightfully deserved this honor. After all, along with him, the monument is also received by millions of those who in one way or another resembled Vasily, who loved their country and did not spare their blood, who found a way out of a difficult situation and knew how to brighten up front-line difficulties with a joke, who loved to play the accordion and listen to music on the halt. Many of them did not even find their grave. Let the monument to Vasily Terkin be a monument to them too.

If you asked me why Vasily Terkin became one of my favorite literary heroes, I would say: “I like his love of life.” Look, he’s at the front, where there’s death every day, where no one is “bewitched from a stupid fragment, from any stupid bullet.” Sometimes he is cold or hungry, and has no news from his relatives. But he does not lose heart. Lives and enjoys life:

"After all, he is in the kitchen - from his place,

From place to battle,

Smokes, eats and drinks with gusto

Any position."

"I will scream, howl in pain,

Die in the field without a trace,

But of your own free will

I will never give up"

He whispers. And the warrior conquers death.

“The Book about a Soldier” was very necessary at the front; it raised the spirit of soldiers and encouraged them to fight for their homeland until the last drop of blood.

Terkin is both a fighter, a hero who performs fantastic feats, described with the hyperbolic nature inherent in the folklore type of narration (for example, in the chapter “Who Shot?” he shoots down an enemy plane with a rifle), and a man of extraordinary fortitude - in the chapter “Crossing” the feat is told - Terkin swims across the icy river to report that the platoon is on the right bank - and he is a craftsman, a jack of all trades. The poem was written with that amazing classical simplicity, which the author himself designated as a creative task:

"Let the probable reader

He will say with a book in his hand:

- Here are the poems, and everything is clear,

Everything is in Russian."

Terkin embodies best features Russian soldier and people as a whole. A hero named Vasily Terkin first appears in the poetic feuilletons of the Tvardov period of the Soviet-Finnish war (1939-1940). The words of the hero of the poem:

“I am the second, brother, war

I'll fight forever"

The poem is structured as a chain of episodes from the military life of the protagonist, which do not always have a direct event connection with each other. Terkin humorously tells young soldiers about the everyday life of war; He says that he has been fighting since the very beginning of the war, he was surrounded three times, and was wounded. The fate of an ordinary soldier, one of those who bore the brunt of the war on their shoulders, becomes the personification of national fortitude and the will to live. Terkin swims twice across the icy river to restore contact with the advancing units; Terkin alone occupies a German dugout, but comes under fire from his own artillery; on the way to the front, Terkin finds himself in the house of old peasants, helping them with the housework; Terkin enters hand-to-hand combat with the German and, with difficulty, defeating him, takes him prisoner. Unexpectedly, Terkin shoots down a German attack aircraft with a rifle; Sergeant Terkin reassures the jealous sergeant:

“Don’t worry, the German has this

Not the last plane"

Terkin takes command of the platoon when the commander is killed, and is the first to break into the village; however, the hero is again seriously wounded. Lying wounded in a field, Terkin talks with Death, who persuades him not to cling to life; Eventually he is discovered by the fighters and he tells them:

"Take this woman away

I am a soldier still alive"

The image of Vasily Terkin combines the best moral qualities of the Russian people: patriotism, readiness for heroism, love of work.

The character traits of the hero are interpreted by the poet as traits of a collective image: Terkin is inseparable and integral from the militant people. It is interesting that all fighters - regardless of their age, tastes, military experience - feel good with Vasily; Wherever he appears - in battle, on vacation, on the road - contact, friendliness, and mutual disposition are instantly established between him and the fighters. Literally every scene speaks to this. The soldiers listen to Terkin’s playful bickering with the cook at the hero’s first appearance:

And sitting down under a pine tree,

He eats porridge, hunched over.

"Mine?" - fighters among themselves, -

I don’t need, brothers, orders,

I don't need fame.

In the poem “Vasily Terkin”, A.T. Tvardovsky’s field of vision includes not only the front, but also those who work in the rear for the sake of victory: women and old people. The characters in the poem not only fight, they laugh, love, talk to each other, and most importantly, they dream of a peaceful life. The reality of war unites what is usually incompatible: tragedy and humor, courage and fear, life and death.

