Evgeny Petrov - biography, information, personal life. E

PETROV Evgeny (1902-1942); MUNBLIT Georgy Nikolaevich (b. 1904) 98 The audience will squeal and cry. Film "Anton Ivanovich is angry" (1941), scenes. E. Petrov and Moonblit, dir. BUT.

According to the rules in force at all times, the biography of a creative person consists of facts, conjectures and outright fictions. The biography of the famous Soviet writer Yevgeny Petrov was no exception. It is true that the child was born in Odessa, a city by the Black Sea. The father's surname is Kataev. Even many readers of our days know about the writer Valentin Kataev. But not everyone knows that Valentin is the older brother, and Eugene is the younger. In life, it so happened that the youngest had to work under a pseudonym in order to avoid confusion on a historical scale and in solving everyday issues.

Education Kataev Jr. received in a classical gymnasium. In the early 1920s, after the completion civil war Eugene came to Moscow after his older brother. Before that, he managed to work at home in the criminal investigation department. The work left its mark on the memory for a long time, and on the basis of these “traces”, the young writer wrote the story “The Green Van”, based on which the film of the same name was made twice. Due to the circumstances, the career of a detective in the capital did not work out, and the visiting Odessa resident had to retrain as a journalist. He was initially good at humorous and satirical essays.

It should be emphasized that natural data - intelligence and excellent memory - allowed Eugene to as soon as possible get used to the literary environment of the capital. The first humoresques and sketches from life saw the light on the pages of the Red Pepper magazine. After some time, Petrov took the position of executive secretary of this publication. At that time, a young and energetic journalist was called a “multi-station operator”. He had the strength and imagination to write several texts at once and send them to different editions. A similar practice is used today, but such a load is not within the power of every subject who stains paper.

Creativity is like life

The personal life of Evgeny Petrov has developed simply and even tritely. In the turmoil of editorial affairs, he fell in love with the girl Valentina, who turned out to be eight years younger than the groom. Husband and wife, as they say, coincided in character, upbringing and temperament. The family was formed once and for all. And each child was born as a unique product. The Petrovs had two sons. And each literary work was prepared for release, like a beloved child. Such harmony in family relationships is extremely rare.

Meanwhile, life in the country flowed and seethed. Already accomplished writer and journalist Yevgeny Petrov set himself and solved large-scale tasks. Some critics note that the novels "12 Chairs" and "The Golden Calf" created in collaboration with a colleague in writing Ilya Ilf became the pinnacle of his work. For a significant number of connoisseurs, the names of the authors - Ilf and Petrov - have become an idiom, a stable combination. Among those noticed and appreciated is their book One-Storied America. Before reading these travel notes, Soviet people knew little about how the American people live in the outback.

When the war began, Evgeny Petrov began to work as a correspondent in the Soviet Information Bureau - the Soviet Information Bureau. At the same time, he sent his materials from active army in the newspapers Pravda, Krasnaya Zvezda, Ogonyok magazine. War correspondent Petrov died in a plane crash in 1942, returning from a mission to Moscow. After his death, collections of his works "Moscow is behind us" and "Front diary" were published.

Russian satirist Evgeny Petrovich Petrov ( real name- Kataev) was born on December 13 (November 30 according to the old style), 1903 (according to some sources - in 1902) in Odessa.

His father, Petr Vasilyevich Kataev, was the son of a priest from the city of Vyatka, a teacher at the diocesan and cadet schools in the city of Odessa. Mother - Evgenia - a Ukrainian from Poltava, who bore the surname Bachey as a girl, died shortly after the birth of her second son. The elder brother is Valentin Kataev, a future writer.

The Kataevs had an extensive family library, but classic literature did not attract Eugene. He read books by Gustave Aimard, Robert Louis Stevenson and others. He dreamed of becoming a detective, he was attracted by adventures.

In 1920, Yevgeny Kataev graduated from the fifth Odessa classical gymnasium. He worked as a correspondent for the Ukrainian Telegraph Agency, then as a criminal investigation inspector in Odessa.

In 1923 he moved to Moscow, where he continued his education and took up journalism.

In 1924, the first feuilletons and stories appeared in the satirical magazine "Red Pepper" under the pseudonym Petrov, also under the name of Gogol's "Foreigner Fedorov". Used a satirist and other pseudonyms. He did not want another writer with the surname Kataev to appear.

Before starting cooperation with Ilya Ilf, Evgeny Petrov published more than fifty humorous and satirical stories in various periodicals and published three independent collections.

In 1926, while working for the Gudok newspaper, Yevgeny Petrov met Ilya Ilf. Their joint work began: they processed materials for the Gudok newspaper, composed themes for drawings and feuilletons in the Smekhach magazine.

In the summer of 1927, Ilf and Petrov made a trip to the Crimea and the Caucasus, visited Odessa. They kept a joint travel diary. Later, some impressions from this trip were included in the novel "The Twelve Chairs", which was published in 1928 in the monthly literary magazine "30 Days". The novel was a great success with readers, but was rather coldly received by literary critics. Even before the first publication, censorship severely reduced it. Soon the novel began to be translated into many European languages, and it was published in many European countries.

Their next novel was The Golden Calf (1931). Initially, it was published in parts in the monthly "30 days".

In September 1931, Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov were sent to the exercises of the Red Army in the Belarusian military district, based on the materials of the trip, the essay "Difficult Topic" was published in the magazine "30 Days".

Since 1932, Ilf and Petrov began to be published in the Pravda newspaper.

In 1935-1936, the writers made a trip to the United States, which resulted in the book One-Story America (1937).

In collaboration with Ilya Ilf, the short stories "Unusual Stories from the Life of the City of Kolokolamsk" (1928-1929), the fantastic story "A Bright Personality" (1928), the short stories "1001 Days, or New Scheherazade" (1929) and others were written.

Ilf's death in 1937 interrupted creative collaboration writers.

Petrov did a lot to perpetuate the memory of his friend. In 1939, he published Ilya Ilf's Notebooks, and later decided to write a novel called My Friend Ilf. The novel was not completed, only separate sketches and detailed versions of the plan have been preserved.

Peru Yevgeny Petrov owns a number of screenplays. In collaboration with Ilya Ilf, Black Barracks (1933), Once Upon a Summer (1936) were created, in collaboration with Georgy Moonblit - Musical History (1940), Anton Ivanovich Gets Angry (1941) and others. scripts were written for the films "Quiet Ukrainian Night" and "Air Carrier". He worked on the script for the film "The Circus", but in the end demanded that his name be removed from the credits.

