The theme of crime in the works of F.M. Dostoevsky and P. Suskind: towards the search for literary kinship. Madame Gaillard's face is red. He's in the basement. It is covered with a thick layer of lime

Grade 11

FROM THE LITERATURE OF THE END OF THE XX - BEGINNING OF THE XXI CENTURY. MODERN LITERARY PROCESS

M. PAVLIN, P. SUSKIND

SAMPLE ESSAYS

Jean-Baptiste Grenouille - the “dark genius” of art

From the very beginning of the novel, the author warns the reader that we will be talking about a person who belonged to one of the most brilliant and most disgusting figures of an era, rich in brilliant and disgusting personalities. His name was Jean-Baptiste Grenouille.

It would seem that everything is clear. But in fact, the image of a perfumer is incredibly complex and contradictory. On the one hand, Grenouille is an unlucky child who was almost killed by her own mother. They don’t like him in the orphanage, they try to kill him several times, the nurses and even the priest don’t like him, no one has ever felt friendship for him, the hero has not made anyone want to be friends or love.

On the other hand, Jean Baptiste is a genius. He is the only one who understands the essence of smells, creates brilliant perfumes from unexpected ingredients, creates fragrances that can control people.

But there is another side to Grenouille - he is a monster, a murderer. To create the formula for the perfect fragrance, he needs new components, and for this he commits crimes. It is interesting that the hero does not even understand the essence of what is happening: he needs the smells of beautiful girls for perfume - he kills them without looking into their eyes, without receiving any emotions towards them - he is only interested in purely scientific ones. He is a monster and a murderer, but a brilliant murderer, who by his existence proves that genius and crime are completely compatible things.

The brilliant scoundrel Grenouille belongs to the same category as de Sade, Saint-Just, Fouche and Bonaparte. In some ways he even surpassed them, because from the moment of birth he was left without a soul, humanity was simply absent in him. He kills without feelings, guided only by cold creative calculation, without remorse and regret, hatred and passion.

He is a maniac, but not in the usual sense for us - a “killer maniac”, but in the sense of a “creative maniac” - a person who cannot help but create. Its tragedy is that in order to obtain a source for creating masterpieces, it is necessary to deprive beautiful girl life. This maniacal genius, while killing, consistently and persistently moves towards his professional goal. He is only an artist, there is nothing personal in his crimes.

Suskind's hero evokes disgust, curiosity and the understanding that he is not a victim, but a murderer, although, apparently, deeply unhappy. The writer managed to create an image that, however, does not evoke sympathy, because the purposeful Grenouille does not look like an unhappy guy, but also a terrible killer.

The hero achieves his goal: a scent is created that gives him mystical power over the crowd. But the writer paints a picture not of the hero’s victory, but of his defeat. The aroma he creates does not improve people, but, on the contrary, corrupts them. You cannot remake humanity for the better with art that is devoid of morality. This idea is confirmed by the scene of the public bacchanalia that took place after the attempt to execute the murderer Grenouille.

The hero, who dreamed of appropriating the created smell in order to be like everyone else, in the end was never able to do this. This smell gave him only a temporary, illusory power over the crowd, which would end when the last drop poured out of the bottle.

The ending of the novel once again emphasizes the idea that Art, Perfection and Beauty must go side by side.

Origin of the name

Grenouille's mother, who worked in a fish market, did not give him a name and was executed shortly after his birth. Police officer Lafosse wanted to first take the baby Grenouille to an orphanage on the rue Saint-Antoine, from where children were sent daily to Rouen, to a state foundling hospital, but since Grenouille was not baptized, he was handed over to the monastery of Saint-Merri, where he received at baptism name Jean-Baptiste.

Biography

Part one

Jean-Baptiste was born near a fishmonger's shop on the rue Haut-Fères near the Cemetery of the Innocents in Paris on July 17, 1738. Grenouille's mother, who had no intention of letting him live, was soon executed for multiple infanticide on the Place de Greve. Possessing a phenomenal sense of smell, Grenouille, however, does not have his own smell, which repels several nurses. In the end, it was decided to raise him at the expense of the Saint-Merri monastery. For this purpose, he was given to the nurse Jeanne Bussy, who lived on the Rue Saint-Denis, offering 3 francs a week as payment. However, a few weeks later, Jeanne Bussy appeared at the gates of the monastery and told Father Terrier (a fifty-year-old monk) that she was no longer going to keep him with her because the baby did not smell. An unpleasant dialogue took place between Father Terrier and the nurse, as a result of which Jeanne Bussy was fired.

“...You can explain this any way you like, Holy Father, but I,” and she resolutely crossed her arms over her chest and looked with such disgust at the basket at her feet, as if a toad was sitting there, “I, Jeanne Bussy, will no longer take this to to yourself!

"- Oh well. “Have it your way,” said Terrier and removed his finger from under his nose. -... I note that for some reason you refuse to continue breastfeeding the baby Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, entrusted to me, and are currently returning him to his temporary guardian - the monastery of Saint-Merri. I find this upsetting, but I can't seem to change it. You are fired."

Having taken the child for himself, Father Terrier was at first indignant at the nurse’s dissatisfaction and was touched by the child given to him: he even began to imagine himself as the father of this child, as if he were not a monk, but an ordinary man in the street who had married a woman who bore him a son. But the pleasant fantasy ended when Jean-Baptiste woke up: the child began to sniff Terrier, and the latter was horrified, because it seemed to him that the baby had stripped him naked, had sniffed out everything about him and knew all his ins and outs.

