In Nizhyn gymnasium
According to the memoirs of his fellow students, Gogol appears to us as a handsome blond boy, in the dense greenery of the garden of the Nizhyn gymnasium, by the waters of a river overgrown with reeds, over which seagulls soar, arousing in him dreams of his homeland. He is the favorite of his comrades, who were attracted to him by his inexhaustible playfulness, but among them there are only a few, and the best in morals and abilities, he chooses as comrades his childish undertakings, walks and favorite conversations, and these few used only to some extent his trust. He hid many things from them, apparently without any reason, or clothed them with a mysterious veil of jokes. His speech was distinguished by words of little use, ancient and mocking; but in his mouth everything took on such original forms that it was impossible not to admire. He processed everything in the crucible of humor. His word was so apt that his comrades were afraid to enter into a sarcastic contest with him. Gogol loved his comrades in general, and to such an extent the companions of his first years were closely connected with that time, about which he later exclaimed from the depths of his soul: “Oh, my youth! Oh, my freshness! ”That even his school enemies, if only he had them, were dear to him until the end of his life. He does not speak of any of them with coldness or hostility, and the fate of each interested him in the highest degree.
He treated his comrades sarcastically, liked to laugh and gave nicknames. He himself seemed like an ordinary boy for a long time.<…>But before the end of the course, Professor Belousov noticed and began to distinguish him, whom he, in turn, respected and loved very much.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
Gogol's former mentors rated him as a modest and "good-natured" boy; but this refers only to the nobility of his nature, which was averse to everything base and insidious. He, indeed, did no harm to anyone, did not bristle against anyone with the cruel side of his soul; he did not have any bad habits. But in no way should one imagine him, as they say, "a quiet sheep." Little, evil childish pranks were in his spirit, and what he tells in Dead Souls about the hussar is written off by him from nature.
Alexander Semenovich Danilevsky:
In Nizhyn, his comrades loved him, but they called him: the mysterious dwarf.
Gogol constantly looked askance at us, kept aloof, and always looked at us with a bang. Our mockery of Gogol was further aggravated because he behaved like some kind of democrat among us children of aristocrats, rarely washing his face and hands in the mornings of every day, always walking around in dirty linen and a soiled dress. In the pockets of his trousers he constantly had a significant supply of all sorts of sweets - sweets and gingerbread. And all this from time to time, getting out of there, he chewed without ceasing, even in classes, during classes. To do this, he usually hid somewhere in a corner, away from everyone, and there he already ate his delicacy. In order to take a seat in the class where no one would see him, he came to the audience first or last and, sitting in the back rows, also left the class so as not to be ridiculed.
Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol.From a letter from M.P. Balabina on November 7, 1838, from Rome:
When I was at school, and as a young man, I was very proud; I was dying to know what others were saying and thinking about me. It seemed to me that everything that was said to me was not what they thought of me. I purposely tried to start a quarrel with my comrade, and he, naturally, in his heart told me everything that was bad in me. This was all I needed; I was completely satisfied when I learned everything about myself.
Alexander Semenovich Danilevsky:
In everyday household life, the pupils amused themselves with pranks invented by Gogol and other frisky boys. So, for example, once Gogol, mimicking the physics teacher Shapalinsky, caught his eye, for which the latter, very angry, grabbed him and shook him by the shoulders for a long time. Sevryugin, the singing teacher, noticing that Gogol was sometimes out of tune and was not able to sing in time with his comrades, put a violin to his ear, calling him a capercaillie, which, of course, aroused general merriment.<…>
Gogol had no favorite games.
Vasily Ignatievich Lyubich-Romanovich:
Among the oddities of Gogol were many of his peculiar views on everything that society recognized as law for itself. Gogol ignored this, called it an unworthy deed, from which one had to run away and rid oneself, as an enemy, with the sword of thought. In the church, for example, Gogol was never baptized before the images of St. of our fathers and did not bow before the altar, but listened to the prayers with attention, sometimes even repeated them in a singsong voice, as if serving a separate liturgy to himself. He condemned the deacons for the nasality of their singing, the indistinctness of reading the psalter, and for the patter of the Lenten service. He also did not approve of degrees and gradations in the church and pushed the peasant forward, saying: “You need God more than others, come closer to him!” Often he turned to a peasant in church with the question: “Do you have money for a candle?” - he immediately took out a coin from his pocket and gave it to the peasant, saying: “Here, go, put a candle to whom you want, but put it yourself; it's better than someone else will put it for you." Gogol was triumphant that his goal had been achieved, and the peasant approached the altar, ahead of all the uniforms standing in front of the pulpit. All he needed was for the muzhik to rub his coat against his shiny uniforms and soil them with his pollen.
