- Essays
- On literature
- Bitter
- Truth and lies in the play At the Bottom
For many years, humanity has always been concerned with the problem of what truth means and what lies are. Colliding, these concepts always stand together and occupy almost the main place in the works of Russian writers. The play “At the Bottom” was no exception. In this work, Gorky talks about 2 types of humanism. If, on the part of Luke, we see a call for sympathy, reconciling with the hardships of life, then Satin puts forward the idea of fighting injustice.
In order to understand who remains right here - Luke or Satin, we turn to the text of the play. At first, we see a basement with heavy and stuffy air, people living there, constantly swearing and living in a world of robbery and debauchery. After a certain time, in the shelter we see Luka, who began to calm the residents with his kind speech. They had never seen such an attentive attitude towards themselves. They were waiting for just such a person who could calm and cheer. After all, no one had addressed the inhabitants of the shelter for a long time in a friendly way. Of course, empathy is important in such a cruel world. It helps you realize that you are not completely alone and without support. It is then that all problems will be solved faster and easier. . But everything should be in moderation. The most important thing is not to cross the line between harm and benefit.
It is clearly visible that Luke took the wrong path, not trying to make any changes in the lives of these people. But it is unlikely that this kind of help was what these inhabitants needed. Perhaps dying Anna needed such a presence to brighten up her last minutes. However, such reassurance is not typical for everyone. With his sugary beliefs, he placed the inhabitants of the basement in an illusory world. The wanderer, who encouraged people to endure hardships and hardships, eradicated the ability to fight in the inhabitants of the basement. Before his arrival, the inhabitants were already inactive, but now they were generally in illusory dreams. It is impossible to live in such dreams all the time; one day you need to hear the truth. Luke's philosophy fails. The fate of the heroes is dramatic - the actor commits suicide, Nastya’s life is ruined.
We see that the author shows more sympathy for the ideas of Satin, who preached the truth. After all, only truthfulness opens a person’s eyes to life. To lie is to show no respect for another person. However, Satin's theory was also not realized. After all, first of all, all these thoughts can be realized when you yourself are ready to change. The people of the shelter did not want to change anything, so they remained at the bottom.
The problem of true and false humanism has always been relevant and always solvable. Our generation is eliminating this problem in accordance with the moral ideals of the time. Therefore, this work is relevant at all times.
