The poem opens with a description of Nikita Morgunk leaving.
Washed in the bathhouse, dressed up in a jacket and boots, as if he were going to visit his relatives for pies.
Nikita is going in search of a certain country of Muravia, which his grandfather told him about. His grandfather often told him:
Health - time, luck - time, Wealth and intelligence. It used to be that the grandfather would say in rhyme, spread out his hands: - Just like at twenty years old Silenka is not there, he won’t be, and don’t wait. Just like when you’re thirty years old you don’t have reason, - It won’t, so go ahead. Just as at forty there is no prosperity, so don’t look any further...
And since Nikita was already approaching 40 years old, and his life was difficult, he decided to try his luck in the country of Ant. This country was famous for freedom and justice:
The land in length and breadth is its own all around. You sow one bobblehead, and that one is yours.
This is a special world with its own laws, living according to peasant rules; there is no communism or collective farms. Nikita’s grandfather told him about this country.
And now the native village is left behind. Morgunok considers it his duty to visit his brother-in-law. They were friends from a young age and were very close to each other in spirit. Nikita tells his brother-in-law about his future journey. They sing the song together for the last time. Nikita "cries for herself." He was born in a church gatehouse, married at seventeen, went to a farm, and separated. I didn’t join the collective farm, but now I went to seek my happiness. The description of his path is accompanied by frequent references to the earth:
Earth!.. More and more beautiful and visible It lies around. And there is no better happiness - to live on it until death.
Morgunok leaves his village. The villages that come along the way are already unfamiliar to him. His horse, Gray, became emaciated and sweaty. This horse is the most precious thing in Morgunk’s life. His entire household was on the horse right down to the last pin. Nikita took care of the Gray - “like his right hand”, “like an eye in his forehead”. This is his friend, “not a horse, but a man.”
On the way, Morgunok meets a priest. They talk, Nikita unharnesses his horse and sits down to dinner with the priest. He talks about his life: there are no more parishes, no services, and he feeds himself by walking around the villages and offering his services:
There are some places that believe in God, - There is no priest, And here I am. The bride and groom are waiting there, - There is no priest, And I’m here. There they take care of the baby, - There is no priest, And here I am.
And the priest’s only regret is that he doesn’t have a horse, otherwise it’s too hard to walk on Russian soil. He invites Nikita to walk together: “Yours is the cart, my instrument.” But Nikita does not agree and goes his own way. Morgunka had to get to know different people. One day he hears a story from one of his random fellow travelers about a grandfather and woman who lived in a dilapidated hut “the windows are on the ground, the roof is on one side.” Grandfather did not go to the collective farm or the state farm, and only one year the water began to rise strongly. The water lifted the hut and carried it far away, brought it to the estate and left it here. The grandfather only said that he and the old woman would now live in a new way. Nikita listens and dozes. And somewhere Ant-country sleeps.
Soon Nikita hears a rumor that Comrade Stalin is traveling across Russia, and perhaps going straight towards Morgunku. And Nikita is thinking about how he will ask Stalin the question of how much longer should people wait for the end of this “fuss” when everything is being scrapped in the name of a new life? He wants to ask Stalin to be left alone and not be forced into a collective farm alone in all of Russia. He has a horse, a nice horse, and only two years left
Nikita will be forty years old, when it will be too late to earn wealth for himself.
The road is long, Morgunok is already covered in dust. A random traveler Nikita meets on the road unexpectedly turns out to be his former neighbor Ivan Kuzmich. He, as if blind, is led by the arm of a boy, his son. From Ivan Kuzmich’s story it is clear that he has been wandering around the world like this for a long time, and only his son remained with him. He no longer has the strength to work; he only lives by begging. For the first time, Nikita fell asleep calmly and soundly next to his neighbor. In the morning I only heard the horse neighing. He jumped up, all frozen, but his neighbor was gone, and neither was his horse. “The cart is here and the boy is here. And the horse?.. There is no horse...” Nikita woke up the boy, and he told him that his father had traded him for a horse with a bridle, and taught Morgunk himself a lesson for life. What could Nikita do? He harnessed the shafts to the cart and went. Tired and completely broken, Nikita walks along the road. People stare after him for a long time; you rarely see such an eccentric. Yes, the dogs are annoying. In one of the villages they take him to the village council and look at his documents. They had nothing to take from Morgunok, so they released him. And again he went to look for his faithful friend, the horse.
And Nikita sees an amazing thing - gypsies are mowing in the field. A feeling of love for the land stirred in Morgunk’s soul; he himself wanted to walk across the field with a scythe. He asks the gypsies to give him his horse. The gypsies bring him to their stables. First one horse, then another, is brought out in front of him. And the horses are one more beautiful than the other, but Nikita did not recognize any of them:
I'm sorry, I can't - I lie, they say, out of calculation. “That’s it,” they threatened Morgunka with a finger, “that’s it...
Nikita spends the night near the gypsies and decides to go to the market the next day to buy a new horse. At night, he painfully thinks that for centuries the gypsies have been stealing horses, but is it possible to steal a good horse from them now? He slowly creeps towards the stable, but is stopped by the guard's voice. In shame, Nikita returns to his cart and quickly leaves.
