Fedor Kryukov, Don Cossack. Alexander Pushkin "Prisoner of the Caucasus"
Fedor Kryukov
QUIET DON
(1912-1920)
PRELIMINARY
Our glorious little land is not plowed up with plows ...
Our land is plowed with horse hooves,
And the glorious land was sown with Cossack heads,
Our quiet Don is decorated with young widows,
Our father, the quiet Don, blooms with orphans,
The wave in the quiet Don is filled with paternal, maternal tears.
Oh you, our father quiet Don!
Oh, what are you, quiet Don, mutnehonek flowing?
Oh, how can I, the quiet Don, not muddy the leak!
From the bottom of me, quiet Dona, cold keys beat,
In the middle of me, quiet Dona, the white fish stirs up,
Ancient Cossack songs
With this epigraph begins "Quiet Flows the Don" under the brand name "Mikhail Sholokhov". But now we have already published an essay by Fyodor Kryukov "Bulavinsky rebellion", in which - oh, strangeness! - we find the same lines about "Father Quiet Don"!
Candidate of Philosophical Sciences Anatoly Sidochenko, who walked far and wide through Kryukov’s places, in his book “Read, Russia! "Quiet Don" of his son, the Don Cossack hero Fyodor Kryukov! (Slavyansk, 2004) writes: “Thus, for Kryukov, only such a beginning is permissible: the Melekhovsky yard is on the very edge of the village. The gates from the cattle base lead south to the Don. A steep eight-yard descent between moss-covered chalk blocks, and here is the shore: a mother-of-pearl scattering of shells, a damp, broken border of pebbles: pebbles, kissed by water, become damp. And further - the stirrup of the Don, boiling under the wind with a blued swell, the main course of the river. To the North - behind the willow redwood and an abundance of humen wattle - a wide steppe road leading to the Ukrainian Mikhailovskaya Sloboda, it was jokingly nicknamed the "Hetman's Way". On the sides of this road there is gray sagebrush and a brown, tenacious plantain trampled by horse hooves. When climbing a large hillock - a fork of three roads, crowned with a chapel, behind it - a steppe covered with a flowing haze. From the West, the chalky ridge of the hill, one of those elevations which locals called "mountains". To the East - the central street of the village, which is decorated with a newly built church; the street permeates the square, and behind the village it seems to run away to a borrowing place, as the Cossacks call the Don water meadows. (In the first paragraph of the plagiarized version of Kryukov’s novel, not only mistakes were made due to the difficult understanding of Kryukov’s handwriting, but also malicious actions of a purely thieves’ nature: Kryukov’s poles of the globe when displaying Tatarskaya station - the prototype of which was his native village Glazunovskaya, “native corner, native land "! - they wear the usual classical sequence, like navigators, travelers and geologists: in pairs, South-North, West-East. And the plagiarists deliberately changed and mixed everything so that Glazunovskaya was unrecognizable. It just has a steep descent , where "love" of the main Kryukov heroes "begins", the Medveditsa, a tributary of the Don, is moved up to the descent, and is called the Don, since Kryukov called the Don his native river. And 150 steps from the "Melekhovsky yard" is the courtyard of the Kryukovs' estate. On this estate, preparing to the Nobel crime of awarding the Sh-vu Prize, in 1962 the large house of the Kryukovs was demolished and a dining room was built in its place, and a smaller house was built or with iron plates and dragged to another street. They did everything so that the countrymen did not remember anything about Kryukov, did not know anything. And so it happened. But in 2002, I reminded Kryukov's countrymen of everything! And by the way: he was completely forgotten!).
The greatest writer of Russia, Fyodor Dmitrievich Kryukov, who knows how to put paint on paint, whipping it up to a metaphor of subtext, accessible to the intellectual reading public, was trampled under the hooves of the Bolsheviks, who drowned the Don in blood and destroyed the Cossacks as a class. A stranger on the Don, Mikhail Sholokh (this is how Pyotr Gromoslavsky signed the first feuilletons and "Don Tales" and the head of the RAPP (in fact, the head of the Union of Writers of the USSR) Alexander Serafimovich who published them) sat on the throne of "Classics Soviet literature", and even later received the Nobel Prize (I note that I attribute this Nobel Prize to Fyodor Kryukov)!
The most thorough disavower of the "writer Sholokhov" Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote: "... that it was not Sholokhov who wrote The Quiet Flows the Don - it is easy to prove to a thorough literary critic, and not putting much work: just compare the style, language, everything artistic techniques"Quiet Flows the Don" and "Virgin Soil Upturned". (That he wrote “Raised” too, maybe he didn’t? - I couldn’t achieve this!) ... "
My conclusion is final and irrevocable: not only was Sholokhov not a writer, but he he was even a reader, did not have the slightest inclination towards "reading - the best teaching" (Pushkin), was only alphabetically literate, did not master the syntax and spelling; to hide his illiteracy, the wildly ignorant Sholokhov never publicly wrote even short notes; after his death, no writer's papers remained from Sholokhov, the desk was empty, empty nightstands, and in "his library" it was impossible to find a single book with his marks and bookmarks. Never seen him working in the library or archives. Thus, those "whistleblowers" who said or wrote that Sholokhov did this and that, revealed the ignorance of the plagiarist: Sholokhov was only able to carry out courier orders, and the plagiarism of The Quiet Don and everything else so-called. "Sholokhov's works" - all types of plagiarism were performed by other people, mainly by his wife and her relatives Gromoslavsky. To attribute plagiarist work to Sholokhov means to create a mythology of a plagiarist who was in all respects a literary insane person. That is why his wife Maria fanned the legend that her and her husband's handwriting is "equally beautiful", and that is why the falsified "his archive" was written in different handwriting and by different people. The absolute truth: Sholokhov was neither a writer nor an active plagiarist: his name, like a stigma, denoted the plagiarism of other people. Sholokhov could be called a writer only once a year as April Fool's joke. He was Stalin's bloody joke, a criminal product of a criminal system, a plague stool of revolutionary October and the magazine Oktyabr, an illegitimate degenerate of October in every sense.
Yuri KUVALDIN
Fedor Kryukov
QUIET DON
(1912-1920)
fragment of the beginning of the novel
Is our glorious land plowed up with something?
Our glorious little land is not plowed with plows, not with plows,
Our land is plowed with horse hooves,
And the glorious land was sown with Cossack heads.
Is our father, the glorious quiet Don, decorated with something?
Our quiet Don is decorated with young widows.
Is our father, the glorious quiet Don, blooming in some way?
Our father, the glorious quiet Don, is blooming with orphans.
Is the wave filled with something in the glorious quiet Don?
The wave in the quiet Don is filled with paternal and maternal tears.
BOOK ONE
PART ONE
Melekhovsky yard - on the very edge of the village. The gates from the cattle base lead south to the Don. A steep eight-yard descent between moss-covered chalk blocks, and here is the shore: a mother-of-pearl scattering of shells, a damp, broken border of pebbles kissed by waves, and further on, the stirrup of the Don, boiling under the wind with blued ripples, silvers. To the north, beyond the willow redwood and an abundance of humen wattle fences, a wide steppe road leading to the Ukrainian Mikhailovsky Sloboda, it was jokingly nicknamed the "Hetman's Way". On the sides of this road, sagebrush rustles, and brown, living plantain, trampled by horse hooves. When climbing a large hillock, there is a fork of three roads, crowned with a chapel; behind it stretched the steppe covered with flowing haze. From the west, the Tatar chalk ridge of the hill guards, one of those elevations that the locals call "mountains". To the east is the central street of the village, penetrating the square, and then running to the place, flood meadows, where Medveditsa flows.
In the penultimate Turkish campaign, the Cossack Melekhov Prokofy returned to the village, who served in the Third Don Regiment and participated in the defeat of the Turks at Kyuryuk-Dar, east of Kars, and in the capture of Kars. On the way home, in a Circassian village in the Verkhokuban region, Melekhov fell in love with a Circassian orphan. Her parents were driven into the mountains by the Chechens, who defeated and robbed the village with a militant raid. The Circassian responded to the Cossack in return. Prokofy gave her relatives everything of value from his "trophies of war" as a bride price. And they, in turn, gave a worthy dowry for the bride.
Prokofy came to his native village with his beloved wife, a small proud woman who wrapped herself in a patterned shawl. Her husband taught her not to hide her face from strangers, and with her beautiful, wild, dull-glimmering eyes she looked around everything around, looked directly into the eyes of Cossacks and Cossack women. Her silk shawls smelled of distant North Caucasian smells, their iridescent patterns aroused woman's envy...
Soon she gave birth to a son Prokofy, but died during childbirth. Prokofy did not marry again, together with his parents he raised a son, named after his grandfather Panteley. Pantelei Prokofievich grew up to be a good Cossack: during his service at the tsar's review, he won the first prize in trick riding and possession of military weapons. But in 1883 he injured his leg at the races, and since then he has been limping on his left leg. He received a government pension of 57 rubles a month. After the death of his father, Panteley "with great appetite" got into the economy: re-covered the house with iron, with the permission of the ataman added half a dozen virgin land to the estate, built a new barn and barn under the tin. At the age of 61, Pantelei Prokofievich was squatting: he was wide, slightly stooped, but still looked like an energetic and well-formed old man. He had an explosive character, wore a silver crescent-shaped earring in his left ear, his black beard and hair had not faded yet. His father married him in 1884 to Akulina Ozhogina, a villager, she was five years younger than Panteley. A year later, their son Petro appeared in their family, all in his mother: medium height, slightly snub-nosed, with a round head in a lush wheat-colored hair, brown-eyed and ironically smiling. Six years younger from Peter, Grigory, in all guises resembles his father, a Circassian in everything: half a head taller than Peter, brightly hooked, blue tonsils of burning eyes in slightly slanting slits, sharp cheekbones covered with swarthy skin. Grigory did not yet stoop like his father, but there was something in common with his smile, animalistic. Twelve-year-old Dunyashka is her father's weakness, the favorite of all the Melekhovs - long-armed, big-eyed, also very similar to her father. Petro had been married for a year and a half to a rather beautiful Cossack Daria. Their baby brought the Melekhov family to six people. It was May 1911...
Gregory came back from the games after the first kochet. From the passage he smelled the smell of sour hops and the spicy dryness of the virgin grass. On tiptoe he went into the room, undressed, carefully hung up his festive trousers with stripes, trousers, crossed himself, and lay down. On the floor lay a golden slumber of moonlight, cut with a cross of a window frame. Daria muttered in a sleepy voice:
- Tsits, you filthy child! No sleep for you, no rest. - She sang softly:
Duda deck,
Where were you?
She guarded the horses.
What did you watch out for?
horse with saddle
With golden fringe...
Grigory, falling asleep to the measured lulling creak, remembered: "Tomorrow Pyotr should go to the camps. Dasha will stay with the child ..."
Gregory was shaken by the boisterous neighing of a horse. I guessed Petrov's drill pit by his voice. With fingers exhausted from sleep, he buttoned his shirt for a long time, again he almost fell asleep to the fluid swell of the song:
Where are the geese?
They went into the reeds.
And where are the reeds?
The girls squeezed out.
And where are the girls?
The girls got married.
And where are the Cossacks?
Went to war...
Oh, war, war, war!
What did she do?!
And most importantly, girls, you:
Your suitors are there ...
broken by sleep, Grigory got to the stables, led the horse into the alley. A web of spider web tickled his face, and suddenly the dream disappeared. Along the Don ran obliquely a silvery, undulating lunar path, untravelled by anyone. Mist was sleeping over the Don, and starry millet sparkled above.
The horse behind carefully rearranges its legs. The descent to the water is bad. On the other side, a duck quack, near the shore in the mud, turned up and thumped a catfish hunting for small things in a swoop on the water. Gregory stood by the water for a long time. The shore breathed damp and insipid Prelu. From the horse's lips a fractional-foamy drop fell. There was a light, sweet emptiness in Grigory's heart. Good and thoughtless. Returning, I looked at the sunrise, the blue semi-darkness had already resolved there. Near the stables I ran into my mother.
- Is that you, Grishka?
- And then who?
Did you drink the horse?
- He drank, - reluctantly replies Gregory.
Leaning back, she carries her mother in an apron to the flood of dung, shuffling around with senile, flabby bare feet.
- I would go and encourage the Astakhovs. Stepan with our Peter was going to go.
The coolness puts a tight trembling spring into Grigory's body. Body in prickly goosebumps. After three thresholds, he runs into the Astakhovs on the porch buzzing with steps. The door is not locked. In the kitchen, Stepan is sleeping on a spread bed, his wife's head under his arm. In the thinned darkness, Grigory sees Aksinya's shirt fluffed up above the knees, birch-white outstretched female legs. He stares for a second, feeling his mouth dry and his head swell in the cast-iron ringing. He furtively rolled his eyes. He spoke hoarsely in a strange voice:
- Hey, who's there? Get up!
Aksinya sobbed from sleep:
- Oh, what is it? Someone? - fussily fumbled, her bare hand thrashed at her feet, pulling on her shirt. All of her, confused and still sleepy: a woman's dream is strong at dawn.
- It's me, - said Gregory. - Mother sent to encourage you ...
"We're at once..." said Aksinya. - You can’t fit in here ... We sleep on the floor from the heat. Stepan, get up, do you hear?
Gregory guesses from her voice that she is embarrassed, and hurries to leave...
About thirty Cossacks left the village for the May camps. Place of gathering - parade ground. By seven o'clock, wagons with canvas booths, foot and horseback Cossacks in white canvas shirts, in equipment, stretched to the parade ground.
On the porch, Petro was hastily sewing together a cracked rope - a third, long rein, to tie a lying horse to a fence, a tree ... Pantelei paced near Petrov's horse, poured oats into the trough, occasionally shouted:
- Dunyashka, did you sew up the crackers? Did you season the salo with salt?
All in a ruddy color, Dunyashka drew bases like a swallow from the cooker to the smoker, laughingly brushed aside her father’s shouts:
- You, dad, manage your business, and I'll put my brother in such a way that he won't turn up to Cherkassky.
- Didn't eat? inquired Petro, drooling over the fight and nodding at the horse.
"He's chewing," his father answered sedately, checking the sweatshirts with his rough palm. It’s a small matter: a crumb or a bull will stick to a sweatshirt, and in one transition into blood it will rub the horse’s back.
- Finish Bay, give him a drink, dad.
- Grishka is taking him to the Don. Hey, Gregory, lead the horse!
A tall lean bottom with a white star on his forehead went playfully. Grigory led him out the gate, slightly touched his withers with his left hand, jumped on him, and from his place went at a wide trot. At the descent I wanted to hold back, but the horse lost its footing, became more frequent, and went downhill on a bait. Leaning back, almost lying on the horse's back, Grigory saw a woman descending downhill with buckets. He turned off the stitch and, overtaking the stirred up dust, crashed into the water.
Aksinya was descending from the mountain, swaying, and from afar shouted loudly:
- Cherkesyuk is mad! A bit of a horse did not stop! Just wait, I'll tell my father how you drive.
- But, but, neighbor, do not swear. If you see your husband off to the camps, maybe I'll get along on the farm.
- What the hell, I need you!
“The mowing will begin, if you ask,” Grigory laughed.
Aksinya deftly scooped up a pail of water from the yoke and, pinching her wind-blown skirt between her knees, glanced at Grigory.
- Well, is your Stepan going? asked Gregory.
- What do you want?
- What are you ... Ask, eh, you can not?
- Gathered. Well?
- You stay, became-be, zhalmerkoy?
- So, so be it.
The horse tore his lips from the water, chewed the flowing water with a creak, and, looking at the other side of the Don, hit the water with his front foot. Aksinya scooped up another bucket; throwing a yoke over her shoulder, she went up the mountain with a slight swing. Grigory touched the horse next. The wind ruffled Aksinya's skirt, sorted out small fluffy curls on her swarthy neck. On a heavy knot of hair, a hat embroidered with colored silk flared, a pink shirt tucked into a skirt, without wrinkling, embraced a steep back and poured shoulders. Climbing the mountain, Aksinya leaned forward, a longitudinal hollow on her back clearly lay out under her shirt. Grigory saw the brown circles of his shirt, which had faded from sweat under the armpits, followed every movement with his eyes. He wanted to speak to her again.
- Will you miss your husband? BUT?
Aksinya turned her head as she walked and smiled:
- And then how. Get married, - taking a breath, she said intermittently: get married, and then you find out, they miss my friend.
Pushing his horse, leveling with her, Grigory looked into her eyes:
- And some women are already happy how they see off their husbands. Our Daria begins to get fat without Peter.
Aksinya, moving her nostrils, breathed sharply; fixing her hair, she said:
- Husband - he is not really, but draws blood. Will we marry you soon?
- I don't know about dad. Must be after service.
- Young ishsho, don't get married.
- And what?
- Dryness alone! - she looked askance; Without parting her lips, she smiled slyly.
And then for the first time Grigory noticed that her lips were frankly passionate, puffy. He, sorting the mane into strands, said:
- There is no desire to marry. Somebody will fall in love anyway,” said Grigory.
- Did you notice? - Aksinya threw it with a hint.
- Why should I notice ... You see Stepan off ...
- Don't play with me!
- Will you hurt?
- I’ll say a word to Stepan ...
- I'm your Stepan...
- Look, brave, a tear will drip.
- Do not scare, Aksinya!
- I'm not scared. Your business is to play with the girls. Let them embroider your ducks, but don't look at me.
- I'll take a look.
- Well, look. - Aksinya smiled reconcilingly and left the stitch, trying to get around the horse.
Grigory turned him sideways and blocked the road.
- Let go, Grishka!
- I won't.
- Don't be stupid, I need to collect my husband.
Grigory, smiling, excited the horse; he, stepping over, pressed Aksinya to the Yar.
- Let go, devil, people out! Will they see what they think? She cast a frightened glance around and passed, frowning and not looking back.
On the porch, Petro said goodbye to his family. Gregory saddled his horse. Holding the saber, Petro hurriedly ran down the thresholds, took the reins from Grigory's hands. The horse, smelling the way, uneasily stepped over, foamed his lips, driving the bit in his mouth. Catching the stirrup with his foot, holding on to the bow, Petro said to his father:
- Bulls do not nuri, dad! Falls-sell. Grigory to handle the horse. And look, don’t sell the steppe grass: there’s none in the meadow, you yourself know what hay will be.
- Well, with God! Good hour! said the old man, crossing himself.
With a habitual movement, Petro "slammed" his downed body into the saddle, straightened behind the folds of his shirt, pulled together by a belt. The horse went to the gate. The head of a saber shone dimly in the sun, quivering in time with the steps. Daria followed with the baby in her arms. Mother, wiping her reddened nose with her sleeve and the corner of the curtain, stood in the middle of the base.
- Brother, pies! I forgot the pies! .. The pies with potatoes! .. - Dunyashka galloped to the gate like a goat.
- What are you yelling, fool! Grigory shouted angrily at her.
- There are pies left! - leaning against the gate, Dunya moaned, and on smeared hot cheeks, and from her cheeks on an everyday jacket - tears.
Daria watched her husband's shirt whitening through the dust from under her palm. Pantelei Prokofievich, shaking the rotten post at the gate, glanced at Grigory.
- Take the gate, fix it, and put up parking lots at the corner. - And after thinking, he added, as he announced the news: - Petro left!
Through the wattle fence, Grigory saw how Stepan was getting ready. Dressed up in a green woolen skirt, Aksinya brought his horse to him. Stepan, smiling, said something to her. He slowly, in a businesslike way, kissed his wife and for a long time did not remove his hand from her shoulder. His strongly tanned hand was black on Aksinya's white blouse. Stepan stood with his back to Grigory; Aksinya laughed at something and shook her head negatively. The tall black horse swayed, lifting the rider in the stirrup.
