For a long time, his biography was polished, creating the ideal image of a “people's chronicler.” Meanwhile, in the fate of Sholokhov one can find many inexplicable, sometimes paradoxical facts.

Nakhalyonok

He was illegitimate son the daughter of the serf peasant Anastasia Chernikova and the not-poor commoner Alexander Sholokhov. The Cossacks called such children “disenfranchised free spirits.” The mother was given in marriage against her will by her “benefactor,” the landowner Popova, to a middle-aged Cossack Stefan Kuznetsov, who recognized the newborn and gave him his last name. And for some time Sholokhov was indeed considered the son of a Cossack. But after the death of Stefan Kuznetsov, the mother was able to marry her lover, and the son changed his surname from Kuznetsov to Sholokhov. It is interesting that the Sholokhov family dates back to the end of the 15th century from the Novgorod peasant Stepan Sholokh and can be traced to the merchant Mikhail Mikhailovich Sholokhov, the writer’s grandfather, who settled on the Don in the mid-19th century. Until this time, the Sholokhovs lived in one of the Pushkar settlements in the Ryazan province, and in their status as gunners they were close to the Cossacks. According to some sources, the future writer was born on the Kruzhilin farm in the village of Vyoshenskaya, according to others - in Ryazan. Perhaps Sholokhov, a “non-resident” by blood, was not a Cossack, but he grew up in a Cossack environment and always felt like an integral part of this world, which he spoke about in such a way that the Cossacks, reading, howled: “Yes, it was about us!”

Plagiarism

Accusations of plagiarism haunted Sholokhov throughout his life. Even today it seems strange to many how a 23-year-old poorly educated person who does not have sufficient life experience, create the first book of "Quiet Don". The writer's long periods of silence only added fuel to the fire: the topic of creative infertility came up again and again. Sholokhov did not deny that his education was limited to 4 classes, but, for example, the vocational school did not prevent Gorky from becoming a classic of Russian literature, and his lack of education was never reproached for him. Sholokhov, indeed, was young, but I immediately remember Lermontov, who wrote “Borodino” at the age of 23. Another “argument”: the lack of an archive. But, for example, Pasternak did not keep drafts either. Did Sholokhov have the right to “years of silence”? Like any creative person, no doubt. Paradoxically, it was Sholokhov, whose name thundered throughout the world, who suffered such trials.

Shadow of Death

There were moments in Sholokhov’s biography that he tried to hide. In the 20s, Sholokhov was the “commissar” at the head of the food detachment. The entire detachment was captured by Makhno. Sholokhov expected to be shot, but after a conversation with his father he was released (perhaps due to his young age or thanks to the intercession of the Cossacks). True, Makhno allegedly promised Sholokhov the gallows at the next meeting. According to other sources, the dad replaced execution with whips. Sholokhov’s daughter, Svetlana Mikhailovna, said from her father’s words that there was no captivity: they walked and walked, got lost, and then there was a hut... They knocked. Makhno himself opened the door. According to another version, the Sholokhov detachment, accompanying a convoy with bread, was captured by Makhnovist reconnaissance. Today it is difficult to say how it really was. Another incident is also known: in the same years, Sholokhov received a stallion from one fist as a bribe. In those days, this was almost a common thing, but the denunciation followed Sholokhov. He was again threatened with execution. According to other sources, Sholokhov was sentenced to death for “abuse of power”: the young commissar did not tolerate formalism and sometimes underestimated the figures for the collected grain, trying to reflect the real situation. “I waited for two days to die, and then they came and released me.” Of course, they couldn’t just release Sholokhov. He owed his salvation to his father, who paid a substantial bail, and presented Sholokhov’s new metric to the court, according to which he was listed as 15 years old (and not almost 18 years old). They believed in the “enemy” at a young age, and the execution was replaced by a year in a juvenile colony. Paradoxically, for some reason Sholokhov, accompanied by a convoy, did not reach the colony, but ended up in Moscow.

The bride is not the wife

Sholokhov will stay in Moscow until the end of 1923, try to enter the workers' school, work as a loader, mason, laborer, and then return home and marry Maria Gromoslavskaya. True, initially Mikhail Alexandrovich allegedly wooed her younger sister, Lydia. But the girls’ father, a former Cossack ataman, advised the groom to take a closer look at the eldest and promised to make a man out of Sholokhov. Having heeded the urgent “recommendation,” Mikhail married the eldest, especially since by that time Maria was already working as an extra under the leadership of her future husband. The marriage “by order” will turn out to be happy - Sholokhov will become the father of four children and will live with Maria Petrovna for 60 years.

Misha - “counterpart”

“Quiet Don” will be criticized by Soviet writers, and White Guard emigrants will admire the novel. The chief of the GPU, Genrikh Yagoda, will remark with a grin: “Yes, Mish, you are still a counterman. Your “Quiet Don” is closer to the whites than to us.” However, the novel will receive Stalin's personal approval. Later, the leader will approve the novel about collectivization. He will say: “Yes, we carried out collectivization. Why be afraid to write about it?” The novel will be published, only the tragic title “With sweat and blood” will be replaced with a more neutral one - “Virgin Soil Upturned”. Sholokhov will be the only one to receive the Nobel Prize in 1965 with the approval of the Soviet government. Back in 1958, when nominating Boris Pasternak for the Prize, the Soviet leadership recommended that the Nobel Committee consider Sholokhov instead of Pasternak, who “as a writer does not enjoy recognition among Soviet writers.” The Nobel Committee, naturally, does not heed the “requests” - the prize will go to Pasternak, who will be forced to refuse it in his homeland. Later, in an interview for one of the French publications, Sholokhov would call Pasternak a brilliant poet and add something very seditious: “Doctor Zhivago” should not have been banned, but published. By the way, Sholokhov was one of the few who donated his prizes to good causes: the Nobel and Lenin prizes - for the construction of new schools, the Stalin prize - for the needs of the front.

Stalin's "favorite"

Even during his lifetime, Sholokhov became a classic. His name is well known far beyond the country's borders. He is called “Stalin’s favorite”, and behind his back he is accused of opportunism. Stalin really loved Sholokhov and created “good working conditions.” At the same time, Sholokhov was one of the few who was not afraid to tell Stalin the truth. With all directness, he described to the leader, including severe hunger, writing how “adults and children feed on everything, from carrion to oak bark.” Did Sholokhov create his works to order? Hardly. It is well known that Stalin once wished Sholokhov to write a novel in which “both heroic soldiers and great commanders would be depicted truthfully and vividly, as in The Quiet Don.” Sholokhov began a book about the war, but never got to the “great commanders”. There was no place for Stalin in the third book of “Quiet Don,” which was published on the leader’s 60th birthday. It seems that everyone is there: Lenin, Trotsky, the heroes of the War of 1812, but the “benefactor” remains behind the scenes. After the war, Sholokhov generally tries to stay away from the “powers of this world.” He refuses his post Secretary General Writers' Union and finally moved to Vyoshenskaya.

A dark spot on Sholokhov’s reputation will remain his participation in the trial of writers Sinyavsky and Daniel, who were accused of anti-Soviet activities. But before this, the writer either chose not to participate in such disgusting campaigns, or, on the contrary, tried to do everything possible to help. He will intercede with Stalin on behalf of Akhmatova, and after 15 years of oblivion, her book will be published. Sholokhov will save not only Lev Gumilyov, the son of Akhmatova, but also the son of Andrei Platonov, stand up for one of the creators of “Katyusha” Kleimenov, and deliver the actress Emma Tsesarskaya, the first performer of the role of Aksinya, from the camps. Despite numerous requests to speak in defense of Sinyavsky and Daniel, Sholokhov will deliver an indictment against the “werewolves” who dared to publish their anti-Soviet works abroad. Was this a sincere impulse or was it the result of a mental breakdown? I think it's the second one. All his life, Sholokhov heard accusations behind his back: talent was portrayed as fake, directness turned into reproaches of cowardice, loyalty to ideas was called corruption, and good deeds were called ostentation. The fate of Mikhail Sholokhov became a vivid reflection of the lives of millions of the writer’s contemporaries.

Why did Sholokhov decide to write his famous novel? How did he write it? On what material, on the basis of what knowledge? We talk about this and much more with a specialist - Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Moscow City Pedagogical University Sergei Vasiliev.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Today our guest is, well, I would like to believe, not just a well-known acquaintance, but our friend, Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Department of Russian Literature of the Moscow City Pedagogical University, Sergei Anatolyevich Vasiliev. Sergey Anatolyevich, hello.

S.VASILIEV: Good afternoon.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Thank you for devoting most of your day off to radio listeners of the Mayak radio station. Thank you.

S. VASILIEV: Thank you for giving such interesting topics, I hope that the conversation will be interesting.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I really want to talk about the great Russian writer, about Mikhail Sholokhov, to talk about the encyclopedia of the Russian Cossacks. And, you know, don’t draw parallels, that “War and Peace” is an encyclopedia of Russian life, an encyclopedia of the Don Cossacks. For me, to be honest, this is also such an encyclopedia of Russian life, “Quiet Flows the Don,” but also to interest our radio listeners not only in the great work, in case someone else hasn’t gotten around to reading the film adaptation, but also in the very life of the great writer. This is the only thing we can do. It’s simply impossible to talk about “Quiet Don” without talking about Sholokhov’s life.

S.VASILIEV: Yes, of course.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: “Quiet Don” and all, where does it come from? From where and where? Let's start from the very beginning. After all, Mikhail Sholokhov’s origins did not indicate that he would become a writer.

S.VASILIEV: How do you become writers?

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I don’t know, I’m not a writer.

S. VASILIEV: You can probably be from a literary family, but not become a writer. This is already, as they say, a writer by the grace of God, if this exists, it grows through a variety of circumstances. There are writers who never thought they would become writers; there are probably others who have studied this all their lives. For some, the gift opens at age 50 or later, so everything happens very differently.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, after all, it seems to me that it would be nice when a child is born into a highly educated family. Russian is not the new Norwegian. Where people speak Russian well, where a person gets a good education, he can get a good education. Sholokhov was born in hard time, well, and, in general, the family was missing stars from the sky.

S. VASILIEV: You know, at the village level, at the local level, or what, we are now talking about this, where everything sprouted from, his father Alexander Mikhailovich Sholokhov was a very cultured, educated person.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Quite educated.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, of course, he had a library. And he cared very much, I must say, Sholokhov’s biographers emphasize this, he cared very much about the education and upbringing of his son, this is very important. And about health, and about education, and about upbringing. The time was terrible, but Mikhail Alexandrovich studied in gymnasiums, including, and even when the revolution occurred, the Civil War began, so the family’s contribution...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: And he finished, he didn’t have time to finish, in my opinion?