One day, Gogol, dissatisfied with the singing of the deacons, went to the kliros and began to sing along with mass, clearly pronouncing the words of prayers, but the priest, who heard a voice unfamiliar to him, looked out of the altar and, seeing Gogol, ordered him to leave. This terribly offended Gogol, and he stopped going to church. Noticing his absence at mass, the priest read him a lecture and said that if he continued not to attend the temple of God, he would impose penance on him. But Gogol was not afraid of this and, as before, did not go to mass. He also did not want to perform the penance in the church in the presence of all those praying and constantly responded to the sick. For this, he was given a one in “behavior”, and he laughed at her in the following words: “It’s good that it’s not a deuce; a unit can at least be mistaken for an ace, but a deuce will remain a deuce.
In general, Gogol was distinguished by all sorts of oddities, even in words. In fact, he sometimes outdid himself. Often forgetting that he was a man, Gogol would sometimes cry like a goat as he walked around his room, then crow like a rooster in the middle of the night, then grunt like a pig, climbing into some dark corner. And when asked why he imitates the cries of animals, he replied that "I prefer to be alone in the society of pigs than among people." He had such a denial of the exchange of thoughts between people. So, he did not like us children of aristocrats, being himself a democrat.<… >
The torture at the school for Gogol dragged on for the entire time he remained in Nizhyn. Thanks to his slovenliness, we all disdained to shake hands with him when we met in the classrooms. Yes, and he himself, noticing this, did not seek a good greeting from us, always trying not to notice any of us. He was always alone. In the end, we even stopped picking up those books in the library that he held in his hands, fearing to catch some evil spirits.<…>
Thus, Gogol's life at school was, in essence, hell for him. On the one hand, he was burdened by his "farm origin" of a single palace, on the other hand, by his physical ugliness. And we laughed at everything, and denied in him any talent and desire for education, for the sciences. Gogol understood this attitude of ours towards him as a sign of the metropolitan arrogance of the children of aristocrats, and therefore did not want to know us himself. He sought rapprochement only with people equal to himself, for example: with his "uncle", servants in general, and with bazaar traders in the Nizhyn market in particular. This rapprochement with simple people obviously gave him a kind of pleasure in life and evoked a poetic mood. So, at least, we noticed it by the fact that, after each such new acquaintance, he would lock himself in his room for a long time and put down his impressions on paper.
If you would send money to me, because my treasury is all exhausted. One of my friends bought a knife for eight rubles; I asked him to let me see; and I forgot to give it to him now, but put it in my box; but a minute later he looked into the box, and he was no longer there. Now he says that I should give him eight rubles now, otherwise he will take all my things and complain to the tutors, and they will punish me with all severity. Forgive me this. I will never take other people's things in advance, and when I ask in advance, I will now give them away and with all caution. And I beg you, please send me money, at least ten rubles; then I will give him eight rubles, and leave two rubles for letters. I also ask you to send me a sheepskin coat, because they don’t give you a sheepskin coat or an overcoat, but only in uniforms, despite the cold. And if only you could send at least two vests. Here we are given one vest each.
N. Yu. Artynov
At the gymnasium, Gogol was remarkable only because he had an overly pointed beard, and, perhaps, because he used to go to Magerki all the time. Magerki is a suburb of Nizhyn. Gogol had many acquaintances among the peasants there. When one of them had a wedding or something else, or when it was just a weathered holiday, Gogol was certainly there. Gogol's studies were not remarkable at all. From the professor of Russian literature, Nikolsky, he constantly received a triple. In his writings, there were an abyss of grammatical errors in literature. Gogol was especially bad at languages. At that time, the language classes in our country comprised three special departments independent of other classes, which students of all courses completed as they progressed. Gogol graduated from the gymnasium, but did not reach the third department in languages. In general, Gogol was the most ordinary mediocrity, and it never occurred to any of us that he could later become famous in the field of Russian literature.
Nestor Vasilyevich Kukolnik(1809–1868), writer, Gogol's gymnasium friend:
At Yves. Semyonovich Orlai (director of the gymnasium) had a tiny estate in the Poltava province, in the Mirgorod district, with only six souls. This estate was located next to the village of Gogol-Yanovsky's mother. By the way, I note that in the gymnasium Gogol, both among his comrades and according to official lists, was not called Gogol, but simply Yanovsky. Once, already in St. Petersburg, one of my comrades asked Gogol in my presence: “Why did you change your last name?” "I didn't think so." “But you are Yanovsky.” “And Gogol, too.” - "Yes, what does gogol mean?" “Drake,” Gogol replied dryly and turned the conversation to another matter. I remembered both Gogol and the tiny estate of Ivan Semyonovich for an amusing circumstance. Ivan Semenovich did not complain if the students left the classrooms during lectures and walked along the corridors, and Gogol loved these walks, and therefore it is not surprising that he often ran into the director, but he always got out of trouble dry and always with the same trick. Seeing Ivan Semyonovich from a distance, Gogol did not hide, walked straight towards him, bowed and reported: “Your Excellency! I just received a letter from my mother. She instructed me to give your Excellency the most zealous bow and report that everything is going very well on your estate. – “Thank you from the bottom of my heart! If you write to your mother, do not forget to bow from me and thank you.” Such was Ivan Semyonovich's usual answer, and Gogol continued his walk along the corridors with impunity.