Nikita walks for three nights and three days, harnessed to a cart. The people marvel. And suddenly he hears the sound of hooves ahead. Suddenly, from around the corner, a priest appears, riding Gray, on Nikita’s horse. Seeing Morgunk, the priest slowed down his horse, turned around and galloped off. While Nikita was unraveling the belts and unharnessing himself from the cart, the priest was already far away. Nikita set off with all his might to catch up with the priest, shouting to him, but he just got tired and fell on the road, clutching his side like a wound. Nikita lay there for a long time until the boy came up and called him. It is unknown whether the priest bought that horse, or whether the thief stole it from the thief, but what does Nikita care? He continues his path with difficulty, remembering his wife who is waiting for him at home. She doesn't know anything.
Finally Nikita reaches the market. He is looking for either the priest or his horse, and when he sees a gray horse, his heart sank. Here he also meets his offender - Ivan Kuzmich. Portraying a blind man, he begs for alms. Nikita grabbed him, leaned on him, held him, did not let go. But by cunning Bugrov escapes from his hands and runs away. Nikita was left with nothing again.
He's on the road again. Meets a guy on a tractor. He offers to give him a lift and take the cart in tow. Nikita agrees. He will find out the future route from the guy. The guy directs him to the village of Ostrov, where he can buy a horse.
In this village Nikita sees complete devastation. “Thin roofs,” “thrown down fences,” “and people are smoking in vain on logs in the shade.” A grandfather sits on a bench, whittling pipes. As Morgunok finds out, these are people without collective farms. Here Nikita tries to sell himself a horse, the grandfather agrees to sell him his own. Seeing the horse, Morgunok decides that it would be better for him to walk all his life than to buy such a nag. Hearing such words from Nikita, the grandfather asks, a little offended, why their life is bad. Morgunok objects: “You don’t live richly.” Material from the site
But happiness is not in wealth, why is it, son?
Grandfather says that a piece of bread is enough for them to live and not have to worry. Their children live “worse than gray pigs,” but they are not to blame, their “father is to blame.”
Nikita returns to the collective farm again, where he left his cart against signature. Chairman Andrei Fokich Frolov is ready to show him the collective farm. Over lunch, Frolov tells his story. He talks about his enemy - Grachev. Frolov at one time divided the meadows, levied a tax, and was beaten for it. The Grachevs met him far from the village, and all with oak. He barely crawled to his father's house. And now he has become the chairman of the collective farm. Nikita also stayed here and attended a wedding. Old Miron Frolov, Andrei Frolov’s grandfather, also comes to the wedding. He himself got married for the first time a hundred years ago. The wedding party is in full swing, the accordion player starts his song. And the dancing had not yet died down when either a beggar or a guest appeared on the threshold. He asked to call the hostess. This is a passing priest, he agrees to marry the newlyweds even now. Nikita instantly rushed to the threshold, jumped out into the street and, breaking the reins, hung on the horse’s neck.
Nikita rides slowly along the road and talks to his horse. On the way, he comes across a gray-haired old man heading to the Lavra. Nikita asks the wise old man where in the world the country of Ant is. The old man replies that there is no such country.
There was a Muravskaya country, and there is no such thing. It disappeared, it was overgrown with grass and ants.
The elder advises Nikita to join the collective farm. Nikita still has a little doubt and, already cheerful, goes home.
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Retelling plan
1. Nikita Morgunok leaves home in search of the country of Ant and ends up either at a wedding or at a funeral.
2. The hero goes to his brother-in-law: he decided to leave the family so as not to join the collective farm.
3. Morgunok remembers his grandfather’s words about different “terms” of human life.
4. Meeting with the priest.
5. The parable of an old man and an old woman who suffered from a flood.
6. Imaginary conversation between Morgunok and Stalin.
7. Nikita meets his neighbor Ilya Kuzmich, who appears in the form of a beggar. A neighbor steals his horse.
8. Morgunok himself is driving the cart. He learns that in this region there are only artels, i.e. collective farms.
9. Meeting with gypsies in search of a horse.
10. Nikita sees a priest galloping on his horse. He is looking for a horse in the market.
11. Another meeting with Ilya Kuzmich. The former neighbor runs away.
12. Morgunka’s cart is towed by a tractor driver.
13. The hero finds himself in the village of Ostrov, consisting of those who do not go to collective farms.
14. Conversation with the chairman of the collective farm and with the night watchman.
15. Wedding in the village. Morgunok finds the horse.
16. The hero talks with the old man, who explains that there is no Ant. He decides to join a collective farm.
Retelling
“The Country of Ant” is an unusual work. The actual epic layer of the plot - the picture of collectivization, the formation and strengthening of collective farms - is almost absent from it. The author makes one feel the very spirit of the attack on the old way of life of the village through a series of large-scale symbolic images of nature:
Spring was coming in mighty strength,
At night the snow crumbled,
Spilled all over Russia
Waters of all seas and rivers.
This hyperbole is notable not only because it speaks of the life-giving power of social and moral changes in the countryside that collectivization should bring. Such a symbolic picture also contains a feeling of anxiety, hinting at the inevitable hardships that the flooded waters of “all seas and rivers” will splash onto the shores of life.
It is no coincidence that the comic context of the above stanza and the episode that follows it is not accidental: the flood caught the hut of two stubborn people - a grandfather and grandmother who did not want to join the collective farm - but, ironically, nailed it straight to the collective farm estate:
The waters subsided. It became dry.
