Taras Grigoryevich SHEVCHENKO (1814-1861)
The outstanding Little Russian (Ukrainian) poet and artist T. G. Shevchenko was born on February 25 (March 9), 1814 in the village of Morintsy, Zvenigorod district, Kiev province (now - Cherkasy region) in the family of a serf peasant landowner P. V. Engelhardt.
Two years later, Taras ' parents moved to the village of Kirillovka, where he spent his childhood.
Taras ' mother died in 1823, in the same year his father remarried to a widow who had three children.
In 1825, when Shevchenko was in his 12th year, his father also died.
From this time, the hard, nomadic life of a street child begins, first with the teacher of the sexton, then with the neighboring painters.
At the school of the sexton Shevchenko learned to read and write, and he got acquainted with elementary drawing techniques from painters.
In 1828, he got into the service of the landowner Engelhardt in the village of Vilshana, first as a cook, and then as a Cossack.
A year later, Taras served in the landowner's house in Vilna, and with his move to the capital in early 1831 - in St. Petersburg.
Having discovered the boy's ability to draw, Engelhardt decided to make a home painter out of him and sent him in 1832 to study with the "various pictorial affairs of the guild master" V. Shiryaev.
During the holidays, the young man visited the Hermitage, drew statues in the Summer Garden, where in 1836 he met a fellow countryman - the Ukrainian artist I. M. Soshenko, who, after consulting with the Ukrainian writer Grebenka, introduced Taras to the conference secretary of the Academy of Arts V. Grigorovich, artists Venetsianov and K. Bryullov, the poet V.Zhukovsky.
These acquaintances were of great importance in the life of Shevchenko, especially in the matter of his release from captivity.
The first attempt to persuade Engelhardt to release Shevchenko in the name of humanity was unsuccessful.
Bryullov went to negotiate with the landowner, but he only took out from him the conviction "that this is the largest pig in Torzhkov shoes" and asked Soshenko to visit this "amphibian" and negotiate the price of the ransom.
Soshenko entrusted this delicate matter to Professor Venetsianov as a more authoritative person.
Taras Shevchenko was pleased and comforted by the care of enlightened representatives of Russian art and literature about him; but at times he was depressed, even despair.
Having learned that his case had stumbled upon the stubbornness of the landowner, Shevchenko once came to Soshenko in terrible agitation.
Cursing his bitter fate, he threatened to repay Engelhardt and went home in this mood.
Soshenko was very worried about his fellow countryman and was waiting for a big trouble.
Then, "having previously agreed with my landowner," Shevchenko wrote in his autobiography, " Zhukovsky asked Bryullov to paint a portrait of him, in order to draw it in a private lottery.
The great Bryullov immediately agreed, and his portrait was ready.
Zhukovsky, with the help of Count Vielgorsky, arranged a lottery of 2500 rubles, and this price was bought by my freedom on April 22, 1838."
As a sign of special respect and deep gratitude to Zhukovsky, Shevchenko dedicated one of his largest works to him: "Katerina".
In the same year, Taras Shevchenko entered the Academy of Fine Arts, where he became a student and comrade of K. P. Bryullov.
The years 1840-1847 were the best in Shevchenko's life.
During this period, his poetic talent flourished.
In 1840, the first Ukrainian collection of Shevchenko's poems was published in St. Petersburg under the title "Kobzar", a small collection that began a new era in the history of Ukrainian literature.
In 1842, "Gaydamaki" was published - his largest work.
Other significant works of this period are the poems "Katerina" (1838), "Blind" (1842), "Untalented" (1844), "Naimichka" (1845), the drama "Nazar Stodolya" (1843).
The political poems "The Dream" (1844), "The Caucasus" (1845) are imbued with a revolutionary spirit, they denounce the autocracy.
The political testament to the people - the poem "How I will die...." ("Testament", 1845) - openly expresses a call for the overthrow of the autocracy.
In May 1843, Shevchenko left for Ukraine, where he spent about a year.
He returned to St. Petersburg in February 1844.
After graduating from the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts in the spring of 1845 and receiving the title of "non class (free) artist", he returned to Ukraine, intending to settle in Kiev.
At that time, Shevchenko worked as an artist in the Kiev Archaeological Commission, traveled a lot in Ukraine.
Impressions from trips to the Kiev, Poltava, Chernihiv provinces, from the difficult situation of the peasants, strengthened Shevchenko's revolutionary aspirations.
During his trips, he wrote anti serf poems, putting them in an album ("Three years"), read them to friends, gave them to rewrite.
St. Petersburg critics and even Belinsky did not understand and condemned Little Russian literature in general, Shevchenko in particular, seeing in his poetry a narrow provincialism; but Little Russia quickly appreciated him.
