In the work of any writer there is always something that inspires him and predetermines the themes in his works. Love is always a pressing topic, which is revealed most clearly, since each person has experienced this multifaceted feeling. But what it will be: tragic or joyful - it's not a matter of chance, but the personal life of the author himself. Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was a timid and very dreamy man, he had to visualize and sort out pictures of love in his fantasies more than to experience a lot of intrigues and romances in reality. His dreams became real in only three cases, which we will discuss in this article.
She was the most honest, noblest woman I have ever known in my life.
Dostoevsky met Maria Isaeva and her husband at the age of 33. The blond girl had beauty, a strong mind and, most importantly, a passionate and lively nature. But she did not have love with her alcoholic husband. Soon he died, and Dostoevsky had a chance to fight for the beauty's heart, which he, of course, took advantage of. In November, after half a year of courtship, Fedor nevertheless decides to propose a hand and heart, they get married.
Either Maria did not have time to move away from her feelings for her husband after his death, or Dostoevsky was not the hero of her novel, but she did not experience great love, which cannot be said about him. The question arises, why did she still go down the aisle? And the answer is quite simple: the woman had a child in her arms, which was extremely difficult to feed alone. It was also beneficial that Fyodor Mikhailovich in the autumn of 1858 was just getting permission to publish the magazine Vremya and earning a good fee. The spouses did not match either the characters or the feelings towards each other, because of this there were constant exhausting quarrels that brought one side to the other.
On April 15, 1964, a woman dies painfully from consumption. Her husband took care of her until her last day. Despite the quarrels, he was always grateful to her for herself and the feelings that he experienced. In addition, he took on the responsibility of caring for her son, whom he provided for even when he grew up.
Appolinaria Suslova
I still love her to this day, I love her very much, but I would no longer want to love her. She doesn't deserve this kind of love. I feel sorry for her, because I foresee that she will be unhappy forever.
When Fyodor Mikhailovich finally returned to the capital, he began to lead active image life, move in the circles of enlightened youth and visit cultural events, where he met a 22-year-old student. It should be noted that Dostoevsky always had a great passion for young girls. Polina was young, charming and witty, she had everything that attracted the writer, and as a big plus - her age. Full set. For her, he was the first man and her most adult love. The novel began while Maria Isaeva was living out her last days. That is why the union of Fedor and Polina was a secret, and while one side sacrificed everything for the other, the other, hiding behind a sick wife, only accepted without giving anything in return. But, nevertheless, he loved Polina, was attached to his wife, and this made it hard for him to lead a double life.
But now, having cast aside doubts, Dostoevsky agrees to leave for a summer vacation with Polina, but in view of his passionate love for gambling, is constantly delayed. Soon, the young beast cannot stand it and gives the gentleman a moral slap in the face with the news that she has fallen in love with another and, they say, there is no longer any need for him. The executioner and the victim switch places, and the writer, loving her a little less than she, begins to burn with passion at the mere thought that he has lost her.
After the death of Mary, he tries to return her for some time, but gets a lapel-turn. Polina behaves coldly with him, although she did not succeed with her new lover. As a result, it was worth guessing that these people fled forever, and according to sources, Polina was unhappy in her personal life because of her imperious nature.
Anna Snitkina
Remember, Anya, I have always loved you dearly and have never cheated on you, even mentally.
After the death of Maria and brother Mikhail, left in large debts, Dostoevsky receives an offer to write a novel for a pretty sum. He agrees, but understands that he simply won’t have time to write such a volume within the set time frame and takes a stenographer as his assistant. In the work on the work, Fedor and Anna come closer and closer, revealing themselves to each other from the best sides. And soon he realizes that he is in love, but in view of his modesty and dreaminess, he is afraid to open up. beautiful lady. And so he tells a story he invented about an old man who fell in love with a young beauty, and asks, as if by chance, what would Anya do in that girl's place? But Anya was, as it was already worth noting, a smart young lady and understood what the “old man” was hinting at, and replied that she would love him to the end. In the end, the lovers got married.
But their family life was not as smooth as it might seem. The Dostoevsky family did not accept her, and her new relatives plotted various intrigues for her. Living in such an environment is excruciatingly difficult, and Anya asks Fedor to go abroad. From this venture, too, in fact, little good came out, because it is there, with the spouse, that his main passion- gambling. But the woman loves him very much and understands that she will not leave him. Soon they return to St. Petersburg, and the couple finally begins a bright streak. He works on numerous works, and she is his support and support, always there and still loves him dearly. In 1881, Dostoevsky dies, and Anna, even after his death, continues to be faithful, devoting her life to serving his name.
Young, in many ways naive girl.
A frame from the documentary-staged film “Anna Dostoevskaya. Letter to my husband”, film company “ATK-Studio”
He had behind him hard labor, exile, an unhappy first marriage, the death of his wife and beloved brother, endless debts, the terrible physical pain of epileptic seizures, an obsession with playing roulette, loneliness and, most importantly, knowledge of life from its most unattractive side. She was cheerful, young, brought up in warmth and carelessness, she didn’t even really know how to do housework. But that depth and strength of personality, which she modestly did not notice in herself, Dostoevsky managed to notice.
Their hasty marriage could easily end in disappointment. But it was he who brought the famous writer that great happiness that he had never known before. It was during these last 14 years of his life that he wrote his most powerful and famous works. "You - the only woman who understood me, ”he repeated to his Anya, and it was to her that he dedicated his last, brilliant novel, The Brothers Karamazov. What was this marriage? How a fragile, inexperienced girl managed to make happy genius who, it seems, felt all the evil in life and became a great preacher of the Light?
“There was no happiness yet. I'm waiting for him"
At the beginning of the 20th century, recalling a meeting with Dostoevsky's widow Anna Grigoryevna, Russian actor L. M. Leonidov (he played Dmitry Karamazov in the 1910 production of The Brothers Karamazov at the Moscow Art Theater) wrote: “I saw and heard ‘something’, unlike anything, but through this “something”, through this ten-minute meeting, through his widow, I felt Dostoevsky: a hundred books about Dostoevsky would not have given me as much as this meeting!”
Fedor Mikhailovich admitted that he and his wife "merged in soul." But at the same time, he also noticed: their inequality in age - and there was no less than a quarter of a century difference between the spouses - the inequality of their life experience could lead to one of two opposite options: “Either, having suffered for several years, we will disperse, or We will live happily ever after." And judging by the fact that Fyodor Mikhailovich wrote with surprise and admiration in the 12th year of marriage that he was still madly in love with his Anya, their life really turned out to be very happy. However, it was not easy from the very beginning: the marriage of Anna Grigorievna and Fyodor Mikhailovich passed the test of poverty, illness, death of children, all Dostoevsky's relatives rebelled against him. And, probably, it helped him to resist, including the fact that the spouses “looked in one direction”, being brought up in the same values ...
