In the autumn of 1907, a young man appeared at the editorial office of the St. Petersburg comic magazine Dragonfly. He introduced himself as Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko and expressed a desire to work in the magazine. It was accepted by the publisher - M.G. Kornfeld, who had just inherited from his father a magazine known throughout Russia, but by that time had lost not only its former popularity, but also most of its subscribers. Having learned that Averchenko edited the Beach magazine in Kharkov, "" the circulation of which was slightly less than the circulation of the Dragonfly, Kornfeld invited the stranger to an editorial meeting.
Here is how Averchenko describes his first appearance in the editorial office of Dragonfly:
- You had no right to invite any provincial crooks to the meeting! - roared like a storm, impulsive Radakov. - The southern trains bring hundreds of pounds of provincial meat every day - what's the point of dragging all of them here, right?
"Yeah," Re-Mi shook his head, restrained. - Not good, not good. So I will invite someone from the street to the meeting - will you be pleased?However, when at the second meeting I proposed a couple of topics for drawings, they listened to me, discussed the topics, accepted them - and the distressed Kornfeld raised his head again.
A week later, I was already invited as editorial secretary and solemnly entered into the performance of my duties *.In 1907, young artists Re-Mi (N.V. Remizov-Vasiliev), A. Radakov, A. Junger, A. Yakovlev, Miss (A.V. Remizova) and the poet Krasny (K. M. Antipov). All of them were dissatisfied with the colorless empty "Dragonfly" and persistently suggested that the publisher reform it. Oddly enough, the appearance of Averchenko seemed to be the last push for the cautious Kornfeld to agree.* "New Satyricon", 1913, No. 28, p. 7
At one of the regular meetings of the editorial board, it was decided to turn "Strekoza" from a humorous magazine into a satirical one, reflecting the topical events of social and political life in the country. They immediately came up with a different name for the magazine. It was proposed by Radakov. He remembered the famous ancient Roman novel "Satyricon" - a colorful kaleidoscope of the nightmarish era of Nero, where the relief details of life are fancifully mixed with grotesque images of a dissolute disgusting world *.
* Gaius Petronius the Arbiter is considered its author.I liked Radakov's proposal. The free presentation of events in the "Satyricon" seemed to the editors a happy find: without restricting the author by any framework, it gave him great freedom creative imagination. The young editors of the Dragonfly also found the author's position of the creator of the Satyricon to be appropriate: he treats the creepy and vulgar world as a calm observer, not alien to humor, and sometimes poisonous irony, but without a sense of sorrow or anger.
Thus, the creative face of the new organ was determined. From April 3, 1908, instead of the Dragonfly, which had bothered everyone, the satirical magazine Satyricon began to appear, which set itself the task of morally correcting society by satire on mores. And "Dragonfly" soon completely ceased to exist.
"All who are in Lately followed the Dragonfly magazine, paid, of course, attention to those more or less noticeable reforms that were gradually invested in the basis of our magazine",- said in one of her latest numbers.“And while steadily reforming the Dragonfly, we simultaneously made an experiment in a broad sense - we founded a new magazine, Satyricon ... At the present time, in view of the ever-growing success of Satyricon, we have decided to unite both editions from June 1 ... " *.Meanwhile, the time for the heyday of satire was the most inopportune. The first Russian revolution was crushed. On June 3, 1907, Nicholas II, breaking the promises that he was forced to make to the people in the revolutionary days of 1905, dispersed the Second State Duma. A streak of gloomy reaction began, which went down in history under the name "Stolypin". Step by step, the "freedoms" won by blood were taken away.* "Dragonfly", 1908, No. 21, p. 2.
"Those were the times, Blok wrote, - when the tsarist government achieved what it wanted for the last time: Witte and Durnovo twisted the revolution with a rope; Stolypin tightly wrapped this rope around his nervous aristocratic hand. *.And if through the mouth of Gogol Russia complained: " boring life, and in the 80s she said after Chekhov: "sad to live", now she could only moan: "terrible to live".*A. Blok. Sobr. soch., vol. 6. M. - L., 1962, p. 9.
Recalling the first days of the life of the magazine, one of its employees - V. Voinov - wrote:
"Satyricon" appeared at the moment when the satirical literature of the progressive direction was finally strangled by censorship terror. The experienced "veterans" of Russian humor dominated the book market: "Alarm clock", "Shards" and "Jester". Recalling this, A. Averchenko wrote:
“It was as if a blood-red rocket took off in 1905. It took off, burst and scattered into hundreds of blood-red satirical magazines, so unexpected, frightening with their unusualness and terrible courage. Everyone walked around with their heads up in admiration and winking at each other at this bright rocket. - Here it is, freedom! .. And when a foggy bad morning came - at the place where the rocket had taken off, they found only a half-burnt paper tube tied to a stick - a vivid symbol of every Russian step - whether forward or backward ...Indeed, the revolution of 1905 caused an unprecedented flourishing of satirical journalism. One after another, acutely topical magazines and magazines were published: "Spectator", "Hammer", "Machine Gun", "Signal", "Arrows", "Zhupel" and many others. Cocky and angry, they painfully offended the ministerial elite, often attacked the "August royal family", boldly cracked down on the royal generals and governors. Shebuev's "Machine Gun" with a bloody Trepov's hand on the manifesto about freedoms went around the whole of Russia. Shebuev altered Trepov's famous order: "Do not spare cartridges." In a satirical interpretation of the magazine, he sounded like an appeal to the people: "Don't spare thrones."The last sparks of the rocket went out gradually back in 1906, and 1907 was already a year of complete darkness, gloom and despondency.
From the horizon represented by the newsboy's leather bag, such magnificent, invigorating names as "Machine Gun", "Dawn", "Bogey", "Spectator", "Glow" disappeared - and still took pride of place driven into a corner - quiet , peaceful "Birzhevye Vedomosti" and "Word".
During this period, everyone who had already managed to get used to the laughter, irony and caustic audacity of the "red" in color and content of satirical magazines, again remained with the four former old men, who were all about a hundred and fifty years old in complexity: with "Dragonfly", "Alarm Clock", " Jester" and "Shards".
