Pleshcheev A.N. "Past" A

Pleshcheev A.N.

Pleshcheev Alexey Nikolaevich (1825 - 1893), poet.

Born on November 22 (December 4 NS) in Kostroma into a noble family that belonged to an old family. Childhood years were spent in Nizhny Novgorod, where his father served, who died early. He received a good education at home under the guidance of his mother.

In 1839, together with his mother, he moved to St. Petersburg, studied at the School of Guards Ensigns and Cavalry Junkers, then at the university, from which he left in 1845. During his student years, his interest in literature and theater, as well as in history and political economy, was determined. Then he became close to F. Dostoevsky, N. Speshnev and Petrashevsky, whose socialist ideas he shared.

In 1844, the first poems by Pleshcheev ("Dream", "Wanderer", "At the Call of Friends") appeared in Sovremennik, thanks to which they began to perceive him as a poet-fighter.

In 1846, the first collection of poems was published, in which there was an extremely popular poem in the circle of Petrashevists "Forward! Without fear and doubt ...".

In 1849, together with other Petrashevites, he was sentenced to death, replaced by soldiery, deprived of "all rights of state" and sent to the "separate Orenburg corps as a private."

In 1853 he took part in the storming of the Ak-Mechet fortress, for bravery he was promoted to non-commissioned officer, in May 1856 he received the rank of ensign and was able to go into civil service.

In 1857 he married, in 1859, after long troubles, he obtained permission to live in Moscow, however, under "the strictest supervision", "without a term."

He actively collaborates with the Sovremennik magazine, becomes an employee and shareholder of the Moskovsky Vestnik newspaper, is published in Moskovskiye Vedomosti, and others. Joins the Nekrasov school, writes poetry about people's life (Boring Picture, Native, Beggars. ), about the life of the urban lower classes - "On the street". Impressed by the plight of Chernyshevsky, who had already been in Siberian exile for five years, the poem "I feel sorry for those whose strength is dying" (1868) was written.

Pleshcheev's work was highly appreciated by progressive critics (M. Mikhailov, M. Saltykov-Shchedrin, etc.).

In 1870 - 80, Pleshcheev was engaged in translations a lot: he translated T. Shevchenko, G. Heine, J. Byron, T. Moore, S. Petefi and other poets.

As a prose writer, as early as 1847, he appeared with stories in the spirit of the natural school. Later he published his Stories and Stories (1860). At the end of his life he wrote the monographs The Life and Correspondence of Proudhon (1873), The Life of Dickens (1891), articles about Shakespeare, Stan-dahl, and others.

Interest in the theater especially increased in the 1860s, when Pleshcheev became friends with A. Ostrovsky and began to write plays himself ("What often happens", "Fellow travelers", 1864).

In 1870 - 80 he was the secretary of the editorial board of Otechestvennye zapiski, after their closure - one of the editors of Severny Vestnik.

In 1890 Pleshcheev received a huge inheritance. This allowed him to get rid of years of struggle for existence. With this money, he helped many writers and contributed a significant amount to the literary fund, establishing funds named after Belinsky and Chernyshevsky to encourage talented writers, supported the family of the patient G. Uspensky, Nadson and others, financed the magazine "Russian wealth".

Pleshcheev was the "godfather" of such aspiring writers as V. Garshin, A. Chekhov, A. Apukhtin, S. Nadson.

The musicality of Pleshcheev's poems attracted the attention of many composers: Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Varlamov, Cui, Grechaninov, Gliere, Ippolitov-Ivanov wrote songs and romances to his texts.

List of references

For the preparation of this work were used materials from the site russia.rin.ru/

Yaroshenko N.A. Portrait of A.N. Pleshcheeva. 1887. Oil on canvas. Xxx

Pleshcheev Alexey Nikolaevich (22.11 / 04.12.1825, Kostroma - 26.09 / 08.10.1893, Paris; buried in Moscow) - writer, critic; member of the circle M.V. Petrashevsky.

Born into an impoverished noble family. Having received a home education, he entered the St. Petersburg school of guards ensigns, but, having lost interest in military service, left the school (formally, quitting "due to illness"). In 1843 he entered the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University in the category of oriental languages. Pleshcheev's social circle at that time included: the rector of the university and the publisher of the Sovremennik magazine P.A. Pletnev, A.A. Kraevsky, the Maikov brothers, F.M. Dostoevsky, I.A. Goncharov, D.V. Grigorovich, M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. He sent the first selection of his poems to Pletnev, who in a letter to Ya.K. Groto wrote: “Have you seen in Sovremennik poems with signature A. P-b? I learned that this was our 1st year student, Pleshcheev. He has talent. I called him to me and caressed him. " Due to illness, lack of funds, and dissatisfaction with the teaching system, Pleshcheev left the University in 1845, devoting himself exclusively to literary activity as a poet, then as a prose writer.

A.N. Pleshcheev began to publish in magazines in 1843. In 1846 he published the collection Poems. In the work of Pleshcheev in the 1840s. there is the influence of M.Yu. Lermontov. In the spirit of the social-utopian views of S. Fourier and F. Lamennais, he developed the theme of Lermontov's "Prophet" in the poems "The Love of a Singer" (1845), "To the Poet" (1846), "Sleep" (1846). Poems “Forward! without fear and doubt "," We feel like brothers, you and I "became revolutionary songs. V.N. Maikov in a review of the first collection of poems by A.N. Plescheeva wrote about the poet's belief in "the triumph of truth, love and brotherhood on earth."

In 1872-1884. A.N. Pleshcheev lived in St. Petersburg. At the invitation of N.A. Nekrasov was a member of the editorial board of Otechestvennye zapiski, and after his death he headed the poetic department of this magazine. Upon the closure of Otechestvennye zapiski, Pleshcheev contributed to the creation of the Severny Vestnik magazine, in which he worked until 1890, also leading the poetry department. A deep friendship connected him with the novice A.P. Chekhov, whom A.N. Pleshcheev considered the most promising of the young writers.

In the 1870-1880s. the poet was mainly engaged in poetic translations from German, French, English and Slavic languages. An important place in the work of A.N. For the last decade of his life, Pleshcheev was interested in children's poetry and literature (collection "Snowdrop").

Many works by A.N. Pleshcheeva set to music. More than a hundred romances and songs by N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov ("The night flew over the world"), P.I. Tchaikovsky ("Not a word, my friend ..."), M.P. Mussorgsky, Ts. A. Cui, A.T. Grechaninov, S.V. Rachmaninov.

A.N. Pleshcheev died in Paris on September 26, 1893; buried in Moscow at the cemetery of the Novodevichy Convent., 3.

In St. Petersburg: 1872-1890 - the house of M. B. Bulatova - Bolshaya Spasskaya street, 1.

Bibliography :

• Poems. 1845-1846. SPb., 1846.
• Poems by A.N. Pleshcheeva. SPb., 1858.
• Poems by A.N. Pleshcheeva. M., 1861.
• Snowdrop. Poems for children and youth. SPb., 1878.
• Everyday. Stories and stories. SPb., 1880.
• A collection of theater plays for home and amateur performances. T. 1‒3. SPb., 1880.
• Songs of an old friend Poems. M., 1891.
• Grandfather's songs. Poems for children. M., 1895.
• Stories and stories / Ed. and entered. Art. P.V. Bykov. T. 1‒2. SPb., 1896‒1897.
• Poems / Ed. and entered. Art. P.V. Bykov. Ed. 4th. SPb., 1905.
• Poems. M., 1950.
• Favorites. M., 1960.
• Full collection of poems / Vstup. Art. M. Ya. Polyakov. 2nd ed. M.‒L., 1964.
• And the hearts are hot and pure aspirations. M., 1978.
• Everyday scenes. M., 1986.
• Poems. Prose. M., 1988.
• My kindergarten. SPb., 2013.

Literature :

• Pustilnik L.S. Life and work of A. N. Plescheev. M., 1981. (2nd ed. M., 1988; 3rd ed. M., 2008)
• Arseniev K.K. One of the poets of the forties. Poems by A. N. Plescheev. // Bulletin of Europe. 1887. March. S. 432-437.
• Maikov V. Poems by A. Pleshcheev // Maikov V. Critical Experiments. SPb., 1891, pp. 129–135.
• Skabichevsky A.M. History of the latest Russian literature. SPb., 1900.
• Dandevil M.V. A.N. Pleshcheev at Fort Petrovsky. (According to unpublished letters). // The past years. 1908. October. S. 103-141.
• S.A. Vengerov The heroic character of Russian literature. SPb., 1911.
• Sakulin P.N. Alexey Nikolaevich Pleshcheev. (1825-1893). // History of Russian Literature of the XIX century / Ed. D.N. Ovsyaniko-Kulikovsky. Moscow, 1911. T. 3. S. 481–490.
• Poets-Petrashevists. L., 1940.
• Bushkanets E. Unknown poem by A.N. Plescheeva // Questions of literature. 1957. No. 9. P. 190-195.
• Zhdanov V.V. Poets of the Petrashevsky circle // Petrashevsky poets. L., 1957, pp. 37–40.
• History of Russian literature of the XIX century: Bibliographic index. M.‒L., 1962.
• Dobrolyubov N.A. Poems by A. N. Plescheev // Collected Works. op. M.‒L., T. 3.1962.
• Dobrolyubov N.A. Well-intentioned and activity // Sobr. op. M.‒L., T. 6.1963.
• Saltykov-Shchedrin M.E. New poems by A. Pleshcheev // Sobr. op. M.‒L., T. 5.1966.
• Shchurov I.A., Lyrica A.N. Pleshcheeva // Writer and Life. Issue 3.M., 1966.
• A.N. Pleshcheev and Russian literature: Collection of scientific articles. Kostroma, 2006.

"The Past" Alexey Pleshcheev

The nights are pale
A gentle light illuminated
My room.

I hear behind the wall again
Over the little sick
Baiushki bye.

Sing again! Listening to you
And my soul is sick
Take a break from the torment.

I remember a different time
The burden was lighter than life,
Life was more fun!

These years passed so fast
Years of happiness and freedom
Years of bright dreams!

How much is caused by a dream
Familiar faces before me
And familiar places.

I remember the forest ... whispering trees,
And the darkened waves of murmur,
And the twinkling of the stars.

The garden is neglected and gloomy,
Over the water of the pond transparent
Country house.

Speeches are gentle and affectionate,
In a cozy corner of a fairy tale
On a winter evening ...

The heart believed, loved,
Everything was so sweet to him
What's funny now!

But everything is quiet behind the wall ...
Over the little sick
The voice ceased long ago ...

Oh, why, bygone years,
Years of participation and freedom
I remembered you!

Longing is stronger in my soul
And until the morning, apparently, with her
I will not close my eyes!

Analysis of Pleshcheev's poem "The Past"

The name of Alexei Nikolaevich Pleshcheev (1825 - 1893) is known to most Russian readers from the socio-political works and translations of Western European authors. However, wonderful poems about childhood belong to the pen of this poet.