“The child, who had no smell, sniffed him shamelessly, that’s what. The child smelled it! And suddenly Terrier seemed to smell like sweat and vinegar, sauerkraut and an unwashed dress. He seemed naked and ugly, as if someone was looking at him, giving no indication of himself. It seemed that he sniffed it even through the skin, penetrating inside, to the very depths. The most tender feelings, the dirtiest thoughts were laid bare in front of this small greedy nose, which was not even a real nose yet, but just some kind of tubercle, rhythmically wrinkled, and swelled, and trembled with a tiny perforated organ. Terrier felt a chill. He felt sick. Now he, too, twitched his nose, as if there was something foul-smelling in front of him that he did not want to deal with. Goodbye to the illusion of father, son and fragrant mother. It was as if the soft trail of affectionate thoughts that he had fantasized around himself and this child had been torn off: a strange, cold creature lay on his lap, a hostile animal, and if not for self-control and fear of God, if not for the reasonable view of things characteristic of Terrier’s character, he In a fit of disgust, I would shake it off like some kind of spider.”

As a result, Terrier decided to get rid of the child, sending him as far away as possible so that he could not reach him. At that very moment he rushed to the Faubourg Saint-Antoine and gave the child to Madame Gaillard, who took any children as long as she was paid.

Grenouille lived with Madame Gaillard until 1747, when he was eight years old. During this time, he experienced “measles, dysentery, chicken pox, cholera, a fall into a six-meter-deep well, and burns from boiling water with which he scalded his chest.” Grenouille inspired unconscious horror in other children; they even tried to kill him, but he survived.

At the age of three he just stood on his feet, and at four he uttered his first word - “fish”. At the age of six, he knew his entire surroundings by smell. As a result of casually attending the parish school of Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours, he learned to read a little and write his name.

This aroma captivated him.

“...He had a vague feeling that this aroma was the key to the order of all other aromas, that one could not understand anything about smells unless one understood this one thing, and he, Grenouille, would live his life in vain if he did not manage to master it. He must get it not just to quench his thirst for possession, but for the sake of the peace of his heart. He almost felt sick from excitement.”

Having reached Marais Street, turning into an alley and passing through an arch, he saw a red-haired girl cleaning a mirabelle - it was from her that this aroma emanated.

Approaching her from behind, he strangled her. Then he took off her dress and absorbed all her scent.

Returning home unnoticed to his closet, he realized that he was a genius, and that his task was to become the greatest perfumer. That same night he began to classify smells.

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Excerpt characterizing Jean-Baptiste Grenouille

It was not difficult to say “tomorrow” and maintain a tone of decency; but to come home alone, to see your sisters, brother, mother, father, to confess and ask for money to which you have no right after this honestly, it was terrible.
We weren't sleeping at home yet. The youth of the Rostov house, having returned from the theater, having had dinner, sat at the clavichord. As soon as Nikolai entered the hall, he was overwhelmed by that loving, poetic atmosphere that reigned in their house that winter and which now, after Dolokhov’s proposal and Iogel’s ball, seemed to thicken even more, like the air before a thunderstorm, over Sonya and Natasha. Sonya and Natasha, in the blue dresses they wore at the theater, pretty and knowing it, happy, smiling, stood at the clavichord. Vera and Shinshin were playing chess in the living room. The old countess, waiting for her son and husband, was playing solitaire with an old noblewoman who lived in their house. Denisov, with shining eyes and tousled hair, sat with his leg thrown back at the clavichord, clapping them with his short fingers, striking chords, and rolling his eyes, in his small, hoarse, but faithful voice, sang the poem he had composed, “The Sorceress,” to which he was trying to find music.
Sorceress, tell me what power
Draws me to abandoned strings;
What fire have you planted in your heart,
What delight flowed through my fingers!
He sang in a passionate voice, shining at the frightened and happy Natasha with his agate, black eyes.
- Wonderful! Great! – Natasha shouted. “Another verse,” she said, not noticing Nikolai.
“They have everything the same,” thought Nikolai, looking into the living room, where he saw Vera and his mother with the old woman.
- A! Here comes Nikolenka! – Natasha ran up to him.
- Is daddy at home? - he asked.
– I’m so glad you came! – Natasha said without answering, “we’re having so much fun.” Vasily Dmitrich remains for me one more day, you know?
“No, dad hasn’t come yet,” said Sonya.
- Coco, you have arrived, come to me, my friend! - said the countess's voice from the living room. Nikolai approached his mother, kissed her hand and, silently sitting down at her table, began to look at her hands, laying out the cards. Laughter and cheerful voices were still heard from the hall, persuading Natasha.
“Well, okay, okay,” Denisov shouted, “now there’s no point in making excuses, barcarolla is behind you, I beg you.”
The Countess looked back at her silent son.
- What happened to you? – Nikolai’s mother asked.
“Oh, nothing,” he said, as if he was already tired of this same question.
- Will daddy arrive soon?
- I think.
“Everything is the same for them. They don't know anything! Where should I go?” thought Nikolai and went back to the hall where the clavichord stood.
Sonya sat at the clavichord and played the prelude of the barcarolle that Denisov especially loved. Natasha was going to sing. Denisov looked at her with delighted eyes.
Nikolai began to walk back and forth around the room.
“And now you want to make her sing? – what can she sing? And there’s nothing fun here,” thought Nikolai.
Sonya struck the first chord of the prelude.
“My God, I am lost, I am a dishonest person. A bullet in the forehead, the only thing left to do is not sing, he thought. Leave? but where? anyway, let them sing!”
Nikolai gloomily, continuing to walk around the room, glanced at Denisov and the girls, avoiding their gaze.
“Nikolenka, what’s wrong with you?” – asked Sonya’s gaze fixed on him. She immediately saw that something had happened to him.
Nikolai turned away from her. Natasha, with her sensitivity, also instantly noticed her brother’s condition. She noticed him, but she herself was so happy at that moment, she was so far from grief, sadness, reproaches, that she (as often happens with young people) deliberately deceived herself. No, I’m having too much fun now to spoil my fun by sympathizing with someone else’s grief, she felt, and said to herself:
“No, I’m rightly wrong, he should be as cheerful as I am.” Well, Sonya,” she said and went out to the very middle of the hall, where, in her opinion, the resonance was best. Raising her head, lowering her lifelessly hanging hands, as dancers do, Natasha, energetically shifting from heel to tiptoe, walked through the middle of the room and stopped.
"Here I am!" as if she was speaking in response to the enthusiastic gaze of Denisov, who was watching her.
“And why is she happy! - Nikolai thought, looking at his sister. And how isn’t she bored and ashamed!” Natasha hit the first note, her throat expanded, her chest straightened, her eyes took on a serious expression. She was not thinking about anyone or anything at that moment, and sounds flowed from her folded mouth into a smile, those sounds that anyone can make at the same intervals and at the same intervals, but which a thousand times leave you cold, in the thousand and first times they make you shudder and cry.
This winter Natasha began to sing seriously for the first time, especially because Denisov admired her singing. She no longer sang like a child, there was no longer in her singing that comic, childish diligence that was in her before; but she still did not sing well, as all the expert judges who listened to her said. "Not processed, but beautiful voice“We need to process it,” everyone said. But they usually said this long after her voice had fallen silent. At the same time, when this raw voice sounded with irregular aspirations and with efforts of transitions, even the expert judges did not say anything, and only enjoyed this raw voice and only wanted to hear it again. In her voice there was that virginal pristineness, that ignorance of her own strengths and that still unprocessed velvet, which were so combined with the shortcomings of the art of singing that it seemed impossible to change anything in this voice without spoiling it.
“What is this? - Nikolai thought, hearing her voice and opening his eyes wide. -What happened to her? How does she sing these days? - he thought. And suddenly the whole world focused for him in anticipation of the next note, the next phrase, and everything in the world became divided into three tempos: “Oh mio crudele affetto... [Oh my Cruel love…] One, two, three... one, two... three... one... Oh mio crudele affetto... One, two, three... one. Eh, our life is stupid! - Nikolai thought. All this, and misfortune, and money, and Dolokhov, and anger, and honor - all this is nonsense... but here it is real... Hey, Natasha, well, my dear! Well, mother!... how will she take this si? I took it! God bless!" - and he, without noticing that he was singing, in order to strengthen this si, took the second as a third high note. "My God! how good! Did I really take it? how happy!” he thought.

