In ancient Greece, in the time of Jupiter, when the “powerful tribe” multiplied so much that each city had its own special king, one monarch still stood out from the rest in wealth, good appearance and kindness, and most of all because he had three beautiful daughters. But the youngest daughter, with her appearance, still outshines the beauty of the others. The Greeks call this beauty Psyche, which means “soul”; Russian narrators call her Darling.
The glory of the youngest princess spreads everywhere, and now the “merry, laughter, games cathedral”, cupids and zephyrs leave Venus and run away to Darling. No one else brings sacrifices or incense to the goddess of love. Soon the evil-speaking spirits inform the goddess that Venus’s servants were appropriated by Darling, and, although the princess did not even think of angering the gods, they add that she did this to annoy Venus. Believing their lies, the angry goddess immediately flies to her son Cupid and begs him to stand up for her violated honor, make Darling ugly so that everyone turns away from her, or give her a husband worse than anyone in the world.
Cupid, in order to calm his mother, promises to take revenge on the princess. And soon news comes to Venus that Darling has been abandoned by everyone; former admirers do not even come close to her, but only bow from afar. Such a miracle troubles the minds of the Greeks. Everyone is at a loss... Finally, Venus announces to all of Greece why the gods are angry, and promises terrible troubles if Darling is not brought to her. But the king and all his relatives unanimously refuse the goddess.
Meanwhile, Darling calls out to Cupid in tears: why is she alone, without a spouse, even without a boyfriend? Her relatives are looking for suitors everywhere, but, fearing the wrath of the gods, no one wants to marry the princess. In the end, it was decided to turn to the Oracle, and the Oracle replies that the husband appointed by fate for Darling is a monster who stings everyone, tears out hearts and carries a quiver of terrible arrows on his shoulders, and in order for the girl to unite with him, she must be taken to the top of the mountain, where she has hitherto no one walked around and left there.
This answer plunges everyone into grief. It is a pity to give the girl to some monster, and all the relatives declare that it is better to endure persecution and misfortune than to take Darling to be sacrificed, especially since it is not even known where. But the princess, out of generosity (or because she wants to have a husband, no matter what) herself says to her father: “I must save you with my misfortune.” And where to go, Darling decides simply: the horses harnessed to the carriage must be driven without a coachman, and let fate itself lead it.
After a few weeks, the horses themselves stop at some mountain and do not want to go further. Then Darling is led to a height without a road, past abysses and caves, where some evil creatures roar. And at the top, the king and his entire court, having said goodbye to the girl, leave her alone and, heartbroken, leave.
However, Darling does not stay there for long. The invisible Zephyr picks her up and lifts her to the “unknown village of heaven.” The princess finds herself in magnificent palaces, where nymphs, cupids and zephyrs fulfill all her desires. At night, her husband comes to Darling, but since he appears in the dark, the girl does not know who he is. The husband himself answers her questions that for the time being she cannot see him. In the morning he disappears, leaving Darling perplexed... and in love.
The princess needs several days to explore the luxurious chambers and the adjacent forests, gardens and groves, which show her many wonders and wonders. And one day, going deeper into the forest, she finds a grotto leading to a dark cave, and, having gone there, finds her husband. Since then, Darling comes to this grotto every day, and every night her husband visits her in her bedchamber.
Three years pass like this. Darling is happy, but she is haunted by the desire to know what her husband looks like. However, in response to all her requests, he only begs that she should not strive to see him, be obedient to him and not listen to any advice in this matter, even from her closest relatives.
One day, Dushenka learns that her sisters have come to look for her at that terrible mountain where the princess was once abandoned. Darling immediately tells Zephyr to take them to her paradise, greets them kindly and tries to “amuse them in every possible way.” When asked where her husband is, she first answers: “Not at home,” but then, unable to bear it, she admits to all the oddities of her marriage. She does not know that her sisters, jealous of her, only dream of depriving Darling of her happiness. Therefore, they say that they allegedly saw a terrible snake crawling into the grotto, and that this is Dushenka’s husband. She, horrified, decides to commit suicide, but the evil sisters object to her that first she, as an honest woman, must kill the monster. They even get and bring her a lamp and a sword for this purpose, after which they return home.
The night is coming. Having waited for her husband to fall asleep, Dushenka illuminates him with a lamp... and discovers that it is Cupid himself. Admiring him in admiration, she accidentally spills oil from the lamp on her husband’s thigh. Waking up from pain, he sees a naked sword and thinks that his wife has planned evil against him. “And then Darling fell and died.” She comes to her senses on the same mountain where she said goodbye to her family a long time ago. The poor thing understands that she herself is to blame for this misfortune; she sobs loudly, cries out, asks for forgiveness. Cupid, furtively watching her, already wanted to throw himself at the feet of his beloved, but, having come to his senses, he descends to her, as befits God, in all the splendor of his greatness and announces that Darling, who has broken the law, is now in disgrace with the gods, and therefore he is no longer can be with her, but leaves her to fate. And, without listening to her excuses, she disappears.
The only option left for the unfortunate princess is suicide. She throws herself into the abyss, but one of the zephyrs picks her up and carefully carries her to the lawn. Deciding to kill herself, Darling looks for a sharp stone, but all the stones in her hands turn into pieces of bread. The branches of the tree from which she wants to hang herself lower her unharmed to the ground. Naiad fish prevent her from drowning in the river. Noticing a fire in the wood on the shore, the princess tries to burn herself, but an unknown force extinguishes the flame in front of her.
“Fate ordained that Darling should live / And suffer in life.” The princess tells the old fisherman who has returned to his firewood about her misfortunes and learns from him - alas! - that new troubles await her: Venus has already sent letters everywhere, in which she demands that Darling be found and presented to her, and that they do not dare to hide her under pain of her anger. Realizing that it is impossible to hide all the time, poor Dushenka asks the most senior goddesses for help, but Juno, Ceres and Minerva for one reason or another refuse her. Then the princess goes to Venus herself. But, appearing in the temple of the goddess of love, the beauty attracts all eyes; the people take her for Venus, kneel... and just at that moment the goddess herself enters.
In order to take proper revenge on Darling, Venus makes her her slave and gives her such assignments that she must die or at least turn ugly. On the very first day, she orders the princess to bring living and dead water. Having learned about this, Cupid orders his servants to help Darling. Faithful Zephyr immediately takes his former owner to the place where such waters flow, explains that the snake Gorynich Miracle-Yuda, who guards the waters, must be treated to a drink, and hands her a large flask with swill for the snake. So Dushenka fulfills the first order.
Venus gives the princess a new task - to go to the Garden of the Hesperides and bring golden apples from there. And that garden is guarded by Kashchei, who asks riddles to everyone who comes, and eats the one who cannot guess them. But Zephyr tells Dushenka the answers to the riddles in advance, and she honorably fulfills the second assignment.
Then the goddess of love sends the princess to hell to Proserpina, ordering her to take a certain pot there and, without looking into it, bring it to her. Thanks to Zephyr's advice, Dushenka manages to safely go to hell and return back. But, unable to contain her curiosity, she opens the pot. Thick smoke flies out from there, and the princess’s face is immediately covered with blackness, which cannot be erased or washed away. Ashamed of her appearance, the unfortunate woman hides in a cave with the intention of never leaving.
Although Cupid, trying to please Venus, pretended that he did not think about Darling, he did not forget either her or her sisters. He informs the sisters that he intends to take both of them as his spouses, and even if they just climb a high mountain and throw themselves down, Zephyr will immediately pick them up and bring them to him. The overjoyed sisters rush to jump into the abyss, but Zephyr only blows at their backs, and they crash. After this, Cupid, having described to his mother how Dushenka has turned ugly, seeks permission from the satisfied goddess to reunite with his wife - after all, he loves her not for her transitory appearance, but for her beautiful soul. He finds Darling, talks to her, and they forgive each other.
And when their marriage is recognized by all the gods, Venus, judging that it is not profitable for her to keep an ugly woman in her family, returns her daughter-in-law to her former beauty. Since then, Cupid and Darling have lived happily.
LYROIC-EPIC POEM 1770-1780
1770-1780 - a time of turning point in the fate of Russian literature of the 18th century, the essence of which was that classicism began to lose its leading position, retreating under the onslaught of new aesthetic ideas about the essence of literature, its relationship with life, its role and purpose in the spiritual life of man and society . The turning point of this literary era was reflected in a number of factors that determined the course of the literary process of 1770-1780. First of all, this is the time of the emergence of new genres and forms of literary creativity that are not included in the classicist hierarchy: satirical journalism and novel prose, which arose in the wake of the democratization of national aesthetic consciousness and literary creativity, are generated by a different type of worldview and offer other ways of world modeling that are not characteristic of classicism.
Burlesque as an aesthetic category of literature of the transitional period and a form of verbal creativity A characteristic feature of the literary process of the 1770-1780s. began the emergence of a large number of contaminated genres, connecting and intersecting stable formal features of high and low genres. By 1770-1780 the process of mutual adaptation of high and low genres has acquired a universal character, capturing into its orbit journalistic and artistic prose (satirical magazines, democratic novel, prose of A. N. Radishchev), drama (high prose and poetic comedy by Fonvizin, Knyazhnin), lyrics (Derzhavin), epic poetry (lyric-epic poem of the 1770-1780s), oratorical prose (false panegyric). The burlesque poem was not included in the official genre hierarchy of French classicism - it is not mentioned in Boileau’s “Poetic Art”, but it was during Boileau’s time and with his direct participation in French literature that two genre varieties of the burlesque poem arose. French poet Paul Scarron, built on the principle of “Batrachomyomachy”, in which the means of achieving a comic effect is the discrepancy between a high plot and a low style: published in 1648-1752. Scarron’s burlesque poem “The Aeneid Re-faced (in disguise)” (in other translations “The Aeneid Inside Out” is an everyday retelling of Virgil’s poem in rude, vernacular language. From the point of view of classicist creative attitudes, this was a low form of art, since it compromised the high content heroic epic.
Therefore, in 1674, Boileau proposed another type of burlesque, the reverse of Scarron's burlesque. Boileau took a low theme - a petty everyday quarrel between church servants - the treasurer and the choirboy - and glorified it in the high style of the epic, observing all the formal rules of this genre in the poem “Naloy”. This is how the second type of burlesque arose, more preferable, since it extracted a comic effect from the discrepancy between the low everyday plot and the high style of its presentation. The first burlesque Russian poem by Vasily Ivanovich Maykov, “Elisha or the Irritated Bacchus,” was born in the wake of literary polemics that spread to a new generation of writers in the 1770s. inherited from Lomonosov and Sumarokov.
In Petrov’s translation, “offer” and “invocation” sounded as follows:
And here is the beginning of Maykov’s poem:
Especially the text of the first song of Maykov’s poem is full of parodic reminiscences from Petrov’s translation and personal attacks against him. Description of the “drinking house called Star” - “This house was appointed by Bacchus to be the capital;
And the entire plot of the poem “Elisha, or the Irritated Bacchus” retained traces of Maykov’s original parody plan: the main plot situations of “Elisha” are obvious burlesque reworkings of the plot situations of “The Aeneid.” Virgil's Aeneas was the cause of the quarrel between the goddesses Juno and Venus - like him, Maykovsky's hero becomes an instrument for resolving the dispute between the fertility goddess Ceres and the god of wine Bacchus over how to use the fruits of agriculture - bake bread or distill vodka and beer. Venus shelters Aeneas from the wrath of Juno in Carthage by making the Carthaginian queen love Aeneas and shrouding him in a cloud that makes him invisible. In Maykov, this plot device is reinterpreted as follows: on the instructions of Bacchus, Hermes kidnaps Elisha from prison and, hiding under an invisibility cap, hides him from the police in the Kalinkinsky workhouse (a correctional institution for girls of easy virtue), where Elisha spends time with an elderly woman who has fallen in love with him the boss and tells her the story of his life, where the central place is occupied by a kind of battle epic - a story about the battle of the inhabitants of two neighboring villages, Valdai and Zimogorye, for hay meadows. It is easy to see that this episode is a burlesque retelling of Aeneas’ famous story about the destruction of Troy and the last battle of the Greeks and Trojans. Aeneas leaves Dido, following the outlines of his destiny - he must found Rome; and the inconsolable Dido, after Aeneas’s departure, throws herself into the fire. Maykovsky's Elisha is inspired by Bacchus to leave the warden of the Kalinkinsky workhouse, and Elisha runs under the invisible cap, leaving “his portas and camisole” in the warden's bedroom, and the warden, offended by Elisha, burns his clothes in the stove. Here the parody plan of Maykov’s poem finally comes to the surface of the text:
And if we remember who was the prototype of the wise Carthaginian queen for Petrov, the translator of “The Aeneid,” then a very risky parallel arises here: in Maykov’s poem Dido corresponds to the voluptuous mistress of the Kalinkin house: a variation on the theme of the “outdated coquette” of Novikov magazines.
Conventionally fantastic and real-life plot plans However, the plot of Maykov’s poem is not limited to the parody-satirical plan. The plot of "Elisha" develops, as in a heroic epic, simultaneously in two narrative planes - in a conventionally mythological one, which involves action in a host of Olympian deities who patronize or hinder the hero, and in the real one, where the earthly hero of the poem acts.
The first layer of the plot, conventionally mythological, is developed by Maykov according to the laws of burlesque of the Scarron type, that is, he travesties the images and deeds of the lofty Olympian gods in the categories of the everyday world image and rough vernacular.
However, in Maykov’s poem another type of hero is presented - the coachman Elisha, whose actions move the real-life plan of the plot and who, as an instrument for resolving the dispute of the gods, is the connecting link of the two plot plans. The real-life plot is connected with criticism of the system of wine farming, which began to be practiced in Russia since the reign of Catherine II. Wine farming is the same everyday reality that serves as the starting point for the poem’s two plot plans. Farmers have increased prices for alcohol - the god of wine Bacchus is dissatisfied with this, since they will drink less expensive alcohol. And, with the permission of Zeus, who in this way hopes to soften the anger of Ceres at the fact that the fruits of agriculture are distilled into alcohol, Bacchus makes the coachman Elisha, a drunkard, a bully and a dashing fist fighter, an instrument of his revenge on the tax farmers.
Thus, Maykov violates two classicist principles of burlesque at once: firstly, by combining in the narrative heroes of two different levels, high characters and an everyday hero, he mixed two types of burlesque within one work; and secondly, if in one case the burlesque task is carried out consistently (high plot - low syllable), then the comic effect in the real plot plan is not at all due to the difference in form and content. The low hero Elisha is narrated in a vernacular language quite appropriate to his democratic everyday status. The only thing that remains from burlesque in this case is the comic combination of high meter epic and tragedy, Alexandrian verse, with the rough and juicy colloquial vocabulary of Maykov’s descriptions.
For example, when Elisha tells the head of the Kalinkinsky workhouse about the battle between the Zimogorsk people and the Valdai people for haymaking, his story, according to the rules of Boileau's burlesque, should have been in the epic heroic tones of battle painting. However, this does not happen, and in Elisha’s narrative the fighting peasants behave not like ancient warriors, but like real Russian men:
The most remarkable thing in these everyday pictures is that in them the direct speech of the democratic hero, an example of which is represented by the quoted fragment, is stylistically in no way different from the author’s speech, in which the same average style serves the same tasks - the reproduction of reliable everyday pictures, neutral in aesthetically, but having the independent value of aesthetic innovation in poetry - such as, for example, the following description of the prison into which Elisha, who had fought with the Chumak, ended up from a tavern:
This unity of the speech norm of the author and the hero of the poem is evidence of the same democratization author's position in relation to the character, which we had occasion to mention in connection with the democratic novel of 1760-1770. If in the novel the author gives the narration to the hero, thereby, as it were, entrusting his writing functions to him, then in Maykov’s poem the rapprochement between the author and the hero is marked by the unity of the stylistic norm of poetic speech.
It is curious that Maykov’s poem is close to the democratic novel due to such a poetic feature as the widespread use of folklore in order to create the image of a national democratic hero, a natural bearer of folk culture. However, if Chulkov equipped the heroine’s direct speech with proverbs, thereby emphasizing the national foundations of her character, then in Maykov’s poem, references to folklore motifs and genres equally saturate the speech of the hero and the author. Thus, Elisha’s story about the battle of the Zimogorsk people with the Valdai people and the author’s story about the fist fight between merchants and coachmen are equally rich in reminiscences from the Russian epic epic; The author's references to the folklore genres of the robber song and popular popular story are scattered throughout the text of the poem in connection with the everyday situations that arise in it. Completely in the genre of Russian folk popular print, Maykov describes the outfit of Bacchus, in which he appears in his St. Petersburg “capital” - the Zvezda tavern: Elisha, who fell asleep in prison so soundly that Hermes is unable to awaken him, evokes in the author the following association with the Russian heroic epic and its Prose Retellings XVII - early XVIII
So inconspicuously in the narrative of the poem there grows a detailed literary and aesthetic background against which Maykov creates his poem. The range of genres and texts with which Maykov’s poem is aesthetically, plot-wise, parodically, and associatively correlated is truly enormous: here Virgil’s “Aeneid” is the primary source of the travestyed plot of “Elisha,” and Trediakovsky’s “Tilemakhides” (“Russian Homer” who does not know “what” in which verses is the meter” - of course, Trediakovsky), and the translation of the first song of “The Aeneid” by Vasily Petrov, and “The Aeneid Inside Out” by Scarron, and popular print prose of the early 18th century. - a kind of national democratic analogue of the chivalric romance - and, finally, folklore genres: epic, barge-burden song. And this polyphony from folklore and literary high epic to folklore and literary humorous genres, with which the text of Maykov’s poem is somehow correlated, gives it a fundamentally new aesthetic quality - a peculiar genre vibration between high and low, serious and funny, pathetic and irony, with a tendency towards mutual assimilation of these polar categories in “mediocre speech” and “mediocre” - neither high nor low - genre. In this sense, Maykov’s poetic epic also turned out to be similar to a democratic prose novel, built against the huge associative background of genre models of the Western European novel.
But the most important thing is that this associative background was introduced into Maykov’s poem on behalf of the author himself. Forms of expression of the author's position as a factor in aesthetics and poetics of storytelling
In a number of cases, in such authorial digressions, one can observe the intonation play of the narrative, changes from pathos to irony, which reveal the very process of burlesque poetry: the convergence of pathetic and ironic contexts in close proximity corresponds to the very nature of the burlesque poem genre:
It is impossible not to notice that all such manifestations of the author’s position are of an aesthetic nature: they, as a rule, relate to creative principles, literary likes and dislikes, ideas about the genre of a burlesque poem and the very process of creating its text, as if in front of the reader’s eyes in constant colloquiums with the muse or Scarron regarding the style, genre, hero and plot of Maykov's poem. Thus, the author - writer, poet and storyteller, with his way of thinking, his literary and aesthetic position, seems to settle on the pages of his work as a kind of hero of the story. The poetics of burlesque, implemented in the plot and style of the poem, is complemented by the aesthetics of this type of creativity, set out in the author’s deviations from the plot narrative.