Grigory Petrovich Danilevsky:
A passionate admirer of everything lofty and elegant, on the school bench he carefully copied for himself on the best paper, with drawings of his own invention, the poems that were published at that time: “Gypsies”, “Poltava”, “Brothers Robbers” and chapters of “Eugene Onegin ".
Maria Ivanovna Gogol:
When released A new book, promising by name, then Nikosha is ready to order her from foreign lands - which he did, being in Nizhyn, from the money he asked for from me for a dress: after he admitted to me that when he reads about a new book, he trembles, as if write out as soon as possible - and for this he received a reprimand from me. I call this hunting passion; although it is not shameful, like a card, it can also ruin ... The man who was with him in Nizhyn (the kind of uncle) told me in secret that his master does not know how to save money and offends himself, saying that when I give he has money on holidays for sweets, which he is a big fan of, then when he has not yet had time to buy and the poor man meets him, he tries so hard to elude me and give him his money, thinking that I have not seen, but I always so I watch him, and when other children eat delicacies, I ask him: why doesn’t he eat? - then he answers me that he has already eaten; but he deceives me, the old man, and concludes; don't give him money, they'll disappear for nothing.
Alexander Semenovich Danilevsky:
At school, Gogol did not stand out much, except towards the end, when he was our editor of the lyceum magazine. At first he wrote poetry and thought that poetry was his vocation. We subscribed with him and with Prokopovich for magazines and almanacs. He always took care of the timely deportation of money. The three of us gathered and read Pushkin's Onegin, which then came out chapter by chapter. Gogol already then admired Pushkin. It was then still smuggling; for our professor of literature, Nikolsky, even Derzhavin was a new person. Gogol perfectly copied Nikolsky.
Konstantin Mikhailovich Bazili(1809-1884), Gogol's comrade at the gymnasium, in 1844-1853. - Consul General of the Russian Embassy in Syria and Palestine:
The professor of literature, Nikolsky, had no idea about the ancient and Western literatures. In Russian literature, he admired Kheraskov and Sumarokov; Ozerov, Batyushkov and Zhukovsky found not quite classical, and the language and thoughts of Pushkin trivial, aware, however, of some harmony in his poems. Naughty comrades in the fifth and sixth grades, who were obliged to pay tribute to poems on a weekly basis, used to copy small poems by Pushkin, Yazykov, Vol. Vyazemsky and were introduced to the professor for their friends, knowing full well that he was not at all interested in modern literature. The professor solemnly subjected these poems to strict criticism, expressed regret that the verse was smooth, but of little use: “Ode is not an ode,” he said, “an elegy is not an elegy, but the devil knows what”; then began to correct. I remember that Pushkin's "Demon" was redirected and altered in the manner of our professor, to the indescribable amusement of the whole class. Nikolsky's contempt for new literature and the resulting ignorance in this area extended to Nikolsky to the point that one day he got into a very funny trouble, signing, after many blots, on the file given to him by Grebenko, later a well-known writer, instead of his own - Kozlov's poem "Evening Ringing" : "Fairly." On another occasion, similarly deceived, he approved of the description of spring in Eugene Onegin, unaware that the poem had been written by Pushkin, who he deeply despised.
Vasily Ignatievich Lyubich-Romanovich:
Prof. N. P. Nikolsky forced his students to compose: this was his weakness, and not only to compose something in prose, but even in verse. At one lesson, Gogol gives him a poem by Pushkin - it seems, "The Prophet". Nikolsky read it, grimaced, and, out of his habit, began to redo it. When Pushkin's verse was completely mutilated by the professor and returned to the imaginary author with the suggestion that it was a shame to write so badly, Gogol could not stand it and said: "But these are not my poems." - "And whose?" - "Pushkin. I slipped them on you on purpose, because there’s no way to please you, and you even remade it.” “Well, what do you understand! exclaimed the professor. - Can't Pushkin write illiterately? Here is clear proof for you. See who did it better."
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
A fellow student and friend of Gogol's childhood and early youth, N. Ya. Prokopovich, retained the memory of how Gogol, while still in one of the first grades of the gymnasium, recited to him his poetic ballad "Two Fishes". In it, under two fish, he depicted the fate of himself and his (deceased) brother - very touchingly, as long as Prokopovich recalls his impression of that time.
Finally, a legend has been preserved about another student work by Gogol, about the tragedy The Robbers, written in iambic pentameters.
Gerasim Ivanovich Vysotsky, Gogol's comrade at the gymnasium:
The desire to write poetry was expressed for the first time by Gogol on the occasion of his attacks on Comrade Borozdin, whom he persecuted with ridicule for having a low haircut and nicknamed Rastrigoya Spiridon. On the evening of Borozdin's name day, December 12, Gogol exhibited in the gymnasium a banner of his own work with the image of a devil cutting a dervish, and with the following acrostic:
This way of life is wicked,
The scarecrow of the dervishes of all.
