A Comparison of Boris Godunov and

Grigory Otrepiev in Boris Godunov

The story of Boris Godunov and Grigory Otrepiev in Russia’s history has been told many times. Nikolai Karamzin recounted the events in his "History of the Russian State," Modest Musorgsky wrote an opera about it, fictional accounts were produced by Pushkin, Khomiakov, Ostrovsky, Suvorin, Tolstoy, and even European writers like Schiller and Lope de Vega. Each depiction has brought Russian influence into another sphere, from German historical writing to French tragedy, to French-Italianate opera, developing and expanding Russian culture with each retelling. Pushkin’s play Boris Godunov is perhaps the most well-loved of all the different versions. (Emerson, pg.28).

In fiction and in life, the adversaries at the heart of the story were completed opposites. The main differences between Boris Godunov and Grigory Otrepiev lie in their modus operandi. They each wanted to be tsar of Russian, but each used very different methods to reach their goals.

Boris Godunov grew up in the Russian court as a favorite of Ivan the Terrible. He was known for this quiet tact and ability to avoid causing offense, which worked well in his relationship with the tsar. Although he never participated in Ivan’s atrocities, he never condemned them and even married the daughter of a brutal executioner, Maliuta Skuratof. Pushkin considered this fact important enough to Godunov’s character that wrote into the first scene of the play, when describing Godunov, "Maliuta’s brother-in-law, an executioner’s brother-in-law, at heart, himself an executioner." (Scene: The Kremlin Palace. February 20, 1598)

Godunov was very intimate with the royal family and sustained a blow to the head from Ivan’s steel pointed staff when the tsar began to administer a fatal beating to his son and heir, Ivan (Graham, pg 13).

After the death of Ivan the Terrible, his second son, Fedor, took the throne. Fedor was known not to be particularly intelligent but devoutly religious, and he allowed Godunov to rule de facto in his place. Godunov sent Ivan’s other remaining son, young Dmitry, and his mother to Uglitch, two hundred miles from Moscow. Fedor – married to Godunov’s sister – failed to produce an heir, and it was assumed that when Fedor died, Dmitry would ascend to the throne. Were he to rule, Godunov would be left out in the cold.

Many stipulate that this was the reason Dmitry was put to death. He was found in a courtyard with his throat slashed and immediately, the blame was put upon Godunov. A bodyguard he had sent to watch over the prince was murdered by the people to Uglitch and although there was a significant uprising in Moscow, no one who might have witnessed the murder first-hand was left alive.

Modern historians agree that it is unlikely that Godunov was responsible for the death of Dmitry (Emerson, pg.16). Ivan the Terrible’s marriage to Dmitry’s mother, Marya Nagy, was never recognized by the church and Dmitry’s legitimacy could theoretically have been challenged by Boris. Most scholars do not believe that Boris was decisive enough to have ordered the killing—he had avoided the violence of Ivan’s reign and everything had had accomplished in his life had come to him through the powers of friendship. Finally, a supporter of Godunov’s, Andrew Kleshnin, may very well have taken it upon himself to commit the murder, believing that it would bring him into Godunov’s good graces (Grey, pg.14).

In Pushkin’s retelling, Godunov attempted to use the laws of the land in order to gain power. In order to make sure that after Fedor’s death Godunov would remain in power, he arranged the assassination of Dmitry. This assured that he would be the only reasonable choice to take over the role of tsar after Fedor’s death.

What Pushkin astutely noticed what the character of the man. Neither in real life nor in fiction did he, at any point, come out and say, "I want to be tsar." Godunov did not attempt to gain the backing of the people. Nor did he try to convince Fedor to make Boris his heir. He had little of the charisma that would make him a hero to the people, which Pushkin demonstrated in his play by having Godunov show no interest in the individual people in his land, referring to them only as, "the mob." He relied on the power of tradition in matters of ascension and arranged things in his favor.

Grigory Otrepiev, on the other hand, took a very personal approach to becoming tsar. He manipulated people into helping him, shown for the first time in Pushkin’s play when he convinces an older monk to recall the story of Dmitry’s death for him. Rather than send an official request to Lithuania asking for admittance, he chose to visit an inn and hope that someone could tell him where he could cross the border. There he adapted his behavior first to the monks he traveled with, then to the landlady, and then to police officers who arrive. He had no problem with selling out those who he had befriended if it benefited him, as when he purposely misread the description of himself in order to place the blame on one of the monks. His secret conversion to Catholicism was no doubt a ploy to gain the support of the Catholic Church and his marriage to Marina was most likely a bid for the support of her royal Polish family.

