The most famous literary hoaxes that history knows. Under Another Name: Pseudonyms and Literary Hoaxes - Exhibition in the New Building

Municipal Educational Budgetary Institution

« high school No. 54"

Orenburg

Research topic:

« Art literary hoaxes »

Ibragimova Olga

Place of study: student of class 8A

MOBU "Secondary School No. 54"

Orenburg

Supervisor:

Kalinina Irina Borisovna

teacher of Russian language

and literature

2015-2016 academic year year

1. Introduction.

1.1. Hoax - what is it?................................................. 3

1.2. Goal and tasks. ……………………………………. 4

1.3. Hypothesis…………………………………………...4

1.4. Object of study. ……………………………....4

1.5. Subject of study. ……………………………..4

1.6. Research methods. ……………………………...4

2. Main part.

2.1.1. Why literary hoaxhas not yet been describedas an independent form of art?......5

2.1.2.Literary hoax is a synthetic art form. .......6

General principles of the art of literary mystification.

2.2.1. Reasons for hoaxes. ………………………7

2.2.2. Special techniques of literary hoax...8

2.2.3. Exposing hoaxes…………………....9

Literary Hoaxes Revealed……….9

3. Conclusion.

4. List of used literature.

Introduction.

Hoax - what is it?

Once in a literature lesson, when we were studying life and creative path A.S. Pushkin, literature teacher Irina Borisovna, mentioning the poet’s uncle, Vasily Lvovich Pushkin, who at one time was a famous poet himself, said that he was the owner of the manuscript of the monument ancient Russian literature“The Tale of Igor’s Campaign”, which burned down during the fire of Moscow in 1812 and that there is a version that the author of “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” was Vasily Lvovich himself. During this period, there were many literary forgeries or literary hoaxes in Russian and European literature. And since hoaxes are interesting to me, I decided to continue working on this topic.

It is necessary to clarify what literary hoax is. This is usually the name given to literary works whose authorship is deliberately attributed to some person, real or fictitious, or is presented as folk art. At the same time, literary hoaxes strive to preserve the stylistic style of the author, to recreate - or create from scratch - his creative image. Hoaxes can be carried out for completely different purposes: for the sake of profit, to shame critics, or in the interests of literary struggle, from the author’s lack of confidence in his abilities or for certain ethical reasons. The main difference between a hoax and, for example, a pseudonym is the fundamental self-delimitation of the real author from his own work.

Mystification has always been, to one degree or another, characteristic of literature. Strictly speaking, what is a literary work if not an attempt to convince someone - a reader, a critic, oneself - of the existence of a reality invented by the writer? Therefore, it is not surprising that not only worlds invented by someone have appeared, but also fake works and invented writers. Everyone who was guided by the desire to attribute to the author a work that was not written by him stopped at creating the work and putting on it not their own names, but the name of the mentioned author. Others did not try to publish poems under own name, but were always signed with the names of fictional characters. Still others called their poems “translations” from foreign authors. Some authors went further, becoming “foreigners” writing in Russian. I wanted to learn more about the art of literary hoaxes. I turned to the Internet and found little-known and even unique publications, on the basis of which I wrote my scientific work.

Purpose my job is: to identify general patterns the art of literary hoax

Tasks:

Find out as much information as possible about literary hoaxes.

Reveal the features of the art of literary hoaxes.

Describe the features of the art of literary hoaxes.

Prove that literary hoax is a synthetic art form.

Identify as many reasons as possible for the emergence of literary hoaxes.

Determine how a hoax is exposed.

Find as many literary hoaxes as possible.

Systematize the collected material.

Research hypothesis: The art of literary hoaxes is a synthetic art that has existed for a very long time and has its own laws and canons.

Object of study: Literary hoaxes.

Subject of study: Literary hoaxes as art.

Research methods:

Comprehensive analysis- viewing an object from different points of view.

The imperial method is the collection of data and information about the subject of research.

Data processing method.

The induction method is a method in which a general conclusion is built on the basis of partial premises.

The generalization method is a method in which general properties subject.

Main part.

Literary hoax as art.

Why is literary hoax still not described as an independent art form?

“Literary hoaxes have been around as long as literature itself.” Almost every article about literary hoaxes begins with this phrase, and it is impossible to disagree with it. As soon as books began to be published, writers appeared who wanted to play pranks on their contemporaries, and more often, on their descendants. There seems to be some kind of attractive force in “fooling” as many people as possible at the same time. "Reader, … laugh: the height of earthly pleasures, laughing at everyone from around the corner"- Pushkin wrote frankly. Of course, the reasons that pushed writers to commit hoaxes were, as a rule, more serious and deeper, but the love of humor cannot be discounted.

And here the question involuntarily comes to mind: why is literary mystification, having existed for thousands of years, still not described as an independent form of art (after all, for example, the art of war has been described - and quite thoroughly - which, like the art of mystification, is largely relies on intuition)? Most articles only tell the stories of one or another long-solved literary hoax; at best, they propose a classification based on who the literary work is attributed to: a writer, a historical figure, or a fictional author. Meanwhile, literary hoaxes have their own general limitations and special possibilities, their own rules and their own techniques - their own laws of the genre. Suffice it to say that in a literary hoax the work of art itself becomes an enlarged sign with which the hoaxer operates in life - in the game, and the general opinion about this work of art is the same subject of the game as the work itself. In other words, in the “table of ranks” of this game, literary hoax is higher than work of art. And this game has its own masters and losers, its own masters and even geniuses. Of course, literature is not the only art form that has misled many people; There have been hoaxers in painting and music, in archeology and cinema, and even in science. But my interests are primarily related to literature.

Literary hoax is a synthetic art form.

Is literary hoax a synthetic art form? First you need to find out what a synthetic art form is. Synthetic arts are such types artistic creativity, which represent an organic fusion or a relatively free combination of different types of art, forming a qualitatively new and unified aesthetic whole. In fact, if in order to write a significant literary work, talent and a pen (quill pen, pencil, typewriter, computer keyboard) are enough, then the hoaxer must also have the ability to mislead a large number of people outside the very process of creating a literary work . If a writer masters the art of playing in the Word, then the hoaxer must also possess the art of playing in Life, since literary hoax is group game, carried out simultaneously both in life and in literature. Moreover, not only those who take the hoax offered by him at face value, but also those who are “on the side” of the hoaxer, initiated into the hoax, involuntarily take part in the game. There may be few of them, one or two people, or, as in Shakespeare’s hoax, dozens, but, with rare exceptions, they always take place.

Lann E. L. "Literary mystification."

Dmitriev V.G. Those who hid their name: From the history of pseudonyms and anonyms / Dmitriev, Valentin Grigorievich, Dmitriev, V.G. - M.: Nauka, 1970. - 255s

"Alexander Pushkin. The Little Humpbacked Horse”, 3rd edition; M., ID KAZAROV, 2011

Yu. Danilin Clara Gazul \ Joseph L "Estrange \ Giakinf Maglanovich \ © 2004 FEB.

Gililov I.M. The Game of William Shakespeare, or the Mystery of the Great Phoenix (2nd edition). M.: Int. Relationships, 2000.

Encyclopedia of pseudonyms of Russian poets.

Kozlov V.P. Secrets of falsification: A manual for university teachers and students. 2nd ed. M.: Aspect Press, 1996.

REVIEW

For the research work of Ekaterina Yurievna Parilova, a 10th grade student at the Rudnogorsk Secondary School.

Topic: “The art of literary hoaxes.”

Ekaterina Parilova's work is dedicated to the art of literary hoaxes.

There is no comprehensive survey of literary forgeries in any language. The reason is not difficult to establish: the science of literature is powerless to verify its entire archive. It is powerless because this verification presupposes the presence of primary sources, that is, manuscripts that do not raise doubts about authenticity. But what an immeasurable number of such manuscripts have been lost forever! And, as a result, the history of world literature, knowing about the falsification of many monuments, tries to forget about it.

Purpose of the study: to identify general patterns of the art of literary mystification.

