Friday, March 29

The life and work of Alexander Blok

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Speaking about the Russian literature of the late 19th – early 20th centuries, it is impossible not to recall Alexander Alexandrovich Blok. Undoubtedly, he was one of the key figures of that time. Blok’s work is not easy to perceive, but nevertheless, it was he who made modernism accessible not to a narrow circle of people, but to ordinary readers. The block is the voice of time, its spirit and power. On his birthday – November 28 – we will try to present Blok’s biography and the work of this great man as fully as possible.

Childhood and family

Alexander Alexandrovich Blok was born on November 28, 1880 in St. Petersburg in a cultured, intelligent family. My father was a professor, a lawyer and taught at the university. Mother, Alexandra Beketova, was the daughter of the rector of one of the capital’s universities.

Unfortunately, little Sasha did not live very long in a full family. Soon the parents separated, and the boy stayed to live with his mother. The father moved to live in Warsaw, occasionally meeting with his son during visits to St. Petersburg. The image of the father and their relationship in the future will influence the work of Alexander Blok and will be sung in one of his poems – “Retribution”.

The writer had excellent relations with his mother, she became his close friend, a moral example and a guide. The Beketov family had an amazing creative cultural atmosphere, scientific and literary interests were supported. Alexandra Beketova was engaged in translations and translated the works of Russian for the first time . Baudelaire. Blok’s grandfather, Andrei Beketov, was closely acquainted with Dostoevsky, Saltykov-Shchedrin. The Botkins and Tyutchevs were close family friends.

Love for the native land

As a baby, Blok was first brought to Shakhmatovo, the Beketov estate near Moscow. Here he grew up, learned to listen to the “voice of nature”, Shakhmatovo became the basis for his love for the Russian land. About 300 poems were written here and a romance developed with Lyubov Mendeleeva, a neighbor on the estate and the daughter of a great chemist. She became the lyrical heroine of the cycle “Poems about a Beautiful Lady”, and then the poet’s wife: they were married in 1903. Their relationship was far from the usual ideas about family life, but Lyubov Dmitrievna remained the closest and most important person for Blok until the end of the poet’s life. In the house 3 on Lakhtinskaya Street in St. Petersburg, the newlyweds lived for 2 years, the famous poem “Stranger” was written here.

Youth

Blok began writing poetry in earnest from the age of 17-18, from the early 1900s he became close to the symbolists Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Zinaida Gippius in St. Petersburg, with Valery Bryusov and Andrei Bely in Moscow. A landmark place for the poet’s life in 1911-1915 was the Stray Dog art cafe, where creative people of St. Petersburg gathered, where Blok read his poems and struck up relationships with ladies.

After graduating from the Vvedenskaya Gymnasium in 1889, Blok went to Germany with his mother. It was there that he met his first love – Ksenia Sadovskaya. At the time of acquaintance, the young man was 16 years old, and Ksenia was 37. There was no question of any relationship, the feelings were platonic, but very strong. Alexander grew up with a very sensual and romantic nature. The image of the beautiful Xenia impressed him so much that it was traced for a long time in his poetry, inspired him to write many works.

In the biography of Alexander Alexandrovich Blok, it is worth noting that in 1898 he graduated from the gymnasium and entered the university with a degree in law, as his father once did. But soon the young man realized that philology was much closer to him, and changed his specialty, choosing the Slavic-Russian direction.

Personal life

The poet was lucky enough to meet his only love in the person of Lyubov Mendeleeva, the daughter of a great chemist. And although he considered her his muse, support and support, the fate of their family was very difficult.

Blok’s attitude to matrimony was not entirely familiar. In the biography about Blok, it is worth mentioning that he glorified spiritual intimacy with his wife, but avoided physical connection. The poet also saw no problems in periodically falling in love and dating other women. But at the same time, he never put them on the same level as his beloved wife. Apparently, because of this, Lyubov Mendeleeva allowed herself to pay attention to other men. The family experienced a particularly difficult period when the poet A. Bely, a friend of A. Blok, intervened in their relationship. White’s passion and feelings for his comrade’s wife practically led to their duel.

Unfortunately, the family did not have any successors of the family. Their only child born was too weak in health and did not survive. Therefore, the couple remained childless.

The first cycle of poems and symbolism

Love for the wife of L. Mendeleeva in many ways inspired and predetermined the creative fate of the poet. The works trace the worship of the beloved. Her image is presented as an inexhaustible source of light and purity. She is the earthly embodiment of the Divine principle.
The collection includes 687 poems dedicated to his wife.

In addition to the image of L. Mendeleeva, Vladimir Solovyov’s philosophy left a big imprint on the collection. It was he who was obsessed with the search for the ideal of Eternal Femininity as a source of kindness, beauty and truth.
The lyrical hero of the works acts as a counterweight to the image of a Beautiful Lady. He is the personification of everything earthly, the slave of his beloved.

