Gunsmith Lefty is the main character of N. Leskov’s story. An interesting tale, which has become the plot of animated and feature films, and theatrical productions, conveys the essence of the life of Russian talent.
The image and characterization of Lefty in the story “Lefty” help to understand the events of the history of Rus', to understand how and how a simple Tula gunsmith lived.
Lefty's Appearance
The master gunsmith Lefty remained known to everyone only by his nickname. Nobody knows his real name. The nickname was given for his skillful use of his left hand. It’s even more convenient for a master to cross himself with his left hand. This ability surprised the British. Overseas engineers did not even imagine that one could become a skilled craftsman without using the right hand.
Left-handed suffers from strabismus. This characteristic is even more striking. How did the scythe man manage to forge the smallest parts for a miniature flea? What is his visual acuity that he works without any microscopes or complex magnifying devices? Moreover, it performs the thinnest part of the product.
Other special signs:
- spot on the face;
- absence of “hair” on the temples.
"...one sideways left-hander, there is a birthmark on his cheek, and the hair on his temples was torn out during training..."
The teacher tore at the boy’s hair, which means the guy managed to be not a particularly diligent and diligent student.
Because of poverty, the peasant dresses modestly:
- worn-out peasant shoes (footwear);
- Cossack on hooks.
He was walking in what he was wearing: in shorts, one trouser leg was in a boot, the other was dangling, and the collar was old, the hooks were not fastened, they were lost, and the collar was torn; but it’s okay, don’t be embarrassed.
The boy is not shy about his appearance. Got used to it. In the story there is no feeling of discomfort when the boy is changed, that is, clothes mean nothing to him. It's scary to read the pages where he is undressed in the hospital and left almost naked on the cold floor. Some people really liked his new suit.
The image of talent from the outback
Lefty lives in the city of Tula in a small house. A cramped mansion - this is how the narrator characterizes him. The couriers who arrived with Platov tried to enter the hut, but failed. The doors were so strong that they remained standing, withstanding numerous blows from heroic strength. The roof of the house was removed faster, one log at a time. The tightness is proved by the staleness of the air, which, when the roof was removed, rose above the house so much that everyone around did not have enough air. The poor peasant loves his parents. When he is asked to stay in England, the first reason why he refuses new living conditions is his old parents. He affectionately calls his father “daddy” and his mother “old lady”. Lefty does not yet have his own family, he is not married.
I'm still single.
The character of a hero from the people
Lefty is one of the three most skilled craftsmen in the city of Tula gunsmiths. This means that among all the gunsmiths of the ancient city, only those who were very talented were chosen. It’s hard to even imagine how many real artisans live in the city of weapons production. According to the narrator, the entire Russian nation hopes for Lefty and his friends. The task facing the masters is to prove that Russian craftsmen can do everything better than others, in this story, better than the British.
The craftsmen are hardworking and persistent. They did not deliver the work before completion, and without fear of the ataman’s anger, they completed everything to the end.
Special Personality Qualities
The main character has many of his own individual characteristics, but at the same time, his personality traits make Lefty a symbol of the entire Russian people, kind and talented.
Education. The gunsmith is not literate or educated, like almost the entire peasantry in Rus' in those years. His school consisted of two textbooks: “The Psalter” and “The Half-Dream Book.” Talent lives in a master by nature. He managed to open it.
Cunning. A simple craftsman does not reveal the ideas that three gunsmiths had about an English craft. He is silent in England, not trusting his thoughts to overseas engineers. He is cunning in a kind way, without evil or intent.
Faith in God. The masters did not begin the work without the blessing of the highest divine powers. They went to the icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker. Gunsmiths rely on themselves and on help from above.
Determination and courage. The master is not afraid to meet with the Russian emperor. Don't be embarrassed by torn clothes. He knows that he and his friends carried out his order and is ready to answer for the work. He boldly tells the king that he engraved his names on the horseshoes, what his work was.
We must take it thoughtfully and with God’s blessing.
Devoted to the Russian people, the oblique craftsman Lefty did not stay abroad, did not seek benefits for himself, even dying, he thought about how to help the Motherland. The patriotism of a simple peasant is amazing.
