Mikhail Zoshchenko: stories and feuilletons of different years. Biography of Mikhail Zoshchenko

From the memoirs of contemporaries

Addresses in Leningrad

Some works

stories

Stories for children

Translations

Screen adaptations

(July 29 (August 10), 1894, St. Petersburg - July 22, 1958, Sestroretsk) - Russian Soviet writer.

Biography

The son of an itinerant artist, hereditary nobleman Mikhail Ivanovich Zoshchenko (1857-1907) and Elena Iosifovna Zoshchenko, nee Surina (1875-1920), who was an actress before her marriage, wrote stories.

In 1913 he graduated from the gymnasium in St. Petersburg. He studied for one year (the First World War interrupted his studies) at the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg University. Possibly expelled for non-payment.

Participated in the First World War, as well as in the Civil War. From September 29, 1914 - a cadet as a volunteer of the first category at an accelerated four-month course at the Pavlovsk Military School.

In February 1915, having completed the course in the first category, he was promoted to the rank of warrant officer and sent to the disposal of the chief of staff of the Kiev military district, and from there to the 106th infantry reserve battalion, being the commander of the 6th marching company, he leaves for the army to staff Mingrelian 16th Grenadier Regiment, to which he was seconded until December 1915.

On December 22, 1915 he was promoted to second lieutenant, on July 9, 1916 to lieutenant, on November 10, 1916 he was promoted to staff captain.

On the night of July 20, 1916, he came under a gas attack by the Germans. After treatment, he was recognized as a patient of the first category, but on October 9 he returned to duty. From November 10, 1916 - company commander.

After the February Revolution of 1917, he was appointed head of the post and telegraph office and commandant of the post office of the city of Petrograd. Soon he left his post and went to Arkhangelsk, where he served as adjutant of the Arkhangelsk squad.

After the October Revolution, he went over to the side of Soviet power.

From 1917 to 1919 he worked as a court clerk, an instructor in rabbit breeding and chicken breeding in the Smolensk province. In 1919, he volunteered for the front, despite the fact that he was released from service for health reasons. He served as a regimental adjutant of the 1st Exemplary Regiment of the Rural Poor. In April 1919, due to heart disease, he was demobilized and removed from military registration.

From 1920 to 1922 he changed many professions: he served in the police, was an agent of the criminal investigation department, a clerk at the Petrograd military port, a carpenter, a shoemaker. He attended the literary studio at the publishing house "World Literature", which was led by Korney Chukovsky.

He made his debut in print in 1922. He belonged to the literary group Serapion Brothers.

In the works of the 1920s. mainly in the form of a story, he created a comic image of a philistine hero with poor morals and a primitive view of the environment. In 1927 he took part in the collective novel "Big Fires", published in the magazine "Spark". In the 1930s he worked on a large scale: Youth Restored, The Blue Book, etc. The essay The History of a Reforging was included in the book The Stalin Canal (1934).

From the beginning of the Patriotic War, he was evacuated to Alma-Ata (he worked in the screenwriting studio of Mosfilm). In the spring of 1943 he returned to Moscow, was a member of the editorial board of the magazine Krokodil.

In 1944-1946 he worked a lot for theaters. Two of his comedies were staged at the Leningrad Drama Theatre, one of which - "Canvas Briefcase" - withstood 200 performances in a year.

Beginning in August 1943, during the heyday of Zoshchenko's fame, the literary periodical Oktyabr began publishing the first chapters of the story Before Sunrise. In it, the writer tried to understand his melancholy and neurasthenia, based on the teachings of Z. Freud and I. Pavlov. On August 14, 1946, the Decree of the Orgburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks appeared on the magazines Zvezda and Leningrad, in which the editors of both magazines were severely criticized "for providing a literary platform to the writer Zoshchenko, whose works are alien to Soviet literature." The Zvezda magazine was prohibited from publishing the writer's works in the future, and the Leningrad magazine was closed altogether. Following the Decree, A. Zhdanov, secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, attacked Zoshchenko and A. Akhmatova. About the story "Before Sunrise" in his report, he said: "In this story, Zoshchenko turns his vile and low soul inside out, doing it with pleasure, with savoring ....". This report served as a signal for the persecution and exclusion of Zoshchenko from the Union of Writers of the USSR. In 1946-1953, he was mainly engaged in translation activities - without the right to sign translated works, and also worked as a shoemaker.

