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The Russian travel writer Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov was born in the Oseki tract of the Kaluga province on May 30 (18), 1892, in the family of a timber merchant clerk.

The childhood and early youth of the writer were spent in the Smolensk region.

In 1910, he entered an agricultural course in St. Petersburg, but soon got a job in Revel (now Tallinn) on a merchant ship and for several years visited European, Asian and African ports.

In 1918, Ivan Sergeevich was demobilized, went to his parents in the Smolensk region. He worked there as a teacher of a unified labor school. By this time, he had already published the first stories noticed by Bunin and Kuprin.

Since 1919, Sokolov-Mikitov has been a sailor on a merchant ship.

In 1920, from the steamer Omsk, sold at auction in Hull (England), Ivan Sergeevich was taken ashore as part of the crew. Forced emigration began.

He lived in England for about a year, and in 1921 he moved to Germany.

After an almost two-year stay abroad, Sokolov-Mikitov returns to Russia. Wanderings around the port bunkhouses of Hull and London gave him material for Chizhikov Lavra (1926).

After returning to his homeland, I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov participates in Arctic expeditions on the icebreaker "Georgy Sedov", headed by O.Yu. Schmidt.

Expeditions to the Arctic Ocean and Franz Josef Land were followed by an expedition to rescue the Malygin icebreaker. Ivan Sergeevich participated in it as a correspondent for Izvestia.

Arctic expeditions provide him with material for a series of essays "White Shores" and an essay story "Saving the Ship".

Numerous travels of the writer around the country are described in the books “Lankaran” (1934), “Ways of the ships” (1934), “Swans are flying” (1936), “Northern stories” (1939), “On the awakened earth” (1941), “Stories about the Motherland" (1947).

A quarter of a century the life of I.S. Sokolova-Mikitova was associated with Karacharovo, Konakovo district, Tver region. In October 1951, the writer visited relatives, purchased a log house and began to build his "Karacharov" house.

Since the summer of 1952, Sokolov-Mikitov has been holding in Karacharovo most of the year. Here Ivan Sergeevich worked on the books "Childhood" (1953), "On the Warm Earth" (1954), "Sounds of the Earth" (1962), "Karacharov Records" (1968) and others.

In the book “At the Holy Springs” (1969), he writes: “With a hunting rifle on my shoulders, I went around the nearby forest lands, traveled in a boat along the Volga. I managed to visit the remote places of the Orsha forest, on the Petrovsky lakes, where not every year an inexperienced person can penetrate. I met young and old people, listened to their stories, admired nature. Living in Karacharovo, he wrote several short stories in which the native nature close to my heart is depicted.

In the regional literary and artistic collection " Motherland"new chapters of the story "Childhood" were published. The writer was a member of the editorial board of the collection.

The regional book publishing house published his books The First Hunt (1953), Leaf Falls (1955), Tales of the Motherland (1956) and others.

During the Karacharov period, Sokolov-Mikitov often turned to the memoir genre. Then "Autobiographical notes", "Dates with childhood" were written.

The book of memoirs "Old Meetings", which the author wrote until the last day, contains portrait sketches of writers M. Gorky, I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, M. Prishvin, K. Fedin, A. Green, A. Tvardovsky, polar explorer P. Svirnenko, artist and scientist N. Pinegin and others.

Writers A. Tvardovsky, V. Nekrasov, K. Fedin, V. Soloukhin, journalists, artists visited the “Karacharovsky” house.

I.S. died. Sokolov-Mikitov February 20, 1975. The urn with his ashes was buried in the cemetery in Gatchina.

In 1981, a memorial plaque was installed on the "Karacharovsky" house of the writer.

Biography (GUK "Regional Special Library for the Blind named after N. Ostrovsky", 2008. - 15 p., 1 sheet. portrait)

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov is an original Russian writer, talented artist, graphic artist, famous traveler and hunter. A wonderful master of the word, certainly belonging to a group of writers, nature lovers and local historians, whose name is inextricably linked with the history of the Kaluga region.

Ivan Sergeevich was born on May 17 (30), 1892 in the Oseki tract near Kaluga in the family of Sergei Nikitich Sokolov, manager of the forest estate of the millionaire Konshin. The writer's mother was born into a peasant family in the village of Buda, Khvastovichi district. Maria Ivanovna, on her father's side, was from the Kaluga Old Believers, religious.

And Sokolov-Mikitov tells: when his mother decided to get married at the age of 20, she went to Optina Hermitage to consult with the elder Ambrose. Three suitors wooed: the head of the station, a young merchant, and the third - Sergei, a forester. The latter was not a very wealthy man, the other two suitors were more enviable, and besides, Sergey was 14 years older than her. Ambrose put mother on a bench in the skete, where he usually received visitors, asked her affectionately and said: “Come out, Mashenka, for Sergius.” At first she was astounded, but the matter was settled. She married Sergei. They had a boy. “It was me,” Ivan Sergeevich announced triumphantly. “Thanks to the elder Zosima from The Brothers Karamazov (as Dostoevsky called the elder Ambrose), I appeared in the world.”

In 1894-1895. the Sokolov family moves to their father's homeland in the village of Kislovo, Dorogobuzh district, Smolensk province. Sokolov-Mikitov lived in Kaluga for only three years. But these years were very memorable. In many works, Ivan Sergeevich described its Kaluga nature, its forests and rivers. In the autobiographical story "Childhood" (1931-1953), the writer vividly described his early childhood held in Oseki. “Vaguely, as if through a layer of water, I remember the house in which I was born ...”, Sokolov-Mikitov said.

In autobiographical notes, Sokolov-Mikitov called his homeland “warm land” and always remembered it with the deepest tenderness.

He touchingly said about the stories “Childhood” and “Elen”: “It is written about a very distant place, but what is close to my heart ...”

The artist rediscovers the beauty of his native places, especially dear to childhood memories, after returning there after his youthful wanderings. In June-July 1926, Sokolov-Mikitov and his friend K.A. Fedin undertakes a journey along the rivers Ugra and Oka with the intention of sailing from the village of Kislovo along the Volga to Astrakhan. A small boat bore the somewhat comical name "Zasuponya" (after the name of the fairy tale by Sokolov-Mikitov). A modest villager took part in this expedition, about whom K. Fedin would later say that he was "a carpenter, hunter, sailor and cook in our boat voyage."

Not everything was possible to implement from the plan, but the path from the tributary of the Ugra Gordota to Kolomna exceeded 600 km. Travelers then visited Yukhnov, Kaluga, Aleksin, Tarusa, Kashira, saw the sights of these places. Sokolov-Mikitov was impatient to show his friends the uplifting forests, fragrant fields dear to the heart of Oseki, where he spent three years of his childhood.

From Kolomna, Fedin returned to Saratov, and Sokolov-Mikitov to Kislovo. Swimming along the Ugra and Oka left a noticeable mark in the work of Sokolov-Mikitov - four letters from the Ugra River - “At the White Stone”, “The Fate of the Brykalov Lady”, “Karla on Dry Legs”, “On a Roll” (in August-September 1926 .).

