The play "The Thunderstorm" is one of the most famous in Ostrovsky's work. A bright, social and everyday drama, the events of which take place in the 19th century in the town of Kalinov. The female characters in the play deserve special attention. They are colorful and unique. The image and characteristics of Kabanikha in the play "The Thunderstorm" are undoubtedly important in the work. She is the main despot and tyrant in the play. She is also responsible for the death of Katerina. The goal of Kabanikha is to subjugate as many people as possible in order to impose on them the customs, traditions and laws that she sacredly observes. True fear crept into her soul when she realized that a new time was approaching, a time of change, which she could not resist.
Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova - she is Kabanikha. Widow. The merchant's wife. Mother of Barbara and Tikhon.
Image and characteristics
The surname Kabanova fits the main character very accurately, characterizing her from the first minutes. A wild animal is able to pounce on a person without a good reason, so is the Kabanikha. Furious, ferocious. Able to "bite to death" a person, if he is not pleasing to her, which happened to Katerina, whom the widow simply killed from the light. It is impossible to please her. She will always find a reason to find fault, no matter how hard she tries.
Kabanikha, after the death of her husband, was left with two small children in her arms. There was no time to lose heart. I had to take care and raise Varvara and Tikhon. Brother and sister are completely different in character and outwardly, although they were brought up in the same way.
Powerful, oppressive woman, keeping in fear not only household members, but the whole district.
"Mamma, you are very cool ..."
Subordinate and rule is her credo. I am absolutely convinced that the family is built on fear and submission of the younger to the elders. “Do not judge yourself when you are older! They know more than you do. Old people have all the signs. " He does not see anything abnormal in his attitude towards children.
"After all, from love, parents are strict with you, because of love they scold you, everyone thinks to teach good."
Religious. This is not the belief of a religious fanatic who piously observes all fasts and God's laws. Rather a tribute to tradition. She performs the rituals automatically, not really delving into the process and its meaning. She lacks faith in forgiveness and mercy. For her, the main thing is the strict implementation of patriarchal orders. It's sacred.
“Well, I'll go to God to pray; Do not bother me…".
She is demanding of others no less than of herself. What people themselves think about this and what feelings they experience is deeply indifferent to her.
Bore. Constantly dissatisfied with everything. Grumbles with or without reason. It's hard to please her. Her own family and that annoys her, especially her son and daughter-in-law. This is where Kabanikha comes off in full. Pokes his nose into their lives, climbs with advice. He believes that the son, after marriage, lost interest in his mother, turning into a rag and henpecked.
“Maybe you loved your mother while you were single. Whether you care about me, you have a young wife. "
Daughter-in-law is a separate topic. The daughter-in-law's behavior is out of the ordinary. He does not observe traditions, does not value her husband. She completely got out of hand. Old age does not respect or honor.
Self-confident. I am convinced that she is doing everything right. Sincerely believes that if you maintain the old order and way of life, the house will not suffer from external chaos. With the economy is managed harshly, worse than a man. The manifestation of emotions is not peculiar to her. In her opinion, this is unnecessary. At the slightest manifestation of rebellion from the home, Kabanikha nips everything in the bud. Any misconduct on their part entails punishment. She immediately infuriates if they young people try to go against her. Strangers are closer to her than her son and daughter-in-law.
“Prude, sir! She clothe the beggars, but she ate the household completely ... ".
He will say a good word, reward with alms.
Loves money. The boar is accustomed to keeping the entire household on herself. She is sure that the one with the most cash in his pocket is right. Having settled in her praying mantis, every day she hears their eulogies addressed to her. The flattering grandmothers completely screwed her head. Kabanikha does not even admit that she can do something wrong. With their talk about the end of the world, the old women support Kabanikha's idea of \u200b\u200blife on earth.
The play "The Thunderstorm" occupies a special place in Ostrovsky's work. In this play, the playwright most vividly outlined the "world of the dark kingdom", the world of tyrant merchants, the world of ignorance, arbitrariness and despotism, domestic tyranny.
