Table of contents:
- Hitler's defender and his family
- Anti-Soviet and Anti-Semite rolled into one
- Anxious care of diaries
Video: Unknown Prishvin: As a writer-order-bearer, whose books were read by all Soviet schoolchildren, "stood for Hitler"
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
Most of us know this Mikhail Prishvin as the author of children's stories about animals and village life. Few took a special interest in his life and read his diaries, published in the general collection of his works in 1986. Writers' diaries are rarely read, even by the most ardent admirers of their work. Only a few curious people nevertheless looked into the notes of Prishvin - and saw a completely different Prishvin. We saw a man who, during the Great Patriotic War, was on the side of the Nazis and passionately wanted them to win.
Mikhail Prishvin kept his diaries for almost half a century: from 1905, when he was 32, until his death in 1954. During this time, he filled up 120 thick notebooks, and in the complete collection of his works they occupied 15 volumes. What did he write about in these notebooks? Literally about everything: his notes are rather chaotic, he jumps in them from his reflections on future stories to everyday issues, from conversations with relatives and friends to thoughts about politics, from dreams he dreamed to the destiny of a writer …
Hitler's defender and his family
And after the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, another one was added to these themes. Prishvin's entourage begins to discuss the events taking place in Europe, and among them there are several people who do not see anything bad in Hitler's actions, support him in every possible way and argue fiercely with those who consider him a dangerous criminal. And Mikhail Mikhailovich also turns out to be one of them and does not hide his views either in conversations or in his diary.
“The Germans approached the Seine,” he writes in 1940, when Nazi Germany occupied France. - For some reason, I am pleased, but the Razumnik is unpleasant, and Lyalya also went over to his side. The reason is for the French (it seems to me) because they are now against us, as in that war they stood for the Germans - because they were against us (there is no one worse than us). And Lyalya is against the Germans now because they are victors, and she feels sorry for the French. I, like a bridle one, stood for Hitler."
The pitiful Lyalya is Prishvin's second wife, Valeriy Liorko, who was 26 years younger than him and for the sake of which he left his first, by that time already elderly, spouse in the same 1940. For the sake of brevity, he calls his friend Ivanov-Razumnik, a wise man, who, after the Germans attacked the USSR, immediately went over to their side and began to fight against the Russians.
Anti-Soviet and Anti-Semite rolled into one
What could make an almost 70-year-old successful writer, receiving very decent money at that time, for his works published and constantly reading letters from grateful readers, happy in his personal life, "how bridle stand for Hitler"? You can also learn about this from his diaries. Mixed with arguments about love and about his writing mission, Prishvin from time to time mentions how terrible the Soviet regime is, how he hates communists and how he hates Jews even more, about whom he repeats the most dense stereotypes. The fascists, as he passionately hoped, would destroy all the people he hated and would make Russia their colony, in which they would establish their strict German order.
"I stand for the victory of Germany, because Germany is a people and a state in its purest form …" - Mikhail Prishvin writes in the spring of 1941, already quite shortly before June 22. Has anything changed in his beliefs after the start of the Great Patriotic War? Not at all. The writer with his wife and her mother left Moscow for the village of Usoltsevo, rented a dacha there and continued to write about how he would like the Germans to conquer the USSR. He only regretted that now they would not be able to quietly and peacefully make a colony out of his native country.
Prishvin continued to wish the Nazis victory and worry about their defeats until the end of the war. "After the announcement of the defeat of Germany in the Crimea, the question arose in all its might: why are the Germans dying, what is the meaning of their heroism?" - he wrote on February 15, 1945. There were less than three months left before the Victory, and this man will continue to consider the fascists heroes. By the way, two years earlier, on the day of his 70th birthday, his native country, which he hated, awarded him the Order of the Red Banner of Labor for his literary merits.
Anxious care of diaries
Mikhail Prishvin considered his diaries to be very important historical documents. During the war, he and his wife hid the already written notebooks in the forest, wrapping them in rubber bags and burying them in the ground. Later they dug them out, and after the death of the writer Valeri Liorco put all the surviving records in galvanized boxes and sealed them, after which she buried them again for several years. And only during the "thaw" Valeria decided to get her husband's diaries and began to decipher his notes and prepare them for publication.
Liorco did this for the rest of her life, almost a quarter of a century. But her husband's records were published after her death. In 1982, the publication of the complete works of Prishvin began, and it was decided to include all of his recordings in them. Then it was discovered that the writer, whose works were studied at school, admired the "heroism" of the Nazis. Nevertheless, the writer's diaries were still published, and the appearance of these books passed almost unnoticed. Writers' diaries are rarely read …
About novel by Mikhail Prishvin and Valeria Liorko we can say - the expectation of love for a lifetime. But that's a completely different story.
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