Research objectives: find out as much data as possible about literary hoaxes; reveal the features of the art of literary hoaxes; describe the features of the art of literary hoaxes; prove that literary hoax is a synthetic art form; identify as many reasons as possible for the appearance of literary hoaxes; establish how a hoax is exposed; find as many literary hoaxes as possible; systematize the collected material.

When writing a research paper, the student used the following methods: 1) Complex analysis; 2) Imperial method; 3) Data processing method; 4) Method of induction; 5) Generalization method.

The work provides a justification for the relevance of the topic under study, put forward goals, set tasks, and formulate a hypothesis; the methods, object and subject of the research are determined; a review of the literature on the topic is given. The material in the work is presented in compliance with internal logic; there is a logical relationship between sections. The author's erudition in the area under consideration is traced. In my opinion, the work has no shortcomings. I have not found any errors or inaccuracies in it. I recommend that teachers of Russian language and literature use the material from this research work.

Reviewer: Tatyana Aleksandrovna Ziatdinova, teacher of Russian language and literature, Municipal Educational Institution “Rudnogorskaya Secondary School”

textual criticism of a text is a branch of philological sciences that studies works of writing and literature in order to restore history, critically verify and establish their texts, which are then used for further research, interpretation, publication and other purposes.

A hoax is an attempt to mislead someone (readers, the public, etc.) by presenting a non-existent phenomenon or fact as real. Literary hoaxes are considered to be works whose authorship is attributed to another person (real or fictitious) or folk art.

The custom of encrypting your last name or replacing it with another dates back to time immemorial. It is not always true that under a literary work there is true surname its creator. By various reasons authorship is often disguised. We invite you to learn more about the most striking literary hoaxes of the 20th century and the pseudonyms of writers.

Nickname Cherubina de Gabriac

Hoax In the fall of 1909, a letter in a purple envelope arrives at the editorial office of Apollo magazine. The editor of the magazine, esthete Sergei Makovsky, carefully opening the envelope, sees snow-white sheets of poetry, which are perfumed and arranged with dry leaves. The poems are signed very briefly - “H”. Makovsky convenes the entire editorial staff, consisting mainly of young men, and they read poetry together. Their lines are bright, spicy, and they decide to publish them immediately. Illustrations for them are made by Evgeny Lanceray himself, one of the leading artists of those years. A mysterious writer periodically calls the editor and reports something about herself. For example, that her name is Cherubina de Gabriac, that she is Spanish, but writes in Russian, that she is beautiful and deeply unhappy. Literary Russia goes crazy with delight, the entire editorial staff of Apollo is in absentia in love with a stranger.

Exposure Until her incognito identity was revealed, Elizaveta Dmitrieva, a teacher at the Petrovskaya Women's Gymnasium, wrote caustic critical notes on her own behalf about the poems of Cherubina de Gabriac and wondered if this was a hoax - provoking the literary community to conduct their own investigations and thereby fueling interest in the mysterious Spanish woman , that is, actually creating a “famous poetess” out of thin air. This is partly why everything was revealed quite quickly: already at the end of 1909, the poet Mikhail Kuzmin found out that it was Dmitrieva who spoke on the phone on behalf of de Gabriak, a very smart and talented girl, but not at all a beauty, and in addition, she was also lame. The St. Petersburg gentlemen who fell in love with the Spanish beauty in absentia were severely disappointed. At the end of 1910, another selection of Cherubina’s poems appeared in Apollo, with the final poem “Meeting,” signed with the poetess’s real name. The revelation turned into a severe creative crisis for Dmitrieva: after the break with Gumilyov and Voloshin and the scandalous duel between the two poets, Dmitrieva fell silent for a long time. However, in 1927, while in exile, at the suggestion of a close friend of recent years, sinologist and translator Yu. Shchutsky, she created another literary hoax - the seven-line cycle “The House under the Pear Tree”, written on behalf of the “philosopher Li Xiang Tzu”, exiled to a foreign land “for his belief in the immortality of the human spirit.”

The meaning of the hoax Maximilian Voloshin liked Dmitrieva’s poems, but when he brought the poetess to Makovsky, one of the publishers of Apollo, he was not impressed. Perhaps because Elizabeth herself seemed unsightly to him. Voloshin and Dmitrieva conceived the hoax in the summer of 1909 in Koktebel: a sonorous pseudonym and a literary mask of a mysterious Catholic beauty were invented.

Quote“I stand at a great crossroads. I left you. I won't write poetry anymore. I don't know what I'll do. Max, you brought out the power of creativity in me for a moment, but then took it away from me forever. Let my poems be a symbol of my love for you” (from a letter from Elizaveta Dmitrieva to Maximilian Voloshin).

Poetry

Alias ​​Max Fry

Hoax Since 1996, the St. Petersburg publishing house "Azbuka" began publishing books by the writer Max Frei. Genre: fantasy with elements of parody. The novels gradually gained popularity, and by 2001 Max Fry had become one of the most published Russian science fiction writers. Eventually, the author's popularity grew to such an extent that it became necessary to present it to the public: Fry became a real star.

Exposure Max Fry is not listed among foreign authors; for Russia such a first and last name is atypical - that means it is a pseudonym, everyone decided. The publisher joked that Max Fry was a blue-eyed black man. This continued until the fall of 2001, when on Dmitry Dibrov’s television program the host introduced Svetlana Martynchik to the audience as the real author of Max Frei’s books. And then a scandal broke out: Martynchik accused ABC of trying to register “Max Fry” as a trademark and get literary blacks to write for her.

The meaning of the hoax In the 1990s, against the backdrop of the flow of foreign science fiction pouring into the domestic market, Russian authors became somewhat lost. As a result, books of domestic origin began to appear, but under foreign names. Dmitry Gromov and Oleg Ladyzhensky wrote on behalf of Henry Lyon Oldie, and Elena Khaetskaya became Madeline Simons. For the same reason, the pseudonym “Max Fry” was born. By the way, Fry’s books always bear the copyright of Martynchik herself. Actually we're talking about about a publishing, not a writer's, hoax: the figure of the author is carefully mythologized, and at the moment the pseudonym is revealed, if the author still retains popularity by that time, you can make good money.

Quote“After the story of the attempt to register the name Max Fry as a trademark was revealed, they [Azbuka publishing house] quickly suggested to me: let’s put the guys in prison, and they will write books—candidates of philological sciences, no less! So, they will write a book per quarter, and for this they will pay me one hundred thousand rubles, also per quarter” (from an interview with Svetlana Martynchik).

P.S. You can borrow books from the “Echo Labyrinths” series from the central library, the city children’s and youth library, and the library named after L.A. Gladina.

Pseudonym Boris Akunin

Hoax In 1998, the detective novel “Azazel” was published about the adventures of the young St. Petersburg detective Erast Fandorin. The author is listed on the cover - Boris Akunin. The genre - “intelligent historical detective story” - turned out to be in demand, although not immediately. At the beginning of the 2000s, Akunin's books became bestsellers, and conversations began about film adaptations, which meant much more money for the author than just royalties for novels.

Exposure As Akunin's books became more popular and their audience wider, a variety of assumptions were put forward, including that the author was actually Vladimir Zhirinovsky or Tatyana Tolstaya. However, already in 2000 it became known that under this pseudonym was hiding a Japanese translator, deputy editor-in-chief of the magazine “Foreign Literature” Grigory Chkhartishvili. He himself admitted this, giving several interviews and beginning to appear in public not only as Chkhartishvili, but also as Akunin.

The meaning of the hoax Throughout the 90s, writing popular books of the “low genre”, that is, detective stories and thrillers, was considered an activity unworthy of an intelligent person: the author should not be smarter than his works. Moreover, as the writer himself admitted in an interview, bookstore merchandisers would never have pronounced Chkhartishvili’s name anyway. But Boris Akunin speaks easily and immediately sets the school-graduated reader in the mood for the classics of the 19th century. "Aku-nin" means " bad person", "scoundrel." According to another version, this pseudonym was chosen in honor of the famous Russian anarchist Bakunin. Well, maybe.

