Brief information about the work
The story “The Childhood Years of Bagrov the Grandson” was written in 1856 and first published in 1858 . This is the second part of the autobiographical trilogy of Sergei Timofeevich Aksakov. This story was written for children and dedicated to the writer’s granddaughter Olga Aksakova.
In the book, the author described the story of his childhood (he lived in the 18th–19th centuries ). The writer spent his childhood in the Southern Urals. The name of the main character of the story is the same as Aksakov’s, Sergei, but the author gave him a different surname - Bagrov. The narration is told from the perspective of this hero.
In the appendix to the story, Aksakov included the fairy tale “The Scarlet Flower,” which he heard from the housekeeper Palageya.
Other characters
- Seryozha's parents:
- Alexey Stepanovich - father, served in court, then retired. This quiet, calm man loved his family, parents and his family estate Bagrovo.
- Sofya Nikolaevna is a mother, an educated, intelligent, sensitive woman.
- Nadya is Seryozha’s younger sister, very attached to him.
- Seryozha's little brother.
- Efrem Evseev is a kind servant who loved Seryozha, who became like his uncle on the road to Parshino.
- Praskovya Ivanovna Kurolesova is Seryozha’s father’s rich aunt, imperious, capricious, and fair.
- Seryozha's aunts (father's sisters):
- Tatyana Stepanovna is an unmarried girl who lived with her parents in Bagrov.
- Alexandra Stepanovna treated her brother’s family with ridicule.
- Aksinya Stepanovna is Seryozha’s godmother, very kind and affectionate towards children.
- Elizaveta Stepanovna is very proud and did not communicate with her brother’s children.
- Parents of Seryozha's father:
- Stepan Mikhailovich is a gentleman, strict towards the serfs and even cruel.
- Arina Vasilyevna - his wife, Seryozha’s grandmother, was unkind to her grandson and treated the servants cruelly.
- Uncle Seryozha (mother's brothers):
- Sergei Nikolaevich - had a talent for drawing and taught his nephew to draw.
- Alexander Nikolaevich is a young man who loves to joke and make others laugh.
- Volkov is an adjutant, a friend of Sergei Nikolaevich and Alexander Nikolaevich.
- Matvey Vasilyevich is a teacher from a public school. He was kind and quiet when he studied with Seryozha, but he was very strict with the students at the school.
- Andryusha is a public school student, a quiet boy, he studied calligraphy with Seryozha.
- Mavlyut Iseich (Mavlyutka) is a Bashkir canton foreman, a very tall and fat man.
- The Chichagovs, friends of Seryozha’s parents:
- Pyotr Ivanovich is a very smart person, he treated Seryozha kindly.
- Ekaterina Borisovna was friends with Seryozha’s mother.
- Marya Mikhailovna Mertvago is the mother of Ekaterina Borisovna Chichagova. A delicate, intelligent woman.
- Alexandra Ivanovna Kovrigina is Seryozha’s cousin, an orphan, and a pupil of Praskovya Ivanovna. A very kind girl.
- Durasov is a rich, vain landowner who had a serf orchestra and serf singers who learned to sing in Moscow.
Summary of the childhood years of Bagrov, grandson of the Aksakovs - summaries of the works by chapter
The childhood years of Bagrov the grandson S. T. Aksakov The childhood years of Bagrov the grandson
The book, essentially a memoir, describes the first ten years of the child’s life (1790s), spent in Ufa and the villages of the Orenburg province.
The author reproduces children's perception, for which everything is new and everything is equally important; events are not divided into main and secondary: therefore, in “Childhood Years” there is practically no plot.
It all begins with incoherent but vivid memories of infancy and early childhood - a person remembers how he was taken away from his nurse, remembers a long illness from which he almost died - one sunny morning when he felt better, a strangely shaped bottle of Rhine wine, pendants pine resin in a new wooden house, etc. The most common image is the road: travel was considered medicine. (A detailed description of moves of hundreds of miles - to relatives, to visit, etc. - takes up most of the "Childhood Years".) Seryozha recovers after he becomes especially ill on a long journey and his parents, forced to stop in the forest, lay down gave him a bed in the tall grass, where he lay for twelve hours, unable to move, and “suddenly woke up as if.” After an illness, the child experiences “a feeling of pity for everyone who suffers.”
With every memory of Seryozha, “the constant presence of his mother merges,” who came out and loved him, perhaps for this reason, more than her other children.
Sequential memories begin at age four. Seryozha with his parents and younger sister live in Ufa. The disease “brought the boy’s nerves to extreme sensitivity.” According to the nanny, he is afraid of the dead, the dark, etc. (Various fears will continue to torment him). He was taught to read so early that he doesn’t even remember it; He had only one book, he knew it by heart and read it aloud to his sister every day; so when neighbor S.I. Anichkov gave him Novikov’s “Children’s Reading for the Heart and Mind,” the boy, carried away by the books, was “just like crazy.” He was especially impressed by articles explaining thunder, snow, metamorphoses of insects, etc.
The mother, exhausted by Seryozha’s illness, was afraid that she herself had fallen ill with consumption, the parents gathered in Orenburg to see a good doctor; The children were taken to Bagrovo, to their father’s parents. The road amazed the child: crossing Belaya, collected pebbles and fossils - “stuffs”, large trees, spending the night in the field and especially - fishing on the Dema, which immediately drove the boy crazy no less than reading, fire mined with flint, and the fire of a torch, springs, etc. Everything is curious, even “how the earth stuck to the wheels and then fell off from them in thick layers.” The father rejoices in all this together with Seryozha, but his beloved mother, on the contrary, is indifferent and even disgusted.
The people met along the way are not only new, but also incomprehensible: the joy of the ancestral Bagrov peasants who met their family in the village of Parashin is incomprehensible, the relationship of the peasants with the “terrible” headman, etc., is incomprehensible; The child sees, by the way, the harvest in the heat, and this evokes an “inexpressible feeling of compassion.”
The boy does not like patriarchal Bagrovo: the house is small and sad, his grandmother and aunt are dressed no better than the servants in Ufa, his grandfather is stern and scary (Seryozha witnessed one of his crazy fits of anger; later, when his grandfather saw that “mama’s boy” loves not only mother, but also father, their relationship with their grandson suddenly and dramatically changed). The children of the proud daughter-in-law, who “disdained” Bagrov, are not loved. In Bagrov, so inhospitable that even the children were poorly fed, the brother and sister lived for more than a month. Seryozha amuses himself by scaring his sister with stories of unprecedented adventures and reading aloud to her and his beloved “uncle” Yevseich. The aunt gave the boy a “Dream Book” and some kind of vaudeville, which greatly influenced his imagination.
