Ivan Turgenev is one of greatest classics on a global scale. Thanks to his work, Russian literature became popular abroad in the 19th century. Moreover, art system, created by Turgenev, influenced the Western European novel.
A lot of interesting things can be said about literary creativity this outstanding personality . But in today’s article we will talk about Turgenev not as a writer, but as a person with an interesting and vivid biography. How did you go? early years prose writer? Where was Turgenev born? In which city did he create his most famous works?
Origin
The writer was a representative of the ancient noble family. His father, Sergei Nikolaevich, once served in a cavalry regiment. He led a carefree lifestyle, was known as a handsome man, and loved to live in grand style. He was probably quite a practical person, because in 1816 he married Varvara Lutovinova, the heiress of a huge fortune. In the small town where Turgenev was born, this lady had a huge estate. There now state museum, which will be discussed further.
When was Turgenev born? The future writer was born in 1818. Twelve years later, his father left the family - the profitable marriage turned out to be unhappy. In 1834, Turgenev Sr. died.
The classic's mother was a difficult woman. In it amazingly Feudal habits coexisted with progressive views. Despotism still prevailed in her manner of education. It has already been said above in what year Turgenev was born. Varvara Lutovinova was 25 years old by that time. She had two more sons - Nikolai and Sergei, who died in early age from epilepsy.
This woman beat not only serfs, but also her own children. At the same time, she gave each of them an excellent education. The family spoke exclusively French. But the mother of the future writer was also partial to Russian literature.
Where was Turgenev born?
Ten kilometers from Mtsensk there is a small settlement called Spasskoye-Lutovinovo. Now there is a museum-reserve dedicated to the life and work of the writer.
The Lutovinov family estate, where Turgenev was born, has a long history interesting story. The village of Spasskoye was granted to one of the representatives of an old noble family by Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century. The locality where Turgenev was born cannot be called a city. This is a small village, known today thanks to the estate, converted into a museum in the 20th century. The history of the Lutovinov estate is outlined below. Let's return to the life and work of the creator of “Spring Waters” and other wonderful books.
Early years
On my mother's estate future writer lived until he was nine years old. It is noteworthy that a serf valet instilled in him a love of literature. This man, by the way, became the prototype of one of Turgenev’s characters. In 1822 the family went to Europe. Five years later, the Turgenevs settled in Moscow.
At the age of 15, Ivan entered the literature department, where Belinsky and Herzen also studied at that time. However, I did not have the opportunity to graduate from Moscow University Turgenev Ivan Sergeevich. Where did the idea of becoming a writer come from? This happened in St. Petersburg, where the family moved after the eldest son joined the Guards artillery. Ivan Turgenev moved to the local university at the Faculty of Philosophy. Here he decided to connect his life with literature. However, initially I wanted to become not a writer, but a poet.
The beginning of creativity
And in 1834, Ivan Turgenev was a third-year student at the Faculty of Philosophy. It was at this time that his literary debut took place. He wrote dramatic poem, then showed his essay to the teacher. The literature professor was quite strict about the young author’s work. True, he answered that there was “something” in the poem. These seemingly neutral words prompted Turgenev to write a number of more poetic works. Some of them were published in the Sovremennik magazine.
Abroad
Turgenev graduated from the University in 1836. Soon he received a candidate's degree. In 1838 he left for Germany, where he actively studied ancient languages and attended lectures on Greek and Roman literature. Turgenev met Zhukovsky, Koltsov, Lermontov. There were only a few meetings with the latter, which, although they did not lead to close communication, had a certain influence on Turgenev.
Staying abroad has had strong influence on the writer's creativity. Turgenev came to the conclusion that only the assimilation of the foundations of universal human culture can bring Russia out of the darkness in which it is immersed. Since then, he has become a convinced “Westernizer.”
"Spring Waters"
In 1839, the house in which Turgenev was born burned down. In what city was the writer at that time? He then lived in Frankfurt am Main. Having learned about the fire, he returned home. But soon he left his homeland again. In Germany one day he met a girl who made a strong impression on him. Returning home once again, the writer sat down to write a novel, which, after publication, gained worldwide fame. It's about about the book " Spring waters».
Confession
In the forties, Turgenev became close to Annenkov and Nekrasov. At this time, he took an active part in the activities of the literary magazine Sovremennik. “Notes of a Hunter” were published in one of the issues. The success of the work was enormous, which inspired Turgenev to create other stories.
Turgenev was an ardent opponent of serfdom, which, according to many biographers, forced him to leave Russia so often. However, in 1848, while staying in Paris, he witnessed revolutionary events, which, as expected, were accompanied by bloodshed. From then on, he forever hated the word “revolution.”