The poet Maykov shared his aesthetic discovery - the forms of manifestation of the author's position in the text of the work and the addition of the system of character images with the image of the author - with his contemporaries, prose writers, authors of the democratic novel. The next step in this direction was taken by Ippolit Fedorovich Bogdanovich, the author of the burlesque poem “Darling”, where the plot plan of the characters is supplemented by the author’s narrative plan, like Maykov’s, but another significant character appears in the system of artistic images of the poem - the reader. I. F. Bogdanovich finished the poem “Darling” in 1775, the first song of the poem was published in 1778; full text in 1783. And the very first thing that probably caught the eye of the first readers of “Darling” - and Bogdanovich’s poem was very popular - was the fundamentally new aesthetic position from which the poem was written. Bogdanovich defiantly contrasted his light, elegant work, which does not pretend to be moralizing or moralizing, with the still quite stable views on literature as a “moral school”: “My own fun in idle hours was my only motivation when I began to write “Darling”,” - so he himself Bogdanovich outlined his aesthetic position, which in the precise and literal sense of the word can be called “aesthetic.”
“Darling” is one of the first examples of not so much entertaining reading; This is a work whose final result of its impact on the reader is aesthetic pleasure in its pure form without any extraneous goals. And, accordingly, the nature of the poetic inspiration that prompted Bogdanovich to write his poem is also designated by him as not claiming any social tasks and not requiring any encouragement for writing, a free, disinterested play of poetic imagination, which is itself a law and the only goal: This aesthetic position also determined the choice of plot for Bogdanovich’s burlesque poem: its source was one of the non-canonical Greek myths, or rather, a literary stylization of a myth - the love story of Cupid and Psyche, set out as an inserted short story in Apuleius’s novel “The Golden Ass” and translated into French language by the famous fabulist Jean La Fontaine in prose with numerous poetic inserts. By the time Bogdanovich turned to this plot, both the Russian translation of Apuleius’s novel “The Golden Ass” and the translation of La Fontaine’s story-poem “The Love of Psycho and Cupid” were already known to the Russian reader. Consequently, when starting to create his poem, Bogdanovich was not guided by the task of familiarizing the Russian reader with a new plot or, especially, not by teaching goals moral lessons
This demonstrative orientation towards one’s own literary whim and personality is reflected in the beginning of the poem, which retains some connection with the canonical epic “proposal” and “invocation”, but in fact polemically contrasts the plot chosen by the author with the traditional plots of both heroic and burlesque epics:
Such an individual approach to the genre of burlesque poem determined the originality of its forms in Bogdanovich’s poem. Such traditional categories of burlesque as the game of discrepancy between high and low in terms of the combination of plot and style are completely alien to Bogdanovich’s poem: “Darling” is not a parody of the heroic epic, the heroes of the poem - earthly people and Olympian deities are not travestyed through a high or low style of narration. And the first sign of a rejection of the usual techniques of burlesque was Bogdanovich’s original meter, which he chose for his poem and, in principle, by this time devoid of any strong genre associations (except, perhaps, only the association with the fable genre) - heterogeneous (free ) iambic, with the number of feet in a verse varying from three to six, with a very whimsical and varied rhyme pattern. In general, Bogdanovich himself precisely defined the style of the poem, as well as its verse: “simplicity and freedom” - these concepts are not only a characteristic of the author’s position, but also the style and verse of the poem.
The burlesque quality of Bogdanovich's poem lies in a completely different narrative plane, and the general direction of burlesque is predicted by the name that the poet gives to his heroine. In Apuleius and La Fontaine it is called Psyche, in Russian - soul; The first Russian translator of La Fontaine's story slightly Russified this name, adding a Russian diminutive suffix to the Greek root: “Psisha.” Bogdanovich called his heroine “Darling”, literally translating the Greek word and giving it an affectionate form. Thus, in the plot of Apuleius-Lafontaine, conveyed by him in “simplicity and freedom,” Bogdanovich indicated a tendency towards its partial Russification. And only in this connection of the heroine, whose image is given the features of a different national definition, with the ancient Cupids, Zephyrs, Venus and other gods of the Olympic pantheon lies the burlesque inconsistency of the narrative plans. Through the stylization of myth in Apuleius’s novel, through the classicist conventions of La Fontaine’s Greece, Bogdanovich felt the folklore nature of the mythological plot. And it was precisely this folklore character of the myth of Cupid and Psyche that Bogdanovich tried to reproduce in his Russian poem on an ancient plot, having found in Russian folklore a genre that comes closest to the poetics of myth. Need I say that this genre is the Russian fairy tale, which in its formal and content structure is characterized by the same plot-thematic stability and specific typology of character and spatio-temporal imagery as the mythological world-image? Bogdanovich introduced a whole series of such typological features of the special world of the Russian fairy tale - topography, geography, population, composition of heroes - into his interpretation of the Apuleian plot.
The hero and heroine of a Russian fairy tale are a princess and her betrothed, one of whose appearance does not correspond to his essence due to the evil machinations of some pests: either the hero has to throw off the monster, or the king’s son gets a frog as his wife; Moreover, their path to each other certainly runs through distant lands to the thirtieth kingdom. And the ancient Psyche in her Russified guise as Dushenka is also a princess who, according to the prophecy of the oracle, must be taken to distant lands so that she can find her betrothed:
The fairy-tale image of “Snake-Gorynych, Miracle-Yuda,” which latently defines these ideas with its plastic appearance, will later appear as a character in the poem: he guards the sources of living and dead water, to which Venus sent Darling to atone for her sin, and the very motive of the three The services that the heroine must render to Venus is also an indisputable fairy-tale topos. This entire episode of the poem is thoroughly permeated with folklore fairy-tale motifs, superimposed on the poetics of the myth. The garden with the golden apples of the Hesperides, guarded by the titan Atlas, where Hercules penetrated in his mythological time, performing one of the twelve labors, in the fairy tale poem Bogdanovich is guarded by Kashchei the Immortal and Princess Perekrasa, who “was reputed in fairy tales in Rus', // As everyone knows, Tsar-Maiden" (476). The road to underground kingdom Pluto, where Darling must get Proserpina’s mysterious box, runs through a dense forest and a hut on chicken legs - the abode of Baba Yaga:
And at the slightest possibility of a functional or figurative coincidence of any plot or figurative motif of a Russian fairy tale with a mythological common place, Bogdanovich does not miss the opportunity to introduce it into the fabric of his narrative and refer to
This is La Fontaine's opinion expressed on a private occasion. Bogdanovich applied the stories of Cupid and Psyche throughout his treatment. In total, La Fontaine has 498 poetic lines in “The Love of Psyche and Cupid”. All of them are reproduced by Bogdanovich and expanded due to details missing from La Fontaine's original.
But this purely quantitative relationship testifies that Bogdanovich could only use La Fontaine’s novel as a canvas and that the poetic treatment of the story of Cupid and Psyche is basically the original creation of the Russian poet.
The language of “Darling” has undergone a certain evolution. In “Dushenka's Adventures” (1778), Bogdanovich is closer to the language of the Russian fable of the 1760s and the comic poem than to La Fontaine. In preparing the ed. 1783 Bogdanovich carefully freed the text of the first book of the poem from places that were satirical in content and written in a fable-comic language. So, the lines were discarded:
Thieves did not steal
And the sneaks were silent,
Everyone lived without sadness,
And he ate and drank to his heart's content.
All subjects and neighbors,
Idolizing such a charter,
The face of the wise king was placed everywhere
From gold, silver or copper,
Buddies, friends
Nobles and princes,
People came to visit him;
He was the first to invent
For fun in between
Yulu, goose and bones;
Card game,
At the royal court
And among the Greek people,
Wasn't in fashion back then
Nobles, like the mob,
They played with grain wisely,
We also played checkers
Without money, on pieces of paper,
And a lot of fun
For each and everyone,
They appeared there every day,
There was laughter everywhere
And people were amused.
Dushenka’s complaint to Amur contained the following lines:
I am no worse than my sisters;
But each of them is with her husband
Found heel lovers,
And everyone can do it according to their will
Find yourself more of them...
In the description of the journey of Dushenka and her relatives to the mountain indicated by the oracle, the priests were ironically depicted:
Finally, on this journey everyone was so tired,
That they almost turned back.
Then the chief priest,
Saving these timid sheep,
He shook his wide mustache,
And to the verbal cattle climbing down
He threatened the oracle and all the heavens.
Some vagueness of the concept and genre nature of “Darling” was reflected in the style of the publication. 1778 and 1783. Bogdanovich still draws the vocabulary of the poem from different genre sources and does not find a single stylistic principle for it. In the language of “Dushenka’s Adventures” and “Darling” (1783) there is still a lot of diversity, colloquial words and phrases, expressions of bureaucratic argot, and Gallicisms. Although already when revising the poem for the publication of 1783, Bogdanovich sought to achieve unity of style and language, to get away from linguistic extremes due to the sharp stylistic discrepancy that had already become unacceptable for the author. The language of the poem was systematically cleared of vernacular expressions and lines (book three)
And he will take her to Kutok;
IN Kutke will show you down the steps...
have been replaced by the following:
Will show you later in the hut corner;
From there he will show you down the steps.
Instead of a word with a colloquial and even dialectal character, a word commonly used and mastered in literature was introduced. When finalizing “Darling” in the edition. In 1794, very careful editing was carried out, mainly of a stylistic nature. Bogdanovich paid special attention to the rhythmic and sound side of the verse of the poem. In the second book the line
And the roads are strewn with roses everywhere
modified as follows:
And the roads are strewn with roses everywhere.
With this change in the line of iambic hexameter, the pyrrhic is moved from the second foot to the third. As a result, rhythmic
228the movement in the middle of the line changes, the monotony of the alternation of stressed stops and pyrrhichs disappears. In other cases, Bogdanovich changed the sound of a line without changing its rhythm:
For all their malice...
replaced by:
For their wickedness I hunger...
The sound repetition z... z... is supplemented by the repetition l... l... and the line receives a completely different sound organization, more consistent with the author's clarified emotional and stylistic task.
Preface.
Being prompted to do so by printed and written praise. Apparently, this refers to the review in the “Additions to the Moskovskie Gazette” (1783, No. 96, December 2) and mentions of “Darling” in the SLRS, in the “Stanzas” of M.M. Kheraskov and the article “Party” (1783, part 9, p. 245), which says “about the wonderful composition of Mr. Bogdanovich, which is not a drama, but a fairy tale in verse.”
Book one.
Homer, the father of double verses. In “Dushenka's Adventures” (1778), Homer was characterized differently:
Homer, father of poetry,
And the rhymes of the rich
And rhymes of married people!
Apparently, Bogdanovich was convinced of the fallacy of this opinion and therefore replaced it with an indication of “doubleness,” that is, the obligatory caesura in the verse of Homer’s poems.
Features, no equal feet.“Darling” is written in multi-footed “free” iambic, the way not poems, but fables and parables were usually written in the 1760s and 1770s.
Lycaon, whose history Nazon wrote. In Greek mythology, he was the king of Arcadia, distinguished by his cruelty. For killing a child as a sacrifice to the gods, Zeus turned Lycaon into a wolf. The “story” of Lycaon was retold in his “Metamorphoses” by Ovid Naso.
Severe brush- hard, rough bristles.
Image of rights- a truthful, correct image.
In Moscow at a masquerade. The Triumphant Minerva masquerade, organized in Moscow during the coronation of Catherine II on January 30 - February 2, 1763. This masquerade took place on the streets of Moscow and consisted of a procession of disguised people in the following order: the herald of the masquerade with his retinue, Momus, or Mockingbird, Bacchus, Disagreement, Deception, Ignorance, Bribery, Perverted Light, Arrogance, Extravagance and Poverty, Vulcan, Jupiter, the Golden Age, Parnassus and Peace, and finally, Minerva and Virtue.
Cerastes(Greek myth.) - horned people, whose transformation into bulls is described in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
Cecrops(Greek myth.) - people turned into monkeys. The legend of this is told in Ovid's Metamorphoses.
Ixion(Greek myth.) - the king who was punished by Zeus for pursuing Hera - chained to an ever-turning fiery wheel.
Cythera, or Cythera - an island in
229Greek archipelago, place of a special cult of Venus - Aphrodite; there was a temple dedicated to her.
Thetis(Greek myth.) - sea deity. Achilles was born from her marriage to Peleus.
Tambours and bobbins- tambour (from the French tambour - drum) - a type of embroidery in which the material was stretched onto a round hoop and held with straps, resembling a drum in appearance; bobbins are small blocks suspended from threads when weaving lace.
Book two.
Calisto, Daphnia, Armida... Angelica, Phrynea- names of mythological, historical and literary heroines. Calisto is a character in Ovid's Metamorphoses, Daphne is the daughter of the river god Ladon and Gaia, the goddess of the earth; fleeing from Apollo who was pursuing her, she was adopted by her mother and turned into a laurel tree; Armida is a character in Tasso's poem “Jerusalem Liberated”; Angelica is a character in Ariosto's poem "The Furious Roland"; Phrynea, or Phryne (5th century BC) - an ancient Greek hetaera, a friend of Pericles, famous for her beauty.
Appell, or Apelles (IV century BC) - Greek painter; here he is mentioned as the author of a painting depicting Aphrodite.
Menander(342-292 BC) - ancient Greek playwright, author of everyday comedies.
Movie(1635-1688) - French playwright, author of tragedies and opera librettos.
Detouche(1680-1754) - French playwright.
Regnard(1656-1709) - French playwright, follower of Moliere.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques (1712-1778) - here named as the author of the comic opera "The Village Sorcerer" (1752).
Not knowing what to say, she often shouted: ah! This refers to the tragedy of F. Kozelsky “Panthea” (1769), where in Panthea’s monologues the exclamation “ah!” is often repeated. “Panthea” was greeted unkindly by satirical magazines in 1769. Novikov wrote in “Trutna” that “the tragedy of Mr. *, recently published, is useful to read only for those who took an emetic medicine and it did not work” (N.I. Novikov. Satirical magazines, 1952, p. 109). In “An Attempt at a Historical Dictionary of Russian Writers” (1772), Novikov called “Panthea” “not very successful.”
And for this purpose she ordered the cupids to translate again in the correct syllable- this refers to the “Collection Trying to Translate Foreign Books” created by Catherine II (1768-1783).
Various sheets - apparently, journals from 1769-1774, came out boldly- obviously, the magazines of Novikov and Emin, and useful- Catherine II’s magazine “All sorts of things” (1769).
Dressed as Pallas, he threatens on horseback- apparently, this refers to the painting by S. Torelli “Catherine II in the image of Minerva.”
Parterre- here: part of the garden with low-trimmed trees.
Book three.
Petimeter- dandy, fashionista.
Calculations- figured decorations on outerwear.
Three span tail- in court usage in the second half of the 18th century, the length of the “tail” (train) was strictly regulated depending on the title and rank.
Shpyn- jester.
Alkmena(Greek myth.) - wife of Amphitryon; Zeus took possession of her, appearing in the form of her husband, and she gave birth to Hercules.
Praxiteles(IV century BC) - ancient Greek sculptor, whose works are known only in Roman copies. Of these, the statue of Aphrodite of Knidos was especially famous.
230Serman I.Z. Comments: Bogdanovich. Dushenka // I.F. Bogdanovich. Poems and poems. L.: Soviet writer, 1957. pp. 225-230. (Poet's Library; Large Series).
B ogdanovich Ippolit Fedorovich (23.XII.1743 (3.I.1744) - 6(18).I.1803) - poet, journalist (published and edited the magazines "Innocent Entertainment", "Collected News", the newspaper "St. Petersburg Vedomosti"), member of the Russian Academy. Born in the village. Perevolochnya, Poltava district, Kyiv province. in a noble family of Russified Serbs.
At the age of 10 he was brought to Moscow, assigned as a cadet to the College of Justice and sent to study at the Mathematical School at the Senate Office. Interest in poetry, music and theater brought Bogdanovich closer to M. M. Kheraskov, with whose permission he attended lectures at Moscow University.
In 1760-62, Ippolit Fedorovich actively collaborated in Kheraskov’s magazine “Useful Amusement”, publishing a number of poems in it. At this time, he became close to the Panin-Dashkova group and, with the help of the latter, began to publish the magazine “Innocent Exercise” (1763), which lasted, however, only six months.
In 1766 Bogdanovich moved to St. Petersburg and joined the Foreign College as a translator. For three years he served as secretary of the Russian embassy in Dresden. Returning to his homeland, he continued to serve in the Foreign Collegium under the command of Panin. He collaborates in the magazine “Evenings”, “Interlocutor of Lovers of Russian Literature”, “New Monthly Works” and others, publishing lyric poems, solemn odes, arrangements of psalms, eclogues and so on.
In 1761 he moved to serve in the university office.
Bogdanovich acted as a conductor of the advanced ideas of the French Enlightenment and soon became one of the most famous writers of the 2nd half of the 18th century. His magazine “Innocent Exercise” publishes translations from Voltaire and Helvetius from issue to issue. In the very first issue of the magazine, Ippolit Fedorovich publishes the poetic “Speech on Equality of State,” then his translation of Voltaire’s poem “On the Destruction of Lisbon,” filled with love for humanity and a sharp negation of idealistic optimism, complacency and tranquility.
In 1765, Ippolit Fedorovich, continuing the traditions of the didactic poem, published a poem in three songs, “Supreme Bliss,” in which, pursuing the theory of natural law, he proves that the basis of universal well-being is material equality and the absence of property.
In 1773, Bogdanovich’s collection “Lyre” was published, containing original poems and translations, in particular by the French writer Marmontel, who proved that for the complete bliss of “happy” subjects to be given freedom. In the fable “The Bees and the Bumblebee,” the poet opposed the drone nobles.
After the Pugachev uprising, social motives in Bogdanovich’s work fade, he moves away from his freethinking and takes the position of a court poet.
In 1775-82, Ippolit Fedorovich edited the government newspaper “St. Petersburg Gazette”; fulfilling the order of Catherine II, he publishes the collection “Russian Proverbs” (1785), in which he falsifies folklore in the spirit of government patriotism and strives to prove the piety and humility of the people. He wrote plays based on the plots of proverbs, the lyrical comedy “Darling’s Joy” (1786), which did not have any success with the reader.
Bogdanovich entered the history of Russian literature as the author of the poetic story “Darling” (1778, full edition - 1783), which is a free adaptation of La Fontaine’s novel “The Love of Psyche and Cupid” (1669), in turn repeating episodes from Apuleius’ novel “The Golden Ass” " Lafontaine, discarding the philosophical basis of the ancient myth of the love of Cupid and Psyche and borrowing only an erotic plot, sought to maintain the main line of the narrative in the form of a salon joke. Bogdanovich makes this last property of La Fontaine’s manner a characteristic feature of his poem. He rejects the “sublime” and “heroic” and widely uses comic ironic motifs of Russian folk poetry. The comic nature of the work corresponded to its style, simple and light, close to conversational. All this ensured Ippolit Fedorovich’s poem a resounding and lasting success. Criticizing the poet for the poverty of the content of “Darling,” Belinsky wrote: “Bogdanovich’s poem is still a wonderful work, as a fact of the history of Russian literature: it was a step forward for the language, and for literature, and for the literary education of our society. Anyone who is engaged in Russian literature as a subject of study and not just pleasure, it is a shame for him - an even more noted writer - not to read “Darlings” by Bogdanovich (Poln. sobr. soch., vol. V, M., 1954, p. 164). With his entertaining poem, Bogdanovich Ippolit Fedorovich opposed not only the forms, but also the ideas of Russian classicism.
In 1780 the poet went to serve in the St. Petersburg archive.
In 1786, together with F. Tumansky and I. F. Bogdanovich, he published the magazine “Mirror of Light”.
From 1788 he served as chairman of the archive.