One of these kind light works is the "Past" of 1858. In its mood, it resembles IZ Surikov's Childhood and has a similar plot. The narration is in the first person. The poem tells how a lyrical hero, having heard a song performed by a small child, plunges into memories. With the help of picturesque metaphors and vivid epithets, the poet manages to recreate the enchanted world of his childhood so that the reader himself can feel his sadness over the past years.

The work has an unusual structure. It consists of fourteen three verses, combined in pairs by the last lines in the stanza, due to which the outline of the poem takes the form aab ccb, \u200b\u200bdde ffe, etc.

The Past begins with a story about the present. Here is a lyrical hero leads the reader to his humble abode:
The nights are pale
A gentle light illuminated
My room.

We understand that this derogatory attitude is associated with the misfortune, poverty of the hero. That is why he so clearly hears the sounds of the melody - the walls of the house are thin, and in the next, equally tiny, room there is a sick child to whom his mother is singing a song. From the text of the work, we can only guess that the voice belongs to a young woman, because the poet does not name anything directly, using the language of metaphors: "The voice is so clear and the ringing ..."

The poet also does not mention childhood, where the gentle melody takes the thoughts of the lyrical hero. Instead, he calls it "years of happiness and freedom", "years of bright dreams." We can understand that it is the early years that we are talking about from the image “in the corner of a cozy fairy tale”.

The poet talks about childhood experiences using personifications, because many children with a vivid imagination endow different objects and phenomena with a soul. Therefore, trees in memories can whisper, and a wave can murmur like a frowning person:
I remember the forest ... whispering trees,
And the darkened waves of murmur,
And the twinkling of the stars.

The poem ends where it began, forming a ring. The lyrical hero returns to today, annoyed that now he cannot sleep. But the reader doesn't feel hurt in the lines. Speaking about the song that gave him these disturbing memories, and about the child who unwittingly became their cause, the poet uses alliterations with soft sonorant consonants ("l", "r", m ":" baby "," silent "," stronger " , "I hear"). Thanks to this, the reader is also imbued with tenderness for the heroes of the work.

Nikolai Alekseevich Pleshcheev, whose biography will be briefly described in the article, is a prominent representative of the Russian intelligentsia of the 19th century. He was a prose writer, poet, translator, literary critic, and revolutionary.

The beginning of life

Pleshcheev's life was full of events, rich in memorable facts. The writer was born into a family that belonged to an old noble family. This joyful event took place at the beginning of the winter of 1825 in Kostroma. Since 1826, the family lived in Nizhny Novgorod, where the father of the future poet was transferred to the civil service. However, soon the head of the family dies, and the boy remains in the care of his mother.

In 1839, the future poet Pleshcheev moved with her to live in St. Petersburg. Here he decides to devote his life to military service and enters the School of Guards Ensigns and Cavalry Junkers. But after studying at an educational institution for two years, the young man realizes that this is not his destiny. He leaves his studies and enters the St. Petersburg University at the Faculty of History and Philosophy. Oriental languages \u200b\u200bbecome the subject of his study.

Pleshcheev's circle of acquaintances by this time was already very wide, despite his young age. He is familiar with such famous people as Pletnev, Grigorovich, Kraevsky, Goncharov, Dostoevsky, Saltykov-Shchedrin.

Social activity

In the middle of the 19th century, among the noble youth it was considered prestigious to be a member of various social movements, circles, parties. Young Pleshcheev did not stay away from modern trends. The poet's biography is full of information about his participation in such organizations, including revolutionary ones. All these hobbies were passionate and had a direct impact on the fate of the poet.
For example, under the influence of the influence of Beketov, who led one of the student circles, Pleshcheev lost interest in his studies and left the university in 1845 without completing his studies. At the same time, he began to attend meetings of the Petrashevsky circle. But the young poet had a special craving for Durov's circle, where not so much political as literary interests prevailed.

Early creativity

Pleshcheev's poems began to appear in print since 1844, mainly in such well-known publications as Otechestvennye zapiski, Sovremennik, Literaturnaya Gazeta, and Library for Reading. In the poems related to the early period of creativity, the influence of the works of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov is clearly felt.

Pleshcheev's poetry is characterized by the motives of sadness, loneliness, romance. In the second half of the forties, the poet's lyrics are filled with the energy of protest, a call for the fight against injustice and oppression. The revolutionary character of Pleshcheev's poems did not go unnoticed by both admirers of his talent and the authorities.

Years of exile

In 1849, in Moscow, together with other freethinkers who belonged to the Petrashevists, Pleshcheev was also arrested. The poet's biography was replenished with one more page of his life. After his arrest, he was taken to the Peter and Paul Fortress of St. Petersburg, where he was imprisoned for about eight months. On December 22, on the Semenovsky parade ground, he was awaiting execution, which at the very last moment was replaced by a four-year hard labor, depriving him of all rights to inherit his fortune and military rank.

Pleshcheev was sent to the city of Uralsk, to a separate Orenburg corps, as a private. From 1852, the service took place in Orenburg, where for special services he was elevated to the rank of non-commissioned officer, and in 1856 the officer rank was restored. In 1857, the title of nobleman was returned to Nikolai Alekseevich Pleshcheev.

During the years of exile, the poet became close to people close to him in spirit, such as the poet Mikhailov, Polish revolutionaries. The poet's lyrics also change. Sincerity appears in poetry, one feels one's own view of some aspects of life. At the same time, a cycle of poems related to love lyrics was born. They were dedicated to the future wife of Nikolai Alekseevich.

After the link

The years of the poet Pleshcheev's life can be divided into two periods - before and after exile. The time spent in harsh conditions only tempered the poet's character, but did not force him to change progressive ideas.

In 1858 Pleshcheev came to St. Petersburg and met Dobrolyubov, Chernyshevsky, Nekrasov here. In 1859 he moved to live in Moscow. Here he is actively engaged in literary activities. The most famous representatives of the Russian intelligentsia, such as Lev Tolstoy, Nikolai Nekrasov, Ivan Turgenev, Pyotr Tchaikovsky and many other writers, poets, actors, and musicians, attended the creative evenings that Pleshcheev arranged in his home.

Educational work

Many years of Pleshcheev's life were devoted to educational activities, which had a pedagogical focus. In 1861, together with Berg, he published the anthology "Children's Book", in 1873, in collaboration with Aleksandrov, a collection for children appears, which contains the best works of Russian classical and modern literature. In addition to literary publications, educational and educational collections on geography are published on the initiative of Pleshcheev. In total, seven books on various topics were prepared and published.

Prose writer and translator

In those years of Pleshcheev's life, when he worked as a translator, all his literary talent manifested itself. Many poetic translations from French, German, English, Slavic languages, made by Nikolai Alekseevich, are still considered the best. Often the poet took on works that had not been translated into Russian before. Pleshcheev also belongs to some scientific translations on historical and sociological topics. Literary criticism was also of interest to Nikolai Alekseevich, she is given a special place in his work.

Throughout his creative career, the poet did not leave work on prose. But I must say that the works created by him did not go beyond the traditions existing at that time. Some of the stories and novellas can be called autobiographical.

Speaking about the fact that the years of the poet Pleshcheev's life were filled with bright events, meetings, acquaintances, hobbies, one cannot but say about Nikolai Alekseevich's addiction to the theater. Pleshcheev himself was an excellent reader. He understood and loved theatrical art. The poet wrote plays that were staged on the stages of the country's leading theaters.

Literary heritage

Nikolai Alekseevich Pleshcheev, whose biography can only evoke the admiration of descendants, left behind a rich cultural heritage.

Pleshcheev's original and translated poems are mesmerizing with their melody. That is why they did not go unnoticed by such great composers as Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Cui, Grechaninov, Rachmaninov. More than a hundred of the poet's poems have been set to music, being examples of art. About 13 original and 30 translated theatrical plays belong to the pen of Nikolai Alekseevich. Some of them are still included in the repertoire of the country's theaters.
Hundreds of Pleshcheev's poems are published in collections. Many, having become classics, are included in the anthology of literary reading.

Pleshcheev's life was cut short on September 26, 1893 in Paris, but Nikolai Alekseevich was buried in Moscow.

Alexey Nikolaevich Pleshcheev (November 22, 1825, Kostroma - September 26, 1893, Paris) - Russian writer, poet, translator; literary and theater critic. In 1846, the very first collection of poems made Pleshcheev famous among the revolutionary youth; as a member of the Petrashevsky circle, he was arrested in 1849, and some time later sent into exile, where he spent almost ten years in military service. Upon his return from exile, Pleshcheev continued his literary activity; After going through years of poverty and hardship, he became an authoritative writer, critic, publisher, and at the end of his life and a philanthropist. Many of the poet's works (especially poetry for children) have become textbooks, considered classics. The most famous Russian composers have written more than a hundred romances based on Pleshcheev's poems.

Biography

Alexei Nikolaevich Pleshcheev was born in Kostroma on November 22 (December 4), 1825 into an impoverished noble family that belonged to the ancient Pleshcheev family (among the poet's ancestors was Saint Alexy of Moscow). The family respected literary traditions: there were several writers in the Pleshcheev family, including the well-known writer S.I.Pleshcheev at the end of the 18th century.

The poet's father, Nikolai Sergeevich, served under the Olonets, Vologda and Arkhangelsk governors. A. N. Pleshcheev's childhood was spent in Nizhny Novgorod, where, since 1827, his father served as a provincial forester. After the death of Nikolai Sergeevich Pleshcheev in 1832, his mother, Elena Alexandrovna (nee Gorskina), was engaged in raising her son.

Until the age of thirteen, the boy studied at home and received a good education, having mastered three languages; then, at the request of his mother, he entered the St. Petersburg school of guards ensigns, having moved to St. Petersburg. Here the future poet had to face the "stupefying and corrupting" atmosphere of the "Nikolaev military clique", which forever settled "the most sincere antipathy" in his soul. Having lost interest in military service, Pleshcheev in 1843 left the school of guards ensigns (formally, quitting "due to illness") and entered Petersburg University in the category of oriental languages. Here Pleshcheev's circle of acquaintances began to take shape: the rector of the university P.A.Pletnev, A.A.Kraevsky, the Maikovs, F.M.Dostoevsky, I.A.Goncharov, D.V.

Gradually, Pleshcheev acquired acquaintances in literary circles (formed, mainly, at parties in the house of A. Kraevsky). Pleshcheev sent his very first selection of poems to Pletnev, rector of St. Petersburg University and publisher of the Sovremennik magazine. In a letter to Ya. K. Groth, the latter wrote: “Have you seen poetry in Sovremennik signed by A. P-v? I learned that this was our 1st year student, Pleshcheev. He has talent. I called him to me and caressed him. He walks through the eastern branch, lives with his mother, whose only son is ... "

In 1845, A.N. Pleshcheev, carried away by socialist ideas, met through the Beketov brothers with members of the circle of M.V. Butashevich-Petrashevsky, which included writers - F.M.Dostoevsky, N.A. Speshnev, S.F.Durov , A. V. Khanykova. N. Speshnev had a great influence on Pleshcheev in those days, about whom the poet later spoke of as a man of "strong will and an extremely honest character."

