Mikhail Evgrafovich Shchedrin. The childhood of Saltykov-Shchedrin

• Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov was born on January 27 (15), 1826 in the village of Spas-Ugol, Kalyazinsky district, Tver province (now Taldomsky district, Moscow region).
• Saltykov's father, Evgraf Vasilyevich, a pillar nobleman, served as a collegiate adviser. He came from an old noble family.
• Mother, Olga Mikhailovna, nee Zabelina, Muscovite, merchant daughter. Mikhail was the sixth of her nine children.
• For the first 10 years of his life, Saltykov lives on his father’s family estate, where he receives his elementary education. home education. The future writer's first teachers were his elder sister and the serf painter Pavel.
• 1836 – 1838 – studied at the Moscow Noble Institute.
• 1838 - for excellent academic success, Mikhail Saltykov was transferred to a state-funded student, that is, trained at the expense of the state treasury, as a student in Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum.
• 1841 – Saltykov’s first poetic experiments. The poem “Lyra” was even published in the magazine “Library for Reading,” but Saltykov quickly understands that poetry is not for him, since he does not have the necessary abilities. He leaves poetry.
• 1844 – graduation from the lyceum in the second category, with the rank of X class. Saltykov enters service in the office of the Military Department, but serves all states. He manages to get his first full-time position only after two years, this is the position of assistant secretary.
• 1847 – Mikhail Saltykov’s first story “Contradictions” is published.
• Beginning of 1848 - the story “A Confused Affair” was published in Otechestvennye zapiski.
• April of the same year - the tsarist government was too shocked by the revolution that took place in France, and Saltykov was arrested for the story “A Confused Affair”, more precisely for “... a harmful way of thinking and a harmful desire to spread ideas that have already shaken the whole of Western Europe...”. He was exiled to Vyatka.
• 1848 - 1855 - service in Vyatka, under provincial government, first as a clerical official, then as a senior official special assignments under the governor and the ruler of the governor's office. Saltykov ends his exile in the position of adviser to the provincial government.
• 1855 - with the death of Emperor Nicholas I, Shchedrin gets the opportunity to “live wherever he wishes” and returns to St. Petersburg. Here he entered the service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and a year later he was appointed an official of special assignments under the minister. Sent on a business trip to Tverskaya and Vladimir province.
• June 1856 - Saltykov marries the daughter of the vice-governor of Vyatka, Elizaveta Apollonovna Boltina.
• 1856 - 1857 - the satirical cycle “Provincial Sketches” is published in the magazine “Russian Messenger” with the signature “Government Councilor N. Shchedrin”. The writer becomes famous, he is called the successor of N.V.’s work. Gogol.
• 1858 - appointment as vice-governor in Ryazan.
• 1860 - 1862 - Saltykov served as vice-governor in Tver for two years, after which he retired and returned to St. Petersburg.
• December 1862 - 1864 - collaboration of Mikhail Saltykov with the Sovremennik magazine at the invitation of N.A. Nekrasova. After leaving the editorial board of the magazine, the writer returns to public service. Appointed chairman of the Penza Treasury Chamber.
• 1866 - moved to Tula to the position of manager of the Tula Treasury Chamber.
• 1867 - Saltykov is transferred to Ryazan to the same position. The fact that Saltykov-Shchedrin could not last long in one place of service is explained by the fact that he did not hesitate to ridicule his superiors in grotesque “fairy tales.” In addition, the writer behaved too atypically for an official: he fought against bribery, embezzlement and simply theft, and defended the interests of the lower strata of the population.
• 1868 - the complaint of the Ryazan governor becomes the last in the writer’s career. He was dismissed with the rank of active state councilor.
• September of the same year - Saltykov became a member of the editorial board of the magazine " Domestic notes", which is headed by N.A. Nekrasov.
• 1869 - 1870 - the fairy tales “The Tale of How One Man Fed Two Generals”, “ Wild landowner", novel "The History of a City".
• 1872 - the Saltykovs’ son Konstantin is born.
• 1873 – birth of daughter Elizabeth.
• 1876 ​​- Nekrasov becomes seriously ill, and Saltykov-Shchedrin replaces him as editor-in-chief of Otechestvennye zapiski. He worked unofficially for two years and was approved for this position in 1878.
• 1880 – publication of the novel “Gentlemen Golovlevs”.
• 1884 - “Domestic Notes” are banned.
• 1887 - 1889 - the novel “Poshekhon Antiquity” is published in “Bulletin of Europe”.
• March 1889 – sharp deterioration writer's health.
• May 10 (April 28), 1889 - Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin dies. According to his own will, he was buried at the Volkov cemetery in St. Petersburg next to