Anna Grigorievna was born on August 30, 1846 in the family of a petty official Grigory Ivanovich Snitkin. Together with his old mother and four brothers, one of whom was also married and had children, Grigory Ivanovich and his family lived in a large apartment with 11 rooms. Anna Grigoryevna recalled that a friendly atmosphere reigned in their large family, she did not know any quarrels, she did not know how to sort things out with relatives and thought that this happens in any family. The mother of Anna Grigorievna - Anna Nikolaevna Snitkina Miltopeus) - was a Swede of Finnish origin, and by religion she was a Lutheran. Meeting her future husband presented her with a serious choice: marriage to a loved one or loyalty to the Lutheran faith. She prayed a lot for a solution to this dilemma. And one day I had a dream: she enters Orthodox church, kneels before the shroud and prays there. Anna Nikolaevna took this as a sign - and agreed to accept Orthodoxy. What was her surprise when, having come to perform the rite of chrismation at the Simeonovskaya Church on Mokhovaya, she saw the same shroud and exactly the same environment that she had seen in a dream!
Since then, Anna Nikolaevna Snitkina has lived a church life, going to confession and taking communion. The confessor of her daughter Netochka with early years was Archpriest Philip Speransky. And as a teenager of 13 years old, while relaxing in Pskov, young Anya suddenly decided to go to the monastery. Her parents managed to return her to St. Petersburg, although they resorted to a trick: they lied that her father was seriously ill ...
In Dostoevsky's family, as he later put it in his Diary of a Writer, "they knew the gospel almost from their first childhood." His father Mikhail Andreevich was a doctor at the Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor, so the fates of those whom the writer would later make the heroes of his works unfolded before his eyes - he learned compassion from childhood, although in the character of his father there were in a strange way generosity and sullenness, irascibility are mixed. Dostoevsky's mother, Maria Feodorovna, whom he loved and respected immensely, was a person of rare kindness and sensitivity. And she died like a real righteous woman: just before her death, she suddenly came “to perfect memory, demanded the icon of the Savior, and first blessed everyone<близких>giving barely audible blessings and instructions.
In Anya Snitkina, Dostoevsky saw the same kind, sensitive, compassionate heart ... And suddenly he felt: "she can be happy with me." That's right: she can be happy, not me.
Did he think about his happiness? Like everyone else, I thought. He told his friends and hoped that after all the hardships of life and at that age, which was considered old age by the generation of his parents, he would still land in a safe haven, be happy in the family. “There was no happiness yet. I'm waiting for him, ”he said, a man already tired of life.
“It’s good that you are not a man”
As often happens, by the time of finding this happiness, tragic, turning points occurred in the fate of both. In the spring of 1866 after prolonged illness Anna's father dies. A year earlier, doctors announced that Grigory Ivanovich was terminally ill, and there was no hope for an amendment, then she was forced to leave the Pedagogical Gymnasium in order to be more close to dad. At the beginning of 1866, stenographic courses were opened in St. Petersburg, they made it possible to combine education and caring for a parent - and Anna Grigoryevna, at his insistence, signed up for the course. But after 5-6 lectures, she returned home in despair: “gibberish writing” turned out to be a very difficult task. It was Grigory Ivanovich who was indignant at the lack of patience and perseverance in his daughter and took her word that she would finish the courses. If only he knew how fateful this promise would be!
What happened at that time in the life of Dostoevsky? By that time, he was quite famous - in the same house of the Snitkins, all his works were read. Already his first story "Poor People", written in 1845, caused the most flattering praise from critics. But then there was a shaft negative reviews that fell upon his subsequent works was hard labor, death from tuberculosis of his first wife, sudden death beloved brother, entrepreneur, debentures which - imaginary and real - Fyodor Mikhailovich took upon himself ...
By the time of the meeting with Anna, he also supported his already adult, 21-year-old stepson (the son of the first wife of Maria Dmitrievna), as well as the family of the deceased brother Mikhail and helped his younger brother, Nikolai ... As he later admitted, “he lived all his life in a money grip ".
And at the end of the summer of 1866, the genius of literature had to conclude an enslaving contract with his publisher Stellovsky: cunning and enterprising, this man undertook to publish the complete works of Fyodor Mikhailovich for 3,000 rubles, provided that he would write a full-fledged long novel before November 1, 1866 . With a delay of a month, Dostoevsky will be obliged to pay a large penalty, and if he does not have time to hand over the novel before December 1, the rights to all his works are transferred to Stellovsky for 9 years, the writer loses a percentage of publications. In fact, this meant doom to a debtor's prison and poverty. As Anna Grigorievna wrote in "Memoirs", Stellovsky "knew how to lie in wait for people in difficult times and catch them in his nets."
The very idea of having time to write a new full-fledged novel in such a short time made Fyodor Mikhailovich discouraged - after all, the writer had not yet finished work on Crime and Punishment, the first parts of which had already been published - it was necessary to finish. And by not fulfilling Stellovsky's conditions, he risked losing everything, and this prospect seemed much more real than the opportunity to put a finished novel on the publisher's table in the remaining time.
As Dostoevsky later admitted, in these circumstances, Anna Grigorievna became the first person who helped him by deed, and not just by word: friends and relatives sighed and groaned, lamented and sympathized, gave advice, but no one entered his almost hopeless situation. Except for a girl, a recent shorthand graduate with virtually no work experience, who suddenly appeared at the door of his apartment. She, as the best graduate, was recommended by the founder of the courses, Olkhin.
It's good that you are not a man, - said Dostoevsky after their first brief acquaintance and "test of the pen."
- Why?
“Because a man would probably drink.” You won't get drunk, will you?
kind and unfortunate
Anna Grigorievna's first impression of meeting her was really not the most pleasant ... Yes, she did not believe her happiness when the professor of shorthand Olkhin offered her to work for famous Dostoevsky- the one! - who was so revered at home, did not sleep at night, repeated, afraid to forget, the names of the heroes of his works (she was sure that the writer would ask them), with a beating heart she hurried, fearing to be late even for a minute, to Stolyarny Lane, and there ...
There she was met by a sickly-looking man, tired of life, gloomy, absent-minded, irritable: either he could not remember her name in any way, then, after dictating a few lines too quickly, he grumbled that she was not keeping up, then he said that none of this undertaking was possible. will come out.
At the same time, Dostoevsky won over Anna Grigorievna with his sincerity, openness and gullibility. In that first meeting, he told the most, perhaps, the most incredible episode of his life - he will later describe it in detail in the novel The Idiot. This is the moment when Dostoevsky was arrested for his connection with the political circle of Petrashevists, sentenced to death and led to the scaffold...
“I remember,” he said, “how I stood on the Semyonovsky parade ground among the condemned comrades and, seeing the preparations, I knew that I had only five minutes left to live. But these minutes seemed to me years, tens of years, so it seemed that I had to live a long time! We were already dressed in death shirts and divided into threes, I was the eighth, in the third row. The first three were tied to poles. In two or three minutes both rows would have been shot, and then our turn would have come. How I wanted to live, Lord my God! How dear life seemed, how much good, good things I could do! I remembered all my past, not quite a good use of it, and so I wanted to experience everything again and live for a long, long time ... Suddenly I heard the all-clear, and I cheered up. My comrades were untied from the poles, brought back and read new verdict: I was sentenced to four years of hard labor. I don't remember another have a good day! I walked around my casemate in Alekseevsky ravelin and sang all the time, sang loudly, I was so glad that life was given to me!
When she left the writer's house, Snitkina carried with her a painful impression. It was not a weight of disappointment, but of compassion.