Monk of the Shrew Monastery,
The rasstriga who committed the sin.
And for this crime
He got this title.
Oh dude! Have patience
Imprint the initial words in your mouth.
Following that, Gogol wrote a satire on the inhabitants of the city of Nizhyn under the title: “Something about Nizhyn, or the law is not written for fools” and depicted in it typical faces of different classes. To do this, he took several solemn occasions, in which one or another estate most showed its characteristic features, and on these occasions divided his work into the following sections: “1) The consecration of the church in the Greek cemetery; 2) Election to the Greek magistrate; 3) omnivorous fair; 4) Dinner at the leader (nobility) P ***; 5) Dissolution and congress of students. I had an autographed copy of this rather extensive work; but Gogol, while still at the gymnasium, ordered it from me from Petersburg under the pretext that he had lost the original, and did not return it.
My first experiments, the first exercises in compositions, for which I had become accustomed during my last time at school, were almost all of a lyrical and serious kind. Neither myself nor my companions, who also practiced writing with me, thought that I would have to be a comic and satirical writer, although, despite my naturally melancholy character, I was often tempted to joke and even annoy others with my jokes. , although in my earliest judgments about people they found the ability to notice those features that escape the attention of other people, both large and small and funny. They said that I was able not only to mimic, but to guess a person, that is, to guess what he should say in such and such cases, with the retention of the very warehouse and way of his thoughts and speeches. But all this was not transferred to paper, and I did not even think at all about what I would make use of this with time.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
Not limited to the first successes in poetry, Gogol wanted to be a journalist, and this title cost him a lot of work. I had to write the articles myself in almost all departments, then rewrite them and, most importantly, make a wrapper like a printed one. Gogol worked with all his might to give his publication the appearance of a printed book, and spent the nights painting the front page, which flaunted the name of the magazine: "Star". All this was done furtively from the comrades, who should not have known the contents of the book before, as after its release from the editorial office. Finally, on the first day of the month, the book was published. The publisher sometimes took the trouble to read aloud his own and other people's articles. Everyone listened and admired. By the way, Gogol's story "The Tverdislavichi Brothers" (an imitation of the stories that appeared in the then almanacs) and various of his poems were placed in the "Star". All this was written in the so-called "high style", because of which all the editor's employees fought. Gogol was a comedian during his apprenticeship only in practice: in literature he considered the comic element too low. But his journal has a comic origin. There was one pupil in the gymnasium with an extraordinary passion for poetry and lack of any talent—in a word, little Tredyakovsky. Gogol collected his poems, gave them the name "Almanac" and published under the title: "Parnassian Dung". From this joke, he moved on to serious imitation magazines and worked very hard on the wrappers for half a year or more.
Vasily Ignatievich Lyubich-Romanovich:
Our comrade P. G. Redkin had a room with prof. Belousov. On Saturday evenings, some of his friends would gather at his place to write poems. Regular visitors were Gogol, Kukolnik, Konstantin Bazili, Prokopovich, Grebenka, myself and others. There was a reading of our works, a critical analysis of them and a decision whether they are suitable for placement in the handwritten journal “Dung of Parnassus” published by us or, for the good of the author, should be solemnly destroyed. Some of Gogol's poems, in a friendly alteration by Prokopovich, were placed in this journal, which Gogol always enjoyed immensely. Gogol's first prose piece was written at the gymnasium and read publicly at the Redkin evening. It was called "Brothers Tverdoslavichi, a Slavic story." Our circle smashed it mercilessly and decided to destroy it at once. Gogol did not resist and did not object. Quite calmly, he tore his manuscript into small pieces and threw it into the smoldering stove. “Practice in verse,” Basili advised him then in a friendly way, “but don’t write in prose: it’s very stupid with you. A novelist will not dance out of you, it can be seen now. But without the friendly support of Prokopovich, Gogol's poems would have been worthless, since he could never cope with the size, with harmony, and chasing rhymes, he always disfigured the meaning of his creations so much that even the always restrained Prokopovich was horrified.
In 1825, 26, 27, our literary circle began to publish its own journals and almanacs, handwritten, of course. Together with Gogol, my best friend, although the matter was not without quarrels and fights, because both were passionate, we published a monthly magazine of fifty and sixty pages in a yellow cover with vignettes of our product, with all the pretensions of a practical literary review. It had departments of fiction, analyzes of modern the best works Russian literature, there was also local criticism, in which Gogol mainly ridiculed our teachers under assumed names. Nestor Kukolnik also published his own journal, in which he published the first experiments of his dramatic works. On Sundays, our circle gathered, people 15-20 older, and our works were read, and there were rumors and disputes.