S. VASILIEV: He didn’t have time to finish, he didn’t have time to complete the full course, yes. But he graduated from the Karginsky one-class parish men's school, he had previously had a wonderful teacher who left memories of him, Timofey Timofeevich Mrykhin, who prepared him for this school. Then he studied in gymnasiums, of course. He studied at the Shelaputin Gymnasium in Moscow, a wonderful building, today’s Kholzunov Lane, where the Main Military Prosecutor’s Office is located, amazing. It’s very pleasant to even pass by, since this is the style of the “Silver Age”.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: It’s better to pass by.

S.VASILIEV: Well, yes, of course, in this sense, yes. But he came for a different reason. He studied for about three years in Boguchar, Voronezh region, which is relatively close to his village, and for some time, several months, he studied at the gymnasium of the village of Veshenskaya, and then terrible battles began on the Don and his parents were forced to leave the central village for a farm Pleshakov, they were saved there.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Please explain, this is a very strange question, what is a village? We use this so often, people who do this, we don’t know what a village is. Does this have anything to do with the Cossack way of life or not? Stanitsa is something that is there where there is no church, that is, is it the name of the village?

S. VASILIEV: No, just the village, well, obviously from the word “stan”.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, of course.

S. VASILIEV: Once upon a time a former camp. The village of Veshenskaya comes from the word “veshki”, “milestones”, which are believed to have been there, located along the river, were landmarks, and so on. Here is one of the possible etymologies. The village, of course, definitely had a temple.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Oh, the village had a temple. That is, if there is a camp of a Cossack army, in general, some kind of Cossack association, of course, there should be a temple there.

S.VASILIEV: Of course.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: That is, this is not a village, but a village.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, this village is quite a large village. And a village differs from a village, first of all, in the presence of a temple. There were two of them in the village of Veshenskaya. One still survives of Michael the Archangel, heavenly patron Mikhail Alexandrovich, and he made efforts to save this temple in the 1930s. A main cathedral, Troitsky, in my opinion, it was destroyed.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I didn’t survive. A completely unimaginable somersault, in fact, he was practically a security officer, he was almost a security officer. Explain.

S.VASILIEV: No, no.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Here is the story of his unsuccessful, thank God, execution and imprisonment.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, he was a Soviet employee.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Who?

S. VASILIEV: Well, at first he was a statistician, then he completed courses and became a food tax inspector. And this was a position, as you understand...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Execution at this time.

S.VASILIEV: Yes, very difficult. There was already a tax in kind, it is believed that this was softer than the surplus appropriation system, when everything was absolutely taken away, but, in fact, the conditions were such that there was nothing to give away. And he was always a very brave person and thought about people, tried to help them, this, I think, is his main quality as a person. And in those difficult times, he wrote reports about how there was nothing to just take, that people had eaten the last roots, that they were brewing oak bark. And against this background, especially when he was faced with difficult situations, large families, for example, and so on, he did not overestimate, as someone might think, based on the formulation “exceeding official authority,” but, on the contrary, he underestimated these standards and took less, which, in fact, led to an official investigation of him, and this at that time, of course, was up to execution.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Execution, of course.

S.VASILIEV: Opinions are divided. One of the judges suggested shooting, the second, fortunately...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: For sabotage.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, this could be regarded as a state crime in such terrible, difficult times.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: And how did he manage to escape? Overall a fantastic story. As I understand it, it was difficult to get out of these dungeons, but he came out.

S. VASILIEV: These were not dungeons; fortunately, he was not transported anywhere, I repeat, to some capitals.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: It seems like they just brought an accusation.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, he was in prison for some time, but this, I repeat, was at the local level and it’s not like somewhere else...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: That is, this is not a prison, not a basement.

S.VASILIEV: No, fortunately, no.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, Russian literature is lucky, actually.

S.VASILIEV: Of course, and more than once. There is another story, some doubt its authenticity, but they write about it, there is an article about it in the Sholokhov Encyclopedia. So I would like to make one small insert, a digression about where we can get reliable information about Sholokhov. It is very important where we get this information, where we get the facts, what is the interpretation, what is the point of view.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: How we weed out myths.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, of course. And in this regard, on this moment The main publication is the Sholokhov Encyclopedia. It was published four years ago by the Synergy publishing house, in a publishing house, the project manager was Ernst Aleksandrovich Bessmertnykh, and Yuri Aleksandrovich Dvoryashin was the chairman of the editorial board. This is where we will see a systematic, very grounded approach to Sholokhov’s life and work. The State Museum-Reserve in the village of Veshenskaya most actively participated in the creation of this encyclopedia.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, of course.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, it is. And there, in particular, we will see in the chronicle of Sholokhov’s life and work, published there, this is an important book for those who want to understand. There are many interesting quotes there, archival publications are put into circulation. Episode with Makhno. It was Sholokhov, being a food inspector, and indeed a Soviet employee in general, who during the Civil War was also supposed to be a defender of Soviet power, to lead an armed struggle. And he wrote in one of his autobiographies that we were chasing gangs, gangs were chasing us, all this was as it should have been. Here it is based on one of the episodes, there are memoirs of Makhno’s chief of staff, a fragment has been published. He just ran into this army of Makhno, naturally, merciless and so on, but according to one version, the dad, having actually seen the teenager, decided to spare him. “We’ll shoot you next time,” he said, “if you get caught doing this again.” So, at least twice, yes, you are right, Russian literature is very lucky.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Dear friends, if you are really not just a poster boy, but really interested in Russian history, take an interest in the history of the Civil War. Not for a long time, for about six months, one of the main allies of the Red Workers' and Peasants' Army was Nestor Ivanovich Makhno on the Don. And his terrible military colossus with five hundred carts. The Tachanka is not the invention of the “Reds”, it is the invention of Nestor Ivanovich. Well, this is a separate story to which many programs can be devoted. And today we are talking about lofty things, about literature, I apologize, there will practically be a poster and a slogan here, about our great compatriot, about Mikhail Sholokhov. And soon we will approach the “Quiet Don”. Why was he drawn to write? So, without academicism, what do you think drew him to write? Again, this is magic, why Babel began to write, it is not clear why Sholokhov began to write? Why Pushkin is understandable, okay, probably understandable, they have been interested in this since childhood. Why?

S. VASILIEV: Apparently, this was his calling, his mission, his duty, his happiness as a person.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: But he himself didn’t say anything about this, no? There were no personal memories left of him, that’s why he began to write?

S. VASILIEV: He talked very enthusiastically about his plans in letters to his wife, for example, he talked a lot with friends. For him, it seems to me, it was natural and organic. It is unlikely that any goal can be fixed here. This we can see some or the most important consequences of what he began to write. And for him it was natural, like breathing, like living. The fact is that in the first year of Soviet power he was engaged in propaganda work, as it was called then, but, in fact, he eliminated illiteracy, even then he began teaching, one might say that his education, of course, more than allowed him. By the way, he consciously wanted to be a writer. And when he ended up in Moscow, he attended classes at the writers' association in the writers' dormitory on Plyushchikha, where Aseev, Shklovsky, and Brik taught, that is, such prominent figures, of course, of that time. And he studied, went to classes, attended seminars at the so-called “Bryusov Institute”. It did not exist for long, this is the predecessor, perhaps, of the Gorky Literary Institute, but this is a completely different institution. That is, the environment was very important for him. He was a member of the RAPP, communicated with the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers, that is, he immersed himself in this atmosphere, and he quickly realized this as the main work of his life. Well, when he was still doing so-called propaganda work, when he was still participating in such amateur propaganda theater, he was already writing plays. Moreover, as his teacher Mrykhin Timofey Timofeevich writes about this, he first passed them off as strangers, saying: “They are sending them to me from the village.” And at some point he opened up, misspoke, came running and said: “There is no inspiration, the third part is not working.”

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Oh, that’s it.

S. VASILIEV: And it probably begins with these amateur productions writing activity. Maybe something happened before. He loved to read. According to his recollections, he could retire to books and look for it, screaming even for children's boyish games was completely useless, he loved words so much, and read the classics. This is also a very important factor, probably. He was drawn to words from childhood, and not to pulp literature, but to classical literature. The entire list of names, of course, was in his arsenal.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: You see, I don’t know what he read, but here we are, when we now say “classics”, and we are not specialists, we immediately imagine Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy.

S. VASILIEV: And you have the right idea.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Very good, everything is correct. You see, but only in the 1920s, both Tolstoy and Babarykin, for a wide readership, they stood at approximately the same level. This is us now, that is, we don’t know who Babarykin is, and, thank God, maybe, by the way, Tolstoy is Tolstoy. This is not only a “mirror of the Russian revolution”, it is also a great Russian writer, or, vice versa. Are Sholokhov’s memories preserved about his favorite writer, whom he loved or not? You see, one time Gogol, another thing, for me this polarity is Gogol and Tolstoy, for me it is polar. Well, for me, I am not Sholokhov.

S. VASILIEV: I see. You named Tolstoy very accurately, Igor Vladimirovich, and he said that we owe everything to the old man, specifically about Tolstoy.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Yes, I know this phrase, yes.

S.VASILIEV: Wonderful. Moreover, Gogol too, he quoted Gogol abundantly and in his speeches, even in his journalism, he mentioned “Taras Bulba” more than once, and at writers’ and party congresses, this is also a very important feature of his. Bunin, Chekhov, for example, he also had a curious phrase about how it seemed “what a difference there is between me and Chekhov, what a huge difference, however, Chekhov also influences.” Here it is.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: And Bunin, how?

S. VASILIEV: Yes, of course, Bunin. He knew his poems very well.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Because Ivan Alekseevich spoke very poorly of him. Well, although Ivan Alekseevich spoke badly about everyone.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, but at the same time, I read and knew what was most important, probably.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: No, Ivan Alekseevich spoke poorly of the one he read. He just didn’t speak so indiscriminately.

S.VASILIEV: Of course.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: He read a lot.

S. VASILIEV: That’s true, his harsh character is known to everyone. I know he corrected some of my opinions about Blok, although there were some destructive statements. That is, he corrected, of course. For him, Tolstoy always remained the number one figure, “The Liberation of Tolstoy,” he wrote such a book already in exile, and so on. So there is something to talk about here too.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, that’s a different story. Does he start with a newspaper, Sholokhov, or with what, with journalism, where does he start?

