Poet Alexei Surkov - the pride of the land of Yaroslavl

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

In Yaroslavl, a survey was conducted on whether residents know the famous song "In the dugout." People of different ages happily picked up the text, almost without mistakes in words. But not everyone could name the author. The Soviet poet Alexei Surkov, whose biography is forever associated with the Yaroslavl region, is the author of famous lines that came out from under his pen at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. What is known about this outstanding person?

In people

Born before the revolution (October 1, 1899) in the small village of Serednevo (Rybinsk district, Yaroslavl province) in a peasant family, Alexei Surkov began his studies at a local school, absorbing the beauty of nature and the simplicity of rural life. Having shown a craving for learning, at the age of 12 he goes to St. Petersburg, where he has to live in the master's house and earn extra money. Such living was called "in people", but it allowed the teenager to read newspapers and develop. The working biography began with work as an apprentice in a printing house, a furniture store, and carpentry workshops. He met the revolution in the trading port, where he worked as a weigher.

In 1918, Krasnaya Gazeta published poems by a certainA. Gutuevsky. Alexei Surkov initially chose such a pseudonym for himself, whose photo in these years can be seen in the article. It was his first attempt at writing. At the age of eighteen, he enlisted in the Red Army, serving as a machine gunner and mounted scout until 1922.

Zolo

In peacetime, the future poet returns to his small homeland, where he is engaged in light work. Until 1924, in a neighboring village, he worked in a reading room, became a village correspondent for the local county newspaper. The profession of a journalist soon becomes the main one for A. Surkov. Already in 1924, his new poems were published in the Pravda newspaper, and in 1925 he became a participant in the congress of writers of the province. In the same year, having joined the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Alexei Surkov was at Komsomol work, at the same time being a correspondent for the newly created newspaper Severny Komsomolets in the province. For three years (1926-1928) he headed it as chief editor, doubling the circulation and creating a "Literary Corner" where novice poets and prose writers could publish.

In May 1928, he was delegated to Moscow for the 1st Congress of Writers, after which he did not return to the Yaroslavl region, having been elected to the RAPP. The beginning of real poetic creativity was laid by the first collection, published in 1930. It was called "Zapev". The poems were distinguished by political poignancy and a sense of patriotism, which was in great demand. During these years, the poet Alexei Surkov was truly born.

Biography: the family of the master of the word

Becoming a regular at literary meetings, the poetmeets Sofia Antonovna Krevs, his future wife. The couple has two children: son Alexei, born in 1928. and daughter Natalia, born in 1938. During the war years, the family would be evacuated to Chistopol, where Alexei Surkov would write his letters from the front. In the future, the daughter will choose the profession of a journalist for herself, doing musicology. The son will become a military engineer-colonel of the Air Force.

The 30s were marked by the fact that A. Surkov had to make up for the lack of education: he would not only graduate from the Institute of Red Professors, but also defend his dissertation, becoming a teacher at the Literary Institute. He will not leave his editorial work either, collaborating with M. Gorky in Literary Education, a magazine of that time. While working at the Lokaf, he continues to write poems and songs about the heroes of the civil war: “Peers”, “Offensive”, “Homeland of the Courageous”. Some works become songs: "Chapaevskaya", "Konarmeyskaya".

War Correspondent

Combat onslaught, Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda, Krasnaya Zvezda are those publications in which military commander Alexei Surkov has been published since 1939. The poet participated in two military conflicts on the eve of the Great Patriotic War: the Finnish campaign and the campaign in Western Belarus. Despite his indefensible age, from the first day of the war he went to the front, having risen to the rank of lieutenant colonel in 1943. Here he will meet with many poets of war hard times. It is to him that Konstantin Simonov will dedicate the famous lines: "Do you remember, Alyosha, the roads of the Smolensk region …".

As the editor-in-chief of the Newworld”, he publishes poems, feuilletons and songs of the heroic time. He will publish several poetry collections: “Poems about hatred”, “Offensive”, “Soldier's heart”. In 1942, he almost died near Rzhev, later writing poignant lines:

I'm unharmed from bullets, and we don't burn with heat, I'm walking along the edge of the fire.

It can be seen that the mother of her exorbitant suffering

Bought me back from death…”

But the songs will become the most popular in his work. Among them: "Song of the Brave", "Song of the Defenders of Moscow" and, of course, the famous "Dugout".

The story of the birth of "Dugout"

The song was born in November 1942 in the vicinity of Istra (the village of Kashino, Moscow region), where he had to leave the encirclement through a minefield. Then he really felt that there were only a few steps to death. When the danger had passed, the entire overcoat was cut with shrapnel. Already in Moscow, he had the lines of a famous poem sent to his wife in Chistopol. When composer Konstantin Listov appeared at the editorial office, Alexei Surkov gave him handwritten lines, and a week later his friend Mikhail Savin performed the song for the first time.

With her first appearance, she immediately went to the front, becoming the favorite work of the soldiers. It was performed by Lidia Ruslanova, and at first they even released records with a recording. But then they were completely destroyed, because political workers saw decadence in the lines of the poem and demanded to change the words. But the song has already gone to the people. There is evidence that the soldiers went tofight, shouting: "Sing, harmonica, blizzard out of spite!" A monument was erected to the famous song near the village of Kashino. This is a real recognition to the author, who was awarded the State Prize for a series of works in 1946.

Recent years

After the war, Alexei Surkov, whose biography became associated with party and government activities, as the editor-in-chief of Ogonyok and the rector of the Literary Institute, did a lot to discover new talents. He published Anna Akhmatova, defending her name before I. Stalin. At the same time, being a convinced communist, he does not recognize the work of B. Pasternak, he will oppose A. Solzhenitsyn and A. Sakharov. The poet will head the Writers' Union of the USSR for several years.

In 1969, the government will mark his merits with the Star of the Hero for labor achievements. After the death of a man in 1983, for many, he will remain a wonderful poet who glorified the Yaroslavl land.