After Bagrov, returning home had such an effect on the boy that he, again surrounded by common love, suddenly grew up. The mother’s young brothers, military men who graduated from the Moscow University Noble Boarding School, are visiting the house: from them Seryozha learns what poetry is, one of his uncles draws and teaches this to Seryozha, which makes the boy seem like a “superior being.” S.I. Anichkov gives new books: “Anabasis” by Xenophon and “Children’s Library” by Shishkov (which the author very much praises).
The uncles and their friend, adjutant Volkov, playfully tease the boy, among other things, because he cannot write; Seryozha is seriously offended and one day rushes to fight; they punish him and demand that he ask for forgiveness, but the boy considers himself right; alone in the room, placed in a corner, he dreams and finally falls ill from excitement and fatigue. The adults are ashamed, and the matter ends with a general reconciliation.
At Seryozha’s request, they begin to teach him how to write, inviting a teacher from a public school. One day, apparently on someone’s advice, Seryozha is sent there for a lesson: the rudeness of both the students and the teacher (who was so kind to him at home), the spanking of the guilty really frightens the child.
Seryozha’s father buys seven thousand acres of land with lakes and forests and calls it “Sergeevskaya wasteland,” which the boy is very proud of. The parents are going to Sergeevka to treat their mother with Bashkir kumiss in the spring, when Belaya opens. Seryozha cannot think about anything else and tensely watches the ice drift and the river flood.
In Sergeevka, the house for the gentlemen is not completed, but even this is amusing: “There are no windows or doors, but the fishing rods are ready.” Until the end of July, Seryozha, father and uncle Yevseich are fishing on Lake Kiishki, which the boy considers his own; Seryozha sees rifle hunting for the first time and feels “some kind of greed, some unknown joy.” Summer is spoiled only by guests, albeit infrequent ones: strangers, even peers, are a burden to Seryozha.
After Sergeevka, Ufa became disgusted. Seryozha is entertained only by a new gift from his neighbor: the collected works of Sumarokov and the poem “Rossiada” by Kheraskov, which he recites and tells his family various details about his favorite characters he has invented. The mother laughs, and the father worries: “Where do you get all this from? Don't become a liar." News arrives about the death of Catherine II, the people swear allegiance to Pavel Petrovich; The child listens carefully to conversations of worried adults that are not always clear to him.
The news arrives that grandfather is dying, and the family immediately gathers in Bagrovo. Seryozha is afraid to see his grandfather dying, he is afraid that his mother will get sick from all this, that in winter they will freeze on the way. On the way, the boy is tormented by sad premonitions, and faith in premonitions takes root in him from then on for the rest of his life.
The grandfather dies a day after his relatives arrive, the children have time to say goodbye to him; “all feelings” of Seryozha are “suppressed by fear”; His nanny Parasha’s explanations of why his grandfather doesn’t cry or scream are especially striking: he is paralyzed, “he looks with all his eyes and only moves his lips.” “I felt the infinity of torment, which cannot be told to others.”
The behavior of Bagrov’s relatives unpleasantly surprises the boy: four aunts howl, falling at the feet of their brother - “the real master of the house”, the grandmother emphatically cedes power to the mother, and the mother is disgusted. At the table, everyone except Mother is crying and eating with great appetite. And then, after lunch, in the corner room, looking at the ice-free Buguruslan, the boy first understands the beauty of winter nature.
Returning to Ufa, the boy again experiences a shock: giving birth to another son, his mother almost dies.
Having become the owner of Bagrovo after the death of his grandfather, Serezha’s father retires, and the family moves to Bagrovo to live permanently. Rural work (threshing, mowing, etc.) keeps Seryozha very busy; he doesn’t understand why his mother and little sister are indifferent to this. A kind boy tries to pity and console his grandmother, who quickly became decrepit after the death of her husband, whom he essentially did not know before; but her habit of beating servants, very common in the life of a landowner, quickly turns her grandson away from her.
Seryozha’s parents are invited to visit by Praskovya Kurolesova; Seryozha’s father is considered her heir and therefore will not contradict this smart and kind, but domineering and rude woman in anything. The rich, albeit somewhat lurid house of the widow Kurolesova at first seems to the child like a palace from Scheherazade’s fairy tales. Having made friends with Seryozha’s mother, the widow for a long time does not agree to let the family go back to Bagrovo; Meanwhile, the fussy life in someone else’s house, always filled with guests, tires Seryozha, and he impatiently thinks about Bagrov, who is already dear to him.
Returning to Bagrovo, Serezha truly sees spring for the first time in his life in the village: “I […] followed every step of spring. In every room, in almost every window, I noticed special objects or places on which I made my observations...” From excitement, the boy begins to experience insomnia; To help him fall asleep better, the housekeeper Pelageya tells him fairy tales, and among other things, “The Scarlet Flower” (this fairy tale is included in the appendix to “Childhood Years...”).
In the fall, at the request of Kurolesova, the Bagrovs visit Churasovo. Seryozha's father promised his grandmother to return to Pokrov; Kurolesova does not let guests go; On the night of Intercession, the father sees a terrible dream and in the morning receives news of his grandmother’s illness. The autumn road back is hard; crossing the Volga near Simbirsk, the family almost drowned. Grandmother died on the very Intercession; This terribly affects both Seryozha’s father and the capricious Kurolesova.
Next winter, the Bagrovs are going to Kazan to pray to the miracle workers there: not only Seryozha, but also his mother has never been there. They plan to spend no more than two weeks in Kazan, but everything turns out differently: Serezha awaits the “beginning of the most important event” in his life (Aksakov will be sent to a gymnasium). Here the childhood of Bagrov the grandson ends and adolescence begins.
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A very brief summary for a reader's diary
This story tells about Seryozha’s childhood - from the third to the ninth year of his life, about his moral growth.
The chapter “Fragmentary Memories” tells that Sergei’s very first memories of his childhood are associated with his nurse, little sister and mother. Then he remembers being very sick, remembers that he was often taken to villages, since the boy felt better on the road.
He also remembers that once in the garden he heard a squeal, it was a small puppy squealing. Seryozha and his mother began to look after him and named him Surka.