The Petrashevites paid considerable attention to political poetry, discussing issues of its development on Fridays. It is known that at a dinner in honor of Charles Fourier, a translation of "Les fous" by Beranger, a work dedicated to the utopian socialists, was read. Pleshcheev not only took an active part in the discussions and creation of propaganda poems, but also delivered forbidden manuscripts to the circle members. Together with N.A.Mordvinov, he took up the translation of a book by the ideologist of utopian socialism F.-R. de Lamennais The Word of the Believer, which was supposed to be printed in an underground printing house.

In the summer of 1845, Pleshcheev left the university due to his financial constraints and dissatisfaction with the very process of education. After leaving the university, he devoted himself exclusively to literary activity, but did not leave hopes of completing his education, intending to prepare the entire university course and take it as an external student. At the same time, he did not interrupt contacts with the members of the circle; Petrashevites often met at his home; Pleshcheev was perceived by them as "a poet-fighter, their own Andre Chenier."

In 1846 the first collection of the poet's poems was published, which included the popular poems "At the Call of Friends" (1845), as well as "Forward! without fear and doubt ... "(nicknamed" the Russian Marseillaise ") and" By the feelings of brothers, we are with you "; both poems became hymns for the revolutionary youth. The slogans of the Pleshcheev hymn, which subsequently lost their sharpness, had a very specific content for the poet's peers and associates: the "teaching of love" was deciphered as the teaching of the French socialists-utopians; "Valiant feat" meant a call to public service, etc. N. G. Chernyshevsky later called the poem "a wonderful hymn", N. A. Dobrolyubov characterized it as "a bold call, full of such faith in himself, faith in people, faith to a better future ”. Pleshcheev's poems had a wide public response: they "began to perceive him as a poet-fighter."

V. N. Maikov, in his review of the first collection of poems by Pleshcheev, wrote with special sympathy about the poet's faith in "the triumph of truth, love and brotherhood on earth", calling the author "our first poet at the present time": "Poems to the Maiden and the Moon are over forever ... Another era is coming: doubt and endless torment of doubt, suffering with universal human issues, bitter lamentation for the shortcomings and calamities of humanity, for the disorder of society, complaints about the trifles of modern characters and the solemn recognition of their insignificance and powerlessness, imbued with lyrical pathos to the truth ... the position in which our poetry has been since the death of Lermontov, Mr. Pleshcheev is undoubtedly our first poet at the present time ... He, as can be seen from his poems, took up the work of a poet by vocation, he strongly sympathizes with the issues of his time, suffers from all the ailments of the century, painfully tormented by the imperfections of society ... "

Poems and stories by A. Pleshcheev, who in those years was charged with faith in the coming kingdom of "humanistic cosmopolitanism" (in the words of Maikov), were also published in Otechestvennye zapiski (1847-1849).

Pleshcheev's poetry turned out to be in fact the first literary reaction in Russia to the events in France. In many ways, this is precisely why his work was so appreciated by the Petrashevists, who set as their immediate goal the transfer of revolutionary ideas to domestic soil. Subsequently, Pleshcheev himself wrote in a letter to A.P. Chekhov: And for our brother - a man of the second half of the 40s - France is very close to our hearts. At that time it was not allowed to poke one's nose into domestic politics - and we were brought up and developed on French culture, on the ideas of 48 years. You will not destroy us ... In many ways, of course, I had to be disappointed later - but we remained faithful to many things

A. Pleshcheev to A. Chekhov, 1888.

The poem "New Year" ("Clicks are heard - congratulations ..."), published with a "conspiratorial" subtitle "Cantata from Italian", was a direct response to the French Revolution. Written at the end of 1848, it could not deceive the vigilance of the censorship and was published only in 1861.

In the second half of the 1840s, Pleshcheev began to publish as a prose writer: his stories “The Raccoon Fur Coat. The story is not without morality "(1847)," Cigarette. True incident "(1848)," Protection. Experienced history "(1848) were noticed by the critics, who discovered in them the influence of N. V. Gogol and attributed them to the" natural school ". During these years, the poet wrote the stories "Prank" (1848) and "Friendship Councils" (1849); in the second of them, some motifs of the story "White Nights" by FM Dostoevsky, dedicated to Pleshcheev, were developed.

In the winter of 1848-1849, Pleshcheev arranged meetings of the Petrashevists at his home. They were attended by F. M. Dostoevsky, M. M. Dostoevsky, S. F. Durov, A. I. Palm, N. A. Speshnev, A. P. Milyukov, N. A. Mombelli, N. Ya. Danilevsky (future conservative author of the work "Russia and Europe"), PI Lamansky. Pleshcheev belonged to the more moderate part of the Petrashevites. He was left indifferent by the speeches of other radical speakers who replaced the idea of \u200b\u200ba personal God with "truth in nature", rejected the institution of family and marriage and professed republicanism. He was alien to extremes and sought to harmonize his thoughts and feelings. The fervent passion for new socialist beliefs was not accompanied by a decisive rejection of his old faith and only merged the religion of socialism and the Christian doctrine of truth and love for one's neighbor into a single whole. No wonder he took the words of Lamennais as his epigraph to the poem "Dream": “The earth is sad and dried up, but it will turn green again. The breath of an evil person will not forever sweep over her like a scorching breath. "

In 1849, while in Moscow (house No. 44 on 3rd Meshchanskaya Street, now Shchepkina Street), Pleshcheev sent FM Dostoevsky a copy of Belinsky's letter to Gogol. The police intercepted the message. On April 8, on the denunciation of the provocateur P. D. Antonelli, the poet was arrested in Moscow, sent under guard to St. Petersburg and spent eight months in the Peter and Paul Fortress. 21 people (out of 23 convicted) were sentenced to death; among them was Pleshcheev.

On December 22, along with the rest of the convicted Petrashevists, A. Pleshcheev was brought to the Semyonovsky parade ground to a special scaffold of the civil execution. A dramatization followed, which was later described in detail by F. Dostoevsky in the novel The Idiot, after which the decree of Emperor Nicholas I was read, according to which the death penalty was replaced by various terms of exile to hard labor or to prison companies. A. Pleshcheev was first sentenced to four years in hard labor, then transferred to a private in Uralsk in the Separate Orenburg Corps.

On January 6, 1850, Pleshcheev arrived in Uralsk and was enlisted as an ordinary soldier in the 1st Orenburg line battalion. On March 25, 1852, he was transferred to Orenburg in the 3rd line battalion. The poet's stay in the region lasted eight years, of which seven he remained in military service. Pleshcheev recalled that the first years of service were given to him with difficulty, in many respects because of the hostile attitude of the officers towards him. “At first, his life in the new place of exile was downright terrible,” testified M. Dandeville. He was not given leave, there could be no talk of creative activity. The steppes themselves made a painful impression on the poet. “This boundless steppe distance, breadth, callous vegetation, dead silence and loneliness are terrible,” wrote Pleshcheev.

The situation changed for the better after the poet began to be patronized by the Governor-General Count V.A.Perovsky, an old acquaintance of his mother. Pleshcheev got access to books, became friends with the family of Lieutenant Colonel (later - General) V.D.Dandeville, who was fond of art and literature (to whom he dedicated several poems of those years), with Polish exiles, Taras Shevchenko, who was in exile in the same area, one of the founders of the literary masks of Kozma Prutkov by A. M. Zhemchuzhnikov and the revolutionary poet M. L. Mikhailov.

In the winter of 1850, in Uralsk, Pleshcheev met Sigismund Serakovsky and his circle; they also met later, at Ak-Mosque, where both served. In the Serakovsky circle, Pleshcheev again found himself in an atmosphere of intense discussion of the same socio-political issues that worried him in St. Petersburg. “One exile supported the other. The highest happiness was being in the circle of your comrades. After the drill, there were often friendly interviews. Letters from the homeland, news brought by the newspapers, were the subject of endless discussion. None of them lost courage and hope for a return ... ”, - his participant Br. Zalessky. Serakovsky's biographer specified that the circle discussed "issues related to the liberation of the peasants and the allotment of land to them, as well as the abolition of corporal punishment in the army."

On March 2, 1853, Pleshcheev, at his own request, was transferred to the 4th line battalion, which was going on a dangerous steppe campaign. He took part in the Turkestan campaigns organized by Perovsky, in particular, in the siege and assault of the Kokand fortress Ak-Mechet). In a letter to his Orenburg friend, Pleshcheev explained this decision by the fact that "the goal of the campaign was noble - the protection of the oppressed, and nothing inspires as much as a noble goal." For bravery, he was promoted to non-commissioned officer, and in May 1856 he received the rank of ensign and with him - the opportunity to go into civil service. Pleshcheev resigned in December "with the renaming of collegiate registrars and with permission to enter the civil service, except for the capitals" and entered the service of the Orenburg border commission. Here he served until September 1858, after which he transferred to the office of the Orenburg civil governor. From the Orenburg Territory, the poet sent his poems and stories to magazines (mainly to the "Russian Bulletin").

In 1857, Pleshcheev married (to the daughter of the caretaker of the Iletsk salt mine, E.A. Rudneva): 12, and in May 1858 with his wife went to St. Petersburg, having received a four-month leave "to both capitals" and the return of the rights of hereditary nobility.

Renewal of literary activity

Already during the years of exile A. Pleshcheev again resumed his literary activity, although he was forced to write in fits and starts. Pleshcheev's poems began to be published in 1856 in the Russian Bulletin under the characteristic title: "Old Songs in a New Way". Pleshcheev of the 1840s was, according to M. L. Mikhailov, inclined towards romanticism; In the poems of the period of exile, romantic tendencies were preserved, but criticism noted that here the inner world of a person who "devoted himself to the struggle for the people's happiness" began to be explored deeper.

In 1857, several more of his poems were published in the Russian Bulletin. For researchers of the poet's work, it remained unclear which of them were really new, and which belonged to the years of exile. It was assumed that the translation of G. Heine "Life Path" (in Pleshcheev - "And laughter, and songs, and the sun shine! .."), published in 1858, is one of the latter. The same line of “loyalty to ideals” was continued by the poem “In the Steppe” (“But let my days pass without joy…”). An expression of the general sentiments of the Orenburg exiled revolutionaries was the poem "After reading the newspapers", the main idea of \u200b\u200bwhich - the condemnation of the Crimean War - was consonant with the sentiments of the Polish and Ukrainian exiles.