When I arrived in St. Petersburg (this was at the beginning of 1908), the ominous faces of the “mother-in-law” and “the merchant who got drunk at the masquerade”, the “summer resident oppressed by the dacha”, etc., were already looking into the windows of the editorial offices. characters of Russian humorous leaflets, who have been eating this half-rotted rubbish for decades. The feast was over ... The guests, intoxicated with free speeches, were taken to the districts, to various "transporters", "loners", and only resigned ones were left to sit at the table filled with wine and littered with leftovers: "country husband", "evil mother-in-law" and "merchant drunk at a masquerade.
What is called poor relatives. Thus, I arrived in the capital at the most unfortunate moment - not only to the hat analysis, but even towards the end of this hat analysis, when almost everyone received a hat. *.
* "New Satyricon", 1913, No. 28, p. 6.
In the magazines of 1905-1906, a whole system of allegories and symbols was invented. So, a small freak with a bump on the crown of the head meant Nicholas II, a herd of donkeys - the royal family, a ringed mustache - Stolypin, a mustache upright, up - Golovin, etc. Readers willingly speculated and supplemented what the magazine could only hint at. A single line of revelations was created, which was especially well seen in the best satirical magazine of those years - The Spectator. According to V. Botsyanovsky, "The satirical spectators turned out to be more perspicacious than those who stood in the center, held the reins of government in their hands, bearers of "firm power", who knew the secret of saving Russia "with a strong sovereign" at the head" *.
* V. Botsyanovsky And E. Hollerbach. Russian satire of the first revolution, L., 1925, p. 141.But in an unequal battle with tsarism, the brave "Spectator" and his allies were defeated. Their life, as a rule, was very short: the police persecuted the editors, the "seditious" issues of the magazines were taken from the newspapermen and burned. After the suppression of the revolution, the atmosphere for the existence of a satirical press became completely unbearable. Black-Hundred humorous organs appeared: Harness, Whip, Sting, Veche, and the like.
Here is how the program of one of them was formulated: "Beat as much as you like!" "Be-r-register!",- the editors of "Knut" warned their enemies. “We won’t put shame on our heads, we won’t put hats on our hands either, we’ll beat them for glory ... And be there - what will happen! ... With a boom, with a whistle, in the old, Russian way .... Watch out, you bastard!" *.
* "Knut", 1908, No. 2, p. 2.These "truly-Russian" magazines portrayed the workers as fools because they believed the socialists, Russia as a mighty hero who fell ill with revolutionary leprosy, and the revolution as the Serpent Gorynych.
In a policy statement, "Knut" confidently reported: "Oh, how would we have our will, my dear! If only you and I could clear up all the muck, we would bring out all the evil spirits, we would humble all those who are arrogant, we would enlighten the unreasonable." The "burning satire" that these magazines promised the reader was in fact a vicious slander against the people and the revolutionary parties.
The pages of the Black Hundred "satirical" publications were full of such miserable verses. Unbridled chauvinism, anti-Semitism, pogrom calls were accompanied by loud words about love for the fatherland, the tsar and the Orthodox faith. There is no need to even talk about the artistic side of this kind of pogrom journalism: illiterate publications were the most base.
Under such conditions, a peculiar kind of humor arose and began to develop in Russian literature - laughter from despair. Under the yoke of reaction, satire turned black: malicious irony and poisonous sarcasm prevailed. "Laughter among the ruins" - this is how the talented satirist O.L. d "Or. In the preface to the collection of his stories, he advised readers to laugh better than cry over a damned life. Caught in a quagmire - what to do, cry? "Wow, better laugh, reader!", - wrote O.L. d "Or *.
* O.L. d "Or. Laughter among the ruins. SPb., 1912, p. 10."There was no laughter, humor was eaten by "famous wombs", Sasha Cherny stated sadly.
The funny has become synonymous with the terrible in the works of L. Andreev. Bloody nightmare, madness and horror he calls the word "laughter". "Red laughter" for Andreev is a symbol of human blood flowing in rivers. The student from his story "Laughter" weeps uncontrollably while everyone around him rolls with laughter at the mere sight of him. "Laughing sadly"- such remarks can often be found in Andreev's plays. The reader is shocked by the ominous, inhuman laughter of Tyukha in the drama Savva. There is an explosion in the monastery. Tyukha looks with fear at the face of his brother Savva and says: "Savka, shut up! I'll laugh." And when the enraged crowd brutally kills Savva, Tyukha laughs long and uncontrollably. "Laughter breaks through fingers, grows, becomes unstoppable and turns into a squeal" *.
* L. Andreev. Full coll. cit., vol. VI. SPb. 1913, pp. 293, 294, 304.Of course, L. Andreev's laughter is an image-symbol, but it is a symbol of horror. What can one really sincerely laugh at in our terrible days, L. Andreev asked. And he answered the readers in the feuilleton "Sincere Laughter", written in 1910: "For sincere laughter, you need something quite simple, clear as day, as simple as a finger, but a finger placed in the conditions of supreme comedy." The author finally found such a situation: he bursts into sincere, pure and pleasant laughter. It turns out, says Andreev, "My grandmother, walking along the garden path, stumbled upon an outstretched rope and fell with her nose right into the sand. And the fact is that I myself extended the rope" *.
* L. Andreev. Full coll. cit., vol. IV, p. 188.Andreev's feuilleton is thoroughly ironic. From such "sincere laughter" the reader becomes uneasy. When A. Kuprin in the 30s set out to find the most essential thing in the nature of Russian humor, he noted precisely this feature: Gogol's laughter through tears. Kuprin admitted that he did not see humor in Chekhov's "Surgery" or in the famous Chekhov dog Nero, who ate puppies.