The beginning of the 50s saw the heyday of Turgenev's creativity. Such works as “The Freeloader”, “Breakfast at the Leader’s”, “A Month in the Village” have already been published. The writer also worked on translations of Shakespeare and Byron. In 1855, Turgenev returned to Russia. Shortly before his arrival, Varvara Lutovinova passed away. See your mother in last time the writer failed.
Link
In the early fifties, Turgenev often visited St. Petersburg. After Gogol's death, he wrote an obituary, which was not missed by censors. Then the writer sent his note to Moscow, where it was successfully published. The authorities did not like the obituary, the author of which too openly admired the creator of Dead Souls. Turgenev was sent into exile in Spasskoye-Lutovinovo.
True, there is an assumption that the reason for the authorities’ dissatisfaction was not the note dedicated to Gogol’s death. In Russia, many did not like the excessive radicalism of the prose writer’s views, his suspiciously frequent trips abroad, and sympathetic stories about serfs.
Turgenev was not always able to find fellow writers common language. It is known that he left the Sovremennik magazine due to a conflict with Dobrolyubov. Turgenev preferred to communicate with Westernized writers, to whom Leo Tolstoy also belonged for some time. Turgenev had friendly relations with this writer. However, in 1861, a quarrel occurred between the prose writers, which almost ended in a duel. Turgenev and Tolstoy did not communicate for 17 years. The author of Fathers and Sons also had difficult relationships with Goncharov and Dostoevsky.
Spasskoye-Lutovinovo
The estate, which once belonged to Turgenev’s mother, is located in the Mtsensk region. After the death of Varvara Lutovinova, the writer ceded his Moscow house and profitable estates to his brother. He himself became the owner family nest, where he spent his early years. Turgenev was in exile until 1853, but after his release he returned to Spasskoye more than once. Fet, Tolstoy, and Aksakov visited him at the estate.
The last time Ivan Turgenev visited the family estate was in 1881. The writer died in France. The heirs removed almost all the furniture from the estate. In 1906 it burned down. And 12 years later, the remaining property of Ivan Turgenev was nationalized.
Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev was born on October 28 (November 9), 1818 in the city of Orel. His family, both on his mother’s and father’s sides, belonged to the noble class.
The first education in Turgenev’s biography was received at the Spassky-Lutovinovo estate. The boy was taught literacy by German and French teachers. Since 1827, the family moved to Moscow. Turgenev then studied in private boarding schools in Moscow, and then at Moscow University. Without graduating, Turgenev transferred to the Faculty of Philosophy of St. Petersburg University. He also studied abroad and then traveled around Europe.
The beginning of a literary journey
While studying in his third year at the institute, in 1834 Turgenev wrote his first poem called “Wall”. And in 1838, his first two poems were published: “Evening” and “To the Venus of Medicine.”
In 1841, having returned to Russia, he was engaged in scientific activities, wrote a dissertation and received a master's degree in philology. Then, when the craving for science cooled, Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev served as an official in the Ministry of Internal Affairs until 1844.
In 1843, Turgenev met Belinsky, they struck up a friendly relationship. Under the influence of Belinsky, new poems by Turgenev, poems, and stories were created and published, including: “Parasha”, “Pop”, “Briter” and “Three Portraits”.
Creativity flourishes
To others famous works The writer can be attributed to: the novels “Smoke” (1867) and “Nov” (1877), novellas and short stories “Diary extra person"(1849), "Bezhin Meadow" (1851), "Asya" (1858), "Spring Waters" (1872) and many others.
In the fall of 1855, Turgenev met Leo Tolstoy, who soon published the story “Cutting the Forest” with a dedication to I. S. Turgenev.
Recent years
In 1863 he went to Germany, where he met outstanding writers Western Europe, promotes Russian literature. He works as an editor and consultant, himself translating from Russian into German and French and vice versa. He becomes the most popular and read Russian writer in Europe. And in 1879 he received an honorary doctorate from Oxford University.
It was thanks to the efforts of Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev that the best works Pushkin, Gogol, Lermontov, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy.
It is worth briefly noting that in the biography of Ivan Turgenev in the late 1870s - early 1880s, his popularity quickly increased, both at home and abroad. And critics began to rank him among the best writers century.
Since 1882, the writer began to be overcome by illnesses: gout, angina pectoris, neuralgia. As a result of a painful illness (sarcoma), he died on August 22 (September 3), 1883 in Bougival (a suburb of Paris). His body was brought to St. Petersburg and buried at the Volkovsky cemetery.