The play takes place in a small town on the Volga - Kalinov. Life here, at first glance, is a kind of patriarchal idyll. The whole city is buried in greenery, beyond the Volga there is an "extraordinary view", a public garden is laid out on its high banks, where residents of the town often walk. Life in Kalinovo flows quietly and unhurriedly, there are no shocks, no exceptional events. News from the big world is brought to the town by the wanderer Feklusha, who tells Kalinovtsy fables about people with dog heads.
However, in reality, not everything is so well in this small, abandoned world. This idyll is already being destroyed by Kuligin in a conversation with Boris Grigorievich, Dikiy's nephew: “Cruel manners, sir, are cruel in our city! In philistinism, sir, you will not see anything but rudeness and naked poverty ... And whoever has money ... is trying to enslave the poor so that he can earn even more money from his gratuitous labors. " However, there is no agreement between the rich as well: they "are at enmity with each other", "malicious slander scribbles", "suing", "undermining trade." Everyone lives behind an oak gate, behind strong locks. “And they do not lock themselves in from thieves, but so that people do not see how they eat their household and tyrannize their family. And what tears are pouring behind these constipations, invisible and inaudible! .. And what, sir, behind these locks, the debauchery of dark and drunkenness! " - exclaims Kuligin.
One of the richest, most influential people in the city is the merchant Savel Prokofievich Dikoy. The main features of the Wild are rudeness, ignorance, hot temper and absurdity of character. “Look for such and such a scolder like ours Savel Prokofich! No way will he cut off a person, ”Shapkin says about him. The whole life of the Wild is based on "swearing". Neither cash payments, nor a trip to the bazaar - "he can’t do anything without abuse." Most of all goes from Dikiy to his family and his nephew Boris who came from Moscow.
Savel Prokofievich is stingy. "... Just give me a hint of money, I will start to kindle all my insides," he says to Kabanova. Boris came to his uncle in the hope of receiving an inheritance, but actually fell into bondage to him. Savel Prokofievich does not pay him a salary, constantly insults and scolds his nephew, reproaching him for laziness and parasitism.
Dikoy and Kuligin, a local self-taught mechanic, repeatedly quarrels. Kuligin is trying to find a reasonable reason for Savel Prokofievich's rudeness: "Why, sir Savel Prokofievich, would you please offend an honest man?" To which Dikoy replies: “I’ll give you a report or something! I don’t give an account to anyone more important than you. I want to think so of you, so I think so! For others, you are an honest man, but I think that you are a robber - that's all ... I say that a robber, and the end. Why are you going to sue, or what, you will be with me? So you know that you are a worm. If I want - I will have mercy, if I want - I will crush ”.
“What theoretical reasoning can stand where life is based on such principles! The absence of any law, of any logic - this is the law and logic of this life. This is not anarchy, but something even much worse ... ”Dobrolyubov wrote about the tyranny of the Wild.
Like most Kalinovites, Savel Prokofievich is hopelessly ignorant. When Kuligin asks him for money to install a lightning rod, Dikoy declares: "A thunderstorm is sent to us as punishment, so that we feel, and you want to defend yourself with poles and rods."
Dikoy represents the "natural type" of tyrant in the play. His rudeness, rudeness, bullying of people are based, first of all, on the absurd, unbridled character, stupidity and lack of opposition from other people. And only then on wealth.
It is characteristic that practically no one is actively resisting the Wild. Although it is not so difficult to calm him down: an unfamiliar hussar "scolded" him on the ferry, and Kabanikha is not shy in front of him. “There are no elders over you, so you are swaggering,” Marfa Ignatievna tells him bluntly. Characteristically, here she is trying to fit the Wild to her vision of the world order. Kabanikha explains the constant anger and irascibility of Dikiy by his greed, but Savel Prokofievich himself does not even think to deny her conclusions. "Who does not feel sorry for his good!" He exclaims.