"We laughed heartily, - he explains , - when in front of us a respectable person fell upside down on the sidewalk and got up with a blotch on his nose; we burst into laughter at the clumsy peasant who unscrewed the nuts from the railroad rails onto the weights for catching the shalesper and who, at the trial, could not understand his guilt at all. Until now, we are shaking with laughter when we read Averchenko's story about a Jewess who took her youngest daughter, sick with eyes, to the ophthalmologist Girshman, and only in the middle of a very long journey she suddenly realized that she was carrying not the youngest, but the eldest, healthy daughter , which she hastily confused with the patient.At "laughter through tears" there was another shade that can be called - "resisting evil with laughter." Writers were guided by a well-known proverb: "trouble with laughter is feasible, trouble with tears is unbearable." Let us refer at least to A. Izmailov's story "Humorist". It depicts a colorful portrait of a rural deacon, a merry fellow and amuser. For many versts in a circle, people pass on to each other the witty jokes of this deacon, talk about his eccentric tricks."What can I say, - Kuprin continues, - we had many talented writers who make up our eternal national pride, but humor was not given to us. "From the coachman to the first poet, we all sing sadly" *.
* "Revival". Paris, August 9, 1932, No. 2625, p. 3.
And so the bishop, who came with an audit to the village where the "humorist" lives, accidentally talking with him, learned the sad story of the life of this merry fellow: he is seriously ill, his wife drowned herself, his son is a bitter drunkard. The amazed bishop asks the deacon why he jokes so readily and often. "A game of imagination, sorry, - the deacon answers. - Only if without it - I don’t know how I would have lived in the world! Again, this is how I decided once and for all in myself: because I will always whimper in front of people, there will be neither light nor joy for anyone. Only people are sad. So I let on myself, as if I don’t know how much fun it is. And I will have time to grieve at home" *.
* A.A. Izmailov. Stories. SPb., 1912, p. 124.The humor of despair was characteristic of the psychology of the "Stolypin" era in Russia. "If you mark in a person or in any society, so to speak, the history of his laughter - how he laughs, what he laughs at when he laughs, - wrote Vorovsky, - we will obtain the richest material for the study of his psychology"*.
* V.V. Vorovsky. Literary-critical articles. M., 1956, p. 416."Laughter Through Tears" revealed certain features of the psychology of Russian society in an atmosphere of ferocious government reaction. An example of such humor is given by Gorky in Russian Fairy Tales, saying that the Russian people - "fun people"."Reassured" by Stolypin, he sings the following ditty:
Finally, the progressive magazine Rudin wrote about the darkest kind of humor:
"There is also the so-called "laughter through tears", there is the bitter "laughter of those sentenced to the gallows - Galgenhumor", there is laughter, the naive and pure laughter of the doomed, who laugh like children to fill with joy and happiness last minutes given to them by fate before inevitable death. But for this laughter, one must either be a deep thinker, who has known to the end the cruel irony of life, or a child ... "*Laughter through tears, of course, had many different variations. Some satirists hid under it the fear of the revolution and hatred for it, others - deep pessimism, indifference to public life, others - only a temporary crisis of spirit and hope for recovery. Among the satirists of the right camp, humor was tinged with fear of inevitable death. So, A. Basargin (A.I. Vvedensky) in "Moskovskie Vedomosti" wrote about the crow of the revolution, which hovered over the camp of masters, inexorably reminding of death. Then he writes, and motives from the Geisha sounded in literature:* "Rudin", 1916, No. 8, p. 15.
For many employees of the "Satyricon" laughter was a means to hide from life, to forget for a moment about the terrible and difficult. Perhaps Sasha Cherny said it best of all in the preface to the poem "Oasis": When the soul is gloomy, like a coffin,
For the writers of the Bolshevik camp, "laughter through tears" did not at all mean unbelief and despair. Remembering Vorovsky's humor, A.V. Lunacharsky wrote:
“His wit was inexhaustible. With his humor and sarcasm, he helped himself to survive the most difficult times, he fought off the onset of all darkness with this sparkling weapon. the same victorious, truly Apollonian smile" *.So, if for some writers laughter was a "magic alcohol" that helps to hide from life, then for others it served as a "sparkling weapon" in the fight against reaction. This is their main difference, although both of them seemed to speak in the same way about the need for cheerfulness and optimism. In fact, some called forward, through the difficulties of everyday life - to the holiday of the revolution, others, on the contrary, called for humbleness before everyday life and try to enliven them with laughter, to poeticize them.* A.V. Lunacharsky. Sobr. soch., vol. 8. M., 1967, p. 401.
The theme of everyday life was very characteristic of Russian literature after 1905. Writers who preferred to stay "above the fray" found in it a kind of revelation. Like the eighties, they created a cult of weekdays and gray people. “People don’t want to put up with the idea that the holiday has passed, weekdays have come, and they don’t celebrate, and don’t work, but Monday, get drunk,- wrote the Bolshevik newspaper Social Democrat. And just as faith in an uninterrupted holiday was strong before, so many now believe in eternal Monday." *.
* "Social Democrat", January 24, 1910.In the first years of the reaction, a whole trend arose in Russian society, which chose "eternal Monday" as its motto. It combined radical phraseology with reactionary discrediting of the recent revolutionary past. A special "Monday" press appeared: the newspapers "Monday", "Free Thoughts", "The Bronze Horseman", "Vesti Monday", etc. They came out on Monday, the day when there were no other periodicals.
Vorovsky wrote about these publications:
"... As if symbolizing its role of a hangover after a heavy feast, this trend timed its activity to Monday, the day when they "wash their teeth", cleanse themselves of the intoxication of the previous day. on the back of the head of a crumpled top hat, there was a "Monday" press, resolving with a cheeky gesture questions of politics, social life, ethics, literature, art - and all this with kondachka, all with an aplomb that does not allow objections " *.The most disgusting manifestation of "Monday" literature was the flat snarling of street satire. The desire to shake the foundations of the old world, which arose at the beginning of the 20th century, gave rise to a need for laughter. However, the scope of the satire was immediately artificially narrowed for "reasons beyond the editor's control." As Vorovsky wrote in those years, "Unfortunately, the authors of the comical in life possessed the magical power of preventing the comical from entering literature"*. Under such conditions, a demand for laughter was born, almost the same market demand as for fabrics or fashionable furs.* V.V. Vorovsky. Literary Critical Articles, p. 407.
* V.V. Vorovsky.- ironically Sasha Cherny.
