This summer morning in the village of Grachi began unusually: with the dawn, all the inhabitants of the house of the poor landowner Anna Pavlovna Adueva were already on their feet. Only the culprit of this fuss, the son of Adueva, Alexander, slept, "how to sleep a twenty-year-old boy, a heroic dream." The turmoil reigned in Rooks because Alexander was going to St. Petersburg to serve: the knowledge acquired by him at the university, according to the young man, must be put into practice in the service of the Fatherland.
The grief of Anna Pavlovna, who parted with her only son, is akin to the sadness of the “first minister in the household” of the landowner Agrafena — his valet Eusei, heartfelt friend of Agrafena — goes to Petersburg with him — how many pleasant evenings this tender couple spent on cards! .. Suffers and the beloved of Alexander, Sonechka - the first impulses of his exalted soul were dedicated to her. Aduev’s best friend, Pospelov, bursts into Grachy at the last minute in order to finally hug the one with whom the best hours of university life were spent in discussions about honor and dignity, about serving the Fatherland and the delights of love ...
Yes, and Alexander himself is sorry to part with the usual way of life. If lofty goals and a sense of his purpose did not push him on a long journey, he would certainly stay in Grachy, with his mother and sister, the old virgin Maria Gorbatova infinitely loving, among his hospitable and hospitable neighbors, next to his first love. But ambitious dreams drive the young man to the capital, closer to fame.
In St. Petersburg, Alexander immediately goes to his relative, Pyotr Ivanovich Aduev, who at one time, like Alexander, “was sent to Petersburg for twenty years by his elder brother, Alexander’s father, and lived there for seventeen years without a break”. Unable to keep in touch with his widow and son, who remained after his brother’s death in Grach, Pyotr Ivanovich was greatly surprised and annoyed by the appearance of an enthusiastic young man waiting for uncle's worries, attention and, most importantly, the separation of his increased sensitivity. From the very first minutes of his acquaintance, Pyotr Ivanovich almost had to restrain Alexander from outpouring of feelings with an attempt to wrap his relative in a hug. Along with Alexander, a letter arrives from Anna Pavlovna, from which Pyotr Ivanovich learns that great hopes rest on him: not only an almost forgotten daughter-in-law, who hopes that Pyotr Ivanovich will sleep with Alexander in the same room and cover his mouth from flies. The letter contains many requests from neighbors, about which Pyotr Ivanovich had forgotten to think for almost two decades. One of these letters belongs to the pen of Marya Gorbatova, the sister of Anna Pavlovna, who for all her life remembered the day when the young Pyotr Ivanovich, walking with her around the countryside, climbed knee-deep into the lake and plucked a yellow flower from her memory ...
From the very first meeting, Pyotr Ivanovich, a dryish and business man, begins to educate his enthusiastic nephew: he rents an apartment for Alexander in the same house where he lives, advises where and how to eat, with whom to communicate. Later, he finds a very specific case: service and - for the soul! - translations of articles on agricultural issues. Mocking, sometimes quite cruelly, Alexander’s addiction to everything “unearthly”, exalted, Peter Ivanovich is gradually trying to destroy the fictional world in which his romantic nephew lives. So two years pass.
After this time, we meet Alexander already partially accustomed to the complexities of Petersburg life. And - without memory in love with Nadenka Lyubetskaya.During this time, Alexander managed to advance in the service, and achieved some success in translations. Now he has become a rather important person in the journal: “he was engaged in the selection, translation, and amendment of other people's articles, he himself wrote different theoretical views on agriculture”. He continued to write poetry and prose. But falling in love with Nadenka Lyubetskaya seems to close the whole world before Alexander Aduev - now he lives from meeting to meeting, drugged by that "sweet bliss that Peter Ivanovich was angry with."
In love with Alexander and Nadenka, but, perhaps, only with that “little love in anticipation of the big”, which Alexander himself experienced for Sofya, now forgotten by him. Alexander’s happiness is fragile - Count Novinsky, Lyubetskys neighbor in the country, stands on the path to eternal bliss.
Pyotr Ivanovich cannot cure Alexander of the raging passions: Aduev Jr. is ready to challenge the count to a duel, to take revenge on an ungrateful girl, unable to appreciate his high feelings, he weeps and burns with anger ... To the aid of a distraught young man is the wife of Peter Ivanovich, Lizaveta Alexandrovna; she comes to Alexander when Pyotr Ivanovich is powerless, and we don’t know exactly what, with what words, with what participation the young woman succeeds in what her smart, reasonable husband did not succeed. “An hour later, he (Alexander) came out thoughtfully, but with a smile, and fell asleep for the first time quietly after many sleepless nights.”
And another year flashed from that memorable night. From the gloomy despair that Lizaveta Alexandrovna managed to melt, Aduev Jr. went on to despondency and indifference. “He somehow liked playing the role of a sufferer. He was quiet, important, foggy, like a man who withstood, according to him, the blow of fate ... ”And the blow did not slow to repeat: an unexpected meeting with longtime friend Pospelov on Nevsky Prospect, a meeting, all the more accidental, that Alexander did not even know about the move of his sincere comrade to the capital, - adds confusion to the already worried heart of Aduev Jr. A friend is not at all what I remember from the years spent at the university: he is strikingly similar to Peter Ivanovich Aduev - he does not appreciate the heart wounds experienced by Alexander, he talks about his career, about money, he welcomes an old friend in his house, but special signs of attention does not show to him.