“For the first time in my life,” she later writes, “I saw a smart, kind man, but unhappy and abandoned by everyone” ...
And that gloom, unsociableness, discontent that were on the surface did not close the depths of his personality from her sensitive heart. Dostoevsky would later write to his wife:
“You usually see me, Anya, gloomy, cloudy and capricious; it is only outside; such was I always, broken and corrupted by fate; inside is different, believe me, believe me!”
And she not only believed, but was also surprised: how could people see gloominess in her husband when he was “kind, generous, disinterested, delicate, compassionate - like no one else!”
26 days
The future spouses had 26 days of joint work on the novel "The Gambler", it was in it that Fedor Mikhailovich described his passion for roulette and a painful passion for a very real person - Apollinaria Suslova, an infernal woman, as the writer himself spoke of her. However, this passion for the game, which Fedor Mikhailovich could not overcome for many years, disappeared as suddenly as it appeared, thanks to the extraordinary patience and extraordinary wisdom of his young wife.
So, Anna Grigorievna Snitkina took shorthand of the novel, at home, often at night, rewrote it in plain language and brought it to Fyodor Mikhailovich's house. Slowly, he himself began to believe that everything would work out. And by October 30, 1866, the manuscript was ready!
Dostoevsky's study in the last St. Petersburg apartment
But when the writer came with the finished novel to the publisher, it turned out that he ... left for the province and no one knows when he will return! The servant did not agree to accept the manuscript in his absence. The head of the publisher's office also refused to accept the manuscript. It was meanness, but meanness expected. With her characteristic energy, Anna Grigorievna joined the case - she asked her mother to consult a lawyer, and he ordered Dostoevsky's work to be carried to a notary, to certify his receipt. But Fyodor Mikhailovich was late for the notary! However, he nevertheless assured his work - in the management of the quarter against receipt. And was saved from ruin.
By the way, we note that Stellovsky, whose name was associated with more than one scandal and more than one meanness in the fate of writers and musicians, ended his days sadly: he died in a psychiatric hospital before he was 50 years old.
So, "The Gambler" is over, the stone has fallen from his shoulders, but Dostoevsky understands that he cannot part with his young assistant ... And he proposes to continue work after a short break - on "Crime and Punishment". Anna Grigoryevna also notices changes in herself: all her thoughts are about Dostoevsky, her former interests, friends, entertainment fade, she wants to be with him.
Their explanation takes place in an unusual form. Fyodor Mikhailovich, as it were, tells the plot of the novel he had conceived, where an elderly, battered artist falls in love with a young girl ... “Put yourself in her place for a minute,” he said in a trembling voice. - Imagine that this artist is me, that I confessed my love to you and asked you to be my wife. Tell me, what would you say to me?" -
“I would answer you that I love you and will love you all my life!”
February 15, 1867 Anna Grigoryevna Snitkina and Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky are married. She is 20, he is 45. “God gave her to me,” the writer will say more than once about his second wife. True, for her this first year turned out to be both a year of happiness and a difficult one to get rid of illusions. She entered the house famous writer, Dostoevsky’s “heart expert”, whom she admired sometimes even excessively, calling him her idol, but real life roughly “pulled” her from these blissful heavens to solid ground ...
First difficulties
“She loved me endlessly, I also loved her without measure, but we did not live happily with her ...” - Dostoevsky said about his first marriage to Maria Isaeva. Indeed, the first marriage of the writer, which lasted 7 years, was unhappy almost from the very beginning: he and his wife, who had a very strange character, in fact, did not live together. How did Anna Grigorievna manage to make Dostoevsky happy?
Already after the death of her husband, in a conversation with Leo Tolstoy, she said (though not about herself - about her husband): “Nowhere is a person’s character expressed as in everyday life, in your family." It was here, in the family, in everyday life, that her kind, wise heart made itself felt ...
After serene and peaceful home furnishings Snitkina - now Dostoevskaya - entered the house where she was forced to live under the same roof with the eccentric, dishonorable and spoiled stepson of Fyodor Mikhailovich Pavel. The 21-year-old youth constantly complained to his stepfather about his daughter-in-law, and, being alone with her, tried to hurt the young woman more painfully. He reproached her for her inability to manage the household, the anxiety that she delivers to an already sickly father, and he himself constantly demanded money for his
content.
“This is my stepson,” Fyodor Mikhailovich admitted, “a kind, honest boy; but, unfortunately, with an amazing character: he positively promised himself, from childhood, not to do anything, while not having the slightest fortune and at the same time having the most ridiculous ideas about life.
And other relatives treated Dostoevskaya arrogantly. Soon she noticed: as soon as Fyodor Mikhailovich receives an advance for the book, out of nowhere, the widow of his brother Mikhail, Emilia Fedorovna, or the younger unemployed brother Nikolai, appear, or Pavel has “urgent” needs - for example, the need to buy a new coat to replace the old one, out of fashion.
One winter, Dostoevsky returned home without a fur coat - he pledged it in order to provide Emilia with 50 rubles, which were urgently needed ... Relatives used the kindness and reliability of the writer, things disappeared from the house - either a Chinese vase donated by friends, then a fur coat, then silver appliances: everything had to be pledged. So Anna Grigorievna was faced with the need to live in debt, and live very modestly. And calmly, courageously accepted this need.
Another difficult test was the writer's illness. Dostoevskaya knew about her from the first day they met, but she hoped that Fyodor Mikhailovich's health would improve from the joyful change of life. And for the first time, a seizure occurred when the young spouses were visiting: “Fyodor Mikhailovich was extremely animated and told something interesting to my sister. Suddenly he interrupted his speech in mid-sentence, turned pale, got up from the sofa and began to lean towards me. I looked in amazement at his changed face. But suddenly there was a terrible, inhuman scream, or rather, a scream, and Fyodor Mikhailovich began to lean forward.<…>Subsequently, dozens of times I had to hear this "inhuman" cry, common in an epileptic at the beginning of an attack. And this cry always shocked and frightened me.<…>
It was here that I saw for the first time what a terrible disease Fyodor Mikhailovich was suffering from. Hearing his cries and groans that did not stop for hours, seeing a face distorted from suffering, completely unlike him, madly stopping his eyes, not at all understanding his incoherent speech, I was almost convinced that my dear, beloved husband was going crazy, and what horror I inspired this thought on me!” She hoped that with his marriage, his attacks would become less frequent. But they continued ... She hoped that at least on their honeymoon they would have time to be alone, talk, enjoy each other's company, but all of her free time occupied by frequent guests, Dostoevsky's relatives, whom she had to treat and entertain, and the writer himself was constantly busy.
The young wife is sad about former life, quiet and homely, where there was no place for experiences, longing, clashes. He is sad about that short time between the engagement and the wedding, when he and Dostoevsky spent evenings together, waiting for the fulfillment of their happiness ... But it was in no hurry to be fulfilled.
“Why doesn’t he, the “great heart specialist,” see how hard it is for me to live?”
She asked herself. She was tormented by thoughts: he fell out of love with her, saw how much lower she was in spiritual and intellectual development(which, of course, was far from the truth). Anna Grigorievna thought about a divorce, thought that if she ceased to be interesting to her beloved husband, then she would not have enough humility to stay with him - she would have to leave: “I placed too many hopes for happiness on an alliance with Fyodor Mikhailovich and it was so bitter I would if this golden dream had not come true!