In 1941, Petrov became a war correspondent for Pravda and the Soviet Information Bureau. Often and for a long time he was at the front.

On July 2, 1942, Yevgeny Petrov died while returning by plane from the besieged Sevastopol to Moscow. The writer was buried in the Rostov region in the village of Mankovo-Kalitvenskaya.

Many films based on the works of Ilf and Petrov were staged: The Golden Calf (1968), The Twelve Chairs (1971), Ilf and Petrov Ride in a Tram (1972) and others. Based on the play by Evgeny Petrov The Island of the World (published in 1947) filmed the cartoon "Mr. Walk" (1950).

Evgeny Petrov was awarded the Order of Lenin and a medal.

The writer's wife was Valentina Grunzaid. Their children: Pyotr Kataev (1930-1986) - a famous cameraman who shot almost all the films of Tatyana Lioznova; Ilya Kataev (1939-2009) - composer, author of a number of popular songs and music for films.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from open sources

On December 13 (November 30 according to the old style), 1902, the satirist writer, journalist and screenwriter Yevgeny Petrov (pseudonym of Yevgeny Petrovich Kataev) was born. In collaboration with I.A. Ilf (Iekhiel-Leib Aryevich Fainzilberg), he created the world-famous novels The Twelve Chairs and The Golden Calf, a number of feuilletons and satirical stories; in collaboration with G. Moonblit - scripts for the Soviet films "Anton Ivanovich is angry" and "Musical history". Father of cameraman Pyotr Kataev ("Seventeen Moments of Spring") and composer Ilya Kataev ("I'm Standing at a Half-Station").

early years

O early years and the childhood of Evgeny Petrov (Kataev) little is known. For a long time there was confusion in the Kataev family even with the year of his birth. It was believed that Eugene was six years younger than his older brother Valentin, and therefore should have been born in 1903. This date appears to this day in a number of literary and cinematographic reference books. But quite recently, Odessa local historians discovered documents that undeniably testify: the year of birth of Yevgeny Kataev is 1902. The confusion was most likely due to the fact that Yevgeny was born at the end of the year (December), and his older brother Valentin in January 1897.

The father of the Kataev brothers, Pyotr Vasilyevich Kataev, served as a teacher at a diocesan school in Odessa. Mother - Evgenia Ivanovna Bachey - daughter of General Ivan Eliseevich Bachey, from the Poltava small local noble family. Subsequently, V. Kataev gave the name of his father and the surname of his mother to the main, largely autobiographical hero of the story “The Lonely Sail Turns White” Petya Bachey. The prototype of the younger brother Pavlik - the victim of the first expropriation of the future revolutionary - was, of course, Yevgeny.

As it turned out later, during the period of the revolution and the Civil War, the Kataev brothers did not participate in the revolutionary movement. On the contrary, in Odessa in 1920, Valentin was in the officer underground, the purpose of which was to prepare for the meeting of the probable Wrangel landing from the Crimea. In August 1919, Odessa had already been liberated from the Reds once by a simultaneous strike by a white landing detachment and an uprising of underground officer organizations. The main task of the underground group was to capture the Odessa lighthouse, so the Cheka called the conspiracy "the Wrangel conspiracy at the lighthouse." According to one version, the idea of ​​a conspiracy could have been planted on the conspirators by a provocateur, since the Cheka knew about the conspiracy from the very beginning. The Chekists led the group for several weeks, and then arrested all its members. Along with Valentin Kataev, his younger brother Yevgeny, a high school student, most likely, had nothing to do with the conspiracy, was also arrested.

The brothers spent six months in prison, but were released, thanks to a happy accident. From Moscow or Kharkov, a certain superior officer came to Odessa with an inspection, whom V. Kataev called Yakov Belsky in his stories to his son. Most likely, V.I. Narbut, a poet, a prominent Bolshevik, the head of UKROSTA in Kharkov, was hiding behind this “pseudonym”. Subsequently, he provided patronage to V. Kataev in Moscow, but in the 1930s he was repressed, and his name was no longer mentioned in well-known literary memoirs. Be that as it may, this high-ranking figure remembered Kataev Sr. from his speeches at Bolshevik rallies in Odessa. The patron, of course, did not know anything about the voluntary service of the future writer with Denikin and his participation in the officer underground, and therefore managed to convince the Chekists of the innocence of both Kataev brothers. The rest of the participants in the "conspiracy at the lighthouse" were shot at the end of 1920.

From the “Double Biography” written jointly with Ilya Ilf, it is known that E. Petrov graduated from the classical gymnasium in 1920. In the same year he became a correspondent for the Ukrainian Telegraph Agency (UKROSTA). After that, during three years served as a criminal investigator. His first " literary work”was a protocol for examining the corpse of an unknown man.

While studying at the gymnasium, a classmate and close friend of Eugene was Alexander Kozachinsky, a nobleman by his father, who later wrote adventure story"Green Van" The prototype of the protagonist of the story - the head of the Odessa district police department Volodya Patrikeev - was Yevgeny Petrov.

Sasha and Zhenya have been friends since childhood, and subsequently fate brought their lives together in the most bizarre way.

Kozachinsky, a man of adventurous temperament and great charm, also joined the militia, but soon gave up detective work. He led a gang of raiders operating in Odessa and the surrounding area. Ironically, in 1922, it was Yevgeny Kataev, then an employee of the Odessa Criminal Investigation Department, who arrested him. After a chase with gunfire, Kozachinsky hid in the attic of one of the houses, where he was discovered by a classmate. Eugene had the opportunity to shoot the armed bandit during the arrest, but he did not. Subsequently, Kataev achieved a review of the criminal case and the replacement of A. Kozachinsky with an exceptional measure of punishment (execution) for imprisonment in a camp. In the autumn of 1925, Kozachinsky was amnestied. At the exit from the prison he was met by his mother and true friend, Evgeny Kataev.

Vadim Lebedev, a journalist for the Sovershenno Sekretno publication, is finishing his essay "Green Van" amazing fact, once again emphasizing the inexplicability and even the supernatural nature of the connection that existed between these people: “1941 separated them. Petrov goes to the front as a war correspondent. Kozachinsky is sent for evacuation to Siberia for health reasons. In the autumn of 1942, having received news of the death of a friend, Kozachinsky fell ill, and a few months later, on January 9, 1943, a modest obituary appeared in the newspaper Sovetskaya Sibir: “Soviet writer Alexander Kozachinsky died”.