It is almost impossible to cure the sensitive Alexander from this blow - and who knows what our hero would have gone this time, do not use uncle “extreme measure” on him! .. Discussing with Alexander about the bonds of love and friendship, Pyotr Ivanovich cruelly reproaches Alexander in that he became isolated only in his own feelings, not knowing how to appreciate the one who is faithful to him. He does not consider his uncle and aunt his friends, he has not written to his mother for a long time, living only thoughts of his only son. This "medicine" is effective - Alexander again turns to literary work. This time he writes a story and reads it to Pyotr Ivanovich and Lizaveta Alexandrovna. Aduev Sr. invites Alexander to send a story to a magazine to find out the true price of his nephew’s work. Pyotr Ivanovich does this under his own name, believing that this will be fairer than the court and better for the fate of the work. The answer was not slow to appear - he puts the last point in the hopes of the ambitious Aduev Jr. ...
And just at that time, Pyotr Ivanovich needed the service of his nephew: his factory associate Surkov suddenly falls in love with the young widow of former friend Pyotr Ivanovich Yulia Pavlovna Tafaeva and completely abandons business. Above all else, appreciating the matter, Pyotr Ivanovich asks Alexander to “fall in love with himself” Tafaeva, forcing Surkov out of her house and heart. As a reward, Pyotr Ivanovich offers Alexander two vases that Aduev Jr. liked so much.
The thing, however, takes an unexpected turn: Alexander falls in love with a young widow and causes her a reciprocal feeling.Moreover, the feeling is so strong, so romantic and exalted that the "culprit" himself is not able to withstand the outbursts of passion and jealousy that Tafaev rains down on him. Raised in romance novels, married too early a rich and unloved person, Julia Pavlovna, meeting with Alexander, as if throws herself into a whirlpool: everything that was read and dreamed about now falls upon her chosen one. And Alexander does not stand the test ...
After Petr Ivanovich managed to bring Tafaev to life with unknown arguments, another three months passed, in which we did not know the life of Alexander after the shock. We meet him again, when he, disappointed in everything he lived before, “plays some eccentrics in checkers or fish.” His apathy is deep and inescapable, nothing, it seems, can lead Aduev Jr. out of stupid indifference. Alexander no longer believes in love or friendship. He begins to go to Kostikov, about whom a neighbor to Grach Zaezalov once wrote in a letter to Pyotr Ivanovich, wanting to introduce Aduev Sr. to his old friend. This man turned out to be very opportune for Alexander: he in the young man "could not awaken emotional disturbances."
And once on the shore, where they were fishing, unexpected spectators appeared - an old man and a pretty young girl. They appeared more and more often. Lisa (that was the name of the girl) began to try to captivate the yearning Alexander with various female tricks. In part, the girl succeeds, but the insulted father comes instead of her on a date in the arbor. After explaining to him, Alexander had no choice but to change the place of fishing. However, he does not remember about Lisa for long ...
Still wanting to awaken Alexander from the soul’s sleep, the aunt asks him to accompany her to the concert once: “some artist, a European celebrity, has arrived”. The shock experienced by Alexander from meeting with beautiful music strengthens his earlier matured decision to leave everything and return to his mother in Rooks. Alexander Fedorovich Aduev leaves the capital along the same road that he entered Petersburg several years ago, intending to conquer it with his talents and high appointment ...
And in the village, life seemed to stop running: the same hospitable neighbors, only aged, the same unlimitedly loving mother, Anna Pavlovna; only she got married, not waiting for her Sasha, Sophia, but her aunt, Marya Gorbatova, still remembers the yellow flower. Shocked by the changes that happened to her son, Anna Pavlovna asked Yevsey for a long time how Alexander lived in Petersburg, and came to the conclusion that life itself in the capital was so unhealthy that it had aged his son and dulled his feelings. Days go by, Anna Pavlovna hopes that Alexander will have hair grow back and his eyes shine, and he is thinking about how to return to Petersburg, where so much has been experienced and irretrievably lost.
The death of his mother saves Alexander from the torment of conscience that does not allow Anna Pavlovna to admit that he again planned to escape from the village, and, having unsubscribed to Peter Ivanovich, Alexander Aduev again goes to Petersburg ...
Four years pass after Alexander’s repeated visit to the capital. A lot of changes happened with the main characters of the novel. Lizaveta Alexandrovna was tired of fighting the coldness of her husband and turned into a calm, sensible woman, devoid of any aspirations and desires. Pyotr Ivanovich, saddened by the change in his wife’s character and suspecting her of a dangerous disease, is ready to abandon the career of a court counselor and resign in order to take Lizaveta Alexandrovna out of Petersburg at least for a while. But Alexander Fedorovich reached the heights that his uncle had once dreamed of for him: “a college adviser, good state maintenance, extraneous labor” earns considerable money and even prepares to get married, taking three hundred thousand and five hundred souls for the bride ...
On this we part with the heroes of the novel. What, in essence, is an ordinary story! ..