In the following chapters there are already sequential memories. After recovery, the boy learned to read. A neighbor gave him educational children's books, and Seryozha became very addicted to reading.
When my mother fell ill, my father took her to the doctor in Orenburg, and the children stayed with their grandparents on the Bagrovo estate. My father’s parents and his sister Tatyana Stepanovna did not treat Seryozha and his sister very kindly.
After more than a month, the parents returned, and the mother began to feel better. Returning to Ufa, the Bagrov family saw guests in their house - two of their mother’s brothers. They were dragoons and came on vacation. Seryozha first heard poetry from his uncles, and one of his uncles began to teach him to draw and write. When his uncles left, Seryozha was hired as a teacher, and under his guidance the boy wrote copybooks.
In the spring, the mother, on the advice of the doctor, needed to drink kumis, and the Bagrovs went to the village of Sergeevka. There Seryozha became an avid fisherman. At the end of July the family went home to Ufa. And in the winter, a letter was received that grandfather was dying. When the family arrived in Bagrovo, he was still alive, but soon died. My father decided to settle in Bagrov after he retired.
After arriving in Ufa, Seryozha’s brother was born, his father submitted his resignation and moved the family to Bagrovo.
There Seryozha selflessly fished and watched the quail hunt. He loved nature, but rejoiced at the sight of shot partridges.
The boy also observed the field work; he liked the deft work of the peasants.
Father’s rich aunt Praskovya Ivanovna invited his family to visit her village of Churasovo. Seryozha was bored there, and he was looking forward to returning home.
The chapter “The First Spring in the Village” tells how in Bagrov Seryozha himself established signs of the approach of spring. This first spring in the village was remembered by Seryozha not only because for the first time he very carefully watched how nature woke up, but also because he then heard the tales of the housekeeper Palageya.
When he caught a cold, the housekeeper Palageya began to tell him fairy tales (“The Scarlet Flower”, “The Firebird” and others). Having recovered, Seryozha began to observe how butterflies, ladybugs, bumblebees, bees, ants appeared, how birds made nests and raised chicks. The boy was especially shocked by the awakening of nature and the many migratory birds landing on the shores of the lake and river to rest.
Father, Seryozhin's uncle (that is, servant) Evseich and Seryozha were very happy about the arrival of spring. The three of them excitedly began to fish.
The boy saw how the peasants sowed grain in the field and how deftly they controlled the horses carrying the plows. And the horses that pulled the harrows were driven by village boys. Seryozha also tried to harrow, but he did not succeed, since it is very difficult to walk on plowed land and control a horse without skill.
Seryozha also liked how the peasants cut the grass together. He began to sympathize with them when his aunt said that mowing in such heat was very difficult.
Seryozha and his sister collected flowers and herbs, as well as worms. They placed the worms in boxes with grass and flowers and watched them transform into pupae and then into butterflies.
One day the women of the yard went to get milk mushrooms, and father and Seryozha went with them. There were a lot of mushrooms because the summer was hot, with frequent thunderstorms.
A landowner he knew gave Seryozha two pairs of two-crested and hairy-legged pigeons. They were placed in a huge cage in the yard, and Seryozha ran all the time to look at the pigeons and listen to their cooing. He took care of them, gave them food and water.
Father’s aunt Praskovya Ivanovna invited the Bagrovs to visit her in Churasovo. Seryozha and his sister did not want to go there, and his father was reluctant to leave his farm. But still I had to go, because my father was the heir of a rich aunt and had to obey her. Leaving their little brother in Bagrov, the family went to Churasovo. This ends the chapter “First Spring in the Village.” From this chapter it is clear that Seryozha showed such character traits as attentiveness, observation, curiosity, patience (patience was very necessary when fishing).
Aunt showed her huge garden, where apples of different varieties ripened. Seryozha liked the springs gushing out of the mountain.
In the fall, the family went to Bagrovo, since the grandmother was very sick, but they no longer found her alive.
After some time, Seryozha caught a bad cold, running out into the cold and damp weather to look at his pigeons. During this illness, he became even more attached to his mother, seeing how much she loved him and cared for him.
Soon a letter arrived from Praskovya Ivanovna, who again called them to Churasovo. When the Bagrovs arrived, she was very happy with them.
From Churasov, mother and father and Seryozha went to Kazan for two weeks, where the mother wanted to pray to the miracle workers there. They didn’t take their sister with them, she cried, and Seryozha, who felt sorry for her, also cried.
This is where Bagrov the grandson’s story about his childhood ended, because his childhood ended and adolescence began.
“The childhood years of Bagrov the grandson” - a reader’s diary based on the story by S. Aksakov
The story “The Childhood Years of Bagrov the Grandson” is the second part of Sergei Aksakov’s autobiographical trilogy, was published in 1856.
Description of the book for the reader's diary
Author:
Sergei Timofeevich Aksakov
Title of the work:
“The childhood years of Bagrov the grandson”
Genre:
story
Year of writing:
1856
Publisher:
Children’s literature
Year of publication:
2020
The main characters and their brief characteristics
Seryozha Bagrov is a little boy, kind, loving, open. The father is a caring, gentle, family man. The mother is a sickly, slightly nervous woman who loves Seryozha more than other children. Sister is Seryozha’s younger sister, who loves her brother very much. Grandparents are my father’s parents, old, strict people. Praskovya Ivanovna Kurolesova is my father’s aunt, a rich, powerful, but kind woman.
Summary and plot
First come the very vague memories of infancy: a nurse, a long serious illness, a new home. Most often, the image of the road and the mother who loved Seryozha more than other children comes to mind. After his illness, Seryozha became very sensitive and fearful. The boy was very keen on reading. The mother, who was trying her best to help her son, began to feel unwell, and together with his father went to Orenburg for treatment. The children were sent to their grandfather in Bagrovo. Seryozha doesn’t like it here: the grandfather was prone to outbursts of anger and treated his grandson coolly, considering him a “mama’s boy.”
Another long road and the children find themselves at home. Soon Seryozha begins to be taught writing. The father buys land in Sergeevka, where they move for the summer. The author often recalls books given to him as a child. He begins to invent all sorts of stories, amusing his mother and somewhat frightening his father.