This was expressed in the poet's warm receptions during his trip in 1845-1847.
"I'm not going to be a peasant poet," he wrote about the reviews of critics, " if only a poet;
I donot need anyone else."
In 1846, Shevchenko joined the secret Cyril and Methodius Society, founded at the end of 1845 by teachers and students of Kiev University, consisting of young people interested in the development of Slavic nationalities, in particular Ukrainian.
In April 1847, on the denunciation of the provocateur, the society was discovered by the police.
Its participants, 10 people, were arrested, accused of forming a political society and were punished, and most of all Shevchenko got for his illegal poems.
For the fact that, as it is said in the sentence, "he composed poems in the Little Russian language, of the most outrageous content," he was exiled as a private to the Orenburg Region.
Approving the sentence of exile and "the strictest supervision, so that outrageous works could not come out of him, under any circumstances," Nicholas I added on his own: "under the strictest supervision with a prohibition to write and draw."
At the same time, Shevchenko's first serious problems with alcoholism also belong to this time.
Even then, Taras Grigoryevich's binge drinking was so well known that during the inquiry into the case of the Cyril and Methodius Society, one of its members, V. Belozersky, justified his colleague in this way: "Shevchenko wrote his poems in a state of intoxication, without having any daring plans, and in a natural state he did not sympathize with what he wrote under the influence of a sad mood."
The Orsk fortress, where Shevchenko got, was a deserted backwater.
"It is rare," he wrote, "to find such a characterless area"...
"All my previous sufferings," he writes in a letter of 1847, " were childish tears in comparison with the real ones.
It's bitter, unbearably bitter."
Not knowing Gogol personally, Shevchenko decided to write to him "by right of the Little Russian virsheplet". "
I am now, like a person falling into the abyss, ready to grasp everything - hopelessness is terrible!
it is so terrible that only Christian philosophy can fight it."
However, judging by Shevchenko's diaries, his life in exile was not so difficult. "
Today, like yesterday, I came to the garden early, lay under the willow for a long time, listened to the oriole and finally fell asleep.
The dream had a wonderful influence on me throughout the whole day...", - this is how Shevchenko describes the next day of his service.
- Further, an outstanding Ukrainian poet, persecuted by the tsarist autocracy, wrote: "There is not the slightest desire for work.
I sit or lie in silence for whole days under my beloved willow, and at least something stirred in my imagination for a laugh.
Still absolutely nothing."
Shevchenko writes a letter to Zhukovsky asking him to apply for only one favor - the right to draw.
In this sense, Count Gudovich and Count A. Tolstoy were busy for Taras, but it was impossible to help him.
Shevchenko also appealed to the head of the III department, General Dubbelt, wrote that his brush had never sinned and would not sin in the political sense, but nothing helped; the prohibition to draw was not lifted until the very liberation.
Some consolation was given to him by participating in an expedition to study the Aral Sea in 1848 and 1849.
Thanks to the humane attitude of the exiled General V. A. Obruchev (1793-1866) and especially Lieutenant Butakov, Shevchenko was allowed to draw views of the Aral coast and local folk types.
He created 350 watercolor landscapes and portraits, captured scenes of the life of the Kazakh people, soldiers ' life.
But this leniency soon became known in St. Petersburg; according to the denunciation of one of the officers, Obruchev and Butakov were reprimanded, and in 1850 Shevchenko was exiled to a new deserted slum, the Novopetrovskoye fortification on the island.
Mangyshlake, with the repetition of the prohibition to draw.
The first three years of his stay in the" smerdyachy barracks " were very painful; then there were various relieves, thanks mainly to the kindness of Commandant Uskov and his wife, who fell in love with Shevchenko for his gentle nature and affection for their children.
Unable to draw, he was engaged in modeling, tried to do photography, which, however, was very expensive at that time.
Shevchenko's release took place in 1857, under an amnesty, thanks to the persistent petitions of Count F. P. Tolstoy and his wife Countess A. I. Tolstoy for him.
Shevchenko stayed in Novopetrovsky from October 17, 1850 to August 2, 1857, i.e. before his release, after the death of Nicholas I.
Shevchenko's return from exile was long and difficult.
On the way, to Nizh.
In Novgorod, he was detained, he was banned from entering both capitals.
However, his friends obtained permission for him to live in St. Petersburg, where he arrived in the spring of 1858.
Here he became close to the circle of authors of Sovremennik, got together with N. G. Chernyshevsky, N. A. Dobrolyubov, N. A. Nekrasov, M. L. Mikhailov, the Kurochkin brothers, A. N. Ostrovsky, etc.
His satire took on even sharper and angrier notes.
The "Third Department" again established strict supervision over the poet.
Shevchenko stayed in exile for 10 years, from June 1847 to August 1857, but it did not break his will and revolutionary beliefs.