The image of Kabanikha is much more complicated in the play. She is the spokesman for the "ideology of the dark kingdom", which "has created a whole world of special rules and superstitious customs."
Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova is a wealthy merchant's wife, a widow who cultivates the orders and traditions of antiquity. She is grumpy, constantly unhappy with others. It gets from her, first of all, from the family: she "eats" Tikhon's son, reads endless lectures to her daughter-in-law, tries to control her daughter's behavior.
Kabanikha jealously defends all the laws and customs of Domostroi. A wife, in her opinion, should be afraid of her husband, be silent and submissive. Children should honor their parents, follow all their instructions implicitly, follow their advice, respect them. None of these requirements, according to Kabanova, are fulfilled in her family. Marfa Ignatievna is dissatisfied with the behavior of her son and daughter-in-law: “They know nothing, no order,” she argues in solitude. She reproaches Katerina with the fact that she does not know how to accompany her husband "in the old way" - therefore, she does not love him enough. “Another good wife, after seeing her husband off, howls for an hour and a half, lies on the porch ...” she teaches her daughter-in-law. Tikhon, in Kabanova's opinion, is too soft in his treatment of his wife, not respectful in the proper measure towards his mother. “The elders are not respected very much nowadays,” says Marfa Ignatievna, reading the instructions to her son.
The boar is fanatically religious: she constantly thinks about God, about sin and retribution, wanderers are often in her house. However, the religiosity of Marfa Ignatievna is nothing more than pharisaism: "The hypocrite ... He closes the beggars, but the household is completely consumed," Kuligin notes about her. In her faith, Marfa Ignatievna is harsh and adamant, there is no place for love, mercy, forgiveness in her. So, at the end of the play, she does not even think about forgiving Katerina her sin. On the contrary, she advises Tikhon to bury his wife alive in the ground so that she may be executed.
Religion, ancient rituals, pharisaic complaints about his life, playing on filial feelings - Kabanikha uses everything to assert her absolute power in the family. And she "gets her way": in the harsh, oppressive atmosphere of domestic tyranny, Tikhon's personality is disfigured. “Tikhon himself loved his wife and was ready to do anything for her; but the oppression under which he grew up has so disfigured him that in him no strong feeling, no decisive striving can develop. He has a conscience, there is a desire for good, but he constantly acts against himself and serves as a submissive instrument of his mother, even in his relations with his wife, ”writes Dobrolyubov.
The innocent, non-spiteful Tikhon lost the integrity of his feelings, the opportunity to show the best features of his nature. Family happiness was initially closed to him: in the family where he grew up, this happiness was replaced by "Chinese ceremonies." He cannot show his love for his wife, and not because “the wife should be afraid of her husband,” but because he simply “does not know how” to show his feelings, which were brutally suppressed since childhood. All this led Tikhon to a certain emotional deafness: he often does not understand the state of Katerina.
Depriving her son of any initiative, Kabanikha constantly suppressed his masculinity and at the same time reproached him for his lack of masculinity. Subconsciously, he seeks to make up for this "lack of masculinity" in drinking and rare "partying" "in the wild." Tikhon cannot realize himself in some kind of business - probably, his mother does not allow him to manage affairs, considering his son unsuitable for this. Kabanova can only send her son on an errand, but everything else is under her strict control. It turns out that Tikhon is deprived of his own opinion and feelings. It is characteristic that Marfa Ignatievna herself is to some extent dissatisfied with her son's infantilism. It slips into her intonations. However, she probably does not realize the extent of her involvement in this.
In the Kabanov family, the life philosophy of Barbara was also formed. Her rule is simple: "do what you want, as long as it is sewn and covered." Varvara is far from Katerina's religiosity, from her poetry and exaltation. She quickly learned to lie and dodge. We can say that Varvara, in her own way, "learned" the "Chinese ceremonies", having perceived their very essence. The heroine still retains the spontaneity of feelings, kindness, but her lies are nothing more than reconciliation with Kalinov's morality.