Name: Jean-Baptiste Grenouille

A country: France

Creator:

Activity: murderer

Family status: not married

Jean-Baptiste Grenouille: the story of the character

The works of Patrick Suskind excited the readership of the early 20th century. They felt the fresh breath of new times, the spirit of extraordinary literary experiences and the charm of intricate plots. "Perfume" - a book that became a shining example creative research of the writer. It attracts intellectuals and ordinary people, leaving a mark on souls.

History of creation

German playwright and novelist, Patrick Süskind, took a curious approach to creating literary works. Each of them tells about a human drama. The novel “Perfume” was published in 1985, collecting rave reviews from critics and readers. Among Suskind's nine books, it turned out to be the most popular work.

The full title of the book is “Perfumer. The story of a murderer." The action takes place in the 18th century. Researchers attribute the novel to the direction of pseudo-realism due to the imagery with which the author recreated the era described. The plot is complemented detailed characteristics characters and environment. The writer indicates dates, the slightest nuances of relationships and physiological details, creating a sense of the reality of what is happening.

Russian readers became acquainted with the work in 1991, when it was published in the journal Foreign Literature. The book tells the story of a man who grovels before everything stronger than him and rises to the status of a deity.

Plot and prototype

As is the case with any work, where every detail has detailed description, the plot of the novel provoked the question - “Did Jean-Baptiste Grenouille have a prototype?” Did he live? real character in France, what his biography is is difficult to say. But the facts confirm that history keeps the secrets of people who were engaged in similar activities and had interests similar to Grenou.

The image of a fragrance compiler whose main desire was to come up with delicious perfumes cannot be considered fictional. People of this profession did not disdain any experiments and manipulations to get what they wanted. A certain Crollius, who studied the effects of incense, chemistry and medicine, claimed: the smell of the body of a recently deceased young man contains an ingredient that can enhance the effect of the aroma of perfume. Crollius believed that the ideal victim would be a man with a shock of red hair, hanged or impaled no later than a day ago.

The researcher voiced the recipe 100 years before writing the novel. Previously, pharmacist and chemist Nicolas Lefebvre suggested using similar instructions. He believed that muscles cut from the corpse of a young man, soaked in wine alcohol and dried, possessed a component precious to perfume.

In Spanish Galicia in the second half of the 19th century, a trial took place over a certain Manuel Blanco Romasanta. He was accused of serial murders of women and children in order to pump out fat to make scented soap. IN Nazi Germany carried out similar experiments for the development of a perfume and hygiene line

Suskind's hero Jean-Baptiste Grenouille combined in himself a maniac and a genius, prone to the practical application of theories regarding perfumery. He was born near the Cemetery of the Innocents and was not a wanted child. The mother tried to get rid of the child by giving birth in the market. The baby was miraculously saved, but the woman was executed for infanticide. Grenouille ended up in the care of a monastery, with a nurse. But the woman refused him, citing the unfamiliar smell from the boy.