), three Russian masters shoed a flea.
One of these masters is Lefty. This is a Tula craftsman who lives poorly, wears bad clothes, but is a master of his craft. He is a religious and patriotic person. Despite the fact that he is left-handed, has no special education, and even has an oblique eye, he performs very delicate, invisible to the human eye, incredible work.
By order of the Tsar, he goes to England, where he introduces the savvy flea and tells what Russian craftsmen are capable of. The British really like this simple, talented man. They bombard him with lucrative offers of cooperation, but Lefty, being an honest, selfless and devoted man to his country, does not agree to their tempting offers. He sees how craftsmen are treated in England, sees that they are well-fed and well dressed, but he yearns for his homeland.
Upon returning to Russia, he falls ill, no one except his new English friend takes care of him and does not want to treat him. But even abandoned by the ungrateful royal authorities, being on the verge of death, he cares and thinks about his country. He asks to convey to the king the tricks of British military affairs.
This hardworking man does not forget about his country for a minute; he worries and cares about his homeland until his last breath.
Essay Description Lefty
The plot of Leskov's story unfolds around the main character Lefty, who was a master from Tula. The description of the craftsman does not appear immediately, approximately in the middle of the story. The hero is a master blacksmith, he is left-handed, a patriot of his homeland, very naive, devoted to Tsar Alexander I and Platov. He has a birthmark on his cheek and his eyes are squinted, but despite this, he does an excellent job.
Lefty, together with his comrades, Platonov gave instructions to make a masterpiece, but using a steel flea. Thus, he wanted to prove to others that not only the British are capable of inventing non-standard things. For a long time, three masters puzzled over what to do to surprise the people and decided to shoe a miniature flea. Without special equipment and proper knowledge, they still succeeded. This invention shocked everyone.
After inventing an ingenious product, Lefty goes to England, not having any documents with him. The British offered the young man both training and money, but he remained faithful to his homeland and refused everything. Lefty dreamed of getting home as soon as possible.
Excessive modesty was the ruin of Lefty. In winter, he refused a cozy cabin because he believed that he was unworthy of such honors. Therefore, I spent the entire trip on deck and fell ill.
Upon arrival in St. Petersburg, Lefty was robbed. Having no money or documents with him, not a single hospital wanted to accept him, only a hospital for the poor. No one even thought to save the great master, except for the Englishman, who brought a good doctor. But, unfortunately, it was already too late. Lefty died modestly, unknown to anyone. Even in the last minutes of his life, the master wants to convey a message to the king that he should not clean his weapon with a brick.
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Distinctive properties of N.S.’s prose Leskov - fairy-tale motifs, the interweaving of the comic and tragic, the ambiguity of the author's assessments of the characters - appeared fully in one of the most famous works of the writer “Lefty”. The title character, who outwardly does not stand out in anything special (“there is a birthmark on his cheek, and the hair on his temples was torn out during training”), is at the same time, according to the author himself, the most skillful among the Tula gunsmiths. However, Leskov does not idealize the hero, showing that despite his excellent skill, he is not strong in the sciences, “and instead of the four rules of addition from arithmetic, he takes everything from the Psalter and the Half-Dream Book.”
Lefty is a skilled craftsman, one of those who participated in shoeing the flea, personifying the talent of the Russian people. But the savvy flea stops dancing: Russian craftsmen do not have the basic technical knowledge that any English master has. Leskov does not give a name to his hero, thereby emphasizing the collective meaning and significance of his character (“Where “Lefty” stands, one must read the Russian people,” Leskov said). Lefty, while in England, rejects lucrative offers from the British and returns to Russia. He is unselfish and incorruptible, but he is “downtrodden” and feels his own insignificance next to officials and nobles. Lefty is used to constant threats and beatings.
One of the main themes in the story is the theme of the creative talent of the Russian person, which has been depicted more than once in Leskov’s works (stories “The Stupid Artist”, “The Imprinted Angel”). Talent, according to Leskov, cannot exist independently; it must necessarily be based on the moral and spiritual strength of a person. Lefty, an unprepossessing little man, is not afraid to go to the sovereign, because he is confident in his rightness and in the quality of his work.
