Olya Meshcherskaya
The author of the story “Easy Breathing” Ivan Bunin in his youth
I read Light Breathing in the summer of 2004. At that time, the work of Ivan Bunin was extremely interesting to me, since I considered his works to be the standard of fine literature and subtle psychologism. Easy Breathing is one of his best works. Nikolai Gumilyov said that the most accurate criterion for the quality of a poem is the desire to be its author. After finishing Breathing Lightly, I really felt regret that the story was not written by me.
The main characters of the story are light breathing, a symbol of spiritual purity, and high school student Olya Meshcherskaya, a beautiful high school student endowed with it. From the point of view of form, the story is interesting in that the meaning of its title is revealed to the reader only at the very end, after Meshcherskaya’s death.
Olya Meshcherskaya is a beautiful high school student, cheerful and... light. Her behavior is so relaxed that it deserves any synonyms for the word “easy.” At the beginning of the story, light breathing can be explained as a sense of self that does not depend on the opinions of the outside world. Olya Meshcherskaya doesn’t care what they think about her - the only thing that matters to her is what she wants. Therefore, she does not pay attention to the ink stains on her fingers, or the disorder in her clothes, or other little things that absorb strangers. The head of the gymnasium, whose authoritative comments Meshcherskaya has to listen to with enviable consistency, is one of them. However, due to her own inertia, intuitively despised by Meshcherskaya, she cannot confuse the obstinate pupil and force her to change her faith in herself.
It is internal independence that gives rise to Meshcherskaya’s lightness. The reasons for Olya's popularity as a friend and as a girl are her naturalness. But Olya is still young and does not understand the exclusivity of her nature, naively expecting from others the same intentions that she pursues.
Easy breathing: the image and characteristics of Olya Meshcherskaya
A person's life is short, often not lasting more than one century, but it is even more offensive when they die young. The image and characterization of Olya Meshcherskaya in Bunin’s story “Easy Breathing” with quotes is an example of the tragic fate of a young beauty from a rich noble family.
Olya's appearance was striking. At first she is an ordinary high school student. The happy schoolgirl from a wealthy noble family was simply pretty. Carefree, playful girl
“...began to blossom and develop by leaps and bounds.”
Fourteen-year-old Olya is already a girl with a thin waist and clearly visible breasts. The body shape could be called in one word - charm. At fifteen years old:
“I was already reputed to be a beauty.”
Olya had special properties: she was not spoiled:
“ink stains on the fingers, disheveled hair, stranded when a knee fell while running.”
The girl captivated with her sincerity and cuteness, attractiveness and uniqueness. She had good hair that allowed her to create colorful hairstyles. A beautifully decorated head caused envy.
The author reveals this feeling not among women of the same age, but among older women. It becomes clear how offensive it was for the headmistress of the gymnasium to see in front of her something that does not exist and never did exist for her. The noblewoman Meshcherskaya knows how to behave:
“...sat down as easily and gracefully as only she could.”
Her movements make her stand out from the crowd; the schoolgirl is always visible, liked and becomes an ideal to follow.
The girl is keen on reading. She found in her father's books what a real woman should be like. From the descriptions, Olya created her ideal, which she strove for:
“eyes boiling with resin...eyelashes black as night...small legs...moderately large breasts...sloping shoulders...”.
But the girl caught the main quality of beauties - easy breathing. Olya asked her friend to determine if her breathing was like that.
A carefree attitude towards life and the world around us can be compared to the wind sweeping over the earth and human passions. Young woman
“... playful and very careless to those instructions that she ...”
do. For her childlike spontaneity, sincerity and openness, Olya is loved by her peers and junior high school students, especially first-graders.
Fans surround the beauty, she likes it, she begins to play with the destinies of men: high school student Shenshin, a Cossack officer. Shenshin tried to commit suicide, an enraged officer kills Olya in front of the crowd.
“... the officer told the judicial investigator that Meshcherskaya lured him, was close to him, vowed to be his wife...”.
Olya simply mocks men. Why does Meshcherskaya have such an attitude towards the opposite sex? The reason is probably that she became a woman early, not because of her desire, but due to the will of circumstances and excessive emancipation. 56-year-old Malyutin used his power and captured the beauty. All that remains from the first intimacy is a feeling of disgust:
“Now I have only one way out... I feel such disgust for him that I can’t get over it!”
The girl writes down everything she experiences. The diary proves that outward recklessness is just a shell. In fact, Olya is a thoughtful and holistic person. She evaluates what happened, understands that her life is over and begins to behave as if every moment is her last:
“...Olya Meshcherskaya went completely crazy with fun during her last winter...”
He leaves life happy, releasing his “light breath” in order to refresh the life around him, to take away tragedy and resentment. The last breath of the schoolgirl stands before the reader’s eyes for a long time. It feels like a cloud enveloping the soul, carrying it far away from earthly problems. You need to live with an open soul, clean breathing and faith in a happy ending.
Easy breathing: fracture
Ivan Bunin. Maturity
Olya Meshcherskaya's meeting with Malyutin is a turning point in her life, when a painful epiphany occurs. In her diary, describing what happened, Meshcherskaya repeats the word “I” seventeen times. “I don’t understand how this could happen, I’m crazy, I never thought I was like this!” (Ivan Bunin. “Easy Breathing”) Intimacy with a man turned Olya into a woman in the literal sense, giving her a new sense of herself.