With a letter from Kaluga dated July 24, 1926, Sokolov-Mikitov sent criticism to V.P. Polonsky two stories "Dead swell", "Bowls", published in October of the same year.

“Ugra and Oka,” notes literary critic P.P. Shirmakov, - were, as it were, the threshold of Sokolov-Mikitov's great travels to the North.

In 1933 and 1934 Sokolov-Mikitov spent two summers in Optina Pustyn near Kaluga, resting and working in the former skete. The writer recalled that in the direction of the monastery the skete was tightly closed, and the only way out was from Ambrose's cell - two stone steps led beyond the fence. At that time, a rest house was located in the monastery itself: calico panels hung, gramophones rattled. Ivan Sergeevich could not get used to the fact that the participle "vacationers" began to be used as a noun, and once attributed in the announcement of a dance evening to the word "vacationers" - "loafers".

Following the chronicle of the writer's life, in 1950, after July 13 - August 15, Sokolov-Mikitov visited Smolensk, Kochany and Kislovo, then Kaluga. From notebooks: “I was in Kaluga, in my native city. Something survived from the old. Through, light bell tower in the glow of the sky. City Garden, where I was scared of fireworks as a child. Oka. People".

September 29, 1958 Sokolov-Mikitov, together with S.M. Alyansky visited Tarusa with K.G. Paustovsky, with whom he was born in the same year and day. The life of the writer had much in common with the fate of Paustovsky.

When the eye disease was just beginning, Ivan Sergeevich increasingly began to recall the Smolensk and Kaluga places where he spent his childhood and adolescence. It was felt, drawn there unbearably: "We must bow to our native graves ...". Then in 1959, until September 15, another trip of the writer to Kaluga took place. Visited Oseki. The Znamya newspaper wrote about this visit.

Ivan Sergeevich said: “The more years pass, the stronger it draws to the small Motherland, where he lived for the first years. I went to where my father was the manager. Came by car. Beautiful places. I was looking for where the house stood, asking old people in the forestry old map found, determined the place of the estate, checked. It is noticeable that the house was, a wild acacia, the remains of alleys. I walk and think: how many people here came to visit my father! The famous forester Tursky held me in his arms - he nursed me.

Having visited his homeland, the writer calmed down, but did not like to talk in detail about the trip: it is clear that his native land shook his soul not only with joys, but also with sorrows of past and present years.

Having survived not a single cruel blow in his life, having buried his three daughters, Ivan Sergeevich survived. A strong character and a strong body also affected. But man is not made of iron. The grief still did its job. Before the time he began to grow old, to all the troubles - to go blind ...

In 1959, the writer was in the clinic of eye diseases of the Military Medical Academy in Leningrad for an examination. In 1964, Sokolov-Mikitov was recognized as a disabled person of group III (eye glaucoma, varicose veins).

The painful process of losing sight proceeded very slowly. At first, more and more powerful glasses became necessary, then he could only read with a magnifying glass, then his central vision faded and he saw, although poorly, with his side vision, then he only faintly felt the light, and, finally, darkness surrounded him.

In 1967, the Sokolov-Mikitov family moved from Leningrad to permanent residence in Moscow.

I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov died on February 20, 1975 in Moscow at his apartment. The urn with the ashes was buried at the family cemetery in Gatchina.

Presentation of correspondence between K. Fedin and I. Sokolov-Mikitov

WITH LOVE TO WILD NATURE (Vladimir SOLOUKHIN)

From childhood, from the school bench, a person gets used to the combination of words: "love for the motherland." He realizes this love much later, and to understand complicated feeling love for the motherland - that is, what exactly and for what he loves - is already given in adulthood.

The feeling is really complex. Here is the native culture, and native history, all the past and all the future of the people, everything that the people managed to accomplish throughout their history and what they still have to do.

Without going into deep considerations, we can say that one of the first places in the complex feeling of love for the motherland is love for the native nature.

For a person born in the mountains, nothing can be sweeter than rocks and mountain streams, snow-white peaks and steep slopes. It would seem that what to love in the tundra? A monotonous swampy land with countless glassy lakes, overgrown with lichens, but the Nenets reindeer herder will not exchange his tundra for any southern beauties there.

In a word, to whom the steppe is dear, to whom the mountains, to whom the sea coast smelling of fish, and to whom the native Central Russian nature, the quiet beauties of the river with yellow water lilies and white lilies, the kind, quiet sun of Ryazan ... And so that the lark sings over the field rye, and to the birdhouse on the birch in front of the porch.

It would be pointless to list all the signs of Russian nature. But thousands of signs and signs add up to that common thing that we call our native nature and that we, while loving, perhaps, both the sea and the mountains, still love more than anything else in the whole world.

All this is so. But it must be said that this feeling of love for our native nature is not spontaneous in us, it not only arose by itself, since we were born and grew up among nature, but was brought up in us by literature, painting, music, by those great teachers of ours who lived before us. , also loved their native land and passed on their love to us, the descendants.

Don't we remember from childhood by heart the best lines about the nature of Pushkin, Lermontov, Nekrasov, Alexei Tolstoy, Tyutchev, Fet? Do they leave us indifferent, do they not teach anything about nature from Turgenev, Aksakov, Leo Tolstoy, Prishvin, Leonov, Paustovsky?.. And painting? Shishkin and Levitan, Polenov and Savrasov, Nesterov and Plastov - didn't they teach and still don't teach us to love our native nature? Among these glorious teachers, the name of the remarkable Russian writer Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov occupies a worthy place.

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov was born in 1892 on the land of Smolensk, and his childhood passed among the very Russian nature. were still alive at the time folk customs, rituals, holidays, life and way of life old life. Shortly before his death, Ivan Sergeevich wrote about that time and about that world:

“My life began in native peasant Russia. This Russia was my real homeland. I listened to peasant songs; from the mountains ... I remember a cheerful haymaking, a village field sown with rye, narrow fields, blue cornflowers along the borders ... I remember how, dressed in festive sundresses, women and girls went out to reap the ripened rye, scattered in colorful bright spots across the golden clean field how zazhinki celebrated. The first sheaf was entrusted to be squeezed by the most beautiful hardworking woman - a good, smart housewife ... This was the world in which I was born and lived, this was Russia, which Pushkin knew, Tolstoy knew ”*.

* Sokolov-Mikitov I. S. Old meetings.

Ivan Sergeevich lived a long and rich life. For several years he sailed as a sailor on all seas and oceans, served in a sanitary detachment during the First World War, worked as a teacher, spent several winters on the shores of the Caspian Sea, traveled through the Kola and Taimyr Peninsulas, Transcaucasia, the Tien Shan mountains, wandered through the dense taiga ... He was a sailor, traveler, hunter, ethnographer. But most importantly, he was a talented and brilliant writer. Even Kuprin once praised Sokolov-Mikitov as a writer:

“I really appreciate your gift for writing for vivid depiction, true knowledge folk life for living and truthful language. Most of all, I like that you have found your own, only your style and your form. Both do not allow you to be confused with anyone, and this is the most expensive.

Sokolov-Mikitov wrote many books about his Smolensk lands, about ordinary Russian people, peasants, polar explorers, hunters, about everyone with whom fate brought him along the path of life. And he was a long one, this path: more than half a century of active writing, and in total he was already over eighty.