The grandfather falls ill, and the family goes to Bagrovo. Seryozha is tormented by premonitions. Almost immediately after their arrival, the grandfather dies, and the boy thinks about suffering. A mother almost dies during the birth of another son. Soon they will permanently move to Bagrovo. The grandson was never able to love his grandmother, an angry old woman. In the village, bright impressions await the boy: the first spring, field work, nature.
In the fall, the Bagrovs go to visit Churasovo, and the father promises his grandmother to return for the holidays, but they are delayed. The father has a bad dream and the next morning he learns that the grandmother is not feeling well. On the hasty journey back, the whole family almost drowns in the river while crossing. Seryozha’s grandmother dies on the same day, and her death shocks everyone.
Later, the Bagrovs go to Kazan, planning to stay there for a short time, but in the end this will become a turning point: it is here that Seryozha will go to study at the gymnasium, which will be the beginning of the most significant period in Aksakov’s life
A very brief summary for a reader's diary
Little Seryozha's life is full of long trips. The boy's family is large, and events are constantly happening in it. Either the family goes to the funeral of their grandfather, then they travel to holy places, or they are going to visit their sick grandmother. Seryozha does not always like to visit: sometimes he cannot find a common language with some relatives. However, he has an outlet - his beloved mother. A woman gives the baby all the warmth of maternal care, so he is always happy next to her.
Retelling plan
1) Early memories. Life in Ufa, the tender love of his parents, the nurse, for whom Seryozha has the warmest feelings, games with a red-cheeked girl, a foster sister - the child of the nurse, whom he loved (in his own words) more than all the toys. 2) Serious illness. Even as an adult, Seryozha believed that only his mother’s devoted love and her unwavering determination to fight to the last for the life of her “child” saved him at that time. 3) After recovery. Seryozha is playful and cheerful, he loves to walk in the large garden near the house, play with his younger (sister) sister, with whom he has a very warm and friendly relationship. 4) Getting to know books. The boy literally learned his first books by heart. New books are kindly given to him by a kind neighbor and family friend Anichkov. 5) First trip to Bagrovo , meeting my grandparents. A long month without my parents, who left for Orenburg because my mother needed serious treatment. 6) Returning home to Ufa and purchasing Sergeevka (a village that was later to go to Seryozha). 7) Life in Sergeevka, “fishing” (fishing) and other village joys.
Another trip to Bagrovo and the death of my grandfather. The intention of the elder Bagrovs is to move to live in the village to look after the estate. 9) Moving to Bagrovo. Gradually, Seryozha begins to like life in Bagrov. 10) A rich relative and the first trip to Churasovo. 11) Return to Bagrovo: fishing, Seryozha and Eveich breed pigeons, Seryozha liked the free life in the village. 12) Second trip to Churasovo , during which the Bagrovs, forced to yield to the requests and orders of their “benefactress,” who intended to sign over her million-dollar estate to them, stayed longer than planned. 13) A terrible dream and illness of the grandmother. The Bagrovs hastily leave Churasovo, but are late, and the grandmother dies. The father is terribly upset. 14) Short life in Bagrovo and return to Churasovo. The benefactress misses her beloved Bagrov family and asks them to come back to stay. 15) Trip to Kazan. The author says that from this moment his childhood ends and adolescence begins.
Main thought
The influence of the family leaves an imprint on the upbringing and personality of the younger generation. The basis for the formation of a little person’s personality is the family.
What does it teach
The work teaches you to pay attention to your children, especially during the period when they grow up and learn new things around them, to explain to them incomprehensible events.
Review and what you liked
A very bright and kind story about a boy’s childhood. He has peculiar, but quite nice relatives. The main character tries to understand them, studies the outside world and draws conclusions (not always correct, due to his age). Reading a book is like watching a little person learn about the world.
Conclusion and my opinion
In his work, Sergei Aksakov emphasized how important it is to treat children with love and attention when they are just learning about the world around them. In his work, the writer revealed the process of psychological and moral formation of his personality.
Proverbs
- A child without a mother is like a table without a tablecloth.
- Parents are hardworking and children are not lazy.
- Children are like flowers: they love care.
Chapter-by-chapter summary (more detailed than summary)
Introduction
Sergei Bagrov reports that he remembers events that happened not only in his childhood, but even in infancy. But he doesn’t remember how they were carried out sequentially. His memories are fragmentary. He decided to tell only what really happened in his childhood, what he remembers, and not what other people told him about his childhood.
Fragmentary memories
The very first people the narrator remembers are his nurse, his mother and his little sister.
The nurse loved Seryozha very much, she was a peasant, and when she stopped feeding Seryozha, she returned to live in a village that was thirty miles from Ufa. In order to sometimes see Seryozha, she would leave the village on Saturday evenings and come to Ufa on Sunday morning. Having looked at Seryozha and rested, she went to the village to catch the corvee.
Seryozha loved and pitied his sister very much; it always seemed to him that she was hungry, that she was cold. He wanted to dress her in his clothes and give her his food, but he was not allowed to do this, and he cried bitterly.
His mother is present in every memory of Sergei, her image is inextricably linked with his existence.
Then the narrator begins to remember himself already very sick and weak. He remembers waking up one day in an unfamiliar room with walls made of pine logs. There was a tarry smell in the room. It turned out that Seryozha was brought to the village. There he felt better and had an appetite.
Relatives noticed that the sick boy felt better on the road, and often his mother or nanny sat with him in a carriage standing in a barn or in the yard. Then the boy calmed down and cried less. Mom tried to often travel with her son to the villages of her brothers and to familiar landowners, because she noticed that the road was useful for him.
One day, their father went on a long journey with them. Seryozha felt bad in the morning and was so weak that he had to be taken out of the carriage and laid on a bed in a forest clearing, in the shade of trees. He felt much better, and he begged to stay there longer, and they left the clearing only late in the evening. From then on, Seryozha got better, and after a few months he recovered.
In the very middle of his recovery, when Seryozha could already get out of bed, sit on the window and look into the garden, he heard a plaintive squeal and asked to find out who was crying. When they brought him a little puppy who squealed pitifully, Seryozha wrapped him up, and his mother taught him to lap up milk. They named the dog Surka, he began to live in the yard and loved Seryozha and his mother very much.
Seryozha finally recovered and, having become an adult, began to attribute his salvation to the mercy of God, the attention and care of his mother and the road, that is, air and movement.