"Before Sunrise" was first published in its entirety only thirty years later, in 1973, by the New York Chekhov Publishing House.

In June 1953 Zoshchenko was again admitted to the Writers' Union. In the last years of his life he worked in the magazines "Crocodile" and "Spark". After reaching retirement age and until his death (from 1954 to 1958), Zoshchenko was denied a pension. In recent years, Zoshchenko lived in a dacha in Sestroretsk. The funeral of Zoshchenko at the Volkovskoye cemetery, among former writers, was prohibited. He was buried at the Sestroretsk cemetery near St. Petersburg.

A museum has been organized in his last apartment.

Based on the works of M. M. Zoshchenko, several feature films were shot, including the famous comedy by Leonid Gaidai “It can’t be!” (1975) based on the story and plays "Crime and Punishment", "Funny Adventure", "Wedding Accident".

From the memoirs of contemporaries

In his diary, Korney Chukovsky, who met with M. Zoshchenko in January 1926, noted the features of the writer's character:

January 25 "... Meyerhold came here to see the Leningrad writers in order to order plays for them. He ordered Fedin and Slonimsky, but he did not succeed with Zoshchenko. Zoshchenko (whom Meyerhold as a writer loves very much) refused to come to Meyerhold and did not want to to get acquainted with him, citing his painful condition. This excited me so much that I went to Zoshchenko's on the same day. Indeed, his affairs are not very good. He lives in the "House of Arts" however, closed, frowning. His wife lives separately. He hadn't been with her for several days. He cooks for himself on a kerosene stove, cleans his room himself, and in terrible hypochondria looks at everything that exists. “Well, what do I need my “glory” for,” he said. “It only interferes! They call on the phone, write letters! Why? You have to answer letters, and this is such longing! , to Odessa (it seems) to read his stories, - either Larisa Reisner or Seifullina is with him, - and this seems to him suffering. I suggested that he settle together in the winter in the Sestroretsk resort, he eagerly grabbed this offer .... "

In Sestroretsk, where the writer lived at the dacha, every year in August, holidays dedicated to his work are held in the library near the monument to Zoshchenko.

Addresses in Leningrad

? - 1934 - Tchaikovsky street, 75, apt. 5

1935 - 07/22/1958 - the house of the former Court stable department - Griboyedov Canal Embankment, 9, apt. 119.

Some works

• The Blue Book (1934-1935) is a series of satirical short stories about the vices and passions of historical characters and a modern tradesman.

stories

• Aristocrat (1923)
• Bath (1924)
• Nervous People (1924)
• Lemonade (1925)
• Wet Business (1925)
• Telephone (1926)
• Useful area (1927)
• Medical Case (1928)

Stories for children

• Lyolya and Minka (1939)
• Galoshes and ice cream
• Grandma's gift
• Do not lie
• Thirty years later
• Nakhodka
• Great Travelers
• Gold words
• monkey adventure
• strategic mistake
• Stories about Lenin

Tale

• "Michel Sinyagin" (1930)
• "Youth Restored" (1933)
• "Taras Shevchenko" (1939)
• The story-essay "Before Sunrise" (part 1, 1943; part 2, entitled "The Tale of the Mind", published in 1972).

Interest in the new linguistic consciousness, the widespread use of tale forms, the construction of the image of the "author" (the bearer of "naive philosophy").

Translations

• "For matches" (M. Lassila) - from Finnish
• "From Karelia to the Carpathians" (A. Timonen) - from Finnish

Screen adaptations

• Crime and Punishment (1940)
• Serenade (1968)
• To a clear fire (1975)
• Can't be! (1975)
• Crazy Day of Engineer Barkasov (1983)
• Goldfish (teleplay) (1985)
• Down with Commerce on the Love Front, or Services by Reciprocity (1988)
• Golden Words (1989)
• Dog scent (1989)
• Bale! (1990)
• True Incidents (2000)

Awards

• November 17, 1915 - Order of St. Stanislaus III class. with swords and bow
• February 11, 1916 - Order of St. Anne IV class. with the inscription "For bravery"
• September 13, 1916 - Order of St. Stanislaus II class. with swords
• November 9, 1916 - Order of St. Anne III class. with swords and bow
• February 17, 1939 - Order of the Red Banner of Labor