Pushkin’s depiction of Marina and Grigory’s interactions is perhaps his strongest characterization of Grigory of a master manipulator. When they meet secretly at night, he is overcome with emotion and blurts out the truth about his identity. Marina immediately rejects him, subconsciously reinforcing his belief that he, Grigory, an unknown Russian monk, is insufficient and that only an impressive mask will allow him to gain the power he desires. He immediately plays on Marina’s desire not to be treated like a child but like an equal by allowing her to work with him in the deception. It is she who plots out his next move: "To Moscow quickly lead your troops. Clean out the Kremlin, take the Moscow throne."

Historians speculate that Otrepiev may have suffered from mental illness and truly believed that he was Dmitri. Long before announcing his true identity as Dmitri to Prince Adam Vishnevetsky, he was already telling other monks that he would someday be tsar and leaving notes about his royal lineage (Graham, pg. 203). In the minds of those monks and scribes he had worked with, who cherished humility as part of their vows, his claims were seen as an arrogance bordering on true evil. While today some think that the former Tsaritza Marya’s acceptance of him as her son may have boosted his confidence, other say that it might actually have made his fantasy too real, frightening him.

Certainly Pushkin was aware of Otrepiev’s instability of character—after losing a battle, the character of the false Dmitri curiously laments the death of his horse and then lays down to nap. At the same time, however, Pushkin is emphasizing Otrepiev’s relationship with Moscow and her people—even defeated, their love for him is still strong enough to keep him safe while he sleeps, defenseless and without a horse to flee on. Pushkin’s Grigory acts exactly as a true prince would in trusting his people and helps to build trust in doing so.

Grigory relied on the individual people of Russia to rise up and help him fight and used his powers of personality accordingly. Boris relied on religious traditions and the establishments of the state. Both men were ruthless and selfish, although it is fair to say that Godunov had more concern for the wellbeing of his people than Otrepiev. As we know from historical evidence, Godunov died of a stroke which was probably the result of his stress over the many plagues on the land; Otrepiev was killed by his own boyars after a riotous wedding celebration, just a year after he had come to power.

The final scene of the play which Godunov appears in shows his death. He counsels his son, Fedor, to be a wise ruler and sees as if for the first time his son’s purity. On an subconscious level, he understands that his death alone will not make up for the sins he has committed, and in a precognitive way see that his son’s murder will echo the true Dmitry’s. Godunov has seen that even Ivan the Terrible’s cruelty did not go unpunished. Indeed, Otrepiev’s boyars murder Fedor and his mother in the last scene of the play. Although Pushkin does not mention it outright, Godunov’s warning to Fedor before he dies to, "Love your sister. You are the one protector that she has," and her exclamation of fear as the house is being stormed foreshadow Fedor’s death and his sister’s mistreatment. Historians provide evidence that Otrepiev raped Godunov’s daughter and made her his mistress. Otrepiev, as always, is seeing the situation from a personal point of view—how has he triumphed over Godunov and how can he show it to the people? Godunov himself saw the outcome of the situation, but in a far grander and less intimate way—he saw the death of a tsar’s son avenging the death of a tsar’s son.

Pushkin’s play ends shortly after Otrepiev has taken control of Moscow in the wake of Godunov’s death and the boyars have murdered Godunov’s wife and son. Otrepiev’s personal vision no doubt ended with the people’s joy that he had been made tsar and their rejoicing in true royalty being returned to the throne. However, even when the "mob" is prompted, they are all too horrified by the murders to be glad for Orepiev’s triumph. They see, as Boris did, that they have ended exactly where they began.

Bibliography

The False Dmitri: A Russian Romance and Tragedy, Sonja E. Howe,

Williams and Norgate, London 1916

Dmitri and the False Tsars, Hans Baumann, Henry Z. Walck Inc.,

New York 1970

Boris Godunov: The Tragic Tsar, Ian Grey, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New

York 1973

Boris Godunov, Stephen Graham, Archon Books 1933

Boris Godunov: Transpositions of a Russian Theme, Caryl Emerson,

Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana 1986