In 1858, after almost a ten-year hiatus, the second collection of Pleshcheev's poems was published. The epigraph to him, the words of Heine: "I was not able to sing ...", indirectly indicated that in exile the poet was almost not engaged in creative activity. Poems dated 1849-1851 have not survived at all, and Pleshcheev himself admitted in 1853 that he had long "lost the habit of writing." The main theme of the collection of 1858 was "pain for an enslaved homeland and faith in the righteousness of one's cause", the spiritual enlightenment of a person who refuses a thoughtless and contemplative attitude to life. The collection opened with the poem "Dedication", which in many respects echoed the poem "And laughter, and songs, and the sun shine! ..". Among those who sympathetically appreciated Pleshcheev's second collection was N. A. Dobrolyubov. He pointed to the socio-historical conditioning of dreary intonations by the circumstances of life, which "hideously break the noblest and strongest personalities ...". "In this respect, the talent of Mr. Pleshcheyev was filled with the same stamp of a bitter consciousness of his powerlessness before fate, the same color of 'painful melancholy and joyless thoughts' that followed the ardent, proud dreams of youth," the critic wrote.

In August 1859, after a short return to Orenburg, A. N. Pleshcheev settled in Moscow (under the "strictest supervision") and devoted himself entirely to literature, becoming an active contributor to the Sovremennik magazine. Taking advantage of his Orenburg acquaintance with the poet M. L. Mikhailov, Pleshcheev established contacts with the updated editorial staff of the journal: with N. A. Nekrasov, N. G. Chernyshevsky, N. A. Dobrolyubov. Among the publications where the poet published poems were also Russkoe Slovo (1859-1864), Vremya (1861-1862), the Vek newspaper (1861), Den (1861-1862) and Moskovsky Vestnik "(Editorial position in which he held in 1859-1860), St. Petersburg publications (" Svetoch "," Iskra "," Time "," Russian Word "). On December 19, 1859, the Society of Russian Literature Lovers elected A. Pleshcheev as a full member.

At the end of the 1850s, A. Pleshcheev turned to prose, first to the genre of the story, then published several stories, in particular, "Inheritance" and "Father and Daughter" (both - 1857), partly autobiographical "Budnev" (1858) , "Pashintsev" and "Two Careers" (both - 1859). The main target of the prose writer Pleshcheev's satire was pseudo-liberal accusation and romantic epigonism, as well as the principles of "pure art" in literature (the story "Literary Evening"). Dobrolyubov wrote about the story “Pashintsev” (published in the “Russian Bulletin” 1859, No. 11 and 12): “The social element permeates them constantly and this distinguishes them from many colorless stories of the thirties and fifties ... he is bound by his environment, as this world gravitates over him with its demands and relations - in a word, you see in the hero a social being, and not a solitary one. "

"Moskovsky Vestnik"

In November 1859, Pleshcheev became a shareholder of the newspaper Moskovsky Vestnik, in which I.S.Turgenev, A.N. Ostrovsky, M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, I.I. Lazhechnikov, L.N. Tolstoy and N.G. Chernyshevsky. Pleshcheev energetically invited Nekrasov and Dobrolyubov to participate and fought to shift the newspaper's political orientation sharply to the left. He defined the task of the publication as follows: “Any nepotism aside. We must beat the serf-owners under the guise of liberals. "

The publication in the Moskovsky Vestnik of TG Shevchenko's Dream translated by Pleshcheev (published under the title The Reaper), as well as the poet's autobiography, was regarded by many (in particular, Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov) as a bold political act. Under the leadership of Pleshcheev, Moskovsky Vestnik became a political newspaper supporting the position of Sovremennik. In turn, “Sovremennik” in “Notes of a New Poet” (II Panaev) positively assessed the direction of Pleshcheev’s newspaper, directly recommending that its reader pay attention to the translations from Shevchenko.

1860s

Collaboration with Sovremennik continued until its closure in 1866. The poet has repeatedly declared his unconditional sympathy for the program of the magazine Nekrasov, articles by Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov. “I have never worked so much and with such love as at the time when all my literary activity was devoted exclusively to the magazine headed by Nikolai Gavrilovich and whose ideals were and always remained my ideals,” the poet later recalled.

Nekrasov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, A.F. Pisemsky, A.G. Rubinstein, P.I.Tchaikovsky, actors of the Maly Theater attended literary and musical evenings in Moscow in the house of Pleshcheev. Pleshcheev was a member and was elected as an elder of the "Artistic circle".

In 1861, Pleshcheev decided to create a new journal, Foreign Review, and offered Mikhail Mikhailov to participate in it. A year later, together with Saltykov, A. M. Unkovsky, A. F. Golovachev, A. I. Evropyus and B. I. Utin, he developed a draft of the journal Russkaya Pravda, but in May 1862 he was refused permission from the journal. At the same time, an unfulfilled plan arose to purchase the already published Vek newspaper.

Pleshcheev's position on the reforms of 1861 changed over time. At first, he received the news about them with hope (evidence of this is the poem "You poor labored, not knowing rest ..."). Already in 1860, the poet rethought his attitude to the liberation of the peasants - largely under the influence of Chernyshevsky and Dobrolyubov. In letters to EI Baranovsky, Pleshcheev noted: the "bureaucratic and plantation parties" are ready to give up the "poor peasant as a sacrifice to bureaucratic robbery", renouncing the previous hopes that the peasant "will free himself from the heavy landlord's paw."

Period of political activity

Pleshcheev's poetry in the early 1860s was marked by the predominance of socio-political, civic themes and motives. The poet tried to appeal to a wide democratic audience; propaganda notes appeared in his poetic works. He finally stopped working with the "Russian Bulletin" and personal communication with M. N. Katkov, moreover, began to openly criticize the direction headed by the latter. "Damned questions of reality are the true content of poetry," the poet argued in one of his critical articles, calling for the politicization of the publications in which he participated.

Typical in this sense poems were "Prayer" (a kind of reaction to the arrest of M. L. Mikhailov), dedicated to Nekrasov's poem "New Year", in which (as in "Anger has boiled in my heart ...") liberals with their rhetoric were criticized. One of the central themes in Pleshcheev's poetry at the beginning of the 1860s was the theme of the citizen-soldier, revolutionary feat. The poet in Pleshcheev's poems is not the former "prophet" suffering from misunderstanding of the crowd, but a "warrior of the revolution." The poem "Honest people on a thorny road ...", dedicated to the Chernyshevsky trial ("Let not weave victorious wreaths for you ...") had a direct political significance.

The poems “Towards Youth” and “False Teachers”, published in Sovremennik in 1862, were also political in nature and were associated with the events of the fall of 1861, when the arrests of students were met with complete indifference of the broad masses. From Pleshcheev's letter to A. N. Supenev, to whom the poem "Towards Youth" was sent to Nekrasov, it is clear that on February 25, 1862, Pleshcheev read "Towards Youth" at a literary evening in favor of twenty expelled students. The poet also took part in collecting money for the benefit of the injured students. In the poem "To Youth", Pleshcheev urged students "not to retreat in front of the crowd, to throw stones at the ready." The poem "To False Teachers" was a response to the lecture of BN Chicherin, delivered on October 28, 1861, and directed against the "anarchy of minds" and "violent rampant thoughts" of students. In November 1861, Pleshcheev wrote to AP Milyukov: Have you read Chicherin's lecture in Moskovskiye Vedomosti? No matter how little you sympathize with the students, whose antics are really often childish, but you must admit that you cannot help feeling sorry for the poor youth, condemned to listen to such flabby nonsense, such worn-out as soldier's trousers, commonplaces and windbag doctrinaire phrases! Is this a living word of science and truth? And this lecture was applauded by the associates of the venerable doctrinaire Babst, Ketcher, Schepkin and Co.

In the reports of the secret police in these years, A. N. Pleshcheyev still figured as a "conspirator"; it was written that although Pleshcheev "behaves very secretively", he is still "suspected of spreading ideas that disagree with the types of government." There were some grounds for such suspicion.

By the time A. N. Pleshcheev moved to Moscow, N. G. Chernyshevsky's closest associates were already preparing the creation of an all-Russian secret revolutionary organization. Many friends of the poet took an active part in its preparation: S. I. Serakovsky, M. L. Mikhailov, J. Stanevich, N. A. Serno-Solovievich, N. V. Shelgunov. For this reason, the police considered Pleshcheev as a full member of the secret organization. In the denunciation of Vsevolod Kostomarov, the poet was called a "conspirator"; it was he who was credited with creating the "Letter to the Peasants", the famous proclamation of Chernyshevsky.

It is known that on July 3, 1863, a note was drawn up in the III Department, informing that the poet-translator FN Berg had visited Pleshcheev at his dacha and had seen leaflets and typographic print on him. "Fyodor Berg responded that Pleshcheev ... is positively one of the leaders of the society" Earth and Freedom "", - said in the note. On July 11, 1863, a search was carried out at Pleshcheev's, which did not bring any results. In a letter to the head of the 1st expedition of the III Branch, F.F. Krantz, the poet was indignant about this, the presence in the house of portraits of Herzen and Ogarev, as well as several forbidden books, explaining literary interests. There is no exact data on Pleshcheev's participation in "Earth and Freedom". Many contemporaries believed that Pleshcheev not only belonged to a secret society, but also maintained an underground printing house, about which, in particular, PD Boborykin wrote. MN Sleptsova in her memoirs "Navigators of the Coming Storm" asserted that Pleshcheev was among the people who were part of "Earth and Freedom" and her personally acquaintances: "In the 60s he was in charge of the printing house in Moscow, where Young Russia, and, in addition, participated in the Russkiye Vedomosti, which had just begun then in Moscow, apparently as a foreign literature reviewer. He was a member of "Earth and Freedom", which for a long time connected him with Sleptsov ", - she said. These statements are indirectly confirmed by letters from Pleshcheev himself. Thus, on September 16, 1860, he wrote to FV Chizhov about his intention to "start a printing house". In a letter to Dostoevsky dated October 27, 1859, it was said: "I myself - although not alone - a printing house."

Literary activity in the 1860s

In 1860 two volumes of Pleshcheev's Tales and Stories were published; in 1861 and 1863 - two more collections of Pleshcheev's poems. The researchers noted that as a poet, Pleshcheev joined the Nekrasov school; against the background of the social upsurge of the 1860s, he created socially-critical, protest-invocatory poems ("O youth, youth, where are you?", "Oh, do not forget that you are in debt", "Boring picture!"). At the same time, in the nature of his poetry, he was close in the 1860s to NP Ogarev; the creativity of both poets developed on the basis of common literary traditions, although it was noted that Pleshcheev's poetry was more lyrical. Among his contemporaries, the prevailing opinion was that Pleshcheev remained a "man of the forties", somewhat romantic and abstract. "Such a mental disposition did not quite coincide with the character of the new people, the sober people of the sixties, who demanded deeds and, above all, deeds," noted N. Bannikov, the poet's biographer.

