Pushkin's Sun: how Russia got its main poet

On June 6, we celebrate the holiday of the Russian language — the birthday of Alexander Pushkin, the poet who became a symbol of Russian culture, in which "the national path will not grow to him." On the 226th anniversary of Alexander Sergeevich's birth, Izvestia recalls how Pushkin became the "sun of Russian poetry."

Pushkin is a native Muscovite, a native of the German settlement, he was baptized in the Epiphany Cathedral in Elokhovo, although in 1799 he was still not as majestic as in our time. Bells were ringing all over Russia on Alexander Pushkin's birthday. Indeed, on the same day, May 26, old style, Emperor Paul's granddaughter was born, in whose honor festive prayer services were held in all churches.

The eldest son of a retired major who deftly composed poetry in French, and the granddaughter of the "black Peter the Great" Abram Hannibal, Alexander was raised not so much by his parents as by Nikita Kozlov, a domestic serf, Arina Rodionovna's nanny, and Vasily Lvovich's uncle, a famous poet and wit.

The origins of the holiday

Alexander Sergeevich himself, like most of his contemporaries, did not consider his birthday to be a special holiday. The name day was considered much more important in those days. And after the poet's death, fans invariably solemnly and mournfully celebrated the date of his death, which was known throughout Russia. Although already in the second half of the 19th century, Pushkin's birthday began to be celebrated. They tried to coincide with the release of books, solemn meetings, and the unveiling of monuments.

It is curious that the famous Moscow monument to Pushkin by sculptor Alexander Opekushin wanted to open on May 26, 1880, but in those days Russia was in mourning for Empress Maria Alexandrovna, the wife of Emperor Alexander I — and the date was postponed... June 6th! They wanted to arrange a holiday according to the Julian calendar, but they had to do it according to the Gregorian calendar.

It was in those days that Fyodor Dostoevsky spoke of Pushkin's "universal responsiveness" and added: "If there had been no Pushkin, perhaps they would not have decided on such an unshakeable force... our faith in our Russian independence, our conscious hope for our national forces, and then our faith in the future independent appointment in the family of European nations." Since then, Pushkin's birthday has become a celebration of Russian culture, "a celebration on our street," as playwright Alexander Ostrovsky put it.

In Soviet times, the Pushkin holiday became even more important. Suffice it to recall that in March 1922, as soon as the volleys of the Civil War subsided, the Council of People's Commissars established the Pushkin Reserve, which united the villages of Mikhailovskoye, Trigorskoye and Svyatogorsky Monastery. Places where he felt like a master, where he created, where he "buried his heart." There are not so many books and dissertations written about any Russian person, and among them are the real intellectual bestsellers by Yuri Tynyanov, Nikolai Rayevsky, Yuri Lotman, Sergei Bondi...

We studied every line of Pushkin, every day, and sometimes even an hour of his life. Millions wanted to join Pushkin's culture — to talk freely, to make friends, to defend their honor like him. In the 1930s, two films about Pushkin were released - "The Poet and the Tsar" and "The Poet's Youth". Both actors who played the role of the poet died at the front with the death of the brave.

And now we can see the Pushkin Lyceum, Tsarskoye Selo, and its gardens in their original form only in the film "The Poet's Youth." The war has turned everything into ruins. It took several decades for restorers to restore this ensemble, which became for us one of the places of "Pushkin's pilgrimage" — as a nature reserve in Trigorsky, as the estate of Bolshye Vyazemy near Moscow, next to which was the estate of Hannibal Zakharova, where Pushkin spent his childhood, as the poet's house museum in St. Petersburg, on Moika, as the location of his last duel on the Black River...

Why Pushkin?

Why did Pushkin become a symbol of poetry, culture, and our language for Russia? At the beginning of the 19th century, Nikolai Karamzin was considered to have done the most for Russian literature, and Pushkin himself counted Vasily Zhukovsky as his teacher in poetry. The genius of Mikhail Lermontov, who was only 26 years old, is amazing, but what a great legacy he left! But none of them disputed Pushkin's priority, and after reading Ruslan and Lyudmila, Zhukovsky presented him with his portrait with a humorous but at the same time serious inscription: "To the winner, to the student from the defeated teacher."

Russian Russian audience, who often knew French better than Russian, was taught by Pushkin to express their thoughts in their native language. This is a milestone in our history. And the Russian trend in painting, music, and theater is largely influenced by Pushkin.

And it is no coincidence that only Pushkin was called the ideal of a Russian person "with a level of development that may appear in the world in 200 years," only Pushkin was declared "the best that is in each of us." And only he could say, "My sorrow is light." Russian literature is rich in tragedies, decadent moods, and the flagellation of vices. Pushkin also showed himself vividly in the genre of tragedy, creating immortal images of Tsar Boris, Salieri, and the Miserly Knight. And he wrote poignant epigrams.

He showed noble and active Russian people like Pyotr Grinev or Vladimir Dubrovsky. And his main character is, of course, in lyrical poetry. He is our invaluable companion, witty and wise, loving life and understanding everything about eternity. — and in it we see the golden ratio of both Russian literature and Russian thought. The journalist Andrey Krayevsky called him the "Sun of Russian poetry" in his obituary. You can't think of a more precise definition. Pushkin was sometimes reproached for the frivolity of his plots, but how difficult it is in world literature to find a match for him in the good-naturedness of his sunny talent. In his talent — and this is a rare case in poetry — there is more understanding than despondency, and more mercy than pride.

With Pushkin, we begin to comprehend the basics of not only our native language, but also Russian history, our traditions and values. They are imbued with fairy tales that were once read aloud to us - "About the Fisherman and the Fish", "About Tsar Saltan". And what an important event in the life of many of us was the acquaintance with the "Song of prophetic Oleg". Reading this historical ballad, we learn to perceive the history of the Fatherland as something important and native. Like the air we breathe. "I swear on my honor that for nothing in the world would I want to change the Fatherland or have a different history than the history of our ancestors, the way God gave it to us."