Life and art Mikhail Zoshchenko

Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko was born in 1895 in the family of a poor itinerant artist Mikhail Ivanovich Zoshchenko and Elena Iosifovna Surina. After graduating from high school, he studied at the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg University. Without completing his studies, in 1915 he volunteered for the army in order, as he later recalled, “to die with dignity for his country, for his homeland.” On the eve of the February Revolution, he was already a battalion commander, holder of four military orders, and a staff captain. After the October Revolution, he became a border guard in Strelna, then was transferred to Kronshdat. He was demobilized due to illness (during the fighting, Zoshchenko was poisoned with gases, as a result of which he developed a heart disease). Here is how he himself writes about it: “I participated in many battles, was wounded, poisoned with gases. Ruined the heart ... ". After demobilization, Zoshchenko took on a variety of professions. He was: an agent of the criminal investigation department in Petrograd, an instructor in rabbit breeding and chicken breeding at the Mankovo ​​state farm in the Smolensk province, a policeman in Ligov, again in the capital - a shoemaker, clerk and assistant accountant in the Petrograd port ...

Here is a list of who Zoshchenko was and what he did, where his life threw him before he sat down at the writing table.

This list is required. These boring, dry lines of tedious enumeration make it possible to understand where Zoshchenko got the material for all his stories, novels, feuilletons.

Published in 1922, "The Stories of Nazar Ilyich Mr. Sinebryukhov" attracted everyone's attention. Against the background of the short stories of those years (and the short story was then the dominant type of literary work), the figure of the hero-storyteller, grated, experienced man Nazar Ilyich Sinebryukhov, who went through the front and saw a lot in the world, stood out sharply. This is so reminiscent of the biography of Zoshchenko himself ...

The works written by the writer in the 1920s were based on specific and very topical facts gleaned either from direct observations or from readers' letters. And they came in great numbers. “He didn't walk around people with a pencil. The people themselves, pushing each other, vying with each other rushed to his pencil. Letters came about riots in transport and in dormitories, about the New Economic Policy and funny incidents in everyday life, about philistines and townsfolk. Often his stories were built in the form of a casual conversation with himself, with the reader.

In his series of satirical works, Zoshchenko maliciously ridiculed those who, by any means, tried to achieve individual happiness, spitting on everything human (“Swearing”, “Grimace of Nepa”, “Lady with Flowers”, “Nanny”, “Marriage of convenience”).

Satire, like all Soviet fiction, changed significantly in the 1930s. During this period, Zoshchenko was seized by the idea of ​​​​merging satire and heroism together. Theoretically, this thesis was proclaimed by him at the very beginning of the 30s, and practically implemented in “Returned Youth” (1933), “The Story of a Life” (1934), the story “The Blue Book” (1935) and a number of other stories of the second half 30s. During the same period, Zoshchenko wrote two more large cycles of stories: stories for children and stories about Lenin.

During the Great Patriotic War, Mikhail Zoshchenko lived in Alma-Ata. The tragedy of besieged Leningrad, the terrible blows near Moscow, the great battle on the Volga, the battle on the Kursk Bulge - all this was deeply experienced by him. In an effort to contribute to the common cause of defeating the enemy, Zoshchenko writes a lot on front-line topics. Here are screenplays for short films, and small satirical plays (“The Cuckoo and the Crows”, Fritz's Pipe”), and a number of short stories “From the Stories of a Soldier”, and humoresques published in “Ogonyok”, “Crocodile”, “Red Army Man”, and a film story "Soldier's Happiness"

In the 1950s, Mikhail Zoshchenko created a number of short stories and feuilletons, a cycle of "Literary Anecdotes", devoted a lot of time and energy to translations. The translation of the book of the Finnish writer M. Lassil “For matches” stands out with special skill.

Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko is a Russian writer, a recognized classic of Russian literature. On the Petrograd side in house number 4, apartment 1 on Bolshaya Raznochina Street on August 10, 1895, the future classic was born - Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko. The boy's father - Mikhail Ivanovich - was from the Poltava nobles, worked as an artist. The writer's mother, Elena Osipovna, was born in Surin and also belonged to the Russian nobles. She was an actress as well as a part-time writer of short stories. Mikhail Mikhailovich graduated from the 8th gymnasium in St. Petersburg in 1913. He wanted to continue his studies and entered the Imperial St. Petersburg University as a lawyer, but a year later he was expelled for non-payment. This year he decided to earn extra money as a controller on the Caucasian railway.