Saltykov-Shchedrin (pseudonym N. Shchedrin) Mikhail Evgrafovich (1826 1889), prose writer.

Born on January 15 (27 NS) in the village of Spas-Ugol, Tver province in the ancient noble family. His childhood years were spent on his father's family estate in "... the years... of the very height of serfdom", in one of the remote corners of "Poshekhonye". Observations of this life will subsequently be reflected in the writer’s books.

Having received a good education at home, Saltykov at the age of 10 was accepted as a boarder at the Moscow Noble Institute, where he spent two years, then in 1838 he was transferred to the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. Here he began to write poetry, having experienced big influence articles by Belinsky and Herzen, works by Gogol.

In 1844, after graduating from the Lyceum, he served as an official in the office of the War Ministry. “...Everywhere there is duty, everywhere there is coercion, everywhere there is boredom and lies...” - this is the description he gave of bureaucratic Petersburg. Another life was more attractive to Saltykov: communication with writers, visiting Petrashevsky’s “Fridays,” where philosophers, scientists, writers, and military men gathered, united by anti-serfdom sentiments and the search for the ideals of a just society.

Saltykov's first stories "Contradictions" (1847), "Confused Affair" (1848) with their acute social issues attracted the attention of the authorities, frightened by the French Revolution of 1848. The writer was exiled to Vyatka for “... a harmful way of thinking and a destructive desire to spread ideas that had already shaken the whole of Western Europe...”. For eight years he lived in Vyatka, where in 1850 he was appointed to the position of adviser to the provincial government. This made it possible to frequently go on business trips and observe the bureaucratic world and peasant life. The impressions of these years will influence the satirical direction of the writer’s work.

At the end of 1855, after the death of Nicholas I, having received the right to “live wherever he wishes,” he returned to St. Petersburg and resumed his literary work. In 1856 1857, “Provincial Sketches” were written, published on behalf of the “court adviser N. Shchedrin,” who became known throughout reading Russia, which named him Gogol’s heir.

At this time, he married the 17-year-old daughter of the Vyatka vice-governor, E. Boltina. Saltykov sought to combine the work of a writer with public service. In 1856 1858 he was an official of special assignments in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, where work on preparing the peasant reform was concentrated.

In 1858 1862 he served as vice-governor in Ryazan, then in Tver. I always tried to surround myself at my place of work with honest, young and educated people, firing bribe-takers and thieves.

During these years, stories and essays appeared (“Innocent Stories”, 1857㬻 “Satires in Prose”, 1859 62), as well as articles on the peasant question.

In 1862, the writer retired, moved to St. Petersburg and, at the invitation of Nekrasov, joined the editorial staff of the Sovremennik magazine, which at that time was experiencing enormous difficulties (Dobrolyubov died, Chernyshevsky was imprisoned Peter and Paul Fortress). Saltykov took on a huge amount of writing and editing work. But he paid most attention to the monthly review “Our Social Life,” which became a monument to Russian journalism of the 1860s.

In 1864 Saltykov left the editorial office of Sovremennik. The reason was internal disagreements on tactics social struggle in new conditions. He returned to government service.

In 1865 1868 he headed the State Chambers in Penza, Tula, Ryazan; observations of the life of these cities formed the basis of “Letters about the Province” (1869). The frequent change of duty stations is explained by conflicts with the heads of the provinces, at whom the writer “laughed” in grotesque pamphlets. After a complaint from the Ryazan governor, Saltykov was dismissed in 1868 with the rank of full state councilor. He moved to St. Petersburg and accepted N. Nekrasov’s invitation to become co-editor of the journal Otechestvennye zapiski, where he worked in 1868–1884. Saltykov now switched entirely to literary activity. In 1869 he wrote "The History of a City" - the pinnacle of his satirical art.