One day, another misunderstanding occurs, Anna Grigoryevna cannot stand it, sobs and cannot calm down, and Fyodor Mikhailovich finds her in this state. Finally, all her hidden doubts come out - and the couple decide to leave. First to Moscow, then - abroad. It was in the spring of 1867. The Dostoevskys will return to their homeland only after 4 years.
save the marriage
Although Dostoevskaya constantly emphasized that she was just a child, when she got married, she settled in unusually quickly, taking care of the family "treasury". Her main task was to provide her husband with peace and the opportunity to engage in creativity. He worked at night. Writing was not only a vocation for Fyodor Mikhailovich, but also the only income: having no fortune, like, for example, Tolstoy or Goncharov, he was forced to write all his works (except for the first story) hastily, in a hurry, under the order, otherwise it would not survive …
Clever and energetic, Anna Grigoryevna took upon herself relations with creditors, analysis of promissory notes, protecting her husband from all these worries. And she took the risk - she pawned her considerable dowry in order to go abroad and "save her happiness."
She was sure that only
“constant spiritual communication with her husband will be able to create that strong and friendly family that we dreamed of.”
By the way, it was her efforts that helped to reveal the fictitiousness of many of Dostoevsky's debts. Despite his vast life experience, he was such a trusting, honest, conscientious person, not adapted to life, that he believed everyone who came to him for money. After the death of his brother Mikhail, who also owned a tobacco factory, people began to come to Fyodor Mikhailovich, demanding the return of the money that his brother owed them. Among them were many crooks who decided to cash in on the simplicity of the writer. He did not demand confirmation, papers from anyone, he believed everyone. Anna Grigoryevna took it all upon herself. One can only guess how much wisdom, patience and labor such activity required.
In “Memoirs,” Dostoevskaya admits: “A bitter feeling rises in me when I remember how these other people’s debts ruined my personal life ... All my then life was overshadowed by constant thoughts about where to get so much money for such and such a number; where and for how much to pawn such and such a thing; how to make sure that Fyodor Mikhailovich does not find out about the visit of the creditor or about the mortgage of some thing. This took my youth, my health suffered and my nerves were upset. She wisely protected him from own emotions: when I wanted to burst into tears, I went to another room, I tried never to complain - neither about my health (rather weak), nor about experiences, always encouraging him. Considering compliance as a necessary condition for a happy marriage, Dostoevsky's wife possessed this rare property in full. Even in those moments when he left to play roulette and returned, having lost all their livelihood ...
Roulette was a terrible disaster. The great writer suffered from it. He dreamed of winning in order to wrest his family out of debt bondage. This "fantasy" possessed him completely, and he alone could not find the strength to escape from her clutches ... If it were not for the unparalleled endurance, love for her husband and the absence of any self-pity of Anna Grigorievna.
“It was painful to the depths of my soul to see how Fedor Mikhailovich himself suffered,” she wrote. - He returned from the roulette table, pale, exhausted, barely able to stand on his feet, asked me for money (he gave me all the money), left and in half an hour returned even more upset, for money, and this until he lost everything that we have." But what about Dostoevskaya? She understood that it was not a matter of a weak will, that this was a real illness, an all-consuming passion. And she never reproached him, did not quarrel with him, did not contradict his requests to give money for the game.
Dostoevsky begged her forgiveness on his knees, sobbed, promised to give up his pernicious passion... and returned to her again. Anna Grigorievna at such moments ... no, she was not silent meaningfully: she tried to convince her husband that everything would be fine, that she was happy, distracted him with a walk or reading newspapers. And Dostoevsky calmed down...
When in 1871 Fyodor Mikhailovich wrote that he was throwing roulette, his wife did not believe it. But he really didn’t return to the game anymore: “Now it’s yours, yours is inseparable, all yours. Until now, half of this damned fantasy belonged.
Sonechka
For countless families, the loss of a child is a fatal ordeal. This terrible tragedy, experienced twice in the 14 years of their marriage, only rallied the Dostoevskys. For the first time, the family faced the hardest grief in the first year of marriage, when daughter Sonechka, having lived only 3 months, suddenly died from a common cold. Anna Grigorievna describes her grief sparingly, she, with her characteristic selflessness, thought about something else - “she was terribly afraid for my poor husband.” Fyodor Mikhailovich, according to her memoirs, “sobbed and cried like a woman, standing in front of the cooling body of her favorite, and covered her pale face and hands with hot kisses. I have never seen such violent despair."
A year later, the second daughter, Lyubov, was born. And Dostoevskaya, who was afraid that her husband would never be able to love another child again, noticed that the joy of fatherhood overshadowed all previous experiences. In a letter to one critic, Fyodor Mikhailovich argued that a happy family life and the birth of children are three-quarters of the happiness that a person can experience on earth.
In general, his relationship with children was unique. He, like no one else, knew how, as she wrote, "to enter into a child's worldview", to understand the child, to captivate him with conversation, and at such moments he himself was like a child. Abroad, Fyodor Mikhailovich writes the novel "The Idiot", and already at home he finishes the novel "Demons". But living far from Russia was a difficult test for the spouses, and in 1871 they returned to their homeland.
8 days after returning to St. Petersburg, the son Fedor was born in the family, and in 1875 another son, Alyosha, was named after the righteous Alexy, a man of God - a saint whom Fedor Mikhailovich greatly revered. This is the year when Otechestvennye Zapiski magazine publishes its fourth great romance Dostoevsky,
"Teenager" * (the concept of "The Great Pentateuch of Dostoevsky", which came into use thanks to critics, implies five novels of the writer: "Crime and Punishment", "Idiot", "Teenager", "Demons", "The Brothers Karamazov. - Ed).
But the family again suffers misfortune. Son Alyosha inherited epilepsy from his father, and her first attack, which happened to a boy at the age of three, turned out to be fatal for him ... This time, the spouses seemed to change places. The unfortunate Anna Grigorievna, an unusually strong woman, still could not cope with this grief, she lost interest in life, in her other children, which frightened her husband. He talked to her, urged her to submit to the will of God, to live on. That year, the writer went to Optina Pustyn and twice met alone with Elder Ambrose, who conveyed his blessing to Dostoevsky and the words that the writer would later put into the mouth of his hero, Elder Zosima, in The Brothers Karamazov: “Rachel weeps for her children and cannot be comforted, because they do not exist, ”and such is the limit for you, mothers, on earth. And do not be comforted, and you do not need to be comforted, do not be comforted and cry, only every time you cry, remember steadily that your son is the only one from the angels of God - from there he looks at you and sees you, and rejoices at your tears, and points to them to the Lord God. And for a long time you will still have this great maternal crying, but in the end it will turn to you in quiet joy, and your bitter tears will be only tears of quiet tenderness and heartfelt cleansing, saving you from sins.
What could he see in me?
Dostoevsky wrote his last and, according to many critics, most powerful novel, The Brothers Karamazov, from the spring of 1878 to 1880. He dedicates it to his beloved wife, Anna Grigorievna ...
