Chapter 20 Appreciation of "The Sixth Ward"

Appreciation This grim, deep and shocking novel is undoubtedly one of the most rebellious works written by the author in his life. It exposes the horror of Tsarist Russia as a prison and criticizes the idea that violence should not be used to resist evil. Ward Six, filled with foul air, is more like a prison than a ward.The grisly bars and brutal beatings are the "treatment" of patients.These unfortunate "lunatics" are actually prisoners. They are oppressed, insulted and bullied people from the lower classes of society.Strikingly, one of the patients, surnamed Gromov, seemed to be very clear-headed and insightful, was he the patient?Or a persecuted prisoner?The reader can't help but have this doubt.What is even more unbelievable is that the kind and honest Dr. Lagin who presided over the hospital was also arrested as a lunatic and locked up here.This is really a thrilling tragedy.It is with such a sharp brushwork that Chekhov described the dark reality of Tsarist Russia in a highly generalized way through the tragedies of two intellectuals with great indignation, and profoundly exposed the crimes of autocratic rule.

Gromov is a small clerk who suffers all kinds of hardships in life. He is warm and sincere, full of wisdom and rationality, and has a clear understanding of the dark and cruel reality.Once he saw a procession of convicts passing by and was deeply irritated.He suddenly understood: he was living in the big prison of Tsarist Russia, and he could never escape.So he could no longer live in peace, and he felt oppressed and suffocated every moment.Here, in the sixth ward, he shouted angrily: "I can't breathe!" "Open the door! Or I'll smash the door!" What happened to Gromov summed up the sense of justice of the lower class Molecular encounters.His angry protests resounded in the darkness, declaring that the brutal despotism could no longer exist.

Lagin is also an upright intellectual. When he first came to the hospital, he also wanted to establish a reasonable and healthy living order around him.But he deeply felt how powerless he was in the dark reality.So he simply took the way of escaping from life, hiding at home drinking and reading.But as a thinking intellectual, he needs to gain inner balance and tranquility, and to find an explanation for his attitude towards life.Over time, he developed a whole philosophy of self-deception that compromised reality.However, the cruel reality made Lajing feel more and more depressed and contradictory.In the debate with Gromov, he was involuntarily attracted by the other party's fierce words and angry protests, and gradually became conscious and sober.But he was soon locked up as a lunatic too.Lagin's tragedy shows that the Russian autocratic system not only destroys intellectuals like Gromov who are dissatisfied with reality, but also persecutes meek and kind people who do not seek resistance.

At the end of the novel, Lakin was persecuted to death.Gromov and others are still imprisoned and tortured, and the tyranny continues.Although Chekhov believed that the great prison of Tsarist Russia would be destroyed, due to the limitations of his worldview, it was impossible for him to point out a specific path to a bright future.Because the writer can't see a way out, when he criticizes violently, he reveals a melancholy and low tone. Like many of Chekhov's works, this novel does not have many characters and complex and tense plots. It takes a hospital room as the main scene, a pair of intellectuals as the protagonists, and their argument as the main plot. Very deep theme.

The main scene of the sick room has a double function, on the one hand, it is a specific sick room, and on the other hand, it is a microcosm of the tyranny of Tsarist Russia.At the beginning of the work, the external environment of the ward is described: the rusty roof, the half-slanted chimney, and the destroyed steps are all a tragic and gloomy atmosphere.Inside the ward: a rotten stench, a leaden gray floor, and cold iron windows.All these constitute the tone of cold, depressing and terrifying.It makes people feel that this is the typical environment of Tsarist Russia.The novel intentionally allows the characters to live in the limited space of the ward, implying that the sixth ward is the epitome of a large Russian prison, and the "patients" here represent all the suffering and suffering lower class people in Russia.Therefore, the novel has great artistic generalization power.

The main plot of the novel is the debate between Lagin and Gromov.In Ratin's mind, Gromov is not a mental patient, but a person with profound insights. Therefore, Gromov's scolding and scolding did not make him feel uncomfortable, but on the contrary won his favor and made him feel that way. The already illusory philosophy of life was shaken.It is through this main plot that the writer criticizes Lagin's proposition of "not using violence to resist evil" and affirms Gromov's sobriety and resistance.At the same time, it also truly depicts the complex mentality of Raking, who is dissatisfied with the dark reality and longs for the light on the other hand, feels his own weakness and longs for self-paralysis.