The collection is a real hymn of love and a concentrate of personal experiences of Alexander Blok, whose biography we continue to consider.

Blok’s initial work was connected with the popular literary current of that time – symbolism. The essence of the direction was the opposition of the real and ideal worlds. The ideal world was comprehended with the help of symbols capable of revealing the essence of being. The real world is also filled with symbols that generalize and typify life phenomena.

Poets and writers have always turned to symbols. They are found in the works of Pushkin, Lermontov, Gogol, Sholokhov, Chekhov and so on. But the symbolists created special, mystical and mysterious symbols, difficult to perceive and understandable only to a select few. They served as a link to the otherworldly, ideal and mysterious world.

For example, in a collection of poems about a Beautiful Lady, Blok actively resorts to such metaphors and symbols as darkness, night, day, sunset, dawn, reflecting the emotional experiences of the lyrical hero. In the biography of Blok, we note that after the release of this collection, he took one of the central places in the ranks of symbolists.

Revolution

Alexander Blok took the October events with great enthusiasm and hopes, urging in his article “The Intelligentsia and the Revolution” to listen “with all my heart, with all my body.” He readily accepts all changes, realizing their great task.

In 1918, he wrote his famous poem “The Twelve” – the apogee of his revolutionary sentiments. Twelve Red Guards become symbols of rapid movement forward. Russia appears to be a storm. Yes, the revolution is ruthless, yes, it demolishes everything in its path. But this is the only way to destroy the past world and open the way for a new one.
At the end of the poem, the image of the Savior appears, in whose name great deeds are done.

The poem was received ambiguously. Some were delighted, others rejected her. Even people who were once close to A. Blok, such as Z. Gippius, D. Merezhkovsky, S. Solovyov, spoke negatively about her. The anti-Bolshevik intelligentsia boycotted the Bloc after the poem was published.

The front

In 1914, the war began, which could not leave Alexander Blok indifferent. In the same year, he released a collection of “Poems about Russia”, begins to write his poem “Retribution”.
The poet could not accept violence, so he avoided mobilization in every possible way and asked friends to help him in this. But in 1916 he also found himself at the front and was sent to serve in Belarus. Fortunately for the poet, he did not participate in military operations, but simply worked as a timekeeper. The poet himself wrote about it as the most “colorless” time in his life. Not a line was written to them at the front.

After returning from the war, the life of the Block developed even more unexpectedly. In the biography of this great classic, it is worth noting 1917, when the poet became an editor in the Extraordinary Commission of Inquiry under the Provisional Government. Perhaps Blok was one of the only representatives of the intelligentsia of St. Petersburg who not only accepted the October Revolution, but also began to work in the institutions of Soviet power.

Last years of life

The last address of Blok’s life (1912-1921) is 57 Dekabristov Street. Not far from him, at 27, at the Kryukov Canal, according to experts, there is a place about which the famous poem “Night, Street, lantern, pharmacy” is written. There is still a pharmacy in the house, and a lantern shines next to it.

A real furore was caused by the poem “Scythians” written in 1918. The main character in it was Russia itself, freedom-loving and brave. Since Alexander Blok always had a hard time going through wars and was an ardent opponent of any violence, the central theme of the “Scythians” was a call for a truce, harmony, unity between Russia and the West.

The Bloc openly expresses its position on the crucial importance of Russia as a connecting link between Western and Eastern civilizations. For all its anti-war orientation and desire for peace, the Bloc emphasizes what a strong and dangerous opponent Russia can become for its enemies.

“Scythians” became the final work of the great poet. After this work, he did not write a single line until his death.

Heritage

The A.A.Blok Apartment Museum in St. Petersburg was opened for the poet’s centenary in 1980. The exposition includes literary and memorial parts. Interactive classes for children, excursions “Petersburg Block” and “Walking in Kolomna”, audio tour “Petersburg Block” are held.

The estate in Shakhmatovo was looted and burned after the revolution. The revival of Shakhmatovo began with the Blok Poetry Festivals, which have been held in early August since 1970. In 2001, a museum was opened in the restored estate. Now other buildings have been added to the main house, a restored park and the surrounding landscape, which tells about the Block no less than museum exhibits. In the village of Tarakanovo, 3 km from Shakhmatovo, the church where Alexander Blok and Lyubov Mendeleeva were married and with which the poem “The Girl sang in the church choir” is associated has been restored. There is a monument to Blok and Mendeleeva next to the church. There is an exhibition in the building of the former zemstvo school.

In April-May 2019, the festival “Days of the Block in St. Petersburg” was held for the first time. The most unusual event of it was the performance “From St. Petersburg to …”, which began at the Moscow railway station of the city, continued in the night car of the train, and then in the estates of Shakhmatovo and Tarakanovo. The audience saw the wedding of Alexander Blok and Lyubov Mendeleeva, and then witnessed the burning of the estate in Shakhmatovo and were “taken hostage” by local residents.

Author of the article: Varvara Kartushina

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