“Anka, you are my angel, everything is mine, alpha and omega! And, so you see me in a dream and, “waking up, you yearn that I am gone.” It's terrible as well, and I love it. Yearn, my angel, yearn for me in every way - that means you love me. That's for me sweeter than honey. I'll come and kiss you"; “But how can I live without you and without children this time? It's no joke, 12 whole days"
These lines are from Dostoevsky's letters in 1875-1976, during the days when he was leaving for St. Petersburg on business, and the family remained at their dacha in Staraya Russa. They do not require comments.
The family became a safe haven for him, and in his wife, according to him own confession He literally fell in love again many times. Anna Grigorievna, until the end of her life, sincerely could not understand what Dostoevsky himself found in her: “All my life it seemed to me a kind of riddle that my good husband not only loved and respected me, as many husbands love and respect their wives, but almost bowed before me, as if I were some special being, created just for him, and this not only in the first time of marriage, but throughout other years until his death. But in fact, in reality, I was not distinguished by beauty, did not possess any talents or special mental development, and I had an average education (gymnasium). And yet, despite this, she deserved from such a smart and talented person deep reverence and almost worship.
Of course, she was not an ordinary person, a kind of simpleton who, for no reason, fell in love with a genius. Fyodor Mikhailovich fell in love with his stenographer, feeling in her not only compassionate and kind, but also active, strong-willed, noble character, rich inner world and the art of being a real woman, with dignity remaining in the shadow of her husband, while being, without exaggeration, his main inspiration.
And although Anna Grigorievna and Fyodor Mikhailovich really “did not match in character,” as they say now, she admitted that she could always lean on him, and he could count on her delicacy and care, and trusted her completely, which also sometimes surprised Anna Grigorievna. “Not echoing or imitating each other in the least, and did not get entangled with my soul - I - in his psychology, he - in mine, and thus my good husband and I - we both felt free in soul ... These relations from both parties and gave us both the opportunity to live all fourteen years of our married life in the happiness possible for people on earth.
Dostoevskaya did not get an ideal life - she was indifferent to outfits and used to live in cramped conditions, in constant debt. Ideal Husband great writer, of course, was not either. For example, he was very jealous and could make a scene for his wife, flare up. Anna Grigorievna wisely avoided situations that could infuriate her husband, and tried to prevent the consequences of his temper. So, at the time of his editorial work, he could lose his temper because of the impudence of the authors, who demanded that not a comma be changed in their writings - he could write them a sharp letter in response. And the next morning, having cooled down, he was very sorry about it, ashamed of his temper. So Dostoevskaya in such cases did not send letters, but waited for the morning. When it "turned out" that they had not yet had time to send a harsh letter, Fyodor Mikhailovich was very happy and wrote a new one, already softened.
She did not reproach him for his impracticality and gullibility. Anna Grigorievna recalled that her husband could not refuse anyone to help. If he did not have change, he could bring the beggar home and give him money there. “Then these visitors began to come themselves and, having learned the name of their husband thanks to a plaque nailed to the door, they began to ask Fyodor Mikhailovich. I went out, of course; they told me about their misfortunes, and I gave them thirty or forty kopecks. Although we are not particularly rich people, we can always provide such assistance, ”she said.
And although religiosity did not prevent the spouses for some reason, maybe out of curiosity, one day to go to some fortune-teller (who, by the way, foretold the death of their son Alyosha), nevertheless, the Gospel always accompanied their lives. Dostoevskaya recalled how, putting the children to bed , Fedor Mikhailovich, together with them, read the prayer “Our Father”, “Virgin Mother of God” and his favorite - “I place all my hope in Thee, Mother of God, keep me under Your shelter” ...
"Don't hold back"
In 1880, Anna Grigoryevna took up the independent publication of his works, founding the enterprise "Book Trade of F. M. Dostoevsky (exclusively for non-residents)". And it was a success! Financial situation the family recovered, the Dostoevskys were able to repay their debts. But Fyodor Mikhailovich did not have long to live. In 1880, his novel The Brothers Karamazov was published, and this, according to his wife, was the last happy event in his long-suffering life.
On the night of January 26, 1881, the writer's throat began to bleed (even from hard labor he suffered from emphysema). During the day, the bleeding recurred, but Fyodor Mikhailovich calmed his wife and entertained the children so that they would not be frightened. During the doctor's examination, the bleeding was so strong that Dostoevsky lost consciousness. When he came to, he asked his wife to invite a priest for confession and communion. I confessed for a long time. And in the morning, a day later, he said to his wife: “You know, Anya, I have been awake for three hours already and I keep thinking, and only now I clearly realized that I will die today.” He asked to give him the Gospel, presented on the way to exile by the wives of the Decembrists, and opened it at random: “John held Him back and said: I need to be baptized from You, and are You coming to me? But Jesus answered and said to him: Do not hold back, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.
“You hear,” he said to his wife. “Do not hold back” means I will die.”
He is recognized as a classic of literature and one of the world's best novelists. 195 years have passed since the birth of Dostoevsky.
First love
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was born on November 11, 1821 in Moscow and was the second child in big family. Father, a doctor at the Moscow Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor, in 1828 received the title of hereditary nobleman. Mother - from a merchant family, a religious woman. From January 1838, Dostoevsky studied at the Main Engineering School. He suffered from military atmosphere and drill, from disciplines alien to his interests and from loneliness. As his colleague from the school, the artist Trutovsky, testified, Dostoevsky kept to himself, but he impressed his comrades with his erudition, and a literary circle formed around him. Having served less than a year in the Petersburg engineering team, in the summer of 1844, Dostoevsky retired with the rank of lieutenant, deciding to devote himself completely to creativity.
In 1846, a new talented star- Fedor Dostoevsky. The young author's novel "Poor People" makes a splash among the reading public. Nobody hitherto unknown Dostoevsky in an instant, he becomes a public person, for the honor of seeing which famous people fight in their literary salon.
Most often, Dostoevsky could be seen at the evenings at Ivan Panaev's, where the most famous writers and critics of that time gathered: Turgenev, Nekrasov, Belinsky. However, it was by no means the opportunity to talk with his more venerable fellow writers that pulled the young man there. Sitting in the corner of the room, Dostoevsky, with bated breath, watched Panaev's wife, Avdotya. This was the woman of his dreams! Beautiful, smart, witty - everything about her excited his mind. In his dreams, confessing his ardent love, Dostoevsky, because of his timidity, was even afraid to speak to her once again.
Avdotya Panaeva, who later left her husband for Nekrasov, was completely indifferent to the new visitor to her salon. “At first glance at Dostoevsky,” she writes in her memoirs, “it was clear that he was a terribly nervous and impressionable young man. He was thin, small, blond, with a sickly complexion; his small gray eyes somehow moved anxiously from subject to subject, and his pale lips twitched nervously. How could she, the queen, among these writers and counts pay attention to such a “handsome man”!
Circle of Petrashevsky
Once out of boredom, at the invitation of a friend, Fyodor dropped in for an evening at Petrashevsky's circle. Young liberals gathered there, read French books banned by the censors, and talked about how good it would be to live under republican rule. Dostoevsky liked the cozy atmosphere, and although he was a staunch monarchist, he began to drop in on “Fridays”.