Stepan rode out of the gate with a hurried step, sat in the saddle, as if dug in, and Aksinya walked beside him, holding on to the stirrup, and looking up into his eyes with loving tenderness. So they passed the neighboring hut and disappeared around the bend. Grigory followed them with a long, unblinking glance...
On the same day, a thunderstorm gathered in the evening. A brown cloud formed over the village of Tatarskaya. The Don, tousled by the wind, threw foam-ridged waves onto the shores. Behind the livadas, dry lightning scorched the sky, crushing the earth with rare peals of thunder. Under the cloud, a kite soared open: it was pursued by crows with a crack. A cloud, breathing a chill, walked along the Don, from the west. Behind the loan, the sky grew menacingly black, the steppe was expectantly silent. Around the stanitsa, people clapped their closed shutters, old women hurried from Vespers, crossing themselves, a gray column of dust swayed on the parade ground, and the first grains of rain were already sown on the earth burdened with spring heat.
Dunyashka, dangling her pigtails, walked along the base, slammed the chicken coop door and stood in the middle of the base, anxiously peering into the darkened sky. Children were running in the street. The neighbor's eight-year-old Petka spun around, crouching on one leg, on his head, closing his eyes, his father's exorbitantly spacious cap circled, and squealed piercingly:
Rain, rain, let it go.
We'll go to the bushes.
Prayer to God
worshiper of Christ...
Dunya looked with understanding and sympathy at Petka's bare feet, thickly strewn with chicks, trampling the ground with a dance. She also wanted to dance in the rain with her head wet, so that her hair would grow thick and curly; I wanted, just like Petya's comrade, to gain a foothold on the roadside dust upside down, with the risk of falling into thorns - but my mother was looking out the window ...
Sighing, Dunyashka ran to the hut.
The rain came down hard and thick. Thunder rumbled above the roof, fragments rolled like a rolling echo beyond the Don. In the passage, father and sweaty Grishka were pulling a rolled-up log from the side.
- Harsh threads and a gypsy needle, very fast! Grigory shouted to Dunyashka.
A fire was lit in the kitchen.
To sew up the nonsense of the village Daria.
The old woman, rocking the child, muttered:
- You, the old one, are a kind of fiction. You would go to bed, kerosene is getting more expensive, and you are burning. What is the catch now? Where will the plague take you? Ishsho stomp, go there, to the base of the passion of the Lord. Look, look, how it blazes! Lord Jesus Christ, Queen of Heaven...
In the kitchen for a second it became dazzlingly blue and quiet, you could hear the rain tapping on the shutters, followed by a gasp of thunder. Dunyashka squeaked and poked her face into the ravine. Darya fanned the windows and doors with small crosses. The old woman gazed with terrible eyes at the cat that was caressing at her feet.
- Dunka! Go-oh-no you use it ... Queen of heaven, forgive me a sinner! Dunka, throw the cat to the bases. Come on, you evil spirit... Shtob you!..
Grigory, dropping his bullshit, was shaking in soundless laughter.
- Well, what did you jump up? Click! shouted Panteley. - Baba, sew up fast! Nadys ishsho said, look around the nonsense.
- And what a fish now, - the old woman began to hint.
You don't understand, shut up! We'll take the most sterlet on the spit. The fish goes to the shore at once, afraid of the storm. The water must have gone murky. Come on, Dunyashka run out, listen - Erik is playing? (steppe stream - Yu.K.)
Dunya reluctantly moved sideways to the door.
- Who's going to roam? Daria can’t, she might get a cold in her chest, ”the old woman did not let up.
- Grishka and I, and with other nonsense - we will call Aksinya, some of the women.
Out of breath, Dunyashka ran in. On the eyelashes, quivering, raindrops hung. She smelled of damp black earth:
- Eric is buzzing already scary!
- Are you going to wander with us?
- A ishsho who will go?
- Let's call Bab.
- I'll go!
- Well, put on a zipun and ride to Aksinya. If he goes, let him call Malashka Frolov.
- Enta will not freeze, - Grigory smiled, - she has fat on her, like on a good boar.
- You should take dry hay, Grishunka, - advised the mother, - put it under your heart, otherwise you will catch a cold inside.
- Grigory, wind for hay. The old woman said the right word.
Soon Dunyashka brought the women. Aksinya, in a torn blouse girded with a rope and a blue underskirt, looked noticeably thinner. Laughing with Darya, she removed the handkerchief from her head, twisted her hair tighter into a knot, and, covering herself, throwing back her head, looked coldly at Grigory. Fat Malashka was tying up her stockings at the threshold, wheezing, with a cold:
- Did you get the bags? True God, we will not shake the fish!
Went to the base. Rain poured thickly on the softened earth, foamed puddles, and slid down to the Don in streams. Gregory walked ahead. His unreasonable joy washed away:
- Look, dad, there's a ditch.
- What a darkness!
“Hold on, Aksyushka, we’ll be in prison together,” Malashka laughs hoarsely.
- Look, Grigory, is there a pier for the Maidannikovs?
- She is.
- From here ... to conceive ... - mastering the whipping wind, Panteley rustles.
- Can't hear it, uncle! - Malasha wheezes.
- Wander, with God ... I'm from the depths. I speak from the depths... Malyashka, the devil is deaf, where are you pulling? I will go from the depths! .. Gregory! Grishka! Let Aksinya away from the shore!
Don has a moaning roar. The wind tears the slanting cloth of the rain to shreds. Feeling the bottom with his feet, Grigory plunged into the water up to his waist. A sticky cold crept up to his chest, tightened his heart like a hoop. In the face, in tightly closed eyes, as if with a puff whip, a wave lashes. The nonsense is inflated with a ball, pulls inward. Gregory's feet, shod in woolen stockings, slide along the sandy bottom. Kamol nonsense is torn from the hands. Deeper, deeper... Ledge. Legs are torn off. The current impetuously carries to the middle, sucks.
Grigory with his right hand pushes his way to the shore with force. The black, rippling depths frighten him more than ever. The foot joyfully steps on the shaky bottom. Some kind of fish knocks on the knee.
- Go deeper! - from somewhere out of the viscous black follows the voice of the father.
The delusion, tilting, again creeps into the depths, again the current tears the earth from under its feet, and Grigory, raising his head, swims, spitting.
- Aksinya, is she alive?
- Pokedova is alive.
- Does it stop raining?
- The little one stops, at once the big one starts moving.
- You go slowly. The father will hear - he will swear.
- I was frightened of my father, but also ...
They drag on for a minute in silence. Water, like sticky dough, knits every movement.
- Grisha, near the shore, kill karsha. Need to circle.
A terrible push throws Gregory far away. A roaring splash, as if from a ravine a lump of rock fell into the water.
- Ah-ah-ah-ah! - Aksinya squeals somewhere near the shore.
Frightened Grigory, having surfaced, swims to the cry.
- Aksinya! - Wind and flowing water noise. - Aksinya! - cold with fear, shouts Grigory.
- Hey! .. Gri-g-o-r-i-i-y!
Gregory throws a wave. Something viscous underfoot, grabbed his hand - nonsense.
- Grisha, where are you? .. - Aksinya's crying voice.
Why didn't she answer? yells Grigory angrily, crawling ashore on all fours.
They, squatting on their haunches, trembling dismantle the nonsense tangled in a lump. A moon peeps through a hole in a torn cloud. Behind the loan, thunder rumbles restrainedly. The earth is glossy with unabsorbed moisture. The sky, washed by rain, is strict and clear.
Unraveling the nonsense, Grigory peers at Aksinya. Her face is chalky-pale, but her red, slightly twisted lips are already laughing:
- How it will kick me ashore, - she says, taking a breath, - she has gone from her mind. Fled to death! I thought you drowned.
Their hands collide. Aksinya tries to put her hand into the sleeve of his shirt:
“How warm you have something in your sleeve,” she says plaintively, “and I froze. Colic went through the body.
- Here he is, the damned catfish, where he hit! - Gregory pushes a hole in the middle of the nonsense about an arshin and a half in diameter.
Someone is running from the scythe. Grigory guesses Dunyashka. Still from afar shouts to her:
- Do you have threads?
- Tutochka. - Dunyashka, out of breath, runs up: - Why are you sitting here? Batyanka sent, shtob quickly went to the spit. We caught a bag of sterlets there! - in the voice of Dunyashka undisguised triumph.
Aksinya, clanging her teeth, sews up a hole in the nonsense. At a trot, to keep warm, they run to the spit. Pantelei twists the cigarette with his fingers, ribbed with water and plump, like those of a drowned man; dancing, boasting:
- Once wandered - eight pieces, and another time ... - he takes a breather, lights up and silently points his foot at the bag.
Aksinya peers in with curiosity. There is a grinding crack in the bag: a living sterlet is rubbing.
- What did you get away with?
- Catfish squandered nonsense.
- Stitched up?
- Somehow, the cells got hooked ...
- Well, let's get to the knee and go home. Wander, Grishka, why did you get the hang of it?
Grigory steps over with stiff legs. Aksinya is trembling so that Grigory feels her trembling through his delirium.
- Don't shake!
- And I would be glad, but I won’t take my breath away.
- Come on, that's what ... Let's climb out, damn this fish!
A large carp strikes through the log with a gilded corkscrew. Teaching a step, Grigory bends the nonsense. Aksinya, bent over, runs out onto the shore. Water rushes back on the sand, fish trembles.
- Shall we go through the borrowing?
- Forest closer.
- Hey, are you there soon?
- Come on, let's catch up. Let's rinse the nonsense.
Wincing, Aksinya wringed out her skirt, picked up the bag with the catch on her shoulders, and almost trotted along the spit. Gregory was talking nonsense. A hundred sazhens passed. Aksinya groaned.
- My urine is gone! Leg cramps!
- Here is last year's mop, can you get warm?
- And then. If you reach Pokedov's house, you can measure it.
Grigory rolled his mop cap on its side and dug a hole. The stale hay wafted with the hot smell of preli.
- Get in the middle. It's like in the oven.
Aksinya, throwing her sack, buried herself up to her neck in the hay:
- That's a blessing!
Shivering from the cold, Grigory lay down beside him. From Aksinya's wet hair came a gentle, exciting smell. She lay with her head thrown back, breathing regularly through her half-open mouth.
“Your hair smells like a drunkard.” You know, like a sort of white flower... - Grigory whispered, leaning over.
She said nothing. Foggy and distant was her gaze, directed at the detriment of the shining moon. Grigory, putting his hand out of his pocket, suddenly pulled her head to him. She abruptly rushed, half-rising:
- Let go!
- Shut up.
- Let me go, or I'll make a noise!
- Wait, Aksinya...
- Uncle Panteley! ..
- Are you lost? - very close, from the thickets of hawthorn Pantelei answered.
Grigory, clenching his teeth, jumped from the hay.
- What are you making noise? Ay lost? the old man asked as he approached.
Aksinya was standing near the shock, straightening a handkerchief that had been knocked to the back of her head. Steam was rising above her.
- There is no way to get lost, but I almost froze!
- Ty, woman, and here, looking, mop. Get warm.
Aksinya smiled, bending over the sack...
Text restored by Anatoly Sidorchenko, Candidate of Philosophical Sciences, edited by Yuri Kuvaldin
Fedor Kryukov. Early 20th century
Looking through the maps and satellite images of the Don, you involuntarily come to the conclusion that the topographical prototype of the Tatarsky farm is located sixty miles east of Veshenskaya. So, Khovansky farm, whose very name is a secret bow from Khovanshchina, the first spark of the Russian bourgeois-democratic revolution and the first attempt to introduce a parliamentary system in Russia. However, it's not about the name. It's just that this place is identical in terms of reality, proportions, and absolute distances to that described in the novel. And there is no other like it on the Don.
Let the attentive reader see for himself:
Khutor Khovansky - twelve miles from the Ust-Medveditskaya village, to the west along the Getman's Way. From the winds it is sheltered from the south chalk mountain, and in front of it is a high cliff and a sandy (so on the maps!) Spit, separated by an erik, a half-overgrown channel from Don to Don. On some maps the spit is depicted as an island, on others as a peninsula.
The left bank is inconvenient: Obdon forest, windbreaks, goloschechins, valleys, sands. Here, just opposite the Melekhovs' kuren, is what is called Prorva in the novel. This is a rare word that did not even get into the Don dictionaries, but the Dictionary of Russian Folk Dialects knows it (with a note Don). Prorva - washing the banks, the place where the river washed a new channel for itself. Another Don meaning is a tear. Well, in TD it is a dry channel leading to the Don from a long and narrow scimitar-shaped lake. Prorva is filled and comes to life only during water springs and summer showers. Then she rumbles and rattles so that she can be heard from the Melekhovs' kuren (and this is at least half a verst).
For Kryukov, Prorva is a native word. That was the name of the river of his childhood, the hard worker river flowing past the Glazunovskaya village: “A narrow river like Prorva with blooming, moldy water, and above the river cherry orchards and dove-eyed, thoughtful willows listen to the wheels groan, the water boils and seethes, and watch the sun catch splashes, green as broken bottles” [F. D. Kryukov. Dreams // "Russian Wealth", 1908].
Let's start with the scheme (all pictures are clickable!):
... I posted a post with a geographic reference of the Tatarsky farm to the real Khovansky farm. And his interpretation, confirmed by cartographic realities: Khovansky is the prototype of the Melekhovsky farm in the Quiet Don. There is simply no other place like it on the Don.
I received an answer from the St. Petersburg bibliographer Igor Shundalov. He discovered that the scimitar-shaped lake to the west of Tatarsky, which in the novel is called the Tsar's Pond, on the map of 1870 was called the Tsaritsyn Ilmen (translated from the Don Tsaritsyn Lake).
The lake is exactly as described in the novel - two or three versts east of the farm, on the very bank of the Don, separated from the river only by a sandy ridge. And it is located, according to the centurion Listnitsky, one and a half hundred miles from the station. The station is the Millerovo railway station; in the novel it flashes more than once. However, according to this binding, a farm near Veshenskaya Stanitsa is also suitable.
And here are the coordinates of the Tsar's Pond in the novel:
“Laughing, Grigory saddled the old uterus left for the tribe andthrough the humane gates - so that the father would not see - went to the steppe. We drove toI'll take it under the mountain. The hooves of the horses, champing, chewed on the mud. In a place nearequestrians were waiting for them from the dried poplar: the centurion Listnitsky on a leana beautiful mare and a man, seven farm boys on horseback.
- Where to jump from? the centurion turned to Mitka, adjusting his pince-nez and
admiring the mighty pectoral muscles of Mitka's stallion.
- From the poplar to the Tsar's Pond.
- Where is the Tsar's Pond? The centurion narrowed his eyes short-sightedly.
- And there, your honor, near the forest.
The horses were built. The centurion raised his whip over his head. Shoulder strapswollen bump.
- As I say "three" - let it go! Well? One two Three!
The first rushed the centurion, falling to the bow, holding his cap in his hand. Heone second ahead of the others. Mitka, with a perplexedly pale face, half roseon the stirrups - it seemed to Grigory, painfully for a long time he lowered the stallion onto the croup
whip pulled over the head.
From the poplar and the Tsar's Pond - three versts. This is already in the nineteenth, when the anti-Bolshevik uprising began, Kryukov moves the Melekhovsky farm closer to Veshenskaya. And in the first version of the novel, the speaker for him was the name Khovansky (1682, the Streltsy rebellion led by Ivan Khovansky, the first attempt to establish a parliament in Russia).
Having described a specific locality, but calling it by a different name, the artist counts on the reader's recognition and on recalling the real name. This is what happened in this case as well. The thing is the name of the farm, referring to a whole complex of literary and historical memories, very relevant. But, of course, in the case when the unpronounced name itself is symbolic. So it happened with Kryukov with the Khovansky farm.
Researcher A. V. Venkov noticed the trace of the transfer of the farm to Veshenskaya: “Prokhor Zykov (part 6, ch. LIV) moves from Tatarsky along the Don to the west (upstream) and passes the Rubezhin farm, which does not belong to Veshenskaya, but to Elanskaya the village, Vyoshensky yurt begins even higher (traps). Accordingly, Tatarsky is located even east of Rubezhin, and even more so it does not belong to Vyoshenskaya, but to Elanskaya or even lower - Ust-Khopyorskaya stanitsa.
Well, V.I. Samarin pointed out that the fellow countryman of the main characters, the merchant Mokhov, lives in the village, located "near the mouth of the Khopra."
And so it happened.
But the fact that the name backfired so clearly: Khovansky - a race for a loan to Tsarev (!) Pond, in which the nobleman Listnitsky loses to tomorrow's punisher and executioner Mitka Korshunov.
To be honest, I didn't even expect this.
I knew that with the total amount of coincidences, there could be no error. And still I sit a little shocked.
By the way, a map with Tsaritsyn Lake of 1870. This year Fedor Dmitrievich Kryukov was born. So the hydronym Tsaritsin Ilmen can be trusted. Another thing is that it was Tsarev Pond that Kryukov needed here. As in the name of the farm, already during the civil war, the name of a Tatar man, an unbending, prickly flower, was sung first by Leo Tolstoy, and then by Fedor Kryukov. In mid-November 1919 he writes:
"And I remember beautiful image, which the great writer of the Russian land found in "Hadji Murad" to depict the vital energy and strength of opposition to that virgin and deep-rooted human race that entered the native land, which amazed and captivated his heart with its selfless devotion, - a Tatar-light ... He alone stood in the midst of a blasted, furrowed field, black and dull, one, chopped off, broken, smeared with black earth mud, still stuck up. “It was clear that the whole bush was run over by a wheel and after that it rose and therefore stood sideways, but still stood - it was as if a piece of the body had been pulled out of it, the insides had been torn out, an arm had been torn off, eyes had been gouged out, but it still stands and does not surrender to a person. who destroyed all his brethren around him...
I also think of my native Cossacks as an irresistible Tatar flower, not clinging to roadside dust and dust in the lifeless expanse of the crucified homeland, defending their right to a decent life and now restoring united Russia, my great fatherland, beautiful and absurd, shamefully annoying and inexpressibly dear and close to my heart.
And here is a Google image of Khovansky and its environs:
From the western edge of the farm to the "knee" of the Don, four miles, from the eastern end to the far pond - three (everything, as in the novel). Further on, about two versts to a huge farm meadow and Alyoshkina copse (an oak forest is marked here on the military map of 1990; so in the TD), further east - Krasny Yar and a ford across the Don (historical name - Khovansky climb). From here, the old man Melekhov is baptized before mowing to the east, "on a little white pod of a distant bell tower." This is the hipped bell tower of the Church of the Resurrection of the Lord (1782) dominating the district, the oldest building on the edge of the Ust-Medveditskaya village (it is eight miles from the Melekhovy versts meadow). Moreover, only the belfry looking to the west is visible from the Melekhovsky meadow, which covers the body of the temple.
... On December 15, 2018, I receive an electronic greeting from the Don from Leonid Biryukov: “Why was the old man Melekhov baptized before mowing to the east“ on a white pod of a distant bell tower ”? Because the inhabitants of the farm of Khovansky Ust-Medveditskaya village were parishioners of the Resurrection Church of the village of Ust-Medveditskaya, Ust-Medveditskaya deanery. GARO. F 226. Op. 3. D. 11739. L. 1–29 rev.
The bell tower of the Resurrection Church over the coastal cliff of the Ust-Medveditskaya village (“little white pod”). Archival photo.
Let us turn to the General Staff two-kilometer route in 1990.
The bell tower (look for the red “+” mark) is perfectly visible from the Khovansky climb (the mark is the red letter “X”), because the height difference between the right and left banks is quite large.
* * *
It so happened that the sequence of the first chapters of the first part of the novel (from the second to the eighth) turned out to be inverted: neither the editor Serafimovich, nor the young plagiarist assigned to the authors, were able to correctly restore the author's architecture of the text.