S. VASILIEV: He starts with works that are topical, that are interesting to his fellow countrymen, that can be read in a narrow circle, and, at the same time, those that would show the era in this, perhaps, comic, amusing, humorous way.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: This is what was then called “feuilleton”. Now by feuilleton we mean several... Well, although, no, it doesn’t matter, this is the tradition of Russian literary feuilleton.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, absolutely right, if you like, the Chekhov tradition, and then it goes deeper, in the 18th century it goes. The feuilleton “Test”, this feuilleton, 1923, the feuilleton is a little later, “The Inspector General” by Gogol, it was very typical for him, the feuilleton between them, also 1923, “Three”, it’s about buttons, humorous. This is where he starts, this is his first publication, the newspaper “Youthful Truth”, and he developed a relationship with this publication, then he published there. And in general, then, in the 1920s, a system of involving young people in the sphere of culture, in writing, was already taking shape and was working very actively. He visited the literary association “Young Guard”, it also gave him a lot, he became friends with some authors there. And, after reading one story there, he found like-minded people, those who could further support him and recommend him.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Who were they?

S. VASILIEV: Well, for example, his friend, writer Vasily Kudashev, he really valued his relationship with him. He's on time Patriotic War died.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: If I’m not mistaken, yes, he died during the war.

S.VASILIEV: Yes. Well, these 1920-30s were a time of close communication, there are photographs, letters. Kudashev even then had a slightly higher status, publications, I mean, and he supported Mikhail Alexandrovich. And then, of course, after a very short time, 1925, there was already a wave of, one might say, publications; stories were not only published in magazines, but also published in separate editions, which was an indicator of interest in him, this is very important.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, probably this... I don’t remember when Kataev’s prose appeared in separate editions, in my opinion, much later. Well, yes, you can probably compare them by age.

S. VASILIEV: Of course, yes, absolutely right. In 1925, he published his first book, “Don Stories,” and in 1926, “Azure Steppe.” That is, from the very beginning he worked extremely intensively, this distinguishes his style, his creative manner 1920-30, colossal energy and works of a very high level. The first story, “Birthmark,” was a departure from this educational feuilleton, so to speak.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Oh, yes.

S. VASILIEV: Frankly speaking, yes.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I will make one remark, and you will either agree or correct me. 1920s, the time of the New Economic Policy, few of the intelligentsia lived so well, and writers are representatives of the intelligentsia, even if they came from a working environment. Few people lived as well as writers and journalists. A clear confirmation of this is the story of his younger brother Kataev’s involvement in writing. He describes this in “His Diamond Crown”, that look, for one, well, reread it, it’s written very beautifully, in one day you earned more than you would have earned in a month serving in Butyrka prison. He served in Butyrka prison, his younger brother, the great one, too. Look at your brother's name, well, at least his nickname. This is what I want to say: they all lived wonderfully for the time being.

S.VASILIEV: No, not at all.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Correct me.

S.VASILIEV: This has nothing to do with Sholokhov. I mean the 1920s are completely irrelevant, because this time was for him a search and search not even for a choice of life, he probably made it, obviously, but for some kind of material, at least some kind of balance . By that time he had already married, Maria Petrovna was his wife, in 1926 their daughter Svetlana Mikhailovna was born, this year she had a wonderful anniversary, we congratulated her, the magazine “The World of Sholokhov”, in particular, responded to this.

S.VASILIEV: Yes, thank you. But life in a material sense was extremely difficult for him in the 1920s.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Exactly extremely heavy?

S. VASILIEV: Yes, since he did not have his own home in Moscow, then he spent the night with friends. At some point, there was simply no money to somehow stay in Moscow, to continue his literary endeavors, and he left.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Precisely for economic reasons?

S.VASILIEV: Of course. He worked here and looked for work through the labor exchange. He worked as a loader, and somewhere I came across, he even laid Moscow pavements. Perhaps, where we walk and don’t think about where we walk, certain stones were laid by Sholokhov’s hand.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: That is, as in demand as that great cohort itself, unfortunately, many of them did not survive the 1930s from the newspaper “Gudok”, he did not have this?

S. VASILIEV: In the 1920s he had a lot of difficulties. He had already been published and, of course, he was expecting these fees, but the fees were not the same.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Not fabulous.

S.VASILIEV: Of course. And he wrote to Maria Petrovna about the difficult situation, tried to send money home, of course. And here they sometimes had a herring and a few potatoes on the table for the day, this is also in the memories, in the memoirs.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, yes, that is, in the 1920s, practically rations still existed during the times of war communism, that is, there was no money, there was simply no money.

S. VASILIEV: Well, yes, it was very difficult for him personally. He worked, I repeat, physically. He had to work during the day to earn a living, in the evening he attended literary courses, educated himself, communicated with writers, and at night he wrote. This was his whirlwind, enormous pace of life.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Is it time for us to approach the “Quiet Don”?

S. VASILIEV: Well, let’s try, although, you see, it’s already time. Of course we should.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Let me be clear right away, I’ve been around for 20 years, I haven’t even raised this idiotic question about authorship within myself. Do you know why? I'm not interested. That is, this question is not interesting to me at all. And with your permission, we will not raise the question - Sholokhov wrote “Quiet Don” or not Sholokhov. No, we can talk about who killed JFK, or what the Earth or the Sun revolves around. But let’s still talk about Sholokhov’s work, about the great work called “Quiet Don”, let’s talk about this.

S. VASILIEV: Thank you very much, that’s exactly how it should be, of course.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: And now the question is even more idiotic than who wrote “Quiet Don”. You see, I kind of brought down the intensity of passions. Why did he need this?

S. VASILIEV: He was looking for his theme, his book, this is the main book of his life, undoubtedly.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Of course.

S. VASILIEV: He wrote about his fellow countrymen, about his small homeland, when he was thinking about “Quiet Don”, the first drafts were already devoted to revolutionary events, and he planned to write the campaign of Kornilov and his troops against Petrograd, this is where he wanted to start . Then, by his own admission, he realized that for many people the Cossacks are “terra incognita,” as he put it, the Latin language, an unknown, unknown land, and he considered it necessary to introduce chapters, or rather, to completely rebuild both the plan and the composition so that to first introduce the reader to this Cossacks, you can call them differently, a subethnos, whatever you like, at least with this special world of culture - the Cossacks, like that, more precisely.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Let me interrupt you for a second, for me this is very important point, with the Don Cossacks.

S. VASILIEV: Of course, yes, absolutely right.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Because there is a general opinion that there was such a subethnic group - Cossacks, Cossacks, it doesn’t matter what we call them now. The Ural Cossacks never treated, say, the Don Cossacks as their own. They treated them the same way as non-residents, and vice versa. Well, this is my family's story. You know, there is such a funny story, it’s funny, this is the bloody history of our country, unfortunately, my great-grandfather in the Urals is still remembered with kind words. Being the first and last, I told this story on air, the first and last chairman of the Council of Cossack Deputies, Semyon Ivanovich Ruzheynikov, saved many of his fellow countrymen in the Urals. To this day, on the Don, he is remembered as the devil, because he and my grandfather were sent there in 1918 to “color” the Cossacks. An ancient Cossack Ural family, they did not in any way relate to the Cossacks, to the Don Cossacks. That is, Sholokhov wrote the history of one of the most glorious troops of the Russian Cossacks - the Don Cossacks. This is a very important note.

S.VASILIEV: Of course, thank you. There were others, naturally, the Kuban, and Semirechensk, Yaik Cossacks and so on.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I named them Ural because they are egg-like.

S.VASILIEV: Siberian, and so on. Undoubtedly, the Don Cossacks, this is absolutely true, they are so more famous. Well, even this more famous Cossacks, the Cossack army, they called themselves the All-Great Don Army already in the revolutionary events. And even it was almost unknown, almost unfamiliar, although there was something, Ataman Platov is known, the events of the Patriotic War of 1812 were also known, and reflected in folklore, and we know from Leskov in “Lefty”, and so on. But as a cultural phenomenon, it was very little known.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: What exactly was inside, they couldn’t take it out, and no one was particularly interested. This is what it is.

S. VASILIEV: Of course, yes, this class was a certain one, very closed, separating itself sharply, say, from the Ukrainian neighbors or from others, nonresidents, of course.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Of course. And Sholokhov was from out of town.

S. VASILIEV: But Sholokhov himself was from out of town, of course, yes.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: This is an amazing thing, that the best book about the Cossacks, general ledger a nonresident wrote about the Cossacks, and the Cossacks recognized it.

S.VASILIEV: Of course. He had a wife, Maria Petrovna, the daughter of the village ataman Gromoslavsky, this, of course, is serious. But, on the other hand, the Cossacks are still obviously a culture, first of all, because they themselves once came there, the Cossacks. Moreover, there is a very interesting anthropological study that the Cossacks of the Don Territory are closer in anthropological type to the Ryazan Russian peasants. Like this. Not to the Ukrainians who neighbored them, but just like to the Ryazan ones. This is amazing and very interesting.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: It’s funny, I’m hearing it for the first time, it’s interesting. Well, because researchers of the Zaporozhye Cossacks, they insist that these are the remnants of the Cossacks, everything from beginning to end.

S.VASILIEV: No, nothing like that.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: There is almost nothing left in the language. That is, something would remain, atavisms in the language would remain, but there are none left.

S. VASILIEV: There is a lot in the language too, Maidan, for example, something else, these are some...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Maidan is Slavic word, and not even entirely Slavic.

S. VASILIEV: Well, it’s not Slavic, it’s borrowed, but it’s widespread. An autonomous group, of course. There is a “Dictionary of the Language of M.A. Sholokhov”, published by linguists, Elena Innokentievna Dibrova is the chief editor, there, perhaps, his most characteristic words are used, well, of course, Cossack usage, first of all, what you need to know to understand the novel .

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Please tell me, he is his, by the way, I don’t know this and, probably, it’s my fault that I was poorly prepared for our program, but fill in this gap. Did he publish it in full or in parts?

S.VASILIEV: In parts. And this was, on the one hand, a huge intrigue, on the other hand, it was another great test for him, since he worked at a colossal pace, and he first published the first two books, half of the novel. He had already become famous even abroad; in the late 1920s, translations into German first, Scandinavian - Swedish and so on, English. And then the next thing, and the very core of the novel - the Upper Don Uprising, the events of 1919, this line was extremely difficult in terms of publication. He had numerous opponents. After all, he exhibited under his own names many figures who were still alive during the Civil War. Commissioner Malkin was so bloody, he was still alive and read this, naturally, he was indignant at how he could be portrayed. And a lot of other things. Readers demanded and expected from him, and the employees of the magazine “October”, where he was published, expected that Grigory would choose the path of a communist, that he would become a collective farmer in the finale, and so on.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: This is the biggest mystery for me, why, let’s say, Grigory did not become Nagulnov, firstly, and how did Sholokhov manage to survive after that? This is a mystery to me. How are you? Not a mystery to you, no?