Moving on to the priest Terrier, Grenouille first sniffs his new acquaintance, and he sends the child to Madame Gaillard's orphanage, where the boy was raised until he was 8 years old. Jean-Baptiste was not the life of the party. His peers did not like him, considering him a weak-minded freak. Since childhood, the hero had unusual abilities based on the finest sense of smell. He predicted rain and found money by smell. Having matured, the boy became an apprentice to a tanner, where he endured hard work for the opportunity to get acquainted with new aromas.

One day, meeting a girl on the street, Grenouille was struck by her delicious aroma. He decided to take possession of it. Having strangled his chosen one, the young man enjoyed the smell and decided to become a perfumer.

Having become a student of the famous Baldini, Grenouille learns the basics of craftsmanship. He invents ingenious fragrances, which Baldini appropriates and presents under his own name. Having become an apprentice, Grenouille began working for himself. The perfumer went to Grasse, accompanied by a new discovery: he had no smell. At this moment, the hero decided to invent a perfume, thanks to which he would cease to be an outcast. Under the patronage of the Marquis Taillade-Espinasse, Grenouille works on special perfumes.

In Grasse, the hero is hired as an apprentice to the widow Arnulfi and again smells the magical aroma. Laura exudes it. Studying the effects of aromas and the way they are captured, Jean-Baptiste comes to the conclusion that fabric soaked in fat preserves them best. This is how the serial murders of the perfumer begin. Young girls are becoming victims. Their corpses are found without clothes and with shaved heads. Laura's father understands that his daughter will become a victim of the perfumer because of her amazing beauty. The young man is arrested and sentenced to death.

Having ascended the scaffold, Grenouille opens a bottle of invented perfume. And everyone who came to watch his death finds himself mesmerized by the aroma. The smell awakens carnal passion in people, which provokes an orgy in the city square. Those present admire the perfumer. Gradually the adoration reaches its peak. Laura's father recognizes him as his son, forgiving his crimes. Jean-Baptiste disappears from the execution site. When the aroma dissipates, the city's residents are left amazed at their own appearance and what happened.

Having realized what his power over people is, Grenouille analyzes how great such power is. Such perfumes will give the perfumer the appearance of a god in the eyes of people who will never appreciate his creation. Grenouille returns to Paris, to the Cemetery of the Innocents. Finding himself among tramps and bandits, he applies the invented perfume to himself. Those around him pounce on him, tear him to pieces and devour his remains.

Film adaptations

The novel “Perfume” was filmed in 2006 by director Tom Tykwer. The director accurately conveyed the atmosphere of the era described by Suskind, focusing on the subtleties and nuances of the given characteristics. He played the main role in the film. The actor, whose appearance, like that of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, was neither attractive nor off-putting, created a credible screen image. Thanks to the professional flair of the performer, the dramatic intensity in the film increased due to the development of the personality of the portrayed hero.

Participation in the project based on the novel was Whishaw's first major work. Engaged in dramatic productions on the theater stage, the actor instantly gained fame in cinematic circles and received a lot of offers. The next films with his participation were “Cloud Atlas”, “The Adventures of Paddington”, “007: Skyfall”.

“Perfume” is a book by Patrick Suskind, which was made into a cool movie. The book itself is no less interesting. For those who are too lazy to read, watch a video review of the novel:

The novel was first published in Switzerland in 1985. To date, it is recognized as the most famous novel written in German since time and has gone through many editions total circulation more than 12 million copies. The book has been translated into 45 languages, including Latin.

Heroes and victims of Perfumer:

1. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is the protagonist, he has an incredibly subtle and strong sense of smell along with a complete absence of his own smell.

2. Grenouille's mother - accused of infanticide.

3. Jeanne Bussy is a simple-minded nurse.

4. Father Terrier is an expert in church dogma.

5. Madame Gaillard is the owner of the orphanage. Treats children only as a way to earn money.

6. Grimal - tanner. A very rude and cruel person

7. The girl from the Marais street is Grenouille’s first victim.

8. Giuseppe Baldini - Parisian perfumer. Although she does not have any creative talents in perfumery, she has enormous knowledge in the production technology itself and the preservation of fragrances.

9. Chenier - Baldini's apprentice.

10. Pelissier is a competitor of Baldini, the most popular perfumer. Only mentioned, does not appear in person.

11. Marquis de la Taillade-Espinasse - eccentric creator of the “fluidic theory”.

12. Madame Arnulfi is the widow of a perfumer from Grasse.

13. Dominique Druot - master perfumer from Grasse and lover of Madame Arnulfi.

14. Antoine Richis - Second Consul of Grasse, an insightful man.

15. Laura Rishi - his daughter, a red-haired beauty. The last victim Grenouille.

Summary of the novel “Perfume” from Wikipedia

Part one
In Paris, at a stinking fish shop, next to the Cemetery of the Innocents, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born. His mother wants to get rid of the unwanted child, but the plan is revealed. She is accused of infanticide and executed, and the baby is transferred to the care of the monastery and assigned a wet nurse. A woman refuses to care for her baby because, she says, he “doesn’t smell like other babies” and is possessed by the devil. The priest, Father Terrier, defends the rights of the baby, but fearing that he is “shamelessly sniffing him,” he arranges Grenouille away from his parish - to Madame Gaillard’s shelter.

The child lives here until he is eight years old. Other children avoid him, considering him weak-minded, and besides, he is ugly and crippled. But Grenouille’s amazing actions are noticed: thanks to his hidden abilities, he is not afraid to walk in the dark and knows how to predict rain. No one realizes that Grenouille is a unique person, a person with an extremely acute sense of smell, which can even detect odors that have no name. When Grenouille, thanks to his nose, finds money hidden by the owner of the orphanage, she decides to get rid of him and hands him over to a tanner as a laborer.