Vasily Ignatievich Lyubich-Romanovich:
Maybe Gogol worked on something else at school on a par with us, but he put an end to his colloquial speech. And he used to say such a word that the whole class would laugh out loud at him. Once one of our teachers pointed this out to him, but Gogol answered him: “How can you prove that I am speaking incorrectly in my own way?”
Alexander Semenovich Danilevsky:
Life in the boarding house was free: the children enjoyed a good room, great freedom, and could even arrange pleasures together, of which, of course, the theater was in the foreground. In spring and autumn, they had at their disposal a vast lyceum garden, in which they spent most of their extracurricular time. With the then limited requirements of the students, they had many leisure hours, and the very preparation for classes often took place in the garden, under the charming sky of Ukraine. Some of the students even managed, taking with them the necessary written material, in the form of pencils and paper, to think over and partly sketch out their compositions somewhere in the garden on a tree.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
Returning one day after the holidays to the gymnasium, Gogol brought a comedy in the Little Russian language, which was played at Troshchinsky's home theater, and became a director of the theater and an actor. Blackboards served as backstage, and the lack of costumes complemented the imagination of the artists and the public. From that time on, the theater became the passion of Gogol and his comrades, so that, after preliminary experiments, the students took shape and arranged for themselves backstage and costumes, copying, of course, at the direction of Gogol, the theater in which his father labored: no one had seen another. Gogol not only conducted the carpenters, but painted the scenery himself.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
The students donated whatever they could to the theatrical wardrobe. By the way, a pair of rusty and broken pistols was donated by someone, wonderful for the next occasion.
Send me canvases and other aids for the theatre. Our first play will be Oedipus in Athens, Ozerov's tragedy.<…>So, if you can send and make as many costumes as possible, even if only one, it would be better if there were more; also some money. Do me only a favor, do not refuse me this request. Each of us has already donated what he could, and I still only. How I will play my part, I will let you know.
I inform you that I study well, at least as much as my strength allows.<…>I think, dear papa, if they saw me, they would definitely say that I have changed, both in morality and success.
Konstantin Mikhailovich Bazili:
Theatrical performances were given at the holidays. Gogol, Romanovich, and I drew the scenery ourselves. One of the recreational halls (we called them museums) provided all the conveniences for setting up a theatre. The spectators were, in addition to our mentors, neighboring landowners and the military of the division located in Nizhyn. Among them I remember the generals: Dibich (field marshal's brother), Stolypin, Emmanuel. Everyone was delighted with our performances, which animated the dead county town and delivered some entertainment to its casual society. We played Ozerov's tragedies "Oedipus" and "Fingal", vaudeville, some Little Russian play, composed at the same time by Gogol, from which the audience burst into laughter. But von Vizin's comedy The Undergrowth was the most successful. I saw this play both in Moscow and in St. Petersburg, but I always retained the conviction that not a single actress succeeded in the role of Prostakova as well as the then sixteen-year-old Gogol played this role. No less successful then fifteen-year-old Nestor Kukolnik, thin and long, played the Undergrowth, and Danilevsky played Sophia. Thanks to my extraordinary memory at that time, I got the longest roles - Staroduma, Oedipus and others.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
Once, just before the performance of The Undergrowth, Gogol somehow offended one of his comrades, Basili, with his joke. He flared up and refused to play; and he played the role of Starodum. Well, how without Starodum to start the presentation? Gogol pretended to lose his temper; in terrible revenge, he challenged his comrade to a duel and gave him theatrical pistols without triggers. Basili laughed and began to play. The authorities of the gymnasium took advantage of this passion to encourage pupils to study the French language, and introduced French plays into the repertoire of the Gogol Theater. It was then that Gogol had to get acquainted with the French language. Russian plays, however, were not published, and tradition says that Gogol was especially distinguished in the role of old women. The theater, founded by Gogol in the gymnasium, finally flourished to the point that city residents also came to his performances.
Nestor Vasilievich Puppeteer:
It was our duty to perform every time we had performances, without fail and first of all, to play a French or German play. Gogol was also to participate in one of the foreign plays. He chose German. I offered him a role in twenty verses, which began with the words: "O mein Vater!", Then there was an account of some incident. The whole story ended with the words: “nach Prag!” Gogol was tormented, studied the role diligently, overcame it, learned it, knew it at three rehearsals, during the very performance he came out cheerfully, said: “Oh mein Vater!” - stammered, blushed, but immediately gathered his strength, raised his voice, with special pathos said: “nach Prag!” - He waved his hand and left. And the listeners, who for the most part did not know either the play or the German language, were completely satisfied with the performance of the role. But in Russian plays, Gogol was truly inimitable, especially in Fonvizin's comedy "Undergrowth", in the role of Mrs. Prostakova; I played Mitrofanushka. Of the Russian plays, I also remember the performance of "Eccentrics", a comedy by Knyazhnin, "The Troublemaker" by Pisarev (the main role is Gogol); from French - "Medecin malgre lui" and "Avare" by Molière. We were going to play Fingal; the roles were handed out; even rehearsals in parts began. The role of Starn was assigned to Gogol, Fingal to me, Moina to Gintovt, but now I don’t remember what upset this performance and our entire home theater.