Having retired under Paul I, he settled in Kursk in 1798, where he lived on a small pension. Here he immediately became the center of attraction for everyone who was interested in literature and art, and supervised the education of the young artist M.S. Shchepkina. When Alexander I ascended the throne, Bogdanovich began to think about resuming his activities at the Academy and was going to republish his works. He sent the new tsar an ode “In the event of the coronation of His Imperial Majesty the Emperor Alexander Pavlovich...”, written in Kursk on September 15, 1801, in which he glorifies the sovereign and expresses confidence that from now on “truth will reign on the throne and wisdom will reign forever.” , foreshadows the flourishing and bliss of all of Russia under the scepter of Alexander. The emperor, who needed the support of public opinion, graciously accepted the ode, and the author was presented with a ring.
Ippolit Fedorovich was planning to return to St. Petersburg, but illness and subsequent death prevented him from fulfilling this intention. He was buried in Kursk at the Kherson cemetery. After Bogdanovich's funeral, his grave had a small tombstone and was abandoned for a long time. And only in 1834, at the expense of lovers of literature and the Kursk governor P.N. Demidov, a monument worthy of the poet’s memory was erected, depicting Psyche holding a vessel with a Stygian dream. The white marble statue of Psyche (Darling) represented a slender woman, whose figure was wrapped in a lush tunic, falling in light folds to her feet. On June 2, 1895, on the initiative of T.I. Verzhbitsky, the monument was restored and installed on Kosagovsky Boulevard (now the territory of the May 1 Garden). Kyiv master P.I. Ostrovsky made a new figure of Psyche, basically repeating the old statue. A new pedestal was also made, on which fragments from the poem “Darling” were engraved on three sides. In the 1930s, at the direction of local authorities, the monument was demolished, the sculpture was lost, and the pedestal was moved to the façade of the Local History Museum. In the 1950s, the pedestal was returned to the poet’s grave, where it remains along with the original tombstone.
P published song - the most popular in late XVIII V. a small lyrical work of the poet.
“None of Bogdanovich’s pleasant trinkets was as famous and glorious as his song: “I am fifteen years old...” It became popular and to this day - despite many new favorite songs - retains its dignity,” wrote N.M. . Karamzin in 1803 (N. M. Karamzin. Selected works in 2 volumes, vol. 2. M.-L.” 1964, p. 223).
Song
I'm fifteen years old.
It's time for me to see the light now:
All my girlfriends are in the village
They became wiser from each other;
It's time for me to see the light now.
Everyone calls me pretty.
I need to think here
How should one manage in the field?
When the shepherd comes to be loved;
I need to think about this.
He will say: "I love you"
I will show him love too;
And I’ll tell him the same three words,
There is no damage in that;
I will show him love too.
This case is completely new to me,
I don't know love words;
He will ask for a deposit of love,
What to give? - I don’t know the tricks;
I don't know love words.
I would give him my staff -
I need the staff myself;
And to beware of animals,
I can’t part with the dog;
I need the staff myself.
In the empty and boring side
I also need pipes;
I'm glad to give him a lamb,
Whenever the herds are counted;
I also need pipes.
I remember when I was little
The shepherdess gave a kiss;
Is it really a reward for the shepherd
For his previous annoyance
Did the shepherdess give you a kiss?
What is the profit from
I don't see anything in that:
He will not believe the deception
When I won’t love him;
I don't see anything in that.
Love, mistress of hearts,
Finally, he will teach you how to act;
Love pays its reward
And he doesn’t waste his arrows in vain;
How to be - he will finally teach.
The shepherdess then says:
Let the shepherd come here;
So that there is no loss to the herd,
I will give him my heart as a reward;
Let the shepherd come here!
1773
****The poet's works can be found by following the links:
Karamzin N.M. About Bogdanovich and his works
WITH With the greatest gratitude, the author took advantage of the news brought to him by the venerable brother of the creator of “Darling”, Ivan Fedorovich Bogdanovich, but added to them some anecdotes he heard from people who were briefly acquainted with the deceased.
Collegiate adviser Ippolit Fedorovich Bogdanovich was born in 1743, December 23, in the happy climate of Little Russia, in the town of Perevolochny, where his father was in office; He alone owes his first education to him and his tender mother. - Talents sometimes take a long time to mature, but they are always discovered early: already in childhood, Bogdanovich passionately loved reading, drawing, music and poetry.
In 1754, he was taken to Moscow and assigned to the College of Justice as a cadet. Its president, Mr. Zhelyabuzhsky, noticed a special inclination for science in him and allowed him to study at the mathematical school that was then attached to the Senate office. But mathematics could not be the science of a person born for poetry; numbers and lines do not feed the imagination. Bogdanovich, tired of arithmetic and geometry, rested with the works of Lomonosov, whose lyre thundered and captivated the Russians at that time, not yet strict judges of poetry, but already sensitive to its great beauties.
Dramatic art has a powerful effect on every tender soul; discernment of taste comes only with age and with the subtle formation of mental abilities: it is not surprising that an ardent young man, seeing dramatic performances for the first time, these living pictures of passions, was so captivated by them that he was ready to act recklessly. One day a boy of about fifteen, modest, even shy, comes to the director of the Moscow Theater and tells him that he is a nobleman and wants to be an actor! [ I heard this from the immortal creator of "Rossiyada".] The director, talking with him, recognizes his desire for learning and poetry; proves to him that the acting title is indecent for a noble man; enrolls him in the university and takes him to live in his house. This boy was Hippolytus [ The pyitic name Hippolyta is more pleasant to the ears without a patronymic.] Bogdanovich, and the director of the theater (which is no less worthy of note) is Mikhailo Matveevich Kheraskov. So, a lucky star led the young student of the muses to their famous favorite, who, having great talent himself, knew how to discover it in others. - Then Bogdanovich learned the rules of language and poetry, foreign languages and acquired other information necessary for the reliable success of his talent; Science does not give talent, but forms it. The creator of "Rossiyada" was useful to him with instructions, advice and example. Bogdanovich studied in classes and wrote poetry, which was published in a magazine published at the university [ In "Healthy Fun".]. They were still far from perfect, but showed in the author the ability to get closer to it. In addition to Mikhail Matveevich Kheraskov (who was then a member of the university), our young poet also had a zealous patron in Prince Mikhail Ivanovich Dashkov. Respect shown to young talent, worthy of always the grateful remembrance of kind hearts: this delicate color, from signs of coldness and inattention, often fades without any fruit. But to the honor of the Russians, we note that young people with talent have always found and continue to find active patronage among us, especially if their moral character raises the value of the mind, as in Ippolit Bogdanovich, who distinguished himself with both - and most of all with the sweet simple-heartedness characteristic of Apollo's favorite...
The son of Phoebus was not born to be a subtle connoisseur
Customs, light conditions;
Innocence and simplicity are visible in the poet's deeds.
The universe is his home,
Where he lives with strangers
Like with brothers;
Loving freedom and peace,
Doesn't think of forcing himself.
Some poets are an exception to this rule; but such was Lafontaine - and Bogdanovich! At eighteen years old, he seemed still a baby in the world; said what he thought; did what he wanted; loved to listen to smart conversations and fell asleep from boring ones. Fortunately, the poet lived with a poet who demanded from him good poetry, and not a slavish observation of secular customs, and, sometimes amused by his innocence, loved both his talent and his rare good nature. Bogdanovich sometimes seemed bold in his sincerity; but if his word offended a person, then he was ready to cry from repentance; felt the need for caution and ten minutes later, again following the movement of his natural frankness: the weakness of a tender and beautiful soul, which sometimes defeats even the longest experience!.. Our poet, rich only in rhymes, could not pour gold on the poor, but (as the dear one said translator of Greeva's "Elegy")
He gave to the unfortunate with whatever he could - a tear!
Affection found in him the most zealous obligingness. One night there was a fire near a house he knew: he forgot a sound sleep young man, bad weather, distance and in only a doublet he appeared there to offer his services. - The owner and hostess, so kind and respectful, treated him like family: he retained his heartfelt affection for them all his life. - But we must still notice one trait of his character, obvious and sharp in almost all poets - sensitivity to female courtesy, which has always served as inspiration for pleasant poems. Those who are born to be a poet of graces early discover this tender sympathy with their friends - but the sympathy is often silent. The young poet saw, adored, blushed and sighed only in the tender madrigals. What strict woman could be offended by such feelings?
In 1761, Bogdanovich was appointed overseer of university classes with the rank of officer, and upon the accession to the throne of Empress Catherine II, he became a member of the commission of ceremonial preparations and composed inscriptions for the triumphal gates. In 1763, through the patronage of Princess Ekaterina Romanovna Dashkova [ “The benefactress of the Bogdanovich family,” adds I. F. B. in his news, “for his brother also owes his upbringing to her.” - We should have preserved this expression of noble gratitude.], he joined the staff of Count Pyotr Ivanovich Panin as a translator and at the same time published a magazine [ Title: "Innocent Exercise".], in which this famous lover of Russian literature participated with her own works. His talent was already revealed with brilliance in the translation of Voltaire’s poems, and most of all in the poem on the destruction of Lisbon, which Bogdanovich translated so successfully that many of its poems are not inferior in beauty to the strength of the French ones. For example:
God holds the chain in his hands, but he is not bound by it.
.................................
When the creator is so good, why does the creature suffer?
.................................
I'm alive, I feel, and my heart is in agony
Calls out to the creator and asks for relief...
O poor children of the almighty father!
Is this why you are given sensitive hearts?
..................................................................................
Who, oh my God! Are your fates known?
The All-Perfect One cannot produce evil.
There is no other creator, but there is evil in the world.
.................................................................................
Only he can open his affairs,
Correct the weak and make the wise wise.
......................................................
Epicurus is rejected, Plato is abandoned by me:
Belle knows more than them - but is it possible to settle down?
Holding the scales in his hands, he teaches - to doubt!
And not accepting any system,
I just denied everything, fought - with myself,
Like Samson, deprived of his eyes by his enemies,
Under the building fell, destroyed by his hands!
..........................................................
Kalifa once, ending his century,
At the last hour, this prayer to the god of rivers:
“I bring all this to you, O king of the universe!
What is missing from your all-perfect goodness:
Sins, ignorance, illnesses, tears, groans!”
He could also add hope to that.
Such poems, written by a young man of twenty, show a rare talent for poetry; some of them can only be condemned by a devout, strict Christian, and not by a critic; but in the first case, Voltaire, and not Bogdanovich, should be responsible. - Along with translations, many of his works were published in this magazine, some of which are distinguished by tenderness and good thoughts; for example, the following verses to Clymene:
So that we can be happy,
I will live so that I can love you;
And you love me so that I can live.
In 1765, Bogdanovich, considered a translator by a foreign collegium, published a short poem “Supreme Bliss.” He divided it into three songs: in the first he depicts a picture of the golden age, in the second - the successes of civil life, science and the abuse of passions, and in the third - the saving effect of laws and royal power. This important subject required maturity of talent: our poet did not yet have it; however, many poems are smart and pleasant. The poet clearly and well describes the pleasures of man in his innocence:
The moment he saw his perfection,
He is learned by nature and heart alone;
As every glance showed him his bliss
And he was delighted with every new object:
The five senses revealed to him the knowledge of things,
Which led him to happiness,
And the feelings only served to please him;
He did not know * then to use them for evil.
His innocence was not corrupted by passion;
He did not extend his desires far beyond his needs;
Wanted what he always had in his power,
And, consequently, he had everything he wanted.
* After: I didn’t know, I should say somehow - that is: I didn’t know how to use it for evil.
The various glories of kings are also well described in the pyitic vision...
I see countless scepters and powers there
And different crowns for the meek and the wicked.
Some will turn out to be people's love,
Foreshadowing peace, tranquility, silence;
Others will buy themselves with atrocities and blood:
They will be subject to hatred in captivity*.
The first ones will remain calm, safe,
And glory will proclaim their name throughout the world;
But finally the last ones will be unhappy,
By making others unhappy.
* Best verse in a poem.
This poem, then attributed to His Highness, the august heir to the throne, is concluded with the following beautiful verses:
Learn, Grand Duke, from the number of these examples,
To be a great king, a great man,
Fortunately for you and your subjects.
She, as far as we know, did not strong impression in public. Laurel wreath has already been woven for the author, but still invisible. In 1766, appointed to the post of secretary of the embassy to
Saxon court, Bogdanovich went to Dresden with the minister, Prince Andrei Mikhailovich Beloselsky. The kindness of this envoy, the brilliant meetings in his house, good acquaintances, the picturesque surroundings of the city and the treasures of art combined in it, made life there very pleasant for Bogdanovich, so that he always loved to remember her: she, no doubt, had a happy influence and to his most imaginative talent. But, walking along the flowering banks of the Elbe and dreaming of the nymphs they deserve; captivated by the animated brush of Correggio, Rubens, Veronese [ Everyone knows the Dresden Art Gallery.] and collecting sweet features in their paintings for his “Darling”, which already occupied his imagination, he at the same time described the constitution of Germany and reconciled the pleasures of a secular man, a lover of the arts, a poet with the position of a learned diplomat.
In 1768, returning from Dresden, he completely devoted himself to literature and poetry; translated various articles from the "Encyclopedia", Vertotov's "History of former changes in Rome", the thoughts of Abbot Saint-Pierre about eternal peace, the song "Catherine" by Michele Angelo Gianetti (for which he had the good fortune to be presented to this great empress), issued a magazine for 16 months under the title of "Petersburg Messenger" and, finally, in 1775, he placed his "Darling" on the altar of the Graces. Bogdanovich spoke with pleasure afterwards about the time of its composition. He then lived on Vasilyevsky Island, in a quiet, secluded house, studying music and poetry, in happy carelessness and freedom; had pleasant acquaintances; he loved to travel sometimes, but even more so to return home, where the muse was waiting for him with new ideas and flowers... Peaceful, inexplicable pleasures of creative talent, perhaps the truest in life! Often the ghosts of vanity and other passions distract us from these kind exercises; but what person with talent, having tasted their sweetness and then plunged into the noisy, active idleness of the world, among all the brilliant amusements, did not regret his captivating moments of inspiration? A strong, good verse, a happy word, a skillful transition from one thought to another delights the poet like a baby, and often makes him cheerful for the whole day, especially if he can communicate his pleasure to a kind friend who is condescending to his authorial weakness! It is alive and innocent; the very labor by which we acquire it is pleasure; and the favor of good hearts awaits the writer ahead.
They talk about envy: but its pitiful efforts often contribute even more to the triumph of talents and are always, like light waves, reflected by a solid base on which talent rises, in honor of the fatherland, to the glory of reason and in the memory of the century...
Psyche's fable is one of the most beautiful mythologies and contains a witty allegory, which the poets finally eclipsed with their fictions. The ancient fable consisted solely of the legend that the god of love was united with Psyche (soul), an earthly beauty, and that from this marriage the goddess of pleasure was born. The idea of the allegory is that the soul enjoys divine pleasure in love. Apuleius, a glorious wit and sorcerer, in the opinion of the Roman people, composed from it an interesting and even touching tale, not at all in the spirit of Greek mythology, but similar to the fairy tales of modern times.
La Fontaine was captivated by it, decorated the fiction with fiction and wrote a folding story, mixing the touching with the funny and poetry with prose. She served as a model for the Russian "Darling"; but Bogdanovich, without letting Lafontaine out of his eyes, goes his own way and picks flowers in the meadows that have hidden from the French poet. Let us say without allegory that La Fontaine’s creation is more complete and more perfect in the aesthetic sense, and “Darling” is in many places more pleasant and lively and generally superior in that it is written in verse: for good verse is always better than good prose; What is more difficult has more value in the arts. It should also be noted that some images and objects necessarily require poetry for the greater pleasure of readers and that no harmonious, colorful prose can replace them. Everything miraculous and obviously unrealizable belongs to this kind (hence the fable “Darlings”). Unnatural cases must be described in unusual language; must be decorated with all the tricks of art in order to entertain us with a story in which there is not even a shadow of truth or probability. Poetry is a pleasant play of the mind and is richer than ordinary language in various turns of phrase, changes in tone, especially in free verse, in which “Darling” is written and which, like an English garden, reveal the artist’s mind and taste more than any correct unity. Lafontaine himself felt this and often leaves prose for this purpose; but he would have done much better if he had left it completely and written his poem from beginning to end in verse.
Bogdanovich wrote with them, and we all read it; La Fontaine is a prose writer, and his novel is hardly known to one in five French who are eager to read. It is true that there are people who do not like poetry, just as others do not like music and beautiful women; but such antipathy is extreme, and out of politeness we will not say anything about these people!
Wanting to decorate the coffin of this dear poet with his own flowers, let us here remind lovers of Russian poetry the best parts of “Dushenka”. It is not a heroic poem; we cannot, following the rules of Aristotle, consider with importance its fable, manners, characters, and their expression; We cannot, fortunately, in this case be pedants, whom the graces and their favorites are afraid of. “Darling” is a light play of the imagination, based only on the rules of delicate taste; and for them there is no Aristotle. In such an essay, everything is correct, it is funny and cheerful, it is witty, and well said. It seems very easy - and in fact, not difficult - but only for people with talent. Let us go, without any scholarly scale, following the poet; and in order to better appreciate his talent, we will compare “Darling” with La Fontaine’s creation.
We have already said that Bogdanovich did not slavishly imitate his model. For example, at the very beginning he very funny describes the good king, the heroine’s father,
Which was useful to the world,
Dear God;
Worthyly rewarded
Worthyly condemned;
And if I found evil souls among the defendants,
This is how he glued the donkey's ears on;
He ordered the envious people to make others happy
Their eyes were bored
look at gold
And be seduced by gold,
But they cannot be satisfied;
He ordered the arrogant not to communicate with people,
And their descendants were given the same arrogance for execution,
Which one is visible remains and brings it up.
Lafontaine doesn't say a word about that. And how nicely everything is said! How the verses change in place and how happy! - The kind name with which Bogdanovich called his heroine presents him with a happy play of thoughts that La Fontaine could envy:
It was called Soul according to the meaning of the sages;
And then, in the stories of ancient experts,
The Russians called her Darling,
And they write that then
Refined not without effort
The most suitable word for its name is,
Which was still new to the ears.
For the glory of Darling we have from those times
It is put in the people's lexicon
Among the most pleasant names,
And love established it in its law.
This alone is much better than any detailed description of Dushenka’s charms, which neither Bogdanovich nor Lafontaine has: for they did not want to talk too ordinary. - The complaints of Venus in the Russian poem are better than in the French fairy tale, where it is also in verse. Readers can judge:
Cupid, Cupid! Intercede for my honor and glory;
Show your judgment, show your authority.
Do you know Dushenka or may have heard of her:
A mere mortal, cursing at the gods,
Doesn't value your immortal mother;
Already by our servants
Dare to command
And in my regions you will triumph over me.
Can I bear and see with indifference,
Why is Darling alone everywhere and everything is obedient?
Chasing after her, they move away from us
Fans, friends, Cupids and Zephyrs.
..................................................
Jupiter himself sighs for her day and night,
And you can hear that he takes her as his wife:
An impudent Greek woman, hardly the king's daughter,
Forgetting Junonin's loyalty and services!
What kind of god will you be, and where will your throne be?
When another Cupid is born from them,
Who will take away your bow and arrows
And will he brazenly conquer the limits within our control?
You know how brave the sons of Jupiter are:
They go to heaven at will
And everyone creates miracles in the world.
And is it possible to tolerate that Darling is himself,
Without your help, passion instills in everyone,
What power did you have to kindle alone?
She's been laughing at you for a long time now
And he makes my misfortune a triumph.