It is characteristic that in the finale of the play both Tikhon and Varvara, each in their own way, rebel against the "power of mamma." Varvara runs away from home with Kuryash, while Tikhon for the first time openly expresses his opinion, reproaching his mother for the death of his wife.
Dobrolyubov noted that “some critics even wanted to see a singer of broad natures in Ostrovsky,” “they wanted to assign arbitrariness to the Russian person as a special, natural quality of his nature - under the name“ breadth of nature ”; they also wanted to legitimize cheating and cunning in the Russian people under the name of sharpness and deceit. "In the play" The Thunderstorm "Ostrovsky debunks both the phenomenon. Arbitrariness comes out in him" heavy, ugly, lawless ", he sees in it nothing more than tyranny. Rogue and cunning turn out not to sharpness, but to vulgarity , the flip side of tyranny.
As you know, in classical works and fairy tales there are several types of heroes. In this article, we will talk about a pair of antagonist - protagonist. This opposition will be examined on the example of the play by Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky "The Thunderstorm". The main character of this play, in other words, the protagonist, is a young girl Katerina Kabanova. She is opposed, that is, is the antagonist, Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova. Using the example of comparisons and analysis of actions, we will give a more complete description of Kabanikha in the play "The Thunderstorm".
To begin with, let's turn to the list of characters: Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova (Kabanikha) - an old merchant's wife, a widow. Her husband died, so the woman had to raise two children on her own, manage the household and do business. Agree, this is quite difficult at the present time. Despite the fact that the nickname of the merchant is indicated in brackets, the author never calls her that. The text contains remarks from Kabanova, not Kabanikha. With a similar technique, the playwright wanted to emphasize that people call a woman this way among themselves, but they personally address her with respect. That is, in fact, the residents of Kalinov do not like this person, but they are afraid of him.
Initially, the reader learns about Martha Ignatievna from the lips of Kuligin. The self-taught mechanic calls her "the hypocrite who ate everyone at home." Kudryash only confirms these words. Then a wanderer, Feklusha, appears on the scene. Her judgment about Kabanikh is exactly the opposite: a quote. Due to this disagreement, additional interest in this character arises. Marfa Ignatievna appears on the stage in the first act, and the reader or viewer is given the opportunity to be convinced of the truthfulness of Kuligin's words.
The boar is not happy with the way her son behaves. She teaches him to live, despite the fact that the son is already an adult and has been married for a long time. Marfa Ignatievna shows herself as a grumpy domineering woman. Her daughter-in-law Katerina behaves differently. In general, it is quite interesting to trace the similarities and differences of these characters throughout the entire play.
In theory, both Kabanikha and Katerina should love Tikhon. For one he is a son, for another - a husband. However, neither Katya nor Marfa Ignatievna have true love for Tikhon. Katya feels sorry for her husband, but does not love him. And Kabanikha treats him as a guinea pig, as a creature on which you can break your aggression and experience manipulation methods, hiding behind maternal love. Everyone knows that for every mother, the most important thing is the happiness of her child. But Marfa Kabanova in The Storm is not at all interested in Tikhon's opinion. Through years of tyranny and dictatorship, she was able to teach her son that the absence of her own point of view is quite normal. Even observing how carefully and, in some moments, tenderly Tikhon treats Katerina, Kabanikha is always trying to destroy their relationship.
Many critics argued about the strength or weakness of Katerina's character, but no one doubted the strength of Kabanikha's character. This is a truly cruel person who tries to subdue those around him. She would have to rule the state, but she has to waste her "talents" on a family and a provincial town. Varvara, daughter of Martha Kabanova, chose pretense and lies as a way to coexist with a despotic mother. Katerina, on the contrary, resolutely opposes her mother-in-law. They seem to have taken two positions, truth and lie, defending them. And in their conversations that Kabanikha should not categorically accuse Katya of mistakes and various sins, the struggle of light and darkness, truth and the "dark kingdom", of which Kabanikha is a representative, appears through the everyday background.