In 1875 1876 he was treated abroad, visited countries Western Europe V different years life. In Paris he met with Turgenev, Flaubert, Zola.

In the 1880s, Saltykov's satire reached its climax in its anger and grotesquery: "Modern Idyll" (1877 83); "Messrs. Golovlevs" (1880); "Poshekhonsky stories" (1883㭐).

In 1884, the journal Otechestvennye zapiski was closed, after which Saltykov was forced to publish in the journal Vestnik Evropy.

IN last years In his lifetime, the writer created his masterpieces: “Fairy Tales” (1882 86); "Little things in life" (1886 87); autobiographical novel "Poshekhon Antiquity" (1887 89).

A few days before his death, he wrote the first pages of a new work." Forgotten words", where he wanted to remind the "motley people" of the 1880s about the words they had lost: "conscience, fatherland, humanity... others are still there...".

This classic of Russian literature is quoted most of all and read least of all. Few can boast that they have read it in full. But it is even more difficult to imagine a person who, when asked who his favorite writer is, will answer: “Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin.”
And yet, the mere mention of his name invariably evokes a mixed feeling of joy and some shame. This eternal writer. Eternal because you can’t deceive him, you can’t escape him. He “undresses” each and every one - naked, to shame. But this is not based on a bilious desire to criticize, but on absolute honesty and knowledge human nature.
Saltykov-Shchedrin's contemporaries did not notice his death in 1889. Everything turned out to be extremely everyday and natural in its own way. He lived and was, wrote something, said something, some liked it, some didn’t. Then it seemed to many that life had stopped and there was no point in waiting for changes. But, as Mikhail Evgrafovich himself wrote about that time, the time became motley. Motley because there was not a single color in sight and was not visible in the near future. Everything was fragmented, atomized, everyone was against everyone and against everyone at once. But Saltykov-Shchedrin still concluded that there was nothing new. However, human nature is unchangeable, and nothing good or new can be expected.

Alexander Kuprin was the first to return to Saltykov-Shchedrin. He returned 22 years after the writer’s death in 1911 in his story “Giants.” The story of the story is simple and uncomplicated. A drunken gymnasium teacher (and a drunken gymnasium teacher is the hero of Saltykov-Shchedrin’s “Provincial Sketches”) puts portraits of Pushkin, Gogol, Nekrasov in front of him and begins to grade them. Suddenly he notices a piercing and terrible look directed at him from the corner. And it seemed to him that the lips in the portrait opened and uttered words that he could not imagine from any of the Russian classics. Waking up in the morning in a cold sweat, the teacher takes the portrait of Saltykov-Shchedrin and takes it from the classroom to the pantry. He is afraid of this look; the portrait cannot be destroyed - state property. It seems that in this story Kuprin expressed his attitude towards Saltykov-Shchedrin, which was based primarily on respect. No matter how cruel and bilious his late colleague was, he still left to all his heirs a sick conscience for Russia. Precisely the sick one, not the calm one. And thus he left his successors that impulse of indifference that made them great writers.
Shortly before his death, Saltykov-Shchedrin told one and a few of his close friends Unkovsky: “It’s not a pity that you die, but that after death you will remember only jokes.” Like looking into the water. His words, like almost all works, turned out to be prophetic.

Of all the Russian writers of the 19th century, Saltykov-Shchedrin seems to me one of the most sentimental. His sentimentalism was taken to the absolute, and it was for this reason that the most cynical Russian pamphlets, satire written on the verge of what was permitted, came from his pen. This is an internal experience when he suffered for everyone and let everything pass through himself. It is impossible to imagine that after what was written, this extremely closed person sobbed bitterly at the life around him. This feeling is difficult to explain, but it is understandable. If we remember his “Conscience Lost” or “Truth”, placed in a strange fairy tale about how a boy dies from an overflow of emotions from a divine service, because his heart is overwhelmed with delight, and he cannot bear it, then this will be the real Shchedrin. The one we didn't notice. And the basis of his attitude to the world was the highest religious feeling - absolute faith in God.
He was neither a Westerner nor a Slavophile. And his view of the surrounding Russian reality was not at all a manifestation of rejection of the regime. And he was never a fighter with him. Moreover, he himself was part of the power system of that time, for a long time served as vice-governor in the Ryazan and Tver provinces.