Quote“I needed a pseudonym because this type of writing is very different from all my other activities. When Akunin sits down at the computer and starts pounding on the keyboard, his thoughts don’t work the same way as Chkhartishvili’s, writing an article or essay. We are so different. Akunin is significantly kinder than me. This is the first thing. Secondly, he, unlike me, is an idealist. And thirdly, he firmly knows that God exists, for which I envy him” (from an interview with Grigory Chkhartishvili).

P.S. You can borrow B. Akunin’s books from any library in Apatity.

NicknamesAnatoly Brusnikin, Anna Borisova

Hoax In the fall of 2007, all of Moscow was covered with advertisements for the novel “The Ninth Savior.” The author is an unknown Anatoly Brusnikin. According to rumors, the AST publishing house invested up to a million dollars in the advertising campaign - colossal money even for the pre-crisis book market. It is unlikely that a little-known writer could qualify for such an investment. To the usual reviews in decent publications, suspiciously laudatory texts in the yellow press are added, and the writer Elena Chudinova claims that the plot of the book was stolen from her. In addition to “The Ninth Savior,” “Hero of Another Time” and “Bellona” were also released.

Exposure Suspicion quickly falls on Grigory Chkhartishvili: the action of the novel takes place at the end of the seventeenth century, and the book is written in the language of the nineteenth century, like the novels of Boris Akunin. Well, the pseudonym is painfully similar: both here and there “A. B." The search for the true author takes place mainly in the tabloids and is fueled by the publishing house itself: some facts are periodically leaked to the press, for example, an indistinct photograph of Brusnikin, where he either looks like Chkhartishvili, or doesn’t look like him. Meanwhile, at the beginning of 2008, the Atticus publishing group, which has much less financial resources, published the novel “There” by another unknown author, Anna Borisova (and also “The Creative” and “Vremena Goda”). Finally, in mid-January 2012, writer Grigory Chkhartishvili officially announced on his blog that Anatoly Brusnikin and Anna Borisova are him.

The meaning of the hoax By inventing Borisova and Brusnikin, Chkhartishvili set up an experiment - on himself and the publishing market. Can publishers promote an unknown writer from scratch and will readers accept this writer? How much money do you need for this? Which genres is the market ready to accept and which ones is not? In fact, a whole marketing study turned out from the hoax.

Quote“I was occupied with the following business problem. Suppose there is some unknown writer in whom the publishing house is ready to seriously invest, because it firmly believes in the prospects of this author. How to proceed? How much money should you invest in promotion so as not to remain in the red? What techniques should I use? What is the sequence of steps? I talked on this topic one-on-one with Jan Helemsky, head of the AST publishing house. I remember I was flattered that he said, without even reading the manuscript of Brusnikin’s first novel: “I’m in the game, I’m very interested in this”” (from Grigory Chkhartishvili’s blog).

P.S. You can borrow A. Brusnikin’s books “The Nine Savior” and “Hero of Another Time” in the central library, the city children’s and youth library, the library named after L.A. Gladina, and the family reading library. And A. Borisova’s books “There” and “Vremena goda” are in the central library and the family reading library.

Nickname: Holm van Zaitchik

Hoax Since 2000, seven novels have been published in Russian under the general title “Eurasian Symphony” by a certain Dutch writer and humanist Holm van Zaichik about a utopian-nice parallel historical reality in which China, the Mongol Empire and Rus' are united into one superpower, Ordus. These stories belong simultaneously to the genres of alternative history and detective, mixed with Chinese stylization, thickly flavored with political propaganda with the addition of love lines and a huge number of well-recognized quotes.

Exposure The mystery of Van Zaitchik was an open secret from the very beginning, although parody interviews were published in the name of the “humanist”. The fact that two St. Petersburg authors were hiding behind this pseudonym, which refers to the name of the Dutchman Robert van Gulik (one of the greatest orientalists of the 20th century and the author of the famous detective stories about Judge Dee), became known a year later, when they began to receive literary awards for their project at science fiction festivals, and then honestly admit in interviews that it’s them.

The meaning of the hoax The frankly ironic content of the work (a utopia parodying Russian history, and even many characters have real prototypes among friends and acquaintances of the authors) encouraged the co-authors to continue the game. At the same time, the serious science fiction writer Rybakov and the serious historian Alimov would look bad as authors on the cover of such a book. But the openly bantering van Zaychik is very good. At the turn of the millennium, literature gravitated towards dystopias, no one wrote utopias, and additional literary play was required to justify positive prose.

Quote“I love utopias. Their appearance is always a harbinger of a sharp historical breakthrough. We've eaten too much dystopia. Every appearance of utopias foreshadows leaps in development. The rejection of utopia is, in principle, the rejection of historical effort in general. Easy, accessible skeptical disbelief that things can and should be good here” (from an interview with Vyacheslav Rybakov).

P.S. You can borrow all of Holm van Zaitchik's books from the central library, the city children's and youth library, and the family reading library.

Pseudonym Mikhail Ageev

Hoax In 1934, the book “A Romance with Cocaine” was published in Paris - a confessional story of the protagonist’s coming of age in pre- and post-revolutionary Moscow against the backdrop of historical events. The novel was liked by most famous emigre authors and critics, including Merezhkovsky and Khodasevich. Even then it was believed that this was someone’s pseudonym, since no other texts (except for the story published along with the novel) were listed as Ageev’s, and the author of one book who appeared out of nowhere is an extremely suspicious phenomenon. In the 1980s, the novel was republished in the West, and it was a great success. In the 90s he reached Russia. Intelligent schoolchildren and students read to him, and perhaps it was he who influenced Pelevin when he wrote Chapaev and Emptiness.

Exposure For a long time there was a popular version that Ageev was none other than Vladimir Nabokov: the facts of the biography of Nabokov and the main character of “A Romance with Cocaine” coincided, structurally this thing resembled early works Nabokov, finally, the names of the characters were often found in Nabokov’s texts. At the same time, the famous poetess Lydia Chervinskaya insisted that the author was a certain Marco Levi, but her version was not taken into account. Finally, in 1996, thanks to the efforts of literary scholars Gabriel Superfin and Marina Sorokina, it turned out that the author's name is really Levi, but not Marco, but Mark. The fact is that the novel quite accurately describes the Moscow private Kreiman gymnasium, where Mark Levy actually studied in the years described by the author. All questions were finally resolved in 1997, when letters from Levi himself were found and published, in which he negotiated the publication of his book.

The meaning of the hoax The biography of the real author of “A Romance with Cocaine” is full of blank spots. It is known that in the 1920s - 1930s he wandered around Europe, studied in Germany, worked in France, possibly collaborated with Soviet intelligence, exchanged Soviet citizenship for Paraguayan, and then returned Soviet citizenship. After the war he lived in Yerevan, where he died in 1973. Given such a biography and in that historical situation, publishing a confessional novel under a pseudonym seems a reasonable precaution: the author invented a “writer” who is not connected with the outside world by political, social or other obligations, and therefore is free to say whatever he wants.

Quote“In 1930, he (Levi. - “RR”) left Germany and came to Turkey, where he was engaged in teaching languages ​​and even literary activities. He wrote a book called “The Tale of Cocaine,” which was published in the Parisian emigrant publication “House of Books.” Levi points out that the book is harmless, it does not contain a single word directed against the USSR, and in general it is his forced work, written for the sake of its existence. From the conversations that took place, one could draw the conclusion that Levi, apparently, thought through and realized the depth of the mistake he made and is trying to make amends for it. practical work" (From a certificate from the Soviet Consulate General in Istanbul).

P.S. You can borrow M. Ageev’s book “A Romance with Cocaine” at the central library and the library named after L.A. Gladina.

Nickname Abram Tertz

Hoax Since the early 1960s, works signed by a certain Abram Tertz began to appear in Russian-language foreign publications. One of the most famous was the story “Lyubimov” - about a small Soviet town in which a bicycle master seized power, became a dictator and began to build real communism. The same author published an ironic and caustic article on socialist realism.

