Granin read this strange life. Read online “It’s a Strange Life”

Annotation

There was such a person: Alexander Lyubishchev. A brilliant scientist, biologist, professor, an amazing person who is passionate about so many aspects of life. One might say the Lomonosov of our time.

There was another person: Daniil Granin. A writer who dedicated his works to the works of scientists and strong personalities. So Granin took it, did not spare his time and himself, and wrote a biography of Lyubishchev...

In fact, Lyubishchev was very strange man- a classic brilliant scientist - he denied and questioned everything. There were no authorities for him. This is necessary to move forward, to open new horizons. And the main thing is not to be afraid of mistakes. Even Einstein made mistakes.

But this is not what is remarkable about Lyubishchev, and Granin takes the reader in a different direction.

The hero of this biography was a miser about time: every day, every month, every year, he counted how many hours and minutes he spent on books, science, research, rest, family. While we cannot plan tomorrow, Lyubishchev planned his time a year in advance with an accuracy of 1%. And even personal tragedies could not prevent this.

He didn’t waste a minute just like that, and at the same time there was no need to resort to short sleep schemes, get rid of the joys of life or family relations. It all fit into his schedule. He managed to read a colossal number of books and works, write a lot of articles, reviews, and help other people. Much of what he wrote was never published, but he personally needed it to train himself, his memory and critical mind.

But from evaluating the book, I somehow abruptly switched to evaluating the hero.

The book is more reminiscent of an admiring review from the author and nevertheless remains a biography and is very interesting to read.

Chapter first,

Chapter two,

Chapter three,

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter six,

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter ten

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter fourteen

Chapter last

I wanted to talk about this person in a way that would stick to the facts and would be interesting. It is quite difficult to combine both of these requirements. Facts are interesting when you don't have to stick to them. One could try to find some fresh technique and, using it, build an entertaining plot from the facts. So that there is mystery and struggle and danger. And so that with all this, authenticity is maintained.

It was customary to portray, for example, this man as a united lone fighter against powerful opponents. One against all. Even better - all against one. Injustice immediately attracts sympathy. But in reality it was just one against all. He attacked. He was the first to attack and crush. The meaning of his scientific struggle was quite complex and controversial. It was a real scientific struggle, where no one manages to be completely right. It was possible to attribute a simpler problem to him, to invent it, but then it would have been inconvenient to leave his real name. Then it was necessary to abandon many other surnames. But then no one would have believed me. In addition, I wanted to pay tribute to this man, to show what a person is capable of.

Of course, authenticity got in the way and tied my hands. It's much easier to deal with a fictional hero. He is both flexible and frank - the author knows all his thoughts and intentions, both his past and his future.

I had another task: to introduce into the reader everything useful information, give descriptions - of course, amazing, amazing, but, unfortunately, unsuitable for literary work. They were more likely suitable for a popular science essay. Imagine inserting a description of fencing in the middle of The Three Musketeers. The reader will probably skip these pages. And I had to force the reader to read my information, since this is the most important thing...

I wanted a lot of people to read about it, and that’s essentially why this thing was started.

...It was also quite possible to get hooked on the secret. The promise of a secret, a mystery - it always attracts, especially since this mystery is not invented: I really struggled for a long time with the diaries and archive of my hero, and everything that I learned from there was a discovery for me, a solution to the secret amazing life.

However, to be honest, this secret is not accompanied by adventures, pursuit, and is not associated with intrigue and danger.

The secret is about how to live better. And here, too, you can arouse curiosity by declaring that this thing is a most instructive example the best device life - gives a one-of-a-kind Life System.

“Our System allows you to achieve great success in any field, in any profession!

"The system provides highest achievements with the most ordinary abilities!”

“You do not get an abstract system, but a guaranteed one, proven by many years of experience, accessible, productive...”

“Minimum costs - maximum effect!”

"The best in the world!.."