Similar errors of clumsy, forced montage were also found in other parts of the novel, for this see, in particular, in the publications of Alexei Neklyudov: http://tikhij-don.narod.ru
How this could happen is an idle question.
The incomplete “manuscript” of the novel (“drafts” and “white drafts”), hastily prepared by Sholokhov in the spring of 1929 for the “plagiarism commission”, not only incriminates its producers, but also gives an idea of the original drafts of The Quiet Flows the Don. Mechanically reproducing the first author's edition, the assemblers inexperienced in textual criticism of the mid-1920s did not notice that the original author had significantly revised the initial edition of the novel and the sequence of chapters had changed somewhat.
At the end of April 2010, in an epistolary discussion about the chronology of the novel, Moscow researcher Savely Rozhkov suggested that the first eight pages with the history of the Melekhov family and morning fishing in the protograph were located after the night fishing scene (and before mowing), and fishing with his father and selling carp to the merchant Mokhov falls on Trinity Day. (Both the goose and the carp turn out to be very useful on this day. Like the “holiday shirt” ... But there are other, not indirect, but direct indications. About them below.)
In addition to Rozhkov, Alexei Neklyudov and the author of this article took part in that discussion. Having checked the assumption of my colleague, I was convinced both of the correctness and the need to transfer the scene of morning fishing (but not the history of the Melekhov family).
In Chapter II, before starting to fish for carp, Grigory exchanges such remarks with his father: “- Where to rule? - To the Black Yar. Let's try it near the entoy karshi, where we sat on the top” (p. 14).
Let us turn to Sholokhov's "drafts". Grigory says: “Why are you angry, Aksyutka? Is it really for the breathless, that in a loan? .. ”(p. 28). Other in the publication of the TD, which was carried out in a more correct list: “- Why are you angry, Aksyutka? Is it really more breathable, what a loan? .. ”(TD: 1, VIII, 48).
Nady'shny- the third day (DS). According to SRNG 1. the other day, recent; 2. Past, past. From the dialect nadys: “This ush on the third day is neither wide nor the day before, but nadys” (DS). Well, breathable - necessary (DS), from necessary. The scribe does not think about the meaning and therefore confuses "e" with "y". (In the protograph, after the "d" there were as many as nine "hooks" in a row, so similar friend at a friend in advanced handwriting.)
But what inspiratory karsha and what kind of yar is this, about which the old man Melekhov speaks?
And here they are. In Chapter IV (!) Aksinya advises:
“- Grisha, near the coast, Kubyt, Karsha. Need to circle.
A terrible push throws Gregory far away. A roaring splash, like from Yar(emphasis mine. - A. Ch.) collapsed into the water lumps of rock” (p. 33).
At this karshi (near the sunken elm tree) Grigory and Aksinya are sitting, darning the nonsense torn by the catfish. That is why they run into the question of Dunyashka, who has come running from the spit: “- Why are you sitting here? Batyanka sent for them to go to the spit as soon as possible.
This “sitting” will remind the old man to his son three days later on the morning fishing: “- Where to govern? - To the Black Yar. Let's try it near the entoy karshi, where we were sitting on top” (p. 14).
... And where a hole was found in the nonsense that Grigory and Aksinya were leading, and where Grishka almost drowned. And where he almost seduced the neighbor's wife.
Gregory does not know that his father saw everything from the hawthorn bushes, and therefore he now orders his son to rule on the site of that crime that almost happened.
That is why on the third day after that night fishing, Pantelei Prokofievich, already dressed in a festive shirt, changed his mind about going to church. It is there, near the sunken karshi, that he must read his father's instructions to his son, it is there that his morality will be most effective.
But why was the place chosen for night fishing?
In April-May, the sterlet spawns on the Don. She chooses for this "spawning pits" - whirlpools with a sandy and pebble bottom (just like that, with "kissed pebbles" near the spit near the Tatarsky farm). It is for the sterlet that the experienced old man Melekhov is hunting.
(On the localization of the Black Yar, see the extract at the end of this text.)
The entire IV chapter is devoted to night fishing with nonsense, in a storm. Right there is the shock that Aksinya refused Grigory, and the cunning Pantelei watched this, waiting in the thickets of hawthorn.
So, two days later, on the third day, the old man decides to talk to his son and calls him to go fishing with fishing rods. At the same time, the old man is wearing a “holiday shirt”. So in Sholokhov's imitation of the "draft" on p. 9, copying the protograph; in the edition, however, it is much more muffled, but also with a hint - a shirt “embroidered with a cross” (!)
It's happening at Trinity. On what other day will the tight-fisted merchant Mokhov definitely buy a fresh carp, and in the morning, but after the service, that is, at 11 o'clock, will he hold an auction with a goose by the church fence?
After fishing, the father and son meet people dispersing from mass and see how a ktitor sells a goose in the church fence.
“People crowded in the square near the church fence. In the crowd, a ktitor, raising a goose above his head, shouted: “Fifty kopecks! From-yes. Who is bigger?"
The goose twisted its neck, contemptuously screwed up its turquoise eyes” (p. 19).
Why a fifty?
Yes, because a fifty kopeck is 50 kopecks, and the Trinity is Pentecost.
The need to transfer Chapter II (according to Sholokhov) to place VIII is confirmed by the beginning of the next, Chapter IX:
“The only thing left of the Trinity was in the farmyards: dry chobor, scattered on the floors, dust of crumpled leaves and wrinkled, obsolete greenery of cut oak and ash branches stuck near the gates and porches. Meadow mowing began with the Trinity ... "
So the chronology:
May 10, three days before the Trinity (May 13/26, 1912) - fishing with a bullshit in a loan near Karshi. Gregory nearly drowned. In a mop, he sticks to Aksinya. Ch. IV.
S. L. Rozhkov believes that the day was not chosen by chance - it falls on Semik (an ancient mermaid holiday, celebrated on the seventh day after the Ascension Day). And it's hard to argue with that. In seven at the Black Yar, Aksinya (a purely mermaid nature) almost drowned Gregory.
"Two days before Trinity" - the farmsteads divide the meadow. Ch. VIII beginning.
The day before Trinity (“the next day in the morning”) - horse races, Gregory apologizes “for the breathlessness (the day before yesterday) in the loan” Ch. VIII continuation.
Trinity: Pantelei Prokofievich calls his son for fishing and refers to the karsha, at which the nadys (of the third day) were sitting. Ch. II.
The new numbering is given in Roman numerals, italicized n/f, the numbering according to the Sholokhov edition is in brackets. Asterisks indicate subchapters that are not numbered. Each time they go as an addition to the chapter indicated by the number.
I(I). The history of the Melekhov family. Prokofy and the death of his wife after the birth of Panteley. * * * Pantelei's family.
II(III). Gregory came back from the games in the early morning. Watering the brother's horse, who is going to serve today. At the request of his mother, Grigory wakes up Stepan and Aksinya Astakhov. * * * Seeing the Cossacks to the May camps. Grigory waters the horse for the second time (Mistake when mixing drafts.) Grigory flirts with Aksinya. The Cossacks leave for the camps.
The latter is described through the eyes of Gregory: “The tall black horse swayed, lifting the rider in the stirrup. Stepan rode out of the gate with a hurried step, sat in the saddle, as if dug in, and Aksinya walked beside him, holding on to the stirrup, and from the bottom up, lovingly and greedily, like a dog, looked into his eyes.
But on p. 18 of the “draft”, after the words of Panteley Prokofievich, said on the day of night fishing (“- We’ll click Aksinya Stepanov, Stepan nadys asked me to help him, we must respect”), the lines crossed out in blue pencil follow: “Grigory frowned, but in his heart he was delighted with his father’s words. Aksinya did not go out of his mind. All day he went over in his memory the morning conversation with her, her smile flickered before his eyes, and that loving-dog look from bottom to top, as she looked when she saw off her husband ... "
That is, both seeing off the Cossacks and late fishing take place on Semik (Thursday) May 10/23, 1912. As indicated by the “nadys” pronounced by the old man Melekhov after “shaking” the meadow two days before Trinity (in 1912, it fell on May 13/26; see below).
III(V). Petro Melekhov and Stepan Astakhov are going to the training camp.
IV(VI). Overnight stay of the Cossacks going to the training camp.
It begins: “Near a mound with a forehead, with a yellow sandy bald head, they stopped to spend the night. There was a cloud coming from the west." This thunderstorm will be described in the next chapter: “The cloud was moving along the Don from the west” (p. 19 of the manuscript).
V(IV). (Three days before Trinity. Thursday of the 7th week of Easter. Semik. Mermaid week, Maundy Thursday, May 10/23) “A storm gathered in the evening.” This refers to the evening after the departure of the Cossacks to the camps. In the edition, this first phrase of Chapter IV sounds like it was corrected in the draft: “[The next day] A thunderstorm gathered in the evening” (p. 29). According to the manuscript, old Melekhov says: “Stepan asked me to mow him down” (p. 18). So it is in the edition (p. 44).
Evening thunderstorm, fishing with a bullshit in the borrowing at Cherny Yar near Karshi, far from the spit. Aksinya rejects Gregory. Pantelei Prokofievich sees everything from the thickets of hawthorn.
VI(VII). Aksinya's life story. (Ends with the phrase: “After fishing with nonsense ...”)
VII(VII). “Two days before Trinity, the farmers shared the meadow” (Friday). From that day on, "puff up" (the day before yesterday, on Wednesday, that is, on the eve of being sent to the camps), Stepan asked the old man Melekhov to "mow him down." The next day (Saturday, the day before Trinity), Mitka Korshunov wakes up Grigory. Horse racing with Listnitsky. Conversation between Grigory and Aksinya. Grigory asks for forgiveness for "breathing in the loan", that is, pestering on a fishing trip, which was the day before yesterday, on Thursday.
VIII(II). Pantelei Prokofievich goes fishing with his son Grigory. (Trinity, May 13/26, 1912). And he determines the place of fishing near the Black Yar: “near the entoy karshi, where they sat on the top”, that is, in Semik, three days ago. * * * Fishing. Caught carp. Explanation of father with son. Mitka Korshunov. (“From mass, the people scattered through the streets […] People crowded in the square near the church fence. In the crowd, the ktitor, raising a goose above his head, shouted: “Fifty kopecks! From-yes. Who is more?”.) Brothers Shamili. Merchant Sergei Platonovich Mokhov and his daughter.
IX. Meadow mowing began "from the Trinity" (on the day after the Trinity). * * * At the mowing, Grigory seduces Aksinya.
x. The merchant Mokhov opens Panteley Prokofievich's eyes to Grigory's affair with Aksinya. Explanation of the old Melekhov with Aksinya and Grigory. The old man beat his son.
XI. camps. Stepan learns about Aksinya's betrayal.
XII. Nine days before the arrival of Stepan. Grigory and Aksinya.
P.S. DISCOVERY OF PHILOLOGIST MIKHAIL MIKHEEV
My old Moscow friend, Doctor of Philology Mikhail Mikheev, describing the archive of Fyodor Kryukov in the House of Russian Diaspora, sent me several texts of Don songs collected by Kryukov as a student. This is a separate notebook. Among the songs there is, in particular, the one that gave the name to the story “On the Azure River” (L. 19v): “On the Azure River in an open field it was ...”
Sholokhov seized the echo of this Kryukov title, giving the name "Azure Steppe" to one of the stories published under his name. And at the same time he stole another azure flower discovered by Kryukov: The dawn has faded, the battle is over": (" Azure steppe»).
It just didn't shock me. In the same notebook there was a song written by Fyodor Kryukov, the plot of which became the plot love story TD.
So, the field phonetic record made by F. D. Kryukov c. 1890 in a large, still childish handwriting.
I would like to thank Mikhail Mikheev for permission to publish the lyrics of the song. I do it in my own verse record. I will only make a reservation that the first word of this entry, apparently, over time and prompted to start a novel with this plot, initially meant only the beginning of the selection (not the text of the song, because the word “End” ends both the first and the second, located below on the same song sheet):
– – –1
Start
Not the evening dawn began to fade
Midnight star she rose high
Good rogue butterfly pashla pashla
A remote, kind young man led a horse to water
I talked to a good rogue grandmother
Let me let the soul of a grandmother spend the night to shelter you,
Come, come, my dear, I'll be at home
I have my own will at home.
Poste[te] lu*you have a white bed;
I'll put three pillows in my little head // End: -
—————————————————————
*Mistake? - A. Ch.
House of the Russian Abroad. Fund 14 (F. D. Kryukov. Works of Cossack folklore.). Description 1. E. x. 25. L. 44v. For a facsimile reproduction, see here, on the Nestorian, in the note "Find of the philologist Mikhail Mikheev."
On the back L. -23 litters: "May 1889".
From this song, and got on the first page of the novel "fading dawn":
“The children who pastured the calves behind the drive said that they saw how Prokofy in the evenings when the dawns wither, he carried his wife in his arms to the Tatar, azhnik, mound. He planted her there on the top of the barrow, with his back to the porous stone worn down by centuries, sat next to her, and for a long time they looked at the steppe. Looked until while the dawn faded, and then Prokofy wrapped his wife in an zipun and carried him home in his arms.
Hence the strangeness of the story: before his brother leaves, Grishka waters Stepanov's horse twice on the Don, although there is a well at the base. (For the first time at night, and then in the morning. And only on the second attempt does he meet his “butterfly rogue” walking with buckets.
In the polemic of life with the song, the ending of Chapter VIII is also written:
Surprised Grigory caught up with Mitka at the gate.
- Will you come to the game anyway? he asked.
– What is it? Or did you call to spend the night?
Grigory rubbed his forehead with his palm and did not answer.
This is not at all about the coincidence of one folklore cliché. It is in this song that the novel begins with the fact that a Cossack woman, left alone in the house (her husband, obviously, serves), goes for water at night and is met by a young Cossack who (at night!) went to water his horse. And she invites him to spend the night, because "alone at home" and she has "her own will."
The first chapters of the TD became a detailed development of the plot of this song. At the same time, the song was recorded not by someone, but by Kryukov.
……………………………………………………………
P.S. Received a letter from Alexey Neklyudov:
Andrei, in addition, the Cossacks sing a variant of the same song when they go to military training camps:
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Oh, you, dawn-lightning,
Rising early to heaven...
Young, here she is, wench
Late on the water went ...
Christonya, help!
And the boy, he guessed
He began to saddle his horse ...
Saddled a bay horse -
Began to catch up with a woman ...
(Chapter 5 of the 1st part)
I think it will be necessary to check which version is in the songbooks, if any.
And in general - it's great ...
…………………………………………………………
Abbreviations:
TD - Quiet Don
DS - Big explanatory dictionary of the Don Cossacks. M., 2003.
Below is a reconstruction of the sequence of the first twelve chapters of The Quiet Flows the Don.
Text according to the publication: Sholokhov M.A. [Quiet Flows the Don: A novel in four books]. // Sholokhov M.A. Collected works: In 8 vols. - M., 1956–1960:
http://feb-web.ru/feb/sholokh/default.asp?/feb/sholokh/texts/sh0/sh0.html
Andrey Chernov
Stanitsa Glazunovskaya. House of the writer F. D. Kryukov. Drawing 1918
book one
Oh, our father Quiet Don!
Oh, what are you, Quiet Don, you mutnehonek flowing?
Oh, how can I, quiet Don, not cloudy leaks!
From the bottom of me, quiet Dona, cold keys beat,
In the middle of me, quiet Dona, a white fish stirs.
(Old Cossack song)
PART ONE
Melekhovsky yard - on the very edge of the farm. The gates from the cattle base lead north to the Don. A steep eight-yard descent between moss-covered chalk blocks, and here is the shore: a mother-of-pearl scattering of shells, a gray broken border of pebbles kissed by waves, and further on - the stirrup of the Don boiling under the wind with blued ripples. To the east, behind the red hummock wattle fences, is the Hetman's Way, sagebrush gray, a brown, living roadside trampled by horse hooves, a chapel at a fork; behind it is the steppe covered with flowing haze. From the south - the chalk ridge of the mountain. To the west - a street that runs through the square, running to the place of residence.
After burying his father, Panteley got into the household: he re-covered the house, cut to the estate from half a dozen ghouls of land, built new sheds and a barn under tin. The roofer, on the master's order, cut out a pair of tin roosters from scraps, strengthened them on the roof of the barn. They amused the Melekhovsky base with their carefree appearance, giving it a self-satisfied and prosperous look.
Pantelei Prokofyevich twitched under the slope of his sagging years: he was wider, slightly stooped, but still looked like an old man of good proportions. He was dry in bones, chrome (in his youth, at the imperial review at the races, he broke his left leg), wore a silver crescent-shaped earring in his left ear, until old age his beard and hair did not shed his black suit, in anger he reached unconsciousness and, apparently, this prematurely aged his once beautiful, and now completely entangled in a web of wrinkles, portly wife.
His eldest, already married son, Petro, resembled his mother: small, snub-nosed, with lush, wheat-colored hair, brown-eyed; and the youngest, Grigory, stomped on his father: half a head taller than Peter, at least six years younger, the same drooping vulture nose as Bati, blue tonsils of hot eyes in slightly slanting slits, sharp cheekbones covered with brown, ruddy skin. Grigory stooped in the same way as his father, even in the smile they both had something in common, animalistic.
Dunyashka - her father's weakness - a long-armed, big-eyed teenager, and Petrov's wife Daria with a small child - that's the whole Melekhov family.
II(III of the first part)
Gregory came back from the games after the first kochet. From the senets he smelled the smell of sour hops and the spicy dryness of the virgin grass.
On tiptoe he went into the room, undressed, carefully hung up his festive trousers with stripes, trousers, crossed himself, and lay down. On the floor is a golden dream of moonlight, cut with a cross of a window frame. In the corner, under the embroidered towels, there is a dull gloss of silver icons; above the bed, on a hanger, there is a viscous buzz of disturbed flies.
I was about to doze off, but my brother's child began to cry in the kitchen.
The cradle creaked with an unoiled cart. Daria muttered in a sleepy voice:
Hush, you filthy child! No sleep for you, no rest. - She sang softly:
Where were you?
- She guarded the horses.
- What did you watch out for?
- A horse with a saddle
With golden fringe...
Grigory, falling asleep under a measured lulling creak, remembered: “Tomorrow Peter should go to the camps. Dasha will stay with the child ... We must mow, without him we will.
He buried his head in a hot pillow, annoyingly oozing into his ears:
- And where is your horse?
- It's behind the gate.
- And where is the gate?
- The water took away.
Gregory was shaken by the boisterous neighing of a horse. By the voice I guessed Petrov's drill horse.
With fingers exhausted from sleep, he buttoned his shirt for a long time, again he almost fell asleep to the fluid swell of the song:
- Where are the geese?
- They went into the reeds.
- And where are the reeds?
- The girls squeezed out.
- Where are the girls?
- The girls got married.
- Where are the Cossacks?
- Went to war...
Broken by sleep, Grigory made his way to the stables and led his horse out into the alley. A web of spider web tickled his face, and suddenly the dream disappeared.
Along the Don, obliquely - a wavy, untraveled lunar path. Over the Don - fog, and at the top of the star millet. The horse behind cautiously rearranges its legs. The descent to the water is bad. On the other side, a duck quack, near the shore in the mud, turned up and thumped on the water like an omaha, a catfish hunting for a trifle.
Gregory stood by the water for a long time. The shore breathed damp and insipid Prelu. A fractional drop fell from the horse's lips. Gregory has a sweet emptiness in his heart. Good and thoughtless. Returning, I looked at the sunrise, the blue semi-darkness had already resolved there.
Near the stables I ran into my mother.
Is that you, Grishka?
And then who.
Have you watered the horse?
Drink, reluctantly replies Gregory.
Leaning back, she carries her mother in a curtain to the flood of kizeki, shuffling around with senile, flabby bare feet.