The life of Mikhail Zoshchenko during the First World War and the Civil War

In 1914, Zoshchenko was admitted to the Pavlovsk military school on the course of a cadet, as a volunteer of the 1st category. At the beginning of 1915, he was transferred to the junker non-commissioned officers. In February of the same year, he was finally able to complete the courses and went to fight in the army infantry. Also in February of the same year, he was sent to the headquarters of the Kyiv military district, and later transferred to replenishment in Vyazka and Kazan. There he received the post of commander of the 6 march company. In March 1915, Mikhail returned to the functioning army for staffing. He was appointed to the post of junior officer of the machine gun team. In November 1915 he was wounded in the leg. In November of the same year, he was awarded the Order of St. Stanislav 3. In the winter of 1915, Zoshchenko became the commander of a machine-gun brigade as a second lieutenant. In February 1916 he was awarded the Order of St. Anne, 1st class "For Courage". In July, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant. In the small town of Smorgon from the 18th to the 19th of 1916, Mikhail discovered enemy installations and decided to report this to the command. On the night of the 20th, there was a serious attack from the Germans, as a result of which Zoshchenko was taken to the hospital with serious gas poisoning. In September, Mikhail was already awarded the Order of St. Stanislaus 2. Despite serious health problems, the writer continues to fight on the front lines. During the war, Zoshchenko received a huge number of military awards, thanks to the courage and courage shown in battles. However, Mikhail believed that he was worthy of only five of his awards. In 1917, Zoshchenko was already awarded the rank of captain. A progressive heart defect did not give Mikhail the opportunity to fully realize himself in military affairs, and already in February 1917 the command decided to send Zoshchenko to the reserve. In the summer of the same year, he received the post of head of the post and telegraphs, as well as the post office of Petrograd. Zoshchenko decides to leave for Arkhangelsk and leaves his post. In this city, he becomes the adjutant of the squad. In 1919, the disease again makes itself felt, and Zoshchenko is again released from military service, but Mikhail, not wanting to put up with the disease, decides to join the ranks of the Red Army. In the spring of 1919, he has a heart attack, and the command sends him to demobilization. However, the classic does not abandon the idea of ​​serving the motherland, and decides to become a telephonist and a border guard.

After Mikhail makes the final decision that it is time to leave the front, he begins to change numerous professions from a criminal investigation agent to a shoemaker. Zoshchenko begins to attend a literary studio, which at that time was led by K. Tchaikovsky. Mikhail was able to publish his works only in 1922. He was a member of the Serapion Brothers group of admirers of literature. Its members: L. Lunts, E. Polonskaya, N. Tikhonov, N. Nikitin, V. Pozner and many other prominent people of that time. The activity of the group was based on a discussion of the independence of art from the influence of politics. In almost all of his works of the 1920s, Zoshchenko created comic images of heroes with small views of the world. In the early 30s, his works become deeper and more meaningful. Works such as "Returned Youth" and "The Blue Book" showed the other side of Zoshchenko's personality as a talented and very unusual writer. Soon he begins to embody his idea for the story "Before Sunrise". His work "The History of a Reforging" was included in the book "The White Sea-Baltic Canal named after Stalin." This book was published in 1934. Success and recognition by a wide audience of readers came to Zoshchenko in the 30s. His works began to be published more and more often, and the books were instantly sold out. Mikhail begins touring the country. In February 1939, Zoshchenko was awarded an order for literary activity.

War and creativity in the life of Zoshchenko

With the beginning of the war, Mikhail wants to go to the front, but he is not allowed because of an old illness. However, Zoshchenko still finds a way to help his homeland. He, along with his son, becomes a member of the fire defense. He also continues his creative activity, writes numerous articles for newspapers and radio. Zoshchenko, together with Schwartz, became the authors of the play Under the Limes of Berlin. This production was at a time when the Germans held the blockade of Leningrad. In September 1941, an order came to evacuate the writer to Moscow, and then to Alma-Ata. In Moscow, he wrote a lot and worked as a screenwriter at Mosfilm. Mikhail, resigned to the impossibility of further implementation of his military skills, began to work hard on writing numerous stories, as well as on the scripts of such famous films as "Soldier's Happiness" and "Fallen Leaves". During the years 1944 - 1946 Zoshchenko focuses on works for theaters.