Grandfather looks at the door in the sun:
“Well, that will happen, old woman,
Now we have to live again..."
Note that the hut was moored in such a way that its door turned out to be facing not the forest, not the field, but the sun. The role of this episode: it serves as a comic “reversal” of the protagonist’s journey to find happiness and fits into the picture of the life of the Soviet people.
The epic layer of the plot of “Ant” is also made up of the repeatedly appearing image of “gave”:
The road stretches in the distance
And sadness presses in my chest:
How much heaven and earth
Left behind.
Let us note a large-scale and emotionally rich generalization: what was left behind were not miles, not villages, but heaven and earth... These lines demonstrate the semantic and emotional significance of the images of “distance” and are heard throughout the entire poem. Tvardovsky does not remain silent about the difficulties of history, but the dramatic movement of history does not exclude its bright prospects. The framework of the historical events reflected in “Ant” also includes two series of conventional pictures, which can be called: “the triumph of the collective farm system” and “the death of the world of the kulaks.” They, according to the folklore type of generalization, are painted in polar colors of the beautiful and the ugly in relation to each other. Thus, the picture of the first collective farm sowing or threshing is perceived as a celebration of liberated labor, as beautiful. In exactly the same way, a picture of a collective farm wedding is painted, full of joy and spiritual abundance of bright colors. Here the poet paints not only the present, but also the future, but not in the guise of utopia or fantasy, but through the prism of the ideal.
“Ant” depicts a friendly, wealthy gypsy collective farm. The standards of everyday plausibility are inappropriate here: before us is the most sharpened dream, the ideal of the beauty of new human relationships. Main character written by Tvardovsky, like an epic panorama of time, with faith in its future, but also with a full understanding of the contradictions. Historical transformations in the village concerned not only the economy. The most important and difficult task was the transformation of the usual moral structure of the individual farmer. Life has presented every peasant with an inevitable, urgent and difficult question: how to live further? What does the collective farm promise? It is at such a dramatic moment that we meet Nikita Morgunk. Nikita Morgunok is a “variegated” image - the hero of the epic, beautiful and funny, dramatic and comic. Tvardovsky conveys the aroma of authenticity of rural life, an amazingly apt and precise language - the language of the people. The plot of the journey in search of “single happiness” allows us to see not only the evolution of the hero, but also the character of a worker close to the earth, for whom work is the primary task of life. Even in the details, Morgunk’s “mastery” is evident. Take, for example, his habit of quickly and dexterously harnessing his horse; At the same time, the poet does not forget to note:
A gray horse wanders through the shafts
Under the painted arc,
And the soup is tightly pulled
With the master's hand.
The definition of “housewife” has not only its direct meaning, but also a hint of Nikita’s ability to masterfully, efficiently, and skillfully take on everything that is required in peasant everyday life. Nikita does not like the work of a “priest-otkhodnik”, and he advises him to work: “I should have seen the bees, raked the hay.” He does not at all sympathize with the kulak Bugrov, who complains about the frosts in the distant region where he was evicted, for a job that is unprofitable for him. For Morgunok, working is in human nature itself. Longing for the long journey to do peasant work, Morgunok volunteered to help the collective farmers on the threshing floor, managing to say his cherished words:
Yes, I’m not a quitter, not a villain,
Yes, I’m no worse than all people.
According to the hero, loving work is evidence of a normal human condition, while the opposite is a sign of worthless people, almost criminals. It is not for nothing that the definitions “idler” and “villain” follow each other through a comma and are equal in meaning. Working on a current is Morgunok’s happiest memories. And any peasant work is the hero’s favorite. And the current scene itself is filled with poetry and beauty:
But Morgunka loved it,
Hanging up the warm flail,
Sit and wind on the current
A day's worth of bread.
This picture reveals a sad and sublime mood, caused by memories and coloring them: everything that is dear to Morgunk now seems so distant to him, perhaps lost forever. The feeling of beauty in the above lines is gradually intensified: it seems to move from the folk-poetic “love” to the lyrically colored words “breeze”, “handful” and reaches its emotional culmination in the final image - “golden crescent”. “Golden rye” is a favorite phrase in folk poetry, the poetry of Nekrasov, Koltsov. The hero never looks at nature from the outside; it enters his spiritual world with the same naturalness as work. As if in passing, Nikita notices everything that a city person would not pay any attention to: the barely perceptible aroma of summer water, the touch of the breeze, a stump or bush, as if forgotten, abandoned on the road. The narration on behalf of the author here also helps to convey the naturalness of the hero’s experiences, especially since the poet seems to look at his surroundings through the eyes of Morgunk, speaking in the same language of the people as Nikita.
Readily responding to other people's troubles, Morgunok treats his own sorrows and inconveniences of life on the road with restraint and does not exaggerate them. Most often, at such moments, the hero sadly makes fun of himself. So, for example, amazed by the meanness of Bugrov (he stole Morgunok’s horse) and simply killed by what happened, he, nevertheless, turns to his travel concerns:
The day is short and the journey is long,
And the sun - where is it already!..
Morgunok changed his shoes,
And it’s easier on the soul.
The humor of the last lines speaks about the moral health of Morgunk - a noticeable feature of the folk hero.