One could promise the reader to tell about something unknown to him outstanding person XX century. To give a portrait of a moral hero, with such high moral rules that now seem old-fashioned. The life he lived is outwardly the most ordinary, in some ways even unlucky; from the point of view of the average person, he is a typical loser, but in his inner sense he was a harmonious and happy person, and his happiness was of the highest standard. Frankly, I thought that people of this scale had evolved, they were dinosaurs...

Just as in the old days they discovered the earth, just as astronomers discovered the stars, so a writer may be lucky enough to discover a person. There are great discoveries of characters and types: Goncharov discovered Oblomov, Turgenev - Bazarov, Cervantes - Don Quixote.

This was also a discovery, not of a universal type, but as if personal, mine, and not of a type, but rather of an ideal; however, this word did not fit either. Lyubishchev was also not suitable for the ideal...

I sat in a large, uncomfortable audience. The bare bulb harshly illuminated the gray hair and bald heads, the smooth comb-overs of graduate students, the long shaggy hair and fashionable wigs and curly blackness of blacks. Professors, doctors, students, journalists, historians, biologists... Most of all there were mathematicians, because it happened at their faculty - the first meeting in memory of Alexander Alexandrovich Lyubishchev.

I didn't expect so many people to come. And especially for young people. Perhaps they were driven by curiosity. Because they knew little about Lyubishchev. Either a biologist or a mathematician. Amateur? Amateur? Seems like an amateur. But the postal official from Toulouse - the great Fermat - was also an amateur... Lyubishchev - who is he? Either a vitalist, or a positivist or an idealist, in any case, a heretic.

And the speakers did not clarify either. Some considered him a biologist, others - a historian of science, others - an entomologist, others - a philosopher...

Each speaker had a new Lyubishchev. Everyone had their own interpretation, their own assessments.

For some, Lyubishev turned out to be a revolutionary, a rebel, challenging the dogmas of evolution and genetics. Others imagined the kindest figure of a Russian intellectual, inexhaustibly tolerant of his opponents.

- ...In any philosophy, living critical and creative thought was valuable to him!

-...His strength was in the continuous generation of ideas, he posed questions, he awakened thought!

- ...As one of the great mathematicians noted, brilliant geometers propose a theorem, talented ones prove it. So he was the proposer.

-...He was too scattered, he should have focused on systematics and not wasted himself on philosophical problems.

- ...Alexander Alexandrovich is an example of concentration and purposefulness creative spirit, he consistently throughout his life...

-...The gift of mathematics determined his worldview...

- ...The breadth of his philosophical education allowed him to rethink the problem of the origin of species.

-...He was a rationalist!

-...Vitalist!

-...A dreamer, an enthusiastic person, an intuitionist!

They had been familiar with Lyubishchev and his works for many years, but each talked about the Lyubishchev they knew.

They had, of course, represented his versatility before. But only now, listening to each other, they realized that each knew only part of Lyubishchev.

I had spent the week before reading his diaries and letters, delving into the history of the preoccupations of his mind. I started reading without a purpose. Just other people's letters. Just well-written testimonies of someone else’s soul, past anxieties, past anger, memorable for me too, because I once thought about the same thing, but didn’t think of it...

I soon became convinced that I did not know Lyubishchev. That is, I knew, I met him, I understood that he was a rare person, but I did not suspect the scale of his personality. With shame, I admitted to myself that I considered him an eccentric, a wise, sweet eccentric, and it was bitter that I missed many opportunities to be with him. I had planned to go to see him in Ulyanovsk so many times, and everything seemed to work out in time.

Once again life taught me not to put anything off. Life, if you think about it, is a patient caretaker; it brought me together again and again. the most interesting people of our century, and I was in a hurry somewhere and often hurried past, putting it off for later. Why did I put it off, why was I in a hurry? Now these past hurries seem so insignificant, and the losses so offensive and, most importantly, irreparable.

The student who was sitting next to me...

Daniil Granin- classic Russian literature, writing career which began back in 1949. Author of more than 30 books, over a dozen of them have been filmed. Laureate of foreign and domestic literary prizes, twice laureate State Prize, laureate of the " Big Book" 2012.