Chronological table
Other biography options
Quest
We have prepared an interesting quest about the life of Ivan Sergeevich - go through it.
Biography test
A brief biography of Turgenev will be remembered much better if you pass this short test:
Biography score
New feature! The average rating this biography received. Show rating
And Van Turgenev was one of the most important Russians writers of the 19th century century. The artistic system he created changed the poetics of the novel both in Russia and abroad. His works were praised and harshly criticized, and Turgenev spent his whole life searching in them for a path that would lead Russia to well-being and prosperity.
“Poet, talent, aristocrat, handsome”
Ivan Turgenev's family came from an old family of Tula nobles. His father, Sergei Turgenev, served in a cavalry regiment and led a very wasteful lifestyle. For amendment financial situation he was forced to marry an elderly (by the standards of that time), but very wealthy landowner Varvara Lutovinova. The marriage became unhappy for both of them, their relationship did not work out. Their second son, Ivan, was born two years after the wedding, in 1818, in Orel. The mother wrote in her diary: “...on Monday my son Ivan was born, 12 inches tall [about 53 centimeters]”. There were three children in the Turgenev family: Nikolai, Ivan and Sergei.
Until the age of nine, Turgenev lived on the Spasskoye-Lutovinovo estate in the Oryol region. His mother had a difficult and contradictory character: her sincere and heartfelt care for the children was combined with severe despotism; Varvara Turgeneva often beat her sons. However, she invited the best French and German tutors to her children, spoke exclusively French to her sons, but at the same time remained a fan of Russian literature and read Nikolai Karamzin, Vasily Zhukovsky, Alexander Pushkin and Nikolai Gogol.
In 1827, the Turgenevs moved to Moscow so that their children could receive better education. Three years later, Sergei Turgenev left the family.
When Ivan Turgenev was 15 years old, he entered the literature department of Moscow University. It was then that the future writer first fell in love with Princess Ekaterina Shakhovskaya. Shakhovskaya exchanged letters with him, but reciprocated with Turgenev’s father and thereby broke his heart. Later, this story became the basis of Turgenev’s story “First Love.”
A year later, Sergei Turgenev died, and Varvara and her children moved to St. Petersburg, where Turgenev entered the Faculty of Philosophy at St. Petersburg University. Then he became seriously interested in lyricism and wrote his first work - the dramatic poem “Steno”. Turgenev spoke of her like this: “A completely absurd work, in which, with frenzied ineptitude, a slavish imitation of Byron’s Manfred was expressed.”. In total, during his years of study, Turgenev wrote about a hundred poems and several poems. Some of his poems were published by the Sovremennik magazine.
After his studies, 20-year-old Turgenev went to Europe to continue his education. He studied ancient classics, Roman and Greek literature, traveled to France, Holland, and Italy. The European way of life amazed Turgenev: he came to the conclusion that Russia must get rid of incivility, laziness, and ignorance, following the Western countries.
Unknown artist. Ivan Turgenev at the age of 12 years. 1830. State Literary Museum
Eugene Louis Lamy. Portrait of Ivan Turgenev. 1844. State Literary Museum
Kirill Gorbunkov. Ivan Turgenev in his youth. 1838. State Literary Museum
In the 1840s, Turgenev returned to his homeland, received a master's degree in Greek and Latin philology at St. Petersburg University, and even wrote a dissertation - but did not defend it. Interest in scientific activity replaced the desire to write. It was at this time that Turgenev met Nikolai Gogol, Sergei Aksakov, Alexei Khomyakov, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Afanasy Fet and many other writers.
“The other day the poet Turgenev returned from Paris. What a man! Poet, talent, aristocrat, handsome, rich, smart, educated, 25 years old - I don’t know what nature denied him?”
Fyodor Dostoevsky, from a letter to his brother
When Turgenev returned to Spasskoye-Lutovinovo, he had an affair with a peasant woman, Avdotya Ivanova, which ended in the girl’s pregnancy. Turgenev wanted to get married, but his mother sent Avdotya to Moscow with a scandal, where she gave birth to a daughter, Pelageya. Avdotya Ivanova’s parents hastily married her off, and Turgenev recognized Pelageya only a few years later.
In 1843, Turgenev’s poem “Parasha” was published under the initials T.L. (Turgenesis-Lutovinov). Vissarion Belinsky appreciated her very highly, and from that moment their acquaintance grew into a strong friendship - Turgenev even became the godfather of the critic’s son.
“This man is unusually smart... It’s gratifying to meet a person whose original and characteristic opinion, when colliding with yours, produces sparks.”