I would go and encourage the Astakhovs. Stepan with our Peter was going to go.
The coolness puts a tight, trembling spring into Grigory. Body in prickly goosebumps. After three thresholds, he runs up to the Astakhovs on the echoing porch. The door is not locked. In the kitchen, Stepan is sleeping on a spread floor, his wife's head under his armpit.
In the thinned darkness, Grigory sees Aksinya's shirt fluffed up above the knees, birch-white, shamelessly spread legs. He stares for a second, feeling his mouth dry and his head swell in the cast-iron ringing.
Hey, who's there? Get up!
Aksinya sobbed from sleep.
Oh who is it? Someone? - fussily fumbled, her bare hand thrashed at her feet, pulling on her shirt. There was a speck of saliva dropped in a dream on the pillow; strong glowing woman's dream.
It's me. Mother sent to encourage you...
We’re contagious… You can’t fit in here… We sleep on the floor from fleas. Stepan, get up, do you hear?
About thirty Cossacks left the farm for the May camps. Place of gathering - parade ground. By seven o'clock, wagons with canvas booths, foot and horseback Cossacks in May canvas shirts, in equipment, stretched to the parade ground.
On the porch, Petro was hastily sewing together a cracked timber. Panteley Prokofyevich was pacing near Petrov's horse, pouring oats into the trough, occasionally shouting:
Dunyashka, did you sew up the crackers? Did you season the salo with salt?
All in a ruddy color, Dunyashka drew bases like a swallow from the cooker to the smoker, laughingly brushed aside her father’s shouts:
You, dad, manage your business, and I’ll put my brother in such a way that Cherkassky won’t turn up.
Didn't eat? inquired Petro, drooling over the fight and nodding at the horse.
Chews, - the father answered sedately, checking the sweatshirts with a rough palm. It's a small matter - a crumb or a bull will stick to a sweatshirt, and in one transition into blood it will rub the horse's back.
Finish Bay - give him a drink, dad.
Grishka takes him to the Don. Hey, Gregory, lead the horse!
A tall lean bottom with a white star on his forehead went playfully. Grigory led him out the gate, - slightly touching his withers with his left hand, jumped up on him and from his place - a sweeping trot. I wanted to hold back at the descent, but the horse lost its footing, became more frequent, and went downhill like a bait. Leaning back, almost lying on the horse's back, Grigory saw a woman descending downhill with buckets. He turned off the stitch and, overtaking the stirred up dust, crashed into the water.
Aksinya was descending from the mountain, swaying, and from afar shouted loudly:
Damn crazy! The miracle did not stop the horse! Just wait, I'll tell my father how you drive.
But-but, neighbor, do not swear. You take your husband to the camps, maybe I can do the farm.
Somehow n[a] hell[a] I need you!
Mowing starts - you ask for it, - Grigory laughed.
Aksinya deftly scooped up a pail of water from the yoke and, pinching her wind-blown skirt between her knees, glanced at Grigory.
Well, is your Stepan going? asked Gregory.
What about you?
What are you ... Ask, eh, you can’t?
Gathered. Well?
Are you staying, so-to be, zhalmerkoy?
Became so.
The horse tore his lips from the water, chewed the flowing water with a creak, and, looking at the other side of the Don, hit the water with his front foot. Aksinya scooped up another bucket; throwing a yoke over her shoulder, she went up the mountain with a slight swing. Grigory touched the horse next. The wind ruffled Aksinya's skirt, sorted out small fluffy curls on her swarthy neck. On a heavy knot of hair, a flaming hat embroidered with colored silk, a pink shirt tucked into a skirt, without wrinkling, embraced a steep back and full shoulders. Climbing the mountain, Aksinya leaned forward, a longitudinal hollow on her back clearly lay out under her shirt. Grigory saw the brown circles of his shirt, which had faded under the armpits from sweat, and followed every movement with his eyes. He wanted to talk to her again.
Will you miss your husband? BUT?
Aksinya turned her head as she walked and smiled.
And then how. You get married, - taking a breath, she spoke intermittently, - get married, and then you find out, they miss your friend.
Pushing his horse, leveling with her, Grigory looked into her eyes.
And some women are glad to see them off, as their husbands are seen off. Our Daria begins to get fat without Peter.
Aksinya, moving her nostrils, breathed sharply; fixing her hair, she said:
Husband - he is not really, but draws blood. Will we marry you soon?
I don't know about dad. Must be after service.
Young isho, don't get married.
Dryness alone. - She glanced sideways; Without parting her lips, she smiled slyly. And then for the first time Grigory noticed that her lips were shamelessly greedy, puffy.
He, sorting the mane into strands, said:
There is no desire to marry. Somebody will love it.
Did you notice?
Why should I notice ... You see Stepan off ...
You don't play with me!
Hurt?
I'll say a word to Stepan...
I am your Stepan...
Look, brave, a tear will drip.
Don't scare me, Aksinya!
I don't scare. Your business with the girls. Let them embroider your ducks, but don't look at me.
I will take a look.
Well, look.
Aksinya smiled reconcilingly and left the stitch, trying to get around her horse. Grigory turned him sideways and blocked the road.
Let go, Grishka!
I won't let you.
Don't be foolish, I need to collect my husband.
Grigory, smiling, excited the horse: he, stepping over, pushed Aksinya to the ravine.
Let go, devil, people out! Will they see what they think?
She darted a frightened glance from side to side and passed, frowning and not looking back.
On the porch, Petro said goodbye to his family. Gregory saddled his horse. Holding the saber, Petro hurriedly ran down the sills, took the reins from Grigory's hands.
The horse, smelling the way, uneasily stepped over, foamed, chasing the mouthpiece in his mouth. Catching the stirrup with his foot, holding on to the bow, Petro said to his father:
Bald people don’t work hard, dad! Overshadows - we sell. Grigory to handle the horse. And look, don’t sell the steppe grass: in the meadow there is none, you yourself know what kind of hay will be.
Well, with God. Good hour, - said the old man, crossing himself.
Petro, with a habitual movement, threw his downed body into the saddle, straightened behind the folds of his shirt, pulled together by a belt. The horse went to the gate. The head of a saber shone dimly in the sun, quivering in time with the steps.
Daria followed with the baby in her arms. Mother, wiping her reddened nose with her sleeve and the corner of the curtain, stood in the middle of the base.
Brother, pies! I forgot the pies!.. Potato pies!..
Dunyashka galloped to the gate like a goat.
What are you talking about, you fool! Grigory shouted angrily at her.
There are pies left! Dunyashka groaned, leaning against the gate, and on her smeared hot cheeks, and from her cheeks on her everyday jacket - tears.
Daria watched her husband's white shirt, covered with dust, from under her palm. Pantelei Prokofievich, shaking the rotten post at the gate, glanced at Grigory.
Take the gate and fix it and stop at the corner. - After thinking, he added, as he reported the news: - Petro left.
Through the wattle fence, Grigory saw how Stepan was getting ready. Dressed up in a green woolen skirt, Aksinya brought his horse to him. Stepan, smiling, said something to her. He slowly, in a businesslike way, kissed his wife and for a long time did not remove his hand from her shoulder. Her hand, burnt by sunburn and work, was coal black on Aksinya's white blouse. Stepan stood with his back to Grigory; through the wattle fence one could see his tight, beautifully shaven neck, broad, slightly drooping shoulders, and - when he leaned towards his wife - the twisted tip of his blond mustache.
Aksinya laughed at something and shook her head negatively. The tall black horse swayed, lifting the rider in the stirrup. Stepan rode out of the gate with a hurried step, sat in the saddle, as if dug in, and Aksinya walked beside him, holding on to the stirrup, and from bottom to top, lovingly and greedily, like a dog, looked into his eyes.
So they passed the neighboring hut and disappeared around the bend.
Grigory followed them with a long, unblinking glance.
III(V of the first part)
To the village of Setrakov - the place of the camp gathering - sixty miles. Petro Melekhov and Stepan Astakhov rode on the same britzka. With them are three more Cossack farmers: Fedot Bodovskov, a young Kalmykish and pockmarked Cossack, second-in-command of the Life Guards of the Ataman Regiment Khrisanf Tokin, nicknamed Khristonya, and batteryman Tomilin Ivan, who was heading to Persianovka. In the britzka, after the very first feeding, they harnessed Christon's two-inch horse and Stepan's black horse. The other three horses, saddled, followed behind. Ruled by a hefty and foolish, like most chieftains, Christonya. With his back bent like a wheel, he sat in front, blocking the light into the booth, frightening the horses with his booming octave bass. In the britzka, covered with a brand new tarpaulin, lay, smoking, Petro Melekhov, Stepan, and the batteryman Tomilin. Fedot Bodovskov walked behind; it was evident that it was not a burden to him to stick his crooked Kalmyk legs into the dusty road.
Khriston's chaise was in charge. Behind her stretched seven or eight more teams with tied saddled and unsaddled horses.
Laughter swirled over the road, screams, lingering songs, horse squawking, empty stirrups ringing.
Peter has a bread bag in his head. Petro lies and twists his long yellow mustache.
- …on the! Let's play service?
It's hot. Everything dried up.
There are no taverns on nearby farms, don't wait!
Well, start. Yes, you are not an artist. Eh, Grishka is your diskanit! It will pull, a pure silver thread, not a voice. We fought with him at the games.
Stepan throws back his head, clearing his throat, starts in a low sonorous voice:
Oh, you, dawn-lightning,
Rising early to heaven...
Tomilin, like a woman, puts his hand to his cheek, picks it up in a thin, groaning undertone. Smiling, stuffing a mustache into his mouth, Petro watches how the busty batteryman's knots turn blue from the effort of the veins on his temples.
Young, here she is, wench
Late on the water went ...
Stepan lies with his head towards Christona, turns around, leaning on his arm; tight beautiful neck turns pink.
Christina, help!
And the boy, he guessed
He began to saddle his horse ...
Stepan shifts the smiling look of his bulging eyes to Pyotr, and Pyotr, pulling his mustache out of his mouth, joins his voice.
Khristonya, gaping her exorbitant bristled mouth, roars, shaking the tarpaulin roof of the booth:
Saddled a bay horse -
Began to catch up with a woman ...
Christonya puts a yard-long bare foot on her ribs and waits for Stepan to start again. He, with his eyes closed, - a sweaty face in the shade, - affectionately leads the song, then lowering his voice to a whisper, then raising his voice to a metallic ring:
Let me, let me, babe,
Water the horse in the river...
And again Christon's voices are crushed with a bell-tocsin horn. Voices pour into the song from neighboring chaises. Wheels on iron passages clatter, horses sneeze from the dust, viscous and strong, hollow water, a song flows over the road. A white-winged lapwing flies up from the drying steppe muzga, from the burnt brown kuga. He flies screaming into the hollow; turning his head, he looks with an emerald eye at the chain of wagons covered in white, at the horses, curlying the savory dust with their hooves, at the people in white shirts tarred with dust, walking along the side of the road. The lapwing falls in a hollow, strikes with its black chest into the drying grass crushed by the beast - and does not see what is happening on the road. And along the road the carts rumble just as reluctantly, the horses, sweating under saddles, step over just as reluctantly; only the Cossacks in gray shirts quickly run from their britzkas to the front, huddle around her, groan in laughter.
Stepan stands to his full height on the britzka, with one hand he holds on to the canvas top of the booth, with the other he briefly waves; sprinkles with the smallest, undermining tongue twister:
Don't sit next to me
Don't sit next to me
People will say you love me
Do you love me,
You walk to me
Do you love me,
You walk to me
And I'm not a simple family ...
And I'm not a simple family,
Not simple -
Vorovskogo,
Vorovskogo -
Not simple
I love the prince's son...
Fedot Bodovskov whistles; squatting, rushing from the traces of the horses; Petro, leaning out of the booth, laughs and waves his cap; Stepan, flashing a dazzling smile, mischievously shrugs his shoulders; and dust moves like a mound along the road; Khristonya, in an unbelted long shirt, shaggy, wet with sweat, walks in a crouch, whirls like a flywheel, frowning and groaning, makes a Cossack, and on the gray silken dust there are monstrous sprawling traces of his bare feet.
IV(VI of the first part)
Near the forehead, with a yellow sandy bald head, they stopped to spend the night.
Clouds were coming from the west. Rain dripped from her black wing. They watered the horses in the pond. Over the dam, bleak willows hunched in the wind. In the water, covered with stagnant greenery and the scales of miserable waves, lightning was reflected and distorted. The wind sparingly sprinkled with raindrops, as if pouring alms on the black palms of the earth.
The hobbled horses were allowed to popas, appointing three people to guard. The rest made fires, hung cauldrons on the drawbars of the carts.
Christonya cooked. Stirring with a spoon in the cauldron, he told the Cossacks sitting around:
- ... The mound, therefore, is high, like this. And I say to the deceased-bata: “But what, the ataman1 will not strike us because, without any, therefore, permission, we begin to gut the mound?”
What is he talking about here? Stepan asked, returning from the horses.
I tell how the deceased father and I, the kingdom of heaven to the old man, were looking for a treasure.
Where did you look for it?
This, brother, is already behind the Fetisova beam. Yes, you know - Merkulov Kurgan ...
Well, well ... - Stepan squatted down, put a piece of coal in his palm. Flapping his lips, he lit a cigarette for a long time, rolling it in his palm.
Here you go. So, dad says: "Come on, Christan, let's dig up the Merkulov mound." He heard from his grandfather that there was a buried treasure in it. And the treasure, it became, is not given to everyone in the hands. Dad promised God: if you give back, they say, the treasure - I will build a beautiful church. So we decided and went there. Stanishnaya land - doubt from the chieftain could only be. We arrive at night. They waited for the pokel to grow dark, so they hobbled the mare, and themselves with shovels climbed to the top of the head. They started buzzing right from the top of the head. They dug a hole about two arshins deep, the earth is pure stone, groaned from old age. I sweat. Dad keeps whispering prayers, but believe me, brothers, my stomach is grumbling so much ... In the summer, so, grub is known to you: sour milk and kvass ... It will catch across the stomach, death in the eyes - and that's it! The deceased father, the kingdom of heaven to him, and says: “Fu,” he says, “Christan, and you bastard! I read a prayer, but you can’t hold back food, breathe, so there’s nothing to do. Go, - he says, - get off the mound, otherwise I'll chop off your head with a shovel. Through you, bastard, the treasure can go into the ground. I lay down under the mound and suffer from my stomach, I took a prick, and the dead father was a healthy devil! - digs one. And he dug to the stone slab. Calls me. So, I lifted it up with a crowbar, lifted this slab ... Believe me, brothers, it was a monthly night, and it shines under the slab ...
Well, you are lying, Christonya! said Petro, smiling and tugging at his moustache.
What are you "breaking"? You went to the teteri-yateri! - Khristonya pulled up his wide trousers and looked around the listeners. - No, it became-be, I'm not lying! The true god is true!
Get to the shore!
So, brothers, and shines. I - look, and this, it became, burnt coal. There were forty measures of it. Batya says: "Climb, Christan, rake him out." Helpful. Threw, threw this stramota, until the light was enough. In the morning, it became, look, and he - here he is.
Who? asked Tomilin, who was lying on a blanket.
Yes, chieftain, who. Rides in a cab: "Who allowed, such and such?" We are silent. He began to rake us up - and to the village. The year before last, they were summoned to court in Kamenskaya, and dad guessed - he managed to die. They signed off with paper that he was no longer alive.
Khristonya took down the cauldron of steaming porridge and went to the wagon for the spoons.
What is the father? He promised to build a church, but he never did? Stepan asked, waiting until Khristonya returned with the spoons.
You are a fool, Styopa, what kind of coals is he, then, building a ba?
Once he promised, it means he must.
There was no agreement about the coals, but the treasure ...
The fire trembled with laughter. Khristonya raised his rustic head from the cauldron and, not understanding what was the matter, covered the voices of the others with a thick cackle.
V(IV of the first part)
By evening a storm had gathered. Over the farm there was a brown cloud. The Don, tousled by the wind, threw ridged frequent waves onto the shores. Behind the levadas, dry lightning scorched the sky, crushing the earth with rare peals of thunder. Under the cloud, opening, a kite was circling, screaming, chasing him with crows. A cloud, breathing a chill, walked along the Don, from the west. Behind the loan, the sky grew menacingly black, the steppe was expectantly silent. Closing shutters banged in the farm, old women hurried from Vespers, making the sign of the cross, a gray column of dust swayed on the parade ground, and the first grains of rain were already sown on the earth burdened with spring heat.
Dunyashka, dangling her pigtails, burned through the base, slammed the chicken coop door and stood in the middle of the base, flaring her nostrils like a horse before an obstacle. Children were bucking in the street. The neighbor's eight-year-old Mishka spun around, crouching on one leg - on his head, closing his eyes, his father's oversized cap was spinning, - and shrieked piercingly:
Rain, let the rain fall.
We'll go to the bushes
pray to God
Bow down to Christ.
Dunyashka looked enviously at Mishka's bare feet, thickly strewn with chicks, fiercely trampling the ground. She, too, wanted to dance in the rain and wet her head so that her hair grew thick and curly; I wanted, just like Mishka's comrade, to stand upside down on the roadside dust, with the risk of falling into thorns, - but my mother looked out the window, angrily smacking her lips. Sighing, Dunyashka ran to the hut. The rain came down hard and frequent. Thunder burst above the roof, fragments rolled over the Don.
In the passage, father and sweaty Grishka were pulling a rolled-up log from the side.
Harsh threads and a gypsy needle, helluva lot! Grigory shouted to Dunyashka.
A fire was lit in the kitchen. To sew up the nonsense of the village Daria. The old woman, rocking the child, muttered:
You, old man, are made up of inventions. You would go to bed, everything goes up in price, and you burn. What is the catch now? Where will the plague take you? Isho peretopnete, there to go to the base of the passion of the Lord. Look, look, how it blazes! Lord Jesus Christ, queen of heaven...
In the kitchen for a second it became dazzling blue and quiet: you could hear the rain scratching the shutters, followed by a gasp of thunder. Dunyashka squeaked and poked her face into the ravine. Darya fanned the windows and doors with small crosses.
The old woman gazed with terrible eyes at the cat that was caressing at her feet.
Dunka! Go-oh-no you, good ... queen of heaven, forgive me, a sinner. Dunka, throw the cat to the bases. Get out, you evil spirit! So that you ...
Grigory, dropping the log of nonsense, was shaking in soundless laughter.
Well, what are you up to? Click! shouted Pantelei Prokofievich. - Baba, sew up fast! Nadys isho said: look around the nonsense.
And what a fish now, - the old woman hinted.
If you don't understand, shut up! We'll take the most sterlet on the spit. The fish goes to the shore at once, afraid of the storm. The water must have gone murky. Come on, run out, Dunyashka, listen - Erik is playing?
Dunya reluctantly, sideways, moved towards the door.
Who will wander? Daria can’t, she might get a cold in her chest, ”the old woman did not let up.
Grishka and I, and with other nonsense - we will call Aksinya, one of the women isho.
Out of breath, Dunyasha ran in. On the eyelashes, quivering, raindrops hung. She smelled of damp black soil.
Erik is buzzing, it's scary!
Are you going to roam with us?
And isho who will go?
Let's call Bab.
Well, put on a zipun and ride to Aksinya. If he goes, let him call Malashka Frolov!
Enta will not freeze, - Grigory smiled, - she has fat on her, like on a good boar.
You should take dry hay, Grishunka, - advised the mother, - put it under your heart, otherwise you will catch a cold inside.
Grigory, wind up for hay. The old woman said the right word.
Soon Dunyashka brought the women. Aksinya, in a tattered blouse girded with rope and a blue underskirt, looked shorter, thinner. She, laughing with Darya, took off her handkerchief from her head, twisted her hair tighter into a knot, and, covering herself, throwing back her head, coldly looked at Grigory. Fat Malashka was tying up her stockings at the threshold, wheezing with a cold:
Did you take bags? True God, we do not stagger the fish.