The poem “Vasily Terkin” is distinguished by its peculiar historicism. Conventionally, it can be divided into three parts, coinciding with the beginning, middle and end of the war. Poetic understanding of the stages of the war creates a lyrical chronicle of events from the chronicle. A feeling of bitterness and sorrow fills the first part, faith in victory fills the second, the joy of the liberation of the Fatherland becomes the leitmotif of the third part of the poem. This is explained by the fact that A.T. Tvardovsky created the poem gradually, throughout the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945.

The theme of war is deeply and fully explored in the works of the great 20th century writer Mikhail Sholokhov.

Mikhail Sholokhov, everyone opens it in their own way. Everyone likes their own hero from Sholokhov's stories. This is understandable. After all, the fate of the heroes, the problems raised by Sholokhov, are consonant with our time.

But my Sholokhov is not only the author of works. He is, first of all, a man of an interesting, bright destiny. Judge for yourself: at the age of sixteen, young Sholokhov miraculously survived, falling into the hands of the power-hungry Nestor Makhno; in thirty-seven he more than once rescued his friends from persecution and repression. They accused him of plagiarism, sympathizing with the white movement, they tried to poison him and kill him. Yes, many trials befell this writer. But he did not become like the grass that “grows, obediently bending under the disastrous breath of everyday storms.” Despite everything, Sholokhov remained a straightforward, honest, truthful person. In his work, Sholokhov expressed his attitude to the war, which was a tragedy for the people. It is destructive for both sides, brings irreparable losses, cripples souls. The writer is right: it is unacceptable when people, rational beings, come to barbarism and self-destruction.

At the very height of the Great Patriotic War, Sholokhov began work on the novel “They Fought for the Motherland.” In 1943, the first chapters began to be published in newspapers, and then came out as a separate publication. The published chapters tell about the dramatic period of the retreat of Russian troops under the pressure of superior forces The Russian soldiers retreated after heavy fighting, and then fought to the death at Stalingrad.

The novel simply and truthfully reproduces the heroism of Soviet soldiers, front-line life, friendly conversations, and unbreakable friendship sealed with blood. The reader came to know and love miner worker Pyotr Lopakhin, combine operator Ivan Zvyagintsev, agronomist Nikolai Streltsov, Siberian armor-piercing specialist Akim Borzykh, and corporal Kochetygov.

Very different in character, they are connected at the front by male friendship and boundless devotion to the Motherland.

Nikolai Streltsov is depressed by the retreat of his regiment and by personal grief: his wife left before the war, he left his children with his old mother. This does not stop him from fighting heroically. In battle, he was shell-shocked and deaf, but he escapes from the hospital to the regiment, in which only twenty-seven people remained after the fighting: “The bleeding from my ears stopped flowing, the nausea almost stopped. Why would I lie there... And then, I simply couldn’t stay there. The regiment was in a very difficult situation, there were only a few of you left... How could I not come? Even a deaf person can fight alongside his comrades, right Petya?”

Pyotr Lopakhin “... wanted to hug and kiss Streltsov, but his throat was suddenly seized by a hot spasm...”.

Ivan Zvyagintsev, before the war, a combine operator, a hero, a simple-minded man, seeks to console Streltsov, complaining to him about his supposedly unsuccessful family life. Sholokhov describes this story with humor.

The words of division commander Marchenko - “let the enemy temporarily triumph, but victory will be ours” - reflected the optimistic idea of ​​the novel and its chapters, published in 1949.

Sholokhov's meeting with General Lukin led to the appearance of a new hero in the novel - General Streltsov, brother of Nikolai Streltsov. In 1936, Lukin was repressed, in 1941 he was released, reinstated and sent to the army. Lukin's 19th Army took on the attack from Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group and part of the divisions of Strauss's 9th Army west of Vyazma. For a week, Lukin's army held back the German advance. General Lukin was seriously wounded and captured during the battle. He bravely endured all the hardships of captivity.