For your honor, for the honor of Venus
Show examples of severity;
Make Darling hateful forever
And so thin
And so bad
So that every person is alienated from her;
Or give her a husband who could be found worse than anyone else;
So that she finds herself a tyrant in her husband
And I tormented myself
Cruel loving;
So that her beauty fades
And I became calm.
La Fontaine's Venus, having said that all the games and laughter fled from Paphos to Darling, continues:
L"un de ces jours je lui vois pour epoux
Le plus beau, le mieux fait de tout l"humain lignage,
Sans le tenir de vos traits ni de vous;
Sans vous en rendre aucun hommage.
Il naitra de leur mariage
Un autre Cupidon qui d"un de ces regards
Fera plus mille fois que vous avec son dards.
Prenez y gard; il vous y fait songer.
Rendez la malheureuse, et que cette cadette
Malgre les siens epouse un etranger,
Qui ne sache oÕ trouver retraite;
Qui soit laid, et qui la maltraite,
La fasse consumer en regrets superflus,
Tant que ni vous ni moi nous ne la craignions plus * .
* One of the men will become her husband,
Who is the most valiant, and strong, and beautiful,
Without your arrows, without your help,
Not subject to you, Cupid.
From their love alive and passionate
The omnipotent Cupid will be born again,
For the honor of Russian talent, we were not afraid of a long statement. Bogdanovich defeats his dangerous collaborator with thoughts and expressions. He makes it much more decent to tell Venus that Jupiter himself can marry Darling, and not the best of mortal handsome men, from whom a second Cupid could not be born. The verses: “You know how brave the sons of Jupiter are” - “And so bad, and so bad” - “And she tormented herself, loving cruelly” - are alive and beautiful; La Fontaine's are only fair, except: "Sans le tenir de vos traits, ni de vous" [ Without your arrows, without your help (French). - Ed.], where one thing is said twice to fill the verse. - La Fontaine’s sketch of Venus’s procession, Bogdanovich’s painting. The first said: "l"un (Triton) lui tient un miroir fait de cristal de roche" [ That mirror crystal substitutes for Venus (French). - Ed.], and second:
Carries a fragment of crystal mountains
In place of the mirror in front of her.
This kind of pleasantness announces
And joy on her brow.
“Oh, if only this view,” he says, “
Remained forever in crystal!"
But he wishes it in vain!
This ghost will disappear like a dream;
Only one stone will remain - and so on.
La Fontaine says: "Thetis lui fait ouir un concert de Sirenes" [ Sirens - sing louder, - Thetis command (French). - Ed..].Bogdanovich:
Sirens, sweet singers,
Meanwhile, they sing poems in her honor,
By which you, O my son, will be surpassed.
Be careful: you have to do this,
So that despite all her relatives’ efforts,
The ugly stranger took her away,
To lead her only wanderings,
Beatings, abuse and complaints,
So that she would cry and suffer in vain,
Humiliated, you and I are not afraid.
(In this article, all poetic translations from French belong to N. Rykova. - Ed.)
Fables interfere with reality,
Trying to extol her.
..................................
Thetis herself sent them
For small and large services
And I only wanted it for myself,
So that her husband would be at home!
The last line funny. Thetis is happy to amuse Venus, but on the condition that the amorous god of the seas does not come to meet her with his trident! - Lafontaine:
Tous les vents attentifs retiennent leur haleines;
Le seul Zephir est libre, et d"un souffle amoureux
Il caresse Venus, se joue a ses cheveux;
Contre ses vétements par fois il se courrouce.
L"onde pour la toucher a longs flots s"entrepousse
Et d"une egale ardeur chaque fleet a son tour
S"en vient baiser les pieds de la mere d"Amour * .
* And the winds try to hold their breath.
One zephyr plays pranks, forgetting all fear:
Only he plays in Venus's curls,
Sometimes he tries to tear the cover off her.
A jealous wave follows wave,
So that with the caress of your lips, which are moist and clean,
Touch the tender feet of the goddess of beauty (French). - Ed.
French poems are good, but Russian ones are even more playful and lively:
The fugitives are flying back,
Zephyrs, ancient impudent people.
Some of her hair flutters;
But suddenly, opening the lovely breast,
Stops blowing for a while
Vlasa lowers his hair in annoyance
And, entangled with them, he flies.
Chasing her, the waves are there
Pushing each other in jealousy
So that, quickly breaking out of the circle,
Humbly fall at her feet.
This is how poets imitate with talent. Bogdanovich did not think about the words of the La Fontaines, but saw the procession of Venus in front of him and painted a picture from life.
What the Frenchman says wittily in prose, the Russian no less wittyly, and even sweeter, said in verse. All lovers leave the beauty. The people are horrified by the unprecedented miracle, and Venus threatens the state with even new disasters if Darling herself is not sacrificed to her...
But the king and all his relatives
They loved Darling beyond measure;
We didn't have a pleasant day without her:
Could they have betrayed her to Venus’s vengeance?
And all in one voice,
Goddess to refuse,
They answered boldly
Something impossible.
Some laughed at her altar;
Others began to cry bitterly;
Others, without listening to the end, go on like that,
When the king says just a word;
Others said to Darling for joy,
What kind of special guilt?
For her it is praiseworthy and glorious,
When, to the shame of the goddesses, she was idolized;
And that Venus has hatred and revenge for her
Her honor will be multiplied.
Although those words were flattering to the princess,
But they would be nicer
When would any lover tell them to her.
She hid it out of pride
Your sadness in front of all eyes;
But secretly I was often depressed,
She called herself unhappy
And often in sorrowful tears
She called out to Cupid like this:
"Cupid, Cupid, merry god!
Why are you being harsh and strict with me?
How long has it been since everyone caressed me?
In victories I kept the clock;
Could captivate, love at will:
Why now in an unhappy lot?
Why are beauties useful to me?
The poorest shepherdess in the fields
Finds himself a shepherd;
I'm alone - -,
Without being bad, without being dashing!"
This complaint of Dushenka is extremely kind in its simplicity. But as proof of our impartiality, we agree that the dark answer of the oracle is better expressed in French verse. The beauty’s despair and what she says to her father, wanting to surrender to the will of a mysterious fate, are also more perfect and touching in La Fontaine. He tells in prose: one is easier than the other. But some places are better in Bogdanovich’s poems. Lafontaine's Psisha says: "Qu"on me mette sur un chariot, sans cocher ni guide; et qu"on laisse aller les chevaux a leur fantaisie: le sort le guidera infailliblement au lieu ordonne"* .
* Put me in a cart without a driver or guide, and let the horses themselves take me wherever they please: chance itself will direct them to the proper place. (Translation from French by A. Smirnov. - Ed.)
Is this soulless prose worth the following verses?
Darling
I told all my relatives,
Just so that she is properly equipped for the journey.
And they put me in a chariot,
Let the horses go free
Without a coachman and without reins.
“Fate,” she said, “will rule;
Fate will show the right trail
To the home of joys or troubles,
Where should you leave me?"
This is the glorious advantage of the language of poetry! If a poet knows how to overcome difficulties and put every word in its right place, then the simplest expressions are perfectly liked and the prose writer remains far behind. The horrors of Dushenka's journey are depicted in the French fairy tale as real horrors, and in the Russian one - with pleasant playfulness:
Everything is there at every step
We met a new fear:
Terrible caves
And to the top of the steepness
And to the abyss of depth.
The vixens appeared there differently;
Other flying dromedaries,
Others are dragons and cerberi
....................................
Princess bed
She was crushed in the hands of those who carried her,
And many are here out of fear
Many hats have been dropped,
Which the dragons devoured to catch them.
Others tore their clothes in the bushes
And, having a naked appearance,
They could barely hide their shame from the eyes of strangers.
Finally only a few pins left
And a few Oracle verses for reference.
You would have to be in a very bad mood not to laugh at the last two verses. We do not regret that our poet chose a caricature here over an important description: it is good.
No matter how smoothly or eloquently Lafontaine describes the Cupid's palace, the gardens, the helpfulness of the nymphs, his prose does not give me as much pleasure as the following poems by Bogdanovich:
Appeared before her
Beautiful view of the alleys
And groves and fields.
High balconies
The kingdom of Flora and Pomona was discovered there,
Cascades and ponds
And wonderful gardens.
From there forty nymphs led her to the palace,
What kind of creation only the gods are comfortable with;
And there Darling, to the coolness from the road,
They brought her to the bathhouse ready for her.
Cupids brought her the purest dew,
Which, instead of water, was collected everywhere.
Marshmallows warmed the air there with their breath,
Bubbles were blown from different aroma
And they made soap,
How do eastern kings wash themselves?
And who know the life-giving power.
Princess with shame
With dispute and labor,
As usual,
Looking at the updates,
Which ones were there for her to choose from,
She allowed us to lay down the covers of our beauties.
The regiments of various servants, before bowing,
They couldn’t get out of there without grief
And even behind the doors, without being in service,
They kissed her trail willingly at their leisure.
There are only one zephyrs, having an entrance everywhere,
Marshmallows are predatory, because they are small in height,
We found cracks in the doors and windows,
They sneaked among the nymphs and hid in the water,
Where Darling swam.
Bogdanovich, treating and entertaining the heroine with music in Cupid's palace, composed his orchestra better than La Fontaine and even ordered, very incidentally, Apollo himself to invisibly control it; but it is a pity that the choir of his singers, praising love, did not repeat in Russian the following stanza of the French anthem:
Sans cet amour tant d"objets ravissants,
Lambris dores, bois, jardins et fontains
N"ont point d"appas qui ne soient languissans,
Et leurs plaisirs sont moins doux que ses peines.
Des jeunes c?urs c"est le suprÉme bien:
Aimez, aimez - tout le reste n"est rien *.
* Yes, without love, dresses and crowns
They will get boring and will not save you from boredom.
Why then fountains and palaces?
The fire of love's torment is dearer to all of them.
For the young - the highest bliss in it:
Love, love - there is no point in the rest (French). - Ed.
As proof that poets, contrary to ancient slander, sometimes know how to be modest, both the Frenchman and the Russian did not want to describe Dushenka’s first meeting with Cupid. The latter got rid of the readers with a pleasant joke, saying that this scene remained forever a secret between the spouses...
But only in the morning did the cupids notice
That the nymphs laughed quietly among themselves,
And the guest, being shy by nature,
She seemed to be between them with her ear hanging up.
In the depiction of the chambers with their jewels, I love the statue of Darling...
Looking at this image, she herself marveled;
Another statue seemed in it then,
The likes of which no one has ever seen.
The trait is wonderful! Taken from French (“elle demeura longtemps immobile, et parut la plus belle statue de ces lieux” (She froze in place for a long time, looking like the most beautiful statue of this palace. (Translation from French by A. Smirnov. - Ed.))); but expressed in poetry, I like it better... I also love various picturesque images of Darling:
In one she, with a terrible shield on her chest,
Dressed as Pallas, he threatens on horseback,
And more than a spear, with his beautiful gaze.
In another we see Saturn in front of her, who
He tries to forget that he is an old grandfather,
He straightens his decrepit frame, wants to be younger,
Curls the remaining shreds of hair
And, seeing Darling, he lifts up his glasses.
And there she is visible, like a queen,
With cupids around, in an aerial chariot,
Beautiful Darling for honor and beauty
Cupids there hearts shoot on the fly;
They fly in a great crowd;
They fly, raising their bow, to the whole world in war;
And there is fierce Mars, destroyer of peaceful rights,
Seeing Darling, he shows a quiet disposition,
The fields are not stained with blood
And finally, forgetting my military regulations.
Softened at her feet, burning with love for her.
In the third picture, Zephyr copies the portrait from her; but, fearing immodesty,
It hides most of the beauties in the list;
And many of them, of course, are miracles,
They suddenly wrote themselves in front of Darling.
Most of all, I love the poet’s address to the beauty:
You, Darling, look good in all your outfits:
In the image of which queen are you dressed?
Are you sitting by the hut as a shepherdess,
In all you are a wonder of the world;
You are a beautiful deity in everyone -
And you alone are more beautiful than the portrait.
Simple and so sweet that perhaps no other place in “Darling” makes such a pleasant impression on the reader. Everyone wants to say these tender, beautiful poems to that woman who is dearer to him than all others; and the last verse can be called golden. - We do not blame the author for not wanting to further describe Cupid’s Palace,
Where everything captivated the eye
And it was incomparable;
But everywhere there is the mind
I'm meeting Darling
I'm seduced and then
I forget the chambers.
But with the chambers the poet forgot the owner; I forgot, between the portraits, to mention his images. Hiding from Darling, Cupid should have appeared to her at least in the picture. La Fontaine presented on the wallpaper various miracles of Cupid: for example, the terrible chaos brought into harmony by his hand...
Que fait l"Amour? Volant de bout en bout,
Ce jeune enfant, sans beaucoup de mystere.
En badinant vous debrouille le tout,
Mille fois mieux qu"un sage*.
* What about Cupid? Flying above chaos
And surpassing in skill and dexterity
All wise men, wonderful child
The confusion unravels it deftly (French). - Red.
How well Bogdanovich could say this in Russian poetry! How well could I, following La Fontaine, describe the attacks of the curious Darling towards the invisible Cupid and his excuses, so witty! "Necessairement je suis Dieu ou je suis Demon. Si vous trouvez que je suis Demon, vous cesserez de m"aimer ou du moins vous ne m"aimerez plus avec tant d"ardeur: car il s"en faut bien qu"on aime les Dieux aussi violemment que les hommes" [Which means that I am either a god or a demon. If you think that I am a demon, you must find me disgusting, and if I am a god, you must stop loving me, or at least stop loving me me with the same fervor, for it rarely happens that gods are loved as passionately as people. (Translation from French by A. Smirnov. - Ed.)] But our poet, as a poet, did not like law and coercion; good in his example, and what slightly and naturally caught his eye -
Loving freedom I wash
I sing as I please.
It is enough that Bogdanovich, sometimes passing by the beauties of the La Fontaines, generously replaced them with his own and varied ones. Knowing how to be gentle and funny, he also knew how to stab - even his own blood, that is, poets. Leading Darling into Amur’s library, he says:
The princess took to reading poetry there;
But they are read as if for sins,
I experienced excruciating boredom for the first time
And, throwing them under the table, she hurt her hand.
There was a rumor after that that it was finally
The creator of these unfortunate poems
By decree of Apollo
Forever driven from Helicon;
And as if Darling, afraid of such boredom*,
Or for the sake of saving hands,
I haven’t read poetry for a week,
Although I loved them and once folded them.
* We don't use boredom in the plural..
This unfortunate man, driven away from Helikon, was, of course, not like Bogdanovich, whom Dushenka could read with pleasure even when he describes her cunning with pious sincerity on the disastrous night of curiosity. The evil sisters persuaded her to light the lamp during Cupid's sleep...
Beautiful Darling used here
And cunning and agility.
What are the characteristics of wives?
When they have business at night,
Rather, they somehow give their husbands peace.
But did her tricks succeed at that time?
Or he himself was falling asleep from the effects of sadness:
He spoke little, sighed,
Yawned
Asleep.
It is reminiscent of one of the most glorious poems in Lutrin and is worth ten pages of La Fontaine's prose.
In the description of Dushenka's misfortunes, some features are also much happier in Bogdanovich; for example, his touching address to the pitiful exile:
Die, beauty, die! Your sweet age
The day has already passed;
And if death does not save you from disasters,
This light, where until now you were equal to the deity,
From now on, your sorrow will be filled with evil,
And everywhere he will present sorrow after sorrow.
...................................................
Unfortunately, Cupid left you.
Your paradise, your joys,
Fun, games, laughter
Gone like a dream.
Having tasted sweets, who in the world has lost them,
Loving separated from beloved
And he no longer looks forward to joy,
Easily feel, without further words,
What is better for Darling to die in this fate.
Our poet, describing with La Fontaine all the images of death chosen by Dushenka, adds one more of his own, not very poetic, but playfully and amusingly presented by him:
Having chosen the strongest branch, she took the last step
And I attached my scarf to the branch as it should,
And Darling put her little head into the noose.
Oh miracle of miracles!
The valley and the forest shook;
The rough oak branch on which she hung,
With respect to her beautiful head
Bent down like a rod - - -
And in good health he placed Darling on the grass;
And then all the branches are drawn down by her,
Or by their own will,
They made noise joyfully over her
And, joining the ends,
They made different crowns for her.
Only one impudent bitch caught on the dress,
And Dushenka’s cover above stopped;
Then I saw the valley and the forest
Another miracle of miracles - -
Liberty can be a small weakness of poets; Strict people have long condemned them, but indulgent people excuse a lot if imagination is inseparable from wit and does not forget the rules of taste. When the mountains and forests, seeing the miracle, exclaimed that Darling was the most beautiful of all in the world,
Cupid, looking from the clouds,
With a diligent gaze he justified it without words!
The poet wanted to say that Darling went through fire and water, and for this he makes her throw herself into the flames when the naiads prevented her from drowning in the river...
As soon as she threw herself into the flames for firewood,
Suddenly an invisible force
The flame was extinguished beneath her;
Instantly the smoke disappeared, the fire and heat went out;
All that was left was the necessary warm spirit,
Then let the princess dry her feet there,
Which I recently soaked in water.
It's funny and the story has all the precision of good prose. - La Fontaine, for the sake of variety in his story, introduces the story of the philosopher-fisherman: in “Darling” she could only stop the speed of the main action. Fairy tales in verse do not require a lot of fiction, which is necessary for the liveliness of prose fairy tales. Bogdanovich mentions the old fisherman solely so that Darling has someone to complain about her misfortune...
Do you remember the existence of all times
And all sorts of changes in the world:
Tell me how the light stands from the beginning,
Has anyone ever met
Is misfortune equal to mine?
I cut myself and put myself in a noose,
She drowned herself and threw herself into the fire;
But in my bitter fate,
Walked through fire, walked through water
And all kinds of deaths
Having terrified all nature,
I live against my will
And in vain I call death to myself.
................................................
"But who are you?" - the old man asked.
"I am Darling - I love Cupid."
The last verse is beautiful and touching, despite the author's humorous tone. - The announcement of Venus, nailed at all intersections, is taken from French, but much funnier in Russian:
Because Darling angered Venus
And Darling Cupid praised Venus in shame;
She, Darling, humiliates blush,
The dignity of whitewash glooms before itself;
...............................................................
She, Darling, has a slender figure,
Charming eyes, pleasant smile;
..................................................
She creates a flaw in the hearts with her eyes;
..........................................
For one thing or another,
Venus to each and everyone
About his anger at her
Announces in proper form.
In Darling's address to the goddesses, the most amusing thing is the importance of Minerva, who, while busy with astronomical observations and comet tails, says with contempt to the poor beauty,
That the world without Darling stood from century to century;
That she is an unimportant person in society;
And what’s more, the comet’s tail scares everyone,
Nobody thinks about Darling then.
Bogdanovich wanted to ridicule the astronomers who, around 1775, if I am not mistaken, frightened people with the danger of a comet. But it must be admitted that La Fontaine speaks of the jealous Juno even more funnily than the Russian poet. Here are his words: “It was not difficult for our shepherdess to find Juno. Jupiter’s jealous wife often comes to earth to inquire about her husband. Psisha greeted her with a hymn, but she sang only the power of this goddess and thus spoiled her work. It was necessary to praise her beauty, and As diligently as possible, speak to the kings about their greatness, and to the queens - about something completely different, if you want to please them. Juno answered that it is necessary to punish the mortal beauties with whom the gods fall in love. ?" Bogdanovich jokes only about Jupiter's metamorphoses: here Lafontaine is more subtle. But soon our poet gains the upper hand, describing the mistake of people who, seeing Dushenka in a peasant dress in the Venus Temple, consider her a goddess and whisper in each other’s ears:
Venus is here in secret!