That is, in the years that have passed since Kozachinsky's release from prison, he managed to become a "Soviet writer." By the way, E. Petrov also contributed to this. Throughout his life, he felt responsible for the fate of this man: he insisted on his moving to Moscow, introduced him to the literary environment, gave him the opportunity to realize his talent as a journalist and writer. In 1926, he arranged for A. Kozachinsky as a journalist in the same editorial office of the Gudok newspaper. And in 1938, E. Petrov persuaded his friend, with whom they once read Mine Reed, to write the adventure story "The Green Van" (in 1983, it was interestingly filmed). Now we understand what is behind the last lines of the "Green Van": "Each of us considers himself indebted to the other: I - for the fact that he did not once shoot me from a mannlicher, and he - for the fact that I planted on time."

Evgeny Petrov

In 1923, the future Evgeny Petrov arrived in Moscow, where he was going to continue his education and start literary work. But initially he managed to get a job only as a warden in the Butyrka prison. Subsequently, V. Ardov recalled his first meeting with Kataev Jr.:

“In the summer of 1923, V.P. Kataev, whom I had known for a year, very, however, remotely, once said to me at a street meeting:

Meet my brother...

Standing next to Kataev was a young, very young man who looked somewhat like him. Yevgeny Petrovich was then twenty years old. He seemed unsure of himself, which was natural for a provincial who had recently arrived in the capital. Slanted shiny black big eyes looked at me with some disbelief. Petrov was youthfully thin and, compared to his brother in the capital, poorly dressed ... "

It's no secret that a significant, even decisive influence on the fate of a novice journalist was exerted by his older brother, writer Valentin Kataev. He introduced Yevgeny into the literary environment of Moscow, got him a job at the editorial office of the Krasny Pepper magazine, and then at the Gudok newspaper. The wife of V. Kataev recalled: “I have never seen such affection between the brothers as Vali and Zhenya have. Actually, Valya forced his brother to write. Every morning he started by calling him - Zhenya got up late, began to swear that he had been woken up ... "Okay, swear further," Valya said and hung up.

Soon, Kataev Jr. no longer made the impression of a confused provincial. In the editorial office, he showed himself to be a talented organizer, began to write feuilletons, give topics for cartoons. He signed his things either with the "Gogol" pseudonym "Foreigner Fedorov", or with the surname into which he turned his middle name - "Petrov". Two writers Kataev "Bolivar domestic literature» would simply not stand it, confusion would inevitably arise, suspicions of plagiarism, etc.

"ILFIPETROV"

Yevgeny Petrov met I.A. Ilf (Ilya Arnoldovich Fainzilberg) in the same edition of Gudok in 1926. E. Petrov did not have any special impressions from the first meeting with the future co-author. Journalists simply worked together in the editorial office, and their close literary cooperation began a year later - in 1927, when Valentin Kataev literally "thrown" the plot of The Twelve Chairs to the authors. He wanted young people, with their inherent enthusiasm and remarkable imagination, to write a satirical novel, which he would then “correct” and become a co-author. In modern terms, the eminent writer found literary “blacks”, so that they would do all the main work for him. But it turned out differently.

In some modern publications in the media and on Internet resources, Evgeny Petrov sometimes appears as a "secondary figure", "assistant" and almost secretary-copymaker of I. Ilf's texts. There is even an opinion that V. Kataev, who already then managed to discern great potential in the modest Ilf, deliberately “slipped” his not very talented brother into his co-authors so that he would share the future literary glory in two. In our opinion, these statements are not just unfair, but have no basis, except for the deep, convinced ignorance of the authors of such statements themselves.

The process of joint creativity of these two outstanding authors - I. Ilf and E. Petrov - has been described more than once by themselves, their contemporaries and close people who saw the writers directly at work. Everything, down to the last detail, down to every plot move, up to the name of a minor of the minor characters - everything was agreed upon and discussed several times by the authors together. And the fact that Petrov usually wrote in the process of creativity, and Ilf went from corner to corner, conducting a dialogue with him or a monologue with himself - Evgeny Petrov explained by the absence of a typewriter at first and by the fact that his handwriting was better than Ilf's illegible handwriting .

But why did V. Kataev suggest that two authors write the novel at once? And there is an explanation for this.

Valentin Petrovich Kataev himself, despite his Odessa past, was a romantic author, socialist realist and lyricist at the same time, had an extraordinary sense of humor, but ... he did not get the talent of a humorist-satirist. Everything written by V.P. Kataev for his long literary life does not fit well with the term “southwest” proposed by the literary critic V. Shklovsky. Shklovsky's article "South-West" appeared in the first issue of " literary newspaper”for 1933 and immediately caused heated discussions in the literary environment. As the center of the southwestern literary school, Shklovsky named Odessa, which gave reason to call the school South Russian, and then simply Odessa. Shklovsky borrowed the title for the article from Bagritsky - that was the title of his poetry collection of 1928. But the term "Southwest" has been in use before. In Kyiv, for example, at the beginning of the century, the magazine "South-Western Week" was published.

Literary historians argue to this day whether or not there was any special "Odessa" literary school and where to look for its roots. However, such authors as I. Babel, L. Slavin, I. Ilf and E. Petrov, Yu. Olesha, V. Kataev, E. Bagritsky and, to some extent, a resident of Kiev M.A. Bulgakov, for many years identified the main directions Soviet literature.

Undoubtedly, in 1927, I. A. Ilf was a more experienced author than the novice E. Petrov. Kataev Sr. could not fail to see in Ilf a good teacher and mentor for his brother, who is still the author of literature of the "small" genre - magazine humoresques and topical feuilletons in the "South-West" style. Ilf's literary talent lay on the same plane as the talent of Kataev Jr., who could show his abilities much more clearly in a creative tandem. According to the memoirs of contemporaries, Evgeny often created his first feuilletons in "Red Pepper" and "Hook" in collaboration with the same Kozachinsky or other members of the editorial board.

In addition, in terms of personality and character, the duet members Ilf and Petrov complemented each other remarkably.