Went to the base. Rain poured thickly on the softened earth, foamed puddles, and slid down to the Don in streams.
Gregory walked ahead. It was washed away by his unreasonable joy.
Look, dad, there's a ditch here.
What a darkness!
Hold on, Aksyusha, we'll be in prison together, - Malashka laughs hoarsely.
Look, Grigory, can't the Maidannikovs' pier?
She is.
From here ... to conceive ... - mastering the whipping wind, Panteley Prokofievich shouts.
Can't hear it, uncle! - Malasha wheezes.
Wander, with God ... I'm from the depths. From the depths, I say ... Malyashka, the devil is deaf, where are you pulling? I will go from the depths! .. Grigory, Grishka! Let Aksinya away from the shore!
Don has a moaning roar. The wind tears the slanting cloth of the rain to shreds.
Feeling the bottom with his feet, Grigory plunged into the water up to his waist. A sticky cold crept up to his chest, tightened his heart like a hoop. In the face, in tightly closed eyes, as if with a whip, a wave lashes. The nonsense is inflated with a ball, pulls inward. Gregory's feet, shod in woolen stockings, slide along the sandy bottom. Komol is torn from the hands ... Deeper, deeper. ledge. Legs are torn off. The current impetuously carries to the middle, sucks. Grigory with his right hand rows to the shore with force. The black, rippling depths frighten him more than ever. The foot joyfully steps on the shaky bottom. Some kind of fish knocks on the knee.
Go deeper! - from somewhere out of the viscous black voice of the father.
The delusion, tilting, again creeps into the depths, again the current tears the earth from under its feet, and Grigory, raising his head, swims, spitting.
Aksinya, is she alive?
Live for now.
No, does it stop raining?
The little one stops, the big one starts moving.
You are slowly. The father will hear - he will swear.
He was scared of his father, too ...
They drag on for a minute in silence. Water, like sticky dough, knits every movement.
Grisha, near the shore, Kubyt, Karsha. Need to circle.
A terrible push throws Gregory far away. A roaring splash, as if from a ravine a lump of rock fell into the water.
Ah-ah-ah-ah! - Aksinya squeals somewhere near the shore.
Frightened Grigory, having surfaced, swims to the cry.
Aksinya!
Wind and flowing sound of water.
Aksinya! - cold with fear, shouts Grigory.
E-gey!!. Gri-go-ri-y! - from afar muffled fathers voice.
Gregory throws a wave. Something viscous underfoot, grabbed his hand: nonsense.
Why didn’t she respond? .. - Grigory angrily yells, getting out on the shore on all fours.
Squatting down, trembling, they sort out the nonsense tangled in a lump. A moon hatches from a hole in a torn cloud. Behind the loan, thunder speaks with restraint. The earth is glossy with unabsorbed moisture. The sky, washed by rain, is strict and clear.
Unraveling the nonsense, Grigory peers at Aksinya. Her face is chalky pale, but her red, slightly twisted lips are already laughing.
How it will knock me ashore, - she says, taking a breath, - she has lost her mind. Fled to death! I thought you drowned.
Their hands collide. Aksinya tries to put her hand into the sleeve of his shirt.
How warm you have something in your sleeve, - she says plaintively, - and I froze. Colic went through the body.
Here he is, damned somyaga, where he hit!
In the middle of the log, Grigory opens a hole about an arshin and a half across.
Someone is running from the scythe. Grigory guesses Dunyashka. Still from afar shouts to her:
Do you have threads?
Tutochka.
Dunya, out of breath, runs up.
Why are you sitting here? Batyanka sent for them to go to the spit as soon as possible. We caught a bag of sterlets there! - There is undisguised triumph in Dunya's voice.
Aksinya, chatting her teeth, sews up a hole in the nonsense. At a trot, to keep warm, they run to the spit.
Pantelei Prokofievich is twisting the cigarette with his fingers, ribbed with water and plump, like those of a drowned man; dancing, boasting:
Once wandered - eight pieces, and another time ... - he takes a breather, lights up and silently points his foot at the bag.
Aksinya peers in with curiosity. There is a grinding crack in the bag: a tenacious sterlet is rubbing.
And what did you get away with?
Catfish squandered nonsense.
Somehow, the cells were hooked ...
Well, let's get to the knee and go home. Wander, Grishka, why have you got the hang of it?
Grigory steps over with stiff legs. Aksinya is trembling so that Grigory feels her trembling through his delirium.
Don't shake!
And I would be glad, but I won’t translate the spirit.
Here's what... Let's get out, damn it, this fish!
A large carp hits through the bullshit. Accelerating his pace, Grigory bends the rod, pulls the pole, Aksinya, bending over, runs out onto the shore. Water rushes back on the sand, fish trembles.
Shall we go through the borrowing?
Forest closer. Hey, you, there, soon?
Come on, let's catch up. Let's rinse the nonsense.
Wincing, Aksinya wringed out her skirt, picked up the bag with the catch on her shoulders, and almost trotted along the spit. Gregory was talking nonsense. A hundred fathoms passed, Aksinya groaned:
My urine is gone! Legs with a couple went.
Here is last year's mop, can you get warm?
And then. As long as you reach the house, you can die.
Grigory turned his mop cap on one side and dug a hole. The stale hay wafted with the hot smell of preli.
Get in the middle. It's like an oven here.
Aksinya threw down her sack and buried herself up to her neck in the hay.
That's a blessing!
Shivering from the cold, Grigory lay down beside him. From Aksinya's wet hair flowed a gentle, exciting smell. She lay with her head thrown back, breathing steadily through her half-open mouth.
Your hair smells like a drug. You know, like a sort of white flower ... - Grigory whispered, bending over.
She said nothing. Foggy and distant was her gaze, fixed on the detriment of the wheeled moon.
Grigory, putting his hand out of his pocket, suddenly pulled her head to him. She jerked up sharply and stood up.
Keep quiet.
Let me go, or I'll make a noise!
Wait, Aksinya...
Uncle Pantelei!
Ai lost? - quite close, from the thickets of hawthorn, responded Pantelei Prokofievich.
Grigory, closing his teeth, jumped from the hay.
What are you making noise? Ai lost? - coming up, asked the old man.
Aksinya was standing near the shock, straightening a handkerchief knocked to the back of her head, steam was smoking over her.
There is no way to get lost, but it was, to freeze.
Ty, woman, and here, looking, mop. Get warm.
Aksinya smiled, stooping for the sack.
VI(VII of the first part)
Aksinya was married to Stepan at the age of seventeen. They took her from the Dubrovka farm, on the other side of the Don, from the sands.
A year before the issue, she plowed in the autumn in the steppe, about eight versts from the farm. At night, her father, a fifty-year old man, tied her hands with a tripod and raped her.
I’ll kill you if you utter a word, and if you keep quiet, I’ll make a plush jacket and leggings with galoshes. So remember: I'll kill if anything ... - he promised her.
At night, in one tattered underwear, Aksinya ran to the farm. Lying at her mother's feet, choking on sobs, she told ... Mother and older brother, an ataman, who had just returned from service, harnessed the horses to the cart, put Aksinya with them and went there, to their father. For eight miles, my brother nearly set the horses on fire. The father was found near the camp. Drunk, he slept on a spread out zipun, an empty bottle of vodka was lying around. In front of Aksinya's eyes, the brother unhooked the baroque from the britzka, lifted the sleeping father with his feet, briefly asked him something, and struck the old man on the bridge of the nose with the chained barque. Together with his mother, they beat him for an hour and a half. The always meek, aged mother frantically pulled the hair of her unconscious husband, the brother tried with his feet. Aksinya was lying under the britzka, her head wrapped around her, shaking silently... The old man was brought home before light. He mooed plaintively, rummaged around the room with his eyes, looking for the hidden Aksinya. From his severed ear, blood and whiteness rolled onto the pillow. He died in the evening. People were told that the drunk fell from the cart and killed himself.
A year later, matchmakers arrived in an elegant britzka for Aksinya. The bride liked the tall, round-necked and stately Stepan, and a wedding was scheduled for the autumn meat-eater. Such a pre-winter day approached, with frost and a cheerful ice ringing day, the young people were wrapped around; from that time on, Aksinya settled in the Astakh house as a young mistress. The mother-in-law, a tall old woman bent over by some kind of cruel woman’s illness, woke Aksinya early the next day after the party, led her into the kitchen and, aimlessly rearranging her horns, said:
That's what, my dear son-in-law, we took you not to mess around and not to lie down. Go ahead and milk the cows, and then get to the stove to cook. I am old, weakness overcomes, and you take the economy into your hands, it will fall behind you.
On the same day, in the barn, Stepan deliberately and terribly beat his young wife. He beat me in the stomach, in the chest, in the back; beat in such a way that it was not visible to people. From that time on, he began to take on the side, got mixed up with the walking zhalmerki, left almost every night, locking Aksinya in the barn or gorenka.
For a year and a half, he did not forgive her offense: until the child was born. After that, he calmed down, but he was stingy with affection and still rarely spent the night at home.
A large multi-animal farm dragged Aksinya to work. Stepan worked with laziness: having combed his forelock, he went to his comrades to smoke, to play cards, to chat about farm news, and Aksinya had to clean up the cattle, turn the household over to her. The mother-in-law was a poor helper. Having fussed, she fell on the bed and, stretching her faded yellow lips into a thread, looking at the ceiling with eyes furious with pain, groaned, huddled into a ball. At such moments, her face, stained with black, ugly large moles, sweated profusely, tears accumulated in her eyes and often, one after another, flowed down. Aksinya, leaving work, would hide somewhere in a corner and look with fear and pity at her mother-in-law's face.
A year and a half later, the old woman died. In the morning, Aksinya began having prenatal pains, and by noon, an hour before the baby was born, her mother-in-law died on the move, near the door of the old stable. The midwife, who ran out of the hut to warn the drunken Stepan not to go to the mother-in-law, saw Aksinya's mother-in-law lying with her legs crossed.
Aksinya became attached to her husband after the birth of the child, but she had no feelings for him, there was a bitter woman's pity and habit. The child died before reaching the age of one. The old life unfolded. And when Grishka Melekhov, flirting, stood in Aksinya's way, she saw with horror that she was drawn to the affectionate black guy. He stubbornly, with bullish persistence, courted her. And it was this stubbornness that was terrifying to Aksinya. She saw that he was not afraid of Stepan, she felt in her gut that he would not give up on her like that, and, not wanting this with her mind, resisting with all her might, she noticed behind herself that on holidays and on weekdays she began to dress up more carefully, deceiving herself, strove more often catch his eye. She felt warm and pleasant when Grishka's black eyes caressed her heavily and frantically. At dawn, waking up to milk the cows, she smiled and, not yet realizing why, she recalled: “Today there is something joyful. What? Grigory ... Grisha ... "This new scarecrow filled her whole feeling, and in her thoughts she groped, carefully, as through the Don on March porous ice.
After seeing Stepan to the camps, she decided to see Grishka as little as possible. After catching the bullshit, this decision became even stronger in her.
VII(VIII)
Two days before Trinity, the farmers shared the meadow. Pantelei Prokofievich went to the division. He came from there at lunchtime, gruntingly threw off his chirps and, savoryly scratching his legs, worn out by walking, said:
We got a plot near Krasny Yar. The grass is not very good. The upper end reaches the forest, in some places there are goloschechins. The feather jumps.
When to mow? asked Gregory.
From the holidays.
Will you take Daria, or what? the old woman frowned.
Pantelei Prokofievich waved his hand - get rid of it, they say.
Need it - take it. At noon, collect what you are worth, opened up!
The old woman rattled the damper, dragged the heated cabbage soup out of the oven. At the table, Pantelei Prokofievich talked for a long time about the carve-up and the crooked ataman, who almost swindled the entire gathering.
He cheated for a year, ”Daria interceded,“ they beat off the uleshi, so he persuaded Malashka Frolov to quit.
Old bitch, - chewed Pantelei Prokofievich.
Father, but who will dig, row? Dunyashka asked timidly.
And what will you do?
Alone, father, uncontrollably.
We will call Aksyutka Astakhov. Stepan nadys asked me to mow him down. We must respect.
The next day, Mitka Korshunov rode up to the Melekhovsky base on horseback on a saddled white-legged stallion. Rain splashed. Khmar hung over the farm. Mitka, leaning over in his saddle, opened the gate and rode into the base. An old woman called out to him from the porch.
You, zaburunny, what did you resort to? she asked with visible displeasure. The old desperate and pugnacious Mitka did not like.
And what do you want, Ilyinishna? - tying the stallion to the railing, Mitka was surprised. - I came to Grishka. Where is he?
Sleeping under the barn. You, well, al paralik hit? Pawns, so you can't move?
You, aunty, are a nail in every hole! Mitka was offended. Swinging, waving and snapping his elegant whip on the tops of his patent leather boots, he went under the canopy of the barn.
Grigory was sleeping in the cart removed from the front. Mitka, screwing up his left eye, as if taking aim, pulled Grigory out with his whip.
Get up, man!
Mitya had the most abusive word "muzhik". Gregory jumped up like a spring.
What are you?
Waking up!
Don't be foolish, Mitriy, until you get angry...
Get up, there's work.
Mitka sat down on the bed of the cart, lashing the dry dirt from his boot, and said:
Grishka, I'm sorry...
Why, - Mitka swore longly, - he is not him, - the centurion, just asks.
In his hearts, without opening his teeth, he quickly threw out words, shaking his legs. Gregory got up.
What centurion?
Grabbing him by the sleeve of his shirt, Mitka said in a quieter voice:
Saddle up your horse and let's run to the place. I'll show him! I told him so: "Come on, your honor, let's try." - "Lead, grit, all your comrade friends, I will cover you all, because the mother of my mare in St. Petersburg won prizes at officer races." Yes, for me, his mare and his mother - but damn them! - and I will not let the stallion jump!
Gregory hastily dressed. Mitka followed on his heels; stammering with anger, he said:
He came to visit Mokhov, the merchant, this same centurion. Wait, whose nickname is he? Kubyt, Listnitsky. Such a dull, serious. Wears glasses. Well, come on! Even though I'm wearing glasses, but I won't dare to overtake a stallion!
Laughing, Grigory saddled up the old womb, left for the tribe, and through the humous gates - so that his father would not see - rode out into the steppe. We drove to the place under the mountain. The hooves of the horses, champing, chewed on the mud. In a haven near a dried-out poplar, horsemen were waiting for them: the centurion Listnitsky on a lean, beautiful mare and about seven peasant children on horseback.
Where to jump? the centurion turned to Mitka, adjusting his pince-nez and admiring the mighty pectoral muscles of Mitka's stallion.
From poplar to Tsar's pond.
Where is Tsar's Pond? The centurion narrowed his eyes short-sightedly.
And there, your honor, near the forest.
The horses were built. The centurion raised his whip over his head. The epaulette on his shoulder was swollen.
As I say "three" - let it go! Well? One two Three!
The first rushed the centurion, falling to the bow, holding his cap in his hand. He was one second ahead of the others. Mitka, with a perplexedly pale face, half rose in his stirrups - it seemed to Grigory that he was languidly lowering the whip pulled up over his head onto the stallion's croup.
From the poplar to the Tsar's Pond - three versts. Halfway along, Mitkin's stallion, stretching into an arrow, overtook the centurion's mare. Gregory galloped reluctantly. Having lagged behind from the very beginning, he rode in a sparse outline, watching with curiosity the receding, broken into links tenacious galloping.
Near the Tsar's Pond there is a sandy ridge, alluvial from spring water. The camel's yellow hump was stunted with holly snake onions. Grigory saw how the centurion and Mitka jumped up on the ridge at once and ran down to the other side, the rest slid behind them one by one.
When he drove up to the pond, the sweaty horses were already standing in a bunch, the dismounted guys surrounded the centurion. Mitka shone with restrained joy. Celebration shone in his every movement. The centurion, contrary to expectations, seemed to Grigory not in the least embarrassed: he, leaning against a tree, smoking a cigarette, said, pointing with his little finger at his mare, as if redeemed:
I made a run of a hundred and fifty miles on it. Just arrived from the station yesterday. If it were fresher, you would never, Korshunov, overtake me.
Maybe, - magnanimous Mitka.
There is no frisky stallion all over the district, - envious, said the freckled boy who rode last.
Kind horse. - Mitka patted the stallion's neck with a trembling hand from the excitement he had experienced and, smiling woodenly, looked at Grigory.
The two of them separated from the rest, drove under the mountain, and not the street. The centurion bade them a cold farewell, put two fingers under his visor, and turned away.
Already driving up the alley to the yard, Grigory saw Aksinya walking towards them. She walked, plucking a twig; I saw Grishka - lowered her head.
What are you ashamed of, are we going by TVs? Mitka shouted and winked: “My Kalinushka, oh, bitter little one!
Grigory, looking in front of him, almost drove past and suddenly hit the peacefully walking mare with a whip. She sat down on her hind legs - glancing, splashed Aksinya with mud.
And-and-and, the devil is bad!
Turning sharply, running into Aksinya with a heated horse, Grigory asked:
Why don't you say hello?
You don't deserve it!
For this, I slapped - do not be proud!
Let it go! shouted Aksinya, waving her hands in front of the horse's muzzle. - Why are you trampling me with a horse?
This is a mare, not a horse.
Let it go anyway!
Why are you angry, Aksyutka? Is it really for more breathless, that in a borrowing? ..
Gregory looked into her eyes. Aksinya wanted to say something, but a tear suddenly hung in the corner of her black eye; lips twitched sadly. She swallowed hard and whispered:
Get off, Grigory... I'm not angry... I... - And she went.
Surprised, Grigory caught up with Mitka at the gate.
Are you coming to the game? he asked.
What's wrong? Or did you call to spend the night?
Grigory rubbed his forehead with his palm and did not answer.
VIII(II of the first part)
Rare stars swayed in the ashen dawn sky. The wind was blowing from under the clouds. Mist reared over the Don, and, spreading along the slope of the chalk mountain, slithered into the pits like a gray headless viper. The left-bank Obdon, sands, valleys, reedy impassability, a forest covered in dew - blazed with a frenzied cold glow. Beyond the line, not rising, the sun languished.
In the Melekhovsky kuren, Pantelei Prokofievich was the first to wake up from his sleep. Buttoning up the collar of his shirt embroidered with crosses, he went out onto the porch. The haunted yard is lined with dewy silver. Let the cattle out into the alley. Daria in her underwear ran to milk the cows. Dew splashed like colostrum on the calves of her white bare feet, and a smoky, flattened trail lay across the grass across the bases.
Panteley Prokofievich looked at the straightening of the grass, crushed by Darya's feet, and went into the upper room.
On the sill of the open window, the petals of the cherry blossoms that had faded in the front garden were deathly pink. Grigory was sleeping face down, throwing his arm out.
Grishka, are you going fishing?
What are you? - he asked in a whisper and dangled his legs from the bed.
Let's go, let's sit down.
Grigory, snoring, pulled off his everyday bloomers from the pendant, pulled them into white woolen stockings and put on a chirp for a long time, straightening the back that turned up.
In Sholokhov's edition, due to an editorial oversight, this “peaceful” epigraph is preceded by another, “military” one (“Our glorious zem[e]lyushka has not been plowed up…”) Although logically, it should open the second, left without an epigraph, military book. The epigraph to the third book (also military) corresponds to its content. The epigraph to the 7th part of the novel remaining in the drafts is unknown, but probably this part should have been included in the third volume, which has grown from numerous quotations from later White Guard memoirs and party Bolshevik articles. In this case, the logic of the three volumes (and their epigraphs) is as obvious as the polemic with the 19th century, the century of Leo Tolstoy: the formula of modern times is not War and Peace, but Peace - War - Civil War. Part 8 belongs entirely to Soviet imitators. ( Note. A. Ch. In the publications: “- Somehow the devil, I need you!”