The last twenty years of Sokolov-Mikitov's life were associated with Karacharovo on the Volga in the Kalinin region, where Ivan Sergeevich, a hundred paces from the water, on the edge of the forest, had a simple log house. The wide expanse of water, copses and villages on the other side, an abundance of flowers, forest birds, mushrooms - all this brought the writer even closer to his native nature. From a hunter, as often happens with people in old age, he turned into an attentive observer, and not only because, say, his eyesight or hand weakened, but because a careful, loving, truly filial attitude towards Russian nature woke up in his soul, when a person understands that it is better to admire a live bird on a tree branch than a dead bird in a hunting bag. During these years, Ivan Sergeevich wrote his best pages about his native Russian nature, about trees and birds, about flowers and animals.

A kind and wise person teaches us that nature is our not only material, but also spiritual wealth, knowledge of nature and love for it instill a sense of patriotism, humanity, kindness, develop a sense of beauty. Generations of Russian people will learn this from Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov, just as they learn from Turgenev and Aksakov, from Nekrasov and Prishvin, from Paustovsky and Leonov.

Biography

The name of Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov (1892-1975) seems now undeservedly forgotten.

His books are not published, and his name appears only in the school curriculum. Meanwhile, he was a major figure of his time - a prose writer, publicist, memoirist. Born in a simple family (father - clerk, mother - from the peasants), the boy received a good "home" education (books were especially revered in the family). However, erudition did not contribute to learning. He did not study well at the Smolensk real school and therefore could only enter the educational institution where a certificate of secondary education was not required - the St. Petersburg Higher Agricultural Courses.

It was there that his literary talent began to take shape. "Salt of the Earth" - the first fairy tale published in the magazine "Argus".

Leaving the courses, Ivan is captivated by the romance of distant wanderings and becomes a sailor. Sea travel is interrupted by the First World War. The writer goes to the front.

The revolution forced the writer to leave his homeland. Being an emigrant, he publishes several accusatory articles about the atrocities of the Bolsheviks. However, he could not be separated from his country for a long time. And in the early 1920s, I. S. Sokolov-Mikitov arrived in the Soviet Union. Here begins the period of his intense writer's work. He writes stories about the village, essays, memoirs. Being essentially a traveler, he visited not only many places in our country and abroad, but was also a member of polar expeditions, which he later colorfully described.

The main theme in the writer's work was nature. Sunrise and sunset, forest, powder, ice drift - he wrote about all this with such love that, reading his books, one cannot help but feel his sense of admiration for the world of wildlife and reverence for it.

Books by I. S. Sokolov-Mikitov are a rich source of information about the world around us, from which we are sometimes so far away!

Biography

The remarkable writer Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov (1892-1975) lived a long and eventful life. His childhood passed in a quiet forest village in the Smolensk region. Father - a hunter, a connoisseur of the forest - went to the merchants for forestry clerks, his mother ran a peasant economy.

“The first words I heard were bright folk words, the first fairy tales, the first music I heard - peasant songs, perhaps the very songs that once inspired the great Russian composer Glinka, who was born in our Smolensk region,” wrote Ivan Sergeevich many years later in his autobiography.

The craving for wandering, which arose during youthful hunting wanderings, did not leave him then all his life. Where he just did not go, getting a job as a sailor on ships of the merchant fleet, where fate did not throw him!

Finally returning to Russia in 1922, Ivan Sergeevich left for his native Smolensk region and surrendered literary work. In the second half of the twenties, the publishing houses of Moscow and Leningrad published one after another several books of his stories about the village and hunting, about sea travels. But domesticity was not in the character of Ivan Sergeevich. Living in Kislov, his native village, he hunted a lot, wandered around the forested Smolensk regions, and together with his friend the writer Fedin and fellow villager Badeev, did a little, baby travel on a punt boat along the Ugra and Oka rivers to Kolomna and again set sail around Europe.

A strong and courageous man, an experienced hunter, Ivan Sergeevich was easy-going, quick to pack and boldly entrusted himself to the road, not fearing the hardships of a marching, devoid of the comforts of life.

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov can rightfully be named among the initiators modern essay as a genre of literature. Both adult and young readers read his poetic essays with equal interest. Several dozen of his books have been published by various publishing houses in the country. His book “From Spring to Spring” was repeatedly reprinted, many works were translated into foreign languages, the books “A Year in the Forest” and “Russian Forest” were awarded prizes for international exhibitions. And the first children's book of the writer "Kuzovok" was published in 1922.

It is wrong to think that only those who study it - biologists, botanists or geographers - should know nature. Knowledge of the nature of love and closeness to it enriches the life of any person, regardless of his occupation. A person who knows and loves nature is happier because he is endowed with this feeling and is free from boredom - after all, the life of nature is diverse, unique from day to day, and it is enough for him to go outside the city to find something new for himself what he knew before.

Ivan Sergeevich was not a specialist - a biologist or a botanist. But he knew and felt nature subtly and unmistakably. This is a trait of great writing talent. This is how Tolstoy and Turgenev, Aksakov, Chekhov and Bunin knew and felt nature.

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov is considered an adult writer.

In the last years of his life, Ivan Sergeevich suffered a misfortune: he lost his sight. But his memory kept the impressions of childhood, long-standing travels, drew pictures of nature for him, and he wrote about it with infallible accuracy. Only now, of course, he could not write - he dictated his stories to a tape recorder, and Lidia Ivanovna, his wife and assistant, then retyped the text on a typewriter.

Remembering, as if once again experiencing what he once saw, the old writer experienced the joy of his former communion with nature - now, perhaps, the last joy.

"I'm doing literary work. The basis and joy of this work has always been and remains love for people, for home country, to its nature, to the living bright world, a particle of which I felt invariably, ”wrote Ivan Sergeevich shortly before his death.

Sokolov-Mikitov's books are written in an unusually clear and simple language. No wonder textbooks of the Russian language and readers so often use excerpts from his works.

Books by Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov engender love for the world around us, for our native country. They call to the knowledge of nature, because what you love, you always want to know even more and even better. (According to V. Chernyshov YUN No. 6/83 40-41)

Biography

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov, a Russian writer, naturalist and traveler, was born in the Oseki tract, in the Kaluga province, on May 30 (18), 1892, in the family of a clerk who served with a merchant who traded in timber. Vanya's childhood and early youth were spent in the Smolensk region, in the vastness of the Ugra. In 1910, he went to St. Petersburg, where he enrolled in agricultural courses, and soon after that he got a job in Reval (now Tallinn) on a merchant ship, thanks to which he visited many countries in Europe, Asia and Africa in a few years. In 1918, after demobilization, Ivan Sergeevich returned to the Smolensk region, to his parents. Here he worked as a teacher in a unified labor school. By this time, he had already managed to publish his first stories, which were noticed by Bunin and Kuprin.