Exposure In the USSR, Tertz’s texts were considered anti-Soviet and defamatory of the “Soviet state and social order", after which the KGB began searching for the author. It is not known exactly how Sinyavsky’s authorship was established - perhaps we are talking about someone’s betrayal or a graphological examination. In 1965-1966, a high-profile trial took place against Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel (he also published in the West under a pseudonym). And although collective letters were received in defense of the writers both from abroad and from many of their Soviet colleagues, nevertheless, the court found them guilty. Sinyavsky received seven years for anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda. In 1991, the case was reviewed and the verdict was overturned. But there remains a letter from Mikhail Sholokhov, in which he calls the books of Sinyavsky and Daniel “dirt from a puddle.”

The meaning of the hoax Pure precaution. To publish in the West, and even with texts that censorship would never have allowed in the USSR, under one’s own name was pure suicide. By publishing under pseudonyms, the authors tried to protect themselves and their loved ones. However, Sinyavsky continued to publish prose under the name of Abram Terts even after his release from the camp and departure to emigrate. According to the version voiced by his wife Maria Rozanova after the writer’s death, the pseudonym was taken in honor of the hero of an Odessa criminal song - a pickpocket. By this, Sinyavsky seemed to admit that he was playing a dangerous game. And having become famous under this name, he no longer wanted to give it up: the fictional writer’s biography turned out to be more glorious and exciting than that of the real one.

P.S. You can borrow the collected works of A. Tertz (in 2 volumes) from the central library, city children's and youth library, family reading library, libraries No. 1 and No. 2.

Nickname Emil Azhar

Hoax In 1974, writer Emile Azhar published his debut novel, “Darling.” Critics receive it with a bang, and then the author who writes under this pseudonym is announced - the young writer Paul Pavlovich, nephew of the famous writer Romain Gary. His second novel, The Whole Life Ahead, wins the Prix Goncourt, France's top literary award. In total, Azhar has four novels coming out.

Exposure Gary claimed that it was he who discovered the talent of a writer in his nephew. However, some suspicions arose quite quickly: the novels of the debutant Pavlovich were too mature and skillful. However, until Gary’s suicide at the end of 1980, it was not known for certain who Azhar was. A few days before his death, the author completed the essay “The Life and Death of Emile Azhar,” which was published in the summer of 1981, in which he detailed the history of his hoax.

The meaning of the hoax By the mid-1970s, Romain Gary, once a favorite of the public and critics, winner of the Prix Goncourt, was considered worn out and exhausted. By creating a pseudonym, Gary wanted to prove to both his critics and himself that this was not so. As a result, he became the only person in French history to receive the Goncourt Prize twice. But it was the fame that went not to the writer himself, but to the Azhar he invented, that became the cause of a deep mental crisis, and then Gary’s suicide: if at first the writer laughed at the critics who began to chase a new star, then in the end it was someone else’s success, which, in theory , should have belonged to him, began to oppress him.

Quote“I was driven out of my domain. Another one has settled in the mirage I created. Having materialized, Azhar put an end to my ghostly existence in him. The vicissitudes of fate: my dream turned against me” (Romain Gary “The Life and Death of Emile Azhar”).

P.S. Books by R. Gary (“Kites”, “Promise at Dawn”, “The Dance of Genghis Khaim”, “The Light of a Woman”, “Pseudo” and “The Fears of King Solomon” - the last two novels were published under the pseudonym E. Azhar) you can borrow from the central library and other city libraries.

Writers' pseudonyms

Anna Akhmatova

Gorenko Anna Andreevna (1889-1966)

Russian poet. For her pseudonym, Anna Gorenko chose the surname of her great-grandmother, who descended from the Tatar Khan Akhmat. She later said: “Only a seventeen-year-old crazy girl could choose a Tatar surname for a Russian poetess... That’s why it occurred to me to take a pseudonym for myself because my dad, having learned about my poems, said: “Don’t disgrace my name.” - “And I don’t need your name!” - I said...” (L. Chukovskaya “Notes about Anna Akhmatova”).

Arkady Arkanov

Steinbock Arkady Mikhailovich (born 1933)

Russian satirist writer. In the early 1960s, Arkady Steinbock began to engage in literary activities, but not everyone liked his last name - it was too Jewish. As a child, Arkady's name was simply Arkan - hence the pseudonym.

Eduard Bagritsky

Dzyubin Eduard Georgievich (1895-1934)

Russian and Soviet poet, translator. He had a phenomenal memory and could recite poems by almost any poet by heart. It is unknown where the pseudonym comes from, but times were “crimson” then. He was also published in Odessa newspapers and humor magazines under the pseudonyms “Someone Vasya”, “Nina Voskresenskaya”, “Rabkor Gortsev”.

Demyan Bedny

Pridvorov Efim Alekseevich (1883-1945)

Russian and Soviet poet. Efim Alekseevich’s surname is in no way suitable for a proletarian writer. The pseudonym Demyan Bedny is the village nickname of his uncle, a people's fighter for justice.

Andrey Bely

Bugaev Boris Nikolaevich (1880-1934)

Russian poet, prose writer, critic, publicist, memoirist, leading theorist of symbolism. His teacher and mentor S.M. Soloviev suggested that he take the pseudonym Andrei Bely ( White color- “complete synthesis of all mental faculties”).

Kir Bulychev

Mozheiko Igor Vsevolodovich (1934-2003)

Russian science fiction writer, film scriptwriter, historian-orientalist (PhD in Historical Sciences). Author of scientific works on history South-East Asia(signed with his real name), numerous fantastic stories, stories (often combined into cycles), the collection “Some Poems” (2000). The pseudonym is composed of the name of his wife (Kira) and the maiden name of the writer’s mother. As the writer admitted, the idea of ​​a pseudonym arose a long time ago, when he was still a graduate student at the Institute of Oriental Studies and wrote his first science fiction story. He was afraid of criticism and ridicule: “I skipped the vegetable depot! Didn’t show up to the trade union meeting... And he’s also playing around fantastic stories" Subsequently, the name “Kirill” on the covers of books began to be written in abbreviation - “Kir.”, and then the period was shortened, and this is how the now famous “Kir Bulychev” turned out.

Voltaire

François-Marie Arouet (1694-1778)

French writer, philosopher and educator. One of the largest French enlightenment philosophers of the 18th century, poet, prose writer, satirist, publicist, founder of Voltairianism. The nickname Voltaire is an anagram of "Arouet le j(eune)" - "Arouet the younger" (Latin spelling - AROVETLI)

Arkady Gaidar

Golikov Arkady Petrovich (1904-1941)

Soviet writer, grandfather of Yegor Gaidar, one of the founders of modern children's literature. His most famous works are “The Fate of the Drummer” and “Timur and His Team”. There are two versions of the origin of the pseudonym Gaidar. The first, which has become widespread, is “gaidar” - in Mongolian “a horseman galloping in front”. According to another version, Arkady Golikov could take the name Gaidar as his own: in Bashkiria and Khakassia, where he visited, the names Gaidar (Geidar, Haydar, etc.) are found very often. This version was supported by the writer himself.

Alexander Herzen

Yakovlev Alexander Ivanovich (1812-1870)

Russian writer, philosopher, revolutionary. Author of the novel "Who is to Blame?" and the essay "The Past and Thoughts." Herzen is the illegitimate son of a Russian writer, philosopher, revolutionary. The author of the novel by landowner Ivan Alekseevich Yakovlev and German Henrietta-Wilhelmina Louise Haag. The surname Herzen - “child of the heart” (from German Herz - heart) was invented by his father.

Grigory Gorin

Ofshtein Grigory Izrailevich (1910-2000)

Maksim Gorky

Peshkov Alexey Maksimovich (1868-1936)

Russian writer, public figure, literary critic, publicist, first Chairman of the Board of the Union of Writers of the USSR. The first story was published in 1892 under the pseudonym Gorky, which characterized hard life writer, this pseudonym was used in the future. At the very beginning of his literary activity, he also wrote feuilletons in the Samara Newspaper under the pseudonym Yehudiel Khlamida. M. Gorky himself emphasized that correct pronunciation his last name is Peshkov, although almost everyone pronounces it as Peshkov.