The last years of Zoshchenko's life

In 1946, he was awarded the award "For Valiant Labor in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945." In the same year, Zoshchenko's work was severely criticized, the Leningrad magazine, in which he published, was closed. After Mikhail Zhdanov's report, they decide to expel him from the Writers' Union. Zoshchenko completely lost his material wealth, his friends turned their backs on him. He had to return to work as a shoemaker and translator. Stalin's death allowed Zoshchenko to be re-admitted to the Writers' Union. The boycott on his works was lifted, and his good name was returned to the writer himself. In 1954, Zoshchenko was at a meeting with the British, where he was able to answer readers' questions about his work. After the meeting with the British, Zoshchenko's authority as a writer was shaken again. The Central Committee considered him a traitor, opposing the decisions of the top leadership. After the interview with Zoshchenko, it became clear to the British that there was no freedom of speech in the USSR. After such a statement from England, the attacks on Zoshchenko by the authorities were significantly reduced, but the writer begins to feel depressed and loses interest in creativity. Michael completely stops writing. In August 1955, he applied for a pension, but it was granted only before the death of the writer in 1958. He spends the rest of his days at his dacha in Sestroretsk. In the spring of 1958, the writer is seriously poisoned by nicotine and ceases to recognize anyone. In the summer of July 22, 1958, he dies of heart failure. The writer is buried in the city of Sestroretsk. Later, his wife, son and grandson will be buried next to him.

Biography and episodes of life Mikhail Zoshchenko. When born and died Mikhail Zoshchenko, memorable places and dates of important events in his life. writer quotes, Photo and video.

The years of life of Mikhail Zoshchenko:

born July 28, 1894, died July 22, 1958

Epitaph

"Brothers-writers! in our destiny
Something lies fatal:
If all of us, not believing ourselves,
They chose something else -
It would not be, for sure, I agree,
Pathetic hacks and pedants -
If only it weren't the same, friends,
Scotts, Shakespeares and Dante!
To exalt one, struggle
Thousands of the weak carry away -
Nothing is given for nothing: fate
He asks for redemptive sacrifices.
From the poem "In the Hospital" by Nikolai Nekrasov

"I'm so sad today,
So tired of painful thoughts,
So deep, deeply calm
My tortured mind,

What an affliction that oppresses my heart,
Somehow bitterly amuses me -
The meeting of death, threatening, going,
I would go myself ... But the dream will refresh -
<...>
And the disease that crushes strength,
It will be the same tomorrow to languish
And about the proximity of the dark grave
It is also clear to the soul to speak ... "
From a poem by Nikolai Nekrasov

Biography

A hard and unfair fate befell the remarkable writer Mikhail Zoshchenko. It is hard to imagine how much the author of Lelya and Minka, a humorist and satirist, endured during the war years, at the front. In the war, he received five orders, was gassed and permanently crippled. But it was not heart disease that broke Zoshchenko, but sudden total disgrace and oblivion after several years of all-Russian popularity.

Zoshchenko fought bravely during the First World War and was eager to volunteer for the front during the Great Patriotic War - but he was not taken because of a serious heart disease, the consequences of poisoning. Zoshchenko's literary talent was revealed in the interwar period, and the writer immediately became popular: after the very first publications, his comic stories were printed and reprinted in huge numbers.

But Zoshchenko's life's work was not stories. During the Great Patriotic War, when he was evacuated, where he was sent as unfit for military service, the writer took with him not things, but notebooks with the achievements of his largest and most important book, Before Sunrise. He worked on it for 10 years, and finally, in 1943, the book saw the light of day: the first chapters began to be published in the October magazine.

And this was the beginning of the end for Zoshchenko. He was heavily criticized; the magazines in which he worked were closed, Zoshchenko was expelled from the Writers' Union, forbade him to work, former colleagues stopped all communication with the former idol. Zoshchenko's book was called anti-Soviet, vulgar and disgusting, and the behavior of Zoshchenko, who was evacuated during the war for health reasons, was unworthy.