Vissarion Belinsky
In the same year, Turgenev met Polina Viardot. About true character Researchers of Turgenev’s work are still arguing about their relationship. They met in St. Petersburg when the singer came to the city on tour. Turgenev often traveled with Polina and her husband, art critic Louis Viardot, around Europe and stayed in their Parisian home. The Viardot family brought him up illegitimate daughter Pelagia.
Fiction writer and playwright
In the late 1840s, Turgenev wrote a lot for the theater. His plays “The Freeloader”, “The Bachelor”, “A Month in the Country” and “Provincial Woman” were very popular with the public and warmly received by critics.
In 1847, Turgenev’s story “Khor and Kalinich” was published in the Sovremennik magazine, created under the impression of the writer’s hunting travels. A little later, stories from the collection “Notes of a Hunter” were published there. The collection itself was published in 1852. Turgenev called it his “Annibal's Oath” - a promise to fight to the end against the enemy whom he hated since childhood - serfdom.
“Notes of a Hunter” is marked by such a powerful talent that has a beneficial effect on me; understanding nature often appears to you as a revelation.”
Fedor Tyutchev
This was one of the first works that openly spoke about the troubles and harm of serfdom. The censor who allowed “Notes of a Hunter” to be published was, by personal order of Nicholas I, dismissed from service and deprived of his pension, and the collection itself was prohibited from being republished. The censors explained this by saying that Turgenev, although he poeticized the serfs, criminally exaggerated their suffering from landlord oppression.
In 1856, the writer’s first major novel, “Rudin,” was published, written in just seven weeks. The name of the hero of the novel has become a household name for people whose words do not agree with deeds. Three years later, Turgenev published the novel “The Noble Nest,” which turned out to be incredibly popular in Russia: everyone educated person I considered it my duty to read it.
“Knowledge of Russian life, and moreover, knowledge not from books, but from experience, taken from reality, purified and comprehended by the power of talent and reflection, appears in all of Turgenev’s works...”
Dmitry Pisarev
From 1860 to 1861, excerpts from the novel Fathers and Sons were published in the Russian Messenger. The novel was written on the topic of the day and explored the public mood of the time - mainly the views of nihilistic youth. Russian philosopher and publicist Nikolai Strakhov wrote about him: “In Fathers and Sons he showed more clearly than in all other cases that poetry, while remaining poetry... can actively serve society...”
The novel was well received by critics, although it did not receive the support of liberals. At this time, Turgenev's relations with many friends became complicated. For example, with Alexander Herzen: Turgenev collaborated with his newspaper “Bell”. Herzen saw the future of Russia in peasant socialism, believing that bourgeois Europe had outlived its usefulness, and Turgenev defended the idea of strengthening cultural ties between Russia and the West.
Sharp criticism fell on Turgenev after the release of his novel “Smoke”. It was a novel-pamphlet that equally sharply ridiculed both the conservative Russian aristocracy and revolutionary-minded liberals. According to the author, everyone scolded him: “both red and white, and above, and below, and from the side - especially from the side.”
From “Smoke” to “Prose Poems”
Alexey Nikitin. Portrait of Ivan Turgenev. 1859. State Literary Museum
Osip Braz. Portrait of Maria Savina. 1900. State Literary Museum
Timofey Neff. Portrait of Pauline Viardot. 1842. State Literary Museum
After 1871, Turgenev lived in Paris, occasionally returning to Russia. He actively participated in the cultural life of Western Europe and promoted Russian literature abroad. Turgenev communicated and corresponded with Charles Dickens, George Sand, Victor Hugo, Prosper Merimee, Guy de Maupassant, and Gustave Flaubert.
In the second half of the 1870s, Turgenev published his most ambitious novel, Nov, in which he sharply satirically and critically portrayed members of the revolutionary movement of the 1870s.
“Both novels [“Smoke” and “Nov”] only revealed his increasing alienation from Russia, the first with its impotent bitterness, the second with insufficient information and the absence of any sense of reality in the depiction of the powerful movement of the seventies.”
Dmitry Svyatopolk-Mirsky
This novel, like “Smoke,” was not accepted by Turgenev’s colleagues. For example, Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin wrote that Nov was a service to the autocracy. At the same time, the popularity of Turgenev’s early stories and novels did not decrease.
The last years of the writer’s life became his triumph both in Russia and abroad. Then a cycle appeared lyrical miniatures"Poems in Prose". The book opened with the prose poem “Village”, and ended with “Russian Language” - the famous hymn about faith in the great destiny of one’s country: “In days of doubt, in days of painful thoughts about the fate of my homeland, you alone are my support and support, oh great, powerful, truthful and free Russian language!.. Without you, how not to fall into despair at the sight of everything that is happening at home . But one cannot believe that such a language was not given to a great people!” This collection became Turgenev's farewell to life and art.