Venus is behind the pillar!
Venus under the scarf!
Venus in a sundress!
I came here on foot!
Of course, with a shepherd boy!
Here short poems with one rhyme perfectly express the speed of folk words. And with what kind, simple-heartedness Darling speaks to the irritated Venus,
On bended knee:
Goddess of all beauty! Don't complain about me!
I did not intend to seduce your son.
Fate, fate sent me to power to him.
It's not me who is looking for people, but people who are blind.
They always marvel at the slightest beauty.
I myself was looking to fall before you;
I myself wanted to be your slave.
Bogdanovich also acted much more mercifully with his heroine than La Fontaine, who forced Venus to mercilessly flog her with rods! What barbarity! The Russian Darling serves only difficult, dangerous services to the goddess, completely in the tone of Russian ancient fairy tales, and beautifully: she goes for living and dead water, to the serpent Garynich, and so well, with feminine cunning, she pleases him:
O serpent Garynich, Miracle Yuda!
You are full at all times;
You are taller than an elephant,
He darkened the camel with beauty;
You have power in everything here;
You sparkle with golden scales,
And you boldly open your mouth,
And you can crush everyone with your claws!
Let me go, let me go to the waters!
Bogdanovich, bringing Darling to the evil Kashchei, does not tell us his riddles: it’s a pity! here was an opportunity to come up with something witty. But the author has already dreamed up enough, rushes to the end, to relax on the myrtle trees with his heroine, and in passing also describes Tartarus incomparably better than La Fontaine. As soon as Darling showed her foot there, everything became quiet...
Cerberus stopped barking
Frozen Tartarus began to melt.
The dark king of the underground kingdom,
Which is near Proserpina
I dozed, with hope for the servants,
Suddenly embarrassed by the silence:
He raised wrinkles around his eyebrows,
Flashed with the sparkle of his ardent eyes,
Looked... having started to speak, he faltered
And for the first time since birth
Smiled at that time!
We conclude our statement with these beautiful verses. Cupid unites with Dushenka, and Bogdanovich, remembering the allegorical meaning of the ancient fable, ends his poem with the praise of spiritual, eternally unfading beauty, as a consolation, as he says, of all earthly non-beauties.
Having noticed the good and beautiful passages in “Darling”, we will say that, of course, it is not all written in such happy verses; but in general it is so pleasant that a prudent critic, sensitive to the beauties of art and talent (and the judgment of others is idle talk or slander), will not want to prove his subtle legibility about it and will not forget that Ippolit Bogdanovich was the first in the Russian language to play with the imagination in light verse : Lomonosov, Sumarokov, Kheraskov could be models for him only in other genera.
Is it any wonder that “Darling” was unanimously glorified by all lovers of Russian poetry? Six or seven sheets, carelessly thrown into the light, changed the circumstances and life of the author. Catherine reigned in Russia: she read “Darling” with pleasure and told the writer about it: what could be more flattering for him? Nobles and courtiers, always zealous imitators of sovereigns, tried to show him signs of their respect and repeated by heart the places noticed by the monarch. The poets of that time wrote epistles, odes, madrigals in honor and glory of the creator of “Darling”. He was on roses, as the French say... But many brilliant acquaintances distracted Bogdanovich from the altar of the muses at the most blooming time of his talent (He was then just over 30 years old.) - and the “Darling” wreath was the only one left on his head. Although he is unfading, lovers of talents will not cease to regret that our poet was content with him and did not want new ones. He proved, unfortunately, that the author's love of fame can have limits! It is true that Bogdanovich still wrote, but little or with carelessness, as if reluctantly or in the slumber of a genius. Another would say that the poet, loving his “Darling,” wanted to leave her the honor of being the only elegant creation of his talent. - From 1775 to 1789, he composed “Historical Image of Russia,” Part I (an easy, imperfect, but quite pleasant experience), the lyrical comedy “Darling’s Joy,” the drama “Slavs” and two small theatrical plays based on Russian proverbs. Catherine herself encouraged Bogdanovich to write for the theater and, as a sign of her favor, gave him a snuffbox for “Darling’s Joy,” and a ring for the drama “Slavs.” In the first there is a funny scene, a feast of the gods, where Momus makes you laugh with his divine simplicity; and in the second, the twenty-five-year celebration of the Slavs in honor of the great empress, who forever founded their prosperity, touched the imagination of all spectators: for this drama was played at the time when a quarter of a century had passed since Catherine’s accession to the throne. - Also fulfilling the will of this monarch, he published “Russian Proverbs”, in which the precious remnants of the mind of our ancestors, their true concepts of goodness and wise rules of life were preserved. We must also mention his small poems published in “Interlocutor”: some of them are distinguished by their design and taste. - But none of Bogdanovich’s pleasant trinkets was as famous and glorious as his song: “I’m fifteen years old.” It became popular, and to this day - despite many new favorite songs - it retains its dignity. It has a true intricacy and a gentle simplicity that puts it on par with the best French songs. What could be simpler and kinder than the following couplets:
"I would give him my staff:
I need the staff myself;
And to beware of animals,
I can't part with the dog.
In the empty and boring side
I also need pipes.
I'm glad to give him a lamb,
Whenever the herds are not counted."
The shepherdess then says:
“Let the shepherd come here;
So that there is no loss to the herd,
I will give him my heart as a reward!"
He also translated all the best French poems written in honor of Catherine, Voltaire's, Marmontel's, etc. These poets knew how to praise the Great One in noble language, and Bogdanovich did not humiliate him. For example, he makes Marmontel speak in Russian like this:
O you who are in laws and heroism
Far surpassed her colleagues, -
Set a divine example for monarchs
Care for your subjects' happiness and peace!
Always show your majesty of soul
And complete the first fruits of your glorious deeds!
Happy people in your possession
The only thing left to have is freedom.
In his translation, Voltaire, like in the original, is sometimes important and sometimes funny, saying:
And where the Great Peter could make people,
Catherine made heroes there...
...................................................
Working day and night to restore peace to everyone
And between his labors he finds time to write to me.
Then Mustafa, proud before the vizier,
In the palaces he breathes insensible luxury,
Yawns in idleness, thinks of nothing,
And on top of that, he never writes to me!
While occupied with Bogdanovich's poetry, we forgot his service. In 1780, he was appointed a member of the then newly established State St. Petersburg Archive, in 1788 - its chairman, and in 1795 - retired with full pay, having served for 41 years. - Finally, in 1796 he left St. Petersburg. The disasters of Europe at that time, the striking picture of the inconstancy of fortune in relation to people and states, the saddest secular experience could in good and tender heart it produces a tendency towards peaceful solitude.
The pleasant climate, kind memories of childhood and the truest connection in the world, family friendship, attracted Bogdanovich to the happy countries of Little Russia. He came to Sumy with the intention of leading his life there in the circle of his closest relatives and enjoying its quiet evening in the arms of nature, always kind to a sensitive heart, especially for a poet. The first days and months seemed to him a complete charm; Never had his soul been so free and serene.
No dreams disturbed her peace anymore. A peaceful conscience, fifty years spent in observing the strict rules of honor; the gentle but everlasting activity of a person’s noble abilities: an educated and mature mind, an imagination that has not yet faded; reading selected authors, dealing with people who are kind and close to the heart, the very uniformity of simple life, amiable in some years, was Bogdanovich’s happiness, true and enviable, which is desired by all people who live for their own glory and the benefit of others in the noise of secular life and which in a sweet way In their thoughts they decorate their last days in the world, days of rest and peace!.. But
There is no refuge in this world!..
Here we must carefully repeat what is unclear, although true. Rousseau, in the sixth decade of his life, experienced the full force of romantic passion, funny in the eyes of the young secular Adonis, but touching for a philanthropic observer. You can joke with old Celadon with a clear conscience; but there is no time limit for special and random affection: you can always love as long as your heart is alive, and the gaze of a sensitive woman expresses sympathy to us.
Self-love, in some way fair in a worthy person; the name of friendship, with which we often close love from ourselves; the hope of being, if not charming, then at least pleasant, and to be liked without having to think about being liked, sometimes leads non-poets very far...
We don't know the circumstances; but who, even knowing them, could, without violating the rules of modest prudence, reveal to the world the details of a heartfelt connection? Let's just say that it is quiet, peaceful, happy life Bogdanovich suddenly became unbearable to him. He had to be separated from his friend and brother... How to stay in those places where everything reminded him of the most blissful hours for his heart and their unexpected consequences?
Offended pride can be an antidote to love, but a cruel one!.. And any strong change of feelings is terrible at a time when we are close to the west of life and when nature prescribes calm to a person; as a necessary condition for happiness that is still possible for him! The hope of replacing the loss makes it easier in youth; but summer robs us of this real consolation. We hear only the voice of strict reason, which forbids even complaining about fate!.. The thought of the last years of our dear poet is sad for anyone who knows how to imagine himself in the place of others.
In 1798 he moved to Kursk. - Alexander ascended the throne; and when all the patriots turned their eyes to him with joyful hopes, Bogdanovich took the lyre, which had long been left to him, and the young monarch sent him a ring as a sign of his favor. The muse “Darling” had the fame and happiness of being liked by the Great Catherine: how could her august grandson fail to honor her with his attention?
At the beginning of December 1802, Bogdanovich fell ill, having always been of weak build; He languished for four weeks and ended his life on January 6, to the grief of his family, friends and all lovers of Russian literature: for he had not yet lived to reach deep, venerable old age, which is the last sign of heavenly favor towards earthly wanderers, facilitating their transition to eternity.
They say that the life and character of the writer are visible in his works; however, we, loving the latter, always ask about the former from those people who personally knew the author. All Bogdanovich's acquaintances and friends unanimously praise his qualities, quiet disposition, sensitivity, selflessness and some kind of innocent gaiety, which he retained until old age and which made him pleasant in friendly society. Nobody noticed the author's pride in him. Bogdanovich even rarely spoke about poetry and literature, and always with a certain shyness that was his natural characteristic. It is no wonder that he did not like criticism, which frightens every tender pride, and admitted that with its crude severity it could completely turn him away from authorship.
Bogdanovich’s friends, whom he, once found, never lost, and even longer lovers of Russian talents will preserve his memory: for the creator of “Darling” will be known to posterity as a pleasant, gentle, often witty and intricate poet.
Notes
First published in "Bulletin of Europe", 1803, No. 9. The article is dedicated to the memory of I. F. Bogdanovich, who died in January 1803.
Page 200. ...as the kind translator of Greeva’s “Elegy” said... - Karamzin published the Elegy “Rural Cemetery” in the translation of the young Zhukovsky in the “Bulletin of Europe” in 1802.
Page 201. In 1763... published a magazine... "Innocent Exercise". - In his autobiography, Bogdanovich indicates that he was not a publisher, but was only “used to participate” in the magazine, which was published “under the auspices of E. R. Dashkova.”
Page 203... ...this poem, attributed... - that is, dedicated.
Page 204. ... issued a magazine for 16 months under the title "Petersburg Bulletin" ... - Karamzin was mistaken: the publisher of the St. Petersburg Bulletin (1778-1781) was G. L. Braiko. I.F.
Bogdanovich published another magazine - "Collected News", which was actually published for sixteen months - from September 1775 to December 1776 inclusive.
Page 217. This is reminiscent of one of the most glorious poems in Lutrin... - that is, in the poem of the 17th century French poet Boileau - “Nala”.
Page 223. Also fulfilling the will of this monarch, he published “Russian Proverbs”... - Bogdanovich published “Russian Proverbs” in 1785.
The fulfillment of Catherine's will determined both the principle of selection of proverbs and the nature of their processing. Bogdanovich arranged proverbs under headings with special titles that emphasized the political meaning of the selected proverbs. So, for example: “Chapter two. It means that service to the sovereign is directed in no other way than when the subject remains faithful, firm and true in his duties.” Next came the headings: “service to the sovereign,” “respect for those on high,” “courage in obedience to those above,” etc.
At the same time, Bogdanovich corrected proverbs, remade them, often distorting their meaning. Sometimes he composed the proverbs needed for a particular section himself.
Khodasevich V.F. Bogdanovich
WITH For some time now, in Soviet Russia there has been a custom of celebrating literary commemorations on many occasions when a real, full anniversary is out of the question. Now, when literary awareness has declined on both sides of the divide, when the present is so meager, and every bright page of the past is so precious, this idea seems to me a good one.
The other day marked one hundred and ninety-five years since the birth of Ippolit Fedorovich Bogdanovich: he was born in Little Russia, in the town of Perevolochny, on December 23, 1743, according to the old style, that is, according to the new style, with a difference of eleven days at that time - January 3, 1744 . At the age of eleven he was taken to Moscow to study. He studied at the Mathematical School, but soon somehow became addicted to the theater. He was seventeen years old when he went to Mikhail Mikhailovich Kheraskov, who was then the director of the Moscow Theater, with a request to be accepted as an actor. He did not become an actor, but, despite the difference in age, he became friends with Kheraskov and began writing poetry under his influence. The author of "Rossiada" even settled him in his home.
Simplicity of heart was and will forever remain his distinctive feature. “Eighteen years old,” says his biographer, “he seemed still a baby in the world; he said what he thought, did what he wanted; he loved to listen to intelligent conversations and fell asleep from boring ones. Fortunately, the poet lived with a poet who demanded from him good poetry, and not slavish adherence to secular customs... Bogdanovich seemed brave in his sincerity; but if his word offended a person, he was ready to cry from repentance; he felt the need for caution and after ten minutes he again followed the movement of his natural frankness.” He was extremely “sensitive to a woman’s courtesy,” that is, amorous, but also extremely timid and tender, and therefore he “saw, adored, blushed—and sighed only in tender madrigals.”
In 1765, paying tribute to the civic passions of the era, he wrote the poem “Supreme Bliss,” in which he sang “the saving effect of laws and royal power.” The poem was quite long, pompous and boring. Subsequently, Bogdanovich almost did not turn to this type of creativity, limiting himself to heartfelt lyrics.
A year later, he received a position as secretary of the embassy at the Saxon court and left for Dresden, where, however, he stayed away from diplomatic life. As part of his service duties, he carefully compiled a description of the German constitutions, but was more occupied with “walking along the flowering banks of the Elbe and thinking about the Nymphs.” The diplomat did not leave it. Two years later he returned to Russia and here at the first opportunity he retired, although he was only twenty-five years old. He settled in St. Petersburg, “on Vasilievsky Island, in a quiet, secluded house, studying music and poetry in happy carelessness and freedom; had pleasant acquaintances; loved to travel sometimes, but even more so - to return home, where the Muse was waiting for him with new ideas and flowers ..." He wrote lyrical poetry, translated, even published, as was customary at that time, his own small magazine, "Petersburg Bulletin", but mainly worked on a work that was destined to bring him fame among his contemporaries and posterity. He wrote "Darling", which he finished in 1775, but published it only eight years later, and then only at the urgent request of his friends.
The theme of this “ancient story” is not original. It belongs to the number of eternal, so-called wandering themes. It is based on the Hellenic myth of Eros-Love and Psyche-Soul. In painting and sculpture it seems to have been interpreted even more often than in poetry. Of its literary adaptations, the most famous is the one contained in the book of the Roman writer Apuleius - “Metamorphosis, or the Golden Ass.” However, Apuleius’ story was hardly even familiar to Bogdanovich, who in his work directly used La Fontaine’s later story.
Bogdanovich's imitation of Lafontaine is obvious and open. He took the entire outline of the story from the French writer, repeating entire chapters and many individual images. At the same time, “Darling” differs significantly from its original source, which, of course, is the reason for its fame. The differences begin with the very form of the narrative: La Fontaine’s story is written alternately in verse and in prose - “Darling” is entirely composed of verse. At the same time, Bogdanovich dared to replace Alexandrian verse, legalized by the 18th century, that is, iambic six-foot with paired alternation of male and female rhymes, with “free verse”, in which rhymes alternate in random order, two or more, while the number of feet in individual verses ranges from one up to six, that is, within the limits of the minimum and maximum allowed by the nature of the iambic itself.
Criticism of the 19th century blamed Bogdanovich for the fact that he remained incomprehensible to the deep meaning of the myth underlying the story. The judgment is correct, but also unfair, because the historical situation is not taken into account.
Russian classicism (or pseudo-classicism, as it is usually called) was filled with a Roman, not a Hellenic, spirit. Rome learned art from Greece, but the religious creativity underlying this art was quite alien to it. The religious idea in him was absorbed by the state one. Russian admirers of ancient art who lived in the 18th century were similar to the Romans in this respect. Poetry itself was for them as much an artistic field as government activities. More than poets, they recognized themselves as instillers of enlightenment, necessary for the state life of young post-Petrine Russia. In the person of Lomonosov, this consciousness reached its highest expression. They dedicated their loud odes to monarchs and generals, the creators of the state, not because they were flatterers, but because they were enthusiastic contemplators of this creation, partly even participants. They did not dare to question the existence of their Christian God, but for them he looked like the Roman Jupiter. They saw in Him, first of all, the Creator, the First Mover and Ruler. They did not think about the Christian idea, about the religious creativity of Christianity, just as the Romans did not think about the religious creativity of Hellas, whose religion they professed. It is characteristic that their favorite poets were Horace and Ovid. Of Greek poetry they officially worshiped Homer, but loved the most superficial and most godless - Anacreon. It is even more characteristic that the Hellenic tragedy, in which the religious life of Hellas is most concentrated and expressed, remained completely alien to them, they did not notice it. The only poet of Catherine’s time who had a genuine religious life was Derzhavin, but he, too, put all the power of faith and all the genius of his poetic creativity into the image of That God,
Who fills everything with himself,
Encompasses, builds, preserves.
Having mentioned the “three persons of the Godhead,” he still did not say anything about the second and third persons. True, later, as if in addition to “God,” he wrote “Christ,” but neither in the depth of content nor in purely poetic merits this ode can be compared with the first. Derzhavin was spiritually insufficient on this topic, and Mickiewicz was hardly right when he saw in “Christ” one of the highest creations of Christian art.
Naturally, Bogdanovich delved just as little into the philosophical and religious content of the myth of Eros and Psyche as the skeptical La Fontaine, whom he followed. The myth itself did not say anything to either one or the other - such was the age. For both, it served as a ready-made, elegant canvas on which it was convenient to embroider light patterns of poetic fantasy and everyday observations. The images of the Olympians spoke even less to Bogdanovich than the content of the myth. In his work they are reduced and parodied, all of them, even down to Psyche herself, who, if not parodied in the full sense of the word, is brought closer to the reader with the help of an unusually elegant Russification. Having given her the Russian, most tender, affectionate name Dushenka, he made her out to be a Russian girl in all her habits, just as La Fontaine had Frenchized her. The famous graphic artist Fyodor Tolstoy subsequently illustrated “Darling”. His drawings, for all their merits, are too “classical”, too Hellenized. Perhaps Venetsianov would have understood Bogdanovich better. In any case, Darling herself would have turned out great for him.
