Poet Mikhail Svetlov: biography, creativity, memory

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

The biography of Mikhail Svetlov - a Soviet poet, playwright and journalist - includes life and work during the revolution, civil and two world wars, as well as during the period of political disgrace. What kind of person was this poet, how did his personal life develop and what was the path of creativity?

Childhood and youth

Mikhail Arkadyevich Svetlov (real name Sheinkman) was born on June 4 (17), 1903 in Yekaterinoslav (modern Dnepropetrovsk). Mikhail's father, a Jewish craftsman, raised his son and daughter Elizabeth in an atmosphere of hard work and justice. The ability to speak accurately and succinctly, to love the truth and want to convey it - all this Mikhail received thanks to his honest and hard-working family. About his childhood, Svetlov jokingly said that his father once brought a whole stack of books by Russian classics to make bags for the sale of seeds. "My father and I signed an agreement - at first I read, and only then he rolled up the bags," the poet said.

From the age of 14, carried away by communist ideas, an ardent supporter of Leon Trotsky and an opponent of Russia's participation in the First World War, young Mikhail published hisfirst publications in the local newspaper Voice of a Soldier.

First steps in creativity

In 1919, 16-year-old Mikhail was appointed head of the Komsomol press department in Yekaterinoslav. At the same time, he first used the pseudonym "Svetlov".

Already in 1920, not wanting to stay away from revolutionary activities, the young man volunteered for the Red Army, showing himself to be a brave and fearless soldier in the Civil War. In 1923, Svetlov's first poetry collection, "Rails", was published in Kharkov, but it was successful only in a narrow circle of the poet's acquaintances. After that, the poet moved to Moscow, participated in the literary groups "Young Guard" and "Pass", released two more poetry collections under the titles "Poems" in 1924, and "Roots" in 1925.

Grenada

On August 29, 1926, Komsomolskaya Pravda published poems by 23-year-old Mikhail Svetlov. His biography as a famous poet began precisely from this event. It was the poem "Grenada":

I left the house, Went to fight, To land in Grenada

Give back to the peasants.

Farewell, folks, Goodbye friends -

"Grenada, Grenada, Grenada is mine!"

The poems instantly spread throughout the country and were literally on everyone's lips - even Vladimir Mayakovsky himself read them at one of his speeches. And Marina Tsvetaeva in one of herletters to Boris Pasternak called "Grenada" her favorite poem of all that she had read in recent years.

The popularity of poetry did not fade even a decade later - in 1936, Soviet pilots participating in the Spanish war sang "Grenada" set to music while flying over Guadalajara. Behind them, the motive was picked up by European fighters - the poem became international.

During the war in the Nazi death camp called Mauthausen, prisoners sang "Grenada" as a hymn to freedom. Mikhail Svetlov said that it was in this poem that he discovered himself as a real poet.

Opposition

Since 1927, while studying at Moscow State University, in the biography of Mikhail Svetlov, a period has come when he decided to become a representative of the left opposition. An illegal printing house for the opposition newspaper Kommunist was located in his house, together with the poets Golodny and Utkin, he organized poetry evenings, the money from which came to the opposition Red Cross and provided material assistance to the families of the arrested Trotskyists. For this, in 1928 Svetlov was expelled from the Komsomol.

In 1934, Svetlov spoke negatively about the newly created Union of Writers of the USSR, calling its activities "vulgar officialism", and in 1938 - about the Moscow trial of the anti-Soviet "Right-Trotskyist" bloc, calling it "organized murders". The poet was disappointed with how Stalin'sall revolutionary and communist ideas were distorted by the authorities. "The Communist Party has been gone for a long time, it has degenerated into something terrible and has nothing to do with the proletariat," Mikhail Svetlov boldly spoke out.

During the war years, when the work of Mikhail Svetlov was on the lips of both the military and ordinary people, raising morale, and he himself served as a war correspondent in the Red Army, the poet's "anti-Soviet" statements turned a blind eye. He was even awarded two Orders of the Red Star and various medals. In the photo below, Mikhail Svetlov (right) with a front-line comrade in defeated Berlin.

But in the post-war years, Svetlov's poetry naturally turned out to be under an unspoken ban - they did not publish it, they did not talk about it, he had a ban on traveling abroad. This continued until 1954, when his work was defended at the Second Congress of Writers. After that, changes took place in the biography of Mikhail Svetlov - his work was officially "permitted", they finally started talking about him openly. At this time, Svetlov's poetry collections were published: "Horizon", "Hunting Lodge", "Poems of recent years".

Private life

Mikhail Svetlov was married twice. There is no information about the first wife, the second marriage was with Rodam Amirejibi, the sister of the famous Georgian writer Chabua Amirejibi. In 1939, Mikhail and Rodam had a son, Alexander, also known as Sandro Svetlov, a little-known screenwriter and director. In the photo below, Mikhail Svetlov withwife and son.

Memory

Mikhail Arkadyevich Svetlov died of lung cancer on September 28, 1964, at the age of 61, was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery. For the last poetry collection "Poems of recent years" he was awarded the Lenin Prize posthumously, and later - the Lenin Komsomol Prize.

The bibliography of the poet Mikhail Svetlov includes a huge number of works, including poems, songs, essays and theater plays. In addition to "Grenada", the most famous works are the poems "Italian", "Kakhovka", "Big Road", "My Glorious Comrade" and the plays "Fairy Tale", "Twenty Years Later", "Love for Three Oranges" (based on the eponymous works by Carlo Gozzi).

In October 1965, the Moscow Youth Library was named after the poet, to this day known as "Svetlovka". In 1968, Leonid Gaidai named a cruise ship after Mikhail Svetlov in his film "The Diamond Hand", in memory of the poet, whom he respected very much. The real ship - a river boat named after Svetlov - was launched only in 1985. In many cities of the former USSR, streets named after the poet have survived to this day, and in Kakhovka, which he sang, the central microdistrict (Svetlovo) was named after him.