This is the cliche of a fighter against the tsarist regime, firmly glued to Saltykov in Soviet time, by inertia is still alive today. His formation began in the Moscow boarding school, and, as one of the best students, he was transferred to the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. And according to the rules of good manners at the Lyceum, writing poetry was mandatory. It’s hard to believe, but in his lyceum years Mikhail Saltykov passionately dreamed of becoming a poet on a par with Pushkin. And in that very thirteenth lyceum graduation, the devil’s dozen, Saltykov writes poems about the Russian plains, about coachmen, about love for the homeland.

As one of the best graduates of the lyceum, he is immediately appointed to the War Ministry. And from the first day of service, with all his soul he harbors a fierce hatred for this work. As he himself later asserted, “writing two hundred petitions from insignificant people to insignificant people does not mean being in public service. Nevertheless, this was what public service consisted of.” Here two points converged in young Saltykov, which would later be regarded by many as the writer’s eternal nihilism towards the entire social order. But I think that this was not quite the case. Saltykov’s internal discomfort consisted of the cosmic distance between his brilliant education and real everyday life. An abundance of education is not always a luxury, but most often a heavy burden that not everyone can bear. When you have “specialists in holes and cracks” under your command, it’s easier to say - a company of binders, and in the head of Fourier with his ideal ideas social structure, internal discomfort is guaranteed. Petrashevsky and his circle were close in spirit to him. But fate favored Mikhail Evgrafovich. At the peak of the Nikolaev repressions of 1848, for two stories “Contradiction” and “Confused Affair” published in Otechestvennye Zapiski, he was sent to Vyatka not as a successful official, but as a compiler of meaningless annual reports. This city, which we know as Kirov, became Saltykov’s place of life for seven whole years. It was a kind of exile, it was indefinite. But he was not forbidden to write. It was here that he would take his literary pseudonym Nikolai Shchedrin, which would later become part of his surname. In "Provincial Sketches" main character- it’s himself, Shchedrin, who travels around for twelve months a year provincial cities and everyone. He drives around and cries all the time. He doesn't cry literally, he constantly whines from internal discomfort.

The Vyatka exile ended not thanks to his constant letters to St. Petersburg, but according to the law of nature. The death of Nicholas I gave Russia hope and a thaw. This definition does not belong to Ilya Ehrenburg, as we still believe, but to Fyodor Tyutchev. Saltykov was immediately forgiven in 1855. And moreover, his “Provincial Sketches” is far from his masterpiece literary creativity, were immediately printed.
Today there is no consensus on which work of Saltykov-Shchedrin should be considered the main one. The inertia of the Soviet era and, above all, the fact that “The Golovlev Gentlemen” were included in the compulsory school curriculum, leave first place to this novel. The main argument for this was the personal opinion of the leader of the world proletariat, Vladimir Lenin, that this particular work is the best panorama of Russian life from business to secular, from peasant to bureaucratic. But this is just one opinion. There is another thing, the most popular today, that the main work of Saltykov-Shchedrin is still his novel “The History of a City.”

Saltykov lived at the turn of two eras. In the Russian social, I emphasize, social and not political tradition, there has always been a certain predetermination - a sinusoidal cycle of development - either “freeze” or “thaw”. Either a turn to the West, or a return to the East. And the eternal search for the perfect social order.
The idea for this novel with very strange content came to Saltykov after meeting Nekrasov. They met in 1857 and really disliked each other. Strictly speaking, all outstanding Russian writers in real life they were far from angels. Their works and themselves are two different things. And that's putting it mildly. Nikolai Nekrasov is an extraordinary and contradictory personality. With us, he was always almost a revolutionary, a defender of the people. But what about Nekrasov, who comes out to Panaev and says: “We are refreshing a newbie here.” Refreshing means plucking. A merchant arrived, lost ten thousand rubles at cards and ran away. That's Nekrasov's trouble! But the question is different - it is extremely difficult to imagine a graduate of the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, Mikhail Saltykov, as Nekrasov’s closest literary associate. But two human extremes amazingly agreed on professionally.
Journal work requires accuracy in submitting texts on time, and Nekrasov was forced to agree to accept reviews from Saltykov. The editor-in-chief of Sovremennik liked his accuracy and commitment.