Grenouille works in difficult conditions, enduring beatings and illnesses; his only joy is learning new smells. Both perfume and the stench of garbage are equally interesting to him. One day on the street he smells an extraordinary fragrance, its source is a young girl who smells like “beauty itself.” Grenouille, wanting to take possession of the scent, strangles the girl, enjoys her scent and hides unnoticed. His conscience does not torment him; on the contrary, he is happy that he possessed the most precious aroma in the world. After this incident, Grenouille realizes that he has learned everything about smells, and his calling is to be their creator, a great perfumer.

To learn this craft, he becomes an apprentice to Master Baldini, making for him wonderful perfumes beyond all rules. From Baldini he learns the language of formulas and how to “rob” flowers of their scent using sublimation. Baldini appropriates all the fragrance formulas invented by Grenouille. The hero will be disappointed - not every scent can be enclosed in a glass bottle, like floral perfume. Grenouille is so unhappy that he even falls ill and comes to his senses only when he learns from the master that there are other ways to obtain smells from different bodies. Having handed over to the vain Baldini all the perfume formulas known to him and having received an apprentice's patent for this, Grenouille leaves him. Shortly after this, Baldini tragically dies when the Changes Bridge, on which his house was located, collapses into the Seine.

Part two
Now the hero's goal is the city of Grasse, whose perfumers possess other secrets of mastery. But on the way, Grenouille ends up in an uninhabited cave, where he enjoys solitude for several years. By chance, a terrible guess comes to him: he himself does not smell at all. He needs such spirits so that people will stop shunning him and accept him as ordinary person. From his refuge, Grenouille falls under the patronage of the Marquis Taillade-Espinasse, an adherent of the “fluidal theory”, following which, he own opinion, made Grenouille a man again from a cave beast. But in reality this happened thanks to good soap and to the perfume that Grenouille created from cat excrement and a piece of cheese.

Part three
Jean-Baptiste leaves the marquis and gets to Grasse, where he becomes an apprentice to Madame Arnulfi, the widow of a perfumer. Here he learns the most subtle ways of mastering smells. Suddenly, next to someone’s garden, he again smells an aroma, even more luxurious than the aroma of the girl he once strangled. It is the scent of young Laura Richis, who is playing in the garden, and Grenouille decides that he has found the pinnacle of his future perfume - his main creation in life: a scent of absolute beauty that inspires a feeling in everyone who breathes it. true love. Over the course of two years, he masters the science of collecting odors and becomes convinced that the aroma of skin and hair beautiful woman It is best accepted by fabric treated with odorless fat. But since Grenouille, in the eyes of others, is a dirty, ill-mannered, half-crazed tramp, he cannot obtain the smell in any other way except by killing its carrier. A wave of strange murders begins in the city - young girls become their victims. They belong to different strata of society, and it is established that they were not subjected to sexual violence- there is no connection between the murdered, the fact that this is the work of one killer is indicated only by the fact that all the victims were beautiful with the genuine beauty of a newly formed woman, and the fact that they were all found naked and shaved bald. The killer is Grenouille, but he acts so carefully, skillfully using his invisibility, that no one can suspect him of being a killer. And Grenouille continues his terrible and brilliant work to collect sheet music for his future perfumes.

Only one person in Grasse is so insightful that he begins to see the true motives of the killer. This is Laura's father, Consul Rishi. He sees that all the victims are a kind of collection of true beauty, and fear creeps into his heart: Rishi realizes that there is no one in the city who would surpass his daughter in this subtle, luxurious beauty, and sooner or later an unknown killer will want to kill and her.

Rishi decides to stop this. He secretly takes Laura out of the city and hides with her on a remote island. There was only one thing he did not take into account: the killer finds his victims by scent, and all the precautions with which he and his daughter fled from the city were powerless against the main thing: as soon as Laura disappeared, her scent would disappear. And it is his disappearing trail that gives away the direction of flight and the shelter where Laura is hidden.

Grenouille receives the last note of his perfume. But as soon as his work is finished, he is arrested.

Grenouille is exposed and sentenced to death. Rishi, distraught over the loss of his daughter, anticipates execution on the wheel. He visits Grenouille in prison and describes the torment ahead of him, without hiding that this will be a balm for his broken heart.

However, before going to execution, Grenouille retrieves a bottle of the completed fragrance, miraculously hidden from the guards.

One drop of this divine smell was enough for the guards to release Grenouille, and for the executioner to give up. The smell flies over the crowd of spectators gathered to admire the execution of the Grasse monster - and subjugates them. The aroma arouses in people the desire to love and awakens carnal passion. People are looking for satisfaction right there in the square, everything develops into a real passionate orgy. Grenouille stands among the crowd and enjoys the effect he has created. Antoine Richis rises to the platform and falls to Grenouille, recognizing him as his son.

Taking advantage of the general madness, Grenouille disappears.

After the intoxication of the aroma of love wears off, people find themselves naked in each other's arms. Dressing embarrassedly, everyone secretly decides to “forget” about what happened. An innocent man will be executed instead of Grenouille, just to put an end to this story.

Part four
Grenouille is free, he leaves the city. Now he knows the power of his power: thanks to the spirits, he can become a god if he wants. But he understands that among those who blindly worship him there will not be a single person who can appreciate the real beauty of his aroma. He returns to Paris and heads to the Cemetery of the Innocents - the place where he was born. Here thieves and tramps gathered around the fire. Grenouille sprays himself with perfume from head to toe, and people, blinded by attraction to him, tear him apart and devour the remains of the great perfumer.

