Three people

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Three People ( Russian Трое ) is a novel by the Russian writer Maxim Gorky , the writing of which was completed in January 1901. In the Journal Schisn the text was preprinted from the November 1900 issue until the paper was banned in early summer 1901. The complete publication of the novel took place in 1902 together with the song of the petrel in the Saint Petersburg publishing group Snanije . In Berlin , Bruno Cassirer published August Scholz's translation into German in the same year .

The title of the novel means that three young men want to make their fortune in an unnamed Russian city. Only Pavel Zsawelitsch Grachev can do this. His two friends Ilya Jakowlewitsch Lunew and Jakow Filimonow fail. But actually the text is to be read as a biography or more precisely as a psychoanalysis of the peddler Ilya. This protagonist murdered a usurer .

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Ilya Lunev's ancestors were farmers from the Kershenez forests. When Ilya's father was exiled to Siberia, the hunchback Terentij, an uncle on his father's side, took care of the sturdy ten-year-old boy. Ilya's mother had lost her mind during a fire in the village that triggered her father's exile. Because Uncle Terentij has no livelihood at home, he goes to the nearest town with his nephew. There both are accommodated in the house of the innkeeper Petrucha Filimonov, a relative. In the city, the innkeeper Petrucha Filimonov is considered a stealer and a fraud. There are about as many people crowded together in the house as there are in Ilya's village as a whole. The hard-working shoemaker Perfischka, a drunkard, lives in the basement with his sick, paralyzed wife and seven-year-old daughter Mascha. Ilja soon made a comrade of gentle, blond Jakow Petrucha, the host's son. Both boys have been looking after Mascha since the shoemaker's wife came to an end. There is even a blacksmith working in the house - the tall, sinewy Zsawel Grachev. Uncle Terentij befriends another resident of the house - the old, single rag picker Jeremjej. Ilya becomes Jeremjej's assistant.

Zsavel Grachev kills his disloyal wife with blacksmith tongs and goes to prison. Pavel Grachev, the blacksmith's son, is taken in by the shoemaker Perfischka. The rag collector Jeremjej falls ill and dies. Petrucha and Uncle Terentij appropriated the deceased's considerable cash. Petrucha puts Ilya in the fish shop of the 55-year-old merchant Kiril Ivanytsch Strogany, a city councilor. Ilja watches how the two employees steal from the merchant, chats - cornered - his knowledge and is fired for it.

Ilja, now fifteen years old, is now a peddler with a mountain of odds and ends through the city. The boy had pushed his new business idea through with Uncle Terentij, who was initially reluctant. When Ilja, Jakow and Mascha talk about their experiences in the evening, the now 46-year-old shoemaker Perfischka also sometimes takes part in the tea party. Ilya reports on the arbitrariness of the police. Jakow mostly talks about his reading, which he devoured during the day while working at his father's buffet .

Pavel writes verses, works in a printing press and is cured of typhus . When he fell in love with the chambermaid Vera Kapitanova in the doctor's house, Vera was dismissed because of this affair. Pavel takes Ilya to the brothel owned by Mrs. Vasa Zzidorovna. Wjera found work as a prostitute there. In the brothel Ilya meets the 27-year-old whore Olympiada Danilowna Schlykowa. Ilya does not fall in love with the woman, but soon he can no longer be without her. Olympiada is also endured by the rich old money changer Wassilij Gavrilowitsch Poluektow and of course “sullied by his lustful hands”. Ilya seeks out the widowed usurer and fence in his shop, strangles him in an affect and steals around two thousand rubles. At home he loudly confesses the act to Masha. The private confession has no consequences for the perpetrator.

The secret police were at Olympiada. The interrogated woman guesses the perpetrator. In cold blood, she gives Ilya recommendations for his impending interrogation. Ilya confesses the act to Olympiada. In response, she confesses her love to Ilya and tells him how she became a whore. The stepfather raped her as a young girl.

The innkeeper Petrucha is questioned in detail by the district chief about Ilya's person. After being summoned to the examining magistrate, Ilya leaves the courthouse as a free man. Uncle Terentij continues to tell Ilya rumors. According to them, he should be involved in the murder of the usurer. Ilya contemplates confessing what he has done.

The shoemaker Perfischka couples his daughter Mascha with the 50-year-old shopkeeper Chrjenow, a widower. Uncle Terentij cannot forgive himself for the enrichment of the fortune of the deceased rag collector Jeremjej, which he shared with the innkeeper Petrucha, and seeks forgiveness on a pilgrimage through Russia. Petrucha has to have his son Yakov taken to the hospital after he beats him. The consumptive Yakov, who always thinks about death, had called his father a thief when the talk of the rag-picker came up. When Ilya found out about the misfortune of his friend Jakow, he physically attacked the landlord and had to look for new accommodation. Ilya is staying as a subtenant in the household of the childless 26-year-old district overseer Kirik Nikodimowitsch Avtomonow and his active wife Tatiana Vlasevna. Occasionally, when the three of them are playing cards in the evening, Ilya brings up the murder. The housewife replies that the perpetrator was lucky. The couple smells money at Ilya's and persuades the peddler to open a clothing store together. The housewife throws herself on the neck of the lodger. Ilya starts an affair with his partner . The affair is not permanent. When Ilya notices how Tatiana is taking advantage of him, he keeps his distance: "What a shameless woman you are, Tanja!" Uncle Terentij, who has returned home from the pilgrimage, nests with his nephew Ilya and works in the shop. Tatjana is against it, because the customers were afraid of a hunchback.