Sequential Memories
After recovery, Seryozha was at first quiet, timid, very compassionate, and cowardly. The nanny told him “about the beech tree, about the brownies and the dead,” and he began to be afraid of the dark. The boy learned to read and constantly read the children's book “The Mirror of Virtue.”
The Bagrovs’ neighbor, having learned that Seryozha loved to read, gave him twelve books from the “Children’s Reading for the Heart and Mind” collection. Seryozha was very happy and read them with delight. From these books he learned what air, lightning, clouds and much more are.
Seryozha began to notice that his mother was unwell, she was turning pale, losing weight and getting weaker. It was decided that the father would take the mother to Orenburg, to see a doctor who healed very sick people. They decided to take Seryozha and his sister to Bagrovo and leave them with their grandparents for a while.
Road to Parashin
On a summer morning, the family rode in a carriage to the Belaya River. The carriage was then taken across the river on a ferry, and the family moved to the other side on a boat with four oarsmen.
The mother wanted to spend the night not in the village, but in the field. To cook the soup, they lit a fire, and Seryozha was allowed to build a fire, and he began to fuss to make a small fire. He was helped by his kind, loving servant Efrem Evseev, who on the road became as if Seryozha’s uncle, that is, his personal servant.
In the morning we continued our journey. The Dema River was blue in the distance. On the banks of this river, Seryozha began fishing for the first time, and from then on fishing became his passion.
In the morning we stopped in Parshino, a village that belonged to Seryozha’s father’s aunt Praskovya Ivanovna. There the father examined the entire farm in order to later write about its condition to his aunt.
Parashino
The grain stores in the village were full. Head Mironych showed the visiting bars the stud farm, springs and mill.
Road from Parashin to Bagrovo
From Parashin to Bagrov it was more than forty miles. They planned to spend the night on the banks of the Ik River, but the mother said that it would be damp at night near the river and wanted to spend the night in the village.
Seryozha was very upset, because he wanted to fish in the evening. The father said that he would ask the owner of the hut to take them to Ika to fish there. With great displeasure, the mother let her son go fishing, so this time fishing did not bring joy to the sensitive boy, and he asked his father to send him and Evseevich to his mother.
Bagrovo
The parents of Seryozha’s father and his sister Tatyana Stepanovna lived in Bagrovo. Grandmother and aunt were not very affectionate towards Seryozha, his sister Nadya and mother. The mother was worried that she would have to leave the children here while she and her husband went to Orenburg to see the doctor. She fell ill from her worries, and when she felt better, her parents left Bagrov. Yevseich and the nanny stayed with the children.
Staying in Bagrovo without father and mother
My parents left for more than a month. The weather was damp, and the children stayed at home and did not go out. Three aunties visited Bagrov. And during these five weeks, Yevseich completely became Seryozha’s uncle, and the boy fell in love with him very much.
Seryozha’s grandfather was unkind to him at first, but later fell in love with him (when he saw that his grandson loved not only his mother, but also his father).
Finally, the parents returned from Orenburg. The doctor there treated the mother, and she felt better. The doctor advised her to drink kumiss in the spring.
Winter in Ufa
Returning to Ufa, the Bagrovs saw guests in their house: their mother’s brothers, Sergei Nikolaevich and Alexander Nikolaevich. They served in a dragoon regiment and came on vacation for several months. Seryozha's uncles were young, cheerful, and affectionate. When the boy felt love for himself from them and his father’s friends, he became more courageous and lively. Sergei Nikolaevich taught him to draw, the boy learned from his uncles what poetry was.
One day, Seryozha’s uncles and their friend Adjutant Volkov began to tease the boy. At first they assured him that a decree had been issued to the nobles to give up their eldest son as a soldier, then they assured him that Volkov wanted to marry his little sister and take her on a campaign. Then they said that the village of Sergeevka, which was considered the property of Seryozha, was given by his mother and father as a dowry to his sister and Volkov. Seryozha furiously grabbed a wooden hammer and threw it at Volkov.
For this, the boy was put in a corner, and he was so upset that he fell ill, and when he began to recover, he asked Volkov and his uncles for forgiveness. They kissed him and promised not to tease him anymore.
Sergei Nikolaevich began to teach Seryozha to write, and before leaving for the regiment, his uncle advised the boy’s father to take him a teacher from the public school, Matvey Vasilyevich. Seryozha was too lazy to write copybooks, and so that he would study more willingly, Andryusha was assigned to write with him, who began to learn calligraphy at a public school from the same teacher.
One day, Seryozha’s mother sent him to public school with Andryusha. Yevseich handed the boys from hand to hand to Matvey Vasilyevich. In the classroom, the teacher, so kind and quiet in the Bagrovs’ house, suddenly became angry and ordered the student, who did not know the lesson, to kneel behind the blackboard, where three boys were already standing. At the end of the lesson, Matvey Vasilyevich called the guards, and they began to whip the boys kneeling with rods. When the lesson ended, the flogged boys ran out of the classroom, cheerful and playful, like the other students.
At home, Seryozha cried and was indignant at Matvey Vasilyevich, but his mother began to calm him down, saying that “the parents of the flogged boys thank the teacher for his severity.” But Seryozha could not come to terms with the fact that the teacher shouted so brutally at the students at the school, and the parents had to refuse Matvey Vasilyevich from further classes with Seryozha.
Sergeevka
In the spring, the Bagrovs went to the village of Sergeevka, named after the part of Seryozha, to which they transported huts and barns and transferred serfs to them. This new village was located on land that the boy's father bought from the Bashkirs. The land was called the Sergeevka wasteland; it was not very far from Ufa, near the Belaya River. There were many lakes there.
The family settled in a new hut without doors, instead of which they hung a carpet for now.
Seryozha was delighted that there were a lot of fish in Lake Kishki, and spent his time fishing.
In order for the mother to drink kumiss, the father agreed with one of the patrimonial owners who sold the Sergeevskaya wasteland, the Bashkir Mavlyut Iseich, who was called Mavlyutka behind his back, so that one of his seven wives would bring a mare every day, milk her and make kumiss from their milk. Seeing Mavlyut Iseich, Seryozha was amazed at his height and thickness.
Drinking kumiss helped Seryozha’s mother improve her health. But at the end of July, the herbs became mature and even began to dry, so mare’s milk lost its healing properties, and the Bagrovs moved to Ufa.
Return to Ufa to city life
In Ufa, neighbor Anichkov gave Seryozha a lot of books. The boy especially liked the works of Sumarokov and Kheraskov’s poem “Rossiada”.