In the novel, General Streltsov, having returned from “places not so distant” to his brother’s house, is resting. Unexpectedly, he was summoned to Moscow: “Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov remembered me! Well, let’s serve the Motherland and our Communist Party!”

Strong emotional impact produce all the battle episodes. Here we see how “one hundred and seventeen soldiers and commanders - the remnants of a regiment brutally battered in the last battles - walked in a closed column,” how the soldiers preserved the regimental banner.

Lopakhin is grieving the death of the heroically fighting lieutenant Goloshchekov. Sergeant Major Poprishchenko said at Goloshchekov’s grave: “Maybe you, Comrade Lieutenant, will still hear our walk...” Lopakhin speaks with admiration about Kochetygov: “How did he set fire to the tank? The tank had already crushed him, half asleep, and crushed his entire chest. Blood was pouring out of his mouth, I saw it myself, and he stood up in the trench, dead, stood up, taking his last breath! And he threw the bottle... And lit it!”

During the battle, Lopakhin knocked out a tank and shot down a heavy bomber.

During the retreat, Streltsov worries: “... with what eyes the residents see us off...” Lopakhin also experiences this, but replies: “Are they beating us? So, they serve it right. Better fight, sons of bitches!”

Combine operator Zvyagintsev sees burning ripe bread for the first time in the expanse of the steppe. His soul was “sick.” He says to the ear of corn: “My dear, how smoked have you become! You stink of smoke, like a gypsy... That’s what the damned German, his ossified soul, did to you.”

Descriptions of nature in the novel are linked to the military situation. For example, before Streltsov’s eyes stands a killed young machine gunner who fell between blooming sunflowers: “Maybe it was beautiful, but in war external beauty looks blasphemous...”

It is appropriate to recall one meeting between Sholokhov and Stalin, which took place on May 21, 1942, when Sholokhov came from the front to celebrate his birthday. Stalin invited Sholokhov to his place and advised him to create a novel in which “truthfully and vividly... both heroic soldiers and brilliant commanders, participants in the current terrible war were depicted...”. In 1951, Sholokhov admitted that “the image of a great commander does not work out.”

Based on the novel “They Fought for the Motherland,” S. Bondarchuk directed a film approved by Sholokhov himself.

The novel “They Fought for the Motherland” deeply reveals the Russian national character, which clearly manifested itself in the days of difficult trials. The heroism of the Russian people in the novel is devoid of outwardly brilliant manifestations and appears before us in the modest attire of ordinary, everyday life, battles, and transitions. Such a depiction of the war leads the reader to the conclusion that the heroic is not in individual exploits, although very bright, calling for oneself, but the whole front-line life is a feat.

Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov is a wonderful master of words, who managed to create monumental canvases of folk life, penetrate into peace of mind man, he conducts a serious conversation with the reader “without the slightest concealment, without the slightest falsehood.”

During the Great Patriotic War, the writer was faced with the task of striking the enemy with his word, full of burning hatred, and strengthening the love of the Motherland among the Soviet people. In the early spring of 1946, i.e. In the first post-war spring, Sholokhov accidentally met an unknown man on the road and heard his confession story. For ten years the writer nurtured the idea of ​​the work, events became a thing of the past, and the need to speak out increased. And so in 1956, the epic story “The Fate of Man” was completed in a few days. This is a story about the great suffering and great resilience of the ordinary Soviet man. The main character Andrei Sokolov lovingly embodies the traits of the Russian character, enriched by the Soviet way of life: perseverance, patience, modesty, a sense of human dignity, merged with a feeling of Soviet patriotism, with great responsiveness to the misfortune of others, with a sense of collective cohesion.

