The Significance of Hermann's Moralizing in The Queen of Spades

This essay analyzes Hermann's moralizing in Alexander Pushkin's "The Queen of Spades," highlighting how his initial aversion to greed contrasts with his eventual corruption. The essay discusses how Hermann, originally portrayed as a moral character, becomes consumed by avarice after hearing the story of the Countess and her gambling success. His pursuit of this secret leads him to feign love for Lizavyeta Ivanovna and ultimately results in his downfall and confinement in a mental sanatorium. The essay argues that Hermann's moralizing is crucial as it underscores the societal corruption of 19th-century Russia and suggests that his tragic fate is a consequence of abandoning his moral principles. Furthermore, it connects his moral nature to the supernatural events he experiences, such as seeing the Countess's ghost, and the resulting psychological distress. The essay concludes that Pushkin's story serves as a cautionary tale about the perils of unethical behavior.

Running head: THE QUEEN OF SPADES
The Queen of Spades
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

1THE QUEEN OF SPADES
Alexander Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” (1834) is a short story which dwells on
the avarice as well as greed of the human beings (Murphy 2017). The central protagonist of
the story is Hermann, an officer in the Imperial Russian Army and in the initial part of the
story he is being shown as a very moral character. However, in the latter part of the story he
also gets corrupted by the greed and avarice and ends up paying a heavy penalty for the same.
This essay will discuss the importance of Hermann’s moralising in the short story “The
Queen of Spades”.
In the initial part of the short story under discussion here Hermann is being portrayed
as a character who simply hates the avarice and greed of the other officers and this is one of
the major reasons why refrains from participating in such actions (Cornwell 2017). However,
he soon gets attracted to them when he hears the story of the Countess who losses all her
fortune and again reclaims them back by gambling. In order to learn the trick he even goes to
the extent to professing false love for Lizavyeta Ivanovna, the ward of the Countess.
However, things go wrong and rather than wining he ends up losing everything and is being
admitted to a mental sanatorium. In this regard, it needs to be said Hermann’s moralising is
important because it in turn showed the corruption as well as greed of the Russian society and
is also indicative of the fact that hadn’t he given up the moral path he would not have met the
fate which meets at the end of story (Murphy 2017). More importantly, it is because of the
moralising nature of his character that he sees the ghost of the Countess and also the resultant
mental issues that he faces. He is being shown as a German because of the fact that since the
traditional times the Germans were believed to be more avaricious and greedy than the other
groups of people (Cornwell 2017).
To conclude, Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” is an important short story because of
the fact it intended to show the moral corruption as well as the greed which existed within the
framework of the society in the 19th century. More importantly, the work in an indirect

2THE QUEEN OF SPADES
manner also shows the pitfalls of following unethical as well as immoral paths in the form of
the fate which Hermann had to meet at the end of the story.

3THE QUEEN OF SPADES
References
Cornwell, N., 2017. European Gothic and nineteenth-century Russian literature. In European
Gothic. Manchester University Press.
Murphy, A., 2017. The Empress Undressed: Dress, Disguise, and the Next Generation in
Pushkin's Prose. The Russian Review, 76(4), pp.713-731.