Only after 8 years did the writer have a chance to be rehabilitated. At a meeting between him and Anna Akhmatova with students from the UK, both writers were asked how they feel about their disgrace. Zoshchenko did not admit any guilt, insisting that his conscience was clear and he did not agree with the party's decision. After that, the cross on Zoshchenko was finally put.

The writer's health, already shaky, became even worse. He was tormented by long periods of depression; Zoshchenko could no longer work. He died of acute heart failure at his dacha in Sestroretsk. Zoshchenko's funeral at Literary Bridges was banned, and his grave is located there, in Sestroretsk.

life line

July 28, 1894 Date of birth of Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko.
1913 Graduation from high school.
1914 Enrollment in the Pavlovsk military school.
1915 Completion of accelerated wartime courses, promoted to ensign. Wound. Receiving the Order of St. Stanislav III degree.
1916 Receiving the Order of St. Anna IV degree, the Order of St. Stanislav II degree and the Order of St. Anna II degree. Appointment as a company commander.
1917 Zoshchenko presented to the Order of St. Vladimir IV degree. Appointment as chief of post and telegraph and commandant of the post office of Petrograd.
1919 Entry into the Red Army.
1920-1922 Visit to the literary studio of K. Chukovsky.
1922 Zoshchenko's first publications.
1939 Awarding the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.
1941 Evacuation to Alma-Ata, work in the scenario department of Mosfilm.
1943 Moving to Moscow, work in the editorial office of the magazine "Crocodile". Publication of the first chapters of the book Before Sunrise.
1946 Decree of the Orgburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks on the closure of the magazine "Leningrad" with criticism of Zoshchenko. Expulsion from the Writers' Union. Translation work.
July 22, 1958 Date of death of Mikhail Zoshchenko.
1968 First publication of "Before Sunrise" in the United States.
1987 The first publication of the story "Before Sunrise" in Russia.

Memorable places

1. House number 4 on the street. B. Raznochinnaya in St. Petersburg, where in the square. No. 1 born writer.
2. Imperial St. Petersburg University (now St. Petersburg State University), where Zoshchenko studied for 1 year.
3. Arkhangelsk, where Zoshchenko served as adjutant of the Arkhangelsk squad in 1917.
4. Alma-Ata, where Zoshchenko was evacuated during the Great Patriotic War.
5. Apartment No. 119 in building 4/2 on Malaya Konyushennaya Street. in St. Petersburg, where Zoshchenko lived from 1954 to 1958; now - the Literary and Memorial Museum of the writer.
6. Zoshchenko's dacha in Sestroretsk, where the writer died; now - a monument of cultural and historical heritage. Address: Polevaya st., 14-a.
7. City cemetery in Sestroretsk, where M. Zoshchenko is buried at site No. 10.

Episodes of life

Zoshchenko came from a poor family and was expelled from the university for non-payment. Throughout his life, he tried many professions for the sake of earning money: he worked as a secretary of the court, a criminal investigation agent, an instructor in breeding chickens and rabbits, and a shoemaker.

Since 1922, Zoshchenko's books have been published about 100 times, including a six-volume collected works.

In 1930-1940. M. Zoshchenko wrote about 20 plays, including one co-authored with E. Schwartz (“Under the lime trees of Berlin”).

The story "Before Sunrise", which infuriated Stalin, was very biographical. In it, Zoshchenko, by his own example, tried to understand the work of the human psyche.

Alexander Filippenko reads the story of M. Zoshchenko "The scent of a dog"

Testaments

“Generally speaking, it is not known how much a person needs in total. Probably more than what he needs, and no less than what he wants.

"War will become absurd, I think, when the technique reaches an absolute hit."

“You have some strange attitude to life - as to a reality that is eternal. Earn! Take care of the future! How ridiculous and stupid is it to settle down in life, as in your own house, where you have to live forever? Where? At the cemetery. All of us, gentlemen, are guests in this life - we come and go.

condolences

“He could never write according to the “stencil”, as required, express “well-known truths” - he was always looking for new, his own, unbeaten paths.
Korney Chukovsky, writer

"Zoshchenko's language envelops, fascinates - it turned out to be very suitable in a variety of situations in life ... Laughter, sadness, bitterness - everything is woven together in the complex novelty of his best works, in their verbal binding."
Mikhail Slonimsky, writer

