[14]January[2009]
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EDITORIAL OFFICE | ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT
"You tortured me to death, I didnot give up anything..."
*Vyacheslav MALEZHIK
Alexander RODNYANSKY: "There has never been advertising in my films, neither in the "9th company" nor in "Peter FM"
12 moments of the Olympic, leap year... (the most significant events of the past year)
Sergey DOVLATOV: "I was destined to go to hell"
Russian Ukrainian"Gaza strip"
Business news
The stock market will feel a bitter aftertaste until the middle of the year
Rating of semi naked celebrities
"Morphine": Bulgakov according to Balabanov.
Fainting at the premiere
Elvira VIKHAREVA, 20 years old, model of the Academy of Beauty agency
!
FRESH THOUGHT "There will definitely be resources and people who will extract positive results from the crisis.
I compare the current situation with a cold shower.
It scares someone, it helps someone."
Valery Gergiev, artistic director and director of the Mariinsky Theater.
Sergey DOVLATOV: "I was destined to go to hell" Despised during his lifetime and crowned with glory after death, he always wrote about himself and his tragicomic life.
Among the reading public, there is hardly anyone who is unfamiliar with this name.
Having earned a reputation as a dissident, in 1978 he was forced to leave for the United States, where his books soon began to be published.
In the USSR, Dovlatov's prose began to be printed only in 1989.
But the truly deserved fame came to the writer only after his death.
Sergey Dovlatov, according to critics, was perhaps the last cultural hero of the Soviet era.
His texts instantly diverged into sayings and anecdotes, returned to the environment that partly gave rise to them.
In a similar function at other times, only "Twelve Chairs" and "The Master and Margarita"acted.
I am forced to report some details of my biography, otherwise much will remain unclear.
I'll make it short, dotted.
A fat, shy boy...
Poverty...
His mother self critically left the theater and works as a proofreader... "
This is how Sergey Dovlatov himself described his biography.
His mother, Nora Sergeevna Dovlatova, was really an actress at first, his father, Donat Isaakovich Mechik – was a theater director.
The future writer was born in Ufa, where his parents were evacuated during the war.
Then they went back to Leningrad.
There, Sergei Dovlatov's father left the family – to his son's nanny.
They rarely communicated – mostly through notes.
In 1959, the future writer entered the Philological Faculty of the Leningrad Zhdanov University, the department of the Finnish language.
During his studies, he became friends with young Leningrad poets Yevgeny Rein, Anatoly Naiman, and Joseph Brodsky.
However, he had to leave his alma mater after two and a half years of study – he was expelled for poor academic performance.
Here is how Dovlatov himself wrote about it: "I passed the German language exam four times.
And every time he failed.
I didnot know the language at all.
Not a single word.
Except for the names of the leaders of the world proletariat.
And finally, I was kicked out.
I, as usual, hinted that I was suffering for the truth.
Then I was drafted into the army.
And I got into the convoy guard.
Obviously, I was destined to visit hell... "
He had a chance to serve in the security system of correctional labor camps in the north of the Komi ASSR.
According to Brodsky's memoirs, Dovlatov returned from the army "like Tolstoy from the Crimea: with a scroll of stories and a certain dazed look in his eyes."
And immediately entered the Faculty of Journalism of LSU.
At the same time, he worked in the student's multi edition of the Maritime Technical University, wrote short stories.
Scandal after the death of Sergei Dovlatov died in New York of heart failure right in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.
He was 49 years old.
The writer was buried at the Mount Hebron Cemetery.
After some time, a scandal broke out in Dovlatov's homeland.
His widow sued his friend.
The fact is that in 2001, the publishing house "Zakharov" published the book " Sergey Dovlatov Igor Efimov.
An epistolary novel".
The book covers the correspondence between Dovlatov and Efimov from 1979 to 1989 and is both a vivid testimony of the era and a valuable source for all Dovlatov's admirers.
Nevertheless, the widow of the writer Elena Dovlatov, even before the publication, repeatedly stated that under American law she is the owner of the copyright to all letters ever written by Dovlatov, and that she does not consent to their publication.