Reviews titled "Our modern life” in “Notes of the Fatherland” soon bored Saltykov, and he decided to write them in a metaphorical style. This is why the city of Foolov was invented. The plot of the novel was simple - first the pre-reform and then the post-reform city of Foolov was depicted. It's about about the reforms of Alexander II after the abolition of serfdom.
There is a huge gap between the first chapter of “The History of a City” - ironic, extremely ironic, containing the entire list of mayors - and the terrible finale, which ends with the cry of Gloomy-Burcheev: “It has come! History has stopped flowing. The last destruction has come to Russia.” And how charming it all began.

Daughter Elizabeth.

Writing a novel for Saltykov-Shchedrin at that moment was not the main meaning of his life. The new emperor, as compensation for the forced exile, offered a good and decent position as vice-governor of the Tver region. And Saltykov began transformations there. It should be noted that almost the entire intellectual elite of that time was convinced that they needed to go into practical farming and direct all their knowledge and experience (which did not exist) to the development of capitalism in the country. An inspired Saltykov wrote: “Five years later, as soon as the man is released, the farm will flourish.” But it was not there. Saltykov-Shchedrin himself, with the Vitenevo estate he bought, went bankrupt in a matter of months. He sincerely believed that he must personally set an example of free housekeeping. But I just couldn’t understand that it was one thing to fight on the pages of a magazine and in bureaucratic life for the freedom of a peasant, and another thing to teach him this freedom. Find out for yourself and teach others to become an owner. It was a revelation to him how freedom immediately became will.
The brilliant poet Afanasy Fet was just as romantic at that time. But the peasants quickly robbed him. After which he became a cruel serf owner, and was doomed to oblivion by Soviet literary criticism. But during his lifetime he became a successful landowner, by our standards a decent business executive, constantly scolding Leo Tolstoy for excessive liberalism. But until the 70s of the 19th century, he was a sincere liberal who did not understand what a downtrodden, corrupt and treacherous people he was dealing with.

For Shchedrin this was a personal disappointment. He could not understand and internally agree with the fact that given to the people freedom will be used primarily for deception. After all, he conceived “The History of a City” as an innocent joke, but it turned out to be a very terrible and gloomy prophecy. His disappointment was all the more painful because he could not come to terms with the fact that he spoke to men in different languages. And the whole paradox of the Russian intellectual elite of that time was that only Nikolai Nekrasov understood the essence of what was happening. It was the same Nekrasov who wrote “Who Lives Well in Rus'.”
Today from the screens Russian television you can hear the idea, quite wildly, that the abolition of serfdom was a political mistake of Alexander II. I think this is stupidity and a substitution of concepts. In my opinion, the bottom line is that freedom and democracy are worth something. And every member of society cannot receive it by decree or order from above. You have to earn it, including with your head. And it was this disappointment that hurt Saltykov-Shchedrin the most.
He guessed the path of Russia's development for at least a century in advance. Intuition, all your passion and intransigence. We consider Vsevolod Garshin to be the founder of Russian modernism. Based on his published stories, this is true. But modernity, as an artistic phenomenon, rests on two foundations - the fusion creativity both real life and, sadly (and Garshin has this), on the aestheticization of vulgarity. According to the second basis, Garshin is the ancestor. What about the first one? I think that the championship here belongs to Saltykov-Shchedrin. Of course, he was not a modernist writer; Shchedrin belonged to the last of the Mohicans of the Russian “golden” literary age. But he clearly guessed Russia's path of movement.
We are often misled by calls for immediate modernization of all public life according to Western style. Modernity is not a Western phenomenon. It is alien to the West due to its gradual pace of development. Modernity is a phenomenon characteristic of countries of the catching-up type of evolution. It originated in the Russian, Austro-Hungarian, German Empires and Sweden. Literary and artistic modernity always precedes political modernity. He is a constant companion of socialism or the collapse of the state. Extremely painful and tragic. The German and Austro-Hungarian empires did not stand the test and did not survive the 20th century. Russian empire transformed into Soviet Union, which collapsed at the end of the twentieth century. The Swedish socialism that is commonly talked about today, in pure form a product of modernity. But the Swedes got sick of it - saved national tradition and mononationality. Great culture « silver age“In its greatness, it also brought something that many cannot come to terms with in the 21st century - the loss of Christian guidelines - mass culture, same-sex marriage, etc.