S. VASILIEV: This is a unique case, we can only rejoice once again.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Why do we still read the novel and see that this is a brilliant attempt to show, I apologize, the truth. I don’t see, I saw political assessments at school. I read this novel for the first time, unfortunately, very early, I didn’t understand anything, I was probably 11 years old. For me this novel was red-red. Well, this is at 11 years old, again. Now I understand that there is neither red nor white, there is the hardest work, including on yourself, to show the truth. How did he manage to survive after this?

S. VASILIEV: Yes, this is, of course, a serious and worthwhile question. He was hinted by none other than Yagoda, for example, the head of the NKVD at one time, hinted that as a White Guard you, Mikhail, are writing this novel, and that this plays into the hands of the foreign counter-revolution, and so on. He certainly heard it all. And these were not just hints, it could be serious. Moreover, in 1938, there really was a conspiracy against him by the Rostov NKVD, an armed group had already left Rostov, and only thanks to an honest man, his friend in the future, Ivan Semenovich Pogorelov...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Has a group already been sent for the arrest?

S. VASILIEV: Yes, absolutely right, this event is later, but “Quiet Flows the Don” has not yet been completed at this point. 1938. The People's Commissar of the NKVD was then Yezhov, and his power, in general, was coming to an end, but, nevertheless, he was still in force, and a special person was assigned to him, I have already mentioned his name Ivan Semenovich Pogorelov, in future friend and literary secretary of Sholokhov, who, understanding the criminality of the plan, obviously opened up to the writer and helped him...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Hide for a while.

S. VASILIEV: Helped him find out about it and hide. Together, they took revolvers, it was such a time, and left the village of Veshenskaya, they left, but not to the nearest railway station, to Millerovo, where they would also be met, met and waited, but he went to Stalingrad. This is how they reached Stalingrad, armed. And then in Moscow, he lived near the Kremlin in the National Hotel, waited for a reception with Stalin, in my opinion, about three weeks. Imagine the tension there was.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, yes, he was waiting either for a reception from Stalin, or for them to come for him, in fact.

S. VASILIEV: Absolutely right. Well, fortunately, Pogorelov, an experienced security officer, had a note from one of the organizers from the Rostov NKVD, and this became an important document that was presented, indicating that a conspiracy had taken place. Stalin gathered not only the Rostov security officers, but also summoned Yezhov, Sholokhov, Pogorelov and ordered them not to touch him.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Why? Did he really like the novel? That is, we know Stalin’s statement about Bulgakov’s work; Stalin, in general, saved Bulgakov’s literary genius. Where is Stalin and where is Bulgakov? There is a common opinion that Stalin gave life to the novel not only for Sholokhov, but also for the novel. Yes or no?

S. VASILIEV: Yes, that’s true. And Sholokhov was helped, it must be said, not only by Stalin. I would start with his first editor Levitskaya, Evgenia Grigorievna Levitskaya, also his friend, he treated her like a mother, judging by his letters. She was the first to note this novel as an editor and supported it. Then Serafimovich, one of the oldest writers at that time, also a Cossack, by the way, helped a lot. Serafimovich did not give the novel...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: I can’t help but say, he’s a great friend of my grandfather.

S.VASILIEV: Wonderful. He did not allow the novel to be shortened and insisted on its publication in October. And later, when the events of the third book had already been written, Sholokhov turned to Gorky, Gorky supported him and arranged a meeting with Stalin, at which, and Stalin became acquainted and very deeply with culture, literature, read everything, he knew this, Stalin said: “We will publish the third book of The Quiet Don.” But even this did not deprive him of many difficulties later. And even after that...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: No, well, wait, what does it mean, he said, it’s Sholokhov remembering. Surely there is no document left, right? Sholokhov recalls: “We will publish the third book.” To the question that, of course, Stalin decided everything. He told Sholokhov: “We will print,” but this does not mean that there were any written orders. And that’s why Sholokhov had problems with the third book. I guess this is how I explain it.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, yes, this is reasonable, of course. And in 1931, you see, even the leader’s word, spoken quite publicly, was not only present there, and that was not an absolute guarantee, you are absolutely right. This is very, by the way, characteristic era.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: That time.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, this is very interesting. Well, he addressed letters to Stalin, he saved the Upper Don, tens of thousands of people from starvation. And Stalin wrote him lightning telegrams: “Write how many pounds of grain need to be sent to your region,” something like that.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Dear friends, if suddenly you haven’t read “Quiet Don” yet, firstly, I feel sorry for you, and, secondly, I envy you incredibly. Because when you read this book for the first time, I apologize for the slightly profane, reduced vocabulary, it just blows your mind.

S. VASILIEV: In a sense, I apologize, we all still have to read “Quiet Don”. The fact is that, as far as I know, the Institute of World Literature is preparing the first scientific edition of “Quiet Don”.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Academic.

S. VASILIEV: Academic, yes, absolutely true. Taking into account all available publications and drafts, manuscripts, and so on. This “Quiet Don” will be new and amazing.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: We are looking forward to it.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, absolutely right. Thank you.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, now I don’t want to leave the serious tone, just two words. Where did “Virgin Soil Upturned” come from and why? I don’t want to say anything bad, I’m not a literary critic.

S.VASILIEV: This is a topical topic. He lived, we know, among the people, among the village workers, and knew their problems; they consulted him on economic issues. And, of course, such a major phenomenon as collectivization could not pass...

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Did he need it or was it a political order? Well, I don’t know, of course, most likely no one came to him and said: “You know what, now write about collectivization.” Most likely, he was already in such strength that no one except Stalin could tell him that. Stalin would not have stooped to this, it was none of his business. Why did he write this? Well, this is a serious question.

S.VASILIEV: Yes. But this is his era. After all, “Quiet Don”, its events took place, as is known, from 1912 to 1922.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: This is not his era.

S. VASILIEV: After all, he caught her too.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Well, on the edge, yes.

S. VASILIEV: Yes, absolutely right.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: And this is exactly his.

S. VASILIEV: And here is what is unfolding now. And he had a gift, of course, the gift of a publicist, his articles and speeches remain very bright, talented, of course. He couldn't get past this. Well, there was a whole complex of phenomena, of course. This was discussed, and it was also discussed with Stalin, of course, how to show it. But it is impossible to see in this what, as you quite correctly noted, is only a political order. Only a political novel is also not possible, of course. Although this work goes, so to speak, on the cutting edge of problems that have not yet been experienced by society, which are of great concern to everyone and many, perhaps not all the accents have even been placed yet.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: There, in my opinion, he managed not to stoop to praising the collective farm system. I don't like Virgin Soil Upturned, but nevertheless I read it, I read the use of Aesopian language. It’s clear that he couldn’t write about the horrors of the “Holodomor” or the collective farm, but he saw it all. And there you need to read Sholokhov’s Aesopian language. Because, if he is absolutely honest with the readers and with all the ordinary... well, ordinary Sholokhov was in “The Quiet Don,” then here he was forced to use Aesops. These are probably the pros and cons of this novel.

S. VASILIEV: You know, this is not entirely true. I think this is not entirely true.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Let us meet sometime and talk about “Virgin Soil Upturned”. This is a bit of a scandalous topic, like, you know, it’s not fashionable to talk about this, but we will meet and talk.

S. VASILIEV: Thank you for raising such wonderful, very important topics and considering them so seriously.

I. RUZHEYNIKOV: Thank you very much. All the best.

S.VASILIEV: Thank you. All the best.

The only Russian laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature, who received it while being officially recognized in his homeland, is the author of the novel “Quiet Don” - in the Kommersant photo gallery.
In the eyes of the enlightened Russian reader, Sholokhov's last speeches and his protective position hopelessly compromised his name. And the compulsory study of Virgin Soil Upturned, imposed on many generations of schoolchildren, made his name odious. However, we should not forget that Sholokhov is the only Russian laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature who received it while being at the same time officially recognized in his homeland. The Nobel Committee was right - “Quiet Don” is undoubtedly the most striking book in all Soviet literature.

The exact date of birth of Mikhail Sholokhov is unknown. Official biographers report that the writer was born on May 11, 1905 in the Kruzhilin farmstead of the village of Veshenskaya. He completed four grades and then dropped out of school. In 1920 he was captured by Makhno. Two years later he was sentenced to death, then he worked as a village tax inspector, but the punishment was replaced by a year of correctional labor.

2.

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“Our soldier showed himself to be a hero during the days of the Patriotic War. The whole world knows about the Russian soldier, about his valor, about his Suvorov-like qualities.”

During the Great Patriotic War, Sholokhov lived with his family in the Stalingrad region beyond the Volga. He did not serve on the front line, he worked as a war correspondent for the newspaper Pravda.

4. Mikhail Sholokhov with Fidel Castro (left)

“We write according to the dictates of our hearts, and our hearts belong to the party”

In 1928, at the age of 23, Sholokhov published the first, and a few years later the second volume of Quiet Don, and already in 1934 translations of the novel appeared in the West. 29-year-old Sholokhov is gaining wide international fame.

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“The evaluation of each work of art must, first of all, be approached from the point of view of its truthfulness and persuasiveness”

Immediately after Sholokhov's debut, critics were at a loss. It was known that the future academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences graduated from only four classes of the gymnasium, which, however, was a lot by the standards of Soviet fine literature. But to write five thousand pages of brilliant prose to a semi-literate village youth in less than two years was beyond my comprehension. Some believed that Sholokhov was simply underestimating his age, and, by the way, exact date his birth remains in doubt. At the same time, in the late 20s, another, scandalous, version of Sholokhov’s child prodigy surfaced - “Quiet Don” was actually composed by the writer Fyodor Kryukov, who died in 1920. According to this version, Kryukov’s notes ended up in the hands of Sholokhov, who only had to carefully reprint them and take them to the publishing house. Exposing the slander, Sholokhov spoke in the press more than once, and later, when under Stalin he was included in the classics of socialist realism, this question disappeared by itself.

6.

“It is a sacred duty to love the country that gave us water and nurtured us like our own mother.”

In 1965, the Swedish Academy awarded the Nobel Prize to Quiet Don. Thus, he became the only Russian laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature, who received it while simultaneously being officially recognized in his homeland. However, receiving the award caused a new scandal: the problem of the authorship of the novel again became relevant.

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“Ask any elderly person, did he notice how he lived his life? He didn’t notice a damn thing.”

