Poor Liza. Stories

Poor Liza and Marfa the TownswomanThe famous tale "Poor Liza"— a sensuous story of love between a peasant girl and a nobleman. The plot was taken by Karamzin from European love novels, but he added authenticity by describing a real place in Moscow and providing an unexpected tragic ending for the literature of that time (the tale was published in 1792). The illusion of documentary reality was so strong that readers began to call the pond at Simonov Monastery "Liza's pond," mistaking the fictional story for a real one. Of course, Karamzin is primarily known as the author of the multi-volume work "History of the Russian State." He worked on it for 22 years, until the end of his life, aiming to "select, enliven, and color" it, making domestic history "something attractive, strong, worthy of attention not only from Russians but also from foreigners"; indeed, the first edition of the 8 volumes of the "History" sold out in a month. Karamzin's interest in history arose during the creation of the tale "Marfa the Townswoman, or The Conquest of Novgorod"—a tale about the confrontation between the Moscow prince and the self-governing republic, a bloody drama of a free city subjected to autocracy and the role of women in this political struggle. This woman is Marfa Boretskaya, a wealthy noblewoman and one of the leaders of the opposition. Officially, she was not a "townswoman" (the ruler of the city); this nickname was a mockery by Muscovites of the self-governance of Novgorod. The tale was published in 1803.