Аннотация: The champagne glasse of the Don writer Petrov-Biryuk. A app-antiquarian story.
The champagne glasse of the Don writer Petrov-Biryuk. A app-antiquarian story.
The memoirs of Dmitry Ilyich Petrov (Biryuk) [Дмитрий Ильич Петров (Бирюк)] (years of life: 1900 - 1977) "The History of My Youth" ['История моей юности'] are interesting especially in the part where he describes the pre-revolutionary life of his family in a Don stanitsa.
Petrov-Biryuk's father was a kind of painter, he sometimes worked in churches. He was accepted into the Cossacks - before his marrying the daughter of one of the stanichniks [stanitsa's inhabitants].
I was especially interested in the descriptions of the writer's father's attempts to become a businessman.
Yuri Trifonov has a melancholic remark that any Cossack (even an absolute beggar) was the owner of a significant piece of land from a public fund.
The memoirs of Alexander Alekseevich Khanzhonkov [Александр Алексеевич Ханжонков] speak of a certain fund from which (as we can understand) significant 'lifting' money was paid to officers entering into marriage. The funds from this fund were used by Khanzhonkov as a source of start-up capital to start a film business.
In general, in an explicit and implicit form, there was a system of mutual support for the stanichniks [stanitsa's inhabitants].
But this system could not help if a stanichnik, for example, moved to the city and began to engage in commerce. A lack of experience and business skills affected. Even the availability of start-up capital did not ensure success. A financial means were melting too quickly.
(Alexander Khanzhonkov had the advantage that he took up a business (film business), almost completely new; education and general cultural development were enough for initial success. Perhaps, in terms of scale, a film studio was a more convenient field for applying of efforts and of capital, when compared with a small trading shop on the outskirts of the city?).
The romantic young man, (future) writer, Petrov-Biryuk went to serve in the imperial army (during the First World War), and after the war he joined the Red Army. From the Red Army, fate sent him to the committee of the poor.
This concludes Petrov-Biryuk's memoirs (which I have read).
Apparently, the smart and successful Petrov-Biryuk did not miss the opportunity to change his job in the vast and diverse bureaucratic apparatus of the Soviet state for literary activity in the ranks of the writers' community (created by Maxim Gorky).
Petrov-Biryuk did not make attempts to climb to the top, he worked quietly in Rostov-on-Don ... For local conditions, he was a more or less noticeable creative figure. He did not monetize his potential, did not transform it into political status. He can report with a clear conscience: his creative merit is the highlighting of the figure of Kondrat Bulavin in history. Kondrat Bulavin, Matvey Platov (Patriotic War of 1812), revolutionary Cossacks... People were working... History was working... Gradually, "trusted persons" appeared at the elections, and the announcers said that this trusted person - "from [out of] the (Don) Cossacks". [People!] Bless the Woman and the pensioner-shooter ... (Colonel Vasily Mikhailovich Chernetsov - and other "unpleasant" topics - for now they can wait ... Even if you are a thrice a political conifer cone out of the blue [on a level place] ...).
There was no talk of any creative competition between Dmitry Petrov-Biryuk and Mikhail Sholokhov ... (Petrov-Biryuk's memoirs have a number of real advantages; one can add Vladimir Gilyarovsky's memoirs about the relatively long life of Gilyarovsky as a guest on one of the Don distant farms [a series of essays in the memoir work 'Russkiye Vedomosti' from the Vladimir Gilyarovsky's book 'A Moscow Newspaperian'] [серия эссе в мемуаре 'Русские ведомости': Владимир Гиляровский 'Москва газетная'])...
How did the future writer Petrov-Biryuk get into the committee of the poor? He writes about this in his memoirs, The Story of My Youth.
'I want to give you one job, friend.
- What job, Matvey Afanasyevich?
- I want to send you to the stanitsa committee of the poor ... Got it?
(...)
- What position will I work there? - I asked.
- Yes, in what position? .. I didn't tell you? You will be the secretary of the committee...
(...)
- 'Well, work on it,' - I said, bewildered. - No pen, no ink, no paper.
- Well... all, brother, you have to get ...
But, seeing that his words had a depressing effect on me, he condescendingly patted me on the shoulder.
- That is OK. At first, I will give you a pen, five sheets of paper, but you ought to find a little bottle, I will pour ink for you ... And then you yourself will adapt, you will be able to get all this from the kulaks.
And so I began to work in the village committee of the poor ...
... we went to Alexei's apartment. It was cool and cozy in the neat, clean room, lined with tubs of ficuses and geraniums.
The hostess prepared lunch for us.
'Please,' she said, 'eat what God sent.'
A small tall wine glass (the champagne glasse) also went into action - for a tasting of cherry liqueur.
It was somehow inconvenient to take away ("to get") him - after a good dinner. Yes, and the thing is fragile, some kind of small - how to transport it? So, unlike other values, the small tall [the champagne glasse] wine glass did not come under the jurisdiction of the Committee of the Poor. In general, (personally) Petrov-Biryuk had a creative nature and shied away from the 'depressing' job ...
This wine glass waited until 2022, I will put it up for sale.
Of course, about the fact that Dmitry Petrov-Biryuk drank cherry liqueur from this wine glass - I came up with this.
But how else would I have written this story?
However, you never know how it was in reality... He really drank? Or didn't drink?
According to my assumptions, this wine glass was produced in a factory way in the period from 1900 to 1960 ... The exact date of its manufacture is not known ... Anyway, the small tall glass is about fifty years old.
If I manage to sell this wine glass for a significant amount of money - good ...
If not, then maybe I'll drink mineral water or juice from it for the New Year ...
Let's see, how things will be... In any case, now this wine glass is at my disposal, and it can be offered for sale...
I will compose the text of the announcement of the sale, post it on the Internet ...
November 2, 2022 16:25
Translation from Russian into English: November 2, 2022 18:07.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'Фужер донского писателя Петрова-Бирюка. Около-антикварный рассказ'.
{ 3234. Фужер донского писателя Петрова-Бирюка. Около-антикварный рассказ.
MMMCCV. The champagne glasse of the Don writer Petrov-Biryuk. A app-antiquarian story.
Vladimir Zalessky Internet-bibliotheca. Интернет-библиотека Владимира Залесского}