Traveling, Nikita, as it happens in folk tales, finds himself at a crossroads; He more than once falls into the hands of a cunning deceiver (meeting with Bugrov) and is faced with a choice: if you go to the left, you will lose your horse; to the right, you won’t lose your head. And, of course, a happy ending to the journey awaits him: in our case, the hero is on the threshold of a new life.
There are constant echoes in “Ant” between the image of the real Nikita and the generalized figure of the wanderer. The author first introduces us to the hero like this:
From morning to noon he travels,
The road is long.
So far the hero has not even been named. A purely conventional landscape immediately follows. Against such a generalized large-scale background, the figure of a real village resident emerges, who, if he leaves home, does not go further than on a visit or to the market. Many meetings await Nikita Morgunka along the way. How do they affect him? Do his views change quickly? The poet does not push his hero to an unreasonably quick “reforging”, as happened in some works of literature. On the contrary, in the character of Morgunk there is a slowness of change, corresponding to his distrust of the new and persistent faith in his dream. Meetings with collective farmers for a long time do not make any impression on Nikita Morgunk, even when he observes their friendly, beautiful work. Seeing a young tractor driver correcting some problem in the car, Morgunok ironically notes precisely this, in his opinion, unreliability of collective farm machines and craftsmen (“Yes,” said Nikita, “good driving!”).
But gradually Morgunok becomes imbued with interest and respect for collective farms. The meeting of Morgunk with Frolov is important in the poem. And not only in order to convince the hero of the advantages of the collective farm system, but also in order to outline the image of the peasant, which has independent meaning in the poem. Tvardovsky emphasizes his conviction and heroism, relying on the traditions of epics. However, at the same time, the poet endows his hero with reliable character traits. Frolov alternates the story about his life, about a mortal fight with fists, either with an everyday remark: “I want to smoke,” or with an everyday question to Morgunk: “Are you tired, brother?” Frolov’s memories of how, having almost died in single combat with his enemies, he was sad that he did not bring the promised gift to his son are very human.
Morgunok is full of confidence in Frolov, simply because he is a hero at work (scene on the current), and loves apt words, and is generally the same man as Nikita (“Two men are sitting in the shade, talking for the first time”).
Many of Morgunk’s experiences, conveyed poetically and psychologically subtly, give rise to a response in the souls of people who are not peasants at all. Explaining this feature of his work, Tvardovsky noted that he considers himself a student not only of the Nekrasov school, but also of the Tolstoy school.
In fact, the “Great Year” turned into a tragedy for the Russian peasantry. Tvardovsky’s poem transformed cruel reality into a “fairy tale.”
Chapter 1
A short introduction introducing the reader to peasant life in a turning point year and to the main character of the poem, Nikita Morgunk. The beginning of Morgunk's journey.
Chapter 2
Morgunok in the “gold-domed village” at a party of fists. Prosperous peasants commemorate “the souls of the departed who went to Solovki.” They do not want to come to terms with their new life and are ready to drink away and destroy all their property, just so that it does not go to the collective farms.
Chapter 3
Morgunok, continuing on his way, stops by to say goodbye to his brother-in-law. He does not approve of Nikita's departure. He asks to stay, explaining that the land is waiting for peasant hands - you can’t quit your job now. But Morgunok insists on his own and sets off on the road again.
Chapter 4
It tells in more detail about where Morgunok is so stubbornly trying to get to. He is looking for the legendary country of Muravia, where without “community” and “collective farms” you can get rich with your labor and live firmly in the old way. Nikita is in a hurry - he is almost forty years old, so if he does not manage to find Muravia in time, he will remain a beggar for the rest of his life.
Chapter 5
On the way, Morgunk comes across priest Mitrofan, who was left without a parish. Today, “the priests have scattered throughout the world, their bread has settled on another,” they have become quiet, wilted, and live. But this one adheres to the old orders and is always looking for where the believers who need to celebrate rituals are preserved. Mitrofan invites Nikita to take up a common cause, since it is more convenient on a horse. But Morgunok is against it, he has “his own long road.”
Chapter 6
Further along the way, Nikita meets an old man and an old woman. They also resisted the new life - simply because they could not understand how, after so many years of individual farming, they would begin to work on a collective farm. The old people didn't see any use in it. But life had its own way. As if in a fairy tale, the spring flood carried the old people’s hut straight to the collective farm estate. Then the grandfather firmly decided: “We will live again now.”
Chapter 7
After this incident, Morgunok thinks for a long time about a new life. Rumor reaches him that Stalin is walking around the villages, writing everything down in a little book and then thinking it over. Great changes are approaching in peasant life. Nikita starts a conversation with Stalin in his thoughts: “The end is in sight, isn’t there all this fuss?” - he asks the leader a question. Morgunok, as a working man, is not against breaking with the old, but he would like to live at least a little as his grandfathers and great-grandfathers dreamed of: as a strong village rich man.
Chapter 8
Morgunok had already gone far from his home, but then he met his dear fellow countryman - Ilya Kuzmich and his little son. Kuzmich also has not come to terms with the changes in the village, but he is not looking for Ant, but lives on alms. At night, Kuzmich abandons his son and steals Morgunok’s horse. The next day, Nikita takes the boy on the road with him, harnessing himself to a cart instead of a horse.
Chapter 9
As luck would have it, there is a large village on the way. Nikita walked through the village and made people laugh. They took him to the village council. The chairman begins to ask who he is and why he is harnessed to the cart? I listened to Morgunk’s answers, marveled at the quirks of an already middle-aged man, but did not detain him - go on your way.