Bogdanovich’s frivolous story had serious literary consequences: against the backdrop of Russian literature of that time, a decline in heroic and mythological images and plots was a step towards realism. The same step and in the same direction took place in “Darling” in that it was the first Russian poetic work in which the author dared to show his personality simply, without poetic conventions and draperies. Not too deep in either joy or sadness, slightly thoughtful, slightly ironic, dreamy, light almost to the point of weightlessness - Bogdanovich himself is clearly visible in her. The verse itself is the same, and its syllable is, first of all, airy, although for us now it is sometimes too heavy: here again we must take into account the era: the Russian language was just being formed at that time. This incomparable lightness of “Darling” was appreciated by Pushkin. Severe, even too harsh towards the Russian poets of the 18th century, even in adulthood he loved Bogdanovich’s poems, “like the sins of his first youth,” and in his library he kept the complete collection of his works, as well as a separate edition of “Darling”.
"Darling" was an extraordinary success. Catherine II read “Darling” with pleasure and told the writer about it: what could be more flattering for him? Nobles and courtiers, always zealous imitators of sovereigns, tried to show him signs of their respect and repeated by heart the places noticed by the monarch. The poets of that time wrote epistles, odes, madrigals in honor and glory of the creator of “Darling”. He was on roses, as the French say...
Despite the success, Bogdanovich wrote little after “Darling”, probably because he fully expressed himself in it. Everything he wrote subsequently cannot be compared with it. The only remarkable thing is his three-volume collection of Russian proverbs. He was thus one of the first Russian folklorists.
For some time he served in the State Archives, but in 1795 he retired for the second time and completely. He soon left for his homeland, Little Russia, where he lived for two years. However, late and unrequited love forced him to move to the Kursk province. There he lived in complete melancholy solitude. His entire company consisted of a cat and a rooster. On January 6 (18), 1803, he died as quietly as he lived. Under the portrait, attached to the collection of his works, published in 1818-1819, there is a couplet, as light as his poetry and like his entire image:
Cupid moved his pen - he wrote “Darling”.
Belinsky V.G. Darling, an ancient story by I. Bogdanovich
"D"Ushenka" had at one time an extraordinary success, perhaps even higher than the tragedies of Sumarokov, the comedies of Fonvizin, the odes of Derzhavin, the "Rossiad" of Kheraskov. Bogdanovich's shepherd's pipe enchanted the ears of his contemporaries more powerfully than the trumpets and kettledrums of epic poems and solemn odes; his myrtle wreath was more seductive than the laurel wreaths of our Homers and Pindars of that time. Before the publication of "Ruslan and Lyudmila", our literature does not represent anything similar to such a brilliant triumph, if we exclude the success of "Poor Liza" by Karamzin. All poetic celebrities began to write inscriptions for the portrait of the happy singer. Darlings", and when he died - epitaphs on his coffin. One Dmitriev, in his time a poetic celebrity of the first magnitude, wrote three such epitaphs; here they are;
Hang it on this urn, O grace! crown:
Here Bogdanovich sleeps, your favorite singer.
All his summers flowed by in peace and dreams,
But he was the mistress of half the world,
And Russia will keep him in memory.
Son of Phoebus! Be proud: here the favorite of the muses sleeps.
Bowing to the urn in the evening,
Cupid often sheds tears here invisibly,
And he thinks, weighed down with melancholy,
Who will sing so sweetly to Darling now?
It seems that Bogdanovich’s brother wrote the following, glorious in his
time for a couplet to the creator of “Darling”;
Zephyr gave him a feather from his wings,
Cupid moved his pen, he wrote “Darling”.
Batyushkov sang Bogdanovich in his beautiful message to Zhukovsky, “My Penates,” along with other celebrities of Russian literature:
Behind them is the beautiful Sylph,
Pupil Harit,
On a sweet-voiced zither
He strums about Darling;
Meletsky with me
A smile calls
And with him, hand with hand,
Sings a hymn of joy.
Karamzin wrote an analysis of “Darling”, in which he tried to prove that Bogdanovich defeated La Fontaine, forgetting that La Fontaine’s fairy tale, if written in prose, was then in elegant prose, in an already established language, without truncations, without violent accents, that La Fontaine also had naivety, and wit and grace, so akin to the French genius.
What exactly is this glorified, this notorious “Darling”? - Yes, nothing, absolutely nothing: a fairy tale written in heavy verse, with truncated adjectives, strained accents, often with semi-rich and poor rhymes, a fairy tale devoid of any poetry, completely alien to playfulness, grace, wit. True, its author laid claim to poetry, grace, and witty naivety, or naive wit; but all of this with him is fake, heavy, rough, often tasteless and flat. Let us write down, as an example, the place where Darling approaches the sleeping Cupid, with a lamp in his hand and a sword under his hem:
Then the princess carefully,
He gets up as quietly as possible.
And below, along the golden path,
Barely touching the fifth,
Comes out into some peace,
Where many are blocked from sight
They hid the sword and the light of the lamp.
Then, with a lamp in his hands,
He goes back, out of fear,
And with a sad imagination,
Hides the sword under a sleeping dress;
He goes and hesitates on the way,
And suddenly speeds up the steps,
And he's afraid of his own shadow,
He's afraid to find a snake there.
Meanwhile, he enters the marriage chamber.
But who introduced himself to her there?
Who does she find in the bed?
It was... but who?.. Cupid was himself.
This god, ruler of all nature,
To whom all cupids are submissive.
He is in a deep sleep, almost naked,
Lying stretched out in bed,
Covered with the thinnest veil,
Which has moved down,
And part of it was only on the body.
Turning his face to the side,
Stretching out both hands,
It seemed like in a dream
He looked for Darling everywhere.
The blush of a rose on the cheeks,
Scattered on top of the lily,
And white curls in three rows,
Wrap yourself around the whitest neck,
And the warehouse, and the tenderness of all parts,
In sight, in all its glory,
Or those who fled from the sight,
They could humiliate Aonid,
For which there is no time, falling in love,
Venus herself, in the rain and mud,
Fled into the wild deserts
Laying down the majesty of the goddess.
This is how the god Cupid revealed himself,
This was or was similar to this,
Beautiful, white and blond,
Good, handsome, capable of love,
But in thoughts free without obstacles.
Behind these brief features
Readers will imagine for themselves
What was the god of pleasures like?
And the king over all beauties.
Seeing Darling is a beautiful deity
In place of the asp I was afraid of,
I considered this vision to be witchcraft,
Or a dream, or a ghost, and was amazed for a long time;
And finally seeing, as everyone could see,
That her wonderful husband was God himself,
I almost threw the lamp and the dagger,
And, then forgetting to become decent,
My wife almost rushed to hug her,
As if I had never hugged him.
But with the pleasure of thirsty eyes
The swiftness of love stopped here;
And then Darling, motionless and speechless,
I considered this night more pleasant than all nights.
She accused herself of this miracle more than once,
Looking from all sides that could only ripen,
It’s been a long time since I came to him with a lamp,
It’s almost as if I hadn’t seen its beauties beforehand;
I was almost ignorant of this god
And she boldly considered him to be a snake.
Finally the king's daughter,
On this pleasant night
Giving freedom to your gaze
She approached, then she brought the lamp closer,
Then an unexpected misfortune
With this movement, both timid and timid,
Holding the fire above the body,
With a trembling hand
She casually tilted the lamp over her hip.
And some of the oil spilled away,
With a burn on her thighs she woke up Cupid,
Feeling severe pain,
He suddenly shuddered, cried out, woke up,
And, forgetting his pain, he was horrified by the light;
I saw Darling, I also saw a sword,
Which from under the shoulders
Then he slid to his feet;
He saw the guilt
Or signs of the guilt of a malicious wife;
And I wished in vain
Say misfortune all over again,
What kind of bearing could I tell him?
The words in my mouth stopped flowing:
And the light and the sword in the wines were evidence,
And then Darling fell and died.
In other words, “fell asleep”; - and it serves her right! We deliberately did not skimp on the extract: let the readers judge for themselves from this passage how much work and sweat it takes to read a poem written in such sweet rhymes and filled with such light, charming and graceful poetry... Bogdanovich’s “Darling” originates from a lofty Hellenic myth about the combination of the soul with love, that is, about the penetration by the spiritual principle of the natural attraction of the sexes: this time, from a pure and deep source, a muddy puddle flowed out like a sparrow, knee-deep. Of course, one cannot blame Bogdanovich for the fact that such a thought could not even enter his head: they began to guess about these wisdom in Germany itself very shortly before his time; We also don’t blame him for the lack of artistic tact, plasticity and naive grace of the ancients: he was neither an artist, nor a poet, nor even a particularly talented poet, and in his time the Germans themselves were just beginning to guess about the artistry and plasticism of the ancients, and the rest Europe lived in the idea of wit; but wit should be witty, and not flat; The prank should be playful and graceful, so as not to offend aesthetic taste...
Why was Bogdanovich’s “Darling” such a brilliant success? - We are the first to agree that every brilliant success is always based, if not on merit, then on some solid reason; and we are convinced that the success of “Darling” was fully deserved, just like the success of “Poor Liza.” It's very easy to explain. Loud odes and heavy poems deafened and surprised everyone, but did not delight anyone - and therefore everyone dreamed of some kind of “light poetry,” probably meaning salon French fiction by it. And here comes a man who, for his time, writes simply and easily, even funny and playfully, tries to introduce a comic element into poetry, to mix the sublime with the funny, as it is in reality, to replace the rhetoric of fake emphasis with the rhetoric of fake naivety and wit, which he awarded his stingy nature. Naturally, everyone is delighted with such an “unprecedented” and “unprecedented thing”: one had to look closely at it (and this required time and time) to see its insignificance and emptiness. And they took a closer look; but at that time our literary authorities were still slowly being crushed: they were not even read, but still they were praised out of tradition and lazy habit. And so Batyushkov, a poet with great talent and artistic tact, unconsciously bowing before the then omnipotent power of tradition, sang Bogdanovich as the favorite of the muses and graces, with whom the singer of “Darling” had nothing in common. After all, Dmitriev spoke about Kheraskov:
Let the hearts of the Zoils ache with envy;
They will not harm Kheraskov:
Vladimir and John will cover him with a shield
And they will lead you to the temple of immortality.
Voeikov (at the time, also a literary and poetic celebrity) proclaimed:
Kheraskov, “our Homer”, who sang the praises of the ancient Brays,
Russian triumph, the fall of Kazan...
And now? - Alas! - Sic transit gloria mundi! [ This is how the world goesglory! (lat.). - Ed.] ... The success of “Darling” was greatly facilitated by its free, playful tone, so contrary to the stiffness of the literary decency of that time. Dmitriev’s fairy tales “The Freaky Woman” and “The Fashionable Wife”, which, however, are much higher in literary merit than “Darling”, owed much of their success to the same circumstance. However, Bogdanovich’s poem is still a wonderful work, as a fact of the history of Russian literature: it was a step forward for the language, for literature, and for the literary education of our society. Anyone who studies Russian literature as a subject of study, and not just pleasure, would be ashamed, even more of a noted writer, not to read Bogdanovich’s “Darlings.” - But it has no merits whatsoever, and in our time there is not the slightest opportunity to read it for pleasure.
Meanwhile, “Darling” is still being published in new editions; small book dealers made it a permanent means of their speculation. And this is very understandable. We have a special class of readers: these are people who are just starting to read, along with the change of the national homespun caftan to something between a merchant's long-skirted frock coat and a frieze overcoat. They usually begin with “My Lord of England” and “Paradise Lost” (frantically translated into prose from some rhetorical French translation), Kurganov’s “Pismovnik”, “Darling” and Chemnitser’s fables - and end with these same books, rereading the delightful for their crude and uneducated taste of creation.
That is why these books are published almost every year by our savvy book dealers.
The new edition of "Darling" is very modest and terribly tasteless. The proofreading is faulty. There are no applications.
NOTES
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
The following abbreviations are used in the text of the notes: Annenkov - P.V. Annenkov. Literary Memoirs. M., Goslitizdat, 1960.
Belinsky, USSR Academy of Sciences - V. G. Belinsky. Full collection cit., vols. I-XIII. M., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1953-1959.
GBL - State Library named after. V. I. Lenin.
Herzen - A. I. Herzen. Collection Op. in 30 volumes. M., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1954-1966.
State Historical Museum - State Historical Museum.
GPB - State Public Library of the USSR named after. M. E. Saltykova-Shchedrin.
IRLI - Institute of Russian Literature (Pushkin House) of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
KSSB - V. G. Belinsky. Works, parts I-XII. M., Publishing House of K. Soldatenkov and N. Shchepkin, 1859-1862 (compilation and editing of the publication by N. Kh. Ketcher).
KSSB, List I, II... - Attached to each of the first ten parts is a list of Belinsky's reviews that were not included in this publication "according to
its insignificance."
LN - "Literary Heritage". M., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences.
Panaev - I. I. Panaev. Literary Memoirs. M., Goslitizdat, 1950.
PR - the latest edition of Articles III and IV on folk poetry.
PssB - V. G. Belinsky. Full collection cit., ed. S. A. Vengerova (vol. I-XI) and V. S. Spiridonov (vol. XII-XIII), 1900-1948.
Pushkin - A. S. Pushkin. Full collection Op. in 10 volumes. M.-L., Publishing House of the USSR Academy of Sciences, 1962-1965.
TsGIA - Central State Historical Archive.
Darling, an ancient story by I. Bogdanovich... (p. 410-414). For the first time - "Notes of the Fatherland", 1841, vol. XVI, ? 5, dept. VI "Bibliographical Chronicle", p. 1-4 (printed on April 30; published on May 1). Without a signature. Included in KSSB, part V, p. 295-300.
The completion of work on the review is determined by Belinsky’s letter to Kraevsky, written around April 10, in which he announced that he was sending a review of “Darling”.
1 The critic quotes two “Tombstones for I. F. Bogdanovich, the author of “Darling” (both 1803) and the poem “I. F. Bogdanovich, author of “Darling” (1803; there are inaccuracies in the quotation).
There is no need to fill that grave with inscriptions,
Where is “Darling”, one can replace everything.
3 This refers to the article by N. M. Karamzin “About Bogdanovich and his works” (“Bulletin of Europe”, 1803, no. 9-10; see: N. M. Karamzin. Selected works, vol. II. M.-L ., "Fiction", 1964, pp. 198-226).
4 The reference is to lines from K. N. Batyushkov’s poem “Answer to Turgenev” (1812):
There's a singer called Darling
Tender favorite of the Music...
5 Inaccurate quote from the poem “To the Portrait of M. M. Kheraskov” (1803); "Vladimir" (1785) - poem by Kheraskov; “John” - this is what Dmitriev called (by the name of the main character) Kheraskov’s poem “Rossiada” (1779).
6 The critic quotes "Satire to S<перанскому>(1805) about true nobility" by A.F. Voeikov.
7 This refers to “The Tale of the Adventure of the English Mylord George and the Brandenburg Margravine Friederike-Louise...” (1782) by M. Komarova.
8 Obviously, this refers to the publication: “Paradise Lost. Poem by D. Milton... parts I-IV. Translation from French, corrected from the English original. With the addition of notes by E. Lyutsenko” (St. Petersburg, 1824).
A. L. Osipovat and L. S. Pustilnik
Polevoy K.A. Darling, an ancient story in free verse. Essay by Ippolit Fedorovich Bogdanovich
B Ogdanovich Ippolit, translator at the State Collegium of Foreign Affairs, a young man, but skilled in verbal sciences; also in French, Italian and Russian. He composed the poem "Supreme Bliss", quite solemn, spiritual and anacreontic odes, epistles, stanzas, fables, fairy tales, sonnets, eclogues, elegies, idylls, epigrams, letters and other satirical works, which were all published in "Monthly Works", "Useful entertainment" 1760, 1761 and 1762, in Moscow, and other books. Translated from Italian by Mr. Michel Angelo Zhianeti the "Song" to Her Imperial Majesty with perfect skill. His poem, song and some odes were published in St. Petersburg and are praised by many knowledgeable people." This is what one of the most remarkable people of his time, Novikov, wrote about the creator of "Darling" sixty years before us, in "An Experience of a Dictionary on Russian Writers" (St. Petersburg, 1772). Twenty years later, soon after Bogdanovich’s death, the famous Karamzin wrote about his life and reviewed almost all of his works. Another twenty years later, N. I. Grech published a short biography of Bogdanovich in “An Experience in the History of Russian Literature.” , lightly touching on his works. Of the other writers, Batyushkov, to whom the muse of tender, charming poems was so favorable, Batyushkov spoke with particular delight about Bogdanovich. But most glorious for the memory of this poet is the constant favor of the public for his “Darling.” tenth edition!.. Not a single Russian poet has ever earned such an honor. After this, it is interesting to consider what is the reason for such an extraordinary phenomenon: is it essential dignity or fame based on legends? In our skeptical age, shouldn’t we really pay attention to the glorious creator of “Darling”? Really, when discussing many small modern phenomena, do we not want to judge a writer who enjoys lasting fame? Readers, of course, will do justice to at least our sincere desire to present them with an analysis of “Darling,” which has not yet been properly appreciated.
It is worthy of note that of all the works of Bogdanovich, who wrote a lot, everything has been forgotten, except for his “Darling”. You involuntarily ask yourself: “Was Bogdanovich the same as Ruban, who remained in everyone’s memory for his one inscription to the monument to the Great Peter? Did some kind and, of course, intelligent genius whisper to him a charming legend about Darling, and betray the rest to the evil one? the enemy of poets, the genius of bad poetry? Or did Bogdanovich himself pray to both, like a good Catholic who lit a candle for both his patron and the main enemy of all people? It's a pity that the mythological times have passed; Then, perhaps, we would be content to answer these three questions: “Yes, yes, yes”! But now, now we need to find another answer and get as close as possible to the true reason. It’s amazing how everything around him is grafted onto a person! Live in the company of ladies, even if they were the nicest of them; live, of course, in those years when your heart, mind and soul are capable of receiving impressions, and you yourself will be a little like a lady. It is a pity that we do not have a decent word to express this state with which to translate the French effemine. Or would you like to live in the company of wolves and bears? Then, perhaps, muttering like your interlocutors, you will confirm the proverb: “they howl with wolves.” Do another experiment: go and breathe the court atmosphere... No Ovid will imagine your transformation! The head is stretched forward, the back bends like a thin reed, there is an eternal smile on the lips, the legs walk with silent feet and, not knowing how to walk, shuffle masterfully. True, there is an exception here: sometimes, instead, they turn into a rude person, into an impudent person, into a truth-teller; but know that this is a shell, a jester’s mask; underneath it hides the same flexible courtier, and his role is almost more pitiful than the first.
And what does our weak personality mean? What does one person mean? Entire nations cannot escape the influence of circumstances and the modern, that is, the spirit that surrounds and penetrates them. Nowadays, all of France is engaged in politics, and there is not a shopkeeper, not a clerk who does not talk about the Chamber of Deputies, about freedom of expression, about parties, about the Chouans and the Vendeans. Under Napoleon, it seems, not long ago, but it was completely different: every boy thought of being a hero, every butcher, cutting up a bull, talked about a great nation and dreamed of a world, that is, a French, monarchy. And Mirabeau? And Necker? And Louis XV and the Regent of insignificant memory? Wasn't France tuned to their tuning fork? However, we have almost reached Louis XIV: a rather long retreat; Let's try to use it to our advantage. The age of Louis XIV, that is, a society that reflected everything that was good and bad at the court of this magnificent, noisy, glorious, but short-sighted monarch, his society continued until the terrible explosion of the Revolution. We will not delve deeper into the reasons that gave rise to the very age of Louis XIV, and divide it into episodes of the Regent and the two sovereigns who followed him: these were truly episodes in one big drama. Let's start counting pre-revolutionary society in France from Louis XIV and see what this society was like?