In 1919, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov signed up as a sailor on a merchant ship. The following year, 1920, Ivan Sergeevich, along with the entire crew, was decommissioned from the steamer Omsk, which was sold at auction in Hull (England) for debts. Thus began an unforeseen forced long-term emigration. For about a year he lived in England, and then, in 1921, he moved to Germany. Finally, after almost a two-year stay abroad, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov returns to his homeland, to Russia. Long wanderings around various port bunkhouses in Hull and London became the basis for the material for the book "Chizhikov Lavra", written in 1926.

Ivan Sokolov-MikitovIn the future, Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov repeatedly participated in Arctic expeditions led by the famous Otto Yulievich Schmidt. On the Georgy Sedov icebreaker, travelers went to the Arctic Ocean and Franz Josef Land, and once they went to the rescue of the Malygin icebreaker. Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov participated in this expedition already as a correspondent for the Izvestia newspaper. The experience of Arctic expeditions gave him a lot of material for a cycle of essays "White Shores", as well as the story "Saving the Ship". You can read about the numerous and varied travels of the writer in his native country in the books Ways of the Ships (1934), Lankaran (1934), Swans Are Flying (1936), Northern Stories (1939), On the Awakened Land ( 1941), "Stories about the Motherland" (1947) and in other works.

Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov For a quarter of a century, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov often visited the village of Karacharovo, Konakovo district. Having visited relatives here in October 1951, the writer acquires a log house and begins to personally build his "Karacharov" house. Starting from the summer of 1952, Ivan Sergeevich spends most of the year in Karacharovo. Here he is working on his become famous books"Childhood" (1953), "On the Warm Ground" (1954), "Sounds of the Earth" (1962), "Karacharov Recordings" (1968), "At the Holy Springs" (1969) and other works.

Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov was a member of the editorial board of the literary and artistic collection "Native Land". In the book publishing house of the region, his books "The First Hunt" (1953), "Leaf Fall" (1955), "Stories about the Motherland" (1956) and many others were published.

Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov Ivan Sergeevich often turned to the genre of memoirs, in which such books as "Dates with Childhood" and "Autobiographical Notes" were written. Until the last day, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov wrote a book of his memoirs "Long Meetings", in which you can see "essays-portraits" dedicated to many of our famous writers - Maxim Gorky, Ivan Bunin, Alexander Kuprin, Mikhail Prishvin, Alexander Grin, Alexander Tvardovsky. The polar explorer Pyotr Svirnenko, the artist and scientist Nikolai Pinegin and many others are also mentioned in it.

Writers Alexander Tvardovsky, Viktor Nekrasov, Konstantin Fedin, Vladimir Soloukhin, many journalists and artists visited Ivan Sergeevich's "Karacharovsky" house.

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov died on February 20, 1975. The urn with his ashes was buried in the cemetery in Gatchina. In 1981, a memorial plaque was installed on his "Karacharovsky" house.

Biography

The Russian travel writer Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov was born in the Oseki tract of the Kaluga province on May 30 (18), 1892, in the family of a timber merchant clerk. The writer's childhood and early youth were spent in the Smolensk region. In 1910, he enrolled in agricultural courses in St. Petersburg, with all that, he soon got a job in Reval (currently Tallinn) on a merchant ship and for several years visited European, Asian and African ports. In 1918, Ivan Sergeevich was demobilized, went to his parents in the Smolensk region. He worked there as a teacher at a unified working school. By this time, he had already published the first stories noticed by Bunin and Kuprin.

Since 1919, Sokolov-Mikitov has been a sailor on a merchant ship. In 1920, from the steamer Omsk, sold at auction in Hull (England), Ivan Sergeevich was taken ashore as part of the crew. Forced emigration began. In England, he lived nearby for a year, and in 1921 he moved to Germany. After a nearly two-year stay abroad, Sokolov-Mikitov returns to Russia. Wanderings around the port shelters of Hull and London gave him material for Chizhikov Lavra (1926).

After returning to his homeland, I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov participates in Arctic expeditions on the icebreaker Georgy Sedov, led by O.Yu. Schmidt. Expeditions to the Arctic Ocean and Franz Josef Land were followed by an expedition to rescue the Malygin icebreaker. Ivan Sergeevich participated in it as a correspondent for Izvestia. Arctic expeditions provide him with material for a cycle of essays "White Shores" and an essay story "Saving the Ship". Numerous travels of the writer around the country are described in the books “Lankaran” (1934), “Ways of ships” (1934), “Swans are flying” (1936), “Northern stories” (1939), “On the awakened land” (1941), “Stories about the Motherland” (1947).

For a quarter of a century, the existence of I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov was associated with Karacharovo, Konakovo district. In October 1951, the writer visited relatives, purchased a log house and began to create his own "Karacharov" house.

Since the summer of 1952, Sokolov-Mikitov has been spending most of the year in Karacharovo. Here Ivan Sergeevich worked on the books “Childhood” (1953), “On the Warm Earth” (1954), “Sounds of the Earth” (1962), “Karacharov Recordings” (1968) and others. In the book “At the Holy Springs” (1969), he writes: “With a hunting rifle behind me, I went around the nearby forest lands, traveled in a boat along the Volga. I managed to visit in the remote places of the Orsha forest, on the Petrovsky lakes, where not every year an inexperienced gentleman can get his way. I met young and old people, listened to their stories, admired nature. While living in Karacharovo, I wrote a few short stories that depict native nature close to my heart.

In the regional literary and artistic collection "Native Land" new chapters of the story "Childhood" were published. The writer was a member of the editorial board of the collection. His books “The First Hunt” (1953), “Leaf Falls” (1955), “Stories about the Motherland” (1956) and others were published in the regional book publishing house.

In the Karacharovo period, Sokolov-Mikitov often turned to the memoir genre. Then “Autobiographical Notes”, “Dates with Childhood” were written. The book of memoirs “Old Meetings”, which the author wrote until the last day, contains portrait sketches of writers M. Gorky, I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, M. Prishvin, K. Fedin, A. Green, A. Tvardovsky, polar explorer P. Svirnenko, artist and scientist N. Pinegin and others.

Writers A. Tvardovsky, V. Nekrasov, K. Fedin, V. Soloukhin, journalists, artists visited the "Karacharovsky" house.

I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov died on February 20, 1975. The urn with his ashes was buried in the cemetery in Gatchina.

In 1981, a memorial plaque was installed on the "Karacharovsky" house.

Biography

Born in the village of Oselki, Kaluga province, but still in infancy he was transferred to the Smolensk province, to his father's homeland, where he spent his childhood, adolescence and youth.

He studied at the Smolensk Alexander Real School, but was expelled from the 5th grade "due to poor progress and bad behavior on suspicion of belonging to student revolutionary organizations." To continue his studies, Sokolov-Mikitov left for St. Petersburg in 1910 and entered the 4-year agricultural courses of the Main Directorate of Land Management and Agriculture. It was there that his literary talent began to take shape.

Petersburg, Sokolov-Mikitov formed wide circle acquaintances, which largely determined his future fate. It included pilot G. V. Alekhnovich, traveler and naturalist Z. F. Svatosh, writers A. I. Kuprin, M. M. Prishvin, A. M. Remizov, V. Ya. Shishkov, A. S. Green. The young man was convinced that he did not have a penchant for agronomic sciences, left the courses and began to attend literary debates and public libraries. In 1910, the first work was born - the fairy tale "The Salt of the Earth".