Saltykov-Shchedrin felt the future and understood a lot. His works are perceived by many as encrypted texts. But this is not encryption, but a generalization, a search for the matrix of that history, the maximum typification in which we live today. All these generalizations are framed in the form of dialogues.
He died early, at only 63 years old. This self-eating took its toll. From everything he experienced, Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin wanted to write his main work, “Forgotten Words.” He explained his desire simply: “Now there are many words that no one remembers. No one remembers what conscience is, no one remembers what sacrifice is, and they certainly don’t remember God at all.”
Saltykov-Shchedrin as a writer is a mystery to us all. In ours not very read time Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin remains the most popular Russian classic. Our time is his second literary birth. And he is far from school and not children's writer, let’s not be mistaken in this, saying “the tales of Saltykov-Shchedrin.” The first satirist of Russia, and in fact - a mirror of everything Russian and Russian society, not crooked, although sometimes unpleasant, has survived its time and entered the minds of everyone, regardless of our desire, regardless of whether we know about it or not.

Saltykov-Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich - (real name Saltykov; pseudonym N. Shchedrin; (1826-1889), Russian satirist writer, publicist.

Born on January 15 (27) in the village of Spas-Ugol, Kalyazinsky district, Tver province. in an old noble family, with early years observed the savagery of serfdom. At ten years of age he entered the Moscow Noble Institute, then, as one of the best students, he was transferred to the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum and accepted into the government account. In 1844 he graduated from the course. At the Lyceum, under the influence of still fresh legends Pushkin's time Each course had its own poet - Saltykov played this role. Several of his poems, filled with youthful sadness and melancholy (among his then acquaintances he was known as a “gloomy lyceum student”), were published in the “Library for Reading” for 1841 and 1842 and in “Sovremennik” in 1844 and 1845. However, he soon realized that he had he has no vocation for poetry, and has stopped writing poetry.

Every ugliness has its decency.

Saltykov-Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich

In August 1844 he enlisted in the office of the Minister of War, but literature occupied him much more. He read a lot and was inspired the latest ideas French socialists (Fourier, Saint-Simon) and supporters of all kinds of “emancipation” (George Sand and others) - a picture of this passion was drawn by him thirty years later in the fourth chapter of the collection Abroad. Such interests were largely due to his rapprochement with the circle of radical freethinkers under the leadership of M.V. Petrashevsky. He begins to write - first short book reviews in Otechestvennye Zapiski, then stories - Contradictions (1847) and Confused Affair (1848). Already in the reviews one can see the way of thinking of a mature author - aversion to routine, to conventional morality, indignation at the realities of serfdom; There are sparkles of sparkling humor.

The first story captures the theme early novels J. Sand: recognition of the rights of “free life” and “passion”. An Entangled Affair is a more mature work, written under the strong influence of Gogol's The Overcoat and, probably, Dostoevsky's Poor People. “Russia,” the hero of the story reflects, “is a vast, abundant and rich state; Yes, the man is stupid, he is starving to death in an abundant state.” “Life is a lottery,” he tells him familiar look, bequeathed by father; - it is so.., but why is it a lottery, why shouldn’t it just be life?” These lines, which probably no one would have noticed before special attention, were published immediately after french revolution 1848, which reverberated in Russia with the establishment of a secret committee vested with special powers to curb the press. As a result, on April 28, 1848, Saltykov was exiled to Vyatka. Tsarskoye Selo graduate, young nobleman The punishment was not so severe: he was appointed a clerical official under the Vyatka provincial government, then holding a number of positions, and was also an adviser to the provincial government.