The book "This strange life", first published in 1974 (with a circulation of 100,000 copies!), has been reprinted dozens of times over almost forty years, it has been translated into several languages, including English and German, and is rightfully considered the ancestor and inspirer of modern time management .

Who is this book for?

For everyone who is interested in the “person-time” relationship, who wants to get more done, cope with an increasing volume of tasks, as well as for those who are interested in history.

Book feature

This book inspired Gleb Arkhangelsky to create the only company in Russia specializing exclusively in time management.

Interesting facts about the book

• Author: Daniil Granin. Winner of the 2012 Big Book Award
• The book describes a completely unique scientific system, created by the scientist Lyubishchev to achieve the greatest impact from its versatile scientific activity— Systems for recording your own time, which allows you to increase the human resource of time for your own and public benefit.

About the hero

Alexander Alexandrovich Lyubishchev(1890-1972) - entomologist, specialist in one of the most complex subfamilies of leaf beetles, the so-called flea beetles (Chrysomelidae: Alticinae), and plant protection. Known for his works over general by application mathematical methods in biology, by common problems biological systematics, theory of evolution and philosophy.

He created a time tracking system that he used for 56 years (from 1916 to 1972). In fact, he is the founder and developer of the principles of goal setting and time tracking, today called time management.

He spoke several languages: English, German, Italian, French, and learned the first two in transport.

Foreword by Igor Mann

Charged with Granin. Charged with Lyubishchev.

To distant student years I came across a book by Daniil Granin, which I read - first avidly, and then re-read, re-read and re-read, savoring it like expensive cognac...

And I thought: “What a little man!”

And there were quite a few such people - back then in the USSR.

Scientists, athletes, inventors, teachers, students... hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of people tried to become better, more efficient, more professional. Not everyone made such sacrifices as Granin’s hero, not everyone worked according to his system one to one - but many took his example and looked up to him.

I don’t know how many people “charged” by Granin work in Russia (and, alas, abroad), but I know for sure that many could, like me, admit that we are largely indebted to him and his hero with his achievements and successes.

I will be very happy if the book that my colleagues publish is as popular as at the time of its release (then the initial circulation of the book was 100 thousand copies).

I appeal to my peers - let (be sure!) read the book to your children. Generation YYY - read this book, putting aside your social media and computer games.

We all need more young people to read this book. Maybe then the current generation will not be lost - and will be focused, concentrated and aimed at finding their goals and achieving them.

My colleagues from MYTH helped you as best they could - the book, as always, excellently published, is in front of you.

All you have to do is breathe... find time and dive into reading...

Charge yourself with Granin. Charge yourself with Lyubishchev.

And act, act, act.

We need new heroes.

Igor Mann

It's a strange life

I wanted to talk about this person in a way that would stick to the facts and would be interesting. It is quite difficult to combine both of these requirements. Facts are interesting when you don't have to stick to them. One could try to find some fresh technique and, using it, build an entertaining plot from the facts. So that there is mystery and struggle and danger. And so that with all this, authenticity is maintained.

It was customary to portray, for example, this man as a united lone fighter against powerful opponents. One against all. Even better - all against one. Injustice immediately attracts sympathy. But in reality it was just one against all. He attacked. He was the first to attack and crush. The meaning of his scientific struggle was quite complex and controversial. It was a real scientific struggle, where no one manages to be completely right. It was possible to attribute a simpler problem to him, to invent it, but then it would have been inconvenient to leave his real name. Then it was necessary to abandon many other surnames. But then no one would have believed me. In addition, I wanted to pay tribute to this man, to show what a person is capable of.

Of course, authenticity got in the way and tied my hands. It's much easier to deal with a fictional hero. He is both flexible and frank - the author knows all his thoughts and intentions, both his past and his future.

I had another task: to introduce all the useful information to the reader, to give descriptions - of course, amazing, surprising, but, unfortunately, unsuitable for a literary work. They were more likely suitable for a popular science essay. Imagine inserting a description of fencing in the middle of The Three Musketeers. The reader will probably skip these pages. And I had to force the reader to read my information, since this is the most important thing...