During the last twenty-five years of his life, Sholokhov did not write a single line at all. On February 21, 1984, he died of laryngeal cancer.

10.

Mikhail Sholokhov is the winner of many awards. Streets, monuments, a university, and even an asteroid are named after him.

A big event in Russian science and culture was that the Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences managed to discover thanks to the support of V.V. Putin bought the manuscript of the first two books of “Quiet Don” in 1999. This is a great work of Russian literature of the twentieth century, which most fully and visibly expressed the feat and tragedy of the historical path of our people in the past century.

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Graphological and textual examination established the fact that the manuscript belonged to M.A. Sholokhov. This is the same manuscript that in 1929 Sholokhov submitted to the writing commission headed by Serafimovich, rejecting accusations of plagiarism. Sholokhov did not take the manuscript with him to Vyoshenskaya then, but, given that he was already under the “cap” of the repressive authorities, he left the manuscript in Moscow with his close friend, the prose writer Vasily Kudashev. Kudashev did not return from the war. And the manuscript, hidden from the heirs of M.A. Sholokhov and writers, was kept by Kudashev’s wife and daughter until, after their death, its location was discovered by employees of the IMLI RAS.

Textual analysis shows that this is not some kind of manuscript “rewritten” from someone else’s text, but an authentic draft of the novel “Quiet Don”. It bears the imprint of the creative pangs of the birth of the novel from the very first, initial time of its emergence. The manuscript clearly shows the deep laboratory of Sholokhov’s work on the word and helps to recreate the creative history of the novel in inextricable connection with the biography of the author of “Quiet Don”.

The authenticity of “Quiet Don” is confirmed not only by the original manuscript of the first two books of the novel, but also by Sholokhov’s life biography, the comprehension of which is still far from complete.

“Additional information” concerning the biography of Sholokhov in connection with the Cossack uprising of 1919 was found in the archives of the Ryazan branch of the Memorial Society, where the official documents of the security officer S.A. are kept. Bolotova. (F. 8. Op. 4. Case 14.)

The interest of the Ryazan Memorial is by no means accidental. The merchant families of the Sholokhovs and Mokhovs, which are discussed in the novel, came to the Don from the Ryazan region.

The Ryazan archive contains, in particular, the mandate of the Don Extraordinary Commission dated June 1, 1920, by which Bolotov S.A. “sent to the 1st Don District (i.e., to the Upper Don. - F.K.) to examine the causes of the uprising and bring those responsible to justice.” (See the afterword by F.F. Kuznetsov and A.F. Struchkov to the publication: Mikhail Sholokhov. “Quiet Don”. In 4 books. M., 2011. pp. 969–974.)

The results of “bringing the perpetrators to justice” can be judged by the fact that in his memoirs, stored in the same archive, Bolotov writes that he “personally shot hundreds of white officers.”

In 1927, Bolotov was again sent to the Don and received a new appointment as head of the Don district department of the GPU, which he held in 1927–1928. What is the reason for this new responsible assignment and appointment?

Bolotov’s papers contain the original telegram from M.A. Sholokhov dated May 24, 1927, addressed to the OGPU of the city of Millerovo: “On the 25th in the morning I will be Millerovo. Sending my regards. Sholokhov".

Why was Sholokhov summoned by telegram to the OGPU?

The answer to this question is in investigative case Ermakov Kharlampiy Vasilievich (archive number 53542), three volumes of which are stored in the archives of the KGB of the Rostov region. On June 6, 1927, the OGPU Collegium, chaired by Yagoda, issued a resolution to execute Ermakov, formerly the commander of the Vyoshensky rebel division and first deputy Pavel Nazarovich Kudinov, commander-in-chief of the Upper Don rebel forces.

Kharlampy Ermakov was arrested on February 3, 1927. During a search, a letter from M.A. was found on him. Sholokhov for April 6, 1926, in which the writer asks Ermakov for another meeting with him, because, as he writes, “I need to get from you some additional information regarding the era of 1919.”

Sholokhov’s letter, together with Ermakov’s service record, stored in a separate envelope, was immediately sent to Moscow personally to Yagoda, the second person in the OGPU. The letter delivered to Yagoda explains the reason for calling Sholokhov to the Donetsk OGPU.

On behalf of the leadership of the OGPU, Bolotov spent two years (1927–1928) “developing an object,” for which he was sent to the Upper Don.

On the back of the joint photograph of Sholokhov and Bolotov, preserved in the archive, it is written: “North Caucasus region, Millerovo. Sholokhov is 27 years old. Wrote "Quiet Don" 1 book. We took pictures in the yard of the OGPU in Millerovo.”

This brief inscription contains important evidence: according to the OGPU, Sholokhov wrote “Quiet Don” in 1927.

In Sholokhovology, it was suggested that Sholokhov’s age was underestimated. Roy Medvedev, in particular, wrote about this in his article “Riddles of Sholokhov’s creative biography” (Questions of Literature. 1989. No. 8). This is indirectly stated in the “Memoirs” of Maria Petrovna Sholokhova. She recalls her wedding with her husband: “Later, when the documents were needed, I found out that he was born in 1905. “What did you deceive?” - I say. - “I was in a hurry, otherwise you might have changed your mind about marrying me.” (“Maria Petrovna Sholokhova remembers...” Don, 1999, No. 2.)

Sholokhov himself describes how, during the Civil War, “white Cossacks burst into their village. They were looking for me. As a Bolshevik... I don’t know where he is,” my mother repeated.” (Sholokhov Encyclopedia. M., 2012. p. 1029.)

But the White Cossacks ruled the Don before the uprising, in 1918. It turns out that Sholokhov was only 13 years old at that moment! Could he be a Bolshevik?!

The controversial issue of Sholokhov’s actual age requires study not because, as opponents of the genius believe, he “could not” write the first book of “Quiet Don” at the age of 23.

“Ermakov is main character novel - Grigory Melekhov..."

The significance of the Veshensky uprising in the life of Sholokhov is revealed by the main document stored in the Ryazan archive - a memo dated September 4, 1928 from the head of the Don district department of the OGPU Bolotov to the authorized representative of the OGPU SKK and DSSR (North Caucasus Territory and Dagestan USSR) E.G. Evdokimov. The note, in particular, says (we retain the author’s punctuation): “During the conversation with him<Шолоховым>I managed to learn some biographical information from him. So, he says that he himself is of nonresident origin, but his Cossack mother is a hut. Kruzhilinsky, is silent about his father, but talks about his commoner stepfather who adopted him. My stepfather was engaged in trade at one time and was also something of a Manager.

Sholokhov's childhood took place in the conditions of Cossack life, and this provided rich material for his novel. The Civil War found him in Vyoshki. Under Soviet power, he worked in the Food Committee to collect surplus appropriation and tax in kind. He is well acquainted with the local leaders of the action in the Upper Don, as well as with Ermakov - a personality, in his opinion, large and colorful, he knows Fomin and the history of his gang. Ermakov, according to him, was first a Cossack officer who received an officer rank for military combat merits, and then served in Budyonny’s 1st Army, commanded his squadron, regiment, brigade successively and was subsequently the Head of the Division School, was sent to Donchek twice as a former a white officer, but through internal pressure springs, was released, and in 1927, by decision of the Special Meeting, he was shot in an operation after the murder of Voikov<…>».

“One gets the deep impression that this Ermakov is the hero of the novel Grigory MELIKHOV,” Bolotov writes further in his report, highlighting the surname of the hero of the novel, written with an “and.” And he continues: “Sholokhov has a house in Vyoshenskaya, which he recently bought, in order to be able to work calmly on his novel in Veshki, from where he draws rich raw material for his works...

The novel “Quiet Don” will consist of 8 parts in three volumes, 3 parts have already been published a long time ago as a separate book, the next ones will be published in a very short time, since he has already completed 6 parts and has selected material for the 7th part.

He really asked me to give him material about the history of the uprising on the Don, which may end up in the archives of our Department. I promised him to find everything we have about individual White Guard figures, but it immediately became clear that he was interested in more extensive materials, and I advised him to turn to you personally with a request for archival files on the uprising.” (See Mikhail Sholokhov. “Quiet Don” in 4 books, afterword by F.F. Kuznetsov, A.F. Struchkov. - M., 2005, pp. 969–973.)

The request to the leadership of the OGPU to admit him to the archival files on the Veshensky uprising was impossible. Moreover. As soon as the theme of uprising arose in the April 1929 issue of the magazine “October,” the third book of “Quiet Don,” the publication of the novel was stopped for more than a year and a half.

Bolotov’s memo, as well as Ermakov’s investigative file, prove that it was Kharlampy Ermakov who became the prototype of Grigory Melekhov. Kharlampiy Ermakov's track record confirms this. According to him, life and military path this commander of the Vyoshenskaya insurgent division and Grigory Melekhov almost completely coincide. So Bolotov had every right to conclude that Kharlampy Ermakov is the main character of “Quiet Don”.

The Main Archives of the FSB contains the investigative file (No. N 1798) of P.N. Kudinov, commander of the rebel forces of the Upper Don, close friend and fellow soldier Ermakov, also a holder of four Crosses of St. George, who went through the imperialist and Civil Wars side by side with Harlampy. In 1918, they both went over to the side of the Bolsheviks, but when Trotsky announced a policy of decossackization of the Don, Kudinov, together with Ermakov, led the uprising of 1919. After the defeat of the uprising, Ermakov ended up in the Red Army, and Kudinov in exile. In 1944, he was arrested in Bulgaria by Smersh authorities and taken to Moscow, where he received 10 years in camps in Siberia.

In 1952, Pavel Kudinov was brought from a Siberian camp to Rostov-on-Don to testify in the case of the Veshensky uprising.

Kudinov’s answers during interrogations, as well as memories of the Verkhnedonsky (Vyoshensky) uprising, published in Prague in the magazine “Free Cossacks” (1931, No. 82), indisputably indicate that the events described by Sholokhov in “Quiet Don” are completely true .

“You can’t steal a book like this.”

Sources associated with the intelligence services were tightly closed to Soviet researchers. Information about most of the prototypes was also classified, since the investigation into the case of the Vyoshensky uprising continued until Stalin’s death.

Naturally, M.A. Sholokhov for a long time avoided revealing the names of the prototypes of his heroes, protecting them from possible troubles. Literary critics believed that it was mostly pure literary characters. Only in 1974 did Sholokhov decide to reveal the truth about the origins and sources of his novel, talk about the prototypes, and first of all, about the prototype of the main character of the novel, Grigory Melekhov.