Chapter 10
Meanwhile, Morgunok ends up with the gypsies: what if they have a missing horse? The gypsies showed him their horses - Nikita did not recognize them as his own, he was not lying. And the gypsies are no longer what they used to be. They don’t steal, they live a working life, mow hay - so much so that Morgunka himself was drawn to the scythe. At night, he decided to steal one horse from the gypsies: they used to steal, which means that stealing a horse from them now is not a sin. But the stable is reliably watched over by a watchman, so Morgunok abandons his idea and leaves the camp before daylight.
Chapter 11
The author depicts a new life: a tractor squad in the field, airplanes in the sky, trains on the railway tracks, icebreakers rounding the pole. And only Morgunok is not with everyone. “Patient as a horse,” he stubbornly rolls his cart along one of the thousands of roads in Russia in search of a better life. Nikita met again an old acquaintance - a priest. He's already on horseback. Isn't this Morgunka's horse? But the priest, as if frightened of something, galloped away.
Chapter 12
Morgunok arrives with his cart at the market in the hope of finding a horse. Here he again meets Kuzmich, who is still begging, this time pretending to be blind. Morgunok grabs him and demands that he return his horse. But Kuzmich manages to outwit Nikita and disappear into the crowd.
Chapter 13
Morgunok continues on his way and meets a tractor driver. He takes pity on the middle-aged man and attaches the cart to his tractor to bring him along. Morgunok asks where he can buy a horse. The tractor driver replies that they won’t sell a horse on the collective farm, but you can go to the village of Ostrov, where individual farming still exists.
Chapter 14
Nikita gets to the village of Ostrov. Here everything flows as before: the river is called Tsar, mass is being celebrated in the church, the fences have been knocked down, the peasants are without work, there is only one shepherd for the whole village. The village is falling into decay, its inhabitants are hopelessly behind the times: “what time it is, what day it is, the Islands don’t know.” Despite the poverty and neglect, the villagers have one excuse - they are free, they live as their own masters and do not depend on collective farms. Another excuse is that there is no happiness in wealth. They offer Nikita a blind horse, but Morgunok does not want such a horse or such a life.
Chapter 15
A collective farm gets in Nikita's way. Life here is completely different: the economy is on the rise. The owner is not the one who is the owner, but the one who takes care of the property entrusted to him and the livestock - this is what the local residents teach Morgunk. It is not acquisitiveness that makes a person a master, but a zealous attitude to rural affairs. Morgunk wonders how much of a life this is. He receives the answer: forever.
Chapter 16
The author draws collective farm workers, whose image is embodied for him in the large Frolov family. The Frolovs are Russian collective farmers, of which there are many throughout the country: they are everywhere, it is these people who build life - reliably and forever.
Chapter 17
Morgunok talked with the collective farm watchman about his dream of finding Ant. The watchman considers Nikita an eccentric and doubts the existence of Ant. Such walks are empty and useless. For example, he tells Morgunk about an old pilgrim who went as a pilgrim to the Kyiv Lavra.
Chapter 18
The wedding of the watchman's daughter Nastya is taking place in the village. The whole collective farm is walking. The author draws a gallery of faces - typical representatives of the new working people. All of them are honored in the village, all are covered with labor glory, just as their ancestors were covered with military glory.
Chapter 19
Morgunok returns back to his native village, tormented by doubts. On the way, he meets an old pilgrim who has returned from Kyiv. He repeats the watchman’s words that the search for Ant is a stupid idea, and at the same time he reproaches himself for his stupidity. A person should not rely on fairy tales with happy endings. Happiness must be made independently, with your own hands. Nikita understands that now he has only one road - to the collective farm. It’s just a shame in front of others: I came as if everything was ready, will they take someone like that? The old man assures that they should take it “for fun,” because a working person is always needed in the collective farm business. And Morgunok agrees with the former pilgrim.
“Ant Country”
A short introduction introducing the reader to peasant life in a turning point year and to the main character of the poem, Nikita Morgunk. The beginning of Morgunk's journey.
Morgunok in the “gold-domed village” at a party of fists. Prosperous peasants commemorate “the souls of the departed who went to Solovki.” They do not want to come to terms with their new life and are ready to drink away and destroy all their property, just so that it does not go to the collective farms.
approves of Nikita's departure. He asks to stay, explaining that the land is waiting for peasant hands - you can’t quit work now. But Morgunok insists on his own and sets off on the road again.
It tells in more detail about where Morgunok is so stubbornly trying to get to. He is looking for the legendary country of Muravia, where without “community” and “collective farms” you can get rich with your labor and live firmly in the old way. Nikita is in a hurry - he is almost forty years old, so if he does not manage to find Muravia in time, he will remain a beggar for the rest of his life.
On the way, Morgunk comes across priest Mitrofan, who was left without a parish.
Today, “the priests have scattered throughout the world, their bread has settled on another,” they have become quiet, drooped and live. But this one adheres to the old orders and is always looking for where the believers who need to celebrate rituals are preserved. Mitrofan invites Nikita to take up a common cause, since it is more convenient on a horse. But Morgunok is against it, he has “his own long road.”