Together with her daughter Katerina, she managed to prove her rights to correspondence in a Russian court and get a ban on the publication of the book however, only a year later after the entire circulation (15 thousand copies) it was sold out.
The court refused Elena Dovlatova's demand to destroy all the released copies of the book.
The editor of the "New American" In 1972, Dovlatov moved to Tallinn, worked there as a correspondent for the newspapers "Soviet Estonia" and "Evening Tallinn", then as a guide in the Pushkin Reserve near Pskov (Mikhailovskoye).
In 1976, he returned to Leningrad, was accepted into the magazine "Koster".
He wrote prose, but nothing came of numerous attempts to be published in Soviet magazines.
The set of his first book was destroyed by order of the KGB.
Since the late 60s, Dovlatov has been published in Samizdat, and in 1976 some of his stories were published in the West in the magazines "Continent"," Time and We", for which the writer was expelled from the Union of Journalists of the USSR.
In 1978, due to the persecution of the authorities, Dovlatov emigrated to Vienna, and then moved to New York, where he became one of the founders of the Russian language newspaper "New American", from 1980 to 1982 he was its editor in chief.
In America, Dovlatov's prose was recognized, published in American newspapers and magazines.
One after another, his books were published: "The Zone" (1964-1982), "The Invisible Book" (1978), "Solo on Underwood: Notebooks" (1980)," Compromise "(1981)," Reserve "(1983)," Ours " (1983) and others.
During the twelve years of his life in exile, he published 12 books that were published in the United States and Europe, Dovlatov became the second Russian writer after Vladimir Nabokov, who was published in the New Yorker magazine.
In the USSR, he was known only by samizdat and author's program on Radio Liberty.
Five days after the death of Sergei Dovlatov, his book "Reserve" was put into the set in Russia, which became the first significant work of the writer published in his homeland.
The fate of the writer was invented by his wife.
One of the most common myths about Sergei Dovlatov attributes to him don juan tendencies and as many as 200 passions in Leningrad alone.
However, according to people who knew him intimately, Dovlatov was... afraid of women!
And in the life of the writer there were only two passions: he loved one – Asya, and the second – Elena – he owed everything.
He met Asya Pekurovskaya on the filfakovskaya stairs.
Dovlatov loved her madly, but Asya, who soon gave birth to his daughter Masha, preferred the more successful Vasily Aksenov, whose novels were already published in the magazine "Yunost", to the loser Sergei, who was expelled from the university.
When she announced to Dovlatov that she was leaving, he initially threatened suicide.
Seeing that this did not help, he locked himself in a room with his beloved, pointed a gun at her and shouted that he would kill her if she did not stay with him!
But Asya was adamant – and a desperate Dovlatov pulled the trigger…
Fortunately, his hand shook, and the bullet went into the ceiling.
Hearing the shot, his mother burst into the room, and Pekurovskaya managed to escape.
She never came back.
Dovlatov, as he wrote later, noted the departure of his beloved woman with a three day drunkenness.
Only after 18 years, Asya decided to show Dovlatov her daughter, but he treated his child coldly – Masha was too similar to the mother who once abandoned him.
Now Dovlatov's eldest daughter lives in San Francisco and writes slogans for posters, earning for each as much as her father did not receive in his entire life.
They say that he would never have realized himself if not for his second wife, Elena.
Reserved and silent, she had that masculine character that Dovlatov himself lacked so much.
Although he writes that his wife was not at all interested in his prose, it was she who typed the complete collection of his works on a typewriter with her own hands.
One movement of Lenin's eyebrows was enough for Sergei to understand that the story needed to be redone.
It was she, according to family friends, who made all the important decisions in his life.
Despite the fact that once they temporarily separated, Lena continued to live in his apartment with his mother and their daughter Katya.
One day Lena said to Dovlatov: "Here's a poplin shirt for you, and sign on a piece of paper that you donot mind your daughter leaving for America."
And he signed it!