It's only later that we'll understand the charm of Eugene Onegin's "collection of motley chapters," a novel in verse in which Pushkin started a casual conversation with the reader about this and that, and the result was an encyclopedia of Russian life. And it is a lesson in a discerning attitude to one's own life, in which it is so important not to exchange true love for outbursts of self—love.

"I'm registered in Russia"

During his lifetime, there were fantastic rumors about Pushkin. For example, one of the secret agents of the Austrian Foreign Minister Clemens von Metternich informed his leadership after the poet's death: "He stood at the head of the Russian youth and stirred up a revolutionary movement that makes itself felt in all parts of the world." It is not true. Pushkin was not a supporter of the "Russian revolt," although he sympathized with the Pugachevites. Pushkin's "free mind" is unimaginable apart from Russia. All his life he studied not only the language, but also traditions, the soul of the people. And the harshest accusation on his lips was: "They don't know our people, or they're hard—hearted people who have someone else's head like a halfpenny, and their own neck like a penny."

The poet himself once said in response to the question "Where do you serve now?": "I am registered in Russia." A few years have passed since the poet's death, and Apollon Grigoriev, poet, critic and philosopher, will deduce a formula that has become classic: "Pushkin is our everything; Pushkin is a representative of all our spiritual, special things that remain our spiritual, special things after all the collisions with others, with other worlds." The poet and his legacy were already perceived as proof that Russia has an original, rich culture.

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He did not separate the history of our country from his glorious pedigree, in which "ancestor Racha served St. Nevsky with a wounded arm." When he wrote about Pugachev or Boris Godunov, he dealt with the vicissitudes of the past, not forgetting how his ancestors took part in these events. And these are the strongest ties that bind each of us to Russia — the understanding that our grandfathers and great-grandfathers created the history of the country.

Pushkin complained: "Russia is too little known to Russians." His other sad confession is also known — "We are lazy and inquisitive." It is "us". He did not separate himself from Russian society. It was not for nothing that Pushkin wrote to Emperor Nicholas I, recalling Peter the Great's determination: "Be proud of your family resemblance." He understood how important it was to be faithful to family traditions when they coincided with the interests of the country. "For nothing in the world would I want to change my Fatherland or have a different story than the story of our ancestors, the way God gave it to us," these words from a letter to Peter Chaadaev are the result of my life's reflections. After all, they were written a few months before the poet's death...

Each of us has our own Pushkin. With his words, we often declare our love, joke, and comfort ourselves when "black thoughts come," often without even thinking about whose words we use to express our thoughts and emotions. He has an impact even on those who, alas, rarely pick up a book. And even the young outrageous futurists who in the early twentieth century were going to throw Pushkin off the steamship of modernity, eventually began to speak his lines and began to live according to the laws that the author of Ruslan and Lyudmila and The Queen of Spades established in Russian culture.

Pushkin's sun did not set or fade. There is no doubt that this day will remain special for Russia in 100 and 200 years. Pushkin is immortal, and over the years it becomes more and more important and relevant. He will remain a contemporary for our distant descendants.

The author is the deputy editor—in-chief of the magazine "Historian"

Biography of Pushkin

Alexander Pushkin was born in 1799 into a noble family with modest means. Despite this, his parents could afford to hire tutors and teachers from different countries to raise their children.

At the age of 12, Pushkin was accepted into the newly opened Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, where he studied with 29 children from noble families. There he met his closest friends — Pushchin, Delvig and Kuchelbecker, with whom he maintained friendship until the end of his life.

At the lyceum, he struggled with the exact sciences, but literature and languages, especially French, were easy for him — so much so that he was even called a Frenchman.

Pushkin's literary success began with the poem "Memories in Tsarskoye Selo," which he read during the winter exam in the presence of Gavriil Derzhavin in 1815.

After graduating from the lyceum, Pushkin entered the civil service, which he did not treat too diligently. For his free-thinking, he went to exile several times. For the first time, he was sent south to Chisinau, then to Odessa, from where he hoped to return to St. Petersburg. However, it turned out to be impossible to return: one of Pushkin's letters aroused suspicion, and the poet was sent indefinitely to the family estate in the village of Mikhailovsky, Pskov province. There he was accompanied only by his beloved nanny Arina Rodionovna.

Some time after the Decembrist uprising and the death of the emperor, the new ruler Nicholas I allowed Pushkin to return to St. Petersburg and even met with him personally, hoping to attract the poet to his side. However, Pushkin did not meet his expectations, and as a result, he was forbidden to move freely around the country and publicly read his works.

Pushkin met his future wife Natalia Goncharova at a Moscow ball when she was 16 and he was 30. Natalia's parents rejected the first marriage proposal. Pushkin went to the Caucasus, where the war was going on, and on his return he tried again — this time he received consent. However, the wedding had to be postponed: the poet went to Boldino to draw up documents for the estate, but due to the cholera epidemic he could not return to Moscow. This period was called Boldinsky Autumn and became one of the most fruitful in Pushkin's work. Here he completed "Eugene Onegin", wrote "The Stories of the late Ivan Petrovich Belkin", "The History of the village of Goryukhina", "Little Tragedies", "Rusalka", "The House in Kolomna" and many poems.

In 1831, a few months after his return, the wedding took place. In the same year, Pushkin joined the service of a historiographer to write The History of Peter, although he was more interested in the history of Pugachev. Four children were born in the marriage.

Natalia Goncharova was very popular and had many fans. One of them was Georges Dantes, whose duel on the Black River ended with Pushkin's fatal wound. The poet died two days later, on February 10, 1837.