Under the influence of this demand, a whole galaxy of laughing and laughing writers, professional laughers, appeared. Almost every major newspaper started a department of "small feuilleton", a special tabloid satirical press appeared, such as the newspaper "Kopeyka".
Darkness and gloom reigned all around,- Vorovsky wrote in the article "Scalvus saltans", - and they laughed. Public thought was driven into a narrow circle, where, apart from literature and art, nothing was left to it, and they all laughed. And when they had nothing else to laugh at, they pounced on fine literature and began to laugh at it. They wrote parodies, cartoons, caricatures" *.
* V.V. Vorovsky. Literary Critical Articles, p. 417.Empty scoffing determined the content of tabloid satire.
Flat street humor indulged the tastes of the townsfolk. Her fat "uterine" laugh sounded like an ominous dissonance in Russian literature. For this "literature" there was nothing sacred; over all human ideals, she cackled with relish and merrily. Gorky in his feuilleton "Uncle Vitya" cited an example of impudent "Jewish" laughter, typical of this "satire":
M. Gorky wrote indignantly about the vulgarization of the high rank of a writer, about the corruption of the personality of the modern bourgeois intellectual. "A new type of writer was born in Great Rus', he stated sadly, this is a public jester, an amuser of the philistinism greedy for entertainment, he serves the public, and not his homeland, and serves not as a judge and witness of life, but as a beggar accustomed to the rich. He publicly mocks himself ... apparently, the laughter and affection of the public is more precious to him than her respect " *.
* M. Gorky. Sobr. soch., vol. 24. M., 1953, p. 68."Judas Laughter" was the most disgusting form of satire of those years. He reigned in the Black Hundreds and tabloid press organs; like a poisonous infection sometimes penetrated the bourgeois-liberal press. It can be found in the yellow "Argus", and in the illiterate "Rodina", and in the petty-bourgeois "Niva", and in the hairdresser's "Awakening", and in such cheap publications as "Spark", "Blue Journal", "World Panorama "and others. Shameless sneer was generated by the social mood that prevailed among the bourgeois intelligentsia after the defeat of the revolution of 1905. Political indifference, "polytheism", extreme individualism brought to life this all-disregarding laughter. The motto of periodicals reflecting the worldview of this part of Russian society could be the famous picture from the magazine "Spring", which depicted a naked lady, and at the bottom was the signature:
Such a program was adhered to by many liberal publications, which were not specifically satirical in nature, but assigned a well-known place to satire. While flaunting their "non-partisanship", these bodies rushed unprincipledly from one bourgeois party to another in evaluating events, never losing sight of the interests of the literary market. With everything individual difference they had one thing in common - unscrupulousness elevated to a principle, openly professed lack of ideas.
"Polytheism" was, in essence, a convenient and pleasant form of apoliticality, since it did not oblige anyone to anything. Of course, the non-party, supra-class nature of the Russian intelligentsia was deceptive, apparent. It was during this period that V. I. Lenin wrote that in a class society there are no and cannot be writers who are free from society and who do not depend on the class interests of this or that social group*.
* Cm. IN AND. Lenin. Full coll. cit., vol. 12, pp. 103-104.The period of the Stolypin reaction and the years that followed it are noteworthy precisely because they completed the process of disengagement. various groups within the Russian intelligentsia. A significant part of it openly or secretly went into the service of the bourgeoisie that had seized the dominance, an insignificant minority joined the movement of the proletariat. Finally, that part of it that wanted to remain "independent", stubbornly believing in its "superclass" existence and saving mission, began to slowly perish or decompose. By 1917, when the delimitation of political parties had reached the highest degree, the illusory nature of the "above-class" position became obvious. But until this happened, this part of the intelligentsia stubbornly believed that its position was the only correct one and in every way glorified its "non-partisanship."
All this should be remembered when speaking about the character and direction of the Satyricon. The disagreements that subsequently arose within the satyricon editorial board clearly reflected the process of the ideological demarcation of the Russian intelligentsia.
Nevertheless, in the beginning, "Satyricon" actively opposed two negative trends in the development of satire of that time: the wretched spitefulness of the Black Hundreds humor and the shameless scoffing of the street press. The editors of the new magazine set themselves the goal of cheering up the despondent Russian society with the help of "resisting evil with laughter" or giving it "magic alcohol" to drink.
The appearance of the "Satyricon" was an event in the literary life of Stolypin's Russia. The reader, who had just survived the era of "freedom of speech", urgently demanded from the satirists topical responses to all the questions that worried him. Meanwhile, the last of the magazines glorifying the "political spring" - "The Gray Wolf" - was banned in 1908 by order of the government *.
* O. Dymov, O.L. d "Or, Sergey Gorny, N. Verzhbitsky and other satyricists.The Satyriconists contrasted their work with the toothless humor of "Jester", "Alarm Clock" and "Shards". After the revolution of 1905-1907. the demand for these publications finally fell. The Russian public, who bought the forbidden numbers of "Machine-gun" and "Signal" from under the floor, could no longer be satisfied with empty, lightweight humor. Ridiculing his "neighbors" in satire, A. Averchenko defined their face as follows:
"Alarm": An old man with trembling hands, blind-sighted, giggling with creaky causeless laughter. He comes out in an old dressing gown with bright stains, and if you open this dressing gown, then, like Plyushkin's, you can see that there is nothing under the dressing gown.And finally - "Shards". Averchenko spoke about them even more angrily:"Jester", once shining against the backdrop of dreary colorless publications, he himself turned into wretched clown, without the slightest sign of originality and spark of wit. Now his decrepitude is premature, and his appearance is despondent to the extreme.
“There was an honest, pretty magazine in which Chekhov, Budischev and others worked under Leikin. Now it is a cocotte that fell on the slope of its days, painted with penny colors, joyless, with its primitive seduction with the help of a badly drawn leg or a famously drawn female thigh” * .Naturally, the satyriconists tried in every possible way to dissociate themselves from such literary brethren.* "Satyricon", 1908, No. 34, pp. 5-6.
In the first issue of the Satyricon, the editors stated:
"We will scourging and mercilessly all the lawlessness, lies and vulgarity that reign in our political and public life ... Laughter, terrible poisonous laughter, like the stings of scorpions, will be our weapon" *.