He took his official duties to heart. He learned well about provincial life, in its darkest sides, thanks to numerous business trips around the Vyatka region - a rich supply of observations made found a place in the Provincial Essays (1856-1857). He dispelled the boredom of mental loneliness with extracurricular activities: excerpts of his translations of French have been preserved scientific works. For the Boltin sisters, one of whom became his wife in 1856, he compiled Brief history Russia. In November 1855 he was allowed to finally leave Vyatka. In February 1856 he was assigned to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, then appointed a ministerial official for special assignments and sent to the Tver and Vladimir provinces to review the paperwork of local militia committees.

Following his return from exile, his literary activity. The name of court councilor Shchedrin, who signed the Provincial Essays that appeared in the Russian Bulletin, became popular. Collected in one book, they opened literary page V historical chronicle era of liberal reforms of Alexander II, laying the foundation for the so-called accusatory literature, although they themselves belonged to it only partly. The external side of the world of slander, bribes, and abuses completely fills only a few of them; The psychology of bureaucratic life comes to the fore here. Satirical pathos has not yet received exclusive rights, in the spirit Gogolian tradition the humor on its pages periodically gives way to outright lyricism. Russian society, who had just awakened to a new life and watched with joyful surprise the first glimpses of freedom of speech, perceived the essays almost as a literary revelation.

The circumstances of the “thaw” period of that time also explain the fact that the author of the Provincial Sketches could not only remain in the service, but also receive more responsible positions. In March 1858 he was appointed vice-governor of Ryazan, and in April 1860 he was transferred to the same position in Tver. At the same time, he wrote a lot, publishing first in various magazines (in addition to the Russian Messenger in the Athenaeum, Library for Reading, Moskovsky Messenger), and from 1860 almost exclusively in Sovremennik. From what was created at the dawn of reforms - between 1858 and 1862 - two collections were compiled - Innocent Stories and Satires in Prose. A collective image of the city of Foolov appears in them, a symbol modern Russia, the “history” of which Saltykov created a few years later. Among other things, the process of liberal innovation is described, in which the sharp eye of the satirist catches hidden defects - attempts to preserve old content in new forms. One “embarrassment” is seen in Foolov’s present and future: “Going forward is difficult, going back is impossible.”

In February 1862 he retired for the first time. I wanted to settle in Moscow and establish there new magazine; but when he failed, he moved to St. Petersburg and from the beginning of 1863 became in fact one of the editors of Sovremennik. Over the course of two years, he published works of fiction, social and theatrical chronicles, letters, book reviews, polemical notes, and journalistic articles. The embarrassment that the radical Sovremennik experienced at every step from the censorship prompted him to re-enter the service. At this time, he is least actively engaged in literary activities. As soon as Nekrasov became editor-in-chief of Otechestvennye Zapiski on January 1, 1868, he became one of their most diligent employees.

The biography of Saltykov-Shchedrin shows not just a talented writer, but also an organizer who wants to serve the country and be useful to it. He was valued in society not only as a creator, but also as an official who cared for the interests of the people. By the way, his real name- Saltykov, a creative pseudonym- Shchedrin.

Education

The biography of Saltykov-Shchedrin begins from childhood spent on the Tver provincial estate of his father, an ancient nobleman located in the village of Spas-Ugol. The writer would later describe this period of his life in the novel “Poshekhon Antiquity,” published after his death.

The boy received his primary education at home - his father had his own plans for his son’s education. And at the age of ten he entered the Moscow Noble Institute. However, his talents and abilities far exceeded average level this institution, and two years later, as the best student, he was transferred “for state money” to the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. In that educational institution Mikhail Evgrafovich became interested in poetry, but soon realized that writing poetry was not his path.

War Department official

Saltykov-Shchedrin’s work biography began in 1844. The young man enters the service as an assistant secretary in the office of the War Ministry. He is fascinated by literary activity, to which he devotes much more mental strength than bureaucratic. The ideas of the French socialists and the influence of the views of George Sand are visible in his early works(stories “Entangled Affair” and “Contradictions”). The author sharply criticizes serfdom, which throws Russia back a century relative to Europe. The young man expresses a deep thought that human life in society should not be a lottery, it should be life, and for this we need a different social structure of this very life.

