"Arab, but not hazel grouse!": 8 little-known facts from the biography of Alexander Pushkin, which are not told at school

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin wrote a huge number of works, which they get to know in childhood. In the biography of this great classic, which is studied in educational institutions, far from all the facts of his biography are revealed. But some of them are quite interesting.

1. "Arabchik, but not hazel grouse!"

The surrounding people began to understand that Alexander Sergeyevich was growing as an extraordinary personality even when the future great writer was small. Ivan Dmitriev, a writer, once visited his parents' house. When he saw little Pushkin, he was surprised by his appearance and said: "What an Arabian!" The boy, who was only 10 years old, was not taken aback and said: "Yes, but not a hazel grouse!" With similar words, he noted the peculiarity of Dmitriev's appearance, whose face was pockmarked. The adults who were present during such an unusual conversation in the room were confused and embarrassed.

2. To the lyceum by acquaintance

It was not easy to enter the lyceum in those days, since only 30 people were accepted into it. Alexander Sergeevich could not enter independently and nevertheless studied here, since he was enrolled, as they say from an acquaintance, thanks to the fact that his uncle Vasily Lvovich Pushkin was familiar with Speransky, the founder of the educational institution.

3.20 challenges to a duel

Pushkin's character was quite hot-tempered, as evidenced by his frequent participation in duels, through which it was decided at that time to resolve disputes. His first duel took place while studying at the Lyceum. Since then, he was repeatedly challenged to a duel, since it was not difficult for Alexander Sergeevich to call another person a scoundrel, even in an insignificant controversial situation. In total, there were more than 20 challenges to a duel, but the writer's friends managed to cancel most of the fights.

4. Drowning Kuchelbecker

While studying at the Lyceum, Pushkin already wrote poetry, which was published in the magazine "Lyceum Sage" about his friend Kuchelbecker, he once wrote that it is good to fall asleep under his poetry. He was offended and even wanted to drown himself in the pond, which he was not allowed to do. Alexander Sergeevich also decide to laugh at this situation by drawing a caricature with a drowning Kuchelbecker and his big nose sticking out of the water.

5. Card debts

Few people know that Alexander Pushkin was a gambling man. For himself, he chose a game of cards and called it a salvation from the blues. Often, excitement led to debts, which later had to be paid off, and for this it was necessary to work more actively. It turns out that excitement and debt contributed to the disclosure of creativity. If in the near future it was not possible to pay off the debt, Alexander wrote evil epigrams to his creditors and drew cartoons. The accidental discovery of such a cartoon once led to a major scandal.

6.10 cm

Contemporaries said that Pushkin was not tall and did not have a beautiful appearance, but despite this, many representatives of the weaker sex were interested in him, for whom the poet himself had a weakness. He married the beautiful Natalia Goncharova, who was 10 centimeters taller than her husband. So that such a big difference was not very noticeable, during official receptions and balls, Alexander Sergeevich tried to stay away from his wife.

7. Stolen Idea

It is believed that during his exile in Chisinau, Pushkin heard about the existence of a place where none of the people die. The reason for this was that the inhabitants of this place changed their names, and therefore, even after death, officially people with their real names were not recorded in the dead. Based on this story, he came up with his own plot, which he decided to share with Gogol. The same Russian classic after a while wrote the work "Dead Souls".

8. Borrowed plot

One of the most famous works of Pushkin is "The Tale of the Fisherman and the Roar". Few people know about the existence of such a tale, only with the name "The Fisherman and His Wife" from the Brothers Grimm. But the Russian writer leaves the old woman with nothing much earlier, while the German storytellers first allowed her to be even the Pope and deprived her of everything only after she wished to become God.