Further along the way, Nikita meets an old man and an old woman. They also resisted the new life - simply because they could not understand how, after so many years of individual farming, they would begin to work on a collective farm. The old people didn't see any use in it. But life had its own way. As if in a fairy tale, the spring flood carried the old people’s hut straight to the collective farm estate. Then the grandfather firmly decided: “We will live again now.”
After this incident, Morgunok thinks for a long time about a new life. Rumor reaches him that Stalin is walking around the villages, writing everything down in a little book and then thinking it over. Great changes are approaching in peasant life.
Nikita starts a conversation with Stalin in his thoughts: “The end is in sight, isn’t there all this fuss?” - he asks the leader a question. Morgunok, as a working man, is not against breaking with the old, but he would like to live at least a little as his grandfathers and great-grandfathers dreamed of: as a strong village rich man.
Morgunok had already gone far from his home, but then he met his dear fellow countryman - Ilya Kuzmich and his little son. Kuzmich also has not come to terms with the changes in the village, but he is not looking for Ant, but lives on alms. At night, Kuzmich abandons his son and steals Morgunok’s horse. The next day, Nikita takes the boy on the road with him, harnessing himself to a cart instead of a horse.
As luck would have it, there is a large village on the way. Nikita walked through the village and made people laugh. They took him to the village council. The chairman begins to ask who he is and why he is harnessed to the cart? I listened to Morgunk’s answers, marveled at the quirks of an already middle-aged man, but did not detain him - go on your way.
Meanwhile, Morgunok ends up with the gypsies: what if they have a missing horse? The gypsies showed him their horses - Nikita did not recognize them as his own, he was not lying. And the gypsies are no longer what they used to be. They don’t steal, they live a working life, mow hay - so much so that Morgunka himself was drawn to the scythe. At night, he decided to steal one horse from the gypsies: they used to steal, which means that stealing a horse from them now is not a sin. But the stable is reliably watched over by a watchman, so Morgunok abandons his idea and leaves the camp before daylight.
The author depicts a new life: a tractor squad in the field, airplanes in the sky, trains on the railway tracks, icebreakers rounding the pole. And only Morgunok is not with everyone. “Patient as a horse,” he stubbornly rolls his cart along one of the thousands of roads in Russia in search of a better life. Nikita met again an old acquaintance - a priest. He's already on horseback. Isn't this Morgunka's horse? But the priest, as if frightened of something, galloped away.
Morgunok arrives with his cart at the market in the hope of finding a horse. Here he again meets Kuzmich, who is still begging, this time pretending to be blind. Morgunok grabs him and demands that he return his horse. But Kuzmich manages to outwit Nikita and disappear into the crowd.
Morgunok continues on his way and meets a tractor driver. He takes pity on the middle-aged man and attaches the cart to his tractor to bring him along. Morgunok asks where he can buy a horse. The tractor driver replies that they won’t sell a horse on the collective farm, but you can go to the village of Ostrov, where individual farming still exists.
Nikita gets to the village of Ostrov. Here everything flows as before: the river is called Tsar, mass is being celebrated in the church, the fences have been knocked down, the peasants are without work, there is only one shepherd for the whole village. The village is falling into decay, its inhabitants are hopelessly behind the times: “what time it is, what day it is, the Islands don’t know.” Despite the poverty and neglect, the villagers have one excuse - they are free, they live as their own masters and do not depend on collective farms. Another excuse is that there is no happiness in wealth. They offer Nikita a blind horse, but Morgunok does not want such a horse or such a life.
A collective farm gets in Nikita's way. Life here is completely different: the economy is on the rise. The owner is not the one who is the owner, but the one who takes care of the property entrusted to him and the livestock - this is what the local residents teach Morgunk. It is not acquisitiveness that makes a person a master, but a zealous attitude to rural affairs. Morgunk wonders how much of a life this is. He receives the answer: forever.
The author draws collective farm workers, whose image is embodied for him in the large Frolov family. The Frolovs are Russian collective farmers, of which there are many throughout the country: they are everywhere, it is these people who build life - reliably and forever.
Morgunok talked with the collective farm watchman about his dream of finding Ant. The watchman considers Nikita an eccentric and doubts the existence of Ant. Such walks are empty and useless. For example, he tells Morgunk about an old pilgrim who went as a pilgrim to the Kiev Lavra.
The wedding of the watchman's daughter Nastya is taking place in the village. The whole collective farm is walking. The author draws a gallery of faces - typical representatives of the new working people. All of them are honored in the village, all are covered with labor glory, just as their ancestors were covered with military glory.
Morgunok returns back to his native village, tormented by doubts. On the way, he meets an old pilgrim who has returned from Kyiv. He repeats the watchman’s words that the search for Ant is a stupid idea, and at the same time he reproaches himself for his stupidity. A person should not rely on fairy tales with happy endings. Happiness must be made independently, with your own hands. Nikita understands that now he has only one road - to the collective farm. It’s just a shame in front of others: I came as if everything was ready, will they take someone like that? The old man assures that they should take it “for fun,” because a working person is always needed in the collective farm business. And Morgunok agrees with the former pilgrim.
Glossary:
- summary of ant's country
- ant country summary by chapter
- Tvardovsky Ant's Country summary by chapter
- ant country briefly
- Brief retelling of Ant Country
Other works on this topic:
- One of A. T. Tvardovsky’s early works, with which he made a name for himself in literature, was the poem “The Country of Ant” (1934-1936), dedicated to collectivization. Working on a poet's work...