Irina Grekova

Elena Sergeevna Ventzel (1907 - 2002)

Russian prose writer, mathematician. Doctor of Technical Sciences, author of numerous scientific works on problems of applied mathematics Pridvorov Efim Alekseevich (1883-1945), a university textbook on probability theory, a book on game theory, etc. Like Lewis Carroll, his scientific works She published under her real name, and published novels and stories under a “mathematical” pseudonym (from the name of the French letter “y”, which goes back to Latin). As a writer, she began publishing in 1957 and immediately became famous and loved; her novel “The Pulpit” was literally read to the gills.

Alexander Green

Grinevsky Alexander Stefanovich (1880-1932)

Ilya Ilf

Fainzilberg Ilya Arnoldovich (1897-1937)

Veniamin Kaverin

Zilber Veniamin Alexandrovich (1902-1988)

Soviet writer, his most famous work is the novel “Two Captains.” The pseudonym “Kaverin” was taken from a hussar, a friend of the young Pushkin (introduced by him under his own name in “Eugene Onegin”).

Lewis Carroll

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898)

English mathematician and theologian, as well as a writer, author of the fairy tale "Alice in Wonderland". Magazine publisher and writer Edmund Yates advised Dodgson to come up with a pseudonym, and in Dodgson's Diaries an entry appears dated February 11, 1865: “Wrote to Mr. Yates, offering him a choice of pseudonyms: 1) Edgar Cutwellis (the name Edgar Cutwellis is obtained by rearranging the letters from Charles Lutwidge ); 2) Edgard W. C. Westhill (the method of obtaining the pseudonym is the same as in the previous case); 3) Louis Carroll (Louis from Lutwidge - Ludwick - Louis, Carroll from Charles 4) Lewis Carroll (by the same); the principle of "translation" of the names Charles Lutwidge into Latin and the reverse "translation" from Latin into English)". The choice fell on Lewis Carroll. Since then, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson signed all his “serious” mathematical and logical works with his real name, and all his literary works with a pseudonym.

Eduard Limonov

Savenko Eduard Veniaminovich (born 1943)

Infamous writer, journalist, social and political figure, founder and head of the liquidated National Bolshevik Party. Since July 2006, he has been an active participant in the “Other Russia” movement in opposition to the Kremlin, the organizer of a number of “Dissent Marches”. The pseudonym Limonov was invented for him by the artist Vagrich Bakhchanyan (according to other sources - Sergei Dovlatov).

Alexandra Marinina

Alekseeva Marina Anatolyevna (born 1957)

Author of numerous detective novels. In 1991, together with her colleague Alexander Gorkin, she wrote the detective story "Six-Winged Seraphim", which was published in the magazine "Police" in the fall of 1992. The story was signed by the pseudonym of Alexander Marinin, compiled from the names of the authors.

Evgeniy Petrov

Evgeny Petrovich Kataev (1901-1942)

Russian and Soviet writer, brother of the writer Valentin Kataev, co-author (together with I. Ilf) of the famous novels “The Golden Calf”, “12 Chairs”, etc. The pseudonym Petrov is a surname derived from the patronymic, since one Kataev, i.e. his brother Valentin was already a famous writer.

Kozma Prutkov

Alexey Tolstoy and the Zhemchuzhnikov brothers - Alexey, Alexander and Vladimir.

Prutkov - fictional writer, one of a kind literary phenomenon. Two talented poets, Count A.K. Tolstoy and Alexey Mikhailovich Zhemchuzhnikov, together with Vladimir Mikhailovich Zhemchuzhnikov and with some participation of Zhemchuzhnikov’s third brother, Alexander Mikhailovich, created a type of important complacency and self-confidence of the St. Petersburg official (director of the assay tent), who, out of vanity, practiced different kinds literature. Famous quotes: “If you want to be happy, be happy,” “Look at the root!”, “Do not cut everything that grows!”, “It is more useful to walk the path of life than the entire universe,” “An egoist is like someone who has been sitting in a well for a long time,” “Genius is like a hill rising on a plain”, “Death is placed at the end of life in order to more conveniently prepare for it”, “Do not take anything to the extreme: a person who wants to eat too late risks eating the next day in the morning”, “Do not I completely understand why many people call fate a turkey, and not some other bird that is more similar to fate?”

George Sand

Aurore Dupin (1804-1876)

French writer. Since it was almost impossible for a woman to get published at that time, Aurora Dupin took a male pseudonym.

Igor Severyanin

Lotarev Igor Vladimirovich (1887-1941)

Poet of the "Silver Age". The pseudonym Northerner emphasizes the poet’s “northern” origin (he was born in the Vologda province). According to another version, in his youth he went with his father on a trip to the Far East (1904). This trip inspired the poet - hence the pseudonym Northerner. For most of his literary activity, the author preferred to write Igor-Severyanin. He perceived the pseudonym as a middle name, not a surname.

Nadezhda TEFFI

Lokhvitskaya Nadezhda Alexandrovna (1872-1952)

Russian writer, poetess, author of satirical poems and feuilletons. She was called the first Russian humorist of the early 20th century, the “queen of Russian humor,” but she was never a supporter of pure humor, always combining it with sadness and witty observations of the life around her. She explained the origin of her pseudonym as follows: she knew a certain stupid man named Stefan, whom the servant called Steffy. Believing that stupid people are usually happy, she took this nickname for herself as a pseudonym, shortening it “for the sake of delicacy” to “Taffy.” Another version of the origin of the pseudonym is offered by researchers of Teffi’s creativity, according to whom the pseudonym for Nadezhda Alexandrovna, who loved hoaxes and jokes, and was also the author of literary parodies and feuilletons, became part of a literary game aimed at creating an appropriate image of the author. There is also a version that Teffi took her pseudonym because her sister, the poetess Mirra Lokhvitskaya, who was called the “Russian Sappho,” was published under her real name.

Daniil Kharms

Yuvachev Daniil Ivanovich (1905-1942)

Russian writer and poet. Yuvachev had many pseudonyms, and he playfully changed them: Kharms, Haarms, Dandan, Charms, Karl Ivanovich Shusterling, etc. The pseudonym "Kharms" (a combination of the French "charme" - "charm, charm" and the English "harm" - "harm" ") most accurately reflected the essence of the writer's attitude to life and creativity.

Vasily Yan

Yanchevetsky Vasily Grigorievich (1875-1954)

Dmitriev V. G. Invented names: (Stories about pseudonyms) / V. G. Dmitriev. - M.: Sovremennik, 1986. - 255 p.

The book talks about the reasons for the appearance of pseudonyms and cryptonyms, about the methods of their formation, about the role they played in the work of a number of outstanding Russian and foreign writers, the semantic meaning of many foreign language pseudonyms is explained. Fascinating stories will introduce the reader to other methods of disguising the author, to the invented names that writers gave to their literary opponents and book characters. Separate chapters are devoted to the pseudonyms of artists, theater and circus performers.

First story. Why do you need a pseudonym?

Second story. How pseudonyms were created.

Third story. Ancient times.

Story four. At the dawn of Russian literature.

Fifth story. Lyceum "cricket".

Story six. Pechorin's acquaintance.

Story seven. From the beekeeper Rudy Panka to Konrad Lilienschwager.

The eighth story. From Savva Namordnikov to Nikanor Zatrapezny.

Ninth story. How the "Iskraists" signed.

Tenth story. Antosha Chekhonte and his contemporaries.

Story eleven. "Sespel" means snowdrop.

Twelfth story. Why is there a double surname?

Story thirteen. The nickname serves as a mask.

Story fourteen. Pseudonyms of revolutionaries.

Story fifteen. Artists' pseudonyms.

Story sixteen. Stage names.

Location of the book: central city library.

Dmitriev V.G. Those who hid their name: From the history of pseudonyms and anonyms / Dmitriev, Valentin Grigorievich, Dmitriev, V.G. - M.: Nauka, 1970. - 255 p.