The evening with Malyutin did not change only one thing about Meshchersky - that which would lead to her death, this gullible conviction that all life is a game. It was so before - with the junior classes who loved her so much, with her friends at the gymnasium who loved her even more - and so it will be now. But now the game of love will turn into theater, losing all its legitimacy. To turn the head of an ignoble man and deceive him, at the very last moment, already on the station platform - what's wrong with that? Who doesn't fall in love and make vows at seventeen? But the officer kills Olya, ending her light breath of life with one shot. His act is a rebellion, and in some ways tantamount to suicide. It's not that he's plebeian-looking and ugly. Meshcherskaya played with his whole life, giving him hope for happiness, which he hardly dared to dream of, and cruelly depriving him of this hope - and with it any bearable future.
The ending leaves a heavy impression. Meshcherskaya, who embodied light breathing, dies; the breath itself turns out to be dispelled, and it is unclear when it will be embodied again. Olya’s death is unfair: she paid for an inspiration in which there was no malicious intent: only spoiled. Alas, Meshcherskaya does not have time to understand what light breathing is, which becomes obvious in the climactic dialogue with Subbotina. Her death is a huge loss, and therefore the heavy and smooth oak cross on her grave looks especially symbolic. How many people are left in the world who are completely subordinate to the outside world and completely devoid of inner lightness and sincerity? Same cool lady. If Olya Meshcherskaya had become her invention during her lifetime, this middle-aged person would certainly have been able to change her life, and perhaps even become happy, cultivating in her soul a drop of the light breath given to her by Olya.
The world rests on people like Meshcherskaya, although this sounds pretentious. Light breathing gives strength not only to them, but supports all life around, forcing other people to follow a new standard. However, light breathing is defenseless, and if its inspiration destroys itself, there will be nothing left of it except a grave cross and a tragic gust of cold wind.
Danil Rudoy – 2005
Option 2
In March 1916, the well-known Ivan Alekseevich Bunin finished writing the story “Easy Breathing”. It tells us about the tragic fate of a young girl, Olya Meshcherskaya, who had to lose her life for just one offense, which, by the way, she did not commit quite consciously and did not even understand that she was following a crooked and wrong path. Let's look at this in more detail.
Olya Meshcherskaya is a girl of about sixteen, from a noble family, receiving an education at a gymnasium. Character traits include liveliness, a desire to live brightly and unforgettably, but also frivolity, a certain naivety and even irresponsibility. We see this in the words “...a portrait with joyful, amazingly lively eyes...”. The reader also knows that Olya becomes indescribably beautiful in her teenage years: “... at fifteen she was already beautiful...”, “... she is one of the pretty ones...”
4 pages, 1504 words
The initial stage of work on staging performing breathing
... respiratory muscles until the lungs are free of air. 2.2 Work on developing performing breathing techniques The second way of training is to play special exercises on the instrument. This …
Like every other family, the Meshchersky family has a friend, or rather a friend of the father - Alexey Mikhailovich Malyutin - a stately elderly officer, about fifty years old. He is also the brother of the headmistress of the gymnasium, where Olya studies. You might think about how he influences the whole story and why he is among the main characters, but all your doubts will immediately dissipate.
One time, when Malyutin visited the Meshchersky family again, they were left at home alone with Olya. And there everything comes to the closeness of an elderly but possessive officer and a young girl who still understands so little. After this incident, Olya began to hate Malyutin. Moreover, in those days, a noblewoman was in danger of losing her reputation if she had a relationship with a man at such a young age, and even with a man who was several times older than her. Here the reader immediately feels disgust towards both Olya herself and Alexei Mikhailovich.
There is no love as such here. Even when Olya marries an inconspicuous Cossack officer, she tells him that she never loved him and that she had an affair with Malyutin. He, in a fit of anger, kills her at the station in a crowd of people when Meshcherskaya saw him off. Before her death, Olya gave me a page from her diary to read, which was dedicated to that terrible day. Everything becomes clear there. At first, Malyutin and Meshcherskaya had a pleasant conversation and walked in the garden, but, unfortunately, Olya felt unwell and she lay down on her bed. Malyutin, as can already be understood, took advantage of her position. First he kissed her hands, and then moved to her lips.
Although Malyutin wanted to propose marriage to Olya, he did not love her sincerely, he loved her only for her young flesh.
I believe that this story is not about pure and true love. I believe that Ivan Alekseevich only wanted to convey to us the idea that the age of the lovers is not so important as the feelings between them. Many people today believe that a man cannot be much older than a girl, or vice versa. No one knows how life will turn out, the main thing is to really find your person, whom you will love with your soul, and not with your body, and you will definitely feel it.
Other works: ← Criticism of the story The Gentleman from San Francisco↑ BuninAccording to the story Dark Alleys →
Story plot
The plot of the work is quite simple. The happy young schoolgirl Olya Meshcherskaya first becomes the prey of her father’s friend, an elderly sensualist, and then a living target for the aforementioned officer. Her death prompts a classy lady, a lonely woman, to “serve” her memory. However, the apparent simplicity of this plot is violated by a bright contrast: a heavy cross and lively, joyful eyes, which involuntarily makes the reader’s heart clench. The simplicity of the plot turned out to be deceptive, since the story “Easy Breathing” (Ivan Bunin) is not only about the fate of a girl, but also about the unfortunate lot of a classy lady who is used to living someone else’s life. Olya’s relationship with the officer is also interesting.