I wanted a lot of people to read about it, and that’s essentially why this thing was started.

It was also quite possible to get hooked on the secret. The promise of a secret, a mystery - it always attracts, especially since this mystery is not invented: I really struggled for a long time with the diaries and archive of my hero, and everything that I learned from there was a discovery for me, a clue to the secret of an amazing life.

However, to be honest, this secret is not accompanied by adventures, pursuit, and is not associated with intrigue and danger.

The secret is about how to live better. And here, too, you can arouse curiosity by declaring that this thing - about the most instructive example of the best structure of life - provides a unique System of Life.

“Our System allows you to achieve great success in any field, in any profession!”

“The system ensures the highest achievements with the most ordinary abilities!”

“You do not get an abstract system, but a guaranteed one, proven by many years of experience, accessible, productive...”

“Minimum costs - maximum effect!”

"The best in the world!.."

One could promise to tell the reader about an outstanding person of the 20th century unknown to him. To give a portrait of a moral hero, with such high moral rules that now seem old-fashioned. The life he lived is outwardly the most ordinary, in some ways even unlucky; from the point of view of the average person, he is a typical loser, but in his inner sense he was a harmonious and happy person, and his happiness was of the highest standard. Frankly, I thought that people of this scale had evolved, they were dinosaurs...

Just as in the old days they discovered the earth, just as astronomers discovered the stars, so a writer may be lucky enough to discover a person. There are great discoveries of characters and types: Goncharov discovered Oblomov, Turgenev - Bazarov, Cervantes - Don Quixote.

This was also a discovery, not of a universal type, but as if personal, mine, and not of a type, but rather of an ideal; however, this word did not fit either. Lyubishchev was also not suitable for the ideal...

I sat in a large, uncomfortable audience. The bare bulb harshly illuminated the gray hair and bald heads, the smooth comb-overs of graduate students, the long shaggy hair and fashionable wigs and curly blackness of blacks. Professors, doctors, students, journalists, historians, biologists... Most of all there were mathematicians, because it took place at their faculty - the first meeting in memory of Alexander Alexandrovich Lyubishchev.

I didn't expect so many people to come. And especially for young people. Perhaps they were driven by curiosity. Because they knew little about Lyubishchev. Either a biologist or a mathematician. Amateur? Amateur? Seems like an amateur. But the postal official from Toulouse - the great Fermat - was also an amateur... Lyubishchev - who is he? Either a vitalist, or a positivist or an idealist, in any case, a heretic.

And the speakers did not clarify either. Some considered him a biologist, others - a historian of science, others - an entomologist, others - a philosopher...

Each speaker had a new Lyubishchev. Everyone had their own interpretation, their own assessments.

For some, Lyubishev turned out to be a revolutionary, a rebel, challenging the dogmas of evolution and genetics. Others imagined the kindest figure of a Russian intellectual, inexhaustibly tolerant of his opponents.

In any philosophy, living critical and creative thought was valuable to him!

His strength was in the continuous generation of ideas, he posed questions, he awakened thought!

As one of the great mathematicians noted, brilliant geometers propose a theorem, talented ones prove it. So he was the proposer.

He was scattered too much; he should have concentrated on systematics and not wasted himself on philosophical problems.

Alexander Alexandrovich is an example of concentration, purposefulness of the creative spirit, he consistently throughout his life...

The gift of a mathematician determined his worldview...

The breadth of his philosophical education allowed him to rethink the problem of the origin of species.

He was a rationalist!

Vitalist!

A dreamer, an enthusiastic person, an intuitionist!

They had been familiar with Lyubishchev and his works for many years, but each talked about the Lyubishchev they knew.

They had, of course, represented his versatility before. But only now, listening to each other, they realized that each knew only part of Lyubishchev.

I had spent the week before reading his diaries and letters, delving into the history of the preoccupations of his mind. I started reading without a purpose. Just other people's letters. Just well-written testimonies of someone else’s soul, past worries, past anger, memorable for me too, because I once thought about the same thing, but I didn’t think of it...