“Over the years of many years of friendship, I never heard his laughter: a small mouth with white even teeth rarely formed into a soft smile. While reading his stories, he was sometimes forced to stop - he was disturbed by the deafening, almost pathological laughter of the audience, and then the look of his beautiful black eyes became especially thoughtful and sad. Softness and hardness - these two opposite concepts did not contradict each other in the least. But was there something else, aloof, deeply hidden - a tendency to loneliness, to the solitude of thoughts?
Veniamin Kaverin, writer

Born July 29 (August 10), 1895 in St. Petersburg in the artist's family.
Childhood impressions - including those about the difficult relationship between parents - were reflected both in Zoshchenko's stories for children (Galoshes and ice cream, Christmas tree, Grandma's gift, No need to lie, etc.), and in his story Before Sunrise (1943). The first literary experiences relate to childhood. In one of his notebooks, he noted that in 1902-1906 he already tried to write poetry, and in 1907 he wrote the story of Coat.

In 1913, Zoshchenko entered the law faculty of St. Petersburg University. By this time, his first surviving stories, Vanity (1914) and Two-kopeck piece (1914), date back. The study was interrupted by the First World War. In 1915, he volunteered for the front, commanded a battalion, and became a Cavalier of St. George. Literary work did not stop during these years. Zoshchenko tried his hand at short stories, in the epistolary and satirical genres (composing letters to fictitious addressees and epigrams for fellow soldiers). In 1917, he was demobilized due to heart disease that arose after gas poisoning.

Upon returning to Petrograd, Marusya, the Meshchanochka, the Neighbor and other unpublished stories were written, in which the influence of G. Maupassant was felt. In 1918, despite his illness, Zoshchenko volunteered for the Red Army and fought on the fronts of the Civil War until 1919. Returning to Petrograd, he earned a living, as before the war, in various professions: a shoemaker, a carpenter, a carpenter, an actor, a rabbit breeding instructor, a policeman, a criminal investigation officer, etc. . Ligovo and other unpublished works already feel the style of the future satirist.

In 1919, Zoshchenko was engaged in a creative studio organized by the publishing house "World Literature". Led by K.I. Chukovsky. Recalling his stories and parodies, written during the period of studio studies, Chukovsky wrote: "It was strange to see that such a sad person was endowed with this wondrous ability to force his neighbors to laugh." In addition to prose, during his studies, Zoshchenko wrote articles about the work of A. Blok, V. Mayakovsky, N. Teffi and others. In the Studio he met writers V. Kaverin, Vs. others, who in 1921 united in the literary group Serapion Brothers, which advocated the freedom of creativity from political tutelage. Creative communication was facilitated by the life of Zoshchenko and other "serapions" in the famous Petrograd House of Arts, described by O. Forsh in the novel Crazy Ship.

In 1920-1921, Zoshchenko wrote the first stories of those that were subsequently published: Love, War, Old Woman Wrangel, Fish Female. The cycle Stories of Nazar Ilyich, Mr. Sinebryukhov (1921-1922) was published as a separate book by the Erato publishing house. This event marked Zoshchenko's transition to professional literary activity. The very first publication made him famous. Phrases from his stories acquired the character of popular expressions: "Why are you disturbing the mess?"; "Second Lieutenant wow, but - a bastard", etc. From 1922 to 1946, his books withstood about 100 editions, including collected works in six volumes (1928-1932).

By the mid-1920s, Zoshchenko had become one of the most popular writers. His stories The Bathhouse, The Aristocrat, The Case History, etc., which he himself often read to numerous audiences, were known and loved by all sections of society. In a letter to Zoshchenko A.M. Gorky noted: “I don’t know such a ratio of irony and lyricism in anyone’s literature.” Chukovsky believed that the center of Zoshchenko's work was the struggle against callousness in human relations.

In the collections of short stories of the 1920s, Humorous Stories (1923), Dear Citizens (1926), and others, Zoshchenko created a new type of hero for Russian literature - a Soviet man who had not received an education, who did not have the skills of spiritual work, who did not have cultural baggage, but who aspired to to become a full-fledged participant in life, to catch up with "the rest of humanity." The reflection of such a hero produced a strikingly funny impression. The fact that the story was told from the perspective of a highly individualized narrator gave literary critics grounds to define Zoshchenko's creative style as "skazovogo". Academician V.V. Vinogradov in his study The language of Zoshchenko analyzed in detail the writer's narrative techniques, noted the artistic transformation of various speech layers in his lexicon. Chukovsky noted that Zoshchenko introduced into literature "a new, not yet fully formed, but victoriously spilled over the country, non-literary speech and began to freely use it as his own speech." Many of his outstanding contemporaries - A. Tolstoy, Y. Olesha, S. Marshak, Y. Tynyanov and others - highly appreciated the work of Zoshchenko.