The book turned out to be very interesting due to the descriptions of smells and the construction of the world through the prism of these descriptions. Jean-Baptiste himself “Perfume” is shown by the author very clearly and does not cause regrets. At the same time, his spiritual world and all the torments are subtly described. Yes, no, but the murders here are more sophisticated...

“Perfumer, the story of a murderer”: reviews

There are books after reading which I calmly lie down and fall asleep, and there are others that I mentally return to from time to time and continue to analyze. “Perfume” is not a very suitable read before bed, that’s for sure. There is no more disgusting and disgusting there than in any modern bestseller, especially those created by our compatriots. But the feelings that gripped me after reading this creation are very, very unusual, and completely new. It doesn’t cause as much depression as Hemingway’s works (sorry for the comparison), but in some ways it’s very similar. It seems to me that our dark side is being touched upon here or something. After all, almost everyone who read Perfumer, at least not for long, sympathized with him, seemed to be in his shoes... Maybe they even rejoiced at his successes... Or is it just me that such metamorphoses happen to me?!
Even as a child, when I watched the cartoon “Well, wait a minute!” I somehow sympathized more with the wolf, he was such a loser...

Unfortunately, in Russian this work was not in its proper field, and this does not give readers the opportunity to appreciate it. An inaccurate translation of the name “Das Parfum” (the correct word would be “Smell” or “Aroma”) immediately leads the reader away from the author’s intentions into the section of maniacal literature. And no one is looking for hidden subtexts anymore (they start with the similarity of the names of the hero Jean-Baptiste Grenouille and the English director Peter Greenaway). For some reason, they often talk about the closeness of Suskind’s novel with Fowles’s “The Collector,” although, in my opinion, the similarities between them are no greater than between Mine Reid’s “The Headless Horseman” and Furmanov’s “Chapaev.” “Perfume” is an innovative novel in which the usual psychologism is replaced by the development of the idea of ​​smell. The author decided to show how much smell, one of the five senses, means in our lives.

I think that over time, “Perfume” will take its rightful place among those works that changed European literature, such as “Towards Swann” by M. Proust or “Ulysses” by D. Joyce.

When you humiliate a pimply fellow student, remember that there are devils in still waters. It is quite possible that this downtrodden and unhappy student may turn out to be a maniac who will come up with a way to become a ruler for all time...

Another thought has not left me since I read the book with strange name"Perfumer. The story of a murderer” by Patrick Suskind: everything in the world is ruled by chemistry. everything is based on sympathy. and beauty has a very specific scent. or rather not quite like that. Beauty smells special. Yes exactly. beautiful people They have a very special aroma. And for this reason, I believe that if such a perfumer actually existed, then the reaction of those who inhaled the aroma extracted from the bodies of beauties could well have caused general madness...

Aphrodisiacs are created according to the principle that the author of the work wanted to talk about.

"Perfumer. The Story of a Murderer” is quite easy to read. The style is light and accessible. The scenes are not for the faint of heart, but after reading there is no feeling of a disgusting aftertaste.

The ending, of course, is stronger than in the film, but cinema is inferior in this; it’s always easier to write, it’s much more difficult to put it on film...

True, not everyone is delighted with all this:

After reading, I was left with a feeling of disgust and disgust for the hero, for the plot, for the book. The author “savors” too much every detail of the main character’s madness and manic passion. Too realistic and therefore disgusting. But for those who love stories like “The Silence of the Lambs,” I think it will be interesting. I wouldn't read it if I knew it would leave such a bad aftertaste. But I will watch the film, because I expect it to soften the impression. Still, the author’s word plus the reader’s imagination is sometimes stronger than the captured image.

Perfumer

Bottle one

Composition: perception, loneliness, xenophobia

I re-read Patrick Suskind’s novel “Perfume” slowly and with pleasure during the general winter holidays, when the world stopped, froze in the sweet thicket holidays like an anthill filled with honey. The novel (about three hundred pocket-size pages in total) turned out to be too long to squeeze a conversation about it into one essay, so I bottled it in three different bottles, imitating Grenouille’s modern colleagues who like to release new fragrances at once in “lines”, emphasizing the similarities basics and differences in nuances.

In the eyes of the average educated reader (to whom, in fact, the novel is aimed), Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is a monster, a freak, a monstrosity (add according to taste, underline as necessary). For me, a barbarian who looks at the treasuries of world literature not only with the admiration of an eternal neophyte, but also economically checking the height of the lintels with my own height, the image of Grenouille is, first of all, an occasion to once again analyze the necessary and sufficient condition of absolute human loneliness: discrepancy individual perception of the world from generally accepted standards. Hence the lack linguistic means for adequate communication - despite the fact that Grenouille has the same lexicon, as did his contemporaries. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille's perception capabilities significantly exceed his lexical capabilities. Moreover, his individual system the symbols seem to not exist at all for those around them.

The image of Grenouille’s “monster” is skillfully and reliably outlined in several strokes: a unique sense of smell, supernatural vitality, unbending perseverance in achieving the set goal, an incredibly intense inner life with an external submissive phlegm and... nothing human except an unattractive (but discreet) appearance. Nothing - not even a smell. If Grenouille had at least some kind of bridge connecting him with humanity, one could safely conclude that this is the kind of dough that Stoics, ascetics and heroes are made of, and leave him alone (however, in this case he would not be the main character THIS novel). However, there is not and cannot be even a hint of the possibility of building such a bridge: Grenouille’s heightened perception has become an insurmountable obstacle between him and other people. Figuratively speaking, such loneliness should be familiar to an aquarium fish, which cannot convey strange creatures, every now and then adding food to her, his knowledge about nine thousand seven hundred and fifty-three properties of water (and besides, he knows for sure that this subject, which perhaps constitutes the only meaning of her existence, is completely uninteresting to them).