Now the village of Setraki, Chertkovsky district, Rostov region, 60 versts from Veshenskaya and 120 versts from the farm of Khovansky ( approx. A. Ch.)
Gas - kerosene
Fishermen "bait" (feeding for fish, usually from grains of wheat, rye or barley) do not boil, but soar. We find a correction missing in the editions in the “draft” manuscript: over “Did your mother cook porridge?” (“Chernovaya”, p. 5) we read: “- Did mother soar bait?” However, in further “editions”: “Did your mother cook the bait?” (“Rewhitened”, p. 5); “Did Mom cook the bait?” ("Belovaya", p. 5). ( Note. A. Ch.)
In the editions of the description: "to the left." But the right, sunless bank of the Don flowing in this place from the west to the east of the Don should be called the Black Yar. The old man accurately determines the place of fishing: “To the Black Yar. Let's try it near the entoy karshi, where we used to sit."
In Sholokhov's "draft" (p. 6) "huge, a yard and a half carp" later became "two yards" (later edited in purple ink over black). But in nature, the maximum length of a carp is exactly one and a half arshins (a little over a meter), and the weight is up to 20 kg. A carp of 15.5 pounds, as Grigory found out with the help of a steelyard (about 6.5 kg), all the more cannot be “two-harshine” (that is, almost half a meter), since the carp is a stewed fish and simply cannot lose weight like that. Before us is a typical Sholokhov's correction. In the first book we meet whole line similar examples: this is an increase in the supply of grain at the Mokhov mill (in poods), and an increase in the distance covered by the rider per day. It was for this kind of postscripts (only not in someone else's prose, but in financial documents) that the young accountant Mikhail Sholokhov was tried in 1922. ( Note. A. Ch.)
In Sholokhov's edition: "...behind her, water rose like an oblique greenish sheet." According to the "draft" (p. 7): "...behind it stood water in a short sheet." According to "whitened" (p. 6) and "white" (p. 6): "... behind her, water rose in an oblique greenish sheet." The editors failed to read the text: if a big fish sat on the hook, stagnant water (in the kotlin / kolovina, near the shore, behind the sunken elm) will pound like a linen when washing and rinsing. ( Note. A. Ch.)
vieu- a drawbar in a bull harness. (Approx. publishers.)
———————————————
OBLIGATORY REPLACEMENT OF THE FRAGMENT IN THE THIRD BOOK OF TD
Yar (meaning not a ravine, but a coastal cliff) near the spit cut off by Erik is not in vain called Black. As the Yar, looking to the east, is called Red. And it is no coincidence that it was immediately clarified that the matter was taking place “in a loan” (p. 33). In the Sholokhov edition, this ravine is twice (but not for the first time!) mistakenly attributed to the left bank. But for seventy miles from Veshenskaya to Ust-Medveditskaya, the Don flows to the east. And therefore, “black”, that is, inaccessible to sunlight, is not the left, but the right bank. The one with the scythe.
This looks most egregious in the 6th part, which describes a visit by Grigory to his division, dug in on the left bank opposite the Tatarsky occupied by the Reds. Here, the description of the right-bank settlement with many speaking farm realities is referred to the left bank. However, there is a completely different landscape here: “The Left Bank Obdon, sands, valleys, reedy impassability, a forest covered with dew” (Book 1, ch. II)
Fragment from p. 413–415 books. 3 should not precede Grigory's visit to the positions of the Tatars dug in on the left bank, but should come immediately after:
“A hundred Tatar scouts were too lazy to dig trenches.
They invent devilry, - Christonya bassed. - What are we, on the German front, or what? Roy, brothers, stripped, so-to be, trenches knee-deep. Is it a mental matter, then, to dig such a congealed earth two arshins deep? Yes, you can’t gouge it with a crowbar, not like a shovel.
They listened to him, on the cartilaginous steep ravine of the left bank they dug trenches for lying, and dugouts were made in the forest.
Well, here we have moved to the marmot position! - wisecracked Anikushka, who never lost heart. - We will live in nury, the grass will go to live, otherwise you would all crack pancakes with kaimak, meat, noodles with sterlet ... Don't you like sweet clover?
The Tatars did not care much for the Reds. There were no batteries against the farm. Occasionally, only from the right bank did a machine gun begin to tap out fractionally, sending short bursts at an observer leaning out of the trench, and then silence again for a long time.
The Red Army trenches were on the mountain. From there they also occasionally shot, but the Red Army men went to the farm only at night, and then not for long.
Having approached the trenches of the Tatar scouts, Grigory sent for his father. Somewhere far away on the left flank, Khristonya shouted:
Prokofich! Go quickly, now, Gregory has arrived! ..
Grigory dismounted, handed over the reins to Anikushka, who came up, and from a distance he saw his father hurriedly limping.
Well, great, boss!
Hello dad.
I arrived?
Violently assembled! Well, how are ours? Mother, where is Natalya?
Pantelei Prokofievich waved his hand and grimaced. A tear slipped down his black cheek...
Well, what is it? What's wrong with them? Grigory asked anxiously and sharply.
Didn't move...
How so?!
Natalya lay down clean in two days. Typhus, it must be... Well, the old woman didn't want to leave her... Don't be scared, son, everything is fine with them there.
And the kids? Mishatka? Polyushka?
There too. And Dunya has moved. I was afraid to stay ... Girl's business, you know? At once, with Anikushkina's woman, they went to Volokhov. And I've been home twice. In the middle of the night I will quietly move on the longboat, well, and I tried it. Natalya is very bad, but the kids are fine, thank God ... Natalyushka is without memory, she has a fever, her lips are parched with blood.
Why didn't you bring them here? Gregory shouted indignantly.
The old man became angry, resentment and reproach were in his trembling voice:
And what did you do? Couldn't you have come running ahead of time to transport them?
I have a division! I had to send the division! Gregory objected passionately.
We heard what you do in Veshki...
Family, kubyt, and without the need? Hey Gregory! You have to think about God, if you don’t think about people ... I didn’t cross here, otherwise wouldn’t I have taken them? My platoon was in Elani, but the Pokedovs came here, the Reds had already occupied the farm.
I'm in Veshki! .. This matter does not concern you ... And you tell me ... - Grigory's voice was hoarse and strangled.
Yes, I'm nothing! - the old man was frightened, looking with displeasure at the Cossacks crowding nearby. - That's not what I'm talking about... And you're quieter than the Gutar, people, over there, are hearing... - and switched to a whisper. - You yourself are not a tiddly child, you yourself should know, but do not hurt your soul about the family. Natalya, God willing, will get a feeling, but the Reds don't beat them. True, they slaughtered the summer heifer, but nothing like that. They had mercy and did not touch ... The grains took forty measures. Well, yes, going to war is not without damage!
Maybe they could be taken away?
No need, in my opinion. Well, where to take her, ill? And yes, it's risky. They have nothing there. The old woman looks after the household, it is so calmer for me, otherwise there were fires in the farm.
Who got burned?
The place was all burned out. There are more and more merchant houses. The matchmakers of the Korshunovs were completely burned. The matchmaker Lukinichna went to Andropov at once, and Grishak's grandfather also stayed at home to keep watch. Your mother told me that he, Grishak’s grandfather, said: “I won’t move anywhere from my base, and the Anchichrists won’t come up to me, they’ll be afraid of the sign of the cross.” In the end, he began to interfere with the mind. But, as you can see, the krasyuki were not afraid of his cross, the hut and the farmstead were engulfed in smoke, and nothing was heard about him ... Yes, it’s time for him to die. I made a domovina for myself twenty years ago, but everything lives on ... And your friend's farm burns down, he is an abyss!
Mishka Koshevoy, may he be cursed three times!
He is a true god! We had one, he tortured about you. Mother said so: “As soon as we pass to the ent side - Grigory, your first regular will be on
417
a bolt. Hang him on the highest oak. I'm talking about him, - he says, - and I won't spoil the checkers! And he asked about me and grinned. “And entogo,” he says, “where the devils carried the lame? I would sit at home, - he says, - on the stove. Well, and if I catch it, I won’t kill it to death, but I’ll dump the whips until the spirit comes out of it! Here's the breakdown! He walks around the farm, sets fire to merchants and priests' houses and says: “For Ivan Alekseevich and for Shtokman, I will burn the whole Vyoshenskaya!” Is that your voice?
Grigory talked with his father for another half an hour, then went to the horse. In the conversation, the old man did not even hint a word about Aksinya, but Grigory was depressed even without this. “Everyone heard it, it must, since dad knows. Who could tell? Who, besides Prokhor, saw us together? Does Stepan even know? He even gritted his teeth from shame, from anger at himself ...
I had a short talk with the Cossacks. Anikushka kept joking and asked to send several buckets of moonshine for a hundred.
We don’t even need cartridges, as long as there is vodka! - he said, laughing and winking, expressively snapping his fingernail on the dirty collar of his shirt.
Grigory treated Khristonya and all the other farmers with the stocked tobacco; and just before leaving, I saw Stepan Astakhov. Stepan came up, slowly greeted, but did not shake hands.
Grigory saw him for the first time since the day of the uprising, peered inquisitively and anxiously: “Does he know?” But Stepan's handsome dry face was calm, even cheerful, and Grigory sighed with relief: "No, he doesn't know!"
End of quote.
(TD: 6, LXIII, 413–417).
Then Grigory crosses over to “his (!) Asylum” in order to secretly visit the family remaining on the other side at night - his mother, Natalya, children (for it is said that the Reds, having dug in on the mountain, do not enter the farm at night):
Gregory has entered to your borrowing before evening.
Everything here was familiar to him, every tree gave rise to memories ... The road went along the Maiden's Meadow, where the Cossacks annually drank vodka on Peter's Day, after they had "shaken" (divided) the meadow. The cape protrudes into the Alyoshkin copse.
414
A long time ago, in this then still nameless copse, wolves slaughtered a cow that belonged to some Alexei, a resident of the Tatarsky farm. Alexei died, the memory of him was erased, as the inscription on the gravestone is erased, even his surname is forgotten by neighbors and relatives, and the copse, named after him, lives on, pulling the dark green crowns of oaks and karaichs to the sky. Them cut down by Tatars for crafts necessary for household items, but from the stocky stumps in the spring tenacious young shoots are swept out, a year or two of inconspicuous growth, and again Alyoshkin's copse in the summer - in the malachite green of outstretched branches, in the fall - as in golden chain mail, in the red glow of carved oak leaves lit by matinees.
In summer, in the Alyoshka copse, the prickly brambles densely entwine the damp earth, on the tops of the old Karaichs, elegantly feathered rollers and magpies build their nests; in autumn, when the smell of acorns and oak-carrion leaves is invigorating and bitter, migrating woodcocks stay in the copse for a short time, and in winter only the round printed trace of the fox will stretch like a pearl thread over the spreading white felt of snow. Grigory many times in his youth went to set traps for foxes in Aleshkin copse ...
He rode under the cool shade of the branches, along the old overgrown chariots of last year's road. I passed the Maiden's Glade, got out to the Black Yar, and memories hit my head like a hop. About three poplars, as a boy, he once chased a brood of still flightless wild ducklings along the muzgochka; It stands on the outskirts, lonely and old. It can be seen from the Melekhovsky base, and every autumn Grigory, going out onto the porch of his hut, admired the viburnum bush, from a distance, as if engulfed in a red tongued flame. The late Petro was so fond of pies with bitter and astringent viburnum...
Grigory, with quiet sadness, looked around the places familiar from childhood. The horse walked, lazily driving away with its tail midges, brown angry mosquitoes, densely swarming in the air.
The green wheatgrass and the Arzhanian leaned gently in the wind. The meadow was covered with green ripples.
The text in bold indicates that the right-bank path from the Khovansky stile was described (not far from the meadow in Krasny Yar, where in 1912 there was a Melekhov plot) to the rear gate of the cattle base. This is a path from the ford, through Aleshkin copse, Maiden's meadow, past Chernoy Yar.
Well, the trenches of the farm hundred are on the left bank.
There is a clear rearrangement of the page: having entered his place of residence, Grigory cannot be on the left bank near the Tatars who have dug in there.
WORDS BRILLIANTLY ABSENT
in the 8th part of the "Quiet Don",
tabloid forgery of the first Sholokhovists
Anonymous imitators who completed The Quiet Flows the Don in 1940, with they made a big mistake: focusing on the method of socialist realism (that is, on the ideological super-task), they betrayed themselves with giblets.
In the last part of the novel, there is nothing that is necessarily (and, as a rule, repeatedly!) found in every volume of the novel - cars and airplanes, Maidans and loans, plots, swamps and muzgi.
There are no messengers, gypsies, accordions and harmonists, sparrows, snakes, red-headed, alder, brooms, bees and sunflowers in this last part. Here they do not know how to untie anything and do not know the outcomes.
There are no nouns "ruble" and "column", there is no such thing as "cursing".
There is nothing crimson and nothing greenish. And no one "angry". There are no words “power” and “emperor”, epithets “military” and “free” (and in the previous parts: “free life”; “free Don”; “Cossacks are free people”; “free, free sons of the quiet Don”) . No, of course, and key concept Quiet Don. And - although people continue to die in the hundreds and thousands - not a single word "corpse" (which occurred 41 times in previous chapters).
And there are no words with the root "sorrow".
See the table here at the end of the page.
4.3.1920. - The writer Fyodor Dmitrievich Kryukov, the alleged author of the novel "Quiet Flows the Don", died.
(2.2.1870–4.3.1920) - Russian writer, Cossack, member of the White movement. Born in the village of Glazunovskaya, Ust-Medveditsky District of the Don Cossack Region, in the family of an ataman. Mother of the Don noblewoman. In total, the family had three children.
Fedor graduated with a silver medal from the Ust-Medveditskaya gymnasium, where he studied with F. Mironov (future commander of the 2nd Cavalry Army), A. Popov (future writer A.S. Serafimovich) and Pyotr Gromoslavsky (father-in-law of M.A. Sholokhov) .
In 1888 he entered the Imperial St. Petersburg Historical and Philosophical Institute for government support, received a very good education. Being a hereditary Don Cossack, Kryukov perfectly knew both the life of his native Don and its history, which he showed already in his first works.
While still a student, he began his literary activity with the article "Cossacks at the Academic Exhibition", published in the journal "Donskaya Rech" (03/18/1890). After graduating (in June 1892) from the institute in the category of history and geography, until 1894 he collaborated in the Petersburg newspaper, printing short stories. The story of Don inspired the writer to great historical essays from the Petrine era "Gulebshchiki" (1892) and "Shulginskaya massacre" (1894), published in the journal "Historical Bulletin".
In September 1893, he got a job as an educator at the boarding school of the Oryol male gymnasium, where in August 1900 he became a supernumerary teacher of history and geography, at the same time fulfilling his former duties until 1904. Additionally, he taught history at the Nikolaev female gymnasium (1894-1898) and Russian language in Oryol-Bakhtin Cadet Corps (1898-1905) and was a member of the provincial scientific archival commission. This period of time includes the first significant works of art from the life of the modern Don Cossacks, such as "Cossack" (1896), "Treasure" (1897), "In native places" (1903). By the same time, Fedor Dmitrievich's long-term collaboration with the writer V.G. Korolenko - the editor-in-chief of the journal "Russian wealth" (since 1914 - "Russian messenger"), where from 1896 to 1917 F.D. Kryukov published 101 works of various genres.
During this period, he was subject to the general liberal-revolutionary and social-democratic craze. In April 1906, he was elected a deputy from the Don, and was a member of the Labor Group. After the dissolution of the Duma in July 1906, he signed the Vyborg Appeal, for which he served a three-month prison sentence. In 1906–1907 participated in the People's Socialist Party.
The period before 1914 is the most notable in the work of F.D. Kryukov, when he gained literary fame. He wrote dozens of novels and short stories, mostly about folk life on the Don. Since 1911, he began to work on the "big thing" - a novel about the life of the Don Cossacks. The total volume of works by F.D. Kryukov is at least 10 volumes, but only one volume was published during the life of the writer - in 1914.
Since the beginning of F.D. Kryukov is at the front. He was a war correspondent and head of the Red Cross detachment of the State Duma in the Caucasus (1914 - early 1915). In November 1915 - February 1916 he was on the Galician front. He published numerous impressions in front-line essays from the life of military orderlies and a military hospital, which echo the military themes of the novel Quiet Flows the Don.
Kryukov described the disaster in the essays "Collapse", "New", "New System", showing the real picture spreading abomination and corruption. In January 1918 he returned to the Don, where he took an active part in, in June 1918 he was shell-shocked in battle. At the same time, he wrote a poem in prose "Dear Land", which was distributed in the form of leaflets at the front. In August he was elected a member of the Military Circle, worked as its secretary. Since the autumn of 1918, he was the director of the Ust-Medveditsk male gymnasium and, obviously, it was during this period that he wrote the main parts of his novel devoted to the civil war. Here, in November 1918, the 25th anniversary of his literary activity. In 1918 - 1919. published in the magazine "Don Wave", in the newspapers "North of the Don", "Priazovsky Krai".
At the beginning of 1920, F.D. Kryukov to the Caucasus and on March 4 died of typhus on the Nezaimanovsky farm near the village of Novokorsunskaya.
The manuscript of Kryukov's long novel remained unknown to us.
However, there is a substantiated version that it was she who was used by M.A. Sholokhov for the novel "Quiet Flows the Flows the Flows the Don" which he completed at the age of 22 (published in 1927) and for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1965. "for the artistic power and integrity of the epic about the Don Cossacks at a turning point for Russia". Disputes over authorship began immediately after the publication of the first chapters of the epic in 1928 and escalated after the publication in Paris in 1974 of I.N. Medvedeva-Tomashevskaya (anonymously) under the title "The Stirrup of the Quiet Don (Riddles of the Novel)".
Solzhenitsyn first called Sholokhov a thief back in the 1960s, that is, during the active "creative" life of the latter, and not after his death, and in the book "A calf butted with an oak" he reasonably outlined the problem of the authorship of the great novel, calling it the main issue of Russian literature of the twentieth century. In subsequent years, many domestic and foreign philologists and historians addressed this problem: R.A. Medvedev, M.T. Mezentsev, A.V. Venkov, Zeev Bar-Sella. The most fundamental research is the book by A.G. Makarova and S.E. Makarova "The Flower-Tatarnik" (2001), where the complex composition of the novel is revealed and the historical and literary forgery carried out by a group of people, including Sholokhov, is convincingly proved. As a result of the research, it was concluded that the first two books of The Quiet Flows the Don (parts 1–4) were written by F.D. Kryukov. The third book (parts 5-6) has a complex structure: it contains inserts from the memoirs of active participants in the white struggle -,; and red - N.E. Kakurina, A.A. Frenkel, as well as adding, mainly, ideological content at the level of official clichés of the 1920s. The fourth book (parts 7–8) is composed of texts also written by various people, including Kryukov.
The helpless objections of the Soviet "Sholokhovists" to this are also analyzed in detail by the above-mentioned researchers. The most weighty argument in favor of Sholokhov's authorship was the solemnly discovered in 1999 manuscript of The Quiet Flows the Don, written in his handwriting, as if he could not rewrite someone else's manuscript... Sofia Andreevna Tolstaya rewrote War and Peace several times, but as co-authors was not attributed to Lev Nikolaevich.
What is the evidence of the impossibility of writing by Sholokhov (1904-1984) the main part of the text of the great epic "Quiet Flows the Don"?