One day, the governor’s Cossack orderly rushed down the street and shouted to everyone to go to church to swear allegiance to the new emperor. It turned out that Empress Ekaterina Alekseevna had died, and now her son Pavel Petrovich would be sovereign in Russia.
Seryozha's father received a letter from Bagrov, informing him that his grandfather was dying. The next evening, the Bagrov family left Ufa for the family estate.
Winter road to Bagrovo
The road lasted almost two days. It was bitterly cold. When they were already approaching Bagrov, the cart in which Seryozha was riding with his maid and sister overturned. It’s good that the cart was raised quickly, otherwise Seryozha would have suffocated from the pillows falling on his face.
Bagrovo in winter
When we arrived in Bagrovo, grandfather was still alive. Seryozha’s father did not sleep for two nights, sitting next to his dying grandfather. When grandfather died, there was crying and howling in the house. My father decided to retire and settle in Bagrov.
Ufa
Soon Seryozha had a brother, then his father submitted his resignation, and the family got ready to move from Ufa to Bagrovo.
Arrival for permanent residence in Bagrovo
The grandmother was glad that the real owners had come to Bagrovo, but Seryozha’s mother said that the grandmother was still the owner. Father was busy with housework all day, and Seryozha fished and went to watch the quail hunt with hawks.
Their friends, husband and wife Chichagovs, came to visit the Bagrovs, who also moved from Ufa to a village 30 miles from Bagrov.
Grandmother changed after the death of grandfather; it was clear that life was not pleasant to her. Seryozha felt sorry for her, and he said that she needed to be consoled. His father advised him to go with his sister to his grandmother more often, so that she would have more fun.
Seryozha and his sister began to run to their grandmother several times a day. But one day the boy saw how his grandmother grabbed a peasant girl who did not please her by the hair and began to beat her with a whip. From that time on, Seryozha only went to his grandmother to say hello and goodbye.
Seryozha asked to go with his father to the field, and saw there how the peasants were putting sheaves into carts with pitchforks. Then the father showed the boy the work of peasant women threshing buckwheat with flails so that the grains were separated from the straw. Then we visited the threshing floor, where the peasants put sheaves into luggage.
The boy realized that peasants and peasant women are much “skillier and more dexterous,” since they know how to share what the gentlemen cannot, and he wanted to learn peasant work.
In late autumn, Seryozha and his parents came to visit the Chichagovs on their estate. Pyotr Ivanovich Chichagov was a painter and architect. From him Seryozha learned “what a mathematical instrument is, what a palette and oil paints are and how they paint with them.” Pyotr Ivanovich gave the boy two volumes of the Arabian Nights fairy tales, which he really liked.
Pyotr Ivanovich’s mother-in-law, Marya Mikhailovna, a quiet, kind old woman, lived with the Chichagovs. And in a special wing lived her son Ivan Borisovich, a young man who had gone crazy. The mother loved her son very much and did not restrict his freedom.
Soon after returning to Bagrovo, the family got ready to travel again: the father’s rich aunt, Praskovya Ivanovna Kurolesova, demanded that her father, who was her heir, show his family.
Churasovo
In the village of Churasovo, Praskovya Ivanovna always had many guests. Praskovya Ivanovna and her young pupil Alexandra Ivanovna Kovrigina fell in love with Seryozha’s mother very much.
Despite the fact that Praskovya Ivanovna’s house was always full of guests, the boy was bored there, he read books and impatiently wanted to return to Bagrovo as soon as possible.
Bagrovo after Churasov
Finally, the family returned to Bagrovo, Aunt Tatyana Stepanovna and grandmother were very happy about this. One day a neighboring landowner came to woo Tatyana Stepanovna for her son. She also brought her son with her, a very fat young man. The groom ate an awful lot at dinner, and after dinner began to doze off. After their departure, the groom was told that the bride would not marry him.
First spring in the village
The approach of spring worried Seryozha. The weather was wet, so he was not allowed to leave the house. From the windows he watched the appearance of thawed patches. When Yevseich reported that a lot of birds were flying from the south, Seryozha begged permission from his mother, dressed warmly, to sit on the porch that overlooked the garden, right above Lake Buguruslan. A damp, strong wind was blowing. All the banks were strewn with birds, and many ducks swam on the water.
Then the weather became warm, and the mother allowed Seryozha and his sister to run around the dry places. Despite all the precautions, the boy caught a cold. Insomnia prevented a speedy recovery. In order for Seryozha to fall asleep faster, they called the housekeeper Palageya, a great master of telling fairy tales. She told the fairy tale “The Scarlet Flower”. The tale aroused the boy's curiosity so much that he could not fall asleep for a very long time. Then his mother allowed him to listen to Palageya’s fairy tales only during the day. Before his recovery, Seryozha listened to one fairy tale every day and because of this, he yearned less for the reviving nature.
Easter has arrived. Seryozha noticed that the Easter cake for the courtyard people is not as white as for the gentlemen, and asked: “Why do Yevseich and the others not eat the same white Easter cake as we do?” The mother replied that it was none of his business.
This bright holiday became sad due to the drowning of a miller who was drunkenly wading a flooded urema (a floodplain area, part of a river valley with bushes).
After Easter, Seryozha had no time for reading or writing, because real spring had come: bird cherry trees were blooming, larks were singing in the sky, ladybugs, butterflies, bees, and bumblebees appeared. He ran into the grove to watch the rooks sitting on their eggs, how the anthills came to life and how the ants began to do their work.
When the leaves bloomed on the trees and bushes, the nightingales began to sing. Their singing delighted Seryozha and at first made it difficult to sleep. Subsequently, memories of this spring filled the soul of Sergei Bagrov with quiet joy.
When the hollow water drained and the river entered its banks, Yevseich prepared three fishing rods of different sizes for Seryozha. The boy began to go fishing with his father and Yevseich. They fished with passion.
One day, Seryozha’s mother let him go to see the field work, and he went to the fields with his father. He saw how the peasants sowed grain seeds, how they drove horses carrying plows and harrows. “The importance and sanctity of work” deeply struck the boy.
Seryozha wanted to learn how to harrow the land and began to ask his parents to make him harrow. His mother said that arable land and harrowing were not his business, but she allowed him to try harrowing the land. It turned out that walking on the plowed ground and driving a horse was very difficult.