Sholokhov did this in connection with the publication in Paris in 1974 of the book by I.N. Medvedeva-Tomashevskaya “The Stirrup of the Quiet Don (The Mysteries of the Novel)” with a preface by A.I. Solzhenitsyn's "Unbroken Secret", where doubts were expressed regarding the authorship of "Quiet Don".

“In his youth,” Ermakov had a riding horse only when he was a division commander in the rebel army. And there is no doubt that such unusual visits to Sholokhov’s parents happened during the uprising. Their meetings continued in those months when Ermakov in 1923, having been demobilized from the Red Army, lived on the neighboring farm of Bazki.

When asked why Ermakov became Melekhov’s main prototype, Sholokhov replied: “Ermakov is more suitable to my idea of ​​what Grigory should be. His ancestors - a Turkish grandmother - four St. George Crosses for bravery, service in the Red Guard, participation in the uprising, then surrendering to the Reds and going to the Polish front - all this really fascinated me about the fate of Ermakov. His choice of path in life was difficult, very difficult. Ermakov revealed to me a lot about battles with the Germans, which I didn’t know from literature... So, Grigory’s experiences after he killed the first Austrian - it came from Ermakov’s stories<…>

Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny told me that he saw Kharlampy Ermakov in horse attacks on the Wrangel front and that it was no coincidence that Ermakov was appointed head of the cavalry school in Maykop...”

K. Priyma wrote that “On November 29, 1974, Sholokhov revealed to us for the first time that the events of the Vyoshensky uprising of 1919 were placed at the center of the epic.” Unfortunately, this conversation was never published in 1974 in either “ Komsomolskaya Pravda", nor in the Literary Gazette.

"Great creation of the Russian spirit"

The worldview of people like Kharlampy Ermakov, their popular view of the revolution formed the basis of the novel. “Quiet Don” is a unique, genuine folk epic that combines both the heroic and tragic beginnings of the life of the country and people at the sharpest turning point in our history. Compare the first and fourth books of the novel. You will not find such a level of tragedy in Russian literature.

The fourth volume of the epic is the completely destroyed life of people, the same life that was seething in full in the first volume.

“It’s amazing how life has changed in the Melekhov family!.. There was a strong, united family, but since spring everything has changed... The family was falling apart before the eyes of Pantelei Prokofievich. He and the old woman were left alone. Suddenly and quickly, family ties were broken, the warmth of relationships was lost, and notes of destructiveness and alienation still slipped through the conversation. They sat down at the common table not as before - as a united and friendly family, but as people who had gathered by chance.

The war was the reason for all this...” (Sholokhov M.A., collected works in 8 volumes, GIHL, vol. 5, p. 123.)

The war broke human ties and took away so many people. These deaths - Natalya, Daria, Pantelei Prokofievich, Ilyinichna - written with soul-tearing power, are a prelude to the finale of that powerful and all-encompassing social tragedy, in the center of which, of course, is the fate of Grigory Melekhov. This tragedy, which made Quiet Don one of the greatest works of world literature, became the center of the fourth book...

And another death - Aksinya: “He buried his Aksinya in the bright morning light. Already in the grave, he folded her deathly white, dark hands in a cross on her chest, covered her face with a headscarf so that the earth would not cover her half-open eyes, motionless looking at the sky and already beginning to fade. He said goodbye to her, firmly believing that they would not be parting for long...

With his palms he carefully crushed the wet yellow clay on the grave mound and stood on his knees for a long time near the grave, bowing his head, swaying quietly. There was no need for him to rush now. It was all over.

In the smoky darkness of the dry wind, the sun rose above the blaze. Its rays silvered the thick gray hair on Gregory’s uncovered head and slid across his pale face, terrible in its immobility. As if awakening from a heavy sleep, he raised his head and saw above him the black sky and the dazzlingly shining black disk of the sun.” (Sholokhov M.A., decree ed., vol. 5, p. 490.)

Aksinya’s death is not the last in “Quiet Don”. Ultimately, “Quiet Don” is a novel about the death of Grigory Melekhov. And this is the main point of the novel.

A great artist who took aim at the tragic truth about tectonic time, Sholokhov considered himself obliged to tell readers what the real ending of Grigory Melekhov’s life was. But he understood that this was impossible.

Sholokhov painfully searched for the true end of the novel, which, it would seem, was practically impossible in the conditions of the 30s. And yet, without contradicting his understanding of historical truth, Sholokhov completed the epic with dignity.

The writer perceived the tragic ending of Grigory Melekhov as a personal drama he deeply experienced. I will cite a letter from Corresponding Member of the RAS V.V. Novikov, which I received while working on the book “Quiet Don”: the fate and truth of a great novel.” He wrote that at one time Yu.B. Lukin, the editor of Quiet Don, with whom he worked at Pravda, according to Maria Petrovna Sholokhova, told him about the circumstances of the completion of M.A. Sholokhov's novel.

This is what M.P. told Lukin. Sholokhov: “It was in 1939. I woke up at dawn and heard that something was wrong in Mikhail Alexandrovich’s office. The light was on, but it was already light... I went into the office and saw: he was standing by the window, crying a lot, shuddering... I went up to him, hugged him, and said: “Misha, what are you doing?.. Calm down...” And he turned away from the window, pointed to the desk and, through tears, said: “I’m finished...”

I walked up to the table. Mikhail Alexandrovich worked all night, and I re-read the last page about the fate of Grigory Melekhov:

“Gregory approached the descent,” he called out to his son, breathless and hoarse:

- Misha!.. Son!..

This was all that was left in his life, what still connected him with the earth and with this whole huge world shining under the cold sun.”

The greatest secret of the novel “Quiet Don,” as well as its highest achievement, is that, having expressed the all-crushing scope of the revolution, the full depth and mercilessness of the historical and human tragedy experienced by the Russian people in the 20th century, “Quiet Don” does not immerse readers in the abyss of darkness, leaving hope and light. And another aspect of the same problem: with all the strength of awareness of the tragedy of the revolution, the novel does not evoke a feeling of its historical futility, accident, or meaninglessness. And in this “Quiet Flows the Don,” which showed the world what seemed to be the most “cruel, truly monstrous face of the revolution” (Vadim Kozhinov), is fundamentally different from books that set as their goal and task the exposure of the revolution.

V. Kozhinov in the article “Quiet Don” by M.A. Sholokhov" (Native Kuban, 2001, No. 1) explains this paradoxical feature of the novel by the fact that "the main characters of Quiet Don, who commit terrible deeds, ultimately remain people in the full sense of the word, people capable of committing selfless, high, noble actions: the devilish still does not defeat the Divine in them.”

This is true. But I think that’s not the whole truth.

Sholokhov, like no one else, felt the historical “decree of fate” in relation to Russia. According to his conviction, “the people want the fulfillment of the ideals for which they went into the revolution, bore on their shoulders the incredible weight of the Civil War and the heaviest, Patriotic War,” but “we must remember the purity” of these ideals. “We must remember about selfless and faithful service to the idea.” (“Pravda”, July 31, 1974, conversation with M. Sholokhov.)

The split in the world that the revolution brought into people’s lives in its reckless striving for the future is still bearing fruit today. In overcoming this split, in a passionate and convinced call for the unity of people is the ultimate meaning and pathos of M.A.’s novel. Sholokhov "Quiet Don".

The answer was given by the commander-in-chief of the Upper Don rebel troops, Pavel Kudinov, who, to a greater extent than anyone else, has the right to judge the authenticity and significance of the “Quiet Don”. In his letter from emigration to Moscow, published in K. Priima’s book “On a par with the century” (op. ed., pp. 157–158), Kudinov said: “M. Sholokhov’s novel “Quiet Don” is a great creation of a truly Russian spirit and heart<…>I read “Quiet Don” avidly, sobbed and grieved over it and rejoiced - how beautifully and lovingly everything was described, and suffered and was executed - how wormwood is the bitter truth about our uprising. And if only you knew, you would have seen how in a foreign land the Cossacks - day laborers - gathered in the evenings in my barn and read “The Quiet Don” to the point of tears and sang old Don songs, cursing Denikin, Baron Wrangel, Churchill and the entire Entente. And many ordinary officers asked me: “Well, how exactly did Sholokhov write about the uprising, tell me, Pavel Nazarovich, don’t you remember who he served at your headquarters, that Sholokhov, who surpassed and depicted everything so thoroughly in thought.” And I, knowing that the author of “Quiet Don” was still a youth at that time, answered the soldiers:

“That’s all, my friends, talent, such a vision of human hearts was given to him from God!..”

By materials"Literary newspaper"

Felix Kuznetsov, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences
specially for “Centenary”, May 22, 2015

May 24 marks the 110th anniversary of the birth of world-famous writer and Nobel Prize winner Mikhail Sholokhov. Today in RG we remember him with the writer’s grandson, director of the Sholokhov Museum in Vyoshenskaya.

You protect your grandfather’s heritage and try to add to it with important memorial finds. Which of these findings surprised you the most?

Alexander Sholokhov: Recently I had a meeting in one of the Rostov libraries - named after Sholokhov, of course. And on it they told me a story - asking if it was true? - which happened in the late 50s and was once told orally by the Don writer Anatoly Kalinin, who had been friends with his grandfather for a long time. In Veshenskaya, while hunting, they were walking with Mikhail Alexandrovich, talking about something, and suddenly Sholokhov stopped. And after a pause, he said: “They killed me.” Everyone was wary: “Who was killed?” “Davydov,” Sholokhov answered.

I found this story beautiful and very reliable. Grandfather was not a writer who sat over preliminary notes and diaries. His completely unique memory allowed him, speaking in "computer language", to think about his heroes "in the background".

At the end of the 50s, he finished restoring the second book of “Virgin Soil Upturned,” written before the war, but lost during it. Individual sheets from the lost book, by the way, were collected by soldiers in Vyoshenskaya and are now in the Pushkin House.

And Sholokhov, thanks to his unique memory, restored half the novel after the war, almost completely writing that missing second book. But it didn't have an ending. And he looked for it, thought it over. And maybe he found it in that “hunting scene” he told me in the Rostov library. This is, if you like, an illustration of the method, the manner of its work.

Mikhail Sholokhov received a Nobel Prize laureate diploma from the hands of King Gustav VI of Sweden at the Bolshoi Concert hall Stockholm City Hall. Photo: RIA Novosti www.ria.ru

And the last lines of “Quiet Don” - this is no longer a version, but an actual story - Mikhail Alexandrovich saw in a dream. Grandmother woke up early in the morning and saw grandfather sobbing at the window. She got scared and ran up to him: “What happened?”