- The novel describes with photographic accuracy the life of the Don Cossacks and various social strata of pre-revolutionary Russia, which Sholokhov could not know both because of his infancy, and because of his non-Cossack origin and complete isolation from the described environment. The action of the novel begins in 1911, and the phenomena of nature are woven into a single context with the Orthodox calendar and fully correspond to reality. Sholokhov, being a 6-8 year old child, neither physically nor psychologically could make any observations and records, although he could, of course, study later this time according to documents, but in this case the first three books of the novel could not have been written by him in two or three years with such reliability of events.
- Description of life situations, adult family problems, relationships with women, children, examples of the behavior of the main characters belonging to different social strata, speak of the author's rich life experience and natural powers of observation. You can't write like that at 22... Moreover, work on the novel in this case should have begun several years earlier, in fact, at a young age.
- Dark spots in the biography of Sholokhov. With deep study, everything that he wrote about himself later turned out to be either fiction or half-truth. And all the information about his "food commissar" and the battles with the Makhnovists, which had been exaggerated for so long in the literature and "memoirs" of the family, turned out to be a lie. He was never a participant in the hostilities, which he talentedly and reliably described in the novel.
- The grossest factual errors in the novel are made in the description of the battles of the First World War. The 12th Don Cossack Regiment, in which his hero Grigory Melekhov served, was never in East Prussia, and meanwhile, East Prussia is constantly mentioned in Grigory's memoirs during the Upper Don uprising. The battles in Galicia in 1914, where the 12th Don Cossack Regiment actually fought, are described with high accuracy. Thus, the fate of the main characters of the novel, as it were, bifurcates, then they fight in East Prussia, then in Galicia. Meanwhile, in Galicia fought regiments formed in the Upper Don district (10th, 11th and 12th Don Cossacks), which included the village of Veshenskaya, and in East Prussia - regiments formed in the Ust-Medveditsky district ( 3rd Ermak Timofeevich and 17th General Baklanov regiments). Namely, in the Ust-Medveditsky district in the village of Glazunovskaya, Kryukov was born and lived for a long time. As an additional confirmation of the last remarks, one can cite the testimony of S.V. Golubintsev (1897-1985) - a Don Cossack who fought during the First World War in the ranks of 11 Izyumsky Hussar regiment and returning to the Don along with the Cossacks of the 12th Don Regiment, the 1st hundred of which was commanded by Yesaul Tsygankov. On the way, young officers sat in a circle and listened to Tsygankov's memoirs, the details of which “later I read in Brazil in the first part of Mikhail Sholokhov's novel The Quiet Flows the Don. Even then I wondered how he, being a teenager during the war, could know that in the 17th Don Cossack regiment of General Baklanov, officers wore red hoods, which he spoke about in such detail in the place where Chernetsov's partisans are mentioned. And in general, I thought then, could he, a communist, talk so beautifully about the elections of the Don Circle to ataman P.N. Krasnov. The only place where he made a mistake in his narratives about the 12th Don Cossack Regiment is in the place where he says that the Cossacks killed their adjutant. This is a lie, because I drove with the Cossacks of the 12th Don Regiment to the village of Setrakov, and the Cossacks generally behaved very restrainedly and did not touch any of the officers ... The name of the dashing anti-communist in the novel, Yesaul Kalmykov, caught my eye, but here I even smiled. Why, this is our "dictator" Yesaul Tsygankov! I last met Yesaul Tsygankov on the Don in 1919 and after that I never had to see him. ”It is clear that Sholokhov could not know Yesaul Tsygankov, as well as the centurion Izvarin and other participants in those tragic events, as well as the details of the uniform of officers 17 th Don General Baklanov Regiment, but F.D. Kryukov - certainly could. And the phrase about the murder of the adjutant is definitely Sholokhov. And this fully corresponds to the research scheme of A.G. and S.E. Makarov.
- In the "Quiet Don" figures of the local Don scale are shown with accuracy and reliability. Moreover, as A.V. Venkov, appearance, habits of these people are described with photographic accuracy. The person who wrote the novel must have known them. And all of them were members of the Cossack Circle, whose secretary in 1918 was Fedor Dmitrievich Kryukov. The thirteen-fifteen-year-old teenager Sholokhov could not even be near these people.
- Modern researchers rightly noted that Grigory Melekhov's "bloating", his suddenly awakening hatred for the officers of 1919-1920. have no foundation or historical basis. These are later ideological insertions into the text of the novel. Cossack officers came from the same sociocultural environment as ordinary Cossacks, lived with them, as a rule, in the same villages, and access to the Novocherkassk Cossack Cavalry School was open to everyone. During the years of the civil war, a large number of Cossacks, like Grigory Melekhov, rose not only to officer ranks, but even became generals. truth seeker Grigory with the uncompromising communist Sholokhov, who strangled and poisoned every living thing in Soviet literature. Any author endows the protagonist of the work with some of his own features, puts his thoughts into his mouth. Such is Pechorin at, and a cornet, and then General Sablin at P.N. Krasnov. It is simply impossible to imagine Grigory Melekhov and Sholokhov in such a ratio.
- Cossack songs are organically woven into the text of "Quiet Don". Sholokhov always said that he took their texts from collections of Don songs by Pivovarov and Listopadov. But in these collections there are no variants of the words of the songs used in the novel. Kryukov, on the other hand, was one of the deepest connoisseurs of Cossack songwriting, he collected songs himself and sang superbly. In the rest of Sholokhov's works there is no shadow of such use of folklore.
- Sholokhov practically did not leave the Don, and in general he had never been to St. Petersburg-Petrograd-Leningrad before the publication of the novel. Meanwhile, the descriptions of the northern capital in the novel are striking in their accuracy. It is also impossible to describe exactly the city where you have never been.
- The low level of Sholokhov's general culture. One of the main arguments of the "Sholokhovists" regarding the youth of the author is an example of the creation of talented works by other great poets and writers. But we must not forget what environment they came from and what a brilliant education they had. Moreover, all their works are written either on personal experience (for example, Lermontov's "A Hero of Our Time"), or on the basis of a deep study of historical documents and, nevertheless, at a more mature age (for example, Pushkin's "History of the Pugachev Rebellion"). And what kind of education could a non-resident of the Veshenskaya village get in the terrible conditions of the civil war? At the very least, a delay in reaching the required cultural and educational level was inevitable, and, judging by Sholokhov's official biography, it did not happen. Meanwhile, later inserts in parts 1-4 of the novel and numerous ideological clichés in parts 5-6 speak of Mikhail Alexandrovich's complete historical illiteracy. Everything is confused: the dates of the movement and battles of the Volunteer Army, the names of the generals who broke through the front of the Red Army and joined the rebels in May 1919, and much more are confused. All this confusion, according to the research of specialists, refers to the later ideological inserts.
There is the testimony of Professor Alexander Longinovich Ilsky, who worked in 1927 as a 17-year-old youth in the editorial office of Roman-gazeta and witnessed Sholokhov’s “formation” as a writer: “Not only I, but everyone in our editorial office knew that the first 4 parts Sholokhov never wrote the novel The Quiet Flows the Don. It was like this: at the end of 1927, to the editors of M.A. Sholokhov brought one copy of the manuscript, 500 pages of typewritten text. However, after the publication of the first 4 parts of the novel, rumors of plagiarism spread. Ilsky describes the atmosphere that prevailed in society in those years. In the conditions of the almost complete extermination of the pre-revolutionary intelligentsia, a talented "proletarian author" with a good profile was needed. The main reactor of Roman-gazeta, A. Grudskaya, through her friend, who worked in Stalin's secretariat, slipped the published novel to the leader. The novel was liked, and Sholokhov was appointed as an indicative ideological "author". After the release of the well-known letter from the RAPP board signed by Serafimovich, Averbakh, Kirshon, Fadeev and Stavsky, for the slightest doubt in the authorship of Sholokhov, he was threatened with execution. Later, almost all the witnesses, led by the Trotskyist Grudskaya, were repressed, and Ilsky entered a technical university, went to work in the field of technology and no longer touched on this topic.- The primitiveness of the further creative path of the "great writer". Having created a novel of great artistic power about events and a time that he practically did not know, in record time, in the future, being a "classic of Soviet literature", he did not create anything significant. It is known that a real writer cannot not write. There are many examples of this. Being in the wild conditions of Stalin's camps, Solzhenitsyn wrote in his mind, memorizing huge parts of the texts in order to pour them out later on paper. But what about a "great writer"? Living without a break in Veshenskaya, having a lot of free time, receiving a lot of money by Soviet standards and practically not needing anything, having access to any sources due to his position, write almost nothing about, by the beginning of which he was about 40 years old (heyday creative forces for any person) The war awakened the talents of a huge number of people who went through it. Victor Astafiev, Boris Vasiliev, Vyacheslav Kondratiev, Vasil Bykov, Konstantin Simonov and many others left brilliant works about the war under all the ideological restrictions of the totalitarian regime, including those originally written on the table. "The great writer Sholokhov" is nothing but primitive "The Science of Hatred" and "The Fate of Man", justly criticized by Solzhenitsyn, he did not create. "Work" on the novel "They Fought for the Motherland" allegedly "continued" until the end of the writer's life, but not a single page was found, even if it was a written text!
- And one more important point, also noted by almost all researchers. There is not a single piece of evidence that anyone saw how Sholokhov worked at the table at all or wrote something. If we take as an example the already mentioned Pushkin, Lermontov and Byron, then there are dozens of testimonies of contemporaries about how poets wrote poems impromptu in albums for women, on the cuff of friends, for a bet during feasts, and later these brilliant works were included in their full collected works on equal terms with everyone else. Still, the memories of Sholokhov come down to how he loved fishing and drinking in nature.
What really happened? Why has "the main question of Russian literature of the 20th century" not yet been resolved? Having brought together all the available material, we can assume the following course of events associated with the writing and publication of individual parts of the great epic, united by the common name "Quiet Flows the Don".
An outstanding Russian writer, the Don Cossack Fyodor Dmitrievich Kryukov, in 1911, 41 years old, decided to write a "big thing" - a novel about the Don and the Don Cossacks, using his rich literary and life experience. He watched the life of both the Don and all of Russia. Being a sociable and charming person, he won the love of ordinary people and recognition in the circles of representatives of Russian literature of that time. The outbreak of the Great War of 1914 and the events of the revolution and civil war that followed sharpened his talent, elevating him to the level of genius. The plots he saw at the front, in Petrograd and on the Don, were reflected in essays, stories and smoothly flowed in a slightly modified form to the pages of the epic novel "Quiet Flows the Don", the first four parts of which were completely completed by 1917. The main scene - farm Tatarsky Ust-Medveditsky district.
The main characters serve in the 3rd and 17th Don Cossack regiments and fight in the First World War in East Prussia - hence the East Prussian branch in the novel. Rapidly developing events on the Don constantly make adjustments to the text of the novel. The Upper Don uprising that broke out in 1919 so impressed Fyodor Dmitrievich, who, being the secretary of the Military Circle, had the opportunity to receive the most reliable information about the events that were boiling on both sides of the front, that he decided to change storyline and move the Tatarsky farm in the Verkhne-Donskoy district to the village of Veshenskaya in the novel. Hence the relocation of the main characters' places of service during the First World War to regiments recruited in the Upper Don District. However, not all the writer managed to finalize and bring to the end. The retreat of the Whites from the Don at the beginning of 1920 brought him to the Kuban, where Fyodor Dmitrievich died of typhus.
His entire rich literary archive fell into the hands of the former stanitsa chieftain Pyotr Yakovlevich Gromoslavsky, who fiercely hated Kryukov because the writer in 1913 exposed his financial fraud and thereby deprived him of the ataman's mace. Returning to the Don, fearing reprisals from the new government, Gromoslavsky marries his daughter Maria to the young Sholokhov, who, apart from a "clean" profile, had nothing in his soul. In order to secure his future, Gromoslavsky comes into contact with A.S. Serafimovich, a talented Don writer who went to the service of the Bolsheviks and personally knew F.D. Kryukov as a one-stationer and writer. Gromoslavsky pursued selfish goals, what goals Serafimovich pursued is hard to say. Perhaps, in this way, he wanted to somehow save the novel from destruction and oblivion, but this does not change the essence of the matter. On the basis of the richest archive of Kryukov for three years from 1926 to 1929. the first six parts of the novel "Quiet Don" were completed, then published under the name of Sholokhov.
Sholokhov himself performed, most likely, only the technical work of rewriting texts. Only this, given the global nature of the narrative and its ideological adjustment, should have taken several years. The fourth book of the novel was compiled, most likely, by Serafimovich himself on the basis of the Kryukov archives, since in it, despite the negative opinion of many modern researchers, there are still brilliant passages that Sholokhov, by definition, could not write on his own. In the future, other materials from the Kryukov archive formed the basis for writing the most powerful passages in the rest of Sholokhov's works, with which many researchers, including Norwegian ones, compared The Quiet Flows the Don. Naturally, the results of the comparison confirmed that it was written by one author.
The interests of the Bolshevik government headed by Stalin coincided with the interests of the literary group of Serafimovich-Gromoslavsky, which explains the rapid publication of the novel and the "green light" given to it. For the rest of his life, Sholokhov tried to make minor adjustments to the text, trying to adjust it to the existing political moment and somehow smooth out obvious mistakes, but nothing came of it. It was not possible to make a communist novel out of the White Guard novel, as well as to replace the great truth of life with ideological clichés. Like false notes in the greatest piece of music, they for a short time cut the ear of the uninitiated reader into the subtleties of history, without changing either the great essence of the novel or the attitude towards the main characters.
Died by natural causes the main inspirers and organizers of the greatest historical forgery in world literature. Sholokhov himself grew old, and remained "a classic of Soviet literature." You can deceive people, but God cannot. You can steal a novel, but you can't steal talent. The ignorant fool of the 1920s. so he remained until old age, without writing anything comparable. Organized by the criminal authorities, the "genius" surrounded himself with a whole host of "researchers of his work" who received money, academic degrees, and built material well-being on this, like Gromoslavsky. It is this and only this that explains their apology for the authorship of Sholokhov, both before and now.
But the authorities at all times knew what they were doing. There is no doubt that the FSB archives contain the secret file of Sholokhov and company. That is why there is no academic edition of his works. That is why, when he died, there was no special hype due to his rank. And that is why for all the time, from 1917 to 1991, not a single work of Fedor Dmitrievich Kryukov was published. Only in 1993, one volume of his works was published - and that's all. But the libraries have all the pre-revolutionary journals in which he was published, and you can put together 10 volumes of his works. And this is another indirect evidence of the guilt of both Sholokhov and those in power.
Indeed, after the death of Stalin, the works of many other writers who emigrated after the civil war were widely published in the USSR. Pre-revolutionary works - almost all, and some written in exile, but not containing criticism of the communist regime. Collected works of these writers could be taken to read in every rural library. Ivan Bunin, for example, having lived abroad for more than 30 years, wrote many unpleasant things about the Bolsheviks. them in Soviet times they just didn't publish it.
Kryukov could write such anti-Soviet works for only three years - from 1917 to 1920. It would seem, why not publish the pre-revolutionary works of the writer, who at one time was liberal-minded and suffered from the tsarist regime, along with members of the First State Duma, who was friends with Korolenko before the revolution, F.K. Mironov and A.S. Serafimovich, who supported the Bolsheviks, who was not repressed by the Soviet authorities, but died of typhus during the civil war? At least publish with the same reservations, as in the case of Bunin and Kuprin, that "he allegedly did not understand the great meaning of the revolution, went against it, and now - the result - an untimely death in the prime of his creative powers"? Why aren't Kryukov's works being published now, when 25 volumes have been on sale for a long time, where the great philosopher leaves no stone unturned from the criminal power that collapsed 14 years ago? It seems that there is no logic in such hushing up of Kryukov?
And, nevertheless, it exists, and lies in the fact that, as before, all key positions in government agencies, and in non-profit publishing houses and literary magazines are occupied by people who are, to one degree or another, involved in Soviet power and to its "sholohovedenie", therefore the publication complete collection Kryukov's writings are a death sentence for their academic degrees and positions. After a cursory comparison, any amateur will understand who the author of The Quiet Flows the Don. After all, Fyodor Dmitrievich Kryukov remains an outstanding Russian writer even without The Quiet Flows the Don, while Sholokhov turns into absolute zero without a great novel.
But for now, it's all hypotheses. Any, both past and future, the most profound literary studies will be only indirect evidence of the crime committed. What is needed is direct evidence. It is known that the "Sholokhov archive", where the drafts of F.D. Kryukov, "disappeared" during the evacuation from Veshenskaya in 1942. As if it were about collective farm accounting, and not about the departure of Stalin's favorite to the rear. Why was the manuscript "searched" for so long in Soviet times, and even 15 years after it? And what, Sholokhov himself was indifferent to the fate of his own manuscripts throughout the post-war period? Yes, according to one of his words, the entire power of the party apparatus and the KGB would have been thrown in search of the "great heritage of Soviet literature" ...
Where the archive disappeared is understandable. Stalin liked to keep everyone "on the hook", the best of which, in the case of Sholokhov, were precisely the manuscripts with traces of the crime. Isn't it time to reveal it? To do this, the government of the Russian Federation must create a target commission and a program to investigate another atrocity of the Bolshevik government. And don't let that bother anyone. Compared to what has already been revealed, this is truly a trifle. How can the theft of one great novel overshadow the deaths of millions of innocent people? But this "trifle" is characteristic! It will once again emphasize the deceit and criminality of Bolshevism and return to world literature the name of the brilliant Russian writer and great patriot - Kryukov, who wrote in his last work "The Tatar Flower", explaining the name of the native farm of the main characters of "Quiet Don", truly prophetic words, consonant with and our present time:
“I also think of my native Cossacks as an irresistible Tatar flower, not clinging to the roadside dust and ashes, in the lifeless expanse of the crucified Motherland ... I managed to spend only one day in it, looked at the ruins of the burned and devastated native nest, native graves. In my heart is sadness. And together - an even feeling of calm conviction that the stages determined by fate cannot be bypassed on foot, nor by a horse. I look at an old chicken destroyed by a shell, at the charred ruins - it's insulting, bitter. But there is no despair! We will go through the crucible of cruel science, we will be smarter, more allied, and, perhaps, we will arrange life better.
In order for life to become truly better, it is necessary, among other things, to return to Russian literature and on the cover of the academic edition of the novel the name of its great and true author - F.D. Kryukov. An attempt should be made to reconstruct the original text of The Quiet Flows the Don, providing it with the most detailed comments and, who knows, perhaps adding the missing passages if they were miraculously preserved in the archive. Why not? After all, as you know, "manuscripts do not burn." The name of Sholokhov, as well as the names of all the people who “helped” him and justify his actions, should take their proper place in history, next to Herostratus.
This article was written in 2005 for Sholokhov's "centenary". Then, indeed, nothing from the works of Kryukov was published, except for one mentioned book (1993). To today The publishing house AIRO XXI Century (Association of Researchers of Russian Society), headed by Andrey Glebovich Makarov, the author of the study "Tatar Flower", published seven books by Kryukov, grouped by topic. All of them can be viewed on the publisher's website. In addition, in 2010 they also published the book “Mysteries and Secrets of the Quiet Don: Twelve Years of Searches and Finds”. In particular, modern researchers have established about 1000 incorrect readings of the letter "yat" in the "manuscript", that is, the scribe sometimes even changed the meaning of the words. But officially nothing has changed in this matter so far. Vice versa.
In November 2006, a serial film by S.F. was shown on the first channel of the central television. Bondarchuk's "Quiet Flows the Don", in which both the historical events and the Soviet "canonical" text of the novel itself were terribly distorted. In general, a rollback to the "experience" of the Soviet period in many areas of life has recently become fashionable, ranging from cinematography to public administration. The children and grandchildren of Sholokhov, Molotov, Khrushchev and other figures of the Soviet era, who, according to all the concepts of Russian legality and international law, are criminals against humanity, constantly appear on television, since the blood of millions of people is on their conscience. It was they who signed the execution lists, calling for "strengthening the fight against the enemies of the people", thereby becoming accomplices in Stalin's crimes, and the "mouthpiece of the party" M. Sholokhov justified them on the radio and at party congresses.