* "Satyricon", 1908, No. 1, p. 2.The first eight issues of the magazine were edited by A. Radakov, from the ninth issue A. Averchenko became the editor and soul of the magazine. Under his leadership, "Satyricon" has become a publication born of living modern life. The Russian reader found on the pages of the "Satyricon" an apt description of the political situation in Russia, a satirical depiction of social mores.
The magazine widely promoted foreign humor: English, French, German. "Satyricon" from issue to issue reprinted cartoons from German humorous magazines: "Simplicissimus", "Fliegende Blatter", "Meggendorfers Blatter", "Kladderadatsch", "Jugend", etc. Therefore, contemporaries perceived "Satyricon" as Russian "Simplicissimus".
>>Magazine "Satyricon"
Writers smile
Magazine "Satyricon"
How many forgotten pages in the history of Russian literature! And how you want to stop the movement of time! Readers of the "General History Processed by the Satyricon" have such an opportunity.
This is an amazing edition. The history of mankind - from ancient times to early XIX century - told not by pundits who draw knowledge from ancient books, studying letters and manuscripts, and funny and witty people - satirical writers.
The appeal to long-gone events and people for the authors was only an excuse to humor look at modern life. The decision itself was not original. In 1868, A. K. Tolstoy created a satirical work "The History of the Russian State from Gostomysl to Timashev", where he told the reader that "Our land is rich, / There is only no order in it." True, the author did not manage to see the poem printed, apparently, such historical parallels were not to the liking of the publishers.
The creators of the "General History ..." were more fortunate. Their offspring saw the light in 1910. Book was released as free app to the magazine "Satyricon".
Despite its young, three-year age, "Satyricon" was known and had its own reader. And it was not easy, since in Russia in the first decade of the 20th century many humorous magazines appeared. “In that vague, unstable, perilous time, the Satyricon was a wonderful outlet from which fresh air poured,” recalled A. Kuprin.
The magazine brought together young talented writers: Ark. Averchenko, Sasha Cherny, taffy, O. Dymova, A. Bukhova and others. A. Kuprin, L. Andreev, A. N. Tolstoy were published in it ... In 1913, after the editorial split, the Satyricon ceased to exist. There was another of his birth - about Paris. To participate in the publications were involved I. Bunin, Sasha Cherny. B. Zaitsev, A. Kuprin, artists A. Benois, M. Dobuzhinsky, K. Korovin. In the third "Satyricon" the novel by L. Ilf and E. Petrov "The Golden Calf" was reprinted, and this was noted by readers. Soon, due to lack of funds and sharp satirical materials, the magazine ceased to be published. Thus closed another page of the national literary chronicle.
In 1911, the General History, processed by the Satyricon, was published. It would seem that what can be found funny in coups d'etat, in numerous wars, epidemics and similar events of the past, information about which has come down to us?
Get acquainted with an excerpt from the “General History Processed by the Satyricon”, prepared by Teffi (1372 -1952), nee Lokhvitskaya Nadezhda Alexandrovna, a prose writer, poet, playwright.
Peru Taffy belongs to the section " Ancient history, opening the book. She enthusiastically joins the general "clownery", creating a witty story ancient world. Teffi ironically plays with the logical constructions of pseudoscientific works (“The upbringing of children was very harsh. Most often they were immediately killed. This made them courageous and persistent”); hyperbolizes clichés (“Ancient history is such a history that happened extremely long ago”)...
Literature, 8th grade. Proc. for general education institutions. At 2 o'clock / auth. V. Ya. Korovin, 8th ed. - M.: Enlightenment, 2009. - 399 p. + 399 p.: ill.
One of the most beloved magazines in St. Petersburg at the beginning of the 20th century was Satyricon. It originated in the depths of the editorial office of the old humorous magazine "Dragonfly", at one time also beloved by readers, but by 1905 already rather bored. The young satirist Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko, who published the Beach magazine in Kharkov and moved to St. Petersburg, was invited to the editorial meeting of the Dragonfly. His appearance at first caused general discontent and grumbling - why invite an outsider to discuss internal editorial affairs? But a week later, Averchenko, who suggested several sharp and funny topics for cartoons, became indispensable and began working as an editorial secretary.
At that time, a number of talented young artists collaborated with Dragonfly: Re-Mi (N.V. Remizov-Vasiliev), A. Radakov, A. Yakovlev, Miss (A.V. Remizova), the poet Krasny (K.M. Antipov). Under the influence of Averchenko, the editorial office decided to publish a new magazine, Satyricon. This name was proposed by Radakov - by analogy with the well-known novel by the ancient writer Gaius Petronius the Arbiter "Satyricon". The direction of the new magazine was supposed to be ironically venomous, but the irony was supposed to be graceful and calm, without anger and fury - as in the aforementioned novel.
"Satyricon" began to appear in April 1908. In June, both editions - "Dragonfly" and "Satyricon" - merged under a new name. In addition to the named artists and poets "Dragonflies", the best satirists and comedians of the capital were involved in work in the "Satyricon" - Peter Potemkin, Sasha Cherny, Teffi.
New magazine arose in difficult conditions, when despondency and decline were intensifying, and laughter from accusatory and impudent turned into a means of oblivion, distraction from troubles and pain. The Satyriconists themselves felt this. No wonder Sasha Cherny, one of the magazine's brightest poets, wrote:
And laughter, magical alcohol,
Against earthly poison
Ringing, swaying pain,
Like waves of a dead naiad.
But the "Satyricon" by some miracle remained sharp and caustic for a long time; later, the satyriconites began to skillfully use Aesopian language.
In the first issue of the magazine, the editors addressed the readers: "We will scourging and mercilessly all the lawlessness, lies and vulgarity that reign in our political and public life. Laughter, terrible, poisonous laughter, like the stings of scorpions, will be our weapon." The "Satyricon" was a kind of anomaly and allowed itself rather bold antics. The objects of his satire were the State Duma, its individual deputies and parties, the government and local authorities, including governors general, and reactionary journalists.
It featured, for example, cartoons with captions like this:
Lucky: Sorry, I'm not wearing a tie.