According to the memoirs of B. Efimov, “Petrov was an expansive and enthusiastic person, able to easily ignite and ignite others. Ilf was of a different stock - restrained, a little reserved, shy in a Chekhovian way. However, he was also capable of sharp outbursts, when he was pissed off by vulgarity, untruth, indifference, rudeness. And then, with all the strength of his stormy temperament, Petrov supported him. Their community was extremely solid and organic. It pleased not only with its literary brilliance, but also with a noble moral character - it was a wonderful union of two pure, incorruptibly honest, deeply principled people ... "(Bor. Efimov "Moscow, Paris, the crater of Vesuvius ..." // Collection of memoirs about Ilf and Petrov)

The literary community of Ilf and Petrov lasted ten years. Initially, according to E. Petrov, not everything went as smoothly as it seemed from the outside:

“It was very difficult for us to write. We worked in the newspaper and in humorous magazines very conscientiously. We knew from childhood what work is. But they never realized how difficult it is to write a novel. If I were not afraid to seem banal, I would say that we wrote in blood. We left the Palace of Labor at two or three in the morning, stunned, almost suffocated by cigarette smoke. We were returning home along the wet and empty Moscow lanes, lit by greenish gas lamps, unable to utter a word. Sometimes we were overcome by despair ... "

In the book “My Diamond Crown”, V. Kataev mentions that the agreement with the editors of the “30 Days” magazine, where the novel “The Twelve Chairs” was to be published, was concluded on his behalf, and initially three authors were planned. But when the literary "master" read seven pages of the first part of the novel, he immediately recognized that he was not dealing with literary "negroes", but with real, established writers. Subsequently, V. Kataev deliberately refused any interference in creative process tandem IlfPetrov, and the novel was written by the authors completely independently.

"The twelve Chairs"

The novel "The Twelve Chairs" was published in 1928 - first in the magazine "30 Days", and then as a separate book. And immediately became extremely popular. The story about the adventures of the charming adventurer and swindler Ostap Bender and his companion, the former marshal of the nobility, Kisa Vorobyaninov, captivated with brilliant dialogues, vivid characters, and a subtle satire on Soviet reality and the philistine. Laughter was the authors' weapon against vulgarity, stupidity and idiotic pathos. The book quickly sold out into quotes:

“All smuggling is done in Odessa, on Malaya Arnautskaya Street”,

"Dusya, I am a man tormented by Narzan",

"A sultry woman is a poet's dream",

"Trading here is inappropriate",

"Money in the morning - chairs in the evening"

"To whom the mare is the bride",

"Quickly only cats will be born",

"Giant of thought, father of Russian democracy"

and many, many others. Unforgettable is the dictionary of Ellochka the cannibal with her interjection words and other replicas that have entered our lives - “darkness!”, “Horror!”, “fat and handsome”, “boy”, “rude”, “your whole back is white! ”, “Don’t teach me how to live!”, “Ho-ho”. In fact, it can be said without exaggeration that the entire book about Bender consists of immortal aphorisms, constantly quoted by readers and moviegoers.

It is worth saying a few words about the possible prototypes of the heroes of this work. According to the authors themselves, Ostap Bender was conceived by them as minor character. For him, Ilf and Petrov had prepared only one phrase about "the key to the apartment where the money is." The writers accidentally heard this expression from a familiar billiard player.

“But Bender began to gradually bulge out of the framework prepared for him. Soon we could no longer cope with him. By the end of the novel, we treated him like a living person and often got angry with him for the impudence with which he crawled into almost every chapter. (E. Petrov "From the memories of Ilf").

One of the prototypes of Bender is Osip Benyaminovich Shor, an Odessa acquaintance of the Kataev brothers, the brother of Natan Fioletov, a well-known futurist poet in Odessa. Kataev in the book "My Diamond Crown" writes: “The brother of the futurist was Ostap, whose appearance the authors kept in the novel almost completely intact: an athletic build and a romantic, purely Black Sea character. He had nothing to do with literature and served in the criminal investigation department in the fight against gangsterism, which had assumed rampant proportions. He was a brilliant operative."

Like this! It is not for nothing that the literary Ostap Bender reveres the criminal code.

The protagonist of the novel "The Twelve Chairs" was supposed to be Kisa Vorobyaninov, the district marshal of the nobility, "a giant of thought and the father of Russian democracy", extremely similar in glasses to the leader of the Cadets party Milyukov. Most researchers agree that Kise was given the features of a cousin of the Kataevs, but there is an opinion that the writer I. A. Bunin, the future Nobel laureate. The Kataev family was also well acquainted with Bunin during his stay in Odessa (1918-1919), and V. Kataev always called him his literary teacher and mentor. Recently, another version was born, not yet confirmed by any documentary data. The prototype of Vorobyaninov was N.D. Stakheev, a well-known Elabuga merchant and philanthropist. In the mid-1920s, he returned from exile in order to find treasures hidden in his former home, but was detained by the OGPU. Subsequently (according to legend) he handed over the treasure to the state, for which he was awarded a lifetime Soviet pension.

In Russian literary criticism, there is a strong opinion that official criticism did not notice the novel "The Twelve Chairs" at all. The first reviews and responses appeared only a year and a half after its publication. This is bewildering: well-known critics should have written about the novel, published in the capital's monthly, about the most popular book of the season, literally immediately “disassembled into quotes”. Their articles were supposed to appear in major metropolitan literary magazines (October, Krasnaya Nov, etc.), but did not appear. It turns out that the "Twelve Chairs" was tacitly boycotted. There was a very loud silence. Not even silence - silence. Modern researchers It is believed that the deathly silence of criticism after the release of the novel is due solely to political reasons. In 1928 there was a desperate struggle for power in the leadership of the country. Stalin has already dealt with Trotsky and almost dumped his former ally N.I. Bukharin. And the "favorite of the party" Bukharin was one of the first to praise the work of Ilf and Petrov. Cautious critics waited for the end of the matter: to praise or scold the book approved by Bukharin? When it turned out that it was necessary to scold, the “spitting” turned out to be somehow sluggish and did not frighten anyone. And although it was dispersed old edition“Beep”, the editor of the magazine “30 days” V.I. Narbut, a longtime patron of the Kataev brothers, was arrested, Ilf and Petrov found literary name, continued to work successfully in other satirical publications, and since 1929 they have been preparing their new novel for publication.

"Golden calf"

The second novel about the adventures of the great schemer Bender was published in 1931 in the magazine "30 Days". However, the transition from magazine publication to book publication proved to be much more difficult than in the case of The Twelve Chairs. The preface to the first edition of The Golden Calf, written by A. V. Lunacharsky, was published in 30 Days as early as August 1931 (before the publication of the novel). But the first edition of the book was not Russian, but American. In the same year, 1931, fourteen chapters of The Golden Calf were reprinted in Paris in the émigré magazine Satyricon. The novel has already been published in Germany, Austria, the USA, England, but the Soviet edition did not take place either in 1931 or in 1932. Why?