As soon as someone dares to touch on these "sensitive" questions for the relatives of the Soviet leaders and their apologists, shouts are immediately heard: “Do not touch the dead! Why stir up the past! Our fathers and grandfathers did a lot of useful things!”. What can be answered? Only the following: even the life of one of the most notorious criminals of the twentieth century, Chikatilo, is not a continuous string of atrocities. He was a member of the CPSU, was considered a good family man, benefited society by working in the system of vocational technical education. But according to more than fifty episodes presented to him by the investigation, he was recognized as a monster. This is also the case with the figures of the Soviet era listed above. They are criminals and there is no excuse for them, despite a number of useful deeds that they have done. Episodes to charge them with crimes will be typed not 50, but ten times more. Their children and grandchildren need to sit quietly and try to atone for their sins, like the relatives of Nazi criminals now living in Germany.
Why is it impossible to talk about this directly, but to pour mud on the screen of the Don generals, highly educated and cultured people who did not spare their lives in the fight against the very Sholokhov, Molotov, Stalin, Trotsky and similar bandits who betrayed the Motherland and took part in its death and looting, maybe? As if the heroes of Russia and the Don have no relatives, and just people who respect their lives and deeds?
One of Sholokhov's defenders writes: "When the bones of the dead are washed, this is not Christian ... And what difference does it make who wrote the great work of Russian literature?" But, firstly, history as a science is only concerned with studying the past, and history cannot be without evaluation. We consider Sholokhov and his "creativity" from the point of view of the historical possibility of writing a great novel by him, and we come to the conclusion that the probability of such writing is close to zero, while for Kryukov it is more than possible.
If we discussed with whom Sholokhov drank and whether he lost state funds in cards or not, then this would be “washing the bones”, in this case it is the restoration of historical truth and justice. It turns out for his similar defenders that it is possible to steal a novel, to create a false myth - it is possible, but to expose a thief and a myth - they cannot: an attempt on "shrines", almost desecration of the religious feelings of believers! Secondly, the application of Christian morality to the Bolsheviks, in whose ranks Sholokhov was active, who exterminated believers by the millions, blew up churches, destroyed more than 90% of the pre-revolutionary priesthood and 70% of the Cossacks, is not only inappropriate, but also blasphemous in relation to their victims. And this blasphemy, unfortunately, continues, multiplying evil in our land...
Dmitry Mikhailovich Kalikhman, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Saratov.
Monument to Sholokhov on Gogolevsky Boulevard, erected on May 24, 2007 opposite the Russian Cultural Foundation. The author is sculptor Alexander Rukavishnikov.
Discussion: 19 comments
When will the anti-Soviet slanderers calm down???
In Sholokhov's manuscripts, generally written according to modern rules, there are traces of the old spelling: "sled", "grandfather", "sergeant", "army". Critics explain this by the fact that the original manuscript of the original author, which Sholokhov used, was made according to the old spelling. There are cases of erroneous reading of words written according to the old spelling, for example, the word “gray” (“gray”, the 2nd letter - “ѣ”, “yat”) turned into “raw” (“ѣ” is taken for “s”) .
When will the falsifier-advisers calm down and repent of their blasphemy?
well, it was in the Bolshevik customs ... in Kazakhstan there is a similar story. , and those who led the union.
knew, but...
The author of the article Kalikhman (surname is annoying) Although the article is not bad, it is quite convincing. But such expressions as "Stalin's crimes" and so on indicate that these are the words of either a narrow-minded person, or he is just an ordinary Kalikhman. Then no wonder. And I do not believe in "Kalikhmans" in anything and never. And I encourage others to do the same. Stalin for them is a litmus test.
From my point of view, the attitude towards Stalin is precisely a litmus test for determining morality and spiritual health man on the one hand, and Satanism and masochism on the other. To separate loyalty to historical Russia - from longing for the Soviet God-fighting paradise with sausage for 2.20 on a foundation of human bones.
As for the author's surname, such of his fellow tribesmen (according to the nationality of his ancestors), as generals Rennenkampf, Wrangel, Keller, Kappel, Dieterichs and many others, showed precisely Russian Orthodox morality in Russian history in its defense against the legion of Voroshilovs, Dybenok and Budyonny, led by Trotskys and Schiffs. Whoever is not able to understand this has no right to call himself Russian.
I completely agree with the MVN that "the attitude towards Stalin is precisely a litmus test for determining the morality and spiritual health of a person" ... But let's try to figure out who hates Stalin today? I think MVN and Felix will agree that these are Jews, thieves, swindlers, prostitutes, various sexual perverts (there are many of them, therefore I won’t list them), weak individuals zombified by the TV box and other media, and other people for whom evangelical values are unacceptable - "blind eyes or stand across the throat. They are also cowardly publishers who do not dare to call a spade a spade. It is safe to scold the communists and Stalin, but to identify the true culprits is fraught. Question to the MVN - to which of the listed "species-humans" do you consider yourself ??? Or who else, besides those listed, hates Stalin and Soviet power???
Your Majesty. I didn't invite you here. Since you have already come to visit me with your demands, first determine for yourself the reasons for your love for the god-fighting sadist and hatred for historical Russia, destroyed by your Judeo-Bolsheviks: Are you a Satanist or a masochist? And why I, along with millions of victims of the anti-Russian system and fighters against it, hate both Satanism and masochism - you cannot understand by definition, due to the lack of the soul property necessary for this. Thank you for using litmus paper.
Gentlemen are good. do not raise the provocative question of the authorship of The Quiet Flows the Don. Nothing can detract from the glory of the journalist and publicist Kryukov. And that dispute is a well-known provocation and strife.
Vladimir is right: either Kryukov stole something, or someone stole something from him - what difference does it make if the author's surname is "annoying", and Stalin sacredly observed the "evangelical commandments" and prostitutes hated him. A fruitful discussion turned out to be "the main issue of Russian literature of the twentieth century," according to Solzhenitsyn. However, this is still that provocative anti-Soviet and accomplice of the CIA, it was he who inflated everything instead of writing "Virgin Soil Upturned" about the successes of socialism. By the way, for some reason everyone forgot about this masterpiece ...
Mr. good MVN, you absolutely unreasonably attributed to me qualities and inclinations that I do not possess, so let me explain where I disagree with you. First of all, I inform you that I have long decided on the reasons for my love, respect and admiration for I.V. Stalin. The basis for this is greatest achievements, accomplishments and deeds. I will not enumerate them, adequate people know them and not only in our country. Stalin is the greatest statesman and politician. In the twentieth century, there is no one to put next to him, and this is recognized by the greatest minds of mankind. Stalin was never a God-fighting sadist, on the contrary, we owe him the preservation of Orthodoxy, under him Kirill Gundyaev would not have gone to kiss the Pope. I didn't and don't have any hatred for historical Russia. I love and am proud of my ancestors who fought and died for historical Russia many centuries. My Judeo-Bolsheviks have never been and never will be. I am not a satanist or a masochist. I am a Russian Orthodox person. That's how I was and still is. I really do not understand what property of the soul I am missing? But do I have a soul? I would appreciate a more detailed explanation. Thank you.
First of all, you do not have a sense of sin (associated with the presence of a conscience). Particularly the sin of murder. The murders of millions of Russian people, how are you trying to justify some of Stalin's "greatest achievements, accomplishments and deeds", as if without the destruction of 66 million people (irrefutable statistics:) achievements would be impossible. If you yourself would like to serve as human fertilizer for these accomplishments, you are a masochist.
Further. You have no national self-consciousness and you are a traitor to your ancestors, "who fought and died for historical Russia for many centuries," but which the Jewish Bolsheviks and Stalin in their leadership destroyed in the service of Satan. They destroyed the Orthodox statehood of the Third Rome, which held back the evil of the world. If you justify this satanic revolution, you are a satanist.
You are in no way a "Russian Orthodox person", because you think that we are not to the New Martyrs (victims of Lenin-Stalin) and not to God, but to the apostate and theomachist "Stalin owe the preservation of Orthodoxy." That is, through the godless five-year plan, the decree on which he personally signed:
Please don't continue this discussion here. We agree that we have directly opposite ideas about Russia and Orthodoxy, that is, directly opposite FAITH. And we will remain each with his own, and each will receive from the Lord according to his faith.
Despite the absurdity of your arguments and women's logic, I accept your proposal not to continue the discussion. Let's not throw pearls before pigs. Let's each have our own opinion.
The novel is good, somewhat tedious at the end. Stylistically, it is close to Virgin Soil Upturned, but artistically it is much stronger. "A manuscript that doesn't exist..." is very romantic, just a "book of veles"! Perhaps some fans of The Quiet Flows the Don fell in love with this book so much that they even decided to find a worthy author for it instead of the party Sholokhov?
All the meanness and villainy, and in fact the satanism of the Judeo-Bolshevism lies in the fact that they tried to show their filthy and vile satanic power as the highest stage in the thousand-year history of Orthodox Russia and its great culture. And it is precisely in this that the villainy and meanness of Sholokhov, who, having stolen the great work of a genuine Cossack and white warrior Kryukov, used it to justify Bolshevism.
I am far from knowledge of history, but I am deeply convinced that Sholokhov is not the author of The Quiet Flows the Don
Let me doubt the date of Fedor Dmitrievich's death. The evacuation from Novorossiysk described in "The Quiet Don" was written by Kryukov, and it was in mid-March 1920.
"- Well, the English guns are barking sharply! But in vain they are bitching the Reds. There is no benefit from their shooting, there is a lot of noise ...
- Let them be bitchy! We don't care at the moment. - Smiling, Gregory touched his horse, rode down the street.
To meet him from around the corner, plaiting in a frenzied bait, flew out six cavalry with drawn blades. At the front rider on his chest, a kumak bow was bleeding like a wound.
Here is, perhaps, the last author's fragment. Truly Kryukovsky, with biblical parallels: horsemen of the apocalypse and the outcome.
Fyodor Kryukov is a Cossack writer undeservedly forgotten in Soviet times, who left behind 4 volumes of stories dedicated to the history and life of the Don Cossacks. A number of modern researchers believe that it was Fyodor Dmitrievich who wrote The Quiet Flows the Don, and Sholokhov either stole his manuscripts or was appointed the author "from above". And this version is not unfounded.
Singer of the Quiet Don
In pre-revolutionary Russia, Fedor Dmitrievich was a fairly well-known person, and after the Bolsheviks came to power, his personality and work began to be forgotten. Kryukov was born in the Ust-Medveditsky district in the large village of Glazunovskaya. The father of the future writer was an ataman, and his mother was a well-born Cossack noblewoman.
He was a member of the Populist Socialist Party, worked as the head of the department of literature and art in the popular scientific journal Russian Wealth. He taught history and Russian literature at the gymnasium. He spent three months in prison for political activities. During the fight against communism, he was a prominent figure in the Military Circle, an ideologist of resistance to the Bolsheviks on the Don. During the retreat of the white forces in March 1920, he died of typhus, according to another version, he was executed.
Fedor Dmitrievich wrote many stories and essays on the history and life of the Don Cossacks. According to friends, last years wrote a novel, the manuscripts of which disappeared after his death. It is Kryukov who is credited with the authorship, if not all, then the first 4 volumes of the epic novel Quiet Flows the Don. The version was first expressed by Solzhenitsyn and the Soviet literary critic Medvedeva-Tomashevskaya.
In Kryukov’s Don stories and in The Quiet Don, there are common comparisons: “a watermelon is like a shorn head”, “outlandish clouds” next to a “thoughtful chicken”, “white burdock of a headdress”, “a jagged back of clouds”, “a face like a boot top ". It is doubtful that such coincidences are accidental, especially "the honey smell of pumpkin flowers from the garden."
field bag
At the 18th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks in 1939, the already well-known writer, but not yet the Nobel laureate Mikhail Sholokhov, speaking to the delegates, said strange words: “In the units of the Red Army ... we will beat the enemy ... And I dare to assure you, comrade delegates of the congress, that We will not leave field bags... We will collect other people's bags... Because in our literary economy the contents of these bags will later come in handy. Having defeated the enemies, we will still write books about how we beat these enemies.
Researchers believe that Kryukov kept his work in a field bag. After the death of the writer, they ended up with Pyotr Gromoslavsky, who later became the father-in-law of Mikhail Sholokhov. Subsequently, the Sholokhovs stated that they were unfamiliar with Kryukov, but this is not true.
Fedor Dmitrievich studied at the gymnasium, where his classmate, which is an important detail, was Pyotr Gromoslavsky. The future well-known Soviet writer Serafimovich also received his education there, who, perhaps, helped Sholokhov to remake the text and fill it with elements of the Cossack dialect.
Also in the English archives there is a photo taken in 1919 in the Ust-Medveditskaya village. The photo surfaced in 2016 showing British officers and leaders of the Cossack uprising against the Bolsheviks. Next to the sitting Kryukov is his friend Alexander Golubintsev and none other than Pyotr Gromoslavsky. Surprisingly, in the photo, Kryukov is holding a leather hiking bag in his hands.
Sholokhov's draft
Researchers who accuse Sholokhov of plagiarism give many arguments. Inconsistencies in dating, historical errors, early age author, lack of education and much more. However, their main argument is the writer's working drafts. Upon closer examination of the sheets with the text, it turned out that this was not a draft, but rather a census.
In 1929, for the commission on plagiarism, Sholokhov urgently needed to prepare a manuscript. He presented it, but written in three different handwritings (the writer himself, his wife Maria and her sister). Kryukov wrote his novel according to the old spelling, and in Sholokhov's draft there are traces of work on the removal of letter rudiments.
There are many turns in the text, which could only arise when rewriting the text with an incomprehensible handwriting. The commission found no plagiarism and recognized Sholokhov as the author. In Pravda it was printed that those who doubted the authenticity of the novel were slanderers and enemies of Bolshevism.
proletarian writer
Sholokhov was suspected of plagiarism back in Soviet times. Professor Dmitry Likhachev, writers Iosif Gerasimov, Alexei Tolstoy and many others did not believe in his authorship. Professor Alexander Logvinovich Ilsky, who works at Roman-gazeta, which was the first to publish Quiet Don, also expressed his attitude towards the problem of the authorship of the great novel.
He left the following recollection: "Not only I, but everyone in our editorial office knew that Sholokhov never wrote the first four parts of the novel The Quiet Flows the Don." According to Ilsky, when there was talk of plagiarism in the literary environment, the entire team was brought together by the editor-in-chief Anna Grudskaya and said that the issue with Quiet Don was decided “at the top” and the question should not be asked.
The party and the new Soviet government needed a novel no worse than War and Peace and a talent on the level of Leo Tolstoy. However, this person must come from the people. This is how the young writer Sholokhov appeared, who wrote a great epic, and for this he did not need a noble origin, education and life experience.
FROM Today's readers hardly know the writer Fyodor Kryukov. Neither in the Soviet encyclopedic dictionary, we will not find even a mention of it in the Encyclopedic Literary Dictionary. True, now this undeservedly forgotten name has begun to be remembered, but mainly in connection with the so-called problem of the authorship of The Quiet Flows the Don. As you know, some researchers have put forward a version that the novel about the turning points in the fate of the Don Cossacks was written or, in any case, started by F. D. Kryukov. At the same time, M. A. Sholokhov is assigned, at best, the role of a co-author of an outstanding work of the 20th century. We will not now touch on this version, which has both its supporters and its opponents. However, the controversy surrounding the authorship of The Quiet Flows the Don revealed the undoubted fact that Sholokhov's biography has not been sufficiently studied and that information about the life and work of F. D. Kryukov is even poorer. Only recently the works of foreign authors have appeared in our press, from which you can learn some details of his biography. (Yermolaev G. (USA). About the book by R. A. Medvedev “Who wrote “Quiet Flows the Don”?” “Questions of Literature”, 1989, No. 8. Hietso G., Gustavsson S., Beckman B., Gil S. “Who wrote “Quiet Flows the Don”?” M., “Book”, 1989.)
Fedor Kryukov was born in 1870 in the family of the chieftain of the village of Glazunovskaya, Ust-Medveditsky district, and grew up in a typical Cossack atmosphere. He received a historical and philological education, traveled a lot around the Don region, studied its history and economy; in 1906 he was elected to the First State Duma, where he defended the interests of the Cossacks. Since the beginning of the 900s, Fedor Kryukov has been constantly published in the journal Russkoye Bogatstvo (since 1914, Russkiye Zapiski), one of the official publishers of which was V. G. Korolenko. The works of G. I. Uspensky, I. A. Bunin, A. I. Kuprin, V. V. Veresaev, D. N. Mamin-Sibiryak, K. M. Stanyukovich and other writers known for their democratic views were published here.
Stories, novels, essays by Fyodor Kryukov “In Cell 380”, “Half an Hour”, “On the Lazoreva River”, “Officer”, “In the Deep Rear” and others opened to the general reader the unfamiliar life of the Cossack class: its history, traditions, way of life . In 1907, Kryukov separately published Cossack Motifs. Essays and stories", in 1910 "Stories". His works went far beyond the framework of historical and ethnographic research, they felt a writer rooting for the fate of his people.
In the late autumn of 1914 the First World War was already underway Kryukov left the Don region to go to the Turkish front (although in his youth he was exempted from military service due to myopia). After a long journey, he joined the 3rd hospital of the State Duma in the Kars region, in the winter of 1916 he was in Galicia with the same hospital. Kryukov reflected his impressions of this period of his life in the front-line notes "Group B" ("Silhouettes").
Then the writer lived in Petrograd, witnessed the February Revolution.
In 19181919, Kryukov was secretary of the Military Circle (parliament of the Don Cossacks) and at the same time editor of the Novocherkassk newspaper Donskie Vedomosti. During these years he actively opposed the Bolsheviks. When the village of Veshenskaya became the center of the Upper Don uprising in the spring of 1919, Kryukov was among those who urged the rebels to hold out to the end. And in September 1919, when the front approached the village of Glazunovskaya, he joined the ranks of the Ust-Medveditskaya White Cossack unit; about a month later, returning from the front to Novocherkassk, he took part in meetings of the Military Circle. Before the capture of Novocherkassk by the Bolsheviks, Kryukov left with the retreating White Cossack units. On February 20 (March 4, according to a new style), 1920, Fedor Dmitrievich died of typhus or pleurisy in the village of Novokorsunskaya (or near it) in the Kuban.
Even from this dotted biographical information, it becomes clear why the writer's work was hushed up by official Soviet literary criticism.
But let's go back a little to Fedor Kryukov's collaboration in the Russian Wealth magazine. In several issues for 1913, the chapters "Fun" and "Service" were published in it, which are included in the large essay by F. D. Kryukov "In the Depths" (the writer published it under the pseudonym I. Gordeev). In addition to these chapters, which we bring to the attention of readers, the essay includes four more: "Deceived expectations", "Rebellion", "New", "Intelligentsia". In general, this work draws a broad panorama of the life of the Don Cossacks; an acutely observant writer, Kryukov notices the specific features of the Cossack temper, the details of everyday life, the peculiarities of the colorful dialect of his heroes, the attitude to military service, the curious and sad phenomena of their life.
Today, the work of Fedor Dmitrievich Kryukov attracts more and more attention. And above all, he is interested in the descendants of his heroes. The recently established Cossack community in Moscow plans to hold Kryukov readings, speed up the publication of all his works, including unpublished ones, in order to return the name of the original Don writer Fyodor Kryukov to Russian literature.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the staff of the Department of Manuscripts of the V. I. Lenin State Library of the USSR for their assistance to me and the editorial staff of the Vokrug Sveta magazine in preparing this publication.
Pyotr Likholitov, student of the Faculty of Journalism of Moscow State University, member of the Cossack community
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