- Well, thank the Creator.
It was a transparent allusion to "Stolypin's ties" - that is how the gallows loops were ironically called at that time - a type of execution so common in the era of Stolypin's premiership.
Another caption under the cartoon parodied the famous conversation between Chichikov and the peasants about the location of the village of Zamanilovka:
“And where, brothers, is your constitution?”
- Not a constitution, but an execution?
No, the constitution.
- Execution, it will be to your left, but there is no constitution! It is called so, that is, its nickname is execution, but there is no constitution at all.
The methods of work of a friend and collaborator of A.S. Suvorin, an unprincipled journalist V.P. Burenin, were ridiculed in the poems of P. Potemkin:
A chizhik rides in a boat
In the rank of admiral
Do not drink vodka
For this reason?
The vodka is bought
Splashing in the decanter...
Do not scold Kuprin
For this reason?
Stolypin's statement: "The government and the state will steadfastly stand guard over the people's representation, protecting the Duma from the powerless attempts of the black crow" - was accompanied by a caricature: a black double-headed eagle claws at the Duma.
The Satyriconians were very friendly with each other: they were united by youth, talent, common satirical goals, and the ability to laugh. “The staff of Satyricon,” recalled Chukovsky, “of a young magazine, at one time were inseparable from each other and went everywhere in a crowd. Seeing one, you could say in advance that you would see the others now. Ahead was the chubby Arkady Averchenko, a burly man, very prolific a writer who filled almost half of the magazine with his humor. Radakov, an artist, a laugher and a bohemian, picturesquely shaggy, walked beside him ... "
But times were getting tougher. More and more often, satires "on the Turkish sultan" had to be published, and the heading "Persian affairs" had to be introduced. The magazine began to appear more and more often with "blank spots" and announcements from the editorial board about materials removed from the issue by censorship. The satire became smaller, turned its edge on the layman and his vices. In the "Satyricon" laughter became bitter, tragic, hopeless notes sounded in it.
In 1913 was introduced new law about the seal, to which the magazine responded with Re-Mi's cartoon "Sad Note" with the caption: "Editor (standing over a black coffin). Of course I knew that the press bill would be shelved, but I didn't think it would be that shape." The death of Foma Opiskin was immediately reported - it was the pseudonym Averchenko, who stood under the sharpest materials. In the same year, there was a final split in the editorial board of the Satyricon: a group of employees led by Averchenko began to publish the New Satyricon, which lasted until the beginning of 1918.
Russian emigrants in the 30s tried to revive the Satyricon. In 1931, M. Kornfeld gathered a group of satyricists in Paris and began publishing the magazine again. The first issue of the revived Satyricon was published in April 1931. V.Azov, I.Bunin, V.Goryansky, S.Gorny, Don-Aminado (A.P. Shpolyansky), B.Zaitsev, A.Kuprin, Lolo (Munstein), S.Litovtsev, A. Remizov, Sasha Cherny, S. Yablonovsky. The art department consisted of A. Benois, I. Bilibin, A. Gross, M. Dobuzhinsky, K. Korovin and others. The revived "Satyricon" did not have much success (only about 20 issues came out). The lack of ties with his homeland harmed him much more than the lack of funds.
Sasha Cherny in 1931, in memory of the magazine dear to his heart, composed the following nostalgic poems:
Over the Fontanka gray-gray
In the good old Petersburg
In low cozy rooms
The Satyricon flourished.
Outside the window were full of barges
With white-barreled firewood,
Opposite Dvor Apraksin
I drank ocher into the sky.
In low cozy rooms
It was noisy and...
crazy drawings
Spread across all tables...
(Based on the book: Muravyova I.A. Former Petersburg. The Age of Modernity. - St. Petersburg: Publishing House "Pushkin Fund", 2004)
Name: Arkady Averchenko
Age: 43 years
Place of Birth: Sevastopol, Russia
A place of death: Prague, Czechoslovakia
Activity: Russian writer, satirist
Family status: unknown
Arkady Averchenko - Biography
Arkady Averchenko is the author of many satirical stories. His works are also interesting to modern readers, because they contain subtle humor, with the help of which the writer managed to expose human weaknesses and vices that are invariably present in society at all times.
Arkady Averchenko - Early years
Arkady Averchenko was born on March 30, 1881. The hometown of the satirist is Sevastopol. The father was a small merchant whose business was so unsuccessful that it led the family to complete ruin. The future writer, as evidenced by his autobiographical works, was forced to receive education at home, with the help of his older sisters. At the age of fifteen, Averchenko left his native city and joined the Donetsk mine as a clerk. And three years later he got a job in one of the Kharkov joint-stock companies. During this period, the future writer began to write short stories.
The beginning of the work of Arkady Averchenko
The first work in the creative biography of Arkady Averchenko, which was published in the Kharkov literary magazine, was created in 1902. The story was called "The ability to live." But the attention of critics attracted another creation. "Righteous" - a story that was published in St. Petersburg. The revolutionary events of 1905 inspired the young writer. He created during this period many essays, feuilletons, which for the most part were banned by censorship.
Arkady Averchenko - Satyricon
Since 1908, Averchenko worked as a secretary in the editorial office of one of the St. Petersburg periodicals. He was able to completely reorganize the work in this organization. First of all, he changed the name of the magazine. "Satyricon" - such a name had literary magazine, which, under Averchenko, was especially popular with readers. The publication paid great attention to revolutionary, political and social topics. Arkady Averchenko managed to work on the magazine not only with authors working in the genre of satire, but also with such outstanding prose writers and poets as Leonid Andreev, Alexander Kuprin.
New Satyricon of Arkady Averchenko
Of course, the main employee of the "Satyricon" - the most reading magazine Petersburg at the beginning of the century - Averchenko himself appeared. But eight years after joining the editorial office of Averchenko, a split occurred in the magazine. Averchenko's journal was the New Satyricon. None of this periodical did not go out without a small satirical work of its founder.
