Little-known facts from the life of Pushkin

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

1. Pushkin remembered himself from the age of 4. He talked several times about how once while walking he noticed how the earth swayed and the columns tremble, and the last earthquake in Moscow was recorded just in 1803. And, by the way, at about the same time, the first meeting of Pushkin with the emperor took place - little Sasha almost fell under the hooves of the horse of Alexander I, who also went for a walk. Thank God, Alexander managed to hold the horse, the child was not hurt, and the only one who got scared in earnest was the nanny.

2. Once the house of the parents of Alexander Pushkin was visited by the Russian writer Ivan Dmitriev. Alexander was then still a child, and therefore Dmitriev decided to play a trick on the boy's original appearance and said: "What an arab!" But the ten-year-old grandson of Hannibal was not taken aback and instantly gave the answer: "But not a hazel grouse!" The adults present were surprised and terribly embarrassed, because the face of the writer Dmitriev was ugly pockmarked!

3. Once one of Pushkin's acquaintances, officer Kondyba, asked the poet if he could come up with a rhyme for the words cancer and fish. Pushkin replied: "Fool Kondyba!" The officer was embarrassed and offered to compose a rhyme for the combination of fish and cancer. Pushkin was not at a loss even here: "Kondyba is a fool."

4. When he was still a chamber junker, Pushkin appeared one day in front of a high-ranking person who was lying on the sofa and yawning with boredom. When the young poet appeared, the high-ranking person did not even think to change his position. Pushkin gave the owner of the house everything he needed and wanted to leave, but was ordered to say an impromptu.

Pushkin squeezed out through clenched teeth: "Children on the floor - smart on the couch." The person was disappointed impromptu: “Well, what's so witty - children on the floor, smart on the couch? I can't understand … I expected more from you. " Pushkin was silent, and the high-ranking person, repeating the phrase and moving the syllables, finally came to the following result: "The kid is half-witted on the sofa." After the sense of the impromptu reached the owner, Pushkin was immediately and indignantly thrown out the door.

5. During the period of courting his future wife Natalya Pushkin told his friends a lot about her and usually said:

“I am delighted, I am fascinated, In short - I'm fired up!"

6. And this funny incident, which happened to Pushkin during his stay at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, shows how witty and resourceful the young poet was. Once he decided to run away from the lyceum to Petersburg for a walk. I went to the governor Trico, but he would not let him in, and even scared that he would be watching Alexander. But hunting is worse than bondage - and Pushkin, together with Kuchelbecker, escapes to St. Petersburg. Trico followed.

Alexander drove up to the outpost first. He was asked his surname, and he replied: "Alexander However!" The zastavny wrote down the surname and let it pass. Kuchelbecker drove up next. When asked what his name was, he said: "Grigory Dvako!" The zastavny wrote down the name and shook his head doubtfully. Finally, the tutor arrives. The question is: "What is your surname?" Answers: "Tricot!" “You’re lying,” the zastavny shouts, “there’s something bad here! One by one - One, Two, Three! You are naughty, brother, go to the guardhouse! " Trico spent the whole day under arrest at the outpost, while Pushkin and his friend calmly walked around the city.

7. Little Pushkin spent his childhood in Moscow. His first teachers were French governors. And for the summer, he usually went to his grandmother, Maria Alekseevna, in the village of Zakharovo near Moscow. When he was 12 years old, Pushkin entered the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, a closed educational institution with 30 students. At the Lyceum, Pushkin seriously studied poetry, especially French, for which he was nicknamed "French".

8. Pushkin got to the Lyceum, as they say, through pull. The Lyceum was founded by Minister Speransky himself, the enrollment was small - only 30 people, but Pushkin had an uncle - a very famous and talented poet Vasily Lvovich Pushkin, who personally knew Speransky.

9. The Lyceum published a handwritten magazine "Lyceum sage". Pushkin wrote poetry there. Once he wrote: "Wilhelm, read your poems so that I fall asleep as soon as possible." Offended, Kuchelbecker ran to drown himself in the pond. They managed to save him. Soon a cartoon was drawn in the "Wise of the Lyceum": Kuchelbecker is drowning, and his long nose sticks out of the pond.

10. In 1817, the first graduation of lyceum students took place. Having passed 15 exams during seventeen days in May, including Latin, Russian, German and French literature, general history, law, mathematics, physics, geography, Pushkin and his friends received their Lyceum diplomas. The poet was 26th in academic performance (out of 29 graduates), showing only "excellent success in Russian and French literature, as well as in fencing."

11. It is known that Pushkin was very loving. At the age of 14, he began visiting brothels. And, already being married, he continued to visit the "gay girls", and also had married mistresses.

12. It is very curious to read not even the list of his victories, but the reviews of different people about him. His brother, for example, said that Pushkin was bad in himself, small in stature, but for some reason women liked him. This is confirmed by an enthusiastic letter from Vera Alexandrovna Nashchokina, with whom Pushkin was also in love: "Pushkin was brown-haired with strongly curly hair, blue eyes and extraordinary attractiveness." However, the same brother of Pushkin admitted that when Pushkin was interested in someone, he became very tempting. On the other hand, when Pushkin was not interested, his conversation was sluggish, boring and simply unbearable.

13. Pushkin was a genius, but he was not handsome, and in this respect he contrasted with his beautiful wife Natalia Goncharova, who, at the same time, was 10 cm taller than him. For this reason, while attending balls, Pushkin tried to stay away from his wife: so that those around him would not see such an unpleasant contrast for him.