The fate of Sokolov, the main character of this story, is full of such difficult trials, such terrible losses that it seems impossible for a person to endure all this and not break down, not lose heart. It is no coincidence that this man is taken and shown in extreme tension of mental strength. The hero's whole life passes before us. He is the same age as the century. Since childhood, I learned how much a “pound is dashing”, in civil war fought against the enemies of Soviet power. Then he leaves his native Voronezh village for Kuban. Returns home, worked as a carpenter, mechanic, driver, and created a beloved family. The war destroyed all hopes and dreams. He goes to the front. From the beginning of the war, from its first months, he was wounded twice, shell-shocked, and finally, the worst thing, he was captured. The hero had to experience inhuman physical and mental torment, hardship, and torment. For two years Sokolov experienced the horrors of fascist captivity. At the same time, he managed to maintain the activity of the position. He tries to escape, but is unsuccessful, he deals with a coward, a traitor who is ready, to save his own skin, to betray the commander. Self-esteem, enormous fortitude and self-control were revealed with great clarity in the moral duel between Sokolov and Muller. An exhausted, exhausted, exhausted prisoner is ready to face death with such courage and endurance that it amazes even the concentration camp commandant who has lost his human appearance. Andrei still manages to escape and becomes a soldier again. But troubles do not leave him: his home was destroyed, his wife and daughter were killed by a fascist bomb. Sokolov now lives in one word - with the hope of meeting his son. And this meeting took place. For the last time the hero stands at the grave of his son who died in last days war. It would seem that everything is over, but life “distorted” a person, but could not break and kill the living soul in him. Sokolov's post-war fate is not easy, but he steadfastly and courageously overcomes his grief and loneliness, despite the fact that his soul is filled with a constant feeling of grief. This internal tragedy requires great effort and will of the hero. Sokolov wages a continuous struggle with himself and emerges victorious; he gives joy little man, adopting an orphan like him, Vanyusha, a boy with “eyes as bright as the sky.” The meaning of life is found, grief is overcome, life triumphs. “And I would like to think,” writes Sholokhov, “that this Russian man, a man of unbending will, will endure, and near his father’s shoulder will grow one who, having matured, will be able to withstand everything, overcome everything on his way, if his Motherland calls him to this.” .

Sholokhov's story is imbued with a deep, bright faith in man. At the same time, its title is symbolic, because this is not just the fate of the soldier Andrei Sokolov, but it is a story about the fate of a person, about the fate of the people. The writer recognizes himself as obligated to tell the world the harsh truth about the enormous price the Soviet people paid for humanity’s right to the future. All this determines the outstanding role of this short story. “If you really want to understand why Soviet Russia won a great victory in the Second World War, watch this film,” one English newspaper wrote about the film “The Fate of Man,” and therefore about the story itself.

Let us remember the time in which the works of Tvardovsky and Sholokhov were created. Stalin's inhumane policies had already triumphed in the country, general fear and suspicion had penetrated all layers of society, collectivization and its consequences had destroyed the centuries-old Agriculture and undermined the best forces of the people. All this left its mark on literature. Therefore, most works of pre-war literature portrayed the Russian people as dark and downtrodden. Any manifestations of living feelings were considered sedition.

But the Great Patriotic War broke out, which required the country to exert all its physical and spiritual strength. The country's leadership understood that the war could not be won without a popular upsurge. And the people themselves, feeling a mortal threat not only to their freedom, but also to the very existence of the Russian land, from the first days of the war showed miracles of fortitude and heroism.

This is a manifestation folk character was noticed in military literature. Works by I. Ehrenburg, A. Tolstoy, K. Simonov, A. Tvardovsky, A. Surkov, M. Sholokhov appear in front-line newspapers, in which the ordinary Russian person is portrayed with warmth and sympathy, the authors treat the courage of their heroes with respect and love . In this row are the heroes of the works of Tvardovsky and Sholokhov - Vasily Terkin and Andrei Sokolov. At first glance, they seem to be completely opposite figures. Indeed, Terkin is a cheerful fellow, they say about such people “that he won’t go into his pocket for a good word.” Sokolov, on the other hand, is a tragic figure, his every word is suffered and carries the burden of everyday suffering. But, despite the apparent differences, there is something that unites these heroes. Both of them are representatives of the people, bright bearers of their original individuality, those traits that are inherent in the character of the entire people. These traits are common in Terkin and Sokolov.