Formally, in The Golden Calf, healthy Soviet reality, of course, triumphed over the commander, but Ostap Bender turned out to be the moral winner in the novel. This circumstance was constantly reproached by the authors. It was, in all likelihood, main reason difficulties encountered in publishing the novel. Immediately after the release of the magazine version, talk began about the dangerous sympathy of the authors for Ostap Bender (as we know, Lunacharsky also wrote about the same). According to one of his contemporaries, in those days, "Petrov walked around gloomy and complained that the 'great strategist' was not understood, that they did not intend to poetize him."

Having not received permission to print the book in the USSR, Ilf and Petrov turned to A.A. Fadeev as one of the leaders of the RAPP. He replied that their satire, despite their wit, was “still superficial,” that the phenomena they described were “characteristic mainly of the recovery period” - “for all these reasons, Glavlit does not go to publish it as a separate book.” Two years later, at the First Congress of Writers, M. Koltsov recalled (referring to the witnesses present) that “at one of the last meetings of the late RAPP, almost a month before its liquidation, I had to, with very disapproving exclamations, prove the right to exist in Soviet literature of writers of such a kind as Ilf and Petrov, and personally them ... ". The RAPP was liquidated in April 1932, and back in February 1932, a group of employees of the Krokodil magazine stated that Ilf and Petrov "are in the process of wandering and, having failed to find the correct orientation, are working in vain." In this regard, the co-authors were opposed to V. Kataev and M. Zoshchenko, who are "conscientiously trying to reorganize." V. Ardov subsequently recalled (with reference to Ilf) that the publication of The Golden Calf was helped by M. Gorky, who, “having learned about the difficulties, turned to the then People's Commissar of Education of the RSFSR A. S. Bubnov and expressed his disagreement with the persecutors of the novel. Bubnov, it seems, was very angry, but did not dare to disobey, the novel was immediately accepted for publication.

The main plot of The Golden Calf is similar to the plot of The Twelve Chairs: the pursuit of treasure, meaningless in Soviet conditions. This time, the resurrected Ostap obtained wealth, but money did not bring him happiness. The plot and denouement of the novel changed during its writing: at first it was about receiving the inheritance of an American soldier belonging to his Soviet daughter; then the source of the extracted wealth became the underground Soviet millionaire Koreiko. The ending also changed: in the original version, Ostap refused useless money and married the girl Zose Sinitskaya, whom he left for the sake of chasing the treasure. Already at the time of publishing in the magazine, Ilf and Petrov came up with a new ending: Ostap runs across the border with treasure, but he is robbed and driven back by the Romanian border guards.

The years when The Golden Calf was written are referred to in Soviet history as the years of the "great turning point". This is a time of continuous collectivization, dispossession and industrialization. In the cities, the “great turning point” was expressed in periodic and massive purges of the Soviet apparatus, trials of wreckers (the Shakhty case of 1928, the trial of the Industrial Party of 1930). “The years of the great turning point” were the years of general repentance and dissociation from former views, from once close people, from one’s past.

In 1929–1932, the problem of the intelligentsia acquired a completely new meaning. In pre-revolutionary and early post-revolutionary years the intelligentsia was most often considered as the subject of history - it can "make" or "not make" a revolution, recognize or not recognize it. Now intellectuals, like other citizens, have become part of Soviet society. From the imaginary subject of history, the intelligentsia became its object. The "bourgeois intellectuals" educated before the revolution, or their descendants, were suspected of hidden ideological vices and secret malevolence. Intelligent engineers were the protagonists of wrecking processes, and ever new ideological campaigns were organized against intellectual writers and scientists.

Subsequent critics, attacking Ilf and Petrov for their mockery of the bourgeois intelligentsia in the person of Vasisualy Lokhankin, unfortunately, did not always understand the subtle irony contained in this grotesque caricature image. Lokhankin, with all the big words about the “rebellion of individuality” and reflections on the fate of the Russian intelligentsia, is just a parody of the ignorance and inertia of a typical Soviet inhabitant, an inhabitant of a sort of “crow settlement”. He is completely apolitical, and the entire rebellion of his personality is directed at his wife, who leaves for a prosperous engineer, depriving her parasite husband of his livelihood. Lokhankin is not an oppositionist, but, on the contrary, a staunch conformist, and the position of this unemployed intellectual, in essence, corresponds to the universal stamp of his bureaucratic colleague Polykhaev, who accepts in advance everything "what is needed in the future."

Such a position, indeed, has been repeatedly occupied by Russian intellectuals. When creating Lokhankin, Ilf and Petrov, probably, did not think about either the Vekhi or the Smenovekhites. But the steady “Hegelianism”, the readiness to recognize the rationality of everything in the world and any change in the social climate, arose among the Russian intelligentsia throughout its history constantly (“probably it should be so, it should be so ...”). In the end, for yesterday's "conscience of the nation" everything ended in general repentance, renunciation of their past and themselves, inevitable and largely predictable death.

As for the "crow's settlement", its description exactly reproduces the atmosphere of the Moscow "communal" of the 1930s, where the family of E. Petrov lived. There was also a "Georgian prince", and "nobody's grandmother" and other characters of the "Golden Calf". E.I. Kataeva (E. Petrov's granddaughter) in an interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta suggested that real prototype Vasisualia Lokhankina could have been served by her grandmother, Valentina Leontievna Gryunzaid. She came from a wealthy family of former tea merchants, in her youth she was friends with Yu. Olesha (she is dedicated fairy tale"Three fat men"), and then married Evgeny Kataev. Valentina Leontievna never worked or served anywhere, she loved to talk about the fate of the Russian intelligentsia and constantly forgot to turn off the lights in public places. In order not to bring the matter to hand-to-hand kitchen fights and to ensure the safety of his beloved wife, E. Petrov alone paid for electricity for all the residents of the "crow's settlement".

Ilf and Petrov became famous writers during their lifetime. Their novels have been translated into different languages, were published and republished both in the USSR and abroad. It turned out even complete collection essays. From 1927 to 1937, in addition to two novels, the duo Ilf and Petrov wrote numerous feuilletons, the story "The Bright Personality", a cycle of short stories about the city of Kolokolamsk and the tales of the New Scheherazade. Essays on a stay in the United States in 1935 made up the book One-Storied America. American impressions gave Ilf and Petrov material for another work - big story"Tonya".