Katerina and Kabanikha are Orthodox Christians. But their faith is completely different. For Katerina, faith that comes from within is much more important. For her, the place of prayer is not important. The girl is devout, she sees the presence of God in the whole world, and not only in the building of the church. The religiosity of Marfa Ignatievna can be called externalized. For her, rituals and strict adherence to the rules are important. But behind all this obsession with practical manipulation, faith itself disappears. Also for Kabanikha it turns out to be significant to observe and maintain old traditions, despite the fact that many of them are already outdated: “You will not be afraid, and even more so. What kind of order will it be in the house? After all, you, tea, live with her in law. Ali, do you think the law means nothing? Yes, if you are holding such stupid thoughts in your head, you would at least not chat with her, but with your sister, with the girl. Characterization of Kabanikha in Ostrovsky's "The Thunderstorm" is impossible without mentioning her almost manic attention to detail. Tikhon, the son of Kabanova Sr. And Marfa Ignatievna worries that they enter the threshold without bowing, not as great-grandfathers taught. Her behavior resembles that of the priestesses of a dying cult, who are trying with all their might to support life in him with the help of external paraphernalia.
Katerina Kabanova was a somewhat suspicious girl: in the "prophecies" of the half-witted lady, she fancied her own destiny, and in a thunderstorm, the girl saw God's punishment. The boar is too mercantile and down-to-earth for this. She is closer to the material world, practicality and utility. Kabanova is not afraid of thunder and thunder at all, she just does not want to get wet. While the inhabitants of Kalinov are talking about the raging elements, Kabanikha grumbles and expresses his displeasure: “Look what raceies he threw. There is something to listen to, nothing to say! Now times have come, some teachers have appeared. If the old man thinks like that, what can we demand from the young! ”,“ Don't judge yourself when you are older! They know more than you do. Old people have all the signs. The old man will not say a word to the wind. "
The image of Kabanikha in the play "The Thunderstorm" can be called a kind of generalization, a conglomerate of negative human qualities. It is difficult to call her a woman, a mother, and indeed a person in principle. Of course, she is far from the dummies of the city of Foolov, but her desire to subjugate and rule killed all human qualities in Martha Ignatievna.
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According to I. A. Goncharov, A. N. Ostrovsky "brought a whole library of works of art to literature, created his own special world for the stage." The world of Ostrovsky's works is amazing. He created characters large and solid, knew how to emphasize comic or dramatic properties in them, draw the reader's attention to the merits or vices of his heroes.
The heroes of the play "Gro-za" deserve special attention - Savel Prokofievich Dikoy and Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova.
Savel Prokofievich Dikoy is a merchant, a significant person in the city of Kalinov. The heroes of the play give him eloquent characteristics. “He belongs everywhere. He is afraid that he is who! " - says Kudryash about him. Dikoy, in fact, does not recognize anything except his own will. He does not care about the thoughts and feelings of other people. Cursing, humiliating, insulting Savel Prokofievich costs nothing. With those around him, he behaves as if he “broke loose”, and without this he “cannot breathe”. "... You are a worm," he says to Kuligi-well. - I want - have mercy, if I want - I will crush ”.
The power of the Wild is the stronger, the weaker, the more weak-willed a person is. So Kudryash, for example, knows how to resist the Wild. “... He is the word, and I am ten; spit, and go. No, I will not become a slave to him, ”says Kudryash about his relationship with the merchant. Another person is the Dikiy's nephew, Boris. “Boris Grigorich got it as a sacrifice, so he rides on it,” others note. Dikogo is not embarrassed by the fact that Boris is an orphan and that he has no one closer to his uncle. The merchant realizes that the fate of his nephew is in his hands, and takes advantage of it. "Hunted down, hammered ..." - Boris says bitterly. The merchant is no less cruel to his workers: “No one here dares to utter a word about the sting, he will scold at whatever is worth it”. On someone else's slave labor and deceit, the shameless Dikoy makes his fortune: "... I will not pay them for some kopeck ... and I make thousands of this ...". Anyway, sometimes he finds insight into the Wild, and he realizes that he is going too far: “After all, I know that I have to give it back, but I can't do everything good.”