The book tells about the origin of pseudonyms, reveals their semantic meaning, methods of their formation, makes an attempt to systematize some facts from this interesting area of ​​literary criticism, and presents the most vivid examples from Russian and foreign literature.

Location of the book: library named after L.A. Gladina.

Osovtsev, S. What's in my name for you? // Neva. - 2001. - No. 7. - P. 183-195.

Sindalovsky N. A. Pseudonym: legends and myths of the second name // Neva. - 2011. - N 2. - P.215-238.

This is a literary hoax text or fragment of text whose author attributes its creation to a figurehead, real or fictitious. Literary mystification is the opposite of plagiarism: the plagiarist borrows someone else’s word without citing the author; the hoaxer, on the contrary, attributes his word to someone else. The main difference between a literary hoax and an ordinary text is the creation of an image of the author, within the imaginary boundaries of whose mental, social and linguistic world the work appears. the dummy author is embodied in the style of the text, therefore literary hoax always involves stylization, imitation of the literary language of a particular author or imitation of the style of the era, within the boundaries of which the social and cultural idiolect of the fictional author is created. Literary mystification, therefore, is a convenient form both for experimentation in the field of style and for inheriting a stylistic tradition. From the point of view of the type of false authorship, literary hoaxes are divided into three groups:

1. Imitating ancient monuments, the name of the author of which has not been preserved or has not been named (“Kraledvor Manuscript”);
2. Attributed to historical or legendary persons (“Wortingern and Rowena”, 1796, issued by W. G. Ireland for a newly discovered play by W. Shakespeare; continuation of Pushkin’s “Rusalka”, performed by D. P. Zuev; “The Poems of Ossian”, 1765, J. Macpherson );
3. Forwarded to fictional authors: “deceased” (“Tales of Belkin”, 1830, A.S. Pushkin, “The Life of Vasily Travnikov”, 1936, V.F. Khodasevich) or “living” (Cherubina de Gabriak, E. Azhar); for the sake of credibility, the fictional author is provided with a biography, and the real author can act as his publisher and/or executor.

Some works, which subsequently gained worldwide fame, were performed in the form of literary hoaxes (“Gulliver’s Travels”, 1726, J. Swift, “Robinson Crusoe”, 1719, D. Defoe, “Don Quixote”, 1605-15, M. Cervantes; "History of New York, 1809, W. Irving).

An important property of a literary hoax is the temporary appropriation of someone else's name by its author.. The hoaxer literally creates the text on behalf of another; the name is the prototype of language and the only reality of the imaginary author. Hence the increased attention to the name and its internal form. The name in a literary hoax is connected, on the one hand, with the language and architectonics of the text (for example, the testimony of E.I. Dmitrieva about the rootedness of the name Cherubina de Gabriak in the poetic fabric of works written in her name), and on the other hand, with the name of the real author (anagram , cryptogram, effect double transfer etc.). The misconception of the reader and the discovery of a forgery, two stages of the reception of a literary hoax, follow not from the gullibility of the reader, but from the very nature of the name, which does not allow, within the boundaries of literary reality, to distinguish between its real and imaginary bearers. The goal is an aesthetic and/or life-creative experiment. This is what distinguishes it from forgeries, the authors of which are guided solely by mercantile considerations (for example, Gutenberg’s companion I. Fust sold the first Mainz Bibles at exorbitant prices in Paris, passing them off as handwritten books), and deliberate distortions of a historical event or the biography of a historical person. Forgeries of historical monuments (“A Tale of Two Embassies”, “Correspondence of Ivan the Terrible with the Turkish Sultan” - both 17th century) and biographical false testimony (“Letters and notes of Ommer de Gelle”, 1933, composed by P.P. Vyazemsky) are quasi-mystifications.

The history of the study of literary hoaxes began with their collection. The first experiments in cataloging literary hoaxes date back to the period of the late Middle Ages - the beginning of the Renaissance and are associated with the need to attribute ancient texts. Experiments in the attribution of ancient and medieval monuments laid the scientific foundations for textual criticism and textual criticism both in Europe (criticism of the “Donation of Constantine”) and in Russia, where partial examinations of manuscripts have been carried out since the 17th century. By the beginning of the 19th century, extensive material had been accumulated for compiling reference books and classifying types of fictitious authorship: literary hoaxes, pseudonyms, plagiarism, forgeries. At the same time, it became clear that compiling an exhaustive catalog of literary hoaxes is impossible, the science of literature is powerless to verify its entire archive, and philological methods for determining the authenticity of a text, especially in the absence of an autograph, are extremely unreliable and can produce contradictory results. In the 20th century, the study of literary hoax ceased to be exclusively a problem of textual criticism and copyright law; it began to be considered in the context of the history and theory of literature. In Russia about literary mystification as a subject theoretical research first said by E.L. Lann in 1930. Interest in literary mystification was stimulated by attention to the problem of dialogue, “one’s own” and “alien” words, which became one of the central philosophical and philological topics in the 1920s; It is no coincidence that in Lann’s book the influence of the ideas of M. M. Bakhtin is noticeable. The central problem of literary mystification in its theoretical coverage is someone else's name and word spoken on someone else's behalf. Literary mystification is subject not only to changing literary eras and styles, but also to changing ideas about authorship and copyright, about the boundaries of literature and life, reality and fiction. From antiquity to the Renaissance, and in Russia until the beginning of the 19th century, the history of fictitious authorship is dominated by forgeries of ancient manuscript monuments and literary hoaxes attributed to historical or legendary figures.

In Greece from the 3rd century BC. the genre of fictitious letters created on behalf of famous authors of the past is known: the “seven” Greek sages, philosophers and politicians(Thales, Solon, Pythagoras, Plato, Hippocrates, etc.). The purpose of the forgery was more often pragmatic: apologetic (making political and philosophical ideas greater authority) or discrediting (for example, Diotima composed 50 letters of obscene content on behalf of Epicurus); less often didactic (exercises in rhetoric schools to acquire the skills of good style). Literary mystification had the same meaning in the literature of medieval Europe and in ancient Russian literature. During the Renaissance, its character changes significantly. Literary hoaxes appear and begin to predominate, attributed to fictitious authors, for which the hoaxer composes not only the text, but also the author, his name, biography, and sometimes a portrait. In modern times, the history of literary mystification consists of uneven bursts, the main of which occur in the eras of Baroque, Romanticism, and Modernism, which is associated with the feeling of the world as linguistic creativity inherent in these eras. Literary hoaxes in modern times can be deliberately humorous and parodic in nature: the reader, according to the author’s plan, should not believe in their authenticity (Kozma Prutkov).

— years of the 19th century.

A fictional “portrait” of Prutkov, created by Lev Zhemchuzhnikov, Alexander Beideman and Lev Lagorio

The authors of this hoax are also well known: poets Alexey Tolstoy (the largest contribution in quantitative terms), brothers Alexey, Vladimir and Alexander Zhemchuzhnikov. They approached the implementation of their idea seriously, even created a detailed biography of their hero, from which we learn that Kozma Petrovich Prutkov (1803 -1863) spent his entire life, except for childhood and early adolescence, in public service: first in the military department, and then in civil. He had an estate in the village “Pustynka” near the Sablino railway station, etc.

Prutkov’s aphorisms became the most popular:

If you have a fountain, shut it up; give the fountain a rest.

If you want to be happy, be it.

Drive love through the door, it will fly out the window, etc.

Prutkov’s poems turned out to be no less interesting.

My portrait

When you meet a person in the crowd,

Which is naked;*

Whose forehead is darker than the foggy Kazbek,

The step is uneven;

Whose hair is raised in disorder;

Who, crying out,

Always trembling in a nervous fit, -

Know: it's me!

Whom they sneer with ever-new anger,

From generation to generation;

From whom the crowd wears his laurel crown

Vomits madly;

Who doesn’t bow his flexible back to anyone,

Know: it's me!..

There is a calm smile on my lips,

There's a snake in my chest!