I soon became convinced that I did not know Lyubishchev. That is, I knew, I met him, I understood that he was a rare person, but I did not suspect the scale of his personality. With shame, I admitted to myself that I considered him an eccentric, a wise, sweet eccentric, and it was bitter that I missed many opportunities to be with him. I had planned to go to see him in Ulyanovsk so many times, and everything seemed to work out in time.

Once again life taught me not to put anything off. Life, if you think about it, is a patient caretaker, it again and again brought me together with the most interesting people of our century, but I was in a hurry and often hurried past, putting it off for later. Why did I put it off, why was I in a hurry? Now these past hurries seem so insignificant, and the losses so offensive and, most importantly, irreparable.

The student who was sitting next to me shrugged his shoulders in bewilderment, unable to combine the contradictory stories of the speakers into one.

Only a year passed after Lyubishchev's death - and it was no longer possible to understand what he really was like.

The departed belongs to everyone, nothing can be done about it. The speakers selected from Lyubishchev what they liked or what they needed as arguments. While telling stories, they also built their own stories. Over the years, their portraits will turn out to be something average, or rather, an acceptable average, devoid of contradictions, mysteries - smoothed out and barely recognizable.

This average will be explained, it will be determined where he was wrong and where he was ahead of his time, and will be made completely understandable. And lifeless. If he gives in, of course. Above the pulpit hung a large photograph in a black frame - an old bald man, wrinkling his drooping nose, scratching the back of his head. He looked puzzledly, either at the audience or at the speakers, as if deciding what else he could do. And it was clear that all these clever speeches and theories now had nothing to do with that old man who could no longer be seen and who was so needed now. I'm too used to him being there. It was enough for me to know that somewhere there was a person with whom I could talk about everything and ask about everything.

Life stories famous people always motivate. They show the way to success. You think, “If this guy could pull this off, why am I any worse?” And then the colossal work of self-improvement begins - priorities change, habits change. But main difficulty is to find the “right” book that can change your mind. The story “This Strange Life,” written by Daniil Granin, is an ideal candidate for the role of a moral mentor and ideological inspirer. The book tells about the life and scientific work of Alexander Lyubishchev, a brilliant scientist who knew how to subjugate time, and not obey it.!

Writer Soviet period preferred to write about the life and work of famous academicians, physicists, mathematicians, biologists, focusing not only on known facts from their biographies, but also on inner world geniuses.

It was no coincidence that Daniil Granin chose Alexander Lyubishchev as the hero of the book “This Strange Life”. The author is impressed by the life rules that guided the hero of his story. The author was faced with a difficult task - using boring facts to create an exciting story that would fully reflect Lyubishchev’s relationship to the system of that time. Thus, the reader is offered a story not only about the scientist’s contribution to the development of science, but also about his personal achievements associated with perseverance of character, rebellion and courage. The dominant traits chosen for the main character were determination and strength. The academician's strangeness, which was noticed by everyone who knew him, also did not go unnoticed by the writer. However, the main achievement of Alexander Lyubishchev was the creation of an effective time management system, which he used throughout his life. Lyubishchev’s method of increasing personal effectiveness is very similar to modern practices time management, and therefore the scientist is credited with the authorship of this system. You can listen to the audiobook in mp3 or read online “This Strange Life” by Daniil Granin on KnigoPoisk.

In the book “This Strange Life,” Daniil Granin describes the life of a man devoted to his own work. His hero does not recognize authorities and can accurately calculate his time for the day, month and even a year in advance. It was the temporary accounting system that allowed Lyubishchev to become what history remembers him to be. This is something worth learning from him.

The modern variety of books on self-development and motivation offers a colossal number of textbooks for increasing personal effectiveness by keeping time records, and few people take it seriously this book, and very in vain. The author's easy narrative style, Interesting Facts and everyday background the best way They will tell you how to master time management and apply its principles in practice.

A strong motivational boost is what you will get after reading the book It's a Strange Life. It's never too late to start, the main thing is not to stop - main conclusion, which you will learn for yourself, but by no means the only one. A must read for anyone looking for a powerful dose of motivation and inspiration!