In 1912, Sokolov-Mikitov moved to Revel (now Tallinn), where he worked as a secretary of the Revel Leaflet newspaper, and from there he went as a sailor on his first voyage, visiting Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Greece, Africa, the Netherlands, England, Italy. Sea travel was interrupted by the First World War. Demobilized in 1918, Sokolov-Mikitov went to his parents in the Smolensk region, where he worked as a teacher at a unified labor school. By this time, he had already published the first stories noticed by Bunin and Kuprin.

Since 1919, he again entered the merchant fleet. In 1920, from the steamer Omsk, sold in Goole England (at auction), he, along with other members of the crew, was written off to the shore. He lived in England, Germany, met A. N. Tolstoy, S. A. Yesenin and Isadora Duncan, A. M. Gorky.

In 1922 Sokolov-Mikitov returned to Russia and settled in the Smolensk region. Here he created his best works: the stories "Childhood", "Elen", "Chizhikova Lavra", cycles of stories "On the river of the Bride", "Across the magpie kingdom" and others. In most of them, the theme of the Russian village, the fate of the Russian peasantry, close to the author, is developed. His work was highly valued by I. A. Bunin, A. I. Kuprin, M. Gorky.

In 1929 Sokolov-Mikitov moved with his family to Gatchina. During this period, he, as a correspondent for Izvestia, participated in the Arctic campaigns led by O. Yu. Sedov", expeditions to rescue the l / n "Malygin". Arctic expeditions gave him material for a cycle of essays "White Shores" and an essay story "Saving the Ship". Numerous travels of the writer around the country are described in the books "Lankaran", "Ways of ships", "Swans are flying", "Northern stories", "On the awakened earth", "Stories about the Motherland".

Sokolov-Mikitov is widely known as children's writer. His books “Fox Subterfuge”, “Leaf Fall”, “Friendship of Animals”, “Karacharovsky House” and many others introduce little reader With colorful world nature; collections of Russian children's books "On the Stone", "Dawn-lightning" - with folk traditions and folklore.

During the war, Sokolov-Mikitov served in the forest protection of the Perm region. There he met with V. V. Bianchi, wrote stories from the life of children in the evacuation. In the summer of 1945 he returned with his family to Leningrad.

For a quarter of a century, Sokolov-Mikitov's life was connected with Karacharovo, Konakovo district, where he spent most of the year from the summer of 1952. There was work on the books "Childhood", "On the Warm Earth", "Sounds of the Earth", "Karacharov Recordings" and others.

During this period, Sokolov-Mikitov often turned to the memoir genre. Then "Autobiographical notes", "Dates with childhood" were written. The book of memoirs "Old Meetings", which the author wrote until the last day, contains portrait sketches of writers M. Gorky, I. Bunin, A. Kuprin, M. Prishvin, K. Fedin, A. Green, A. Tvardovsky, polar explorer P. Svirnenko, artist and scientist N. Pinegin and others.

Sokolov-Mikitov experienced a lot of grief in his personal life - he was destined to bury his three daughters.

In the last years of his life, the writer went blind. The last book of memoirs, "Long Meetings", was already written under dictation and was published after his death. The works of Sokolov-Mikitov have been translated into many languages ​​of the world.

He died in Moscow, where he lived for the last 11 years of his life. The urn with the ashes was buried at the family cemetery in Gatchina.

Bay (Mikitova) northeast of the Savich Peninsula on west coast northern island New Earth. Named in 1930 by an expedition to the l / r "G. Sedov.

Biography (en.wikipedia.org)

Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov was born in the Oseki tract of the Kaluga province (now [[Przemysl district] Kaluga region) in the family of Sergei Nikitich Sokolov, the manager of the forest lands of the wealthy merchants Konshins.

In 1895, the family moved to their father's homeland in the village of Kislovo, Dorogobuzh district (now Ugransky district, Smolensk region). When he was ten years old, his father took him to Smolensk, where he assigned him to the Smolensk Alexander Real School. At the school, Sokolov-Mikitov became interested in the ideas of the revolution. For participation in underground revolutionary circles, Sokolov-Mikitov was expelled from the fifth grade of the school. In 1910 Sokolov-Mikitov left for St. Petersburg, where he began to attend agricultural courses. In the same year he wrote his first work - the fairy tale "The Salt of the Earth". Soon Sokolov-Mikitov realizes that he has no inclination for agricultural work, and becomes more and more interested in literature. He visits literary circles, gets acquainted with many famous writers Alexei Remizov, Alexander Green, Vyacheslav Shishkov, Mikhail Prishvin, Alexander Kuprin.

Since 1912, Sokolov-Mikitov worked in Revel as the secretary of the Revel Leaflet newspaper. Soon he got a job on a merchant ship, visited many port cities in Europe and Africa. In 1915, in connection with the outbreak of the First World War, he returned to Russia. During the war, Sokolov-Mikitov, together with the famous pilot Gleb Alekhnovich, flew sorties on the Russian Ilya Muromets bomber.

In 1919, Ivan Sokolov-Mikitov signed up as a sailor on the merchant ship Omsk. However, in 1920 in England, the ship was arrested and sold at auction for debts. For Sokolov-Mikitov, forced emigration began. For a year he lives in England, and then in 1921 he moves to Germany. In 1922, Sokolov-Mikitov met in Berlin with Maxim Gorky, who helped him obtain the documents needed to return to his homeland.

After returning to Russia, Sokolov-Mikitov travels a lot, participating in Arctic expeditions on the Georgy Sedov icebreaker, led by Otto Schmidt. Expeditions to the Arctic Ocean, Franz Josef Land and Severnaya Zemlya were followed by an expedition to rescue the Malygin icebreaker, in which he participated as a correspondent for Izvestia.

In 1930-1931, the cycles "Overseas Stories", "On the White Earth" and the story "Childhood" were published.

In 1929-1934 Sokolov-Mikitov lived and worked in Gatchina. He often comes to visit famous writers Evgeny Zamyatin, Vyacheslav Shishkov, Vitaly Bianchi, Konstantin Fedin. The well-known hunting writer Nikolai Anatolyevich Zworykin (1873-1937) also lived in his house for a long time.

During World War II, Sokolov-Mikitov worked in Molotov special correspondent"Izvestia". In the summer of 1945 he returned to Leningrad.

Beginning in the summer of 1952, Sokolov-Mikitov began to live in a house he built with his own hands in the village of Karacharovo, Konakovo district. Here he writes most of his works.

His prose is expressive and illustrative above all when he adheres to own experience, it is weaker when the writer conveys what he heard.

Writers Alexander Tvardovsky, Viktor Nekrasov, Konstantin Fedin, Vladimir Soloukhin, many artists and journalists visited his "Karacharov" house.

Sokolov-Mikitov died on February 20, 1975 in Moscow. According to the will, the urn with his ashes was buried at the New Cemetery in Gatchina. In 1983, a monument was erected at the burial place, the initiator was the Gatchina city branch of VOOPIIK. Next to Ivan Sergeevich, his relatives are also buried - mother Maria Ivanovna Sokolova (1870-1939) and daughters Elena (1926-1951) and Lydia (1928-1931).