End of duet

In 1937, Ilya Ilf died of tuberculosis. The death of I. Ilf was a deep trauma for E. Petrov: both personal and creative. He never came to terms with the loss of a friend. last day life. But creative crisis overcame with perseverance and perseverance a man of great soul and great talent. He made a lot of effort to publish a friend's notebooks, conceived great work"My friend Ilf." In 1939-1942 he worked on the novel Journey to the Land of Communism, in which he described the USSR in the near future, in 1963 (excerpts were published posthumously in 1965).

It turned out to be impossible to finish what he started with Ilf alone, although shortly before Ilf's death, the co-authors had already tried to work separately - on One-Story America. But then, working in different parts of Moscow and even not seeing each other every day, the writers continued to live in common creative life. Each thought was the fruit of mutual disputes and discussions, each image, each replica had to pass the judgment of a comrade. With the death of Ilf, the writer "Ilf and Petrov" died.

E. Petrov in the book "My friend Ilf" intended to tell about the time and about himself. About myself - in this case it would mean: about Ilf and about himself. His intentions went far beyond the personal. Here, anew, in different features and with the involvement of other material, the era already captured in their joint works was to be reflected. Reflections on literature, on the laws of creativity, on humor and satire. From the articles that were published by E. Petrov under the title "From the Memoirs of Ilf", as well as from the plans and sketches found in his archive, it is clear that the book would have been generously saturated with humor. Unfortunately, Yevgeny Petrovich did not have time to complete his work, but most of The archive after his death was lost, so today it is not possible to restore the text of the book about the most famous creative duo of the 20th century.

As a correspondent for Pravda, E. Petrov had to travel a lot around the country. In 1937 he was on Far East. The impressions of this trip were reflected in the essays "Young Patriots", "Old Paramedic". At this time, Petrov also writes literary critical articles, and is engaged in a lot of organizational work. He was deputy editor of the Literaturnaya Gazeta, in 1940 he became the editor of the Ogonyok magazine and brought genuine creative passion into his editorial work.

According to contemporaries, the semi-official magazine, which had already decayed by that time, under the leadership of Petrov, seemed to have found a second life. It became interesting to read again.

In 1940-1941, E. Petrov turned to the comedy genre. He wrote five scripts: "Air Carrier", "Quiet Ukrainian Night", "Restless Man", "Musical Story" and "Anton Ivanovich Gets Angry" - the last three co-authored with G. Moonblit.

"Musical History", "Anton Ivanovich Gets Angry" and "Air Carrier" were successfully filmed.

war correspondent

From the first days of the Great Patriotic War Yevgeny Petrov became a correspondent for the Soviet Information Bureau. His front-line essays appeared in Pravda, Izvestia, Ogonyok, and Krasnaya Zvezda. He sent telegraphic correspondence to the USA. Knowing America well, able to speak with ordinary Americans, he did a lot during the war years to convey to the American people the truth about the heroic deed of the Soviet people.

In the autumn of 1941, these were essays about the defenders of Moscow. E. Petrov was at the forefront, appeared in the liberated villages, when the ashes were still smoking there, talked with the prisoners.

When the Nazis were driven away from Moscow, E. Petrov went to the Karelian front. In his correspondence, he spoke about the heroism and courage of the defenders of the Soviet Arctic. Here his paths crossed with the no less famous later front-line correspondent K.M. Simonov. The latter left interesting memories of a personal meeting with Petrov, in which the author of The Golden Calf and The Twelve Chairs appears as a sociable, cheerful, very attentive to people, intelligent person.

E. Petrov obtained permission to go to the besieged Sevastopol with difficulty. The city was blocked from the air and from the sea. But our ships went there and planes flew, delivering ammunition, taking out the wounded and residents. The leader of the destroyers "Tashkent" (it was also called the "blue cruiser"), on which E. Petrov was located, successfully reached the goal, but on the way back he was hit by a German bomb. All the time, while the ships that came to the rescue were filming the wounded, children and women, the Tashkent was under fire from enemy aircraft.

Petrov refused to leave the ship. He remained with the crew until arriving at port, being on deck and helping the crew fight to save the ship.

“When on the day of departure I entered in the morning on the veranda on which Petrov was sleeping,” said Admiral I.S. Isakov, - the whole veranda and all the furniture on it were covered with scribbled sheets of paper. Each was carefully pressed down with a stone. It was Yevgeny Petrov’s notes being dried, which, along with his field bag, fell into the water during the battle.

On July 2, 1942, the plane, on which front-line journalist E. Petrov was returning to Moscow from Sevastopol, was shot down by a German fighter over the territory of the Rostov Region, near the village of Mankovo. Crew members and several passengers survived, but E. Petrov died. He was not even 40 years old.

In memory of Evgeny Petrov, Konstantin Simonov dedicated the poem "It's not true, a friend does not die ..."

Evgeny Petrov was awarded the Order of Lenin and a medal. Odessa, where they were born and started creative way satirical writers, there is Ilf and Petrov street.

Persecution and prohibition touched the works of Ilf and Petrov after their death. In 1948, the publishing house "Soviet Writer" published the novels "The Twelve Chairs" and "The Golden Calf" in seventy-five thousand copies in the prestigious series " Selected works Soviet Literature: 1917-1947. But it immediately paid off. By a special resolution of the Secretariat of the Union of Soviet Writers dated November 15, 1948, the publication was recognized as a “gross political mistake”, and the published book was recognized as “slander on Soviet society”. November 17 general secretary Union of Soviet Writers A.A. Fadeev sent to the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, comrade I.V. Stalin and comrade G.M. Malenkov this resolution, which described the reasons for the publication of the "harmful book" and the measures taken by the SSP Secretariat.

It must be admitted that the writers' leadership showed "vigilance" not of their own free will. He was forced by employees of the Department of Agitation and Propaganda of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, "pointing out the error of the publication." In other words, Agitprop officially informed the SSP Secretariat that the Soviet Writer publishing house, which is directly subordinate to it, made an unforgivable mistake, in connection with which it is now necessary to look for the guilty, give explanations, etc. Because it was not possible to find the perpetrators - both authors were no longer alive, the case was actually “hushed up” (the planned devastating article in Literaturka never appeared, no one was actually imprisoned, the head of the publishing house “Soviet writer” was only relieved of his post). But until the Khrushchev “thaw”, the works of Ilf and Petrov were not reprinted and were considered “ideologically harmful”.