In the summer, Seryozha really liked the way the peasants mowed the grass, swinging their scythes widely and deftly. At home he spoke about it with delight. Auntie said that it is very difficult to mow in such heat. Her words made the boy think.
Seryozha’s sister collected herbs and flowers with him, watched the nests of small birds, watched how the chicks grew. The children collected worms, kept them in boxes, putting herbs and flowers there, and watched as the worms turned into pupae, and from the pupae into butterflies.
The summer was hot, there were frequent thunderstorms, and a lot of mushrooms appeared. Father with Seryozha, aunt and the women of the courtyard went for milk mushrooms.
One landowner gave Seryozha two pairs of valuable hairy-footed and two-crested pigeons. They made a huge cage for them, and the boy constantly ran to it to listen to the cooing of the pigeons. He made sure they always had food and water in the trough.
Seryozha and his sister really didn’t want to go to Churasovo to visit their father’s aunt Praskovya Ivanova. Father also did not want to leave his farm, but he did not dare to disobey his rich aunt, who certainly wanted to show them her huge garden when the apples, pears and cherries were ripe there. Mother was going to Churasovo very willingly. On August 2, leaving their little brother in the care of their grandmother and aunt, the Bagrovs went to Praskovya Ivanovna.
Summer trip to Churasovo
On the way, the mother was very cheerful. She believed that her illnesses came from the low and damp place in which Bagrovo was located. When the horses were being fed in the village of Nikolskoye, the footman called the gentlemen on behalf of the rich landowner Durasov for lunch. Durasov showed them two pigs brought from England. The pigs were huge and lived in a beautiful house, in two large rooms, and in the third lived a cowman and a cowwoman who looked after them.
At dinner, the guests were entertained by an orchestra and two serf girls who had learned to sing in Moscow.
The travelers crossed the Volga to Simbirsk, then went to Churasovo. Praskovya Ivanovna was very happy with him and immediately took him to her garden. Various types of apples ripened there. Seryozha especially liked the strong springs that flowed from the mountain.
The boy soon became bored in Churasovo; he sadly recalled Bagrovo, where there was now excellent fishing and quail hunting.
At the end of September, father told Praskovya Ivanovna that it was time for them to go home, that mother was weak and unwell, but his aunt did not want to hear about their departure. The father obeyed. But when a letter arrived from Bagrov that his mother was very ill, Praskovya Ivanovna let them go and repented that she had not let them go earlier.
Autumn road to Bagrovo
It rained all the time, there were huge waves on the Volga, and there were no carriers on the shore. But the father sent to find them. The headman of the ferry offers to spend the night with him and cross at dawn, when the wind subsides.
In the morning we took a boat across the Volga. In the middle of the river, water began to flow into the boat, and two rowers poured it out with a ladle and a hat. When they reached the shore and turned the boat over, it turned out that at the stern it was broken by something sharp.
After the bad weather, mud formed and the horses walked very slowly. Then the mud froze, a lot of snow fell, and the ride became even harder. The mother fell ill and had to stay for a while in a Chuvash hut.
Only on the seventh day did the Bagrovs reach Neklyudov, the estate of Seryozha’s cousin, and there they learned that his grandmother had died. The father cried for more than an hour.
After lunch and feeding the horses, the Bagrovs left Neklyudov.
In Bagrov, in the courtyard they were greeted by the joyful barking of Surka and Trezor (a pointing dog), and on the porch stood all four aunties and two uncles, Karataev and Erlykin.
Life in Bagrov after the death of my grandmother
Seryozha saw that his brother had grown up and began to speak better.
A few days later, Seryozha caught a cold, because the weather was damp and cold, and he ran several times to watch his hawks and his pigeons. He lay in the heat and unconscious for three days, and after a week he recovered. During this time, Seryozha realized how much his mother loved him, and his affection for her grew even more.
Soon Praskovya Ivanovna invited them to come to Churasovo. So that the aunt would not be angry, the father decided to go himself and take his family, but his sister Tatyana Stepanovna flatly refused to go.
Seryozha was very upset by his departure, as he liked to catch birds, as Yevseich taught him. He put the birds in cages and in a large cage by the porch. There he set up a watering hole and two small birch trees on which the birds were sitting, he piled food on the floor and joyfully watched the birds.
When the winter journey was over, the Bagrovs went to Churasovo, this time taking Seryozha’s brother with them.
The landowner Durasov was not in Nikolskoye, and the Bagrovs stayed with a wealthy peasant. This smart man made them laugh with stories about his master. Seryozha made a discovery for himself: the peasant mocked the master, and the boy always thought that peasants treated their masters with reverence.
Five days after leaving Bagrov, Churasovo appeared. Praskovya Ivanovna was very happy with the Bagrovs. After the New Year, Seryozha’s mother asked him if he wanted to go with her and his father to Kazan. Mother wanted to pray there to the local miracle workers.
Having learned that Seryozha was going to Kazan, but they wouldn’t take her there, my sister began to cry. Seryozha felt very sorry for her, and he asked his mother to leave him in Churasovo. Having learned why he did not want to go, she said that she would never leave him, that they would only be traveling for two weeks and that her sister would soon stop crying.
On January 3, the Bagrovs went to Kazan. Seryozha, instead of joy that he would see a new city, felt grief. He felt sorry for his sister, and he slowly cried.
At this point, Bagrov the grandson’s story about his childhood stops. Further stories already relate to his adolescence.
Summary
Chapter 1. Fragmentary memories
The writer's childhood memories paint images of the people most dear to him - his mother, younger sister and nurse, separation from whom brought him a lot of pain. Seryozha was ill, he was treated for a long time and incorrectly, weakening his already exhausted body. The poor mother constantly prayed for her son, not knowing how else to help him.
Seryozha's only joy was his little sister. The boy was happy when he was allowed to play with the baby and pat her on the head.
Chapter 2: Sequential Memories
Seryozha recovered, but the suffering he endured left a mark on him: he became a meek, indecisive, very “compassionate” boy. He learned to read quickly, but began to write much later.
The Bagrovs lived in Ufa, in a spacious wooden house. Seryozha was very impressionable. The nanny often told the children stories and legends about brownies and the dead. After these stories, little Seryozha became timid, restless, and was afraid to be alone in the dark. The nanny, whose stories caused the boy to have nervous breakdowns, was sent to the village.