Over the years, Averchenko's literary skills have been honed, and a unique style of the writer has been developed. The main and characteristic properties of Averchenko's stories were exaggeration and the depiction of some kind of anecdotal situation, which was often brought by the author to sheer absurdity. His stories were not plausible, and therefore enjoyed even greater success with the so-called intelligent public. By the way, the very word "intelligent" was introduced into everyday speech not without the assistance of the "satirikonists".
Arkady Averchenko - Special style
The staff of the magazine, headed by its editor-in-chief, extremely valued their reputation. They ignored base tastes, stupid buffoonery and direct political engagement were not inherent in them. In their essays and articles, the staff of the journal expressed a somewhat mocking disloyalty. Their position favorably differed in the then literary world, where there was no censorship at all.
The February Revolution was certainly welcomed by Averchenko and his associates. But then unbridledness and “democratic” lawlessness reigned in Russia, which caused the writer to be wary. Like many representatives of the intelligentsia, the Satyriconists perceived what was happening in the country as a monstrous misunderstanding. In the works of the now Soviet writer, the sharpest humor, bordering on black, began to be present. Such grotesqueness is inherent in the work of Bulgakov, Ilf, which indicates the influence of the greatest social change on literature and art.
Arkady Averchenko - Emigration and death
In 1918, the New Satyricon was banned by the new authorities. Averchenko fled to the South, where he continued to write and published several anti-Bolshevik essays. In 1920 he managed to leave for Constantinople. Abroad, the writer felt relatively comfortable, because he had the opportunity to communicate with Russian emigrants. Subsequently, Averchenko moved to the Czech Republic, where his works were widely popular. Most of them have been translated into Czech. In 1925, the Russian writer passed away after a long serious illness. Averchenko was buried in Prague.
Among the satirical magazines, of which there were a great many in Russia at the beginning of the last century, "Satyricon" occupies a special place. Without a doubt, he enjoyed the greatest fame of all of them, as he was the most vivid spokesman of his time: he was even quoted at Duma meetings.
Main authors
The Satyricon group took shape by 1908; The first issue of the magazine came out on April 3rd. Humorous drawings and caricatures signed by Radakov (1879-1942), Remi (pseudonym of Remizov-Vasiliev), Benois, Dobuzhinsky began to appear on the pages of the new weekly magazine. These drawings were often accompanied by small poems; in addition, the magazine devoted much space to satirical poetry. Among the permanent employees of the "Satyricon" should be called Pyotr Potemkin (1886 - 1926), Vasily Knyazev (1877 - 1937 or 1938), acmeist Sergei Gorodetsky (1884 - 1967), Vladimir Voinov (1878 - 1938), Evgeny Vensky (pseudonym of Evgeny Pyatkin, 1885 - 1943), Krasny (pseudonym of Konstantin Antipov, 1883 - 1919), Samuil Marshak (1887 - 1964), Arkady Bukhov (1889 - 1946), Vladimir Likhachev (1849 - 1910), Dmitry Censor (1877 - 1947), Nikolai Shebuev (1874 - 1937).
Sasha Cherny, undoubtedly the most gifted of the authors of the group, left the magazine in 1911, having managed to publish many works there.
Of the prose writers of the group, besides Averchenko, Teffi (pseudonym of Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, married Buchinskaya, 1872 - 1952), Osip Dymov (pseudonym of Osip Perelman) ...
"New Satyricon"
In 1913, a crisis occurred in the journal, most of its authors left Kornfeld and founded the New Satyricon, the first issue of which went out of print on June 6. The old magazine still continued to appear: Knyazev, Valentin Goryansky (pseudonym Valentina Ivanova, 1888-1944) and several other writers remained there, but in 1914, after the 16th issue was published, the magazine ceased to exist. The New Satyricon flourished for some time and attracted a number of young writers, among whom were Alexei Budischev (1867-1916), Georgy Vyatkin (1885-1941), Chuzh-Chuzhenin (pseudonym of Nikolai Faleev, 1873-30s) and Mayakovsky, who published in it the poems of 1915-1916 and his "hymns".
Content and focus of the journal
The magazine "Satyricon" was very diverse in content and direction: it reflected the tastes of the public and certain literary trends of its time. The public wanted it to be satirical. Responding to this wish, the journal revived and became to strengthen the old tradition of Russian literature. He proclaimed Saltykov-Shchedrin as his teacher, which is proved by the issue specially dedicated to his memory (“New Satyricon”, No. 17), published on the 25th anniversary of the writer’s death in 1914. Bukhov mentions this in his poem “Remember!”, placed in the issue:
...Many of you...
Picks up drops of caustic bile,
Dropped by a smart old man.
However, after the revolution of 1905, this tradition acquired a very special character in the world of the press. In the period 1905-1906, many satirical publications began to be published: "Hammer", "Machine Gun", "Bogey", "Masks", "Gadfly", "Zarnitsa", "Red Laughter", etc., in which they appear, alternating each friend, caricatures and poems, often signed by famous names from the Art World or from the Symbolist school. satire was usually extremely harsh and harsh, excluding any humor, in most cases painted in tragic tones: it was a time when images of death, blood, murder filled both painting and literature.
The Satyricon group, responding to the tastes of the time (close to Leonid Andreev), picked up this tradition and contributed to it. Many times the magazine has placed in very gloomy tones allusions to repression against the opposition, for example, under the guise of descriptions of executions by impalement in Persia.
Thus, on the one hand, the Satyricon develops themes that exclude laughter a priori. In his works, despair sounds, both political and moral, which sometimes really becomes a commonplace. Some poems openly fall into revolutionary pathos. Knyazev is especially inclined to him.
“Now,” Averchenko writes, “all of Great Rus' is writhing in its sleep, immersed in mortal boredom.” This phrase was designed for a comic effect: boredom and vulgarity were considered shameful, and it was customary to constantly remind them that they were opposed by ideals, enthusiasm, noble spiritual impulses; but this almost obligatory recommendation has long been more of a rhetorical formula than a real source of inspiration.
About whom wrote "Satyricon"
In fact, the only social stratum with which the pages of the Satyricon are filled is precisely the petty bourgeoisie, that philistinism, whose presence is felt among both the readers and the authors of the magazine. Krasny's poem, dated 1908, demonstrates, perhaps not quite consciously for the author himself, that the old Russian myths are losing their power. The poem is built on the contrast between the topics of conversations in society (freedom, homeland, indignation, sacrifice) and their material basis- restaurant, party, etc. (No. 10, 1908):
Oh, what could be prettier
Than walking in the world of searching,
Where the path is glorious only by sacrifice...