Dikoy is a despot and a tyrant in his family, “his own people cannot please him in any way”, “when he is offended by such a person whom he does not dare to curse; hold on to your pets! "
Not inferior to the Wild and Kabanikha, the rich Kalinovskaya merchant's wife. The boar is a prude, she does everything "under the guise of piety." Outwardly she is very devout. However, as Kuligin notes, Kabanikha "clothe the beggars, but ate the household altogether." The main object of her tyranny is her own son Tikhon. As an adult, married man, he is completely in the power of his mother, does not have his own opinion, is afraid to contradict her. Kabanikha "builds" his relationship with his wife, she guides his every act, every word. Complete obedience is all she wants to see in her son. The power-hungry Kabanikha does not notice that under her oppression a cowardly, miserable, weak-willed, irresponsible person has grown up. Having escaped for some time from under the supervision of his mother, he chokes on freedom and drinks, because he does not know how to use freedom otherwise. "... Not a step out of your will," he repeats to his mother, and "he himself thinks how he could get out as soon as possible."
Kabanikha is jealous of his son's daughter-in-law, constantly reproaches him with Katerina, “he eats at his meals”. “I can see that I am a hindrance to you,” she says to Tikhon. Kabanikha believes that the husband's wife should be afraid, precisely afraid, and not love or respect. In her opinion, the right relationship is built precisely on the suppression of one person by another, on humiliation, on lack of freedom. An indicator in this respect is the scene of Katerina's farewell to her husband, when all Tikhon's words addressed to his wife are just a repetition of Kabanikha's instigations.
If Tikhon, crushed by her, suffers from Kabanikha from childhood, then life of such a dreamy, poetic and integral nature like Katerina, in the house of a merchant's wife, becomes unbearable at all. “It's all the same what you got for a husband here, what you buried,” says Boris.
Constant pressure makes the daughter of Kabanikha, Varvara, adapt. “Do what you want, if only it was sewn and covered,” she says.
Assessing the images of the "masters of life", N. Dobro-lyubov shows Dikiy and Kabanikha as tyrants, with their "constant suspicion, nagging and pickiness." According to the critic, "Gro-za" is Ostrovsky's most decisive work "in this play," the mutual relations of tyranny and speechlessness have been brought ... to the most tragic consequences ... ".
Petty tyranny and Ignorance in the drama of A. N. Ostrovsky "The Thunderstorm"
1. Realism of the drama "Thunderstorm".
2. Portrait of Savel Prokofievich Diky.
3. The boar is the head of the “dark kingdom”.
4. Completion of power Petty tyranny and ignorance in the drama of A. N. Ostrovsky "The Thunderstorm"
The idea of \u200b\u200bcreating the drama "The Thunderstorm" came to Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky in 1859 after a long trip to the Volga cities. It is believed that the prototype of the main character of this play, Katerina Kabanova, was a real woman, Alexandra Klykova. Her life story was very similar to that of Katerina. Of interest is the fact that Ostrovsky completed his work about a month before Klykova drowned in the Volga, unable to withstand the bullying of her relatives. This circumstance, of course, testifies to the fact that the author very clearly and realistically showed in the drama "The Thunderstorm" the tough conflict that occurs between different generations in the same merchant family.
Petty tyranny and ignorance in the drama of A. N. Ostrovsky "The Thunderstorm" shown by the author with the help of two very vivid images - Savel Prokofievich Diky and Martha Ignatievna Kabanova ("The Kabanikha"), the mother-in-law of the main character.