ND Khvoshchinskaya (under the pseudonym "V. Krestovsky" in a review of Pleshcheyev's collection of 1861, highly appreciating in retrospect the poet's work, who wrote "lively, warm modern things that made us sympathize with him", sharply criticized the "uncertainty" of feelings and ideas, in some poems capturing decadence, in some - sympathy for liberalism. ”Indirectly, Pleshcheev himself agreed with this assessment, in his poem“ Meditations ”he admitted about“ miserable disbelief ”and“ conviction of the futility of the struggle ... ”.

The researchers noted that in a new literary situation for Pleshcheev, it was difficult for him to develop his own position. "We need to say a new word, but where is it?" - he wrote to Dostoevsky in 1862. Pleshcheev sympathetically perceived various, sometimes polar socio-literary views: thus, while sharing some ideas of N. G. Chernyshevsky, at the same time he supported both the Moscow Slavophiles and the program of the Vremya magazine.

Literary earnings brought the poet a meager income, he led the existence of a "literary proletarian", as FM Dostoevsky called such people (including himself). But, as contemporaries noted, Pleshcheev behaved independently, remaining faithful to the "high humanistic Schiller idealism, assimilated in his youth." As Y. Zobnin wrote, “Pleshcheev, with the courageous simplicity of an exiled prince, endured the constant need of these years, huddled with his large family in tiny apartments, but did not give up his civil or literary conscience one iota.”

Years of frustration

In 1864 A. Pleshcheev was forced to enter the service and received the position of an auditor of the control chamber of the Moscow post office. “I was completely pounded by life. In my years to fight like a fish on the ice and wear a uniform, for which I never prepared, how hard it is, ”he complained two years later in a letter to Nekrasov.

There were other reasons for the sharp deterioration of the general mood of the poet, which was outlined by the end of the 1860s, and the predominance of feelings of bitterness and depression in his works. His hopes for popular action in response to reform suffered collapse; many of his friends died or were arrested (Dobrolyubov, Shevchenko, Chernyshevsky, Mikhailov, Serno-Solovievich, Shelgunov). The death of his wife on December 3, 1864 was a heavy blow for the poet. After the closure of the Sovremennik and Russkoe Slovo magazines in 1866 (the Dostoevsky brothers' magazines Vremya and Epoh were discontinued even earlier), Pleshcheev was among the group of writers who had practically lost the magazine platform. The main theme of his poems of this time was the exposure of betrayal and treason ("If you want it to be peaceful ...", "Apostaten-Marsch", "I feel sorry for those whose strength is dying ...").

In the 1870s, revolutionary sentiments in Pleshcheev's work acquired the character of reminiscences; characteristic in this sense, considered one of the most significant in his work, the poem "I walked quietly along a deserted street ..." (1877), dedicated to the memory of VG Belinsky. As if the poem "Without hopes and expectations ..." (1881), which was a direct response to the state of affairs in the country, would draw a line under a long period of disappointment and collapse of hopes.

Pleshcheev in St. Petersburg

In 1868, N. A. Nekrasov, becoming the head of the journal Otechestvennye zapiski, invited Pleshcheev to move to St. Petersburg and take the post of editorial secretary. Here the poet immediately found himself in a friendly atmosphere, among like-minded people. After the death of Nekrasov, Pleshcheev took over the leadership of the poetry department and worked in the magazine until 1884.

At the same time, together with V. S. Kurochkin, A. M. Skabichevsky, N. A. Demert, he became an employee of Birzhevye Vedomosti, a newspaper in which Nekrasov dreamed of secretly "following the views" of his main publication. After the closure of Otechestvennye zapiski, Pleshcheev contributed to the creation of a new magazine, Severny Vestnik, in which he worked until 1890.

Pleshcheev actively supported novice writers. He played a major role in the life of Ivan Surikov, who was begging and was ready to commit suicide; his life changed after the first publication arranged by Pleshcheev. Having tremendous influence in the editorial offices and publishing houses, Pleshcheev helped V. M. Garshin, A. Serafimovich, S. Ya. Nadson, A. Apukhtin. The most important role Pleshcheev played in the literary fate of D. S. Merezhkovsky during the years of his literary debut. The latter, as a relic, he kept in his archives a short note: “I invite<Литературного> Society of Semyon Yakovlevich Nadson (Krondstadt, corner of Kozelskaya and Kronstadtskaya, house of the Nikitins' heirs, Grigoriev's apartment) Dmitry Sergeevich Merezhkovsky (Znamenskaya, 33, apartment 9) A. Pleshcheev ". A deep friendship connected Pleshcheev with the novice A.P. Chekhov, whom Pleshcheev considered the most promising of the young writers. The poet greeted with admiration Chekhov's first major story "The Steppe".

In his bibliographic notes, Pleshcheev defended realistic principles in art, developing the ideas of VG Belinsky and the installation of "real criticism", primarily of NA Dobrolyubov. Each time, proceeding from the social significance of literature, Pleshcheev tried to reveal in his critical reviews the social meaning of the work, although he "relied, as a rule, on vague, too general concepts such as sympathy for the disadvantaged, knowledge of the heart and life, naturalness and vulgarity." In particular, this approach led him to underestimate the works of A. K. Tolstoy. As head of the literary department of the Severny Vestnik, Pleshcheev openly clashed with the populist group of the editorial board, primarily with NK Mikhailovsky, from whose criticism he defended Chekhov (especially his Steppe) and Garshin. Ultimately, Pleshcheev fell out with A. M. Evreinova ("... I do not intend to cooperate with her after her rude and impudent attitude towards me," he wrote to Chekhov in March 1890) and stopped working with the magazine.

Creativity of the 1880s

With the resettlement to the capital, Pleshcheev's creative activity resumed and did not stop almost until his death. In the 1870s-1880s, the poet was mainly engaged in poetic translations from German, French, English and Slavic languages. As the researchers noted, it was here that his poetic mastery was manifested to the greatest extent.

A. Pleshcheev translated major dramatic works ("Ratcliffe" by Heine, "Magdalene" by Goebbel, "Struensee" by M. Behr), poems by German poets (Heine, M. Hartmann, R. Prutz), French (V. Hugo, M. Monier ), English (J.G. Byron, A. Tennyson, R. Southey, T. Moore), Hungarian (S. Petofi), Italian (Giacomo Leopardi), works of the Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko and such Polish poets as S. Vitvitsky ("The grass turns green, the sun shines ...", from the collection "Rural Songs"), Anthony Sova (Eduard Zheligovsky) and Vladislav Syrokomlya.

A. Pleshcheev also translated fiction; some works ("The Belly of Paris" by E. Zola, "Red and Black" by Stendhal) were first published in his translation. The poet also translated scientific articles and monographs. In various journals, Pleshcheev published numerous compilation works on Western European history and sociology (Paul-Louis Courier, his life and works, 1860; The Life and Correspondence of Proudhon, 1873; The Life of Dickens, 1891), monographs about the work of W. Shakespeare, Stendhal, A. de Musset. In his journalistic and literary-critical articles, in many ways following Belinsky, he promoted democratic aesthetics, urged people to look for heroes in the people's environment capable of sacrificing themselves for the sake of common happiness.

In 1887, a complete collection of poems by A. N. Plescheev was published. The second edition, with some additions, was made after his death by his son, in 1894; later, Pleshcheev's Tales and Stories were also published.

A. N. Pleshcheev was actively interested in theatrical life, was close to the theatrical environment, he was familiar with A. N. Ostrovsky. At various times he held the positions of foreman of the Artistic Circle and chairman of the Society of Stage Figures, actively participated in the activities of the Society of Russian Drama Writers and Opera Composers, and often gave readings himself.

A. N. Pleshcheev wrote 13 original plays. Basically, these were small in volume and “entertaining” lyric-satirical comedies from the provincial landlord life. Theatrical performances based on his dramatic works "Service" and "There is a silver lining" (both - 1860), "Happy couple", "Commander" (both - 1862) "What often happens" and "Brothers" (both - 1864), and others) were performed in the leading theaters of the country. During these years, he reworked about thirty comedies by foreign playwrights for the Russian stage.

Children's literature

Children's poetry and literature occupied an important place in the work of Pleshcheev in the last decade of his life. His collections "Snowdrop" (1878) and "Grandfather's Songs" (1891) were successful. Some of the poems became textbooks ("The Old Man", "Grandmother and Granddaughter"). The poet took an active part in publishing, precisely in line with the development of children's literature. In 1861, together with FN Berg, he published a collection-reader "Children's Book", in 1873 (with N. A. Aleksandrov) - a collection of works for children's reading "For a holiday". Also, thanks to the efforts of Pleshcheev, seven school manuals were published under the general heading "Geographical Sketches and Pictures."

Researchers of Pleshcheev's work noted that Pleshcheev's poems for children are characterized by a striving for vitality and simplicity; they are filled with free colloquial intonations and real imagery, while maintaining general moods of social discontent (“I grew up with my mother in the hall ...”, “Boring picture”, “Beggars”, “Children”, “Native”, “Old people”, “Spring "," Childhood "," Old Man "," Grandmother and Granddaughter ").

Romances to verses by Pleshcheev

A. N. Pleshcheev was characterized by specialists as a "poet with a smoothly flowing, romance" poetic speech and one of the most "melodious lyric poets of the second half of the 19th century." About a hundred romances and songs were written on his poems - both by his contemporaries and by composers of subsequent generations, including N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov ("The night flew over the world"), M. P. Mussorgsky, C. A. Cui , A. T. Grechaninov, S. V. Rachmaninov.

Pleshcheev's poems and children's songs became a source of inspiration for PI Tchaikovsky, who appreciated their "soulful lyricism and spontaneity, emotion and clarity of thought." Tchaikovsky's interest in Pleshcheev's poetry was largely due to the fact of their personal acquaintance. They met in the late 1860s in Moscow in the Artistic Circle and maintained good friendly relations for the rest of their lives.

Tchaikovsky, who turned to Pleshcheev's poetry at different periods of his creative life, wrote several romances to the poet's verses: in 1869 - "Not a word, my friend ...", in 1872 - "Oh, sing the same song ...", in 1884 - "You are the only one ...", in 1886 - "Oh, if you knew ..." and "For us the meek stars shone ...". Fourteen songs by Tchaikovsky from the cycle "Sixteen Songs for Children" (1883) were created on verses from Pleshcheev's collection "Snowdrop"

“This work is easy and very pleasant, because I took the text Pleshcheev's Snowdrop, where there are many lovely little things,” the composer wrote while working on this cycle to MI Tchaikovsky. In the House-Museum of PI Tchaikovsky in Klin, in the composer's library there is a collection of Pleshcheev's poems “Snowdrop” with the poet's dedication: “To Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a sign of affection and gratitude for his wonderful music to my bad words. A. N. Pleshcheev. 1881 February 18th St. Petersburg ".