You can buy or download the book “It’s a Strange Life” for ipad, iphone, kindle and android on the website without registration or SMS. Also read reviews and reviews about the book.

DOWNLOAD THE BOOK “It’s a Strange Life” for FREE

DANIIL GRANIN

THIS STRANGE LIFE

I wanted to talk about this person in a way that would stick to the facts and would be interesting. It is quite difficult to combine both of these requirements. Facts are interesting when you don't have to stick to them. One could try to find some fresh technique and, using it, build an entertaining plot from the facts. So that there is mystery and struggle and danger. And so that with all this, authenticity is maintained.
It was customary to portray, for example, this man as a united lone fighter against powerful opponents. One against all. Even better - all against one. Injustice immediately attracts sympathy. But in reality it was just one against all. He attacked. He was the first to attack and crush. The meaning of his scientific struggle was quite complex and controversial. It was a real scientific struggle, where no one manages to be completely right. It was possible to attribute a simpler problem to him, to invent it, but then it would have been inconvenient to leave his real name. Then it was necessary to abandon many other surnames. But then no one would have believed me. In addition, I wanted to pay tribute to this man, to show what a person is capable of.
Of course, authenticity got in the way and tied my hands. It's much easier to deal with a fictional hero. He is both flexible and frank - the author knows all his thoughts and intentions, both his past and his future.
I had another task: to introduce all the useful information to the reader, to give descriptions - of course, amazing, surprising, but, unfortunately, unsuitable for a literary work. They were more likely suitable for a popular science essay. Imagine inserting a description of fencing in the middle of The Three Musketeers. The reader will probably skip these pages. And I had to force the reader to read my information, since this is the most important thing...
I wanted a lot of people to read about it, and that’s essentially why this thing was started.
...It was also quite possible to get hooked on the secret. The promise of a secret, a mystery - it always attracts, especially since this mystery is not made up: I really struggled for a long time with the diaries and archive of my hero, and everything that I learned from there was a discovery for me, a clue to the secret of an amazing life.
However, to be honest, this secret is not accompanied by adventures, pursuit, and is not associated with intrigue and danger.
The secret is about how to live better. And here, too, you can arouse curiosity by declaring that this thing - about the most instructive example of the best structure of life - provides a unique System of Life.
“Our System allows you to achieve great success in any field, in any profession!”
“The system ensures the highest achievements with the most ordinary abilities!”
“You do not get an abstract system, but a guaranteed one, proven by many years of experience, accessible, productive...”
“Minimum costs – maximum effect!”
"The best in the world!.."
One could promise to tell the reader about an outstanding person of the 20th century unknown to him. To give a portrait of a moral hero, with such high moral rules that now seem old-fashioned. The life he lived was outwardly the most ordinary, in some ways even unlucky; from the point of view of the average person, he is a typical loser, but in his inner sense he was a harmonious and happy person, and his happiness was of the highest standard. Frankly, I thought that people of this scale had evolved, they were dinosaurs...
Just as in the old days they discovered the earth, just as astronomers discovered the stars, so a writer may be lucky enough to discover a person. There are great discoveries of characters and types: Goncharov discovered Oblomov, Turgenev - Bazarov, Cervantes - Don Quixote.
This was also a discovery, not of a universal type, but as if personal, mine, and not of a type, but rather of an ideal; however, this word did not fit either. Lyubishchev was also not suitable for the ideal...
I sat in a large, uncomfortable audience. The bare bulb harshly illuminated the gray hair and bald heads, the smooth comb-overs of graduate students, the long shaggy hair and fashionable wigs and curly blackness of blacks. Professors, doctors, students, journalists, historians, biologists... Most of all there were mathematicians, because it took place at their faculty - the first meeting in memory of Alexander Alexandrovich Lyubishchev.
I didn't expect so many people to come. And especially for young people. Perhaps they were driven by curiosity. Because they knew little about Lyubishchev. Either a biologist or a mathematician. Amateur? Amateur? Seems like an amateur. But the postal official from Toulouse - the great Fermat - was also an amateur... Lyubishchev - who is he? Either a vitalist, or a positivist or an idealist, in any case, a heretic.