Only now these “tea parties” ended deplorably for Fyodor Mikhailovich. Emperor Nicholas I, having received information about the "Petrashevsky circle", gave a decree to arrest everyone. One night they came for Dostoevsky. First six months in solitary confinement Peter and Paul Fortress, then the verdict - the death penalty, replaced by four years of prison with further service as a private.
The following years were among the most difficult in Dostoevsky's life. A nobleman by birth, he found himself among murderers and thieves who immediately disliked the "political". “Each of the new arrivals in the prison, two hours after arrival, becomes the same as everyone else,” he recalled. - Not so with a noble, with a nobleman. No matter how fair, kind, intelligent, he will be hated and despised by the whole mass for whole years. But Dostoevsky did not break down. On the contrary, he came out as a completely different person. It was at hard labor that the knowledge of life, human characters, the understanding that good and evil, truth and lies can be combined in a person.
In 1854 Dostoevsky arrived in Semipalatinsk. Soon fell in love. The object of his desires was the wife of his friend Maria Isaeva. This woman, all her life, felt deprived of both love and success. Born into a rather wealthy family of a colonel, she unsuccessfully married an official who turned out to be an alcoholic. Dostoevsky, throughout for long years who did not know female affection, it seemed that he had met the love of his life. Evening after evening he spends with the Isaevs, listening to the drunken eloquence of Maria's husband just to be near his beloved.
In August 1855, Isaev dies. Finally, the obstacle was removed, and Dostoevsky proposed to the woman he loved. Maria, who had a growing son in her arms and debts for her husband's funeral, had no choice but to accept the offer of her admirer. On February 6, 1857, Dostoevsky and Isaeva got married. On the wedding night, an incident occurred that became an omen of the failure of this family union. Dostoevsky suffered an epileptic attack as a result of nervous tension. The body convulsing on the floor, the foam flowing from the corners of his mouth - the picture she saw forever instilled in Mary a shade of some kind of disgust for her husband, for whom she already did not have love.
conquered summit
In 1860, thanks to the help of friends, Dostoevsky received permission to return to St. Petersburg. There he met Apollinaria Suslova, whose features can be seen in many of the heroines of his works: in Katerina Ivanovna and Grushenka from The Brothers Karamazov, and in Polina from The Gambler, and in Nastasya Filippovna from The Idiot. Apollinaria made an indelible impression: a slender girl "with large gray-blue eyes, with regular features smart face, with a proudly thrown head, framed by magnificent braids. In her low, somewhat slow voice and in the whole habit of her strong, tightly built body, there was a strange combination of strength and femininity.
Their romance that began turned out to be passionate, stormy and uneven. Dostoevsky either prayed to his "angel", wallowed at her feet, or behaved like a rude and rapist. He was now enthusiastic, sweet, then capricious, suspicious, hysterical, shouting at her in some kind of nasty, thin woman's voice. In addition, Dostoevsky's wife became seriously ill, and he could not leave her, as Polina demanded. Gradually, the relationship of lovers came to a standstill.
They decided to leave for Paris, but when Dostoevsky appeared there, Apollinaria told him: "You are a little late." She passionately fell in love with a certain Spaniard, who, by the time Dostoevsky arrived, had abandoned the Russian beauty that had bothered him. She sobbed into Dostoevsky's vest, threatened to commit suicide, and he, stunned unexpected meeting, reassured her, offered her brotherly friendship. Here Dostoevsky urgently needs to go to Russia - his wife Maria is dying. He visits the patient, but not for long - it’s very hard to look at it: “Her nerves are irritated in the highest degree. The chest is bad, withered like a match. Horror! It's painful and hard to watch."
In his letters - a combination of sincere pain, compassion and petty cynicism. “The wife is dying, literally. Her suffering is terrible and resonates with me. The story is expanding. Here's another thing: I'm afraid that the death of my wife will be soon, and here a break in work will be necessary. If there hadn't been this break, then, it seems, I would have finished the story.
In the spring of 1864, there was a "break in work" - Masha died. Looking at her withered corpse, Dostoevsky writes in a notebook: "Masha is lying on the table ... It is impossible to love a person as oneself according to the commandment of Christ." Almost immediately after the funeral, he offers Apollinaria his hand and heart, but is refused - for her, Dostoevsky was a conquered peak.
“For me you are a charm, and there is no one like you”
Soon Anna Snitkina appeared in the life of the writer, she was recommended as an assistant to Dostoevsky. Anna took it as a miracle - after all, Fyodor Mikhailovich had long been her favorite writer. She came to him every day, and transcribed shorthand records sometimes at night. “Talking to me in a friendly manner, Fyodor Mikhailovich every day revealed to me some sad picture of his life,” Anna Grigoryevna later wrote in her memoirs. “Deep pity involuntarily crept into my heart with his stories about difficult circumstances, from which, apparently, he never got out, and could not get out.”
The Gambler novel was completed on October 29th. The next day Fedor Mikhailovich celebrated his birthday. Anna was invited to the celebration. Saying goodbye, he asked permission to meet her mother to thank her for her magnificent daughter. By that time, he had already realized that Anna had fallen in love with him, although she expressed her feeling only silently. She also liked the writer more and more.
Several months - from the engagement to the wedding - were serene happiness. “It was not physical love, not passion. It was rather adoration, admiration for a man so talented and possessing such high spiritual qualities. The dream of becoming a companion of his life, sharing his labors, making his life easier, giving him happiness - captured my imagination, ”she would write later.
Anna Grigoryevna and Fyodor Mikhailovich got married on February 15, 1867. Happiness remains, but serenity is completely gone. Anna had to use all her patience, stamina and courage. There were problems with money, huge debts. Her husband suffered from depression and epilepsy. Convulsions, seizures, irritability - all this fell upon her in full. And that was only half the trouble.
Dostoevsky's pathological passion for gambling is a terrible passion for roulette. Everything was at stake: family savings, Anna's dowry, and even Dostoyevsky's gifts to her. Losses ended in periods of self-flagellation and hot remorse. The writer begged his wife for forgiveness, and then everything started all over again.
The writer's stepson Pavel, the son of Maria Isaeva, who actually ran the house, did not have a meek disposition, and was dissatisfied with new marriage father. Pavel constantly sought to prick the new mistress. He sat firmly on the neck of his stepfather, like other relatives. Anna realized that the only way out was to go abroad. Dresden, Baden, Geneva, Florence. Against the background of these divine landscapes, their real rapprochement took place, and affection turned serious feeling. They often quarreled and reconciled. Dostoevsky began to show unreasonable jealousy. “For me, you are a charm, and there is no one like you. Yes, and every person with a heart and taste should say this if he looks at you - that's why I sometimes get jealous of you, ”he said.
And during their stay in Baden-Baden, where they spent their honeymoon, the writer lost again in the casino. After that, he sent a note to his wife at the hotel: “Help me, come wedding ring". Anna meekly complied with this request.
They spent four years abroad. Joys were replaced by sorrows and even tragedies. In 1868, their first daughter, Sonechka, was born in Geneva. She left this world after three months. This was a big shock for Anna and her husband. A year later, in Dresden, their second daughter, Lyuba, was born.