.................................................
There was a class of people who concentrated everything in themselves: rich and noble people. They possessed everything: land, government, and literature. When discussing literature, we will leave the rest to them; but let's see how they controlled literature?
Materialism, crude, insane, denying the divine in nature and man, dominated this society. The majority of voices has the most powerful effect on society, and its external splendor dazzles most of all. Brought up without philosophy, for we do not dignify with this high name the teachings of the wise men of that time, noble and rich people calmly, unconsciously indulged in sensual pleasures. The general example and splendor of the court fascinated them; philosophy did not support the weak human spirit, and, finally, everything concluded in the pleasures of boudoirs and living rooms. The very legend about beauty disappeared: they were content with the best, the chosen; and what was the best then? Something that struck the senses without penetrating the depths of souls and hearts.
Such a society could not be the home of literature and especially poetry. Poetry is the child of the spontaneous development of the human spirit. She dies in the cramped space and stuffy atmosphere of the living rooms. Petty passions turn her away from herself: she is afraid of them, like a person who cannot exist without the fire of the sun, loves the beneficial warmth, but is afraid of fire and does not bring the candle closer to the walls of her home or to herself, for its effect would be harmful . Frightened by the fire of petty passions, this fire from tallow candles, and not the beneficial heat of the sun, poetry left the living rooms of the French rich for a long time, disappeared into solitude, into folk songs and prepared for itself a solemn celebration in the future exploits of people who had forgotten it.
Meanwhile, what was society doing?
With some kind of insane pleasure it drowned in sensual and insignificant passions. Not understanding the orphanhood of literature without poetry, it, like the ancient Israelites, poured out the golden calf and forced the unfortunate writers to worship it; but alas! Among them there was no high-spirited Moses, who would have broken his tablets when looking at the soulless idol displayed for inspiration. It's sad to see how the most excellent geniuses bowed their knees! Neither Racine's pure soul, nor the powerful hatred of the immortal Moliere's vice could withstand the fight against the gilded crowd. Many are amazed to see that Shakespeare, who by civil ranks belonged to the peasant class, hated the mob, despised it, branded it with the name of a thousand-headed monster and exhibited it everywhere with all its vices. I marvel at this amazement! Is it really true that even in our time they still do not understand that the mob, the crowd, does not lie within boundaries measured by the scale of civil institutions? Is it really only in the squares that the mob crowds? No, she does not obey civil laws, dresses up in the dress of honorable people and fills living rooms, as well as dirty streets and taverns. It was this crowd that disobeyed general laws that Shakespeare hated. If we take the word murderer in its proper meaning, then no one has destroyed as many souls as this multi-colored and varied crowd, this mob, divided into noble and small, rich and poor. She, under the name of the nobility, possessing French society, destroyed so many souls among the French writers. Decidedly not one of them escaped from her seductive hobbies and did not escape from her murderous breath. She personified the fable about the sirens, who attract to themselves with their sweet singing and the charming half of their bodies, but, having grabbed the deceived one, drown them in the waves and overwhelm them with their disgusting tail. All the writers of that time can serve as proof of this. They wanted to imitate in their works what was considered best; and the court society, with its own morals and spirit, was considered the best. To see and comprehend what this society meant, you only need to read the “Notes” of Madame DuBarry and the “Notes” of Dubois, who was called a cardinal. Politeness, secular education and a language absurdly subordinate to decency served as a cover and varnish for everything that one could imagine that was depraved, insignificant, disgusting. This unhappy state of society, which was then representative of France, is reflected in all the works modern writers. Which one would you like to choose? We will not talk about the Dorats, Boileaus, Regnards, Bernards, Chaulieu, Bernices, Batomons, Lafars and other even more mediocre writers; Let's stop for a moment at the names of loud and worthy of loud fame, with the names of Racine, Moliere, La Fontaine. Racine, gifted with a high poetic genius, was capable and born for religious poetry. His pure soul, his strict virtue, his harmonious language were to develop and express themselves in objects majestic, magnificent, based on the devotion of the heart of the believer. But, as we said, there was no religion; philosophy was replaced by dry refinement and the narrow gaze of material criticism; they saw letters in classical authors without understanding their inner meaning; folk legends were considered vulgar; there were no people. Meanwhile, everything brilliant, everything seductive for the feelings and for the modern mind, which must be distinguished from the mind that belongs separately to everyone, all this captivated the timid, weak-character Racine. He remained faithful to the noble calling of the poet, but thinking to express what his religious genius strove for, he expressed the etiquette of the court that surrounded him, the decorum in all sensations and the cold, soulless splendor of the parquet rulers. He needed faith in the face of public unbelief, and he thought to find it in the almost divine worship of the court. Thus, false teaching, deceptive brilliance and the very spirit of Racine, capable of belief and devotion, deprived posterity of one of the most brilliant geniuses.
Moliere, a former actor, was at the same time both Ninona's interlocutor and a courtier. We see this in all his works. It must be admitted that he drew most of his comedies from foreign sources: from the Spanish theater, from Italian and ancient French slapstick plays, and finally from Plautus and Terence<,>but even in borrowing he knew how to be original. What is amazing about him is his lively, bold brush, his ability to take advantage of every situation, develop it, show new sides to it. His strong soul was not content with this; indignation towards vice wanted to be expressed more clearly, more powerfully, and he created high comedy (La haute comedie, la comedie de caractere). In this way, almost all of his comedies are distorted by the unfortunate situation in which the poet found himself. In "The Misanthrope", for example, instead of penetrating deeply and presenting what the "Notes" of the Marquis Saint-Simon so simply and therefore perfectly depict: this insignificant world of secular people, this selfishness taken to the highest degree, these vile intrigues, These low passions and meanness, covered with a varnish of politeness, pleasantness in treatment, he presented the most common, ever-present, almost inevitable shortcomings of people: female coquetry, a passion for poetry, the servility of side persons and the injustice of judges. That is why the whole comedy is cold as ice, despite many excellent individual features. Tartuffe is more modern; but also more one-sided; There is more of a desire to drop piety in general than to portray hypocrisy, under whatever mask it may appear. Tartuffes are disgusting and harmful not only because they cover up villainous intentions with the wing of religiosity, but because they use and subvert all sacred objects for evil. And in this regard, were Richelieu’s actions less hypocritical..? Was Thalia worth the arrows of an insignificant beggar who wanted to seduce a woman and take possession of her husband’s estate, when the magnificent Tartuffes did the same with the whole state? That is why, again, the incongruity of the subject with a high goal makes the comedian’s work petty and little striking. Moliere could have created a truly high and characteristic comedy if fate had not chained him to Louis’s chariot and Ninona’s train. In his free flight, his comic genius would present to us what makes us laugh and infuriates us in the historical monuments of France. Now his true glory and undying comedy come from comedies, where he portrayed the middle and lower class of people and where he was not connected by any relationships.
Lafontaine, with his simplicity, his kindness and lack of search, seemed most opposed to the modern spirit. But in him too we see a courtier, more cunning than others, and, moreover, a sensualist, indulging in all the baseness of sensual pleasures. The fables that form the crown of La Fontaine's immortality, his fables are captivating not always in their meaning, but in their expression, always charming, always true and often tender. For the French it is a different and new world of proverbs. This, in our opinion, is their true dignity and what, in general, is the dignity of the most famous fabulists, who for the most part copy each other. And is this dignity not enough? Is it not enough for the crown of immortality to clothe moral truths with poetic expression and to concentrate the mind of an entire people in one person? The truth is the same for everyone; only each nation understands and expresses it in its own way.
But look at La Fontaine from the other side; delve into the generality of his works or at least remember his fairy tales. Remaining a charming poet, he indulges there in all his inclination to riotous pleasures, wants and tries to captivate one sensuality. It is true that many individual poems and especially many epilogues of his fables reveal a tender soul in him, often even showing true traces of poetic melancholy and sadness; but the reason for this was precisely the contradiction of his personality with the century in which he lived. La Fontaine was by nature of a carefree and even more timid character; but society made him a violent libertine; he was capable of loving and more than once in his life he loved tenderly, truly; however, having spent the day in platonic sighs near the object of his passion, he indulged in the lowest debauchery at night. All this has been revealed by our age of exploration. Thus, the air that all people belonging to court society breathed in France was destructive. Poetry lurked at the bottom of some hearts, but did not dare to appear outside, where the infectious atmosphere would have killed it. But what, however, replaced it with people who felt something higher in themselves and could not help but convey the sensations with which Providence endows us so that we share them with the world? They replaced it with the desire to please in that society, where they assumed the focus of all life, everything lofty and beautiful.
La Fontaine speaks with a kind of self-distrusting irony in the preface to his “Les amours de Psyche et de Cupidon” [" love passion Psyche and Cupid" (French).]: "My main goal is still the same: to please. For this purpose I consult the taste of the age, and, after many experiments, it seems to me that it is inclined towards the pleasant and playful (au galant et la plaisanterie). He does not despise passions; not at all! Not finding them in a novel, in a poem, in a theatrical play, they complain about it; but in a fairy tale like mine, where, it is true, there is a lot of wonderful things, but mixed with jokes and suitable to amuse people, it was necessary to joke from beginning to end, it was necessary to look for what was pleasant and humorous. "This is what they had about the elegant, this is what they strived for greatest geniuses!
Our long digression from Bogdanovich’s poem might seem unnecessary if we were not writing about a phenomenon of that time when the spirit of our writers was the same as the spirit of the French; when, feeling and looking at objects just as accurately as the French, ours even borrowed from them all their inventions and all their borrowings. While writing about the French, we wrote about the Russians. “Darling” will serve us as one of a thousand proofs.
Bogdanovich borrowed its subject and almost all the details from La Fontaine; La Fontaine by Apuleius; Apuleius from Lucian, and Lucian himself apparently borrowed it from folk legends. It is interesting to note how this legend passed on.
Lucius, or Lucius of Patras, wrote a charming fairy tale, “The Donkey,” where he describes his transformation into a donkey and the various adventures that happened to him in this form. His tale is short, written intricately and in the true spirit of the Greeks, not contemporaries of the golden age of Greek poetry, but Greeks who had already fallen somewhat. He seems to have been imitated by Lucian; we say, it seems, because the original work of Lucian has not reached us. But we have a Latin imitation of it, known under the name of Apuleius’s “Golden Ass.” If Apuleius borrowed everything from Lucian, then this latter is the first creator of Darling, for in him Lucius’s “Donkey” is widespread and burdened with many episodes and inserts, mostly absurd, but it is also enriched with a precious legend about Darling. It’s strange even to come across this charming fiction among the stupid stories about a man enchanted by an old woman, and about how another’s nose was cut off by witches when he fell asleep next to a dead man. In the midst of various such nonsense, Darling shines like a star in the darkness. Therefore, we can confidently conclude that Lucian, whose work we know from Apuleius, is innocent of the invention of Darling and that he without intent placed, along with others, this precious flower of antiquity [In Russian there is a curious translation of Apuleius’s “The Golden Ass” , on which the bachelor Ermil Kostrov, later the famous translator of the Iliad, worked.].
Be that as it may, the legend about the passion of Love itself, or Cupid, for the Soul, or Psyche, does not belong to distant antiquity. The love of the gods for the human soul is reminiscent of many of the ideas of the New Platonists. Poetry has taken advantage of this charming myth, which, as Herder says, has no equal in beauty and above which nothing can be created. Here is its content, in the shortest and simplest story.
There lived a king who had three daughters. The first two were beauties, but the third, which was called Psyche, was so beautiful that people left the temples of Venus and began to worship Psyche as the goddess of beauty. Insulted, Venus ordered Cupid to make this mortal scold fall in love with the most disgusting person. Cupid looked at Psyche and fell in love with her himself. Meanwhile, the father, thinking about who to marry his youngest daughter to, consulted with the Oracle, and he told him that Psyche should be dressed in a mourning dress and taken in a sad procession to a certain mountain, where she would find her groom, a monster terrible to gods and people . The father obeyed. He took his daughter to a terrible rock and left her there. Zephyr picked up Psyche and carried her to the enchanted palace, where she enjoyed all possible luxury and happiness and where every night, during darkness, Cupid flew to her. He told her that she would enjoy her bliss until she decided to see him, because after that terrible misfortunes awaited her. Psyche did not listen to his orders: convinced by the sisters, who also came to her without Cupid’s will and, out of envy, assured her that a disgusting monster flies to her every night, she stocked up on a lamp and, while Cupid was sleeping in a deep sleep, approached him and in delight, in amazement, at the sight of Love itself, she dripped burning oil onto him. Cupid fluttered up and left her with reproaches. The inconsolable Psyche wandered for a long time; I wanted to DROWN myself, but I couldn’t; I looked everywhere for Cupid and finally came to Venus herself. The evil goddess of beauty imposed the most difficult works and trials on her; but Cupid secretly helped his beloved. The last and most dangerous test for Psyche was the order: to go to the region of shadows and bring a box of beauty ointment from Proserpina. She, however, happily accomplished this feat, but became curious, opened the box, and the mortal vapor struck her. Cupid appeared to the lifeless woman and revived her with the touch of an arrow. At last Venus was appeased; Jupiter accepted Psyche into the host of immortals, and she united with Cupid. This incident was celebrated on Olympus with the greatest triumph. The envious sisters of Psyche killed themselves by throwing themselves off a cliff.
The graceful genius of La Fontaine comprehended the charm of this legend; but his mind, chained to the century by the golden chain of modern society, cooled and even largely distorted the charming Greek myth. He looked at it as a funny fairy tale, where you could paste in a lot of cute things about love, women, beauty and so on. And so it was done. Despite the fact that La Fontaine describes the love of Psyche and Cupid in beautiful language, his story itself is not entirely consistent with the subject, which required greater simplicity. And who, it seems, could be more capable of this than La Fontaine, who was called simple-minded by both his contemporaries and posterity? But this extraordinary genius could not indulge his heart's desire. What would Boileau say about him? What would the ladies of the court say? There were two paths before him: either to make a magnificent poem, to resurrect in it the entire Greek mythology, enrich it with several episodes and write it in an inflated style; or pass off your essay as a pleasant joke, as a trifle, as a spark of fun leisure. Thank him for choosing the latter. He wrote his Psyche in prose and in the preface he admits that prose cost him as much work as poetry. “I didn’t know,” he says, “what character to choose? The character of history? Too simple. A novel? Still not quite flowery; and the character of the poem would already be too ornate. My faces demanded something pleasant; their adventures, fulfilled in many places miraculous, they demanded something heroic and sublime. To use one thing in one place and another in another is not allowed; uniformity of style is the most restrictive of all our rules.”
Do you see in these words how poorly ancient simplicity was understood then? The charm of the fiction itself did not in the least amaze the man of genius and did not enter into his consideration. A story, a good story, a decent story, according to the rules: that’s what he needed! As if anticipating future criticism, La Fontaine says casually: “Look at my work without relation to what Apuleius did; and at what Apuleius did, without relation to my book: leave the decision to taste.” No, great, inimitable fabulist! We agree that it depends on taste to do a two-arshin or level hairstyle, smear the face with blush and sculpt flies on it; but we will never agree that it depends on taste to put a caftan or a woman’s dress on a Greek statue: here it is not taste, here the sense of grace is the supreme judge. And grace is equal both in the eyes of the Greek and in the eyes of us, the inhabitants of the cold, distant north.
But in this form, in the story of the court poet, our Bogdanovich got the fable about Darling.
We presented an outline of the society of that time, which was the same in France and in all educated countries, of course with different shades. At least here in Russia, literary concepts were entirely transferred from France. This phenomenon is all the more strange because among the French, as we have seen, it was a consequence of general events; but our minds, blinded by the glory of French writers, without reasoning accepted all the conditions, all the quirks and whims of someone else's literary code. This had an extremely disastrous effect on the general course of literature, for it deprived our poetry of its original development.
Will we be surprised that Bogdanovich, whom one cannot even think of comparing with La Fontaine, will we be surprised that he too was carried away general example, that he simply followed his example, conveying in Russian poetry what he found in La Fontaine?
Of course, this wouldn't be surprising. The surprising thing is that Bogdanovich went his own way. True, he borrowed everything from La Fontaine, but he gave everything a special character, a special color, cast in a thousand shades in his story.
What in “Darling” actually belongs to Bogdanovich? What did he borrow from La Fontaine besides the basis of the story, which undoubtedly belongs to the latter? What influence did modern literary concepts and the age in general have on the Russian poet? Finally: what is the merit of his work, which has survived many literary phenomena and is still reliable for a long life? These are the questions that we will try to resolve in our next article. We saw the sphere where our poet lived; they saw the origin and transitions of the fable that he took as the basis of his story; saw what a genius made of her French writer. Let's see what transformation happened to her at the sounds of the Russian poet's lyre. When a child, starting to babble, expresses to us some concept, some observation in unclear sounds, we listen to his babbling with an inexplicably pleasant feeling! With almost the same feeling we look at Bogdanovich, who, in the infancy of our literature and more than in the infancy of language, conveyed to us a charming legend and, perhaps, a lofty myth about Cupid and Psyche. One thought: to assimilate this creation into one’s language, one choice of subject would already be sufficient for the glory of the poet.
But Bogdanovich also showed originality, not slavishly following his model, La Fontaine. An ordinary writer would simply translate the French original, and, of course, a lot of courage had to be hidden in one’s soul in order to dare to fight a giant illuminated by brilliant glory. Our poet has clothed La Fontaine's story with the colors of poetry. His poems are often rude, too often reminiscent of the time in which they were written, but they are often euphonious, playful, light, embedded in the memory and decorate it without burdening it, like flowers decorating the head of a beautiful woman.
The question of what was more appropriate for his subject: poetry or prose, would lead us into a discussion about the essence and origin of poetry; but we don't want that. Any story is good when it is not boring; and no one would call Bogdanovich’s story boring. In La Fontaine one can see more poetic ingenuity when he conducts his narrative in prose and only in lyrical places or in those that should have been presented as sayings does he move on to poetry. But, however, Bogdanovich could also be carried away by the false thought that his critic, Karamzin, later said: “Good poetry is always better than good prose; what is more difficult has more value in the arts.” Perhaps this same thought forced Tredyakovsky to translate Telemakov into poetry. Then everyone thought like Karamzin, and what belongs to everyone, no one is to blame.
Bogdanovich’s main merit, as we think, is that in his story he hit exactly the poetic tone that was befitting of his poem. Russian fairy tales were the delight of his leisure time: we could say this even without knowing the details of his life, but having read only “Darling”. Not many of our poets, and even contemporaries, know and feel the charm of ancient Russian stories as well as Bogdanovich knew and felt it. He realized that in a light story the only salvation of the Russian poet was our ancient fables, where the poetic spirit of the people shines and plays like a ray of sunshine on a wave. In this regard, I marvel and salute the poet who knew how to write as seductively as the following poems were written:
But the one I want to talk about now is
The beast was neither in its image nor in its disposition.
................................
And if he found brutal souls in people,
That's how he glued the donkey's ears,
Some have a cow's tail, others have two pairs of legs,
One is a camel's hump, another is a ram's horn.
From caustic antiquity, which swallows everything,
Not all of his archive of affairs has been saved;
The remainder of his rights, however, honors
And the latest light in our times.