Timofei Grigorievich Pashchenko:
On the small stage of the second lyceum museum, lyceum students sometimes liked to play comic and dramatic plays on holidays. Gogol and Prokopovich - intimate friends - took special care of this and staged performances. They played plays and ready-made ones, and the lyceum students themselves composed them. Gogol and Prokopovich were the main authors and performers of plays. Gogol loved mainly comic plays and took the role of old people, and Prokopovich - tragic ones. Once they composed a play from Little Russian life, in which Gogol undertook to play the silent role of a decrepit old Little Russian. Learned the roles and did a few rehearsals. The evening of the performance came, which was attended by many relatives of lyceum students and outsiders. The play consisted of two acts; the first act went well, but Gogol did not appear in it, but had to appear in the second. The public did not yet know Gogol, but we knew it well and looked forward to his appearance on the stage. In the second act, a simple Little Russian hut and several bare trees are presented on the stage; in the distance there is a river and yellowed reeds. There is a bench near the hut; there is no one on stage.
Here is a decrepit old man in a simple jacket, in a sheepskin hat and oily boots. Leaning on a stick, he barely moves, groaningly reaches the bench and sits down. Sitting shaking, groaning, giggling and coughing; finally, he giggled and coughed with such a choking and hoarse old man's cough, with an unexpected addition that the whole audience roared and burst into uncontrollable laughter ... And the old man calmly got up from the bench and trudged off the stage, killing everyone with laughter ...
From that evening on, the public recognized and became interested in Gogol as a wonderful comedian. Another time, Gogol undertook to play the role of an old uncle - a terrible miser. In this role, Gogol practiced for more than a month, and the main task for him was to make his nose converge with his chin ... He sat for hours in front of the mirror and pressed his nose to his chin, until he finally reached the desired one ... He played the satirical role of uncle miser perfectly , stained the audience with laughter and gave her great pleasure. We all thought then that Gogol would enter the stage, because he had an enormous stage talent and all the data for acting on stage: facial expressions, make-up, a variable voice and a complete rebirth in the roles that he played. It seems that Gogol would have eclipsed the famous comic artists if he had entered the stage.
Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol.From a letter to G. I. Vysotsky on March 19, 1827, from Nizhyn:
We have fun at the boarding house now. All sorts of pleasures, amusements, occupations have been brought to us, and for this we are indebted to our inspector. I don't know if this rare person can be adequately praised. He treats all of us exactly as with his friends, intercedes for us against the claims of our conference and professors and students. And I confess, if it were not for him, I would not have had the patience to complete my course here - now, at least, I can firmly endure this cruel torture, these fourteen months. We had a great buttermilk. We had a theater for four days in a row; everyone played great. All the former visitors, experienced people, said that it was not possible to see such a wonderful performance at any provincial theater. The scenery (four changes) was done masterfully and even magnificently. The beautiful landscape on the curtain completed the charm. The lighting in the hall was brilliant. The music also excelled; there were ten of us, but they nicely replaced a large orchestra and were arranged on the weekend itself, in a loud place. Four overtures by Rossini, two by Mozart, one by Weber, one by Sevryugin (a lyceum teacher of singing. - Comp.) and others were performed. The plays presented by us were as follows: "Undergrowth", op. Fonvizin, "The Unsuccessful Conciliator", a comedy by Y. Knyazhnin, "Coastal Law" by Kotzebue and, in addition, another French one, Op. Florian, and have not yet had enough: we are preparing a few more plays for the Bright Holiday. These lessons, however, entertained me a lot, and I almost forgot everything that was sad. But for how long? Fasting came, and with it a deadly melancholy. There was absolutely no news, nothing interesting happened at all.
Panteleimon Aleksandrovich Kulish:
We also know Gogol in the role of the keeper of books that were subscribed to them for a common pool. The pool of funds was small, but it was not difficult to buy all the magazines and books of that time, with little money, no matter how much they came out. The most important role was played by the "Northern Flowers", published by Baron Delvig; then followed separately published works by Pushkin and Zhukovsky, then some magazines. Books were given out by the librarian for reading in turn. In the presence of the librarian, the one who received the book for reading had to sit down decorously on a bench in the classroom, in the place indicated to him, and not get up from his seat until he returned the books. This is not enough: the librarian personally wrapped the thumb and forefinger of each reader in pieces of paper and then only entrusted him with a book. Gogol cherished books like a jewel, and was especially fond of miniature editions. Passion for them developed in him to such an extent that, not loving and not knowing mathematics, he subscribed to Perevoshchikov's Mathematical Encyclopedia with his own money, only for the fact that it was published in the sixteenth part of a sheet.