- Chapter 1 A short introduction introducing the reader to peasant life in a turning point year and to the main character of the poem, Nikita Morgunk. The beginning of Morgunk's journey. Chapter 2...
- “The Country of Ant” is considered the work from which Tvardovsky’s true literary career began. The poem was warmly received not only by critics, but also recognized by a large circle of readers. AND...
- The poem opens with a description of Nikita Morgunk leaving. Washed in the bathhouse, dressed up in a jacket and boots, as if he were going to visit his relatives for pies. Nikita...
- Analysis of the work “Ant Country” is considered the work from which Tvardovsky’s true literary career began. The poem was warmly received not only by critics, but also recognized by a large circle... Tvardovsky’s poem “The Country of Ant” (1934-1936) was noticeably different from the simplified interpretation of what was happening in the village that was common in literature of that time. The author used the plot suggested by Alexander. Fadeev, who...
Tvardovsky Alexander Trifonovich
Ant Country (poem and poems)
Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky
Ant Country
Poems
The book includes the well-known poem “The Country of Ant”, poems from the cycle “Rural Chronicle”, thematically adjacent to the poem, as well as an article by A. Tvardovsky “About the “Country of Ant”.
ANTS COUNTRY Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19
RURAL CHRONICLE
Tractor departure. (From the poem “The Path to Socialism”) “The snow will melt, the earth will recede...” “Like the sea, it gets dark in winter...” Guest Bubashka “Rye was worried...” “He got up before it was light...” Brothers Owner Manor “I go and rejoice. It’s easy for me...” A humpbacked peasant New Lake “Anxious and sad neighing of a horse...” “Happy, one of all the sisters...” Smolensk region The story of the collective farm chairman “You came to your husband’s house with one beauty ..." Meeting of Friend Katerina "White birch trees were spinning..." To the bride Son Quarrel Song Traveler "You timidly lift him up..." Station Pochinok "Who knew you, my affectionate friend..." "Noisy, making his way through the bushes ..." "Beyond the open window..." . . “What did he do, what did he think...” “Pillars, villages, crossroads...” Ice drift “Your beauty does not age...” In the village Driver Road Farewell Mother and son Rivals “I’ll see how cute you are... " “And you, what a lot of people..." Mothers Before the rain How Danila was dying About Danila More about Danila Grandfather Danila in the bathhouse Ivushka At the wedding Peers "We have lived little in the world..." Mother and daughter Polina An incident on the road The blacksmith's family About a calf A thousand miles away Rural morning “Stars, stars, how should I be...” Children In the old yard On the farm of Zagorye For friends A trip to Zagorye “Rye, rye... Field road...” Marriage of the driver Grandfather Danila goes to the forest “The day will warm up - near the house...” Lenin and the stove maker
APPLICATION
From the “Muravo Notebook” by A. Tvardovsky Departure “Dogs were barking all around...” “...Father was a big horseman...” “Sprinkled with needles...” Stove maker “On a nice golden day...” “On the hill the village stood up..." About "Ant's Country"
Ant Country
From morning to noon he travels, the road is long. The light is white on four sides and clouds are on top.
Longing for their native warmth, They fly in a chain in the distance, but what is here on earth, The cranes do not know...
The transport has a clatter of wheels, a crash, a hubbub, a clatter of feet. People are walking, a convoy is crawling, the old ferryman is sweating.
The ferry creaks, the rope cracks, the people stand sideways. The commissioner is in a hurry, and the woman is with the chest.
The ferry goes like a carousel, spinning from the rapids. The carpenter's team takes the accordion to the edge of the country...
Wires hum over the field, pillars run forward. Trains rattle along the rails, And waters flow into the distance.
And the caps of snow foam turn white near the bushes, And the young birch leaf smells of tar.
And in the world there are thousands of paths and thousands of roads. And Nikita Morgunok goes on his way.
A gray horse wanders in the shafts Under a painted arch, And the supon is tightly pulled together by the Master's hand.
He tied Degtyarka from behind, stuck the whip at his feet, As if Morgunok was going to the city, to the market.
Washed in the bathhouse, dressed up in a jacket and boots, as if he were going to visit his relatives for pies.
And the yard is far behind, The pillars are running forward. Not a native hut in sight, not a roof, not a chimney...
Smoke trails in the wind from an alder bush. “Farewell,” Morgunok waves, Father’s places!..
From behind the mountain the village of Zolotolovoye was coming towards us.
Here, as they say, Napoleon passed through to Moscow. Here thirty-eight years ago Nikita was baptized.
Here the bells rang for twenty villages, the throne and the fair were on the green Spirits day.
And the first of all the courtyards was the Courtyard - facing the highway, And the sign "Ilya Bugrov" was blue above the porch...
Nikita was driving straight. And suddenly - in the middle of the village, either a bazaar or a pogrom, Merry things!
People are walking to the accordion, Shaft is a dense forest, Seeing horses, the horse has lost its way... People come out:
Stop!.. - Stop, there is no mercy for anyone, And there is one honor for everyone: Walk at the wedding, because it is the last...
Some by the sleeve, some by the floor, They lead Nikita into the house, to the table.
They brought it in and - a glass - knock on him! And don't breathe - to the bottom! - Walk at the wedding, because she’s the last one...