(* Option: “Who is wearing the tailcoat.” (Note by K. Prutkov

First publication - in Sovremennik, 1860, No. 3)
The experience of this literary hoax turned out to be so successful that the works of Kozma Prutkov are still published, which cannot be said about another literary hoax, whose name is Charubina de Gabriak. And how amazingly beautiful it all started!

Anastasia Tsvetaeva in her “Memoirs” described this story as follows: “Her name was Elizaveta Ivanovna Dmitrieva. She was a teacher. Very modest, ugly, homely. Max ( poet Maximilian Voloshin-Prim. V.G.) became interested in her poems, invented a way for her to become famous, created a myth about (Spanish woman?) Charubina de Gabriac, and in the radiance of this name, foreignness, imaginary beauty, her poems rose over Russia - like a new moon. And then, then people desecrated everything, destroyed everything, and she no longer began to write poetry. It was a cruel day when - at the station - a group of poets was waiting for a beautiful poetess with a fiery name. An inconspicuous little woman came out of the carriage - and one of those waiting, a poet! - behaved unworthily, impermissibly. Max challenged him to a duel."

Another touch to her portrait - until the age of seven, Dmitrieva suffered from consumption, was bedridden, and remained lame for the rest of her life.

Elizaveta Dmitrieva spent the summer of 1909 in Koktebel, at Voloshin’s dacha, where the joint idea of ​​​​a literary hoax was born, the sonorous pseudonym Cherubina de Gabriak and the literary mask of a mysterious Catholic beauty were invented.

Cherubina de Gabriac's success was brief and dizzying. And it’s not surprising, because she actually wrote wonderful poetry.

“In the deep furrows of the palm...”

In the deep grooves of the palm

I read life's letters:

They contain the path to the Mystic Crown

And the depths of dead flesh.

In the ring of ominous Saturn

Love is intertwined with my destiny...

Which lot will the urn fall?

Which arrow will ignite blood?

Will it fall like scarlet dew?

Having burned your lips with earthly fire?

Or it will lie as a white stripe

Under the sign of the Rose and Cross?

But she was soon exposed. Cherubina's exposure took place at the end of 1909. The first to learn the truth was the poet Mikhail Kuzmin, who managed to find out Dmitrieva's phone number. The translator von Gunther got Dmitrieva to confess to deception, and the secret became known in the editorial office of Apollo, where it was constantly published. And then, as we already know, followed insult Gumilev to Dmitrieva, which led to Voloshin challenging Gumilyov to a duel.

All this turned into a severe creative crisis for the poetess.

Elizaveta Dmitrieva (1887-1928), poetess, playwright, translator, still wrote poetry after this ill-fated story, but she never managed to achieve fame under her own name.

There is another case in the history of literature that can be called differently - either a hoax or plagiarism. This started strange story in Georgia, was associated with the name of the Azerbaijani poet Mirza Shafi Vazekh (or -), and ended in distant Germany.

In 1844 in Tiflis (Tbilisi), at that time it was the capital of the Tiflis province of the Great Russian Empire, the German writer and Orientalist Friedrich Bodenstedt arrived, who soon met Mirza Shafi Vazekh, who worked as a teacher here.

Returning to Germany, in 1850 Bodenstedt published a voluminous book “1001 days in the East” (“Tausend und ein Tag im Orient”), part of which is dedicated to Mirza Shafi Vazeh. And in 1851, the book “Songs of Mirza-Shafi” (“Die Lieder des Mirza-Schaffy”) was published, translated by F. Bodenstedt. The book unexpectedly became extremely popular. So popular that it was reprinted annually and translated into many European languages.

The most interesting thing began to happen then. Twenty years after the death of Mirza Shafi, Vazeha Bodenstedt published the book “From the Legacy of Mirza Shafi”, in which he announced that the songs of Mirza Shafi were not translations of the poems of the Azerbaijani poet, who, in addition to his native language, also wrote in Persian, but of him, Friedrich Bodenstedt a, own works.

We will end our short essay on the most famous literary hoaxes with a tragic story about a story called “Emile Azhar.” Hoax. In 1974, writer Emile Azhar published his debut novel, “Darling.” Critics received it enthusiastically, and then the author writing under this pseudonym was announced - this is the young writer Paul Pavlovich, nephew of the famous writer Romain Gary (1914-1980). His second novel, The Whole Life Ahead, wins the Prix Goncourt, France's top literary award. In total, Azhar has four novels coming out.

It is impossible not to say at least a few words about Gary himself, how interesting and amazing his life was. Real name - Roman Katsev) was born in Vilna in the then Russian Empire. There was a legend that his real father was Ivan Mozzhukhin, a Russian silent film star. In 1928, mother and son moved to France, to Nice. Roman studied law in Aix-en-Provence and Paris. He also studied flying to become a military pilot. During the war he fought in Europe and Africa. After the war he was in the diplomatic service. His first novel was published in 1945. He soon becomes one of the most prolific and talented French writers. But let's return to the topic of our story. Namely, literary hoaxes.

However, critics soon became suspicious. Some of them considered the same Gary to be the author of the novels. Some, but by no means all. The fact is that by the mid-1970s, Romain Gary, winner of the Goncourt Prize, was considered worn out and exhausted.

Everything finally became clear after the publication in 1981 of the essay “The Life and Death of Emile Azhar,” which Gary wrote a few days before his death.

The reason for the deep mental crisis that led Gary to suicide was that in the end all the glory went not to the real Gary, but to the fictional Azhar. Although, in essence, Romain Gary is the only writer who received the Goncourt Prize twice - in 1956 under the name of Romain Gary for the novel “The Roots of Heaven” and in 1975 under the name of Emile Azhar for the novel “The Whole Life Ahead”... As time has shown, Emile’s life Azhara turned out to be short-lived.

. . .

Mystification has always been, to one degree or another, characteristic of literature. Strictly speaking, what is a literary work if not an attempt to convince someone - a reader, a critic, oneself - of the existence of a reality invented by the writer? Therefore, it is not surprising that not only worlds invented by someone have appeared, but also fake works and invented writers.

Many researchers call Homer's poems the first literary hoax - the personality of Homer, in their opinion, was invented, and the works attributed to him are the fruit of collective work that may have lasted more than one decade. It is certainly a hoax - the parody epic "Batrachomyomachy", or "The War of Mice and Frogs", attributed in turn to Homer, the ancient Greek philosopher Pigret and a number of other, less notable poets.

In the Middle Ages, the appearance of hoaxers was “facilitated” by the attitude of the people of that time towards literature: the text was sacred, and God directly transmitted it to man, who, thus, was not the author, but only a “conductor” of the Divine will. Other people's texts could be borrowed, altered and modified quite easily. It is not surprising that almost all the works that were popular at that time - both secular and ecclesiastical in nature - were completed and supplemented by copyists. During the Renaissance, when interest in ancient authors and their texts was especially high, numerous forgeries began to appear along with previously unknown genuine works of ancient authors. They added historians - Xenophon and Plutarch. The lost poems of Catullus, the speeches of Cicero, and the satires of Juvenal were “found.” They “looked for” the writings of the church fathers and scrolls with biblical texts. Such forgeries were often arranged very inventively: manuscripts were made, which were given an “antique” appearance, and then under mysterious circumstances they were “discovered” in old monasteries, castle ruins, excavated crypts and similar places. Many of these forgeries were only exposed several centuries later.

A real explosion of literary hoaxes occurred in the second half of the 18th century. The so-called imaginary translations were especially popular. In 1729, Charles Montesquieu published a “translation from Greek” of the poem “The Temple of Cnidus”; in 1764, the English writer Horace Walpole passed off his novel “The Castle of Otranto” - by the way, the first “Gothic” novel - as a translation of an Italian manuscript. For greater authenticity, Walpole also invented the author - a certain Onofrio Muralto. Daniel Defoe was a true master of passing off his texts as someone else's - out of the five hundred books he wrote, only four were published under his real name, and the rest were attributed to various historical and fictional figures. Defoe himself acted only as a publisher. So, for example, three volumes of “The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe” were written by a “sailor from York”, “The History of the Wars of Charles XII, King of Sweden” - by a certain “Scottish officer in Swedish service”, “Notes of a Cavalier” were given to him as the memoirs of a nobleman , who lived in the 17th century, during the Great Rebellion, and “The Narrative of All the Robberies, Escapes and Other Affairs of John Sheppard” - for the suicide notes of the real-life famous robber John Sheppard, written by him in prison.