According to some reports, Elena also arranged the emigration.
It all started with a small thing – Sergey went to see Lena and Katya off to the airfield, where he waved his scarf after them for a long time.
Because of the icy wind, his throat immediately ached, and he called the self propelled barge "Altai", where he then worked as a watchman, so that they would take care of him, and he went home.
Without waiting for the doctor, he actively engaged in self medication he drank vodka.
Therefore, the doctor who arrived instead of the hospital stated that Dovlatov was intoxicated.
At this time, on the barge, they were on duty for him and recorded working hours in his name – and this was a natural forgery, for which the authorities subsequently deprived Dovlatov of his job.
Further – more: after his dismissal, he was threatened with being arrested for parasitism, from which he escaped in a very original way.
He bribed a journalist friend for a bottle of vermouth, who was sitting on the first floor and was looking out for the policemen who came for Dovlatov.
As soon as they were announced, the journalist picked up the phone and said two words to Sergei: "The bastards are coming."
At this signal, Dovlatov closed the door on the latch and climbed under the blanket with his head – so he managed to hide for a long time.
However, in addition to the police, the KGB was also hunting for him, where they found out about the publication of Dovlatov's works abroad, which he himself did not even suspect!
They caught him during one of the exits to the store – and in prison, a KGB colonel started a conversation with him from afar: "Sergei Donatovich, do you love your wife?
Your daughter?
You are published abroad, arenot you?
You donot want to leave – we will help you..."
So Dovlatov found himself overseas, where he married his own wife again.
"You keep talking with your tongue, and life passes..."
Fragments from the stories of Sergei Dovlatov.
She began to lie.
I am silent in such cases let them.
Disinterested lies are not lies, they are poetry.
* * * – Are you an alcoholic?
- Yes – - Zhbankov answered clearly – - but in moderation...
* * * – Do you have a car?
– You ask if I have whole socks.
* * * As usual, there was not enough alcohol, and, as always, I foresaw this in advance.
But there were no problems with the snack.
And it couldnot be.
What problems can there be if Sevastyanov managed to cut an ordinary apple into sixty four slices?!.
* * * In journalism, everyone is allowed to do one thing.
In one thing, to violate the principles of socialist morality.
That is, one is allowed to drink.
Another – to bully.
The third is to tell political jokes.
The fourth is to be a Jew.
The fifth – non partisan.
The sixth is to lead an immoral life.
And so on.
But everyone, I repeat, is allowed one thing.
You canot be a Jew and a drunk at the same time.
A bully and a non partisan...
I was perniciously universal.
That is, he allowed himself a little of everything.
* * * Bush was handed a glass of liqueur.
Bush drank willingly and said – " I canot.
I'm on a mission.
* * * – There should be no Otsebyatina.
"You know –" I say, " it's better to have a little shit than a lot of shit.
– How? the woman asked.
- Okay – - I say – - everything will be fine.
* * * Whoever lives in the world of words does not get along with things.
* * * – What does it mean – "got drunk"?
– Potocki objected.
- Yes, I had a drink.
Yes, I am somewhat liberated.
Excited by the company of a beautiful lady.
But I am ideologically sober...
* * * He was drunk, but there was some cunning in this, too...
Sergey Dovlatov and Joseph Brodsky.
Alexandra and Ekaterina Dovlatov.
Ekaterina YEVGLEVSKAYA, Administrator of the Seminar Department of the Progress Center for Scientific and Technical Information (Saint Petersburg):
– I first got acquainted with Dovlatov's works when I was twenty one years old.
My acquaintance with "Solo on Underwood" began.
Immediately after that, I read almost all of his books.
He is a very easy writer, accessible, but at times very deep, and it is this depth that does not allow him to be classified as a publicist.
Although many do it.
I once had a verbal altercation with my friend, a literary critic, who claimed that this was very good, but journalism.
I understand why people think so.
The language in which he writes could probably be corrected in places, but it seems to me that he did not do this consciously.
A friend of mine said that Dovlatov is a writer for people with a technical education who are not interested in cultural life or literature, but just sometimes like to read something – something that comes to hand.