A. N. Pleshcheev and A. P. Chekhov

Pleshcheev became an admirer of Chekhov even before he met him personally. Memoirist Baron N. V. Drizen wrote: “As I now see the fine, almost biblical figure of the elder - the poet A. N. Pleshcheev, talking with me about the book In the twilight, just published by Suvorin. “When I read this book,” said Pleshcheev, “Ivan Turgenev's shadow was invisibly hovering before me. The same pacifying poetry of the word, the same wonderful description of nature ... "He especially liked the story" Holy Night "."

Pleshcheev's first acquaintance with Chekhov took place in December 1887 in St. Petersburg, when the latter, together with I. L. Leontyev (Shcheglov), visited the poet's house. Shcheglov later recalled this first meeting: “… less than half an hour had passed since the dear Alexei Nikolaevich was at Chekhov's place in complete 'mental captivity' and was worried in turn, while Chekhov quickly entered his usual philosophical and humorous mood. If someone had dropped by by chance into Pleshcheev's office, he probably would have thought that old close friends were talking… ”. A month later, an intense friendly correspondence began between new friends, which lasted five years. In letters to his other acquaintances, Chekhov often called Pleshcheyev “grandfather” and “padre”. At the same time, he himself was not an admirer of Pleshcheev's poetry and did not hide his irony towards those who idolized the poet.

Chekhov wrote the story "The Steppe" in January 1888 for the Severny Vestnik; at the same time, he shared his thoughts and doubts in letters in detail (“I am shy and afraid that my Steppe will come out insignificant ... Frankly speaking, I squeeze out of myself, I strain and pout, but still, in general, it does not satisfy me, although in some places it comes across her poetry in prose "). Pleshcheev became the first reader of the story (in manuscript) and repeatedly expressed delight in letters (“You have written or almost wrote a great thing. Praise and honor to you! .. It hurts me that you have written so many lovely, truly artistic things - and are less famous, than writers unworthy to untie the belt at your feet ”).

First of all, Chekhov sent to Pleshcheev stories, novellas and the play "Ivanov" (in the second edition); shared in correspondence the idea of \u200b\u200bthe novel, on which he worked in the late 1880s, he was given the first chapters to read. On March 7, 1889, Chekhov wrote to Pleshcheev: "I will dedicate my novel to you ... in my dreams and in my plans my best piece is dedicated to you." Pleshcheev, highly appreciating internal independence in Chekhov, was frank with him himself: he did not hide his sharply negative attitude towards Novoye Vremya and even to Suvorin himself, with whom Chekhov was close.

In 1888, Pleshcheev visited Chekhov in Sumy (the Lintvarevs' dacha on Luka), and the latter spoke about this visit in a letter to Suvorin:

is he<Плещеев> he is sluggish and senile lazy, but this does not prevent the fair sex from rolling him on boats, taking him to neighboring estates and singing romances to him. Here he portrays himself the same as in Petersburg, that is, an icon, which is prayed for being old and once hung next to miraculous icons. Personally, in addition to being a very good, warm and sincere person, I see in him a vessel full of traditions, interesting memories and good commonplaces.

Memories of Pleshcheev's visit to the dacha on Luka were left by Mikhail Chekhov.

Pleshcheev criticized Chekhov's "Namedays", in particular, its middle part, with which Chekhov agreed ("... I wrote it lazily and carelessly. Getting used to small stories consisting only of the beginning and end, I miss and start to chew when I feel that I am writing the middle "), then he sharply spoke about the story" Leshy "(which had been praised by Merezhkovsky and Urusov). On the contrary, the story "Boring Story" was awarded the highest praise.

The correspondence began to come to naught after Chekhov, having gone to Tyumen, did not respond to several letters from the poet, however, and after receiving the inheritance and then moving to Paris, Pleshcheev continued to describe in detail his life, illness and treatment. A total of 60 letters from Chekhov and 53 letters from Pleshcheev have survived. The first publication of the correspondence was prepared by the poet's son, writer and journalist Alexander Alekseevich Pleshcheev, and was published in 1904 by the Petersburg Diary of a Theater-Goer.

last years of life

For the last three years of his life, Pleshcheev was freed from worries about earnings. In 1890, he received a huge inheritance from a Penza relative of Alexei Pavlovich Pleshcheev and settled with his daughters in the luxurious apartments of the Paris hotel Mirabeau, where he invited all his literary friends and generously gave them large sums of money. According to the memoirs of Z. Gippius, the poet changed only outwardly (losing weight from the onset of the disease). The enormous wealth that suddenly fell on him "from heaven", he accepted "with noble indifference, remaining as simple and hospitable as the owner in a small cage on Preobrazhenskaya Square." “What is this wealth to me. That's just the joy that I was able to provide for the children, well, and he sighed a little ... before his death, "- this is how the poet conveyed his words. Pleshcheev himself took guests to the sights of Paris, ordered sumptuous dinners in restaurants and "most respectably asked" to accept from him an "advance payment" for travel - a thousand rubles.

The poet contributed a significant amount to the Literary Fund, established the Belinsky and Chernyshevsky Foundations to encourage talented writers, began to support the families of G. Uspensky and S. Nadson, and undertook to finance the journal of N.K. Mikhailovsky and V.G. Korolenko "Russian Wealth".

On January 2, 1892, from Nice, Pleshcheev wrote to Chekhov that his son Nikolai bought himself an estate in the Smolensk province, that in July in Lucerne his left arm and leg were taken away from him, he described in detail the consultations with famous doctors (including “... the famous Kusmaul, whom Botkin wrote to himself before his death "- the latter forbade him to return to Russia in winter), and also mentioned the treatment with" electricity and massage ":" ... But still far from a perfect amendment. I can't walk a lot or walk soon. I'm getting tired. Although I walk around with a stick. Shortness of breath and palpitations are very rare here. Quit smoking altogether. I drink a glass of wine at lunch and breakfast "- A. N. Pleshcheev - A. P. Chekhov. 2 (14) January 1892, Nice.

Pleshcheev wrote that he avoids the beau monde, mentioning among those with whom communication gives him pleasure, only Professor M. Kovalevsky, zoologist Korotnev, Vice-Consul Yurasov, the Merezhkovsky couple.

In 1893, already seriously ill, A.N. Pleshcheev once again went to Nice for treatment and on the way on September 26 (October 8) 1893 died of apoplectic stroke. His body was transported to Moscow and buried in the cemetery of the Novodevichy Convent.

The authorities banned the publication of any "panegyric word" about the poet's death, but a huge crowd gathered at the farewell ceremony on October 6. The funeral, as contemporaries testified, was attended mainly by young people, including many still unknown writers, in particular, K. Balmont, who made a farewell speech over the coffin.

Reviews from critics and contemporaries

Researchers of the poet's work noted a huge resonance that had one of his first poems, "Forward", which laid the foundation for "the social, civil side of his poetry ...". It was noted, first of all, the strength of Pleshcheev's civic position, the complete correspondence of personal qualities to the ideals they proclaimed. Peter Veinberg, in particular, wrote: “Pleshcheev's poetry is in many ways an expression and reflection of his life. He belongs to the category of poets with a completely definite character, the essence of which is exhausted by some one motive, grouping around itself its modifications and ramifications, always preserving, however, the fundamental foundation inviolable. In Pleshcheyev's poetry, this motif is humanity in the broadest and noblest sense of the word. Applied mainly to the social phenomena surrounding the poet, this humanity naturally had to take on an elegiac character, but his sadness is always accompanied by an unshakable faith in the victory - sooner or later - of good over evil ... "

P. Weinberg.

At the same time, many critics reservedly evaluated the early works of A. Pleshcheev. It was noted that it was "tinged with the ideas of socialist utopianism"; traditional romantic motives of disappointment, loneliness, melancholy "were interpreted by him as a reaction to social ill-being", in the context of the theme of "holy suffering" of the lyric hero ("Dream", "Wanderer", "At the Call of Friends"). The humanistic pathos of Pleshcheev's lyrics was combined with a prophetic tone characteristic of the moods of utopians, nourished with the hope of “seeing the eternal ideal” (To the Poet, 1846). Belief in the possibility of a harmonious world order, expectation of imminent changes were expressed in the most famous poem by P., extremely popular among Petrashevists (as well as among the revolutionary-minded youth of the next generations, "Forward! Without fear and doubt ..." (1846).

Writers and critics associated with the social democratic movement were often skeptical about the pessimistic moods that prevailed in the poet's poetry after his return from exile. However, the same Dobrolyubov, noting that in Pleshcheev's poems one can hear "some kind of internal heavy grief, a sad complaint of a defeated soldier, sadness about the unfulfilled hopes of his youth", nevertheless noticed that these moods had nothing to do with "the plaintive groans of the crying piet of the former time ". Noting that such a transition from the initial elevation of hopes to disappointment is generally characteristic of the best representatives of Russian poetry (Pushkin, Koltsov, etc.), the critic wrote that “... the poet's sadness about the failure to fulfill his hopes is not devoid of ... social significance and gives the poems of Mr. Pleshcheev the right to be mentioned in the future history of Russian literature, even completely regardless of the degree of talent with which this sadness and these hopes are expressed in them. "

Critics and writers of later generations evaluated the poet's minor intonations somewhat differently, finding them in tune with the time in which he lived. “He kept the torch of thought on a rainy day. Sobs sounded in his soul. His stanzas contained the sound of native sorrow, the dull groan of distant villages, a call for freedom, a gentle sigh of greetings and the first ray of the coming dawn, ”K. Balmont wrote in his posthumous dedication.

A. N. Pleshcheev was not an innovator of the form: his poetic system, formed in line with the Pushkin and Lermontov traditions, was based on stable phrases, established rhythmic-syntactic schemes, a well-developed system of images. Some critics saw this as evidence of genuine taste and talent, while others gave reason to call some of his poems "colorless", accuse him of "lack of independence" and "monotony." At the same time, contemporaries, for the most part, highly appreciated the "social significance" of Pleshcheev's poetry, its "noble and pure direction", deep sincerity, a call to "honest service to society."

Pleshcheev was often reproached for being carried away by abstract concepts and bombastic metaphors ("To all the enemies of black untruths who rise up against evil", "The sword of the peoples is stained," "But high aspirations were brought to the sacrifice of human vulgarity ..."). At the same time, the poet's supporters noted that didactism of this kind was a form of Aesop's speech, an attempt to bypass censorship. M. Mikhailov, who at one time criticized Pleshcheev, wrote already in 1861 that "... Pleshcheev had only one power left - the power of calling for honest service to society and neighbors."

Over the years, critics have paid more and more attention to the individual, "special purity and transparency of Pleshcheev's poetic language", sincerity and sincerity; the softening of the tones of his poetic palette, the emotional depth of outwardly extremely simple, artless lines.

