The Storm

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky (1823–1886) — a famous Russian playwright and the founder of the national theater. «You have brought a whole library of artistic works as a gift to literature, creating your own special world for the stage. You alone completed the building, laying the cornerstone laid by Fonvizin, Griboedov, Gogol», — wrote the critic I. Goncharov about him. In the play «The Storm», A.N. Ostrovsky depicted the life of a merchant city in the mid-19th century and the personal tragedy of everyone who dared to oppose the «dark kingdom» of petty bourgeois life. The main heroine, Katerina, is dreamy and original; she cannot endure the rough treatment she receives and suffers from the unjust reproaches of the widow Kabanova, who keeps the whole family in submission. Unable to come to terms with the difficult life in a house with a despotic mistress, the girl challenges the established norms. She takes a great risk when she decides to betray her husband with the one whom her heart truly loves. And even the fictional city of Kalinov cannot turn a blind eye to this transgression.