The image of Lefty stands among other images of the righteous created by Leskov. He sacrifices himself for the sake of the Fatherland, in the name of the Cause. He goes to England without documents, hungry (on the road, “at each station, his belt was tightened by one more badge, so that his intestines and lungs would not get mixed up”) to show foreigners his Russian ingenuity and skill, and earns the respect of the British with his reluctance to stay in their country . Lefty has a number of qualities inherent in Leskov’s gallery of righteous people: he is a true patriot, a patriot in his soul, gifted from birth, he is characterized by high morality and religiosity. He went through many trials, but even in his death hour he remembers that he must tell the military secret of the British, ignorance of which negatively affects the combat effectiveness of the Russian army.
According to Leskov, the inattention of the authorities to the fate of national talents, the denseness and lack of education of the Russian people themselves constitute the reason for the backwardness of Russia. It is interesting to compare Nicholas’s conversation with Lefty, to whom the emperor condescends, and the hero’s meeting with the British, who respect him as a master and speak as equals. When Lefty returns to his homeland, he falls ill and dies, useless to anyone. Thrown on the floor in a “common people’s” hospital, he personifies the inhumanity, short-sightedness and ingratitude of the tsarist government - the reason for the disorder in Russia, according to the author.
From the entire story it becomes obvious that Leskov sympathizes with Lefty and takes pity on him; the author's comments are filled with bitterness. The image of Lefty reflected Leskov’s search for a positive hero, and I think this image is closest to this goal.
Deeply believing in the spiritual power of the people, Leskov was nevertheless far from idealizing them and from creating idols. The writer explained his position by the fact that he “studied the people not by talking with St. Petersburg cab drivers”, but “grew up among the people” and that he “neither should have raised the people on stilts, nor laid them under his feet.” Confirmation of the writer's objectivity can be seen in “The Tale of the Tula Oblique Lefty and the Steel Flea,” which was assessed at one time by critics as “a set of clownish expressions in the style of ugly foolishness.” Unlike other fairy tale works by Leskov, the narrator from the folk environment does not have specific features. ..
Can a writer and a man who passionately loved Russia and his people find a measure of such objectivity? The answer is in Leskov’s work itself. Tula Lefty, despite all the promises of the British, remains faithful to his ungrateful but dear homeland. Another Leskovskip hero is Ivan Nikitich Sipachev did not live up to the hopes of his relatives and, unexpectedly for everyone (and first of all for himself), died a "German". The story of the "Germanization" of a "true Russian man" looks comical at first. However, as the narrative unfolds, the author introduces the reader to very serious thoughts about the militant Prussianism, about his constant desire for the Germanization of neighboring peoples. This problem, topical in Leskov’s time, will face the people of the 20th century with unprecedented severity...
Tula master. His external characteristics are rather meager: “he’s left-handed with an oblique eye, there’s a birthmark on his cheek, and the hair on his temples was torn out during training.” He is one of three craftsmen tasked with creating a product more amazing than the English dancing flea. And these three craftsmen shoe the flea. And L. makes nails for horseshoes. L.'s image is very ambiguous: both positive and ironically negative. On the one hand, he is a very skilled craftsman, a wonderful craftsman. On the other hand, he is extremely downtrodden and considers himself an absolutely insignificant being. The British offer L. to stay with them, but he rejects this offer. And here not only a sense of patriotism plays a big role, but also disbelief in the possibility of living better, in human conditions. L. is a completely downtrodden creature, to whom the thought of any slightest resistance to circumstances does not even occur to him. His life ends tragically. He falls ill and dies unknown, useless to anyone, deprived of any care. The tragic fate of L. is contrasted with the story of the Englishman who came to St. Petersburg with him. He was received very carefully at the English embassy. Leskov notes that indifference to human life is a purely Russian quality. A man from the people, a rare craftsman with golden hands, died, and no one knew about it. It is important to note that there is a lot of comedy in L.’s description. This skilled master was not only left-handed, but also oblique. And this did not stop him from doing incredibly delicate work, invisible to the human eye.