Returning to St. Petersburg, they spent much of their time in the romantically secluded Staraya Russa. He dictated, she took shorthand. The children grew up. In 1871, the son of Fedor was born in St. Petersburg, and in 1875 in Staraya Russa, the son of Alyosha. Three years later, Anna and her husband again had to endure the tragedy - in the spring of 1878, three-year-old Alyosha died of an epileptic seizure.
Returning to St. Petersburg, they did not dare to stay in the apartment, where everything reminded of their dead son, and settled at the famous address - Kuznechny lane, house 5. Anna Grigoryevna's room turned into an office business woman. She managed everything: she was Dostoevsky's secretary and stenographer, she was engaged in the publication of his works and the book trade, she was in charge of all financial affairs in the house, she raised children.
The relative calm was short-lived. Epilepsy receded, but new diseases were added. And then there are family strife over inheritance. Fyodor Mikhailovich's aunt left him the Ryazan estate, setting the condition for the payment of sums of money to his sisters. But Vera Mikhailovna, one of the sisters, demanded that the writer give up his share in favor of the sisters.
After a stormy showdown, Dostoevsky's throat gushed blood. It was 1881, Anna Grigorievna was only 35 years old. She didn't believe until the very end. quick death husband. “Fyodor Mikhailovich began to console me, spoke sweet kind words to me, thanked me for the happy life that he lived with me. He entrusted children to me, said that he believed me and hoped that I would always love and protect them. Then he told me the words that a rare husband could say to his wife after fourteen years of marriage: “Remember, Anya, I always loved you dearly and never cheated on you, even mentally,” she will recall later. Two days later he was gone.
- (nee Snitkina; August 30 (September 12), 1846, St. Petersburg, Russian empire- June 9, 1918, Yalta, Crimea) - Russian memoirist. Stenographer, assistant, and since 1867 the second wife of F. M. Dostoevsky, the mother of his children - Sophia (February 22, 1868 - May 12 (24), 1868), Lyubov (1869-1926), Fyodor (1871-1922) and Alexei ( 1875-1878) Dostoevsky; publisher of the creative heritage of Fyodor Mikhailovich. Known as one of the first philatelists in Russia.
Biography
Born in St. Petersburg, in the family of a petty official Grigory Ivanovich Snitkin. Since childhood, I have been reading the works of Dostoevsky. Student of shorthand courses.
From October 4, 1866, as a stenographer and copyist, she participated in the preparation for publication of the novel "The Gambler" by F. M. Dostoevsky. On February 15, 1867, Anna Grigoryevna became the writer's wife, and two months later the Dostoevskys went abroad, where they remained for more than four years (until July 1871).
On the way to Germany, the couple stopped for a few days in Vilna. On the building, located at the place where the hotel where the Dostoevskys stayed, was located, a memorial plaque was opened in December 2006 (sculptor Romualdas Kvintas).
Heading south to Switzerland, the Dostoevskys stopped at Baden, where at first Fyodor Mikhailovich won 4,000 francs at roulette, but he could not stop and lost everything that happened to him, not excluding his dress and his wife's things. For almost a year they lived in Geneva, where the writer worked desperately, and sometimes needed the bare necessities. On March 6 (February 22), 1868, their first daughter, Sophia, was born; but on May 24 (12), 1868 in age three months the child died, to the indescribable despair of the parents. In 1869, in Dresden, the Dostoevskys had a daughter, Lyubov (d. 1926).
Upon the return of the spouses to St. Petersburg, their sons Fedor (July 16, 1871 - 1922) and Alexei (August 10, 1875 - May 16, 1878) were born to them. The brightest period in the life of the novelist began, in a beloved family, with a kind and intelligent wife, who took into her own hands all the economic issues of his activities (money and publishing) and soon freed her husband from debts. Since 1871, Dostoevsky gave up roulette forever. Anna Grigorievna arranged the life of the writer and did business with publishers and printing houses, she herself published his works. dedicated to her last novel writer "The Brothers Karamazov" (1879-1880).
In the year of Dostoevsky's death (1881), Anna Grigorievna turned 35 years old. She did not remarry. After the writer's death, she collected his manuscripts, letters, documents, photographs. Organized in 1906 a room dedicated to Fyodor Mikhailovich in the Historical Museum in Moscow. Since 1929, her collection was transferred to the Museum-apartment of F. M. Dostoevsky in Moscow.
Anna Grigoryevna compiled and published in 1906 " Bibliographic index works and works of art related to the life and work of F. M. Dostoevsky" and the catalog "Museum in memory of F. M. Dostoevsky in the Imperial Russian historical museum name Alexander III in Moscow, 1846-1903". Her books The Diary of A. G. Dostoevskaya 1867 (published in 1923) and Memoirs of A. G. Dostoevskaya (published in 1925) are an important source for the biography of the writer.
Anna Grigorievna died in Yalta in the hungry military year of 1918. After 50 years, in 1968, her ashes were transferred to the Alexander Nevsky Lavra and buried next to her husband's grave.
Bibliography
"Diary of A.G. Dostoevskaya 1867" (1923)
"Memoirs of A.G. Dostoevskaya" (1925).
Memory
Movies
- 1980 - Soviet Feature Film"Twenty-six Days in the Life of Dostoevsky". Stage director - Alexander Zarkhi. In the role of A. G. Dostoevskaya - the famous Soviet and Russian actress Evgenia Simonova.
- 2010 - documentary film "Anna Dostoevskaya. Letter to husband. Stage director - Igor Nurislamov. In the role of A. G. Dostoevskaya - Olga Kirsanova-Miropolskaya. Produced by the producer center "ATK-Studio".
Literature
- Grossman L.P.A.G. Dostoevskaya and her “Memoirs” [Introduction. Art.] // Memoirs of A. G. Dostoevskaya. - M.-L., 1925.
- Dostoevsky A.F. Anna Dostoevskaya // Women of the world. - 1963. - No. 10.
- Brief literary encyclopedia in 9 volumes. - M .: " Soviet Encyclopedia", 1964. - T. 2.
- Kissin B. M. Country of Philately. - M.: Communication, 1980. - S. 182.
- Mazur P. Who was the first philatelist? // Philately of the USSR. - 1974. - No. 9. - S. 11.
- Strygin A. Women's theme in philately. Some thoughts about collecting stamps // NG - Collection. - 2001. - No. 3 (52). - 7 March.
Is one of the first famous women Russia, fond of philately. The beginning of her collection was laid in 1867, in Dresden. The reason for this was the dispute between Anna Grigoryevna and Fyodor Mikhailovich about the female character:
“I was very indignant in my husband that he rejected in the women of my generation any restraint of character, any persistent and prolonged striving to achieve the intended goal.<...>
For some reason, this argument provoked me, and I announced to my husband that I would prove to him by my personal example that a woman could pursue the idea that attracted her attention for years. And since at the present moment<...>I don’t see any big task ahead of me, then I’ll start at least with the lesson you just indicated, and from today I’ll start collecting stamps.