And the speakers did not clarify either. Some considered him a biologist, others - a historian of science, others - an entomologist, others - a philosopher...
Each speaker had a new Lyubishchev. Everyone had their own interpretation, their own assessments.
For some, Lyubishev turned out to be a revolutionary, a rebel, challenging the dogmas of evolution and genetics. Others imagined the kindest figure of a Russian intellectual, inexhaustibly tolerant of his opponents.
– ...In any philosophy, living critical and creative thought was valuable to him!
-...His strength was in the continuous generation of ideas, he posed questions, he awakened thought!
– ...As one of the great mathematicians noted, brilliant geometers propose a theorem, talented ones prove it. So he was the proposer.
– ...He was too scattered, he should have focused on systematics and not wasted himself on philosophical problems.
– ...Alexander Alexandrovich is an example of concentration, purposefulness of the creative spirit, he consistently throughout his life...
-...The gift of mathematics determined his worldview...
– ...The breadth of his philosophical education allowed him to rethink the problem of the origin of species.
-...He was a rationalist!
-...Vitalist!
-...A dreamer, an enthusiastic person, an intuitionist!
They had been familiar with Lyubishchev and his works for many years, but each talked about the Lyubishchev they knew.
They had, of course, represented his versatility before. But only now, listening to each other, they realized that each knew only part of Lyubishchev.
I had spent the week before reading his diaries and letters, delving into the history of the preoccupations of his mind. I started reading without a purpose. Just other people's letters. Just well-written testimonies of someone else’s soul, past anxieties, past anger, memorable for me too, because I once thought about the same thing, but didn’t think of it...
I soon became convinced that I did not know Lyubishchev. That is, I knew, I met him, I understood that he was a rare person, but I did not suspect the scale of his personality. With shame, I admitted to myself that I considered him an eccentric, a wise, sweet eccentric, and it was bitter that I missed many opportunities to be with him. I had planned to go to see him in Ulyanovsk so many times, and everything seemed to work out in time.
Once again life taught me not to put anything off. Life, if you think about it, is a patient caretaker, it again and again brought me together with the most interesting people of our century, but I was in a hurry and often hurried past, putting it off for later. Why did I put it off, why was I in a hurry? Now these past hurries seem so insignificant, and the losses so offensive and, most importantly, irreparable.
The student who was sitting next to me shrugged his shoulders in bewilderment, unable to combine the contradictory stories of the speakers into one.
Only a year had passed since Lyubishchev’s death, and it was no longer possible to understand what he really was like.
The departed belongs to everyone, nothing can be done about it. The speakers selected from Lyubishchev what they liked or what they needed as arguments. While telling stories, they also built their own stories. Over the years, their portraits will turn out to be something average, or rather, an acceptable average, devoid of contradictions, mysteries - smoothed out and barely recognizable.
This average will be explained, it will be determined where he was wrong and where he was ahead of his time, and will be made completely understandable. And lifeless. If he gives in, of course. Above the pulpit hung a large photograph in a black frame - an old bald man, wrinkling his drooping nose, scratching the back of his head. He looked puzzledly, either at the audience or at the speakers, as if deciding what else he could do. And it was clear that all these clever speeches and theories now had nothing to do with that old man who could no longer be seen and who was so needed now. I'm too used to him being there. It was enough for me to know that somewhere there was a person with whom I could talk about everything and ask about everything.
When a person dies, many things become clear, many things become known. And our attitude towards the deceased is summed up. I felt this in the speakers' speeches. There was certainty about them. Lyubishchev’s life appeared complete before them, now they decided to think it over and summarize it. And it was clear that now many of his ideas would receive recognition, many of his works would be published and republished. For some reason, the dead have more rights, they are allowed more...
...Or you can do this: warn the reader that there will be no entertainment, on the contrary, there will be a lot of dry, purely business prose. And you can’t call it prozoito. The author has done little for decoration or entertainment. The author himself had difficulty understanding this material, and everything that was done here was done for reasons that the author reports at the very end of this narrative, which is unusual for him.