The "rehabilitation" and, one might say, the "canonization" of the authors took place only in the second half of the 1950s, when the "Twelve Chairs" and "The Golden Calf" were claimed by Khrushchev's propaganda as "the best examples of Soviet satire."

Nevertheless, the "canonization" of Ilf and Petrov as classics required considerable effort from the then liberals: the novels clearly did not correspond to the Soviet ideological guidelines even of such a relatively liberal era. Traces of controversy can be found, for example, in the preface written by K.M. Simonov for the reissue of the dilogy in 1956. Literally in the second paragraph, he considered it necessary to specifically mention that the "Twelve Chairs" and "The Golden Calf" were created by "people who deeply believed in the victory of the bright and reasonable world of socialism over the ugly and decrepit world of capitalism."

Such clauses were also used in the 1960s. Domestic researchers were forced to constantly explain to readers that Ilf and Petrov were not opponents of the political regime of the USSR, "internal emigrants" or dissidents. Throughout the entire period of the domination of communist ideology, Soviet writers Ilf and Petrov needed justification and protection, because the special space they created on the pages of novels was completely free from any ideological attitudes. And this freedom ran counter to the internal lack of freedom of critics, delighting and attracting new generations of readers.

Unfortunately, today's young reader, brought up on the works of Dontsov's "negroes" and low-grade imitations of Western fantasy, is not able to appreciate either the features of the humor of that distant time, or the high literary skill of the creators of novels, who, in spite of everything, survived their harsh era.

"The envelope"

There is another world-famous story associated with the name of Evgeny Petrov.

During his lifetime, the writer had a very unusual hobby - he collected envelopes from his own letters, sent to a non-existent address and returned by mail to the sender. Obviously, he was attracted by the opportunity to get back an envelope decorated with rare foreign stamps and postmarks from different countries.

According to a widely circulated legend, in April 1939, Evgeny Petrov allegedly sent a letter to New Zealand, to the fictional city of Hydebirdville, 7 Reitbeach Street. The addressee was a certain Merrill Bruce Weisley (a character completely invented by Petrov). In the letter, the sender expressed condolences on the death of Uncle Pete and asked to kiss Meryl's daughter Hortense. Two months later, the writer received back not his envelope, but a reply letter. It contained gratitude for condolences and a photograph in which a man of strong physique hugged Petrov. The picture was dated October 9, 1938 (on this day the writer went to the hospital with severe pneumonia and was unconscious).

After the death of the writer, his widow received a second letter, where a New Zealand friend asked Petrov to be careful, explaining that when Petrov was visiting them, they discouraged him from swimming in the lake - the water was cold. Petrov answered them that he was not destined to drown, but destined to crash on an airplane.

It must be said that the above legend does not have a single reliable source. Letters and photographs, of course, have not been preserved. And if you call on common sense to help, then it is worth remembering that in the 1930s and 40s, free correspondence between Soviet citizens and foreign correspondents was simply impossible. The strange "hobby" of the writer would inevitably attract the attention of the NKVD to him, and this institution, by the nature of its activities, was not inclined either to jokes or to jokes in the style of E. Petrov himself.

Today, this story can be perceived as a joke or an entertaining hoax by the author of The Twelve Chairs. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that it was she who was the basis for the script of the short film feature film"Envelope", filmed in 2012 in the USA.

Lurie Ya.S. In the Land of Non-Frightened Idiots. A book about Ilf and Petrov. - St. Petersburg, 2005. – 129 p.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yevgeny Petrov (pseudonym of Yevgeny Petrovich Kataev, 1902-1942) - Russian Soviet writer, co-author of Ilya Ilf.

Evgeny Petrovich Petrov (real name Kataev) was born in Odessa in the family of a history teacher.

In Odessa, the Kataevs lived on Kanatnaya Street.

In 1920 he graduated from the 5th Odessa classical gymnasium. During his studies, his classmate was Alexander Kozachinsky, who later wrote the adventure story "The Green Van", the prototype of the main character of which - Volodya Patrikeev - was Evgeny Petrov.

He worked as a correspondent for the Ukrainian Telegraph Agency.

For three years he served as an inspector of the Odessa Criminal Investigation Department (in the “double autobiography” of Ilf and Petrov (1929) it is said about this period of life:
"His first literary work was the report of the inspection of the corpse of an unknown man").

In 1922, during a chase with a shootout, he personally detained his friend Alexander Kozachinsky, who led a gang of raiders. Subsequently, he achieved a review of his criminal case and the replacement of A. Kozachinsky with the highest measure of social protection - execution - by imprisonment in a camp. This story later formed the basis of Kozachinsky's story "The Green Van", based on which films of the same name were made in 1959 and 1983.

In 1923, Petrov came to Moscow, where he became an employee of the Krasny Pepper magazine.

In 1926, he came to work for the Gudok newspaper, where he arranged A. Kozachinsky, who had been released by that time under an amnesty, as a journalist.

In 1927 joint work over the novel "The Twelve Chairs" began the creative community of Evgeny Petrov and Ilya Ilf (who also worked in the newspaper "Gudok").

The novel "Twelve Chairs" (1928);
the novel The Golden Calf (1931);
short stories "Unusual stories from the life of the city of Kolokolamsk" (1928);
fantastic story "Bright Personality" (screened);
short stories "A Thousand and One Days, or New Scheherazade" (1929);
story "One-story America" ​​(1937).

In 1932-1937, Ilf and Petrov wrote feuilletons for the Pravda newspaper.

In 1935-1936 they made a trip to the United States, which resulted in the book One-Story America (1937). The books of Ilf and Petrov were repeatedly staged and filmed.

During the Great Patriotic War, Petrov became a front-line correspondent. He died on July 2, 1942 - the plane on which he was returning to Moscow from Sevastopol was shot down by a German fighter over the territory of the Rostov region, near the village of Mankovo. Monument erected at the crash site

How long has death been chasing Yevgeny Petrov (Kataev)?

On the morning of July 2, 1942, in the last hours heroic defense Sevastopol, Admiral Ivan Stepanovich Isakov turned to his old acquaintance, the famous writer Yevgeny Petrov: “Evgeny Petrovich, Douglas is flying to Moscow at noon. It will have a place for you. Everything you wanted to see in the besieged city - you have already seen. The Soviet people must know how we are fighting here.” Petrov did not answer immediately; in general, he always treated any proposal with extreme caution. He silently looked towards the sea, where everything was engulfed in the glow of fire, listened to the roar of the cannonade, and finally said in a barely audible voice:
"I will think. And now we have to disperse, it's too late already.