Just don’t talk about “genius and villainy” in relation to Suskind’s “Perfume”. Both “genius” and “villainy” are obligatory, but secondary semantic figures in the personal “linguistic” drama of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. Man is tightly tied to language; the need for continuous dialogue keeps us on a short leash. Grenouille is a double stranger in the human world, his tongue-tiedness is fatal: obligatory in human society the language of words is too poor to even allow him to begin negotiations; on the other hand, nature mysteriously deprived him of the opportunity to pass as “one of our own” on a sensory level. He doesn't smell human. That says it all.

Absence common language(more precisely, a mutually acceptable system of symbols) is one of the root causes of xenophobia. It’s funny (tragicomic) that in Suskind’s novel both sides are obsessed with xenophobia: both Grenouille himself and the people around him. The nurse, who even for an increased fee refused to keep a boy, a baby who “smells nothing”; Father Terrier, who in a panic sent the baby to the other end of the city, never to see him again; children in an orphanage who tried to strangle him... Their pitiful, rudimentary (compared to Grenouille’s receptive nose, of course) sense of smell was quite enough to smell a stranger. In this case, the degree of xenophobia of the matured Grenouille can only be remotely imagined by anyone who has had the opportunity to ride on a crowded, tightly sealed commuter bus in the heat of a summer afternoon (I, alas, have had the opportunity more than once; I am afraid that it is precisely this experience that makes my empathy for Grenouille especially sharp).

The monstrous experiment of the perfumer Grenouille (Syskind interprets it as the desire of an outcast to FORCE people to love himself) seems to me to be an attempt by a genius to force the world to learn HIS LANGUAGE. Moreover, the attempt was successful. Another thing is that he did not want (could not?) take advantage of the fruits of his victory. Why? The answer is simple: disgust. Don't forget, the xenophobia was mutual. However, this topic deserves a separate discussion.

Bottle two

Composition: possession, disgust, weakness

We concluded that Jean-Baptiste Grenouille had absolutely nothing to say to people. If tomorrow scientists learn to decipher the language of insects and give representatives of the army of domestic cockroaches the opportunity to strike up a conversation with humanity, the cockroaches will most likely remain silent, unable to find even one general theme for conversation (or they will burst out with meaningless curses if they are not as dispassionate as it seems to me) ... A similar logic in my youth prevented me from believing in the possibility of any dialogue between people and aliens; thoughtful reading of science fiction novels of any quality only deepened my doubts.

But, unlike aliens or the same cockroach, Grenouille had an external resemblance to people and a powerful instinct of ownership. A very human instinct, one of the basic ones, although its manifestations in the case of Grenouille, of course, are distinguished by a certain eccentricity: the frantic thirst for possession for a creature in whose picture of the world the only value is ephemeral aromas is an almost insoluble problem (when he himself decided that it was insoluble , he began to die and returned to life only after making sure that there was a way out). Over time, Grenouille not only coped with this problem, but also learned to manipulate the assigned aromas. And (if he wanted) these manipulations could take both the experimenter himself and his experimental subjects far. But he didn't want to. Because…

To imitate this human smell - albeit insufficient, in his opinion, but quite sufficient to deceive others - Grenouille selected the most inconspicuous ingredients in Runel's workshop.

He found a handful of cat shit, still quite fresh, behind the threshold of the door leading into the courtyard. He took half a spoon of it and put it in the mixer with a few drops of vinegar and crushed salt. Under the table he found a piece of cheese the size of a fingernail. thumb, clearly left over from some meal of Runel. The cheese was already quite old, began to decompose and exuded a piercingly pungent smell. From the lid of a barrel of sardines that stood at the back of the shop, he scraped something that smelled like fish offal and mixed it with rotten egg and castor oil, ammonia, nutmeg, burnt horn and burnt pork crackling. To this he added quite a large number of civet, diluted these terrible seasonings with alcohol, let it brew and filtered it into a second bottle. The smell of the mixture was monstrous. It stank of cesspool, decomposition, rot, and when the wave of a fan mixed clean air with this evaporation, you got the impression that you were standing on a hot summer day in Paris at the intersection of the Rue Haut-Fères and the Rue de Lengérie, where the smells of fish markets, the Cemetery of the Innocents and the crowded ones merged. houses1.

“Disgust” is another code word in describing Grenouille’s existence. He was happy only during the seven years he spent completely alone on the top of the Plon du Cantal volcano. Pesky, aggressive, greedy, stupid, annoying-smelling creatures remained somewhere far away, beyond his perception. For Grenouille, loneliness is not just a symbol of freedom, it is freedom. Which, I will not fail to notice, he failed to take advantage of.

Seven years spent in endless dreams, in continuous dreams of his own greatness and splendor - in this sense, Grenouille, who “left people solely for his own pleasure, only to be close to himself,” is similar to those from whom he fled. And having squandered his loneliness, he returned to people, disgust for whom was one of his strongest feelings. Exhibitionism is an integral part human nature. The most inveterate misanthrope needs at least some kind of environment: an audience to whom he can demonstrate his “achievements.” However, Grenouille was too sincere a misanthropist not to recoil from the crowd, stupefied by the scent he created.

This peculiar kind of mental weakness, which does not allow one to take advantage of the results of persistent, frantic work, makes the maniac Grenouille similar to many historical and literary characters (especially, by the way, Martin Eden, who in the last part of his path was also guided solely by disgust).