The poems and poems of the "slave muse" (as the poet called his works created in exile and carefully hidden during searches) are marked by an increase in revolutionary sentiments: in the cycle of poems "Tsars" (1848), a guilty verdict against tyrants and a call for reprisals against them sounds.
During the years of exile, realistic stories were written in Russian: "The Princess" (1853), " The Musician "(1854-1855)," The Unfortunate"," The Captain"," The Twins "(all - 1855)," The Artist " (1856); all of them are imbued with anti serf sentiments and contain many autobiographical details.
But the difficult years of exile, due to ingrained alcoholism, led to a rapid weakening of health and talent.
Attempts to arrange a family hearth (actress Riunova, peasant women Harita and Lukerya) were not successful, he remained lonely until the end of his days.
After spending a short time in St. Petersburg (from March 27, 1858 to July 1859), Shevchenko again goes to his homeland.
Then he had the idea to buy a manor house over the Dnieper.
A beautiful place was chosen near Kanev, on Chernechya Mountain.
Shevchenko worked hard to acquire it, but he did not have to settle here.
Once he was reading his poems in an unfamiliar drunken company, the local mayor immediately filed a report to the governor, Prince Dolgorukov, that "Academician Shevchenko" was agitating the people against the authorities.
He was arrested again, ordered to leave Ukraine and return to St. Petersburg under the supervision of the III Department.
Distracted by numerous literary and artistic acquaintances, Shevchenko in recent years wrote little and drew little.
Almost all of his time, free from dinner parties and evenings, Shevchenko gave to engraving, which he then became very interested in.
In the same year, 1860, he received the title of Academician in engraving on copper.
At the beginning of 1861, the poet met with a seriously ill person (liver, heart disorder, dropsy), he had rheumatism, but the poet hoped for a cure until the end.
In his letters to his second cousin Bartholomew in Ukraine, he wrote that he would wait for spring, come to Ukraine and be sure to recover there.
Before his death, as if there was relief, early in the morning on March 10, 1861, Taras Shevchenko got out of bed, asked for help to get dressed and go to the workshop.
He started to go down the stairs and fell.
The servant assigned to the academician of the Imperial Academy of Arts heard his last will: "Before Kanev..." - and the poet's heart stopped.
Shevchenko died in St. Petersburg on his birthday, February 26 (March 10), 1861.
But his body was not immediately transported to Kanev.
Despite the fact that Taras Shevchenko served the prescribed 10 years of exile, he was never rehabilitated and continued to be considered a political criminal, who was being monitored.
Therefore, the official permission of the authorities was required for the burial of the unreliable Shevchenko in Ukraine.
Friends decided to bury him in St. Petersburg, and after obtaining permission to determine a permanent burial place.
Already on the day of Taras Shevchenko's death in St. Petersburg, his friends, members of the Ukrainian community, the artist G. Chastakhivsky, the brothers writers Mikhail and Alexander Lazarevsky decided that they should at all costs fulfill the last will of the poet and bury him in Ukraine.
Shevchenko asked about this in "Zapoviti" and more than once told Chastakhivsky about the Kanevskaya Chernech Mountain, on which he dreamed of putting a hut for himself.
Taras Shevchenko was buried at the Smolensk Orthodox Cemetery, near the cathedral.
Dostoevsky, Leskov, Saltykov Shchedrin, Turgenev, Nekrasov, representatives of the Ukrainian, Polish and Greek communities of Petya came to the funeral service rburg.
Only relatives from Ukraine did not come - brothers Joseph, Mikita and sister Yaryna did not have the means to travel.
Academician Shevchenko was lying in an expensive wooden coffin corresponding to his rank, which was placed in a metal box before burial, so that the earth would not damage either the body or the tree, because eventually Shevchenko's ashes would have to be returned to Ukraine.
Herzen placed a heartfelt obituary in the "Bell".
Shevchenko's death was perceived in Russia as a great loss for literature and the liberation movement.
The funeral procession reached Kanev for almost two weeks.
Shevchenko's body was no longer in two, but in three coffins.
Before the road, a metal coffin was placed in a wooden one, so that the procession had a decent appearance.
Therefore, people were surprised that it was so hard for them to carry a seemingly small man.
In Moscow, where the procession arrived by rail, the poet was buried in the church of St. Tikhon - later the Arbatskaya metro station was built in its place.
From there, they went to Ukraine on artillery drogues.
On the Kiev Chain Bridge on May 18, 1861, they stopped and unharnessed the horses.
Instead, the drogs with Shevchenko's coffin were carried by students of the Kiev University to the Church of the Nativity of Christ on Podil.
Here the body of his brother was first seen by Joseph, Mikita and Yaryna Shevchenko.