Link to Vyatka

It is natural that the biography of Saltykov-Shchedrin during the reign of despot Emperor Nicholas I could not be free from repression: public freedom-loving thoughts were not welcomed.

Exiled to Vyatka, he served in the provincial government. He devoted a lot of time and effort to his service. The career of an official was successful. Two years later he was appointed advisor to the provincial government. Thanks to frequent business trips and active insight into people's affairs, extensive observations of Russian reality are accumulated.

In 1855, the term of exile ended, and the promising official was transferred to his native Tver province to the Ministry of Internal Affairs for militia affairs. In fact, a different Saltykov-Shchedrin returned to his small homeland. The (short) biography of the returning writer-official contains one more touch - upon his arrival home, he got married. His wife was Elizaveta Apollonovna Boltova (the Vyatka vice-governor blessed his daughter for this marriage).

A new stage of creativity. "Provincial Sketches"

However, the most important thing is to find his own literary style: his regular publications in the Moscow magazine “Russian Messenger” were expected by the literary community. This is how the mass reader became acquainted with the author’s “ Provincial essays" Saltykov-Shchedrin's stories presented the addressees with the pernicious atmosphere of outdated serfdom. Anti-democratic state institutions the writer calls it “an empire of facades.” He denounces officials as “guzzlers” and “mischievous people”, local nobles as “tyrants”; shows readers the world of bribes and behind-the-scenes intrigues...

At the same time, the writer understands the very soul of the people - the reader feels this in the stories “Arinushka”, “Christ is Risen!” Starting with the story “Introduction,” Saltykov-Shchedrin immerses recipients in the world of truthful artistic images. A short biography concerning creativity, at the turn of writing “Provincial Sketches”, he himself assessed it extremely succinctly. “Everything I wrote before was nonsense!” The Russian reader finally saw a bright and truthful picture of the generalized provincial town Krutoyarsk, the material for the image of which was collected by the author in Vyatka exile.

Cooperation with the magazine "Otechestvennye zapiski"

The next stage of the writer’s work began in 1868. Saltykov-Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich left public service and completely focused on literary activity.

He began to work closely with the Nekrasov magazine Otechestvennye zapiski. The writer publishes in this printed edition his collections of stories “Letters from the Province”, “Signs of the Times”, “Diary of a Provincial...”, “The History of a City”, “Pompadours and Pompadours” ( full list much longer).

The author’s talent, in our opinion, was most clearly demonstrated in the story “The History of a City,” full of sarcasm and subtle humor. Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin masterfully illustrates to the reader the history of his own collective image"dark kingdom" of the city of Foolov.

Before the eyes of the addressees passes a host of rulers of this city who were in power in XVIII-XIX centuries. Each of them manages to leave social problems without attention, while on their part compromising the city government. In particular, mayor Brudasty Dementy Varlamovich ruled in such a way that he provoked the townspeople into unrest. Another of his colleagues, Pyotr Petrovich Ferdyshchenko, (former orderly of the all-powerful Potemkin) died of gluttony while touring the lands entrusted to him. The third, Vasilisk Semyonovich Wartkin, became famous for launching real fighting and destroyed several settlements.

Instead of a conclusion

The life of Saltykov-Shchedrin was not simple. A caring and active person, not only as a writer he diagnosed the diseases of society and demonstrated them in all their ugliness for viewing. Mikhail Evgrafovich, as a government official, fought to the best of his ability against the vices of government and society.

His health was undermined by professional loss: The authorities closed the magazine “Domestic Notes”, with which the writer connected great personal creative plans. He died in 1889 and, according to his will, was buried next to Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, who had passed away six years earlier. Their creative interaction during life is well known. In particular, Mikhail Evgrafovich was inspired to write the novel “Gentlemen Golovlevs” by Turgenev.

The writer Saltykov-Shchedrin is deeply revered by his descendants. Streets and libraries are named in his honor. On small homeland, in Tver, open memorial museums, numerous monuments and busts were also installed.