And I also worked with a photographer who personally knew Dovlatov, because he was in close contact with his cousin (the writer told about him in the work "Relatives").
This man, according to the stories of my colleague, was very extraordinary.
Denis KRAVETS, director of the production center "Allies":
– "Donot write with epochs and cataclysms!
Donot write with passions and locomotives!
And you write, you fool, with letters A, B, C... "
This is one of dozens of quotes from Dovlatov that instantly come to mind.
I read Sergey Donatovich's two volume book in a couple of days at the time.
In one rush.
Only Dovlatov can put all the accents sharply with a short succinct phrase, seemingly simple.
No matter how much I reread Dovlatov, I did not stop laughing at the absurdity of the pictures drawn.
In the center – always unhappy, somewhere flawed, not understanding and not recognizing some other people's truths and canons characters…
And the constant feeling is laughter through tears.
There are no purely positive characters – there are no angels.
People are depicted with all their oddities and vices.
That's why they do not seem "cardboard", flat.
Yulia NIKONCHUK, Chief Insurance Specialist of OSAO "Russia":
– We did not pass Dovlatov at school, so I recognized this writer not so long ago.
I had a period of Brodsky's discovery, almost immediately I began to read Dovlatov.
They were friends back in Leningrad.
Dovlatov is probably liked by everyone, because he is understandable.
On the one hand, this is an easy read, on the other many respected writers, writers and sophisticated readers recognize a real master in it.
There is a very strong sense of journalism in the language of his works.
After all, he worked constantly in newspapers and magazines, in New York, even, as far as I know, was the editor in chief.
Mikhail NI, producer:
– You shouldnot ask me about Dovlatov.
Unfortunately, I have read exactly one book from this writer – "The Suitcase".
The book is good, it remained in my memory, but I did not take it especially for my soul.
Accordingly, I know a little about him.
Probably the same thing that everyone knows.
He left the institute, served in the army, then spent a long time trying to find his place in the Country of the Soviets.
In the end, of course, America.
There, which is very pleasing, I did not get lost, did not drink, but on the contrary, I earned recognition with hard work.
And not only among emigrants.
In general, the standard path of the Soviet dissident of the stagnant period.
Only this one, apparently, was smarter and more talented than many others.
So it remained in the people's memory.
I myself perceive all this fashionable blasphemy against the "cursed scoop" very ambiguously.
Here you read, for example, the books of the poet Makarevich, who also loves to scold the scoop with passion.
And for what – it is unclear.
The dude was rummaging around Moscow in bell bottoms and with a hair as tall as a house, in the evenings he chopped tax free loot at underground concerts (and he never got anything for it), and in the afternoon he slept at a "hated" job.
For which, again, he received money.
Sometimes he also drank at Mikhalkov's dacha.
That's really, really, life did not work out.
In this regard, Sergey Dovlatov, I think, looks more honest.
It's a pity that I didnot live long enough.
It would be interesting to know his opinion about today's scoop, about the one in which we live.
How much does he pull on the living embodiment of the dissident dream?
Veronika KLIMOVA, Head of the Public Relations Service of the Vostsibstroy Management Company:
- For me, Sergey Dovlatov is a great writer who managed to express all the advantages and disadvantages of the Russian intellectual of the second half of the XX century, with an abyss of irony and even more self irony, noticing all the absurdity and beauty of the surrounding world.
And in each of his stories there is an endless love even for the funniest little people.
Dovlatov is somewhat akin to Chekhov, only the hero became even more lonely after several decades.
Of all the characters inhabiting the prose of Sergei Dovlatov, I am most interested in the writer himself.
His look, his point of view, his reaction, his endless humor, turning into sad satire.
Perhaps that is why the memories of his friends are imbued with such pain: with his departure, they lost more than others.
Until we stop reading such books as the prose of Sergei Dovlatov, everything is not so hopeless!
The material was prepared by Klara ZAKHAROVA and Galina POZDNYAKOVA.
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