The Metropolitan of Kiev has forbidden to bury the unreliable poet in Kiev.
In addition, Chastakhivsky, who accompanied the body, insisted on Chernechya Mountain.
The coffin was carried to the pier, installed on the steamer "Kremenchug", and on May 20 the procession left for Kanev.
The Shevchenko brothers wanted to bury Taras at the walls of the Kanevsky Assumption Cathedral, built in 1144.
Chastakhivsky even had to quarrel with his relatives, demanding the fulfillment of Taras ' last will.
There was a flood and flood on the Dnieper, they did not dare to take the coffin from the Assumption Cathedral to Chernechya Mountain by the shortest way - they did not dare to go down the river, the boat could capsize...
Therefore, the coffin with the body of Taras was carried on their hands for 11 versts.
In 1861, the residents of Kanev and the nearest villages were not so educated, and did not know who exactly was being buried.
But the solemnity of Shevchenko's funeral was felt.
The day before, teachers and students of Kiev University, Poltava and Kiev intellectuals, clergy, representatives of Ukrainian St. Petersburg arrived here.
On May 22, Taras was buried like a boy.
In front of his coffin there were girls in bright wreaths and ribbons, embroidered shirts.
The girls were shouting loudly, as if parting with their betrothed.
And just a few days after the funeral, Chernech Mountain began to be called Tarasova.
Even during his lifetime, Shevchenko turned into a mythical figure.
The secrets did not disappear even after his death.
The people did not accept the death of the poet, and the most incredible rumors went around Kiev for a long time.
They said that he did not die, but simply disappeared, fleeing from a new arrest.
They say that the poet's friends buried an empty coffin, and he himself "walked along the svit I pisni warehouse, he did not show up".
For many years, there were rumors that Shevchenko rides a white horse on the outskirts, and people appeared in Kiev every now and then, claiming that they "only yesterday" saw him on the street and even bowed to him from afar.
In 1894, the news spread that the poet had returned to his homeland and visited, with the passport of his friend Vasily Krichman, the villages of Kirillovka, Tarasovka and Zvenigorodka.
As the sister of the famous philologist A. Krymsky wrote from there, " he examined everything very carefully: obviously, he was remembering his homeland, which he had not been to for a long time.
In Zvenigorodka, he visited the investigator several times on the case... he visited Shevchenko and his sister in Kirillovka.
By the way, he said that after his death there will be many new, not yet printed works of his."
For a long time, a dark and mysterious person who pretended to be the brother of the late poet T. Shevchenko also wandered around Ukraine.
It is known that in 1939, when a museum and a new monument on Tarasova's grave were opened in Kanev, Shevchenko's burial was opened.
To prevent the granite pedestal and the bronze figure of Shevchenko from crushing the crypt with the coffin, it was necessary to accurately determine the burial place.
After the funeral, the grave was covered with stones and turf, according to the Cossack custom, giving it a rounded shape.
Over time, the rains eroded the artificial embankment and the mound was leveled arbitrarily.
A special commission, which included representatives of the government, the NKVD and local authorities, decided to find the crypt.
When the commission members went down to the dug up grave, someone gave the idea to open the coffin, although no one had the right to do so.
Opening the first pine coffin, they saw a metal box, and in it a beautiful coffin with a window, on which lay a dried wreath.
Later, the memoirs about her work in the commission were published by an old Bolshevik, the order bearer Tsvintarnaya.
The woman recalled that the members of the commission saw Shevchenko, who was lying "as if alive", and were very scared.
After 78 years since the death of Taras Grigoryevich, they expected to see the remains.
When the air got on the face of the buried person, it instantly began to settle.
The frightened people left in a hurry.
After 1939, it was decided to seal up the entrance to the crypt with a reinforced concrete slab so that no one could enter there.
Even the Germans did not touch the grave during the occupation.
Only the bronze figure of Kobzar was touched by fragments of shells, the traces of which were then carefully restored.
And the marks of the war remained on the granite of the pedestal.
In recent decades, various religious communities have repeatedly appealed to the Shevchenko National Reserve about the canonization of Taras Shevchenko.
It is known that one of its conditions is the incorruptibility of the remains of the deceased.
And if the church commission finds that he did good deeds during his lifetime, a decision is made on canonization.
The Taras Shevchenko Museum and Grave in Kaniv is one of the most revered places for the Ukrainian people.
If I die, then pohovayte
Mene na mogili,
The middle of the wide steppe,
On the last mile,
Shchob lani shirokopoli,
I Dnipro, i kruchi
Bulo can be seen, bulo chuti,
Yak reve revuchy.
…
I am not in the great world,
In sim'y volny, noviy
Donot forget to remember
We are not offended by a quiet word.
1845