He ordered the envious to toil idle forever,
So that the happiness of others
Always destroyed them
And they could not enjoy peace;
He appointed the stingy one to sit near the gold,
look at gold
And be seduced by gold,
But they cannot be satisfied;
He ordered the arrogant not to communicate with people
And he gave the same arrogance to all their descendants for execution,
Which one remained visible and brought it up;
He ordered the world not to believe in anything
To the one who flattered and dissembled;
To the slanderers
And to the informers of lies to the sovereign
I was told to wear it everywhere
The most disgusting mug,
Which one could express slanderers:
It was so visible
Not long ago, in Moscow at a masquerade,
When on Maslenaya, in the ceremonial parade,
The people ridiculed the shameful deeds.
Many similar places, and perhaps even more flowery and bright ones, for we made an extract without any choice, will prove to any non-believer that Bogdanovich comprehended the beauty of the folk language. Everything that we know is captivating and beautiful in Dmitriev and Pushkin, all this was a consequence of the thoughts of Bogdanovich, who guessed as a poet what the experience and criticism of our time justifies and proves. But, being original in his presentation, Bogdanovich took advantage, and very happily, of La Fontaine’s special property, under the guise of a joke, in passing, as if inadvertently expressing a caustic and apt truth, hurting heterogeneous prides and telling the truth in compliments. Before him, no one here knew how to wield this weapon. However, this is almost the only useful loan he made from La Fontaine: everything else that he seduced from this rich man cost our literature dearly, for bad things collect interest faster and more accurately than good things. He borrowed from him a very harmful defect: the colorlessness of the general character of the poem. I ask: where was the action? Bogdanovich assures us that it happened in Greece, although neither Lafontaine nor Apuleius say this. But we agree that Psyche was of Greek breed. Where is Greece for Bogdanovich? Would it matter if he said that Dushenka’s father was a Russian prince: his colors are as fitting for Greece as for Rus'. But in France, and throughout Europe, they did not know Greece at that time, and that is why, when dressing Achilles in a French caftan, they never thought that Greece had many eras, so different from one another that there was almost no similarity in them . Greece of Omir and Sophocles; Greece Alexandra and Augusta; Greece of Constantine the Great and Muhammed II; no one saw this. Greece, all Greece! Thus, one great Russian poet did not know how to distinguish between the meter of poetry, and when he was reminded of this, he answered with confidence: “Well, what is it? That’s it, brother, dactyl!” Everything was dactyl.
Consequently, while we consider Bogdanovich to be the first example in our light poetry, we, however, have the right to blame him for this general lack of accountability of character, which was later exchanged among us for small coin and forced to speak to Greek shepherds as chamber-pages and Russian princes as crusading knights . Of course, Bogdanovich is to blame for this as a resident of a century in which everyone understood poetry in the same way; however, this is nevertheless a flaw in his poem. Century! the word is meaningful. We have already talked about its general character. Let's see what exactly is reflected from this century in "Darling". The form of this composition undoubtedly belongs not to Bogdanovich, but to his century. Perhaps, convinced by the words of La Fontaine, who, as we saw, did not know what he was writing: a poem, a novel, or a history, Bogdanovich did not dare to step out of the indicated facets and, calling his fairy tale an ancient story, gave it the imaginary form of a poem, then That is, I put “I sing” at the beginning, made a proclamation, and divided it, like “Telemacus,” into books. However, this would not mean much if it did not force Bogdanovich to stand on stilts in some places and in many ways move away from the primitive unsophistication of the original. Thus, the description of Dushenkin’s palace, populated by La Fontaine with living beings, contrary to Apuleius, is devoid of all simplicity: this is a description of an ordinary palace with the addition of some magical accessories. Change the name of zephyrs, nymphs to chamber-pages, chamber-maids of honor - and you are in Versailles, in Fontainebleau, anywhere, but not in the magical castle of the Amur. Why? Because they knew no other palaces, no other gardens, except those of Versailles and Fontainebleau. Go to Sheremetev’s palaces near Moscow: and there you will see the same thing as in Bogdanovich’s poem.
You can also point out one sharp feature, belonging to the century and noticeable in Bogdanovich’s story: this desire to boast of some kind of shamelessness and to show that we are not afraid of strict morality. It is also remarkable that Karamzin, in his criticism, takes particular pleasure in writing out many of these passages, including, among other things, the well-known description of how Darling wanted to hang herself on an oak branch, ending with the verses:
Then I saw the valley and the forest
Another miracle of miracles!
But let’s forgive the weakness, then a general one, and let’s talk about the main flaw that distinguishes almost all poetic works of the 18th century, a flaw so obvious in “Darling” that it, like the name of the emperor on a Roman coin, can always show to what time Bogdanovich’s story belongs. This is a lack of poetic inspiration. One can, without reproach of conscience, praise good poetry, many charming details, the choice of subject, Bogdanovich’s wit, for all this is in his story; but hardly anyone will find true inspiration in it. However, let us not be more demanding than we should be. Each age has its own character, its own animation. It is not Bogdanovich’s fault that his age was humiliated by materialism and carried away from true poetry into a too earthly sphere.
Poetry then turned into poetry, an activity to which people devoted themselves just as much as spiritual or civil service. A writer was the same as an official in some modern states. With the name of a writer one could have entry into the best societies. What more? Busy with petty social relations and pitiful materiality, when and where could poets find inspiration? The so-called better society was their only goal. The legend about the suffering poets, about Dante, Tassa, Cervantes, became a pleasant mythology, which, however, no one wanted to experience for themselves, because it seemed madness to exchange the distant and often incorrect wreath of a poet for significant benefits. Solitude was seen only in country palaces and bar and was known only from Zimmerman's book. The examples seemed concentrated in Boileau's "Piitik" and Batteux's "Course." And who would dare to go against such authority? Who would think of becoming a man by reading Shakespeare or folk poems? The consequence was that, finally, they thought only about the conventional laws of poetry and about the smoothness and straightening of poetry. "Clean, straighten, polish your poems!" - Boileau exclaimed. "Clean, straighten!" - repeated the chorus of mediocre poets, from the banks of the Seine to the Volga, from Voltaire, full of talents, to our empty-sounding Kheraskov. The desire to develop poetry and to be distinguished by some verses gave rise to a phalanx of poets who wrote an incomprehensible variety of sonnets, triplets, rondos, madrigals, epigrams, charades, epitaphs, cenotaphs, etc., etc. Not understanding the essence of all these poems, not knowing the inspired sonnets of Petrarch and Shakespeare, not thinking that the French had found many other genres in the essence of their language, poets from all countries set off after them, repeating Boileau’s law: Un sonnet sans defaut vaut seuil un long poeme [ One perfect sonnet is worth a long poem (French). With such a view of poetry, it was natural not to know inspiration and to lose even the legend about it. Is Bogdanovich to blame for living in this unhappy time? And he had no inspiration. He searched for objects, not expecting them to come to him on their own, and, obeying his harmonious soul, wrote odes, fables, songs, messages, epigrams. This is the reason for all his failures, this is the true reason why all his poems are forgotten, except for “Darling”. These are just poems, although they often contain good poetry. Deprived of inspiration and poetry, they, like a heavy load, little by little sank to the bottom of Lethe.
But they will ask us: if we deny inspiration in all of Bogdanovich’s poems, and even in “Darling” itself, if we set the absence of poetry as a line between his other works and his posterity, then what constitutes the vital force of “Darling” itself? What is her virtue which, as we have said, promises her long life?
This will be the conclusion of our entire article, the consequence of all our research, and we must proceed to this important, main subject. Do you remember Napoleon? It is not surprising if so, because this man remained forever memorable throughout the centuries for his victorious wanderings in all climates. But I am sure that you know the names of all his famous employees. Who does not know the names of Murat, Eugene, Magdonald, Ney, Ulino, Mare, Duroc and many others? Thus great events attract to themselves a number of names who would otherwise remain in obscurity. Thus Troy glorified the names of many Greeks, and so the fall of Rome brought from oblivion the names of many barbarians. Let us descend somewhat below these great events; Let us move from the bloody field of war to the peaceful streams and meadows of poets, to the charming fictions of Greece, to the charming fable of Darling. What do you think: if Bogdanovich had simply translated Dushenka by Apuleius or La Fontaine, translated it in the poetic sense, in verse, without dropping or distorting the original? Would his name remain among the honorable names of Russian literature? There is no doubt.
But Bogdanovich did more. He gave Dushenka a character more understandable to Russians; True, he did not preserve either the freshness of Greek fiction or the charming language of the French adaptation, but he enriched our poetry with new, unprecedented beauties, borrowed from folk poetry and imprinted with the folk playfulness of the Russian mind. His poetic shadow must pray to Dushenka, or, better to say, to the Greek fiction about the passion of Love for the Soul, for this fiction contains so many beauties that with them the Russian poet had to emerge from the waves of the river of oblivion. Poetic inspiration did not visit him; but as a translator he fully maintained his dignity. Indeed: what is Bogdanovich’s merit? Of course, not in his additions to Apuleius’s story, most of them refined and superfluous, and not in the details, almost without exception borrowed from La Fontaine. The beauty of “Darling” lies in the very fiction of the story, which is so elegant that it is almost impossible to distort it: would it be necessary to have the mighty forces of Tredyakovsky or Sumarokov for this. But Bogdanovich was an excellent poet: read the forgotten six volumes of his works, and you will be convinced of this. Look at how he translated Voltaire’s poem “On the Destruction of Lisbon”: you will see that this man mastered poetic language. With this talent, he happily fell into the subject, for we see that it was not out of inner inspiration that he began to translate Darling into poetry. This is his attempt, the same as many others. But the attempt was consistent with his talent, his way of writing poetry, and “Darling” remained the first monument of our light poetry. Thus, the consequence of our judgments about “Darling” can be presented in the following words: its dignity lies in the charm of the fiction itself and in the successful arrangement, which showed the first example of light, truly Russian poetry.
Until now, “Darling” has enjoyed popular fame: the tenth edition that is before us is proof of this. But we are sure that in this regard her lucky star will soon fade. The rudeness and cruelty of many of the poems, the generally outdated language, and the incongruity with the spirit of fiction will soon make the largest part of the public forget this wonderful work of our literature. It may remain among the people as a fairy tale, just as the legend of the capture of Troy and “Paradise Lost”, read in funny translations servants and shopkeepers, in the front and behind the counters; but in general, for the public, the time for “Darling” has passed. But in the eyes of true lovers who follow the development of our literature, it will remain an eternal monument, and in this sense we predict its undoubted longevity.
Our analysis is over. But we must turn to one more curious subject that is connected with the memory of “Darling”: this is a criticism written by Karamzin. There is no need to mention either Karamzin’s fame or his education, known to everyone. But for this reason it is necessary to look at how this extraordinary man judged Bogdanovich’s work. This view will be useful for us in two respects; as a confirmation of everything that we said about the spirit and direction of the time, and as a justification for Bogdanovich, who, of course, was not higher than Karamzin in his concepts.
Having said that good poetry is better than good prose and that in the arts that which is more difficult has more value, Karamzin continues: “It should also be noted that some images and objects necessarily require poetry for the greater pleasure of readers and that no harmonious, colorful prose can replace them “Everything that is miraculous and clearly unrealizable belongs to this kind (hence the fable “Darling”). Unnatural cases must be described and embellished with all the cunning of art in order to entertain us with a story in which there is no shadow of truth or probability.” .
It’s just as if you were reading a discussion about some craft! Readers' pleasure: that's the goal; poetry or colorful prose: these are forms, without any concept that form is a necessary consequence of essence! Miraculous means unnatural, as if everything is unnatural that does not belong to the three kingdoms of nature, and therefore our soul, which attunes us to all the fantasies of the miraculous! In “Darling” there is not even a shadow of probability, according to Karamzin, as if it is incredible what fantasy creates and as if the poet’s inspiration should be consistent with what happens to us every day! And what conclusions! Wouldn’t it be just as clear to say: “Colorful prose can always replace poetry; the most unnatural cases should be described in ordinary language.” “Poetry is a pleasant game of the mind,” Karamzin further says. We accept the word “poetry” in its true meaning and are ashamed to even remind our readers that poetry is a necessary, in some cases, expression, and not at all a toy. But such and such a concept finally turned poetry into idle talk, into the art of writing poetry.
““Darling” is not a heroic poem; we cannot, following Aristotle’s rules, consider with importance its fable, morals, characters and their expression; we cannot, fortunately, in this case be pedants who are afraid of grace and their favorites.” Darling "is a light play of the imagination, based only on the rules of delicate taste; and for them there is no Aristotle."
Karamzin said all this in earnest. His criticism shows that he really considered “Darling” a toy, and not a creative work; I wanted to look at it as sweet nonsense, and that’s why I called people who seek rules in the works of the human spirit pedants. "There is no Aristotle for the rules of delicate taste!" - he said, probably thinking of saying something sharp; but if there are rules, then how can one not follow them? Aristotle precisely wrote the rules for the taste of Greek; but we, in our new world, have our own, new rules for all the works of the creative spirit. Not only must one consult with them, but one cannot write without them. Otherwise, you will sin against poetic truth, and this is an offense that cannot be made up for by anything.
At the conclusion of his analysis, Karamzin says: “Having noticed the good and beautiful passages in “Darling”, let’s say that it, of course, is not all written in such happy verses; but in general it is so pleasant that a prudent critic, sensitive to the beauties of art and talent (and the court others are idle talk or slander), he will not want to prove his subtle legibility about her and will not forget that Ippolit Bogdanovich was the first in the Russian language to play with his imagination in light verse."
So, this is what the entire court of criticism was limited to! Happy poems, light poems: that’s what was highly valued, that’s what was admired in Bogdanovich’s poem! But aren’t Karamzin’s own poems smoother, more harmonious than Bogdanovich’s poems? Why doesn't anyone read them nowadays? And you, legislator, smart Boileau! Aren't your poems strong, beautiful, gracefully crafted? Why do our contemporaries respect them so little? Because neither Karamzin’s smooth verses nor Boileau’s epigraphic verses have a soul, no poetry, no essence worthy of the memory and love of posterity.
Happy Bogdanovich, who met the immortal Greek fiction, to which he inseparably attached his name, at least for us Russians. Despite the fact that the poems in his other works are as good as in “Darling”, they perished; but the poems of “Darling” will live for a long time. This is a piece of beautiful marble that is not afraid of the all-destroying time in the statue of Praxiteles, while entire masses of it, from the same scrap, perished long ago and irrevocably.
Let's say a few words about the tenth edition of "Darling" itself, printed in the printing house of the Lazarev Institute. It is sinful and unforgivable to publish the works of our best writers in this way, of whom we have very few. The unpleasant format and bad paper are not the main shortcomings of the tenth edition of “Darling”, as well as most of our good books. There are no notes, no explanations, no options; there is no news about the author himself and his work. But does every reader have the opportunity and even the leisure to search in twenty different books for what one needs to know for a complete understanding of a classical work? For this purpose, many appendices to Bogdanovich’s “Darling” would be necessary. How can one not remember enlightened foreigners on this occasion!.. You can’t help but sigh, knowing the convenient, beautiful and enriched with critical additions editions of the Didots and Murrays and looking at our best books, which appear in primitive simplicity in 1832!
Ippolit Fedorovich Bogdanovich (1743-1803) entered the history of Russian literature as the author of the heroic-comic poem-fairy tale “Darling”. Written in 1775 g. (first part), the poem was published in full in 1783. “Darling,” with its irony towards mythological heroes and plots, marked the ideological and aesthetic crisis of classicism. The content of "Darling" is ancient myth about the love of Cupid and Psyche, which received literary treatment in the novel by the Roman writer Apuleius “The Golden Ass” (II century AD), and then in the 17th century. by La Fontaine (“The Love of Psyche and Cupid”). Bogdanovich Russified the foreign plot. It retains all the main features of the myth. The reversal of this story lies in the tone itself, in the playful and ironic manner of presentation. This is exactly how the images of ancient mythology are depicted; they are intricately mixed with the characters of Russian fairy tales. In “Darling” there is no demonstrative and deliberate rudeness, but the author’s irony and skepticism dominate everything, sparing neither gods, nor people, and even the heroine of the poem herself, with all the patronizing and affectionate attitude of the poet towards her. The poem abundantly includes elements of Russian fairy-tale folklore intertwined with ancient Greek mythology. For example, the sword with which Hercules “cut off the nine heads of the hydra” is kept in Kashchei’s “arsenal” and is called Samosek.
Dushenka herself has lost the features of the ancient Psyche. Bogdanovich's heroine is lively, flirtatious and capricious. The author portrays her with slight irony. She is characterized by traditionally feminine shortcomings: love of clothes, vanity, curiosity, gullibility (you might think that men don’t suffer from vanity, I don’t either...female shortcomings) .
In "Darling" there is neither the philosophical depth of ancient myth, nor the wise spontaneity of Russian folk tales. The poem does not fit within the framework of the poetics of classicism, being a symptom of the brewing literary shifts that were being formed in the depths of classicism itself of a new literature. direction - Russian noble sentimentalism.
Neither Achilles' wrath nor the siege of Troy,
Where in the noise of eternal quarrels the heroes ended their days,
But I sing to Darling.
Bogdanovich also gives “Darling” a new genre designation “ancient story”.
The poem is written in free, varied iambic, with free and varied rhyming. In general, we can say that this is the first poem representative of light poetry, a family love story in verse.
So you understand what kind of nonsense this is:
“I, Darling... love Cupid...”
Then she cried like a fool;
Then, without further words from her,
The fisherman cried together
And all nature wept with her.
Brief summary of “Darling”:
Once upon a time there lived a girl, Dushenka, and she was so beautiful that she angered Venus with her beauty. Then Venus went to Cupid and, having collected “lies and all kinds of fables,” began to tell him all sorts of heresy about Darling. And Venus asked Cupid to “Make Darling hateful forever,” in short, so that suitors would not come to her and so that no one would dare take her as a wife. And so it happened. Darling suffered and decided to leave home. She staggered everywhere, and then... “The invisible Zephyr on “windy wings” carries Darling to luxurious palaces.” At night, the lover Cupid appears to the girl, but does not allow her to see him. And then the curious Darling, envious of her two evil sisters, whom Zephyr brings at her request to Amur’s palace, encourage her to see if her terrible husband is a snake, and if so, to kill him; why the Zephyrs bring the Samosek Sword and an oil lamp to Darling to the palace; at night, Darling lights a lamp and examines her husband, admiring what a wonderful husband she has, but accidentally spills hot oil from the lamp on Cupid, and he wakes up, sees a sword at his wife’s feet, and gets angry. And she was severely punished - the Zephyrs brought her back (“from the high places to the earth, to where they took her from”). And that’s when the curious woman’s suffering began. She tried to commit suicide, even many times. But Cupid did not forget her, and secretly watched her and saved her. First she jumped from the mountains, Zephyr caught her. Then “I’ll kill myself!” - she cried out; but she didn’t have a dagger,” then she wanted to stab herself with stones, but, as luck would have it, they turned into bread. Hanged myself on trees, but all were bitches And ( With at ki!) bent her to the ground. Further: “Unable to cling to the oak tree, she decided to drown herself.” But when she jumped, she landed on a pike and it rolled it over the waves. And finally, the last way to commit suicide is to burn in a fire. I found some kind of fire in the forest, went into it, and it immediately went out. In the same forest, she meets a fisherman (while crying like a fool - see above), who tells her why everyone hates her so much. And then the curious woman goes to Venus to beg for forgiveness. She sends her to all sorts of different feats, where Darling loses her beauty. In short, Cupid stands up for her because he loves Darling’s soul, and everything ends well. Beauty returns, Dushenka and Cupid live happily ever after and their daughter is born. The end of the fairy tale.