But much more interesting
Read about it in the novel
And sigh over coffee...
Perhaps the intention of the poet was to ridicule the softness of the average intellectual, but the effect produced by the poem is quite different, because the polarity of these ideas is too ridiculous.
Parody in a magazine
The magazine's output was rich in both old and new techniques. The first place among them was occupied by parody - a genre that is satirical in itself. The authors of the "Satyricon" did not neglect the opportunity to ridicule new literary trends, such as symbolism, futurism (for example, Bukhov's poem "The Legend of the Terrible Book" (1913) presents Futurist poems as the most terrible torture for the reader that one can imagine). Egofuturism (Igor Severyanin) has become a favorite target for parody. The archaic style was willingly used, with the help of which the most striking effect of the grotesque was created (for example, Shebuev's ode to universities, designed in the style of the Russian XV111th century, No. 37, 1913).
Often parody coexisted with a serious tone so covertly that contemporaries did not even always notice it. So, for example, Goryansky gave his collection "My Fools" the subtitle "Lyrical satires". Sasha Cherny uses this technique almost everywhere, and one of the letters to Kranichfeld proves that the poet used it quite consciously. He writes: "Humor, satire and lyricism are combined in the same poem..." Some of Bukhov's poems could be mistaken for those written by one of the Symbolists ("To the Poets").
Potemkin especially shone in this crafty genre. He was associated with the Symbolist milieu, frequenting the Stray Dog cabaret, staging some of his plays at the Crooked Mirror Miniature Theatre. In his collection Ridiculous Love (1908), there are also themes characteristic of Russian romantics and symbolists - masks, dolls, and it is not clear whether one should look for the funny in the serious or the serious in the funny. Later, namely in his collection of poems "Geranium" (1912), the poet will move away from this genre and come to a purely comic, more sincere and simpler.
Techniques of fairy tales and folk art in the "Satyricon"
Another favorite technique of the "Satyricon" is a fairy tale. Here its authors willingly followed Kozma Prutkov, in whom they recognized their predecessor. In 1913, a special issue (No. 3) was dedicated to his memory. One of the employees of the Satyricon, Boris Vladimirovich Zhikovich, signed the name Ivan Kozmich Prutkov, as the son of a fictional writer. Nevertheless, his tales are, as a rule, satirical, they do not contain absurdity, like Kozma Prutkov's. Thus, the fable "Brains and the Night" (1914) makes fun of spiritualism, although it is written in Prutkov's style.
"Satyricon" willingly used sources folk art: fairground comedy, quatrains in the style of ditties, which Potemkin and Knyazev collected from the villages. If Knyazev’s ditties serve to “simplify” poetry, then Potemkin, especially in Geranium, with the help of folk style, introduces very lively comic motifs into the descriptions of the life of the St. Petersburg common people (“Groom”).
He did not drink fuselage,
But I drank a little
Copper in the ear
He wore an earring.
Here, the comic is achieved by introducing into the verses the language and habits of the common people: a clerk, an artisan, a worker, a petty merchant, and so on. Such poetry, typically urban and comically good-natured, anticipates the genres that would develop in the 1920s.
Pseudo-childish poetry
And finally, the authors of the "Satyricon" willingly used the form of pseudo-children's poetry. Thus, The Stranger's "Children's Song" (1913), written in response to the new restrictions on the press, portrayed the censors as obedient children:
Like Vanya-Vanyushka
The nannies turned up
Nannies are sad
Strict bosses...
But this literary device, created at first as a satirical one, gradually grows into a special genre, into a style that loses its original orientation. Subsequently, many of the poets of the Satyricon write specifically for children and influence future authors of this genre (the most famous of them is Samuil Marshak). Often they imitate English nursery rhymes and songs, as, for example, Vyatkin, who wrote a poem about the python "The Fifth".
Style of English humor
Some authors adopted the style of English humor, and the first among them was Teffi, whose stylistic devices and turns are examples of a purely English manner. Such, for example, is “the captain, who looked around with round eyes with the air of a man just taken out of the water” (“Instead of Politics”). Taffy's plots reproduce the technique of English humor, which achieves a comic effect, introducing absurdity into everyday situations - for example, a plot about a petty official who won a horse in the lottery and found himself in a hopeless situation, as she quickly brought him to complete ruin ("Gift Horse" ). In addition, the "Satyricon" often published foreign humorists, in particular Mark Twain.
Wordplay
However, the humor of the Satyricon was not only borrowed. Its best authors were able to continue the Russian comic purely verbal direction, based not only on a pun, but also on the semantic collision of words, on a joke that comes from a sound play on words, going back to Gogol.
Taffy's play on words is often brought to the point of absurdity, it causes laughter, as it introduces a whole family of words that sound like nonsense. So, for example, a boy, coming from school, asks adults: “Why do they say “anthem-Asia” and not say “anthem-Africa”?” ("Instead of politics"). Kulikov picks up Kozma Prutkov's play on the words "villa" and "pitchfork" in order to make a poem with a "social" sound on this material: the dream of a rich man - "villa" is opposed to the peasant's dream of new pitchforks ("Two thoughts", 1908). But here the social content pales next to the comic absurdity of the pun.
The Satyricon group, therefore, in its work stands, as it were, on two piles, on two traditions - satirical and humorous, which at that time were not too sharply divided, since humor was often mistaken for satire. Such a mixture prevented the authors of the magazine, at least most of them, from reaching the heights of humor (in the metaphysical sense), satire, in turn, lost its liveliness, degraded, fell into didactics and lost significance.
Nevertheless, the Satyricon remained the legitimate heir of Kozma Prutkov and paved the way for the flourishing of humorous literature that came later, in the 1920s.
Used book materials: History of Russian Literature: XX century: Silver Age / Ed. Zh. Niva, I. Serman and others - M .: Ed. group "Progress" - "Litera", 1995
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