A family

Mother - Kaluga peasant woman Maria Ivanovna Sokolova (1870-1939)
Father - clerk, forest land manager Sergei Nikitich Sokolov.
Wife - Lydia Ivanovna Sokolova. They met at the Moscow publishing house Krug.

After marriage, they had three daughters. The eldest Irina (Arina), the middle Elena (Alena), the youngest - Lydia. All of them died during the life of their parents. The youngest daughter died of an illness, ten years after that she died eldest daughter. The middle daughter Elena drowned in 1951 on the Karelian Isthmus.
Grandson - Minister of Culture of Russia (2004-2008), rector of the Moscow Conservatory (2001-2004, then since 2009), Professor Alexander Sergeevich Sokolov.

Compositions

* Lankaran (1934)
* Ways of ships (1934)
* Swans are flying (1936)
* Northern stories (1939)
* On awakened land (1941)
* Stories about the Motherland (1947)
* Childhood (1953)
* First hunt (1953)
* On warm ground (1954)
* Leaf fall (1955)
* Earth Sounds (1962)
* Karacharov recordings (1968)
* At the holy springs (1969)

Memory

* In 1981, a memorial plaque was installed in the house where Sokolov-Mikitov lived in Karacharovo. In 2007, a memorial plaque was opened in St. Petersburg in the house where Sokolov-Mikitov lived. In 2008 in with. Poldnevo, Ugransky district, Smolensk region, the house-museum of Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov was opened, transported from the village of Kislovo.

Notes

1. Mikitov in accordance with the clarification of the writer's grandson, the former Minister of Culture of the Russian Federation Sokolov, the newspaper Zvezdny Bulvar, No. 30 for 2010 http://www.zbulvar.ru/newspaper/streaks/articles/detail.php?STID=29827&phrase_id =459851
2. Cossack V. Lexicon of Russian literature of the XX century = Lexikon der russischen Literatur ab 1917. - M .: RIK "Culture", 1996. - 492 p. - 5000 copies. - ISBN 5-8334-0019-8. - S. 393.
3. Burlakov A. V. Gatchina necropolis. Historical cemeteries of the city of Gatchina and its environs. - Gatchina: Laton Printing House, 2009. - 186 p. - 750 copies.

One of the bright, "amazing" impressions in the writer's life was, by his own admission, the impression of the sea, which "conquered" him.

"Nothing to regret" - and yet it's a pity

"I was born and raised in the middle part of Russia, between the Oka and Dnieper rivers, in a simple, working family, my great-grandfathers and grandfathers are forever connected with the earth" (Quoted here and further from: I. Sokolov-Mikitov. Collected works in four volumes. L., 1985; vol. 4. p. 130), - Ivan Sergeevich Sokolov-Mikitov wrote in his "Memoirs" of 1964.

He was born on May 17, 1892 in the village of Oseki, Kaluga province; lived a long, 82 years, life; died on February 20, 1975, leaving behind books that were highly valued by many of his contemporaries - among them were A. Remizov, I. Bunin, M. Gorky, M. Prishvin, A. Tolstoy, K. Fedin, A. Tvardovsky, K .Paustovsky. He was lucky to have good, devoted friends in life and literature. But I would like to believe that it belongs not only to the history of Russian literature, but also to the present day.

In one of his favorite works - the story "Childhood" (1931) - the writer lovingly and deeply poetically reproduced the world of childhood, which remained in his memory for the rest of his life and in which he rightly saw the very origins of both his character and his creativity. The image of the young hero in the story is, of course, an artistic generalization in which personal impressions melted like wax, were illuminated by later life experience, voluntarily or involuntarily were subject to the laws of creativity. And yet there is much here that is deeply personal, autobiographical; Sokolov-Mikitov wrote about his hero, but thought about himself...

The beauty of Russian nature, the customs and traditions of the Russian village, the kaleidoscope of Russian characters, types that are imprinted in the children's minds, the most diverse - ordinary, ordinary and extraordinary - events of those distant years, whether it was a strong thunderstorm on the way or reading books, the death of Uncle Akim, - all this was laid in the foundation of the writer's personality, determined his view of the world, and later found its reflection in his artistic creativity... An unconscious feeling of the fullness of life served as the basis of his natural optimism, which then helped him in the most difficult cases of life.

However, childhood is not only a time of happiness, fullness of life; it is also a time of childhood fears, resentments, disappointments, a time when not only teeth and bones, but also a personality, a soul, erupt and grow - and this process is not always easy and simple, often painful, complex, disharmonious. The hero of the story - and, of course, the author - is familiar with both despair, and the consciousness of his weakness, and the inability to understand many things that sometimes baffle him.

The childhood of Sokolov-Mikitov came at a time when much was already changing in Russia, leaving: the poetic "Larin" estates, the old landowner life of Turgenev's novels, were disappearing, Chekhov's cherry orchards were being cut with might and main. Practical Lopakhins came to the village, to Russia, the "iron" city, with its strict orders and laws, was advancing. The age-old way of the Russian village, Russian peasant life was destroyed. “Everything changed then in the countryside. More and more often, suffering from unemployment and landlessness, the peasants went to work in the cities, moved to mines, to factories. ..." (p. 47). And yet - "there was still a lot of old, almost untouched in a remote Smolensk village ..." (p. 48).

“I have nothing to regret from this past,” we read at the end of the story. “It’s only a pity for grouse broods, village songs and sundresses, it’s a pity that once filled me with a childish feeling of joy and love, which now cannot be returned by any forces ...” (p. 96 ).

“There is nothing to regret” - and yet it’s a pity ... It’s a pity for a past, flashed childhood, those moments of happiness and fullness of life that he knew, that world of Russian life, an established life, customs, a pity for parents, friends, a pity for everything that " you can’t return by any means,” it’s a pity for the past, no matter how wonderful the future may be ... With this feeling of slight sadness and love-pity - here it is, his saving “raft”, - the writer says goodbye to his childhood.

We also find many of the motifs and themes of "Childhood" in the story "Elen" (1929), in which we also see an island of endless Russian space, the Russian cosmos. The plot of the story develops slowly, as if gradually. Her chronological framework- Russo-Japanese war, the first Russian revolution in 1905. We will learn how Khludov made his capital, how his son squandered his father's inheritance. In parallel with the line of the Khludovs in the story, the theme of the Russian peasantry, its fate sounds, gaining a crescendo. The author tells us about ordinary Russian peasants, such as the forester Frol, his father, nicknamed Okunek, and other villagers. At the same time, the writer does not idealize them, he does not hide the fact that the village people often turn out to be indifferent to the misfortune of their countrymen. Poverty makes people callous, separates them; what unites them is their joint, friendly work. A true hymn to free collective labor is played by the head office "Rafts" - about rafters who float timber along the river ...