At the same time, Turgenev met his last love- actress of the Alexandrinsky Theater Maria Savina. She was 25 years old when she played the role of Verochka in Turgenev's play A Month in the Country. Seeing her on stage, Turgenev was amazed and openly confessed his feelings to the girl. Maria considered Turgenev more of a friend and mentor, and their marriage never took place.
IN recent years Turgenev was seriously ill. Parisian doctors diagnosed him with angina pectoris and intercostal neuralgia. Turgenev died on September 3, 1883 in Bougival near Paris, where magnificent farewells were held. The writer was buried in St. Petersburg at the Volkovsky cemetery. The writer's death came as a shock to his fans - and the procession of people who came to say goodbye to Turgenev stretched for several kilometers.
Literary critics argue that the artistic system created by the classic changed the poetics of the second novel half of the 19th century century. Ivan Turgenev was the first to sense the emergence of a “new man” - the sixties - and showed it in his essay “Fathers and Sons”. Thanks to the realist writer, the term “nihilist” was born in the Russian language. Ivan Sergeevich introduced into use the image of a compatriot, which received the definition of “Turgenev’s girl.”
Childhood and youth
One of the pillars of classical Russian literature was born in Orel, in the ancient noble family. Ivan Sergeevich spent his childhood on his mother’s estate, Spasskoye-Lutovinovo, not far from Mtsensk. He became the second son of three born to Varvara Lutovinova and Sergei Turgenev.
Family life parents didn’t work out. The father, a handsome cavalry guard who had squandered his fortune, married not a beauty, but a wealthy girl, Varvara, who was 6 years older than him. When Ivan Turgenev turned 12, his father left the family, leaving three children in the care of his wife. 4 years later, Sergei Nikolaevich died. Soon died of epilepsy youngest son Sergey.
Nikolai and Ivan had a hard time - their mother had a despotic character. An intelligent and educated woman suffered a lot of grief in her childhood and youth. Varvara Lutovinova's father died when her daughter was a child. The mother, a quarrelsome and despotic lady, whose image readers saw in Turgenev’s story “Death,” remarried. The stepfather drank and did not hesitate to beat and humiliate his stepdaughter. Not in the best possible way treated the daughter and mother. Because of her mother’s cruelty and her stepfather’s beatings, the girl fled to her uncle, who left her niece an inheritance of 5 thousand serfs after her death.
The mother, who did not know affection in childhood, although she loved the children, especially Vanya, treated them the same way her parents treated her in childhood - her sons would forever remember their mother’s heavy hand. Despite her quarrelsome disposition, Varvara Petrovna was an educated woman. She spoke to her family only in French, demanding the same from Ivan and Nikolai. Spassky kept a rich library, consisting mainly of French books.
Ivan Turgenev at the age of 7 When Ivan Turgenev turned 9, the family moved to the capital, to a house on Neglinka. Mom read a lot and instilled in her children a love of literature. Preferring French writers, Lutovinova-Turgeneva followed literary novelties, and was friends with Mikhail Zagoskin. Varvara Petrovna knew the works thoroughly and quoted them in correspondence with her son.
The education of Ivan Turgenev was carried out by tutors from Germany and France, on whom the landowner spared no expense. The wealth of Russian literature was revealed to the future writer by the serf valet Fyodor Lobanov, who became the prototype of the hero of the story “Punin and Baburin”.
After moving to Moscow, Ivan Turgenev was assigned to the boarding house of Ivan Krause. At home and in private boarding houses, the young master took a course high school, at the age of 15 he became a student at the capital's university. Ivan Turgenev studied at the Faculty of Literature, then transferred to St. Petersburg, where he received a university education at the Faculty of History and Philosophy.
IN student years Turgenev translated poetry and the Lord and dreamed of becoming a poet.
Having received his diploma in 1838, Ivan Turgenev continued his education in Germany. In Berlin, he attended a course of university lectures on philosophy and philology, and wrote poetry. After the Christmas holidays in Russia, Turgenev went to Italy for six months, from where he returned to Berlin.
In the spring of 1841, Ivan Turgenev arrived in Russia and a year later passed the exams, receiving a master's degree in philosophy at St. Petersburg University. In 1843, he took a position in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but his love for writing and literature prevailed.
Literature
Ivan Turgenev first appeared in print in 1836, publishing a review of Andrei Muravyov’s book “Journey to Holy Places.” A year later he wrote and published the poems “Calm on the Sea”, “Phantasmagoria in moonlit night" and "Dream".