14. Popov, a gendarme official of the III department, wrote about Pushkin: "He was in the full sense of the word a child, and, like a child, he was not afraid of anyone." Even his literary enemy, the notorious Thaddeus Bulgarin, covered with Pushkin's epigrams, wrote about him: "Modest in his judgments, amiable in society and a child to his liking."

15. Pushkin's laughter produced the same enchanting impression as his poems. The artist Karl Bryullov said about him: "What a lucky Pushkin! He laughs so much that it looks like the guts are visible." And in fact, Pushkin all his life argued that everything that arouses laughter is permissible and healthy, and everything that kindles passions is criminal and pernicious.

16. Pushkin had gambling debts, and quite serious ones. True, he almost always found means to cover them, but when there were some delays, he wrote evil epigrams to his creditors and drew caricatures of them in notebooks. Once such a sheet was found, and there was a big scandal.

17. Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich advised Pushkin to quit the card game, saying;

- She spoils you!

- On the contrary, Your Majesty, - answered the poet, - cards save me from the blues.

- But what then is your poetry?

- She serves me as a means to pay off my gambling debts. Your Majesty.

And indeed, when Pushkin was burdened with gambling debts, he sat down at his desk and worked them off overnight in one night. Thus, for example, he has "Count Nulin" written.

18. While living in Yekaterinoslav, Pushkin was invited to one ball. That evening he was in a special shock. Lightning jokes flew from his lips; ladies and maidens vied with each other to capture his attention. Two guards officers, two recent idols of the Yekaterinoslav ladies, not knowing Pushkin and considering him some kind of, probably, a teacher, decided, at all costs, to "overconfuse" him. They come up to Pushkin and, bowing their heads in the most incomparable way, address:

- Mille pardon … Not having the honor of knowing you, but seeing you as an educated person, we allow ourselves to turn to you for a little clarification. Would you be so kind as to tell us how to put it right: "Hey man, bring me a glass of water!" or "Hey man, bring a glass of water!"

Pushkin vividly understood the desire to make fun of him and, not in the least embarrassed, answered seriously:

- I think you can put it bluntly: "Hey, man, drive us to the watering hole."

19. In one literary circle, where more enemies and less friends of Pushkin gathered, where he himself sometimes dropped in, one of the members of this circle wrote a libel on the poet, in verse, under the title "Message to the Poet". Pushkin was expected on the appointed evening, and he arrived late as usual. All those present were, of course, in an agitated state, and especially the author of the "Message", who did not suspect that Alexander Sergeevich had already been warned about his trick. The literary part of the evening began with the reading of this particular "Message", and its author, standing in the middle of the room, loudly proclaimed:

- "Message to the Poet"! - Then, turning to the side where Pushkin was sitting, he began:

- I give the poet a donkey's head …

Pushkin quickly interrupts him, turning more towards the audience:

- And he will stay with which one?

The author was confused:

- And I will stay with mine.

Pushkin:

- Yes, you just gave it.

General confusion ensued. The defeated author fell silent.

20. According to the calculations of the Pushkinists, the clash with Dantes was at least the twenty-first challenge to a duel in the poet's biography. He initiated fifteen duels, of which four took place, the rest did not take place due to the reconciliation of the parties, mainly through the efforts of Pushkin's friends; in six cases the challenge to a duel came not from Pushkin, but from his opponents. Pushkin's first duel took place at the Lyceum.

21. It is known that Aleksandr Sergeevich was very fond of his lyceum comrade Kuchelbecker, but he often arranged practical jokes for him. Kuchelbecker often visited the poet Zhukovsky, pestering him with his poems. Once Zhukovsky was invited to some friendly dinner and did not come. Then he was asked why he had not been, the poet replied: "I had upset my stomach the day before, besides, Kuchelbecker came, and I stayed at home …" Pushkin, hearing this, wrote an epigram:

I ate too much at supper

Yes, Jacob locked the door blindly -

So it was to me, my friends, And küchelbeckerno, and sickening …

Kuchelbecker was furious and demanded a duel! The duel took place. Both fired. But the pistols were loaded … with cranberries, and, of course, the fight ended in peace …

22. Dantes was a relative of Pushkin. At the time of the duel, he was married to the sister of Pushkin's wife, Ekaterina Goncharova.

23. Before his death, Pushkin, putting his affairs in order, exchanged notes with Emperor Nicholas I. Notes were transmitted by two prominent people: V. A. Zhukovsky - a poet, at that time educator of the heir to the throne, the future Emperor Alexander II, and N. F. Arendt - physician-in-chief of Emperor Nicholas I, Pushkin's physician.

The poet asked for forgiveness for violating the tsar's prohibition on duels: "… I'm waiting for the tsar's word to die peacefully …"

Sovereign: "If God does not order us to see each other in this world, I send you my forgiveness and my last advice to die a Christian. Do not worry about your wife and children, I take them in my arms." It is believed that Zhukovsky gave this note.

24. Of the children of Pushkin, only two left offspring - Alexander and Natalya. But the poet's descendants now live all over the world: in England, Germany, Belgium … About fifty live in Russia. Tatyana Ivanovna Lukash is especially interesting. Her great-grandmother (Pushkin's granddaughter) was married to Gogol's grand-nephew. Now Tatiana lives in Klin.