What struck you about him?

Alexander Sholokhov: My grandfather was as easy to communicate as he was full of some complex, immense, but obvious depth.

I had the feeling—don’t take it as pathos—that you were communicating with a sage. I saw how even people invested with great power next to him became boys. Not because he was suppressing. On the contrary, he is all there and open to you. And it was precisely this that captivated and plunged me into some kind of half-childish feeling. And everyone understood that he was absolutely understandable to this person.

Mikhail Alexandrovich had a rather motley and, in the opinion of many, strange entourage of local residents. A writer seems to have to be selective...

Select your environment?

Alexander Sholokhov: Yes. And here, at first glance, there was no selection at all. His “inner circle” included old fishermen, district committee secretaries, drivers, and police officers. But in reality there was “selection”. All these people were great storytellers. And he, by the way, is a great listener. Although I have never met storytellers like him either. He had an unusual - laconic - way of telling stories. He spoke very slowly and managed to fit everything into one sentence. This is in keeping with his writing style.

Well, a grandfather is like a grandfather. WITH great feeling humor. It's hard to imagine a meeting with him or a dinner where he wouldn't throw something out and everyone wouldn't laugh. He loved to joke. But it’s never offensive. No one expected any encouragement from him, and everyone expected support.

During the war, our family was evacuated to the Volga, and when the Germans approached Stalingrad, to Northern Kazakhstan. They left in a hurry, 16 children, women and a grandfather with them, all alarmed. And as soon as the family left, a bomb hit the writer’s house, scattering the manuscripts in the explosion. But the worst thing is that Mikhail Alexandrovich’s mother was killed. Grandfather had to leave everyone and return to bury her.

The adults were scared all the way, but my grandfather played with the children, joked, and told them some stories, so my dad and all my aunts and uncles considered this trip-retreat the most exciting journey in the world. This is what grandfather is all about. All his works are full of love of life. You close his books with the feeling that you have to live.

The hero of "Quiet Don" goes through Shakespeare's path of tossing and doubt, but returns "to his child and home." And here, at home, with the children - not in the forest, not in a gang, not at the front - is his salvation.

And in "Man's Fate", which Hemingway called best story XX century, the main character, who went through the camps, did not break, did not become bitter, did not lose compassion and saves himself by saving the child.

By the way, before Sholokhov no one wrote about the fate of prisoners of war; it was an absolutely closed topic. “The Fate of Man” somehow slipped through this warming crack. It soon slammed shut. And as soon as the “camp theme” began in “They Fought for the Motherland,” publication of the novel immediately stopped. Sholokhov - this is a well-known story - waited a long time for a visa from Brezhnev to give him the right to speak the truth about it. Without waiting, he slammed the door and left Moscow.

Encyclopedia from Sholokhov

What, in your opinion, gave it its novelty, incredible scale, and inexhaustible legacy? What made a great writer?

Alexander Sholokhov: His genius. Attempts to explain geniuses are like measuring sea distances with a tailor's meter. It's pointless and you'll drown. Genius, as a hereditary disease, does not depend on age or nationality.

Well, of course, we can list the obvious features of Sholokhov’s prose - its colorfulness, incredibly subtle and precise knowledge of the medium and material. The latter, by the way, always impresses me.

At the annual Sholokhov Readings there are the most unexpected reports. Once an application was made... by astronomers. I thought: well, there are enough eccentrics in the world! And they brought most interesting report! We analyzed Sholokhov’s texts from the point of view of astronomy, and it turned out that Sholokhov’s Venus rose where and then, where it actually rose on that day and place. The moon was in decline, just like in the novel.

And one day we had a serious geobotanical study. Its author compared the work of a Russian geobotanist of the early 20th century, done very close to us in the Lugansk region - a description of the steppe, soil, vegetation - with excerpts from Sholokhov. And everyone had the impression that the grandfather almost took advantage of this research. And the same with popular names, dialects, folklore.

All his works are full of love of life. You close his books with the feeling - you have to live

It turns out that he was a man of encyclopedic knowledge?

Alexander Sholokhov: Yes. At one time I corresponded with a professor at Oxford University who was making comments on “The Quiet Don” for an English-speaking reader who is learning Russian and trying to read the novel in it. But the novel is still written in dialect speech, and although this is not such a dull dialectism, the number of South Russian words is enormous. Not all of them are understandable even to the Russian reader from the middle zone. The professor, with incredible pedantry, demanded that this and that be translated for him. The only means of communication then available was regular mail. It was a nightmare, I suffered with it. You write a letter, forget about it, and a month and a half later the answer comes: “Thank you, I understood something, but I didn’t understand this.” I drew drawings, explained that the “iron splinter” is an element of a bull harness, and drew it. We came to a description of the stables in the Listnitsky estate, where the groom, Sashka’s grandfather, a great connoisseur of horses, had bunches of dried herbs hanging - I still remember them almost by heart - spring grass from the fuse, a snake’s eye from a snake bite and inconspicuous white grass growing in willow roots along the levadas, also from some kind of horse disease. With difficulty we found the Latin names of the listed herbs for the English professor. But no one knew what this inconspicuous white grass was.... I eventually wrote to him that he was discriminating against the Russian reader. Having frightened a respectable European with the word “discrimination,” a month and a half later he explained that the Russian reader also does not know the name of this white grass: there are no old horse breeders left, and horses have long been treated with other means.

But the feeling of cosmic integrity of his writer’s perception, it seems to me, is understandable to anyone, regardless of the number of dialectisms.

But this encyclopedicism of his is, after all, the fruit of the “old” southern Russian culture. For us, Akhmatova’s meeting with Brodsky became a symbol of the meeting of “old” and “new” cultures. And in the case of Sholokhov, we somehow miss that he is largely a phenomenon of the “old”, pre-revolutionary culture. And she, despite all the changes of the century, remained in it?

Alexander Sholokhov: Yes. Now they like to say that Mikhail Aleksandrovich did not receive an education, he became a commissar early... There is no need to exaggerate, he was not a commissar, only an inspector, a clerk and an accountant in an office. And due to his age - 15 years old - he could not do anything more. Although, of course, the Civil War matured people early. Like any war.

But he was from a merchant family, which sought to give him the best education at that time. Yes, the time was such that, unfortunately, he did not stay long in one place of study. But he studied at the best gymnasiums in the area. And when, due to illness, he was sent to Moscow for treatment of an inflamed eye, he studied for a year at one of the best private gymnasiums in Moscow - Shelaputinskaya.

So, in my opinion, during his “unfinished secondary school” he learned a lot precisely because it was “old school” and “old culture”.

But there was also a universe of folk Cossack wisdom and observation. Accumulated for centuries, twisted from sayings and jokes.

Nekazak and Nesholokhov

But here I’ll insert a trick: the Sholokhovs are not Cossacks. Your grandfather is not a Cossack. Merchant - by class.

Alexander Sholokhov: Yes. Mikhail Alexandrovich was considered a Cossack only until he was 7 years old. Because the great-grandmother’s former official husband, a Cossack, was alive.

Genius as a hereditary disease does not depend on age or nationality

Grandfather is not a Cossack in the sense that he is neither white nor red. He could always rise above this - class, civil divisions. Loving the Cossacks, he told the whole truth about them. I think it’s unlikely that, being a Cossack by blood and bone, he would have been able to write “Quiet Don” THIS way. I would write like Turoverov or Krasnov.

And, of course, he was in love with the Cossack traditions and way of life, because he grew up here and everything here was native to him.

Well, for the Cossacks themselves, Sholokhov, of course, is a Cossack. It was not without reason that when the question arose about the revival of the Don Cossacks, the first mini-“circle” took place within the walls of our museum. And in 1990, we collected all 11 here Cossack troops. The atamans came to the grandmother. The grandmother is in tears (she’s a high-class Cossack). And the first “circle” chose my dad as ataman, who was not even distinguished then active work for the revival of the Cossacks. He was authoritative, of course, among other things, because of his last name.

Alexander Mikhailovich Sholokhov, grandson of Mikhail Sholokhov, graduated from the Faculty of Biology at Rostov University, then graduated from graduate school at the Faculty of Biology at Moscow State University. Defended his Ph.D. dissertation. When a museum-reserve was created in Veshenskaya, the first director invited Alexander, as a biologist, to work on its reserved part. Photo: Vladimir Fedorenko/RIA Novosti www.ria.ru

After the departure of Mikhail Alexandrovich, a second, and still humiliating, wave of suspicion arose: who is the real author of “Quiet Don”? There were refutations, but at first they did not seem completely convincing. I came to you about ten years ago with a proposal to write a book based on the Vyoshensky materials, proving the absolute local prototype of everything that happens in the Quiet Don. According to them, if Nesholokhov wrote the novel, then he certainly had to live here and at the same time...

Alexander Sholokhov: Well, among the versions of “Nesholokhov” there is one like this. Unfortunately, I have to look through them all. And somehow I came across a seemingly “seriously” written article about what “Quiet Don” created unknown writer, locked in Sholokhov's basement. He suffered from agoraphobia (fear of open spaces - approx. Auto.) and in gratitude for being provided with this basement, he wrote texts for Sholokhov. Where did he come from, what did he write before, why did he come to Sholokhov?! - the author was not interested in such questions. Absurd absurdity, gray game.

I remember the conversation with you. I received similar offers from a variety of people. And they called for filing a lawsuit, because this is obviously a winning story and you can get both moral and material compensation.

But it still seems to me that all the supporters of “Nesholokhov” did not have the task of definitively proving something. Rather, they wanted to maintain persistent doubts about authorship. Now it has subsided on its own. If only you and I could take up the book, we would prolong the conversations.

Yes, we know that there are serious arguments, scientific and factual material. But why, even if you have the results of scientific research and clear arguments in your hands, argue with speculative arguments and an essentially irresponsible position?

I also thought, but if you take and make an exhibition and show the texts of all the announced contenders for the authorship of “Quiet Don” in one room, and everything will immediately fall into place. But then I felt offended by the name of Serafimovich in such a context, who supposedly in his declining years did not have enough strength and courage to publish “Quiet Don”, which he wrote, he found a young writer for this... And the name of the same Kryukov, a Russian officer, is nothing like untainted, in Civil War who did not express it negatively... After all, they themselves never claimed to be the author of “The Quiet Flows the Don.”

Yes, but Wikipedia still says that Sholokhov’s future wife Maria Gromoslavskaya studied “at the Ust-Medveditsk gymnasium, the director of which at that time was F. D. Kryukov.” Why does the reader need to know who was the director of this gymnasium? Only to sow doubts.