The image of Yeleni is poetic and realistic at the same time - a quiet river and a small Russian village of the same name, which is located in the forest, in the swamps, in the very heart of Russia. Its median, root essence is confirmed by the fact that it is the focus of many traditions of Russian life, with all its specificity and originality, uniqueness. This world is dominated by respect for the distant and recent past, for the traditions of the ancestors. The sprouts of the new are slowly breaking through here - that which comes from the city, from the outside world, with the war, the revolution. For all the isolation, tightness of this island of the Russian cosmos, it turns out to be vitally connected, connected with all of Russia, with its historical soil, destiny.

The story "Elen" was conceived as a novel; it feels some incompleteness, unfolding of storylines, atomic conciseness of images, individual scenes. However, the material underlying the story, the artist's realistic skill make it a completely self-valuable, self-sufficient work. Its relevance is not striking, it is not declared, but it is organic integral part his artistic world. All this constitutes the characteristic features of the artist's creative manner, already established in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Writer at 25

The formation of the writer took place in the conditions of a sharp revolutionary break in the traditional foundations of Russian national life. He was a witness and participant in the revolution of 1905, February Revolution finally October 1917. I. Sokolov-Mikitov was drawn to his native land, to the village; he was in love with Russian nature with its open spaces and silence, Levitan's peace. At the same time, by his own admission, he "never felt attracted to a settled way of life, property, and domesticity" (p. 136). And so his life turned out to be filled with a variety of events from his very youth.

He often changed professions (he was a physician, aircraft engineer, sailor, etc.), traveled a lot, participated in the First World War, as already mentioned, was not just an outside observer in revolutionary events. But, finding himself far from home, he yearned for his homeland, he was again and again drawn to his native places in "middle Russia." All this was reflected in his work, in which the motives of the road, partings and meetings, the motives of distant wanderings and insatiable love for the Motherland - like in a symphony, complemented and enriched each other...

Already at the age of ten, I. Sokolov-Mikitov experienced the first "turn" in his life, when, together with his family, they moved from the village to the city (Smolensk), where a complex and contradictory world, previously unfamiliar, opened up to him.

At the school, he especially did not get along with the teacher of the law - a class mentor, "who for some reason did not like me" (p. 133). He was "expelled from the fifth grade of a real school with a wolf ticket" on suspicion of belonging to student revolutionary organizations. "" The expulsion from the school was preceded by a search in my little room on Zapolnaya Street, in the presence of a gendarmerie captain and two policemen. As it turned out later, the reason for the search was the denunciation of a provocateur who served as a clerk in a tobacco shop, behind the partition of which we sometimes gathered "(p. 134). This was the second "turn" in his life, introducing him to revolutionary events in Russia.

One of the bright, "amazing" impressions in the writer's life was, by his own admission, the impression of the sea, which "conquered" him. He served as a sailor on merchant ships, visited many cities and countries, and saw many seas. I. Sokolov-Mikitov recalled that the events of the First World War found him far from his homeland, on the shores of the Aegean Sea, where he wandered without a penny in his pocket around the Chalcedon Peninsula, near the legendary Olympus. "I returned to Russia by sea, when the First World War was already raging over the world. This First World War, which shook the foundations of the old world, became the third life test"(p. 137).

Then, having lived for a short time in the village, he went to the front as a volunteer, served in sanitary detachments, flew the first Russian heavy bomber, the Ilya Muromets, commanded by G.V. Alekhnovich is one of the first famous pilots in Russia. During the war, Ivan Sergeevich continued to write and occasionally published in literary collections and magazines.

He met the February Revolution at the front. Later, Sokolov-Mikitov recalled how, as a deputy from front-line soldiers, he arrived "in revolutionary Petrograd, flooded with red flags." met here October revolution; in the hall of the Tauride Palace he listened to Lenin's speech; here, in the editorial office of Novaya Zhizn, he met A.M. Gorky and other writers who were kind to his creative experiments, for the first time began to seriously think about what soon determined his life, became his fate ... "The revolution became my fourth and final turning point in my life: I became a writer" (Memoirs, 137, v. 4). At that time he was twenty-five years old.

Origins: folklore and "Russian nature"

I. Sokolov-Mikitov himself admitted that one of the main and first sources of his work was Russian folklore, Russian folk tales, which he knew well from childhood, loved, in which he drew inspiration. Over the years, he created the cycle "Naughty Tales", in which the writer "in his own language" told some well-known fairy tale motifs, developed them, used well-known ones and created new images. fairytale heroes. Work on fairy tales was a school for him, in which he learned the beautiful figurative Russian language, the ability to artlessly and simply tell, build a plot, combine fantasy, fiction with subtle and deep observations on life, human psychology, with his wise attitude to genuine moral and spiritual values.

At the same time, Sokolov-Mikitov definitely and unequivocally declared himself as a follower of the realistic school. During these years, he creates a cycle of stories about the war. He writes that he knows well what he saw and heard himself, so his stories often look like sketches, essays, correspondence. The author's commentary in them, as a rule, is minimal, philosophical reflections are rare and stingy. At the same time, the main thing for the writer is to convey the state of the soul.

The nerve of the military stories of I.S. Sokolova-Mikitova - thoughts about Russia, about the Russian character. There is pain and pride, but behind all this is the desire for truth. In the story "Here and There" the writer reflects on "Russian nature": "God knows what to say, but to be firm in deeds"; "to scold the cause and curse, but at the same time carry it to the end uncompromisingly, despite troubles and misfortunes" (p. 13).

In the stories "Cuckoo's Children", "Winged Words", "Whisper of Flowers", "The Calm Before the Storm" there are many episodes in which the spiritual generosity of a Russian person, his selflessness, an irresistible craving for beauty are revealed.

"No people"

Being in the distant sea ​​voyages, on the fronts of the First World War, Ivan Sergeevich listened to what was happening in Russia. He accepted the revolution - first the February, and then the October - with enthusiasm, realizing the need and beneficialness of changes, but also well aware of the difficulties that the new government faces ... About one of these difficulties is the story "Desolation". "There are no people - that's what I understood. Conscientious, conscious people who understand the threatening situation of the country and the revolution." "The great misfortune of Russia, worse than hunger - desertion" (p. 45, 47).

In 1923, his "Letters from the Village" were published in the journal "Russia", which contain interesting observations about the village in the first post-revolutionary years. "The ends were strangely mixed up: the twenty-first century was mixed up with the sixteenth century," notes Sokolov-Mikitov (p. 70). In this mixture, there is inevitably a lot of superficial, superficial, which, in turn, negatively affects the language itself. "Time covered the village with verbal rubbish - and a woman in a consumer house, choosing a calico, no longer says to the clerk-godfather:" Arsenya's godfather, give me a better calico"; the woman says: "It is advisable to take an energetic calico." In the executive committee ... the chairman says to the secretary Kuzka, to the blown guy: "Edit, Kuzka, a piece of paper" (p. 70). "Life is new, life is old - where can I find words ?!" - the author exclaims (p. 71). When reading "Letters ...", the characters of satirical works are involuntarily recalled .Mayakovsky, D. Bedny, short stories and short stories by M. Zoshchenko, M. Bulgakov.

"Sea" stories

In the same 1920s, I. Sokolov-Mikitov developed a whole layer of stories and works of other genres, which reflected the "marine" period of his life, numerous wanderings around the world, travels.