And the owner climbed across the table: - My hut - My space. Get on the bench, son, Drink, go for a walk, Celebrate the throne!.. Have fun, drink, people, It’s all the same: What’s in the bottle, What’s on the platter Whose is it? Whose cattle? Whose barn? Whose Samovar is on the shelf?..
It’s crowded at the table, like in a bathhouse, Morgunok is wiping off the sweat, Where is the groom, where is the bride, Where is the wedding? - Will not understand.
And the owner, without hesitation, pours another. - There’s a wedding and a wake, everything in the world, dear.
Reluctantly, barely, I drank a glass of Morgunok. The guests ate, drank, sang, They said what they could...
What kind of mention? - General mention. - Who's walking? - Fists!
We remember the souls of the departed who went to Solovki. - They weren’t beaten, they weren’t tied up, they weren’t tortured,
They were transported, transported in cartloads with children and belongings. And those who did not leave the hut themselves, those who fainted, were led out by the police guys by the arms...
He will drink for us, he will fool around... - Jesus Christ worked miracles...
And who paid, When I didn’t pay?.. - Why don’t you, God’s bird, peck the grains of bread?
Why don’t you, little one, sing sonorous songs? This bird answers: “I don’t want to live in a cage.”
Open the prison for me, I will fly free... - He will drink for us, he will fool around.
It's time for us to come to our senses, go home, think: What should we drink tomorrow?
Jesus Christ walked on water... - Who paid when I didn’t pay? For every haystack that you threw in the field, for every horn that you kept in the stable, for every cart that you brought from the field, for a dog’s tail, for a cat’s tail, for the shadow of a hut,
For the smoke from the chimney, For the light and for the darkness, And for simply, and for so...
We know! You yourself are not a fool, You brought the bread into the water at night: Like, it’s neither for me nor for the dog. We know! Don't be stupid yourself. Drink and eat, eat and drink!
Forty years ago there lived a soldier. Just then the cholera was going on, Half the village was rolling on the day. Of all of them, only one soldier remained alive, they say. He drank and ate like a hero, and read the psalter for everyone, poured vodka into a bowl, made a pot and drank it, everyone died, but the soldier was saved by that, they say.
Trulla-trulla-trulla-shi!.. Dad drank away the plowshares. And the son Hatchet, And the daughter Comb, And the mother, of that kind, Drank the Frying Pan away. She crawled under the stove: “Son, there’s nothing to bake pancakes with...”
Everyone is shouting, but I am silent: All is idleness. And for Ilya Kuzmich Tears are not fun...
Bring it in, take it out. Bring a treat! - How affectionate he is, how good-natured he has become.
They say, we are friends, old neighbors. Like, the whole village will go with me to Solovki...
Listen, master, don’t feel sorry for God’s caged bird. Fill it up, water the guests, take your last breath!..
The guests hummed vaguely, Blink stood up, staggering, as if drunk, as if out of breath, Slowly - beyond the threshold.
Dust hung over the road, and the barking of the dog did not subside. Swearing, songs...
Touch me, Gray. Somewhere there will be an end...
The village fell silent far away, And the whip grew cold in your hand, And it became clouded with blue, It became dark in the distance.
And the horse's tail was scattered by a sudden wind, and thunder rumbled somewhere, dully, like a huge bridge.
And the hasty, young rain dripped at random. It smelled like summer water, the Earth, like a year ago...
And like a child, Morgunok suddenly extended his palm. And, bowing his head to the side, the horse was stern and sad.
That was a horse - there are no such horses! Not a horse, but a man. It used to be that a wedding could be felt in five days, the snow was falling.
Land, family, hut and stove, And every nail in the wall, Footcloths from the feet, shirt from the shoulders Kept on a horse.
Like the right hand of a horse, Like an eye in the forehead, Nikita Morgunok protects from thief, pestilence and fire.
And on the night before leaving the yard, there was a conversation with the horse, That you still can’t expect good, That without a horse there is no yard;
That we lived together for so many years, That eight troubles are one answer.
And the horse carries itself forward along the same road. White steam flows over the darkened back.
The rain has stopped. Hoof prints filled with water. A crooked rainbow hangs above the arc itself...
The day is drawing to a close. Morgunka Needs to visit his brother-in-law: Stop for the night, Say goodbye after all. A man of spiritual life was Morgunkov's brother-in-law. We were friends from a young age, from the time we married two sisters.
They were friends for twenty years, Until their first gray hairs, And they liked the same songs, And they had the same conversation...
The sad owner is glad to see the guest, Meets him at the gate: - Thank you, brother. Respected, brother. And it leads to the porch.
Your soul is open to you, your first friend and brother-in-law: Spring is coming, the earth is burning, Should I decide or what?..
And Morgunok answered him:
First friend and brother-in-law!
Not all the light in the window is white, I guess so...
But he says to Nikita: “What should I do, brother-in-law?” Spring is coming, the earth is burning, there is no way to give up.
They sit at the table as before. And they fell silent. Each about his own. Children huddled in the corners. The hostess serves it with bee “bread” in half, honey in bruised honeycombs.
We drank a glass. They sit like a year, two, and three ago.
The two of them sit sadly, do not raise their eyes. - Well, let's sing?.. - Let's sing. Maybe for the last time...
They were friends for twenty years, Until their first gray hairs, And their cheeks liked the songs, And they had the same conversation.