The main one of these traits is love and affection for one’s native country. The heroes of both writers constantly remember their native places, the Motherland. What attracts people in these heroes is mercy and greatness of soul. They went to war not because of a warlike instinct, but “for the sake of life on earth.” The defeated enemy only evokes in them a feeling of pity (Terkin’s appeal to the German).

Another important trait of heroes is modesty. Terkin, although he can sometimes boast, tells his friends that he does not need an order, he “agrees to a medal.” In Sokolov, this same trait is evidenced by the obvious reluctance with which he began a bitter story about his life. After all, he has nothing to be ashamed of! In his youth, he made mistakes, but the dedication that he showed during the testing years should have atoneed for his sins a hundredfold.

The heroes of Sholokhov and Tvardovsky have such charming traits as worldly savvy, a mocking attitude towards enemies and any difficulties. Terkin is the most characteristic exponent of these qualities. Let us remember his playful appeal to Death. The next trait is heroism. Let us remember the behavior of Andrei Sokolov in captivity, the heroism of Terkin at the front, when he had to swim across the Dnieper twice in November to save his own and ask for reinforcements.

All of the above leads us to an important conclusion about the great vitality of the heroes, the strength of the people's character. Here Sholokhov and Tvardovsky continue the tradition begun in Russian literature by the works of Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Leskov and other writers, in which the simple Russian person is the focus of the strength and vitality of the people. The actions of Terkin and Sokolov lead the reader to realize the greatness of the Russian people and refute the dogmas of the stilted literature of the “class approach”.

The battle is holy and just.
Mortal combat is not for glory,
For the sake of life on earth...

Tvardovsky’s poem was precisely an expression of the unity of the national spirit. The poet specifically chose the simplest folk language for the poem. He did this so that his words and thoughts would reach every compatriot. When, for example, Vasily Terkin told his fellow soldiers that

Russia, old mother,
There is no way we can lose.
Our grandfathers, our children,
Our grandchildren do not order, -

These words could be repeated with him by a Ural steelworker, a peasant from Siberia, a Belarusian partisan, and a scientist from Moscow.
The poet, together with his hero, survived all the hardships and bitterness of the war. He truthfully describes the drama of the retreat of our army, the life of a soldier, the fear of death, the grief of a soldier who hurries to his newly liberated native village and learns that he no longer has a home or relatives. One cannot indifferently read the lines about how

Homeless and rootless
Returning to the battalion,
The soldier ate his cold soup
After all, and he cried.
On the edge of a dry ditch,
With a bitter, childish trembling of the mouth,
I cried, sitting with a spoon in my right,
With bread in the left - an orphan.

The truth that Tvardovsky’s poem carries is often very bitter, but never cold. It is always warmed by the author’s warmth, his sympathy for the soldiers of our army and “ours” in general - this kind word of that war time is heard more than once in the poem. I like that love and kindness are present here not in the form of any special explanations, but simply live in every word, in every intonation.

Look - and really - guys!
How, in truth, yellow-throated
Is he single, married,
These shorn people...
Past their swirling temples,
Near their boyish eyes
Death whistled often in battle
And will there be a blowjob this time?

All these guys, not excluding Terkin himself, - simple people, and they are shown in the most everyday circumstances. The author specifically avoids describing heroic moments, because from his own experience he knows: war is hard work. In his case, “the infantry is dozing, huddled, with their hands in their sleeves” or “a rare rain is falling, an angry cough is tormenting the chest. Not a scrap of native newspaper—to wrap a goat’s leg.” The fighters' conversations are not at all about “high” topics - for example, about the advantage of a boot over a felt boot. And they end their “war-work” not under the columns of the Reichstag, not at a festive parade, but where in Russia all suffering usually ends - in the bathhouse.
So, in Tvardovsky’s poem an ordinary person, an ordinary soldier, became the symbol of the victorious people. The poet made his experiences understandable and close to us, his descendants. We treat his Vasily Terkin with gratitude and love. These same advantages and also its democracy, “a book for a fighter” became close to front-line readers.
It is known that for works of art time is the most important critic, and many books do not withstand this cruel test. Our time is also not the last milestone on the path of Tvardovsky’s work. Perhaps the next generations of Russians will read it from a different angle. But I am sure that the poem will still be read, because the conversation in it is about the enduring values ​​of our life - homeland, goodness, truth. The author, as if foreseeing the future life of his work, made the end of the poem with parting words:

The story of a memorable time,
This book is about a fighter
I started from the middle
And ended without end

With a thought, perhaps daring
Dedicate your favorite work
The fallen in sacred memory,
To all friends during the war,
To all hearts whose judgment is dear.

I believe that Tvardovsky is absolutely right - real poetry has neither an end nor a beginning. And if it was born from thoughts about the fate and military feat of an entire people, then it can even count on eternity.

War is a difficult and terrible time in the life of any people. It is during the period of world confrontations that the fate of the nation is decided, and then it is very important not to lose self-esteem, self-respect, and love for people. In a time of difficult trials, during the Great Patriotic War, our entire country rose to defend our homeland against a common enemy. For writers, poets, and journalists at that time it was important to support the morale of the army and to help morally the people in the rear.

A.T. During the Great Patriotic War, Tvardovsky became an exponent of the spirit of soldiers and ordinary people. His poem “Vasily Terkin” helps people survive a terrible time, believe in themselves, because the poem was created during the war, chapter by chapter. The poem “Vasily Terkin” was written about the war, but the main thing for Alexander Tvardovsky was to show the reader how to live in times of difficult trials. Therefore, the main character of his poem, Vasya Terkin, dances, plays a musical instrument, cooks dinner, and jokes. The hero lives in war, and for the writer this is very important, since in order to survive, any person needs to love life very much.

The composition of the poem also helps to reveal the military theme of the work. Each chapter has a complete structure, complete in thought. The writer explains this fact by the peculiarities of wartime; Some readers may not live to see the release of the next chapter, and for others it will not be possible to receive a newspaper with a certain part of the poem. The title of each chapter (“Crossing”, “About the reward”, “Two Soldiers”) reflects the event described. The connecting center of the poem becomes the image of the main character - Vasya Terkin, who not only raises the morale of soldiers, but also helps people survive the difficulties of wartime.

The poem was written in difficult wartime field conditions, so the writer took the language of the work from life itself. In “Vasily Terkin” the reader will encounter many stylistic turns inherent in colloquial speech:

- It’s a pity, I haven’t heard from him for a long time,

Maybe something bad happened?

Maybe there's a problem with Terkin?

There are synonyms, rhetorical questions and exclamations, and folklore epithets and comparisons characteristic of a poetic work written for the people: “bullet-fool.” Tvardovsky brings the language of his creation closer to folk models, to living speech structures that are understandable to every reader:

Terkin said at that moment:

“It’s over for me, it’s over for the war.”

Thus, the poem, as if in a leisurely manner, tells about the vicissitudes of war, making the reader an accomplice of the events depicted. The problems raised by the writer in this work also help to reveal the military theme of the poem: attitude towards death, the ability to stand up for oneself and others, a sense of responsibility and duty to the homeland, the relationship between people at critical moments in life. Tvardovsky talks with the reader about painful issues, using a special artistic character - the image of the author. Chapters “About Myself” appear in the poem. This is how the writer brings his main character closer to his own worldview. Together with his character, the author empathizes, sympathizes, feels satisfied or indignant:

From the first days of the bitter year,

In the difficult hour of our native land,

Not joking, Vasily Terkin,

You and I have become friends...

The war described by Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky in the poem does not seem to the reader a universal catastrophe, an unspeakable horror. Since the main character of the work - Vasya Terkin - is always able to survive in difficult conditions, laugh at himself, support a friend, and this is especially important for the reader - it means that there will be a different life, people will start laughing heartily, singing songs loudly, joking - a time of peace will come . The poem “Vasily Terkin” is full of optimism, faith in a better future.