Fame came in 1843, when Ivan Sergeevich composed the poem “Parasha”, approved by Vissarion Belinsky. Soon Turgenev and Belinsky became so close that the young writer became godfather son famous critic. The rapprochement with Belinsky and Nikolai Nekrasov influenced creative biography Ivan Turgenev: the writer finally said goodbye to the genre of romanticism, which became obvious after the publication of the poem “The Landowner” and the stories “Andrei Kolosov”, “Three Portraits” and “Breter”.
Ivan Turgenev returned to Russia in 1850. He lived sometimes on the family estate, sometimes in Moscow, sometimes in St. Petersburg, where he wrote plays that were successfully performed in theaters in two capitals.
In 1852, Nikolai Gogol passed away. Ivan Turgenev responded to the tragic event with an obituary, but in St. Petersburg, at the behest of the chairman of the censorship committee, Alexei Musin-Pushkin, they refused to publish it. The Moskovskie Vedomosti newspaper dared to publish Turgenev’s note. The censor did not forgive the disobedience. Musin-Pushkin called Gogol a “lackey writer”, not worthy of mention in society, and moreover, he saw in the obituary a hint of a violation of the unspoken ban - not to remember in the open press Alexander Pushkin and those who died in a duel.
The censor wrote a report to the emperor. Ivan Sergeevich, who was under suspicion due to his frequent trips abroad, communication with Belinsky and Herzen, and radical views on serfdom, incurred even greater wrath from the authorities.
Ivan Turgenev with colleagues from Sovremennik In April of the same year, the writer was put in custody for a month, and then sent under house arrest on the estate. For a year and a half, Ivan Turgenev stayed in Spassky without a break; for 3 years he did not have the right to leave the country.
Turgenev’s fears about the censorship ban on the release of “Notes of a Hunter” as a separate book were not justified: the collection of stories, previously published in Sovremennik, was published. For allowing the book to be printed, the official Vladimir Lvov, who served in the censorship department, was fired. The cycle included the stories “Bezhin Meadow”, “Biryuk”, “Singers”, “District Doctor”. Individually, the novellas did not pose a danger, but when collected together they were anti-serfdom in nature.
Collection of stories by Ivan Turgenev "Notes of a Hunter" Ivan Turgenev wrote for both adults and children. The prose writer gave the little readers fairy tales and observation stories “Sparrow”, “Dog” and “Pigeons”, written in rich language.
In rural solitude, the classic author composed the story “Mumu”, as well as the novels “Mumu”, which became an event in the cultural life of Russia. Noble nest", "The Eve", "Fathers and Sons", "Smoke".
Ivan Turgenev went abroad in the summer of 1856. In winter in Paris, he completed the dark story “A Trip to Polesie.” In Germany in 1857 he wrote “Asya” - a story translated during the writer’s lifetime into European languages. Critics consider Turgenev's daughter Polina Brewer and illegitimate half-sister Varvara Zhitova to be the prototype of Asya, the daughter of a master and a peasant woman born out of wedlock.
Ivan Turgenev's novel "Rudin" Abroad, Ivan Turgenev closely followed cultural life Russia, corresponded with writers who remained in the country, and communicated with emigrants. Colleagues considered the prose writer controversial personality. After an ideological disagreement with the editors of Sovremennik, which became the mouthpiece of revolutionary democracy, Turgenev broke with the magazine. But, having learned about the temporary ban on Sovremennik, he spoke out in its defense.
During his life in the West, Ivan Sergeevich entered into long conflicts with Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky and Nikolai Nekrasov. After the release of the novel “Fathers and Sons,” he quarreled with the literary community, which was called progressive.
Ivan Turgenev was the first Russian writers received recognition in Europe as a novelist. In France, he became close to the realist writers, the Goncourt brothers, and Gustave Flaubert, who became his close friend.
In the spring of 1879, Turgenev arrived in St. Petersburg, where young people greeted him as an idol. Delight from the visit famous writer did not share power, letting Ivan Sergeevich understand that a long stay of a writer in the city was undesirable.
In the summer of the same year, Ivan Turgenev visited Britain - at Oxford University the Russian prose writer was given the title of honorary doctor.
The penultimate time Turgenev came to Russia was in 1880. In Moscow, he attended the opening of a monument to Alexander Pushkin, whom he considered a great teacher. The classic called the Russian language support and support “in the days of painful thoughts” about the fate of the homeland.