He is excited by distant countries, he admires the beauties, landscapes; he is shaken by such simple and eternal values ​​as the sun, earth, sea, birds; he does not get tired of admiring all the changing splendor of nature day and night, at sunrise and sunset ...

The world of sea stories is both romantic and realistic at the same time. Romance emanates from the heroes' craving for travel, during which the world expands, surprises with its diversity, beauty - there is a real discovery, comprehension of the world.

The heroes of Sokolov-Mikitov are ordinary working people, sailors, loaders, men and women, Russians and British, Greeks and Turks - a whole gallery of artistic images created with varying degrees of expressiveness, remembered for their unusualness, eccentricity, then characteristic, typical. Most of the scenes are visible, tangible, the portraits are embossed, as if embossed on a medallion.

The author of the stories shows a deep and lively interest in those countries and peoples that pass before his eyes, which he meets when entering foreign ports - these are the ports of Africa, the Mediterranean countries, with their midday heat, the spicy smells of oriental bazaars, and the ports of England, Holland, other countries.

The hero swims for years away from his native shores, walks along the streets and squares of foreign ports and cities - and the dream of returning to Russia remains always longed for by the author himself and his compatriot heroes. Memories of childhood and youth, of parents and friends, are pulling home; in dreams he sees Russian fields and gardens, a river where he fished, roads, forests - the whole world of peace and quiet that is stored in the soul and serves as an inexhaustible reservoir in the difficult years of wandering. Events, disturbing and joyful, are also pulling home.

true to his creative manner, style, Sokolov-Mikitov, as a rule, does not build complex plots, intricacies, does not go into deep philosophical reasoning and psychological depths of his characters. It is limited to a restrained, stingy record of events, a brief author's commentary; here, it seems, much remains behind the scenes ... But in the very manner of narration, devoid of external showiness and significance, the inner energy and tension of the unsaid is hidden, which pushes the reader's imagination, helps him "finish" a lot of things himself, as if participating in the process of creating artistic image, a little planned plot.

Restraint of intonation, unhurried external action, keen observation, fullness of the word, harmony of the hidden and perceived in the depicted - these are just some of the characteristic features of I. Sokolov-Mikitov's prose, his style, without understanding which a meaningful attitude to the artist is impossible, the real value of his work.

Ivan and the fog

The most notable work of Sokolov-Mikitov in the 1920s was the story Chizhikov Lavra (1926); it is also essentially autobiographical. There are several time layers in the story that interpenetrate one into another, enrich the narrative, help to penetrate into the spiritual world of the hero, to better understand the very origins of his character, his worldview. And here an important role is played by the hero's memories of his childhood, youth, of those years that precede his emigrant odyssey. These memories of the past as of a lost paradise torment him, but also help him to survive, to survive in a foreign country. They are the solid foundation on which the building of his personality, his relationship with the world is built. They are like a litmus test that determines the most important life values by which the hero is guided in his adult life.

Most of the story is devoted to the life of the protagonist - Ivan in England. He is upset that the British know offensively little about Russia. Peering into his surroundings, noticing the new, unusual, Ivan becomes even more aware of himself, his belonging to Russia, to everything Russian. And now he is even more convinced: "there is something in a Russian person - no matter how you dress, from afar you can see that he is Russian" (p. 157).

Homesickness is perhaps the main, persistent pain of the hero. She constantly reminds of herself, suffocates him - sometimes worse, angrier than "consumption" - truly "at least with her head on a joint." This melancholy devalues, distorts everything "local"; from this, sometimes the most ordinary gives rise to inadequate feelings, unexpected irritation ...

With the Bolsheviks coming to power in Russia, the attitude towards Russians abroad worsened even more: "... they threw us out of the yard like a thin cattle" (p. 159). There was no permanent job, there was not enough money to pay for housing, they ate "bare bread" ... A feeling of complete homelessness, almost doom visits him on the streets of the city, where he spends whole days in search of food and work. "And suddenly, as if with a hoof in my forehead:" I'm disappearing! sometime in the Siberian taiga... No one will even notice, not a single point will move. It became so frightening to me then that even with my head on a stone "(185).

The key here is the image of a wall that separates a person from the world, from society, from his own kind, it is a symbol of a person’s complete alienation from the world around him, the inability to resist circumstances, just survive in these conditions. In many respects, another image, often found on the pages of the story, performs a similar function - the image of fog. It becomes a capacious artistic metaphor, meaning the vagueness, opacity of the surrounding world, the vagueness of the life goals of a person cut off from his homeland, who has lost touch with the root system of his people. "There were such fogs! People walked like fish in a muddy pond. And the city was terrible, invisible and deadly yellow" (p. 186).

"Own" and "foreign", "with us" and "with them" - one of the constant, cross-cutting motifs of the narrative, the principles of identifying a person who is in emigration. With his mind, Ivan notes a lot of useful, reasonable in the orders and customs of foreigners, he is ready to accept a lot - but the soul, the heart rise up, reject. Memory paints the whole past in nostalgic tones, prevents you from fitting into the "local" ...

Various Russian people ended up abroad. The writer creates a whole gallery of types, characters, talks about human destinies - all of them in one way or another are connected with the revolution, with the changes that took place in recent times in Russia. Often the author only sketches a colorful portrait with a few strokes, without developing in detail this or that storyline, one or another drawing of the image. However, these few touches are enough to outline a unique character. Almost each of them has its own "odd thing", its own peculiarity - attractive or repulsive, but as a result, we are presented with a rather motley and in many respects characteristic "mixture" of persons, a kind of panopticon of the types that made up the Russian emigration of those distant years.

Quiet classic

There were still years and decades of hard creative work ahead, moments of insight and upsurges, hours and days of doubt and despair - everything that the life of a Russian artist is full of, living one life with the people, with his country.

I. Sokolov-Mikitov did not shy away from acute topics, topical problems, often wrote on the "live trail" of events in the center of which he found himself. But at the same time, he retained a special, quiet tone of voice, artificial, superficial pathos was alien to him. He was often criticized for the hero's passivity, for the author's insufficiently clear and precise position, for the fact that his work supposedly is away from the main, "main path" of Soviet literature...

After the death of Sokolov-Mikitov, 30 years have passed, the former reproaches have become a thing of the past, have lost their relevance, but our time does not show due interest in this "quiet", "forgotten classic". To read it, you need silence, peace of mind, faith in a person, his destiny on earth, you need a non-vain, relentless love for the motherland, for Russia - all this was with I.S. Sokolov-Mikitov in full measure. And it remains to believe that his time will definitely come.

. (30.05.1892 - 20.02.1975) . Born May 30, 1892 in the town of Oseki near Kaluga in the family of a clerk who served with a merchant who traded in timber. Soon the family moved to the village of Kislovo in the Smolensk region. At the age of 10, he was sent to Smolensk to study at a real school. In 1910 he went to St. Petersburg and enrolled in agricultural courses. In 1912 he moved to the city of Revel (Tallinn) and became an employee of the Revel leaflet newspaper. Soon he gets a job on a merchant ship. I have traveled to many countries in Europe, Asia and Africa. During the First World War, he entered medical courses and was sent to the front as an orderly. In 1918, the first small book "Zasuponya" was published.