Gradually Seryozha calmed down, became addicted to books and began to read everything. Due to constant worries about her son’s health, the mother herself fell ill. They found a good doctor in Orenburg, and the children had to wait for their parents at their grandparents.
Chapter 3. Road to Parashin
It took a long time to get to Parashin. All the way, Seryozha watched in amazement at the constantly changing picture around him. He even forgot about books for a while.
Chapter 4. Parashino
In Parashin, Seryozha met Mironych, the manager of the estate. He was an evil and cruel man towards the peasants. Seryozha didn’t like him right away.
The boy was happy when his father took him to the field or to the horse yard. Much of what he saw here was incomprehensible to him. But he saw how difficult it was for the peasants, especially in the heat, and sympathized with them.
Chapter 5. The road from Parashin to Bagrovo
From Parashin to Bagrov it was necessary to travel more than forty miles. The mother wished to stop at a passing village and rest. Father suggested that Seryozha go fishing, and he gladly agreed.
When we arrived at Bagrov, mother and father for some reason became sad.
Chapter 6. Bagrovo
The parents of Seryozha’s father turned out to be middle-aged and modestly dressed people. They behaved strictly, and the boy was afraid of them. Seryozha’s mother spoke to them respectfully, but the child did not feel the warmth in her voice. The “proud” daughter-in-law and her children were not loved in Bagrov.
The boy got bored and wanted to go somewhere again. Later, even more severe shocks awaited him: his mother became worse, she was taken away for treatment, and for the first time they separated for a long time.
Chapter 7. In Bagrov without father and mother
It was bad in Bagrov without parents. Grandfather Seryozha was often in a bad mood, the house was boring. Due to the wet weather it was impossible to play outside. At first the boy tried to teach his little sister to read, but it didn’t work. Then he began to entertain himself with various fictitious stories, in which he attributed the main roles to himself. So time passed. Finally their parents came for them. The mother looked stronger. Everyone began to get ready to go home.
Chapter 8. Winter in Ufa
Seryozha was happy to return home. Here you can be yourself, play, run and make noise, without worrying that it might bother someone. Those around him noticed that he had grown and became more confident in himself. His maternal uncles took charge of his development; they taught him writing, drawing, and read poetry with him.
Chapter 9. Sergeevka
The doctor recommended Seryozha’s mother to drink fresh kumiss. In the spring, the family moved to the small village of Sergeevka. The boy had a good time here. He loved to fish and go hunting. The main joy was the noticeable improvement in the mother’s well-being.
Chapter 10. Return to Ufa to city life
Compared to the carefree and exciting village life, the previous city everyday life seemed boring. Seryozha began to read more.
Chapter 11. Winter road to Bagrovo
This time the road left a bad impression. Mother felt bad all the time. When they had almost arrived at Bagrov, the cart with people overturned and the boy hit his head. During this trip, Seryozha realized what a bad feeling was.
Chapter 12. Bagrovo in winter
Seryozha’s grandfather became seriously ill, the family came so that he could say goodbye to them. Grandfather passed away that same night. In the boy’s soul there remained heavy, fragmentary memories of his grandfather’s death. One thing definitely stuck in my memory and surprised me - why was everyone crying, but at the same time eating with a good appetite?
Grandmother asked Seryozha’s father to move in with her. Someone needed to manage the estate.
Chapter 13. Ufa
Frequent quarrels began at home. Parents argued about moving. The father decided to resign and fulfill the mother’s request to move in with her. Mother did not want to go to Bagrovo. She feared that her health would deteriorate because no one loved her there. The father insisted, but postponed the trip until the mother gave birth. In June, Seryozha’s brother was born, and the family left for Bagrovo.
Chapter 14. Arrival for permanent residence in Bagrovo
Grandma has aged noticeably over the past six months. Seryozha’s father immediately took the reins into his own hands, and his mother said that she intended to be a guest here, not a hostess. Seryozha fell in love with Arabic fairy tales. He liked the rural way of life, and he did not understand why his mother and sister were not interested in anything here. A kind and sympathetic boy tried to caress and console his grandmother, who was left alone. But, seeing how she punished the peasants, he quickly cooled down towards her.
Chapter 15. Churasovo
At the end of autumn, the family decided to stay with their father's aunt. It was necessary to go to Churasovo. Aunt Praskovya greeted them cordially. Seryozha really liked the kind woman. Two months later the family returned home.
Chapter 16. Bagrovo after Churasov
After a cheerful life visiting my aunt, the boring, quiet days in Bagrov came again. The groom came to one of the aunts for a viewing. They arranged a dinner, during which the groom showed excessive gluttony. Aunt Seryozha flatly refused to get married. The boy was pleased with this answer.
Chapter 17. First spring in the village
Spring surprised Seryozha every time with its discoveries, amazing and so diverse. And this time he greeted her with the same enthusiasm. The hero liked spring in Bagrov. He spent days on the street. He had so many interesting things to do: he could catch crayfish or fish, collect bouquets for his mother, catch butterflies or other insects. In the summer, the family again went to visit Praskovya Ivanovna.
Chapter 18. Summer trip to Churasovo
On the way to see their aunt, the family stopped at a landowner Durasov. Seryozha was impressed by the luxurious furnishings of his house, which looked like a real palace. The owner took the guests through his greenhouses and greenhouses, in which unusual fruits and magnificent plants grew. The boy could not hide his surprise at what his mother was unhappy with.
Praskovya Ivanovna was still doing well. The hostess was delighted with the guests. The house was full of people. All the fun was overshadowed by news from Bagrov: Seryozha’s grandmother suddenly became ill. I had to go back.
Chapter 20. Autumn road to Bagrovo
Due to autumn bad weather, we had to travel home for a whole week. The father was very nervous about this, the mother tried to support him. He still did not have time to say goodbye to his mother, who died before their arrival. This shocked both father and Aunt Praskovya, who dissuaded them from going.
Chapter 21. Life in Bagrov after the death of my grandmother
Seryozha fell ill and spent three days unconscious. The mother sat next to her son all these days. Praskovya Ivanovna again called them to her place, and they did not refuse her. Yevseich taught him to make snares and catch birds. The boy liked the new entertainment. A kind aunt advised me to take the boy to Kazan and read prayers for his health. Seryozha was glad to have the opportunity to visit the new city. The boy did not yet know that a very significant event for him would happen very soon. Seryozha was sent to the gymnasium - a new period of his life began, the end of a carefree childhood.