Personal life
Heinrich Heine compared the femme fatale, who became the love of the writer’s life, to a landscape, “at the same time monstrous and exotic.” The Spanish-French singer Pauline Viardot, a short and stooping woman, had large masculine features, a large mouth and bulging eyes. But when Polina sang, she transformed fabulously. At such a moment, Turgenev saw the singer and fell in love for the rest of his life, for the remaining 40 years.
The prose writer's personal life before meeting Viardot was like a roller coaster. The first love, which Ivan Turgenev sadly told about in the story of the same name, painfully wounded the 15-year-old boy. He fell in love with his neighbor Katenka, the daughter of Princess Shakhovskaya. What a disappointment befell Ivan when he learned that his “pure and immaculate” Katya, who captivated with her childish spontaneity and girlish blush, was the mistress of her father, Sergei Nikolaevich, a seasoned womanizer.
The young man became disillusioned with the “noble” girls and turned his attention to simple girls - serf peasant women. One of the undemanding beauties, seamstress Avdotya Ivanova, gave birth to Ivan Turgenev’s daughter Pelageya. But, traveling around Europe, the writer met Viardot, and Avdotya remained in the past.
Ivan Sergeevich met the singer’s husband, Louis, and began to enter their house. Turgenev's contemporaries, the writer's friends and biographers disagreed about this union. Some call it sublime and platonic, others talk about the considerable sums that the Russian landowner left in the house of Polina and Louis. Viardot's husband turned a blind eye to Turgenev's relationship with his wife and allowed her to live in their house for months. There is an opinion that the biological father of Paul, the son of Polina and Louis, is Ivan Turgenev.
The writer’s mother did not approve of the relationship and dreamed that her beloved offspring would settle down, marry a young noblewoman and give him legitimate grandchildren. Varvara Petrovna did not favor Pelageya; she saw her as a serf. Ivan Sergeevich loved and pitied his daughter.
Polina Viardot, hearing about the bullying of her despotic grandmother, was imbued with sympathy for the girl and took her into her home. Pelageya turned into Polynet and grew up with Viardot's children. To be fair, it is worth noting that Pelageya-Polinet Turgeneva did not share her father’s love for Viardot, believing that the woman stole the attention of her loved one from her.
Cooling in the relationship between Turgenev and Viardot came after a three-year separation, which occurred due to the writer’s house arrest. Ivan Turgenev made attempts to forget his fatal passion twice. In 1854, the 36-year-old writer met the young beauty Olga, the daughter of his cousin. But when a wedding appeared on the horizon, Ivan Sergeevich began to yearn for Polina. Not wanting to ruin the life of an 18-year-old girl, Turgenev confessed his love for Viardot.
The last attempt to escape from the embrace of a French woman happened in 1879, when Ivan Turgenev turned 61 years old. Actress Maria Savina was not afraid of the age difference - her lover turned out to be twice as old. But when the couple went to Paris in 1882, in the home of her future husband, Masha saw many things and trinkets that reminded her of her rival, and realized that she was superfluous.
Death
In 1882, after breaking up with Savinova, Ivan Turgenev fell ill. The doctors made a disappointing diagnosis - spinal bone cancer. The writer died in a foreign land long and painfully.
In 1883, Turgenev was operated on in Paris. Last months In his life, Ivan Turgenev was happy, as happy as a person tormented by pain can be - his beloved woman was next to him. After her death, she inherited Turgenev's property.
The classic died on August 22, 1883. His body was delivered to St. Petersburg on September 27. From France to Russia, Ivan Turgenev was accompanied by Polina's daughter, Claudia Viardot. The writer was buried at the Volkov Cemetery in St. Petersburg.
Calling Turgenev “a thorn in his side,” he reacted to the death of the “nihilist” with relief.
Bibliography
- 1855 – “Rudin”
- 1858 – “The Noble Nest”
- 1860 – “On the Eve”
- 1862 – “Fathers and Sons”
- 1867 – “Smoke”
- 1877 – “Nove”
- 1851-73 - “Notes of a Hunter”
- 1858 – “Asya”
- 1860 – “First Love”
- 1872 – “Spring Waters”
Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev was born on October 28, 1818 in the Oryol province. His father, Sergei Nikolaevich, is a retired hussar officer, participant Patriotic War 1812. Mother - Varvara Petrovna (nee Lutovinskaya) - came from a wealthy landowner family, so many said that Sergei Nikolaevich married her solely for money.
Until the age of 9, Turgenev lived on his mother’s family estate, Spasskoye-Lutavinovo, Oryol province. Varvara Petrovna had a tough (sometimes cruel) character and was disdainful of everything Russian, so little Vanya was taught three languages from childhood - French, German and English. Primary education the boy received from tutors and home teachers.