Among literary historians of the 20th century, a negative assessment of Pleshcheev's work belongs to DP Svyatopolk-Mirsky; he wrote in the preface to the poetic anthology that Pleshcheev “introduces us to the true Sahara of poetic mediocrity and lack of culture”, and in his “History of Russian Literature” notes: “Civic poetry in the hands of its most significant representatives has become truly realistic, but ordinary citizenship bards are often were just as eclectic as the poets of "pure art", and in obedience to conventions they were still surpassed. Such, for example, is the flat and boring poetry of the very sweet and respectable A. N. Pleshcheev. "

Influences

Most often, critics attributed Pleshcheev's poetry to the Nekrasov school. Indeed, already in the 1850s, the poet began to appear poems, as if reproducing the satirical and social lines of Nekrasov's poetry ("Children of the century are all sick ...", 1858, etc.). The first all-encompassing satirical image of a liberal appeared in Pleshcheev's poem "My acquaintance" (1858); critics immediately noted that many of the attributes of imagery were borrowed from Nekrasov (a father who went bankrupt “on dancers,” the provincial career of a hero, etc.). The same denunciatory line continued in the poem "Lucky" ("Slander! I and a member of God-pleasing different societies. Philanthropists take five rubles every year from me.") An unusual symbiosis of Nekrasov's accusations and Turgenev's theme of "Superfluous Hero" appeared in the story "She and He "(1862).

The poet wrote a lot about the life of the people ("Boring picture", "Native", "Beggars"), about the life of the urban lower classes - "On the street". Impressed by the plight of NG Chernyshevsky, who had already been in Siberian exile for five years, the poem "I feel sorry for those whose strength is dying" (1868) was written. Nekrasov's influence was noticeable in everyday sketches and in Pleshcheev's folklore and poetic imitations (“I grew up with my mother in the hall ...”, 1860s), in poetry for children. For Nekrasov, Pleshcheev forever retained feelings of personal affection and gratitude. “I love Nekrasov. There are sides in him that involuntarily attract him, and for them you forgive him a lot. In these three or four years that I have been here<в Петербурге>, I had a chance to spend two or three evenings with him - the kind that leave a mark on my soul for a long time. Finally, I will say that I am personally indebted to him a lot ... ”, - he wrote to Zhemchuzhnikov in 1875. Some contemporaries, in particular M. L. Mikhailov, drew attention to the fact that Pleshcheev failed to create convincing pictures of the life of the people; the craving for the Nekrasov school was, for him, rather an unrealized tendency.

Lermontov motives

V.N.Maikov was one of the first who ranked Pleshcheev among the followers of Lermontov. Subsequently, modern researchers also wrote about this: V. Zhdanov noted that Pleshcheev, in a sense, “took over the baton” from Lermontov, one of the last poems of which told about the fate of the Pushkin prophet, who set out to bypass “seas and lands” (“I began to proclaim love / And pure teachings of truth: / At me all my neighbors / They threw stones madly ... "). One of the first published poems of Pleshcheev was "Duma", denouncing the public's indifference "to good and evil", consonant with Lermontov's theme ("Alas, he is rejected! The crowd in his words / Teachings of love and truth does not find ...").

The theme of the poet-prophet, borrowed from Lermontov, became the leitmotif of Plescheev's lyrics, expressing "a view of the role of the poet as a leader and teacher, and of art as a means of rebuilding society." The poem "Dream", which repeated the plot of Pushkin's "Prophet" (a dream in the desert, the appearance of a goddess, transformation into a prophet), according to V. Zhdanov, "allows us to say that Pleshcheev not only repeated the motives of his brilliant predecessors, but tried to give his own interpretation Topics. He strove to continue Lermontov, as Lermontov continued Pushkin. " Pleshcheev's prophet, who awaits "stones, chains, prison", inspired by the idea of \u200b\u200btruth, goes to people ("My fallen spirit has risen ... and the oppressed again / I went to proclaim freedom and love ..."). From the Pushkin and Lermontov sources comes the theme of personal, family happiness, unfolded in the poetry of the Petrashevists, and in the work of Pleshcheev received a new interpretation: as the theme of the tragedy of a marriage that breaks love ("Bay"), as a preaching of "reasonable" love based on the similarity of views and beliefs ("We are close to each other ... I know, but alien in spirit ...").

Like-minded people and followers

Critics noted that in the nature and nature of his poetic activity, Pleshcheev in the 1860s was closest to N.P. Ogarev. He himself insisted on this creative "relationship". On January 20, 1883, the poet wrote to S. Ya. Nadson that P. I. Weinberg, in his report on him, “approached the topic perfectly, combining me in his characterization with Ogarev”. The landscape and landscape-philosophical lyrics of Pleshcheev were considered by critics as "interesting", but rational and in many ways secondary, in particular, in relation to the work of A. A. Fet.

Researchers of the 20th century have already noted that the idea of \u200b\u200bPleshcheev, implanted by the liberal press, as a “poet of the 40s” who outlived his time, or a Nekrasovian epigone, was largely motivated by political intrigues and a desire to belittle the authority of a potentially dangerous, oppositional author. Biographer N. Bannikov noted that Pleshcheev's poetic work was developing; in his later poems there was less romantic pathos, more - on the one hand, contemplation and philosophical reflections, on the other - satirical motives ("My friend", "Happy"). Such protest works of the poet as "Honest people, thorny dear ...", "I feel sorry for those whose strength is dying" had a completely independent value; poems that ridiculed the "superfluous people" who were degraded in their passive "opposition" (the poetic story "She and He", the poem "Children of the Century are all sick ...", 1858).

Critics noted that Pleshcheev's poetry was clearer and more specific than the civil lyrics of the 60-70s of Ya. P. Polonsky and AM Zhemchuzhnikov, although some lines of creativity of the three poets intersected. The lyrics of Polonsky (as noted by M. Polyakov) were alien to the pathos of revolutionary duty; unlike Pleshcheev, who blessed the revolutionary, he lived with the dream of “overpowering time - going into prophetic dreams” (“Muse”). Closer to the poetic system of Pleshcheev, the lyrics of "civil motives" AM Zhemchuzhnikov. But their commonality was expressed rather in what constituted (in the opinion of the revolutionary democrats) the weak side of Pleshcheev's poetry. The resemblance to Zhemchuzhnikov was due to the ideological "vagueness" and sentimental didacticism of some of Pleshcheev's poems, mainly from 1858-1859. The motives of civil repentance, the allegorical perception of nature, brought both of them together. Zhemchuzhnikov's clearly liberal position (in particular, the latter's recognition of the ideals of "pure poetry") was alien to Pleshcheev.

The most obvious and brilliant follower of Pleshcheev was S. Ya. Nadson, who in the same tones protested against the “kingdom of Baal”, praised the shedding of “the righteous blood of the fallen fighters,” using a similar didactic style, symbols and signs. The main difference was that the feelings of despair and doom in Nadson's poetry took on an almost grotesque form. It was noted that Pleshcheev's poetry had a noticeable influence on N. Dobrolyubov's poems of 1856-1861 (“When a bright ray of knowledge penetrated the darkness of ignorance ...”), on the work of P.F. Yakubovich, early N.M. Minsky, I. Z. Surikov, V. G. Bogoraz. A direct retelling of Pleshcheev was the poem by G. A. Machtet, "Forgive the last!", F. V. Volkhovsky ("Friends"), S. S. Sinegub ("To the bust of Belinsky"), P. L. Lavrov were quoted from his poem "Forward!" used part of Pleshcheev's program poem.

In the 1870s, Pleshcheev's landscape poetry developed; the poems were filled with "sparkling tints of colors", accurate descriptions of the elusive movements of nature ("Ice shackles do not weigh on the sparkling waves", "I see the vault of heavens transparent blue, huge mountains jagged peaks"), which was interpreted by experts as the influence of A. A. Fet ... Pleshcheev's landscape lyrics, however, in one way or another served as a symbolic interpretation of the motives of public life and ideological quests. The “Summer Songs” cycle, for example, was based on the idea that the harmony of nature opposes the world of social contradictions and injustice (“A Boring Picture”, “Motherland”). Unlike Fet and Polonsky, Pleshcheev did not experience a conflict in the separation of two themes: landscape and civil.

Criticism from the left

Pleshcheev was criticized not only by liberals, but also - especially in the 1860s - by radical writers, whose ideals the poet tried to match. Among the poems that gave out, in the opinion of critics, sympathy for liberal ideas, it was noted "You poor labored, not knowing rest ..." (from which it followed that the peasants, "obedient to fate", patiently carried "their cross, as a righteous man carries", but came "Time for the holy revival", etc.). This liberal "prayer" evoked a sharp response from Dobrolyubov, who, on the whole, was always sympathetic to the poet. He parodied (in the poem "From the Motives of Modern Russian Poetry") the liberal "praise" by Pleshcheev of the "Tsar-Liberator", which he saw as liberal. However, the parody was not published for ethical reasons. Dobrolyubov criticized Pleshcheev for "abstract didacticism" and allegorical images (entry in the critic's diary dated February 8, 1858).

Radical authors and publicists criticized Pleshcheev for what they considered to be excessive "broad-mindedness." Often he supported conflicting ideas and trends, sympathizing only with their "opposition"; the breadth of views "often turned into uncertainty of judgments."

N. A. Dobrolyubov about Pleshcheev's prose

Pleshcheev the prose writer was considered a typical representative of the "natural school"; he wrote about provincial life, denouncing bribe-takers, serf-owners and the pernicious power of money (story "Raccoon fur coat", 1847; "Cigarette", "Protection", 1848; stories "Prank" and "Friendship Councils", 1849). Critics noticed the influence of N.V. Gogol and N.A.Nekrasov in his prose works.

N. A. Dobrolyubov, reviewing in 1860 a two-volume edition, which included 8 stories by A. N. Plescheev, noticed that they “... were published in all our best journals and were read in their time. Then they forgot about them. The talk and controversy of his story never aroused either in the public or in literary criticism: no one praised them especially, but no one scolded them either. For the most part, they read the story and were satisfied; that was the end of the matter ... ”. Comparing Pleshcheev's stories and stories with the works of second-class writers of his contemporaries, the critic noted that "... the social element permeates them constantly and this distinguishes them from many colorless stories of the thirties and fifties."

The world of Pleshcheev's prose is the world of "petty officials, teachers, artists, small landowners, semi-secular ladies and young ladies." In the history of each hero of Pleshcheev's stories, however, a connection with the environment is noticeable, which "gravitates over him with its demands." This, according to Dobrolyubov, is the main merit of Pleshcheev's stories, however, it is not a unique merit, belonging to him "on a par with very many of the modern fiction writers." The dominant motive of Pleshcheev's prose, according to the critic, can be reduced to the phrase: "the environment seizes a person." However - A fresh and sane reader, when reading ... the stories of Mr. Pleshcheyev, the question immediately arises: what exactly do these well-meaning heroes want, why are they being killed? .. Here we do not find anything definite: everything is so vague, fragmentary, petty, that you will not deduce a common thought, you will not form an idea about the purpose of life of these gentlemen ... All that is good in them is a desire for someone to come, pull them out of the swamp in which they get stuck, put them on their shoulders and drag them in a clean and bright place. " - N. A. Dobrolyubov. "Goodwill and Action."