In 1929, known in Soviet history as "the year of the great turning point," Zoshchenko published Letters to a Writer, a kind of sociological study. It was made up of several dozen letters from the huge reader's mail that the writer received, and his commentary on them. In the preface to the book, Zoshchenko wrote that he wanted "to show true and undisguised life, genuine living people with their desires, taste, thoughts." The book caused bewilderment among many readers, who expected only regular funny stories from Zoshchenko.

Soviet reality could not but affect the emotional state of the receptive writer prone to depression from childhood. A trip along the White Sea Canal, organized in the 1930s for propaganda purposes for a large group of Soviet writers, made a depressing impression on him. But after this trip, he wrote about how criminals are re-educated in the camps (History of one life, 1934). An attempt to get rid of the oppressed state, to correct their own painful psyche was a kind of psychological study - the story Returned Youth (1933). The story evoked an interested reaction in the scientific community, unexpected for the writer: the book was discussed at numerous academic meetings, reviewed in scientific publications; Academician I.Pavlov began to invite Zoshchenko to his famous Wednesdays.

A collection of short stories, The Blue Book (1935), was conceived as a continuation of Youth Restored. Zoshchenko considered the Blue Book to be a novel in its internal content, defined it as a "brief history of human relations" and wrote that it "is not driven by a short story, but by the philosophical idea that makes it." Stories about the present were interspersed in this work with stories set in the past - in different periods of history. Both the present and the past were given in the perception of the typical hero Zoshchenko, who was not burdened with cultural baggage and understood history as a set of everyday episodes.

After the publication of the Blue Book, which caused devastating reviews, Zoshchenko was actually forbidden to print works that go beyond "positive satire on individual shortcomings." Despite his high writing activity (custom feuilletons for the press, plays, film scripts, etc.), Zoshchenko's true talent manifested itself only in stories for children, which he wrote for the Chizh and Ezh magazines.

In the 1930s, the writer worked on a book that he considered the main one in his life. Work continued during World War II in Alma-Ata, in evacuation, since Zoshchenko could not go to the front due to a severe heart disease. In 1943, the initial chapters of this scientific and artistic study of the subconscious were published in the magazine "October" under the title Before Sunrise. Zoshchenko studied cases from life that gave impetus to a severe mental illness, from which doctors could not save him. The modern scientific world notes that in this book the writer anticipated many discoveries of the science of the unconscious for decades.

The magazine publication caused such a scandal, such a flurry of critical abuse fell upon the writer, that the press Before Sunrise was suspended. Zoshchenko sent a letter to Stalin, asking him to familiarize himself with the book "or give an order to check it in more detail than is done by the critics." There was no answer. In the press, the book was called "nonsense, needed only by the enemies of our country" (magazine "Bolshevik"). In 1946, after the decision of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks "On the magazines" Zvezda "and" Leningrad "" was issued, the party leader of Leningrad A. Zhdanov recalled in his report about the book Before Sunrise, calling it "a disgusting thing" see APPENDIX.

The decree of 1946, which criticized Zoshchenko and Anna Akhmatova, led to their public harassment and a ban on the publication of their works. The reason was the publication of Zoshchenko's children's story The Adventures of a Monkey (1945), which contained a hint that monkeys live better than people in the Soviet country. At a writers' meeting, Zoshchenko said that the honor of an officer and a writer does not allow him to accept the fact that in the resolution of the Central Committee he is called a "coward" and "a bastard of literature." In 1954, at a meeting with English students, Zoshchenko again tried to state his attitude to the 1946 resolution, after which the persecution began in a second round.

The saddest consequence of this campaign was the exacerbation of mental illness, which did not allow the writer to work fully. His reinstatement in the Writers' Union in 1953 and the publication of his first book after a long break (1956) brought only temporary relief to his condition.