Chapter two,
about the reasons and strangeness of love

I have long been embarrassed by the enthusiasm of his fans. Not for the first time, their epithets seemed overly enthusiastic. When he arrived in Leningrad, he was greeted, accompanied, and people constantly swarmed around him. He was “snatched up” for lectures at various institutes. The same thing happened in Moscow. And this was not done by lovers of sensations, not by journalists - discoverers of unrecognized geniuses: there is such a public - just the opposite, serious scientists, young doctors of science - very exact sciences, skeptical people, ready to overthrow authorities rather than establish them.
What was Lyubishchev for them - it would seem, a provincial professor, from somewhere in Ulyanovsk, not a laureate, not a member of the Higher Attestation Commission... His scientific works? They were rated highly, but there were mathematicians greater than Lyubishchev, and geneticists more deserving than him.
His erudition? Yes, he knew a lot, but in our time erudition can surprise, not conquer. His integrity, courage? Yes, of course... But I, for example, could not appreciate much, and most understood little of his special research... What did they care about the fact that Lyubishchev obtained the best discrimination of the three species of Hatoknema? I had no idea what Hatoknem was, and I still don't. And I can’t imagine discriminant functions either. And yet, rare meetings with Lyubishchev had an effect on me strong impression. Leaving my work, I followed him, listening for hours to his rapid speech with disgusting diction, illegible, like his handwriting.
The symptoms of this love and greedy interest reminded me of people like Nikolai Vladimirovich Timofeev Resovsky and Lev Davidovich Landau, and Viktor Borisovich Shklovsky. True, there I knew that before me were exceptional people, recognized by everyone as exceptional. Lyubishchev did not have such fame. I saw him without any aura: a poorly dressed, bulky, ugly old man, with a provincial interest in all sorts of literary rumors. How could he captivate? At first it seemed that he was attracted by the heretical nature of his views. Everything he said seemed to contradict. He knew how to question the most immutable positions. He was not afraid to challenge any authorities - Darwin, Timiryazev, Thayer de Chardin, Schrödinger... Each time, convincingly, unexpectedly, he thought from where no one was thinking. It was obvious that he had not borrowed anything, everything was his own, worn out, tested. And he said in your own words, in their original meaning.
- Who am I? I am an amateur, a universal amateur. This word comes from the Italian diletto, which means pleasure. That is, a person who enjoys the process of any work.
Heresy was only a sign, behind it one could guess general system worldview, something unusual, the contours of a grandiose structure going somewhere high. The shapes of this not yet completed building were strange and attractive...
And yet this was not enough. For some reason this man still captivated me. Not just me. He was approached by teachers, prisoners, academics, art critics and people I don't know who they are. I read not their letters, but Lyubishchev’s answers. Thorough, free, serious, some very interesting, and in each letter he did not condescend, but thought intensely. You could feel his difference, his separateness. Through letters I understood my feelings better. In letters he revealed himself, apparently, better than in communication. At least that's what it seemed to me now.
It is no coincidence that he had almost no students. Although this is generally characteristic of many major scientists, creators of entire directions and teachings. Einstein also had no students, neither did Mendeleev, nor Lobachevsky. Students, scientific school– this doesn’t happen so often. Lyubishchev had admirers, he had supporters, he had admirers, and he had readers. Instead of students, he had students, that is, he did not teach them, but they learned from him - it is difficult to determine what exactly, most likely how to live and think. It seemed that we had finally met a man who knew why he lived, why... As if he had highest goal, and maybe even the meaning of his existence was revealed to him. Not just to live morally and work conscientiously, no, he understood the hidden meaning of everything he did. It was clear that this was only suitable for him. Albert Schweitzer did not encourage anyone to go to Africa as doctors. He found his own way, his own way of embodying his principles. Nevertheless, Schweitzer's example touches people's consciences.