Do you escape fate?

They met when the sun was already high. Petrov was in excellent spirits, it was evident that the hours of sleep had done him good. However, he did not fall asleep right away - on the table of the gazebo there were several written sheets, pressed down with pebbles so that they would not scatter from the wind.

“You know, for three or four days I couldn’t close my eyes at all,” the writer smiled at the admiral. - And then, although not immediately, he fell asleep. True, I slept like a log, I didn’t even see dreams ... I agree: to Moscow, so to Moscow. They went to the airport together. Ivan Stepanovich looked wearily at a small black dot that was moving away in space, and thought that maybe it was good that Petrov would not see with his own eyes how our troops would leave Sevastopol. Yes, he knows that the situation is critical, but he does not even imagine how hopeless the situation is. Not today, tomorrow everything will be over. And who knows if he will be able to escape from this meat grinder. And so, by plane, more reliable ...

Isakov felt great relief because he had persuaded one of the authors of The Twelve Chairs to leave the city. He already reproached himself for not being able to do this three days earlier, when the destroyer Tashkent, on which Petrov arrived in Sevastopol, was returning to Novorossiysk. Then Yevgeny Petrovich flatly refused to go back... But who could have guessed that fate had prepared for Petrov the most chess fork ever? And he had no choice: if he had gone on the "Tashkent", inevitable death would have awaited him: it was on July 2 that the fascist aviation made a massive raid on the Novorossiysk naval base and several bombs fell on the "Tashkent", sinking it at the very pier as soon as he returned from Sevastopol.

After more than three hours, about four o'clock in the afternoon, on July 2, Admiral Isakov was called to a special telephone. Here it is better to give the floor to the admiral himself: “Are you Admiral Isakov? - Yes I! - Did you send the Douglas in the morning with the writer Yevgeny Petrov? - Yes I! - Unfortunately, we must inform you that Petrov has crashed... - Who is talking to me? I yelled, still hoping for something. - Commissioner of the NKVD from Chertkovo.

Was death chasing after him?

Was this death accidental? It's hard to say, everything happens in a war, both on the front line and in the relative rear. But Petrov's older brother, the writer Valentin Kataev, having learned about the death of the younger, was the first to exclaim: "This catastrophe was rigged!" They rushed to calm him down. And in fact, who was interested in the death of Petrov? It seems that no one, the writer was very fond of. Just a fatal accident. But Kataev stubbornly insisted: "Death was chasing him on his heels, and it could not have happened otherwise!" Perhaps it was emotion. But many years later, Valentin Petrovich wrote the following: “... He was terribly unlucky.
Death was on his heels. He swallowed hydrogen sulfide in the gymnasium's laboratory, and was pumped out by force in the fresh air, on the lawn in the gymnasium's garden, under a blue Christmas tree. In Milan, near the famous cathedral, he was hit by a cyclist and nearly hit by a car. During the Finnish war, a shell hit the corner of the house where he spent the night. Near Moscow, he fell under mortar fire Germans. At the same time, on the Volokolamsk Highway, his fingers were pinched by the door of the front-line emka, painted with white protective paint of winter camouflage: they were attacked by German aircraft, and they had to run out of the car into a ditch.

Finally, the plane on which he flew from the besieged Sevastopol, leaving the "Messerschmites", crashed into a mound somewhere in the middle of the endless Don steppe, and he forever remained lying in this dry, alien land ... "

And right there, many people who knew Yevgeny Petrov immediately began to pile up stories around the writer, one more terrible than the other. Like, for example, Ilya Ehrenburg, who, as they say, heard the ringing, but does not know where he is. Here is what you can read in his memoirs about Petrov: “... A few days later he made his way to Sevastopol. There he came under desperate bombardment. He was returning on the destroyer Tashkent, and a German bomb hit the ship, there were many casualties. Petrov reached Novorossiysk. There he rode in a car; an accident occurred, and again Evgeny Petrovich remained unharmed. He began to write an essay about Sevastopol, in a hurry to Moscow.
The plane flew low, as they flew then in the front line, and hit the top of the hill. Death chased Petrov for a long time, and finally overtook him…”

Rumors abound...

Let's compare the two stories and we will realize that only one detail is common - death in a plane crash. But the car accident, according to Kataev, took place in Milan, and according to Ehrenburg, in Novorossiysk. According to Kataev and Isakov, who saw off Petrov at the airport, the writer flew from Sevastopol, while according to Ehrenburg it turns out that from Novorossiysk. Hypnotized by the words of the two masters, the rest of Petrov's acquaintances began to look for mystical coincidences in his fate.
“I firmly knew that I must die very soon, that I cannot help but die,” they quote from Petrov’s diary a few years before 1942. Or another one: “Until now, I lived like this: I thought that I had three, four days left to live, well, a maximum of a week. I got used to this thought and never made any plans.
I had no doubt that<…>must perish for the happiness of future generations.<…>I knew for sure that I must die very soon, that I can’t help but die” – this is in Petrov’s sketches for the book about Ilf. It remains to be added that at that time Yevgeny Petrovich served in the criminal investigation department and, in his own words, “... stepped over the corpses of people who died of starvation and made inquiries about 17 murders. I conducted the investigation, as there were no judicial investigators. Cases immediately went to the tribunal. But isn't the service in the criminal investigation department a certain risk? And couldn't she have been cut off by a shot from a bandit sawn-off shotgun?
But, as you can see, his bullet was never cast ...

For myself and for that guy...

One thing is clear: Petrov was not looking for death, as it might seem to someone, and was not afraid of it. He simply lived the same front-line life as other war correspondents of that time, the same Konstantin Simonov or Semyon Guzenko, who became a Hero of the Soviet Union. So to say that death personally "chased" Yevgeny Petrovich means to sin against the truth ... Someone was lucky, but someone was not very good. Is it possible to say that the same Ivan Stepanovich Isakov got off with a “light fright”? Three months later, on October 4, 1942, he was seriously wounded near Tuapse, his leg was amputated. For three months, the struggle for his life continued ... And then he began to live for two: for himself and Petrov. In marine magazines and separate publications, his research works on the experience of the Second World War were published, of which more than 60 were published! Yes, it was impossible to return Petrov, but Isakov replaced him in some way... And, by and large, there is no death for writers. They live in their works...