N. Yu. Artynov:
Gogol loved reading books and especially loved the books themselves. I cannot recall without laughter one oddity of Gogol's librarianship. We had our own student library, we subscribed to Pushkin's works, The Moscow Telegraph, and so on. So we elected Gogol as a librarian: he was a boarder, lived in a building, it was more convenient for him, no one else agreed, but he expressed complete readiness; so they agreed that he looked after the books. He was very fond of the purity of books, and to preserve it he devised such an intricate means. He will make an abyss of paper rolls, in the form of thimbles, and invites students to put these tips on their fingers so that when reading and flipping through books, they do not salt them with their fingers. The students, of course, did not follow this advice, they laughed, and nothing more. Such was this Gogol.
Course completion certificate
Nikolai Gogol-Yanovsky, collegiate assessor Vasily Afanasyevich's son, who entered the gymnasium of higher sciences on May 1, 1821, Prince. Bezborodko, completed the full course of study there in June 1828, with very good behavior, with the following successes in the sciences:
in the law of God very good,
in moral philosophy very good,
in logic with very good,
in Russian literature very good,
in rights:
Roman with very good,
in Russian civilian very good,
in criminal very good,
in the state economy very good,
in pure mathematics financial,
in physics and the principles of chemistry with good,
in natural history with excellent,
in technology, in military sciences with very good,
in universal and Russian geography good,
in the history of the world with very good,
in languages:
Latin with good,
in German from excellent,
in french with very good,
in Greek ( no mark), –
and on the final test by the conference of the gymnasium, he was awarded the title of student and approved by the Minister with the right to the rank of the 14th grade, upon entering the civil service, with his release from the test for promotion to higher ranks, and upon entry into military service six months later, in the lower ranks, for the rank of officer, at least in the regiment in which he would be accepted, at that time there was no vacancy. In witness of what was given to him, Gogol-Yanovsky, this certificate from the conference of the gymnasium of higher sciences, Prince. Bezborodko, with the proper signature and with the application of the official seal. Nizhyn. 1829 January 25th day.
Except for inexperienced teachers of sciences, except for great negligence, etc., languages are not taught here at all<…>. If I know anything, then I owe it entirely to myself<…>. I had no other guides besides myself; Is it possible to improve yourself without the help of others? But there is still a lot of time ahead of me, I have the strength and diligence. My labors, although I have now doubled them, are not burdensome to me in the least; on the contrary, they serve me no other than entertainment<…>. I have experienced more grief and need than you think. Whenever I was at home, I purposely tried to show absent-mindedness, willfulness, etc., so that you would think that I had not wiped myself enough, that I had not been pressed down by evil. But hardly anyone has endured so many ingratitudes, stupid injustices, ridiculous pretensions, cold contempt, and so on. I endured everything without reproaches, without grumbling, no one heard my complaints, I even always praised those responsible for my grief. True, I am considered a riddle for everyone, no one has completely figured me out. You revere me as a wayward, some kind of insufferable pedant, who thinks that he is smarter than everyone else, that he was created in a different way from people. Would you believe that I inwardly laughed at myself along with you. Here I am called the humble, the ideal of meekness and patience. In one place I am the most quiet, modest, courteous, in another - gloomy, thoughtful, uncouth, etc., in the third - talkative and annoying to the extreme. Some are smart, others are stupid... Only from my real career will you know my real character...
From the book Ilya Nikolaevich Ulyanov author Trofimov Zhores AlexandrovichWhat should a gymnasium be like? Ilya Nikolaevich drove to the place of his new service with an almost festive mood. The summer of 1863 was bright and joyful. On August 25, he married Mashenka Blank and was extremely happy. A quiet wedding was played in Kokushkino. And a few days later the young
From the book Fatal Illusions author Costello John From the book of Volodya Ulyanov author Veretennikov Nikolay IvanovichStories about the gymnasium Volodya also told a lot about other Simbirsk teachers, for example, about a mathematics teacher who reproached a student who did not know the lesson: “What, brother, you don’t know the lesson! It can be seen that “I will walk along Sviyaga, I will put my hands on my hips,” he said, hinting with words
From the book Biased Stories author Brik Lilya Yurievna From the book of Chekhov author Sobolev Yuri VasilievichIn the gymnasium In 1868, after an unsuccessful venture with the Greek school, Anton was sent to the preparatory class of the classical gymnasium. He spent two extra years in the gymnasium - remaining in the third and fifth grades for the second year. He entered the gymnasium in the era of the so-called
From the book of memories author Avilova Lidia Alekseevna[Gymnasium graduation] I took final exams. And then, at the final exam in Russian, something happened that I considered a miracle. Before starting to call the students for an oral answer, our teacher began to distribute sheets of written work. These were