Grenouille's death is as monstrous as his life was. But the abomination of the details is surprisingly harmoniously combined with the blasphemously beautiful quote. We should not forget that Suskind wrote primarily for a European reader, who for the most part had at least minimal experience of participating in Catholic church rites. With his last exhalation, the author makes it clear that the beggars from the Cemetery of the Innocents, who devoured Grenouille, perceived their cannibalism precisely as a sacrament, “for the first time they did something out of love.”

In some way, these creatures solved for themselves the problem of possessing a beloved creature - not as sophisticated as the Grenouille they ate, but still... The circle, one might say, has closed.

Bottle three

Composition: several different deaths

I deliberately saved the collection of varieties of nasty ways to die, which I collected on the pages of Patrick Suskind’s novel, “for dessert.” This collection is very visual, completely self-sufficient and hardly needs additional comments. It opens with the execution of Grenouille's mother on the Place de Greve (I doubt that limited abilities this pathetic creature in the field of constructing chains of cause and effect allowed her to realize what exactly was happening to her and why it happened) and is crowned with the enchanting death of Grenouille himself, devoured by the vagabonds who loved him.

The pages of "Perfume" are teeming with magnificent examples of human stupidity, baseness and ugliness (against this background, Grenouille himself looks - in spite of or in accordance with the author's will, I don't know - an almost innocent, crazy angel). It is not surprising that the list of deaths to which Suskind (not without a certain pleasure, I suppose) condemned his heroes is much more instructive than the sluggish suffering of the characters in Dante's Inferno. Perhaps especially instructive (and tragicomic) is the death of Madame Gaillard, a woman who died in spirit as a child and (probably partly for this reason) was preoccupied exclusively with careful preparation for death. Madame Gaillard wanted to allow herself a private death and devoted her whole life to achieving one single goal: to allow herself to die at home, and not die in the Hotel-Dieu, like her husband.

...In 1797 - she was then approaching ninety - she lost all her property, accumulated bit by bit, acquired through centuries of hard work, and huddled in a tiny furnished closet on Kokiy Street. And only now, with a ten-, twenty-year delay, death approached - it came to her in the form of a tumor, the disease grabbed Madame by the throat, deprived her first of her appetite, then her voice, so that she could not object a word when she was sent to Almshouse Hotel-Dieu. There she was placed in the same hall, crowded with hundreds of dying people, where her husband had once died, put into a common bed with five other completely stranger old women (they lay closely pressed with their bodies to each other) and left there for three weeks to publicly die. Then she was sewn up in a bag, at four o'clock in the morning, along with fifty other corpses, they were thrown onto a cart and, accompanied by the delicate ringing of a bell, they were taken to the new cemetery in Clamart, which is located a mile from the city gates, and there they laid her to eternal rest in mass grave under a thick layer of quicklime1.

The next victim is not Grenouille - the monotonous deaths of numerous victims of his manic desire to possess the ideal aroma are hardly worthy of close attention - but the so-called “inevitable fate” (when we're talking about about the book, “inevitable fate” is, of course, the author of the text) became the jeweler Baldini - the living embodiment of self-deception, self-delusion and self-satisfaction so popular among homosapiens. Before his death, he (a man, like most of his contemporaries, a sincere believer) once again postponed visiting the temple for the sake of “more important” matters. The metaphor is as clear as diet broth.

...At night a small catastrophe occurred, which, after a time appropriate to the occasion, gave rise to the king to issue an order for the gradual demolition of all houses on all bridges of the city of Paris; the bridge collapsed for no apparent reason. Changed - with west side between the third and fourth supports. Two houses collapsed into the river so quickly and suddenly that none of the inhabitants could be saved. Fortunately, only two people died, namely Giuseppe Baldini and his wife Teresa1.

The tragedy reaches its climax when it comes to the “ascetic” death of the Marquis de la Taillade-Espinasse, inventor and propagandist of the “fluid theory.” This metaphor is no less transparent than others; On my own behalf, I’ll add that the marquis is the only exhibit in this collection that evokes not disgust in me, but sympathy. And his theory was stupid, and he died, to be honest, stupidly, and his followers look like complete idiots... But at least there was some (albeit vain) inspiration in his existence, and last minutes marked by hectic but sincere exaltation.

This pundit, standing on the threshold of old age, ordered himself to be taken to a peak 2800 meters high and there for three weeks exposed to the real, freshest vital air, so that, as he publicly announced, he would descend again as a strong twenty-year-old youth by Christmas.

The adherents surrendered just beyond Vernet, the last human settlement at the foot of the terrible mountain. However, nothing could stop the Marquis. In the icy cold, he threw off his clothes and, emitting loud cries of jubilation, began to climb alone. Last memory about him is his silhouette with his hands ecstatically raised to the sky, disappearing with a song in a snowstorm2.

I finish rummaging through this collection of literary deaths with a strange feeling: in the story known to readers under the name “Perfume”, there was not one brilliant maniac, but two. While Jean-Baptiste Grenouille mercilessly disemboweled the young bodies of beautiful strangers to extract from them the divine aroma of love, Patrick Suskind just as mercilessly destroyed and dissected human garbage.

I will not falsely summarize that the author surpassed his hero in this strange marathon from “genius” to “villainy”: it is not easy for a living person to compete with literary character. But for a living person, Suskind acted flawlessly: the impact of the cruel charm of his prose on the readership has already been “field tested” and cannot but be recognized as most effective.

For a week now (exactly the same amount of time has passed since the moment when I began to absorb the aromas of “Perfume”) I have been haunted by a manic desire to write one single phrase: “An artist who is not able to detect Jean-Baptiste Grenouille in the twilight of his own personality is either lying, or is not an artist."

That's it.