Describing the main character of the story of the same name, Dobrolyubov notes: “This Pashintsev is neither this nor that, neither day, nor night, nor darkness, nor light”, like many other heroes of stories of this kind, “does not represent a phenomenon at all; the whole environment that seizes him consists of exactly the same people. " The reason for the death of Gorodkov, the hero of the story "Benevolence" (1859), according to the critic, is "... His own naivety." Ignorance of life, uncertainty in the means and ends and poverty of means also distinguish Kostin, the hero of the story "Two Careers" (1859), who dies in consumption ("Immaculate heroes in Mr. Pleshcheev, like those of Mr. Turgenev and others, die of debilitating diseases ", - the author of the article ironically)," having done nothing anywhere; but we do not know what he could do in the world, even if he had not undergone consumption and was not continuously seized by the environment. " Dobrolyubov notes, however, the fact that the shortcomings of the poet's prose also have a subjective side: “If Mr. Pleshcheev, with exaggerated sympathy, draws us his Kostins and Gorodkovs, it is<следствие того, что> other, more sustained in practice types, in the same direction, have not yet been represented by Russian society. "

The value of creativity

It is believed that the significance of A. N. Pleshcheev's work for Russian and East European social thought significantly exceeded the scope of his literary and poetic talent. Since 1846, the works of the poet were regarded by critics almost exclusively in terms of socio-political significance. The collection of poems by A. N. Pleshcheev in 1846 became, in fact, a poetic manifesto of the Petrashevsky circle. In his article, Valerian Maikov, explaining what Pleshcheev's poetry was for people of the 40s, inspired by socialist ideals, put the latter at the center of modern poetry and was even ready to consider him as the direct successor of M. Yu. Lermontov. “In the miserable state of our poetry since the death of Lermontov, Mr. Pleshcheev is undoubtedly our first poet at the present time…”, he wrote.

Subsequently, it was precisely the revolutionary pathos of Pleshcheev's early poetry that determined the extent of his authority in revolutionary circles in Russia. It is known that in 1897 one of the first Social Democratic organizations, the South Russian Workers' Union, used the poet's most famous poem in its leaflet.

In January 1886, the celebration of the 40th anniversary of A. N. Plescheev's activity took place. This celebration was reacted with great sympathy not only to the old Petrashevsky comrades-in-arms (in particular, N. Kashkin, who wrote to the poet on April 12, 1886, that he followed the anniversary "with sincere joy and lively sympathy"). Participants in the revolutionary movement of the new generation reacted to this event even more vividly: some of them, in particular, the one who signed himself as the "editor of Otgoloskov", called the poet their teacher.

Pleshcheev was known and highly valued by the revolutionary democratic circles in Ukraine, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, where he was perceived exclusively as a political poet. The founder of the new Bulgarian literature, Petko Slaveikov, translated in 1866 “Forward! without fear and doubt ... ”, after which the verse became the anthem of the Bulgarian revolutionaries. Emanuel Vavra mentioned Pleshcheev, Shevchenko, Ogarev and Mikhailov among the "most honored, talented, really worth having" Slavic poets. In 1868, the Bulgarian revolutionary Lyuben Karavelov, in the Serbian magazine "Matitsa", put Plescheev among the greatest poets of our time. Demanding that the poetry that moves the people “forward” be “humanistic, truthful and reasonable,” he listed Burns, Byron, Beranger, Plescheev and Taras Shevchenko in one row. In 1893, the Slovenian writer Fran Celestin praised Pleshcheev's work. In 1871, the first translations of Pleshcheev were published in Ukraine. Since 1895, P.A.Grabovsky became his permanent translator here. Ivan Franko wrote about Pleshcheev that he "deserves a place in the galaxy of the most outstanding writers in Russian literature of the 1940s ..."

Meanwhile, in general, the significance of A. N. Pleshcheev's work was not limited to his contribution to the development of Russian revolutionary poetry. Critics noted that the poet had done an enormous amount of work (mainly on the pages of Otechestvennye zapiski and Birzhevye vedomosti), analyzing the development of European literature, accompanying publications with his own translations (Zola, Stendhal, the Goncourt brothers, Alphonse Daudet). Pleshcheev's poems for children ("On the Shore", "Old Man") are recognized as classical. Along with Pushkin and Nekrasov, he is considered one of the founders of Russian poetry for children.

Pleshcheev's translations

Pleshcheev's influence on poetry in the second half of the 19th century was largely due to his translations, which, in addition to artistic and socio-political significance: partly through poetry (Heine, Beranger, Barbier, etc.), revolutionary and socialist ideas penetrated into Russia. More than two hundred translated poems make up almost half of the entire poetic heritage of Pleshcheev. Modern criticism saw him as one of the greatest masters of poetic translation. “In our extreme conviction, Pleshcheev is even more a poet in translations than in the originals,” wrote the Vremya magazine, noting also that “in foreign authors he primarily seeks his thoughts and takes his good, wherever it may be ... ". Most of Pleshcheev's translations were from German and French. Many of his translations, despite specific liberties, are still considered textbooks (from Goethe, Heine, Rückert, Freiligrat).

Pleshcheev did not hide the fact that he did not see any special differences in the method of work on the translation and his own, original poem. He admitted that he uses translation as a means of propaganda of the ideas most important for this period, and in a letter to Markovich dated December 10, 1870, he directly indicated: “I prefer to translate those poets for whom the common human element prevails over the popular one, for whom culture has an effect. ! " The poet was able to find "democratic motives" even among poets of clearly expressed conservative views (Southey - early poems "Blenheim battle" and "Complaints of the poor"). Translating Tennyson, he especially emphasized the English poet's sympathy for the "fighter for an honest cause" ("Funeral Song"), for the people ("Queen of May").

At the same time, Pleshcheev often interpreted translation possibilities as a field of improvisation, in which he often departed from the original source. The poet freely altered, reduced or enlarged the translated work: for example, the poem by Robert Prutz “Did you look at the Alps at sunset…” from a sonnet turned into a triple quatrain; Syrokomli's large poem "Plowman to the Lark" ("Oracz do skowronku", 1851), which consisted of two parts, under the arbitrary title "Birdie" retold in an abbreviation (in the original 24 lines, in translation - 18). The poet considered the genre of poetic translation as a means of promoting new ideas. He freely interpreted, in particular, the poetry of Heine, often introducing his own (or Nekrasov's) ideas and motives there (translation of "Countess Godel von Gudelsfeld"). It is known that in 1849, when he visited Moscow University, the poet told his students that “... it is necessary to awaken self-awareness among the people, and the best means for this would be to translate foreign works into Russian, adapting to the common people’s way of speech, to distribute them in manuscripts … ”, And that a society has already emerged in St. Petersburg for this purpose.

Character and personal qualities

All those who left memories of Pleshcheev characterized him as a man of high moral qualities. Peter Weinberg wrote about him as a poet who “... amid the harsh and frequent impulses of reality, even exhausted under them, ... nevertheless continued to remain the purest idealist and called others to the same ideal service to humanity,” never betrayed himself, “ nowhere and never (as it was said in the poetic address on the occasion of his 40th anniversary) without sacrificing good feelings before the light.

“A man of the forties in the best sense of this concept, an incorrigible idealist,<Плещеев> he put his living soul, his meek heart into his songs, and that is why they are so beautiful, ”wrote the publisher P. V. Bykov. A. Blok, reflecting in 1908 about old Russian poetry, especially noted Pleshcheev's poems, which “awakened some sleepy strings, aroused high and noble feelings”.

Contemporaries and later researchers of creativity noted the extraordinary clarity of mind, integrity of nature, kindness and nobility of Pleshcheev; characterized him as a man who "was distinguished by the unclouded purity of the soul"; retained "despite all the dashing convicts and soldiers' decades ... a child's faith in the purity and nobility of human nature, and was always inclined to exaggerate the talent of the next debutant poet."

Z. Gippius, whom Pleshcheev "completely charmed" at the first personal meeting, wrote down her first impressions of him:

“He is a big, somewhat overweight old man, with smooth, rather thick hair, yellow-white (gray blond), and a magnificent, completely white beard that gently spreads over his waistcoat. Correct, slightly blurred features, a thoroughbred nose and seemingly harsh eyebrows ... but in the bluish eyes there is such a Russian softness, special, Russian, to the point of scattering, kindness and childishness that the eyebrows seem harsh on purpose "- Zobnin Yu. Merezhkovsky: Life and deeds.

Noting that, as if without effort, "wonderful poems for children" were coming out from the pen of A. Pleshcheev, N. Bannikov remarked: "Apparently, there was something in the poet's heart that easily opened the world of a child to him." As P. Bykov wrote, Pleshcheev "... was all reflected in his poetry, all with his pure, like crystal, conscience, fiery faith in goodness and people, with his whole personality ... deeply sympathetic, gentle, soft."

Researchers' findings

Numerous agitation poems were created among the Petrashevites, but only a few of them survived. Presumably, many of Pleshcheev's campaign poems also disappeared. There is an assumption that some of the unsigned works that appeared in the emigre collections of the Lute series may belong to Pleshcheev; these include the poem "The Righteous", marked: "S. Petersburg. January 18, 1847 ".

The poem "We feel brothers, you and I ..." (1846) was attributed to KF Ryleev for a long time. Its belonging to Pleshcheev was established in 1954 by E. Bushkants, who found out that the addressee was V.A.Milyutin (1826-1855), a member of the Petrashevsky circle, an economist, whose work Belinsky and Chernyshevsky paid attention to.

The poem "Autumn has come, the flowers have dried up ...", in all collections of children's poetry attributed to Pleshcheev, but absent in all collections of his works, does not really belong to Pleshcheev. As the literary critic MN Zolotonosov established, the author of this text is the inspector of the Moscow educational district Alexei Grigorievich Baranov (1844-1911), the compiler of the collection where this poem was first published.

The poem "I'm sorry for her ..." ("Give me your hand. I understand your sinister sadness ...") was published with a dedication to DA Tolstoy, with whom the poet was friends in his youth. Tolstoy, however, later acquired a reputation as a "reactionary" and even became the chief of the gendarme corps. In this regard, as it turned out later, A.A.Pleshcheev, the poet's son, urged P.V.

For a long time there was a debate about who could be addressed to the poem "S ... y" (1885), which began with the words: "Before you lies a wide new path ...". The most convincing was the version of S.A. Makashin, according to which Saltykov-Shchedrin was its addressee. In a magazine publication, it had a subtitle: "When entering the field." Pleshcheev appreciated Shchedrin as "a really huge talent", referred him to "the best people of his country."