Dikoy is one of the typical representatives of the provincial wealthy merchants. This is a person who has certain rights in the city and believes that he is allowed, if not everything, then a lot. This circumstance is evidenced by the following statement:
Kuligin. Why, sir, Savel Prokofievich, would you please to offend an honest man?
Wild. I’ll give you a report! I don't give any account to anyone more important than you ...
Further, Ostrovsky points out that petty tyranny and unworthy behavior of the Wild is not at all a vicious quality, but a natural property of his “hot, self-willed heart”. The trouble with Savel Prokofievich is that he makes no attempts to curb his indomitable disposition, and therefore he does whatever he wants with impunity.
People around him perceive Savel Prokofievich ambiguously. For example, Kuligin argues that the Dikiy should yield in everything so as not to run into rudeness, but Kudryash quite reasonably objected to him: “... who will please him if his whole life is built on swearing? And most of all because of the money; not a single calculation is complete without abuse ... ".
But no capital, no means can help to enrich the spiritual life of the Wild. Despite the unshakable conviction of his own righteousness, he quickly sets his tail, colliding by chance with a more significant person. At the same time, self-criticism is not at all alien to him: for example, having shouted at an innocent peasant who brought him firewood during Lent, he publicly apologized to the offended so as not to take sin on his soul. But this "kind" act is just another quirk of a rich tyrant, and not a sincere repentance.
Savel Prokofievich's life is built around money, capital - in his opinion, all good things can be bought, and money should be given “just like that” only in exceptional cases. He himself directly says about this: "I will give it back, but I will swear."
Unlike Dikiy, Marfa Ignatievna Kabanova, whom others call "Kabanikha", adheres to the established norms of the old morality, or rather, its worst side. Observing the rules and laws of "Domostroy", she scrupulously selects only those that are beneficial to her, not paying attention to the rest. Unfortunately, she does not observe the most important, key law - you cannot condemn people who accidentally sinned, you should first of all think about your own sins and take care of it. Kabanikha finds negative sides in everything - even at the moment of Katerina's farewell to her husband, who is leaving on business at the day of the week, the unkind mother-in-law finds a reason for a snide statement: “Why are you hanging around your neck, shameless! 11th you say goodbye to your lover! He is your husband, head! Don't you know the order? Bow at your feet! " At the same time, Marfa Ignatievna treats her son too harshly, imposing her m. Chlyady, not allowing him to live independently.
Perhaps such despotism, the desire for unlimited power over household members were not the main character trait of Kabanova. She tried with all her might to maintain strict order in the house, to manage not only the household, but also human relationships. Unfortunately, due to its ignorance, it is unable to delicately resolve the conflicts that arise, further aggravating the tense situation with its dictatorship. The opinion of strangers is indifferent to her, she does not know how to learn from her own mistakes.
The tragic denouement of The Thunderstorm drama is the suicide of Katerina, tired of the constant oppression of her mother-in-law, emotional stress, constant excuses due to invented sins and “wrong” actions. This is not just a withdrawal from a hateful life, but above all an unconscious challenge to that force. Petty tyranny and ignorance, which rules the surrounding world, a protest against the imposed false "morality". And even Katerina's husband Tikhon, who was downtrodden by her mother, understands this. Leaning over the body of his drowned wife, he says: “It's good for you, Katya! And why did I stay to live in the world and suffer! " He begins to understand the viciousness and insincerity of the relationship that reigns in his family, but his soft, weak-willed character does not allow him to decide on a serious act, to resist psychological pressure.
Tikhon's words let us understand that life in the "dark kingdom", where tyranny and ignorance rule, is worse than death. Otherwise, how can living people be jealous of those who have departed, especially suicides (after all, according to the laws of the Orthodox Church, voluntary "flight" from life is one of the most serious sins)? And the very existence of this vicious circle is drawing to a close. A normal person cannot exist in an atmosphere of oppression, resentment, ignorance and false morality, which means that liberation from the power of Kabanikha and others like her is approaching.