No sooner said than done. I dragged Fyodor Mikhailovich into the first stationery shop I came across and bought (“with my own money”) a cheap album for sticking stamps on. At home, I immediately made stamps from the received three or four letters from Russia and thus laid the foundation for the collection. Our hostess, learning of my intention, rummaged through the letters and gave me some old Thurn-Taxis and the Saxon Kingdom. Thus began my collection postage stamps, and it has been going on for forty-nine years ... From time to time, I boasted to my husband about the number of added marks, and he sometimes laughed at this weakness of mine. (From the book “Memoirs of A. G. Dostoevskaya.”)”
A happy turn in the difficult fate of Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky occurred at a time when he was in a difficult situation: in an unrealistic short time should have written new novel. I had to hire a young but experienced stenographer, Anna Snitkina. It was this woman - Anna Snitkina - who became the second wife of Dostoevsky.
Dostoevsky's assistant successfully completed not only the St. Petersburg courses for stenographers, but also the Mariinsky women's gymnasium, at the end of which she received a large silver medal. Studying at the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics of the Higher Pedagogical Courses had to be interrupted due to the illness of his father, who died soon after. The joint daily work of a famous writer and a twenty-year-old brilliantly educated girl eventually led not only to the writing of the novel The Gambler, but also to the subsequent family life.
The beginning of the family life of Dostoevsky and Anna Snitkina
The wedding ceremony of Dostoevsky and Anna Snitkina took place in the Izmailovsky Cathedral on February 15, 1867. Exactly ten years ago, also in the month of February, Fyodor Dostoevsky stood in front of the altar of a church in the city of Kuznetsk with another woman whom he long and passionately sought - Maria Isaeva. But the first wife died of consumption, and now the writer was destined to go through life with another companion - loving, understanding and very worthy in all respects. So, Anna Snitkina became the second wife of Dostoevsky.
But this marriage was negatively perceived by Dostoevsky's stepson, therefore married couple in order to avoid family disagreements and cement their relationship, they had to go abroad.
Even before leaving for Europe, Anna Snitkina had to deal with Dostoevsky's epileptic seizure. And it happened not at home, but visiting my sister. Dostoevsky's seizure was so terrible and was accompanied by such an inhuman scream that his sister and son-in-law fled the living room in fear. For the first time in their lives, all those present saw the epilepsy with their own eyes, and only Anna Snitkina was not at a loss and rendered all possible assistance to her husband. After bouts of illness, Dostoevsky spent a very long time returning to normal condition he felt depressed and lost. Epilepsy not only overshadowed family life, but also was inherited by her son Alyosha.
The second shock for Dostoevsky's young wife was her husband's unbridled passion for gambling. Back in time honeymoon in Dresden, he left Anna Snitkin alone for a week, and he himself left to try his gambling fortune in Homburg, from where he constantly sent letters asking him to send money. This was the beginning of future financial losses, which are simply inevitable with such a destructive passion.
Together they went to the roulette city of Baden-Baden. In just a week, Dostoevsky lost all the money available, so that in the future he had to pawn jewelry. Dostoevsky's wife, Anna Snitkina, was especially sorry about her husband's unredeemed wedding gift - a brooch and earrings interspersed with diamonds and rubies. The money sent from St. Petersburg by Anna's mother also went to the game. Dostoevsky's weakness consisted in the fact that he could not stop at the right moment and played until the last thaler.
Dostoevsky's first wife was Maria Dmitrievna Isaeva, who died of consumption, and with whom family relationships were heavy. Dostoevsky's second wife Anna Snitkina.
In the autumn of 1867, this gambling nightmare ended - the couple moved to Geneva, where Dostoevsky began writing the novel The Idiot.
Sorrows and joys alternated, as in any family life, but in 1868 the couple had to experience terrible grief - daughter Sonya, who was born in Geneva, died three months later. In 1869, the second daughter, Lyuba, was born in Dresden, and two years later the Dostoevsky couple, who lived in Italy and completely yearned for their homeland, returned home. Instead of the planned three months, they spent four years abroad.
In native penates
Shortly after returning to St. Petersburg, Dostoevsky's wife Anna Grigorievna Snitkina successfully resolved with her son Fyodor, and in 1875 the family was replenished with another son, Alyosha. He was not destined to live long, the boy died at the age of three during an attack of epilepsy.
At home, Dostoevsky wrote the most fundamental work of his life - the novel The Brothers Karamazov. The main place for writing was a quiet and cozy place - Staraya Russa, where the writer dictated his novel, and Anna Snitkina habitually took shorthand. Every summer, the writer and his family fled from the bustle of St. Petersburg to this creative haven.
After returning from Europe, Anna Grigorievna had to fight for 13 years with creditors who threatened to list property and even intended to put the great writer in a debtor's prison. The amount of the debt was about 25 thousand rubles, and basically these were the debts of Dostoevsky's brother, who died suddenly in 1864. His large family, accustomed to a prosperous life, was left without a livelihood. Until the end of his life, Dostoevsky provided material assistance to his widow and nephews, depriving his family in many ways. The question was constantly on the agenda: “Where to get the money?”.
Many sad things happened in 1872. Arriving at summer rest in Staraya Russa, the couple discovered an incorrectly healed fracture of the hand of a little daughter. The next day, I had to return to St. Petersburg again to have the operation. At the same time, the infant son Fedya remained with strangers in Staraya Russa. At the same time, the mother of Dostoevsky's wife, Anna Grigorievna, severely injured her leg: a heavy chest literally crushed her thumb. And her sister Masha, at the age of 30, suddenly died abroad. Anna Snitkina herself almost went after her sister: the abscess formed in her throat left few chances for life. But the abscess burst, the patient recovered, life went on as usual.
In 1873, the novel The Demons was published, on the creation of which the writer worked for almost three years. Taking an artistic break, Dostoevsky agreed to temporarily become the editor of the magazine The Citizen, and then proceeded to write the novel The Teenager. Dostoevsky worked on his works at night, and during the day he dictated to his wife what he had written during the night. Heavy writer's work more and more undermined the health of Fyodor Mikhailovich. In 1874, 1875 and 1879 he made trips abroad to the resort of Ems. But the result of the treatment was short-lived.
The life of Anna Snitkina without Dostoevsky
All 14 years old life together Dostoevsky's wife Anna Grigorievna Snitkina was worried about the poor health of her brilliant husband, each of his seizures resounded with pain in her soul and left scars on her heart.
In January 1881, after a quarrel with his sister Vera over an inheritance, Dostoevsky began to bleed in the throat. It was a harbinger of the end. A few days later, on January 28, the writer died in his wife's arms, having managed to say how much he loved her all these years and never cheated, even mentally.
For the 35-year-old widow, life has stopped. A trip to the Crimea, organized by relatives, was supposed to soften the bitterness of loss, but Anna Snitkina, on the contrary, plunged into terrible longing and despair.
She devoted the next 37 years to preserving the memory of the great writer, publishing his books, letters, collecting manuscripts and photographs, and creating a house-museum in Staraya Russa.
Death overtook Dostoevsky's wife in Yalta in 1918, where she was interred. And only fifty years later, thanks to the efforts of her grandson, she was reburied next to her husband in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.
You have read the article, which tells about who the second wife of Dostoevsky was and about their family life. You can find more material on these topics in the Blog section. In addition, be sure to visit the Summary section - there, in a summary, you can find and read many of the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky.