Alexander Sholokhov: But this is not factual material - speculation, hints. And why fight them scientifically? This empty exercise of “refuting refutations,” in the words of the notorious hero Al Pacino, “insults my intelligence.”

I also don't want to sit down and write corrections to Wikipedia. It would be better during this time to organize a unique ethnic festival in my grandfather’s homeland, in the Kruzhilinsky farm, where people will plow on bulls, reap with sickles, or prepare an exhibition. And compiling Wikipedia - everyone knows - is an activity not so much for the smartest and most knowledgeable, but for the most active and unoccupied.

Although I am aware that it is necessary to work with the modern multimedia space, which creates strong opinions and easily turns fiction into truth.

I was told about “different authorship” by people to whom I cannot impute nothing but stupidity, baseness and envy. What gives them cause for suspicion? It seems to me that there is confidence that a “man of the people” cannot just like that and rise to the top of Russian verbal culture.

Alexander Sholokhov: Well, we talked about this: he’s not from that kind of people. It is rather a product of the “old” southern Russian culture.

Although, probably, the basis for the emergence of such great and unexpected writers as Sholokhov or Platonov was not just the “old culture”, but also the drama of great changes. Epochs of upheaval give rise to outstanding personalities in both art and literature, this is a fact. It’s a pity that our era has not yet produced such a cultural result.

I remember the one I love

But today Sholokhov’s work is in fashion. Sergei Ursulyak recently shot a series based on "Quiet Don".

Alexander Sholokhov: Just don’t compare Ursulyak’s film adaptation with Gerasimov’s film! Each generation needs its own adaptation of famous books.

Your museum is fundamentally not provincial. The famous “Vyoshensky Manifesto” was adopted here; the director of the Hermitage, Piotrovsky, did not want to move the exhibition planned in Vyoshki to Rostov. Is this your grandfather's inheritance?

Alexander Sholokhov: The best that Russia has is located in the provinces. Mikhailovskoye, Spasskoye - Lutovinovo, Tarkhany - would anyone say “province” about these places? in a derogatory sense? ...Vyoshenskaya is in this row. But living in the provinces, we must do everything at the level of the best museums in the world. And surpass them.

Surpassed?

Alexander Sholokhov: Russia, of course, has surpassed the world museum community in the presence of literary museum-reserves. There is nothing like it in the world. Well, to answer your question specifically, in 2007 our museum became a nominee for the competition the best museum Europe.

He hid from the NKVD and came drunk to Stalin, received the Nobel Prize and dreamed of the glory of Leo Tolstoy. Such is the fate of Mikhail Sholokhov.

ALREADY during his lifetime he was recognized as great and became the only one of the five Russian writers who received the Nobel Prize while being a citizen of the country. (Ivan Bunin, Joseph Brodsky and Alexander Solzhenitsyn received the award while in exile, and Boris Pasternak was forced to refuse the award.)

He won the prize “for his uncompromising portrayal of a man of the 20th century.” However, for all Sholokhov, first of all, the author of "Quiet Don".

The first two books were published in 1928-1929. The 24-year-old writer was noticed. World fame came to Sholokhov several years later, after the 3rd and 4th books were published.

He was late for the meeting with the leader

BY THE WAY, at first they did not want to publish the third book of “The Quiet Don,” which deals with the Civil War. The fate of both the novel and the writer himself was decided by Stalin, whose meeting with Sholokhov was organized by Gorky, who treated him well.

The meeting between the leader and the young writer took place at Gorky’s dacha. Sholokhov arrived first and, seeing that the main guest was not yet there, went fishing. On the river, as usual, time flew by. Stalin met Sholokhov, who was late, unfriendly. The conversation turned out to be quite tough.

“Why do you write with sympathy for the white movement? You have the Kornilovs there, the Lisnitskys...” Stalin began with a question. It turned out that before the meeting he read the entire novel. Sholokhov was not taken aback: “And the whites were actually significant people. The same General Kornilov managed to make his way to the very top, having been born into a poor family. He ate at the same table with the privates. And when he escaped from Austrian captivity, he carried a wounded man for several kilometers soldier." Stalin did not like the answer: “A Soviet writer must have a choice - what to write and what not.” “Well, I didn’t put this into the novel,” Sholokhov retorted. “Okay, we’ll print,” the leader finally agreed.

By the way, he insisted that Grigory Melekhov (the hero’s original name was Abram Ermakov) become a Soviet man, almost a communist, at the end of the novel. Sholokhov tried, but in the end he could not step on the throat of his own song. He worked on finishing the novel in Moscow, visiting his friend Vasily Kudashev. He recalled that Mikhail woke him up late at night: “No, Vasya, I can’t. This is what the ending will be.” And I read what soon became known to the whole world.

The name of Vasily Kudashev is connected with the story of the missing manuscript of "Quiet Don". Sholokhov met Vasily when he came to Moscow to enroll at Moscow State University. But, as the son of wealthy parents and, moreover, a non-party member, he did not pass the selection.

Without entering the university, Mikhail Alexandrovich returned to his home in Veshenskaya. But when he came to the capital, he always visited Kudashev. And on one of his visits, he left in his apartment on Kamergersky Lane the manuscript of the first two books of “The Quiet Don.”

After the writer’s death, it became known that Kudashev’s daughter owned them. When the woman died and her daughter also died, the rights to the relic passed to a distant relative of the Kudashevs. She was inundated with offers to sell the manuscript, including through the Sotheby's auction. They offered a lot of money. But she did not give in to persuasion and decided not to give the manuscript abroad. V. Putin, who was then Prime Minister, ordered to find the necessary amount for the state to purchase the manuscript. After 885 pages (605 of them were written by the writer himself, the rest were rewritten by his wife) of handwritten text were at the disposal of specialists, it became finally clear that the author of the novel was Mikhail Sholokhov.

TALK that the first book of "Quiet Don" was not written by Sholokhov appeared back in 1929. A special commission was created that made a decision on the authorship of Sholokhov. The second wave of accusations (they said that Mikhail Alexandrovich borrowed the novel from the Cossack writer Kryukov) appeared in the 70s.

“Why?” argues Alexander Ushakov, professor, head of the department of modern Russian literature at the Gorky Institute of World Literature. “But Sholokhov had too many envious people.” Solzhenitsyn wrote the preface to the book “The Stirrups of the Quiet Don,” published abroad. Returning from exile in the 50s, Alexander Isaevich first of all sent Sholokhov a letter in which he called him a great writer. But when Sholokhov spoke out against awarding Solzhenitsyn’s story “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” with the Lenin Prize, he apparently harbored a grudge against him. Having gone to live in the West, Solzhenitsyn - I know this for sure - began to look for a person who would write an anti-Sholokhov book. And, of course, I found it. By the way, when we came into possession of the manuscript of “Quiet Flows the Flow of the Flow”, which unconditionally confirmed Sholokhov’s authorship, we invited Alexander Isaevich to look at it. He refused, citing many issues."

Sholokhov’s relationship with his colleagues is a separate issue. Alexei Tolstoy treated him rather reservedly. When in 1940 there was talk of awarding the Stalin Prize to Quiet Don, Tolstoy opposed it. Together with Fadeev, they insisted that the novel needed improvement; it lacked a more Soviet ending. True, when it came to voting, all cultural figures - members of the award committee unanimously spoke in favor of "Quiet Don".

However, the “culprit” behind the positive decision was Stalin himself, who on the eve of the vote said in a conversation: “It’s up to the writers to decide, of course. But as a reader, I like the novel.” The fact that the reader Stalin liked the writer Sholokhov decided the outcome of the matter. As a few years earlier he decided the very fate of the writer.

They tried to make the writer the head of the conspiracy

THE FACT is that in the mid-30s an assassination attempt was being prepared on Sholokhov. The NKVD of the Rostov region, where he lived, fabricated a case in which Sholokhov appeared as the head of a local counter-revolutionary conspiracy. But one of the security officers managed to warn the writer. And he took a roundabout route, deliberately confusing his tracks, and left for Moscow. When he got there, he immediately called Stalin’s secretary Poskrebyshev. “Don’t be afraid, they will call you,” he said.

Sholokhov began to wait for a call from the Kremlin in the company of Alexander Fadeev. The friends drank heavily. And suddenly a call came to the Kremlin! Poskrebyshev, seeing the state Sholokhov was in, tried to give him tea. But Stalin smelled it: “Comrade Sholokhov, they say you drink too much!” To which the writer replied: “You’ll get drunk with such a life, Comrade Stalin!” And he told the leader in detail what brought him to Moscow. After this conversation, Stalin convened a meeting of the Politburo and summoned the entire leadership of the NKVD. And after some time, serious personnel changes began there.

Sholokhov understood perfectly well what was happening in the country. He was not a naive person. On the contrary, he was quite practical and always distanced himself from power. “I remember in 1954, together with the then head of our institute, Anisimov, we went to the opening of the Second Congress of the Writers’ Union,” recalls Professor Alexander Ushakov, “and on the street we met a staggering Sholokhov. “Misha, are you drunk?” asked our director: “A friend of mine has returned from the camps,” said Sholokhov. - Served 17 years. There is not a single whole finger."

Sholokhov failed to find a common language with the new leadership of the country - Khrushchev and Brezhnev. Having finished “They Fought for the Motherland,” he sent the manuscript to Brezhnev. Tom didn’t like the novel so much that he didn’t even answer. And then Sholokhov, according to his relatives, burned the manuscript. Although, according to experts, this novel could be compared in its power to “Quiet Don”. What was eventually published is far from the original version created by the writer.

But he still went down in history as the author of the great novel "Quiet Don". The campaign to award Sholokhov the Nobel Prize was led by the English writer Lord Snow, a great admirer of Sholokhov’s talent. It so happened that the year before, in 1964, the Nobel Prize was awarded to Jean Paul Sartre, who refused to accept it with the words: “I will not receive the Nobel Prize until Mikhail Sholokhov becomes its laureate.”

For Sholokhov himself, the award of the Nobel Prize came as a complete surprise. Although he always knew his worth as a great writer. It is not for nothing that in the margins of the manuscript of “Quiet Don”, next to the autograph “M. Sholokhov”, he carefully wrote: “L. Tolstoy”.

“In my opinion, Sholokhov is the greatest writer of the twentieth century,” says Alexander Ushakov. “The topics that he touched upon were not touched upon by anyone. He wrote about the main problems of the century, about the fact that man, like his Grigory Melekhov, has always "Wars will tear apart. In terms of the level of understanding of the century and man's place in it, Sholokhov has no equal. Sholokhov's talent is the talent of a prophet."