But the most famous literary hoax of that time was, of course, “The Songs of Ossian,” created by the talented English poet and literary critic George Macpherson in 1760-1763 on behalf of the Scottish bard Ossian, who supposedly lived in the 3rd century. Ossian's works were a huge success among the public, were translated into many languages ​​and, before their exposure, managed to leave a deep mark in world literature.

Macpherson published Ossian at a time when the Scots and Irish, united by common historical roots and equally inferior position to the English, began to actively revive their culture, language, and historical identity. In this situation, pro-Gaelic critics were ready to defend the authenticity of the poems even in the face of obvious evidence to the contrary, and even after Macpherson's final exposure and admission of falsification, they assigned him a prominent place in the pantheon of figures of the Gaelic Renaissance. The Czech philologist Vaclav Hanka found himself in a similar situation. In 1819, he published the Kralovedvor Manuscript, which he allegedly found in the church of the city of Kralev Dvor. The manuscript was recognized as a monument from the 13th century, proving the antiquity of Czech literature, which actually did not exist at the time. early XIX century. A few years later, Ganka published another manuscript - “Zelenogorsk”, called “The Court of Libushe”, dating back to the 9th century - to those times when the rest of the Slavs did not have not only literature, but even writing. The falsity of the manuscripts was finally proven only in 1886, but even after that the name of Vaclav Hanka enjoys great respect - as a patriot who has done a lot to raise the prestige of Czech literature.

Unfortunately, not all hoaxers survived exposure so successfully. Known tragic fate the brilliant English poet Thomas Chatterton. In addition to those published under his own name satirical works, Chatterton created a number of poems that he attributed to the 15th-century monk Thomas Rowley and some of his contemporaries. Moreover, Chatterton, who from an early age was distinguished by his love for old books, approached his deception with all seriousness: he fabricated manuscripts on genuine parchment of that time, written in Old English in an ancient, difficult-to-read handwriting. Chatterton sent some of his “finds” to the already mentioned Horace Walpole - he, in Chatterton’s opinion, should have responded favorably to the fictitious work of a medieval monk. At first everything was like that, but then Walpole realized it was a fake. In 1770, Chatterton committed suicide - he was not yet eighteen years old. English literary scholars call him one of the most brilliant poets in Great Britain. Unfortunately, having played with someone else's fictional life, Thomas Chatterton lost his...

Among the most famous hoaxers, Prosper Merimee should also be mentioned. First, he published a collection of plays under the name of the fictitious Spanish actress Clara Gazul, then a collection of peculiar prose ballads “Guzla”, attributed to the equally unrealistic Serbian storyteller Iakinfu Maglanovic. Although Merimee was not particularly hiding - in the collection of plays there was even a portrait of Gazul published, which was a portrait of Merimee himself in a woman’s dress: anyone who knew the writer by sight would easily recognize him. However, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin himself succumbed to the hoax, translating 11 songs from “Guzla” for his collection “Songs of the Western Slavs.”

Pushkin, by the way, was no stranger to hoaxes: when publishing the famous “Belkin’s Tales,” the poet himself acted only as a publisher. And in 1837, Pushkin published the article “The Last of the Relatives of Joan of Arc,” where he quoted Voltaire’s letters, written by the poet himself. He also resorted to “imaginary translations” - for censorship reasons, many of his “free-thinking” poems were accompanied by postscripts: “from Latin”, “from Andrei Chenier”, “from French”... Lermontov, Nekrasov, and other authors did the same. There were many outright fakes: fake novels by Walter Scott, Anna Radcliffe and Balzac, plays by Moliere and even Shakespeare. Let us modestly put aside the question of whether Shakespeare himself was not the greatest literary hoax.

In Russia over the last two hundred yearsliterary hoaxesand there were a lot of hoaxes. For example, Kozma Prutkov is a smug graphomaniac, whose literary activity occurred in the 50-60s of the 19th century. Only after some time it became clear that Prutkov was created by the Zhemchuzhnikov brothers and A.K. Tolstoy. The image of Prutkov was so overgrown with flesh and blood that it was published full meeting his works, his portrait was painted, and his relatives began to appear in literature - for example, in 1913, the non-existent publishing house "Green Island" published a collection of the first poems of his "niece" Angelika Safyanova - a literary hoax of the writer L.V. Nikulina.

Another similar case is a beautiful and sad story Cherubins de Gabriac. The image created by Maximilian Voloshin and Elizaveta Dmitrieva (in Vasilyeva’s marriage) struck the imagination of contemporaries with its tragic beauty, and the exposure of the deception led to a duel between Voloshin and Gumilev and Vasilyeva’s almost complete departure from literature. Only many years later she released another poetry collection, “The House Under the Pear Tree” - again under someone else’s name, this time the Chinese poet Li Xiangzi.

The most famous hoax of the twentieth century was the image of the novelist Emile Azhar, brought to life by the famous French writer Romain Gary, laureate of the Prix Goncourt. Tired of his established literary reputation, Gary published Azhar's first novel, Fat Man, in 1974, which immediately won love and recognition. Azhar's very next novel was awarded the Prix Goncourt - thus Romain Gary (or rather, Roman Katsev - the writer's real name) became the only two-time winner in the world of this award, which is never awarded twice. Azhar, however, refused the prize - and as it turned out, Paul Pavlovich, Gary’s nephew, who later ended up in psychiatric clinic. And it soon became known that Pavlovich only played, at his uncle’s request, the role of Azhar, which he wrote about in his book “The Man Who Was Believed.” In 1980, Romain Gary - and at the same time Emile Azhar - committed suicide.

What made all these - and many other - people, undoubtedly talented, often even brilliant, hide their faces behind someone else's mask, giving up the rights to their own works? Apart from the obvious cases where the reason was the thirst for profit or other, much more noble, but also completely understandable reasons (as, for example, in the story of Vaclav Hanka), the motives for such behavior, which often leads to the most tragic consequences, are unclear. For example, many of Chatterton’s acquaintances were perplexed: if he had published his works under his own name, he would have won universal recognition. But Chatterton felt much more confident in the role of “Rowley” than when he was himself. Macpherson did the same - while remaining himself, he wrote much weaker than when he transformed into Ossian. Such a “mask,” which often completely replaces the face, is a necessary element of the hoax. Play, an unconditional condition for any creativity, takes on exaggerated proportions among hoaxers. The creator of a hoax can often create only by dissolving his true self in a mask he has invented, creating not only his own own world, but also the demiurge and the only inhabitant of this world. An invented mask helps the writer move away from the restrictions imposed on him (or by himself) - class, stylistic, historical... He gets the opportunity, by rejecting his own “I,” to gain creative freedom in return - and thus build himself anew. Since the era of modernism, the idea of ​​the game, the split personality, the “hidden” author has dominated literature itself. Authors build themselves, their biography, according to the laws of the texts they write - the text, thus, is much more real than its author. The boundaries between literature and life are shifting: the figure of the author becomes an element artistic structure text, and the result is a unique complex work consisting of the actual text (or texts) and the constructed author.

From this point of view, virtual reality, which has settled on the Internet, provides simply unlimited opportunities for various kinds of hoaxes, placing initially equal conditions existing people and fictional characters. Both of them have only an email address and the ability to generate text. All the dangers that beset their predecessors have now disappeared: there is no need to present manuscripts, appear in person at various events, monitor linguistic features, or track allusions and borrowings in their own and others' works. Anyone who enters the vastness of the World Wide Web with his literary - or claiming to be - creativity becomes real at the moment of its appearance, and it should be taken into account that if he leaves the virtual space, his existence will have to be proven again. Because what was generated by the Internet must live in it.

After all, the famous phrase “The whole world is a stage, and the people in it are actors” applies to any world, regardless of its reality.