Turgenev's education
In 1827, Turgenev’s parents, wanting to give their children a decent education, moved to Moscow, where they sent Ivan Sergeevich to study at the Weidenhammer boarding school, and then under the guidance of private teachers.
At the age of fifteen, in 1833, Turgenev entered the literature department of Moscow University. A year later, the Turgenevs moved to St. Petersburg, and Ivan Sergeevich transferred to St. Petersburg University. Given educational institution he graduated in 1836 with the degree of a full student.
Turgenev was passionate about science and dreamed of devoting his life to it, so in 1837 he passed the exam for the degree of Candidate of Sciences.
Further education he received abroad. In 1838 Turgenev left for Germany. Having settled in Berlin, he attended lectures on classical philology and philosophy, studied the grammar of ancient Greek and Latin languages. In addition to his studies, Ivan Sergeevich traveled a lot throughout Europe: he traveled almost all of Germany, visited Holland, France, and Italy. In addition, during this period he met and became friends with T.N. Granovsky, N.V. Stankevich and M.A. Bakunin, who had a significant influence on Turgenev’s worldview.
A year after returning to Russia, in 1842, Ivan Sergeevich applied for an exam at Moscow University for a master's degree in philosophy. He successfully passed the exam and hoped to receive the position of professor at Moscow University, but soon philosophy as a science fell out of favor with the emperor and the philosophy department was closed - Turgenev failed to become a professor.
Turgenev's literary activity
After returning from abroad, Turgenev settled in Moscow and, at the insistence of his mother, entered the bureaucratic service in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. But the service did not bring him satisfaction; he was much more passionate about literature.
Turgenev began trying himself as a writer in the mid-1830s, and his first publication took place in Sovremennik in 1838 (these were the poems “Evening” and “To the Venus of Medicea”). Turgenev continued to collaborate with this publication as an author and critic for a long time.
During this period, he actively began to attend various literary salons and circles, communicated with many writers - V.G. Belinsky, N.A. Nekrasov, N.V. Gogol, etc. By the way, communication with V.G. Belinsky significantly influenced Turgenev's literary views: from romanticism and poetry he moved to descriptive and morally oriented prose.
In the 1840s, such stories by Turgenev as “The Breter,” “The Three Little Pigs,” “The Freeloader” and others were published. And in 1852, the writer’s first book, “Notes of a Hunter,” was published.
In the same year, he wrote an obituary for N.V. Gogol, which served as the reason for the arrest of Turgenev and his exile to the family estate of Spasko-Lutavinovo.
rise social movement, which occurred in Russia before the abolition of serfdom, Turgenev perceived with enthusiasm. He took part in the development of plans for the upcoming reconstruction of peasant life. He even became an unofficial employee of Kolokol. However, if the need for social and political transformations was obvious to everyone, the opinions of the intelligentsia differed regarding the details of the reform process. Thus, Turgenev had disagreements with Dobrolyubov, who wrote critical article on the novel “On the Eve”, and Nekrasov, who published this article. Also, the writer did not support Herzen that the peasantry is capable of making a revolution.
Later, already living in Baden-Baden, Turgenev collaborated with the liberal-bourgeois Vestnik-Europe. In the last years of his life he acted as a “mediator” between Western and Russian writers.
Personal life of Turgenev
In 1843 (according to some sources in 1845) I.S. Turgenev met French singer Polina Viardot-Garcia, who gave tours in Russia. The writer fell passionately in love, but he understood that it was hardly possible to build a relationship with this woman: firstly, she is married, and secondly, she is a foreigner.
However, in 1847, Turgenev, together with Viardot and her husband, went abroad (first to Germany, then to France). Ivan Sergeevich’s mother was categorically against the “damned gypsy” and deprived him of his financial support for his son’s relationship with Polina Viardot.
After returning home in 1850, relations between Turgenev and Viardot cooled. Ivan Sergeevich even started new novel With distant relative O.A. Turgeneva.
In 1863, Turgenev again became close to Polina Viardot and finally moved to Europe. With Viardot he lived first in Baden-Baden, and from 1871 in Paris.
Turgenev's popularity at this time, both in Russia and in the West, was truly colossal. Each of his visits to his homeland was accompanied by triumph. However, the writer himself found the trip more and more difficult - in 1882, a serious illness began to manifest itself - cancer of the spine.
I.S. Turgenev felt and was aware of his approaching death, but he endured it, as befits a master of philosophy, without fear or panic. The writer died in Bougival (near Paris) on September 3, 1883. According to his will, Turgenev's body was brought to Russia and buried at the Volkovskoye cemetery in St. Petersburg.