Pawel got infected from Wjera . When his mistress has run away from him, he wants to look for her and stab her. Masha fled to Ilya. The woman was mistreated and badly beaten up by her husband, the shopkeeper Chrjenow. Ilya visits his friend Jakow in the hospital. The silent boy doomed to die withers away. Gorky writes that Ilya left the hospital with a hatred of life "which ... almost formed the basis of his mental life ..."

Ilya goes to the nearest church, but does not want to repent . He thinks of Jakow's words: “It must be interesting to die.” Ilya, who has lost his old thirst for action, finds time for long walks through the city. Once the path happened to lead him to the tombstone of his victim Poluektow. Ilya speaks to the dead: "Because of you, Damn, have I my whole life shattered, ..." In his shop Ilya busy twelve years Gavrik as errand boys . The 19-year-old well-built but not at all pretty high school student Ssofia Nikonovna Medwjedewa visits her brother Gawrik in the shop. Ssofia wants to get Mascha a lawyer in the trial against her husband. The highly educated girl does not love the merchants; so despises the dealer Ilya. He lives on someone else's work. Pawel falls in love with Ssofia and dedicates one of his published poems to her.

Ilya wants to hang up. Let the uncle continue in the shop. Thought and done. At Tatiana Vlasjewna's birthday party, Ilya unwraps in front of the perplexed host Kirik Avtomonow and the confused, invited wealthy citizens: The birthday child was his bed companion and he killed the usurer Poluektov. The police are called and take away the confessor. On the way, Ilya breaks free and breaks his skull at full speed against a stone wall. Death.

Self-testimony

  • Gorky wrote to KP Pyatnitsky around 1902 after revising and shortening the 2nd edition of the novel: “I think the duty of a decent writer is to be an unpleasant writer to the public, and the highest art consists in the art, the people to anger. "

reception

  • The murder case reminded Russian literary criticism of guilt and atonement . The Soviet literary criticism later contradicted this up to the year of Stalin's death in 1953, claiming that Gorky merely parodied Dostoyevsky in the case.
  • The responsible Russian authorities would have registered his message after the novel was published: Capitalism is the enemy of the worker . So the officials restricted the author's freedom of movement. Gorky was allowed Arsamas not leave.

German-language editions

  • Three people. A novel. Only authorized German edition. From the Russian by August Scholz . Bruno Cassirer, Berlin 1902. 543 pages, ornaments by Th. Th. Heine . First edition
  • Three people. The only authorized German edition translated by August Scholz . (= The New Novel). Kurt Wolff Verlag Leipzig 1923. 529 pages

Used edition

  • Three people. Novel. The only authorized translation from Russian by August Scholz . 463 pages. Vol. 4 from: Maxim Gorki: Collected Works in Individual Editions. Malik-Verlag, Berlin 1926

literature

  • Nina Gourfinkel: Maxim Gorki. With testimonials and photo documents. Translated from the French by Rolf-Dietrich Keil . Rowohlt, Hamburg 1958 (1986 edition), ISBN 3-499-50009-4 .
  • Nadeshda Ludwig: Maxim Gorki. Life and work. Series of Contemporary Writers. People and Knowledge, Berlin 1984.
  • Henri Troyat : Gorky. Petrel of the Revolution. German adaptation by Antoinette Gittinger. Casimir Katz Verlag, Gernsbach 1987, ISBN 3-925825-08-8 .

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ The title of the novel appears literally once in the text, namely in the 22nd of the 26th chapter of the novel in a slightly different context: "... we are three people here ... people of dark origins, and uneducated ..." (used Edition, p. 372, 13th Zvu). Here Ilya, Pawel and Mascha (see below) are meant.
  2. ↑ Maybe Gorky says the river Kerzhenets River . A neighboring village of Ilya's home village Kiteshnaja (Russian Китежная) is called Romodanowsk (Russian Pомодановск) (Edition used, p. 13).
  3. ↑ Some characters have at least one nickname: Mascha - Maschka or Maschutka, Ilja - Ilyushka, Jakow - Jaschka, Pawel - Paschka, Olympiada - Lipa or Lipotschka, Wjera - Wjerka, Ssofia - Ssonjka or Ssonja.
  4. ↑ Uncle Terence arrives at Afanassy the seat ends (russ. У Афанасья Сидящего ), the miracle workers of Perejaßlawl (russ. У переяславльских чудотворцев ) in Mitrofanij Voronezh (russ. У Митрофания Воронежского ) and tihon Sadonskij (russ. У Тихона Задонского) over, seeks the island of Valaam (Russian на Валаам остров) and prays to the helpers in need Peter and Favronija in Murom (Russian у Петра и Фавроньи в Муроме) (edition used, p. 413 middle).
  5. ↑ Ssofia develops something like Marx's theory of surplus value (edition used, p. 401, 6th Zvo).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ludwig, p. 68 below
  2. ↑ About three people at home.mts-nn.ru (Russian)
  3. ↑ Russian Пятницкий, Константин Петрович; engl. Konstantin Pyatnitsky
  4. ↑ Gorki, quoted in Ludwig, p. 69, center
  5. ↑ Gourfinkel, p. 64 above
  6. ↑ Gourfinkel, p. 65 above
  7. ^ Troyat, p. 74, middle