From the RAEM book - my callsigns author Krenkel Ernst TeodorovichIn the gymnasium for the rich Overcoat or not an overcoat? Trotters and a kerosene can. My classmates are Sonya Garrel, Anatoly Goryunov, Boris Livanov. Oedipus Rex and Little Red Riding Hood. At the musician's table in a rich house. The history of soldiers' boots. My friends are books. Collection
From the book At the beginning of life (pages of memories); Articles. Performances. Notes. Memories; Prose of different years. author Marshak Samuil Yakovlevich From the book of Chekhov without gloss author Fokin Pavel EvgenievichIn the Taganrog gymnasium, Vasily Vasilyevich Zelenko: Chekhov entered the gymnasium in 1868, graduated in 1879. He stayed at the gymnasium for 11 years; studied mediocre, rather below average; twice stayed in the second year: in the 3rd grade and in the 5th; in III because of mathematics, and in geography
From Franco's book author Khinkulov Leonid FedorovichIII. AT THE DROHOBYCH GYMNASIUM In the same place, in Drogobych, in 1867, Ivas entered the gymnasium. Here the same thing was repeated as in the Vasilian school: the entire first class of the village boy was kept at the last - "donkey shop". But when he moved to the second class, he received a second
From the book Gumilyov without gloss author Fokin Pavel EvgenievichIn the Tsarskoye Selo gymnasium, Anna Andreevna Gumilyova: In 1903, the family returned to Tsarskoye Selo. Here the boys entered the Tsarskoye Selo classical gymnasium. Its director was famous poet Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky. Dmitry Iosifovich Klenovsky: I was
From the book Block without gloss author Fokin Pavel EvgenievichIn the gymnasium, Maria Aleksandrovna Gribovskaya, wife of V. M. Gribovsky, a professor at St.
From the book of Bunin without gloss author Fokin Pavel EvgenievichIn the Yelets Gymnasium, Ivan Alekseevich Bunin. From a letter to A. Korinfsky. November 18, 1895: For ten years I was sent to the Yelets Gymnasium, where, fortunately, I did not finish the course due to illness ... Vera Nikolaevna Muromtseva-Bunina: My father placed him (in 1881–1882 - comp.) in freeloaders to
From the book Everyday Life of an Old Russian Gymnasium author Shubkin Nikolai FeoktistovichThe head of our gymnasium October 8 The head of our gymnasium is a lady with great pretensions. But since, according to the regulations on women's gymnasiums, she is no more than an inspector or a senior class lady who has no power over the teaching staff and over
NEGINSKY LYCEUM - "GYMNASIUM OF HIGHER SCIENCES"
Russian lyceums of the 19th century, these unique educational institutions that combined gymnasium and university education, inscribed a bright page in the history of national public education. Among them, a special place is occupied by the “Gymnasium of Higher Sciences and the Lyceum of Prince Bezborodko”, which existed in the county town of Nizhyn, in the Chernihiv region. The Nizhyn Lyceum is famous primarily for the fact that the great Nikolai Gogol studied here. But not only this.
Over the twelve years of the existence of the gymnasium, eight graduations took place, 105 people graduated from it, including writers N. V. Kukolnik, E. P. Grebenka, V. N. Zabila, philosopher P. G. Redkin and other prominent figures who made a notable contribution to Russian and Ukrainian culture. The lyceum, especially at the initial stage, was distinguished by teaching methods advanced for that time, which contributed to the development of democratic and progressive traditions in domestic education.
The emergence of lyceums was largely due to the need to create cultural centers in regions remote from universities, and the emergence of lyceums in Ukraine (Volynsky, Nezhinsky, Richelievsky) was also caused by the need to strengthen ties between Ukrainian (Little Russian) regions, relatively recently (or even quite recently) included in the Russian Empire, with the imperial center. The opening of the lyceum in Nizhyn was a kind of recognition of the merits of this city in the history of Ukraine. It was here that in the 17th century the Councils met, at which the hetmans of the Left Bank were elected. A century later, a prominent Catherine's nobleman, statesman and diplomat, Prince Alexander Andreevich Bezborodko built a house in the center of Nizhyn and surrounded it with a huge park. Bezborodko bequeathed the land, along with three thousand souls of peasants, "to ensure" the future educational institution, which was to become a "hotbed of science and morality."
Alexander Andreevich himself did not live to see his plan come true, his dream was realized by his brother, Count Ilya Andreevich Bezborodko. Through the efforts of Ilya Andreevich and largely at his expense, on the site of an old house in the center of the park, according to the project of the famous academician of architecture Alois Ruska, in 1805-1817, a monumental three-story building was erected in the style of classicism, the facade of which is decorated with twelve slender white columns (colonnade "White Swan" ). The inscription on the pediment Labore et zelo calls to live "by labor and diligence". Here, in 1820, the "Gymnasium of Higher Sciences and the Lyceum of Prince Bezborodko" was opened. According to its charter, the educational institution was equated to a university and resembled the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum. Nizhyn received the status of a university city and became the only county center in the Russian Empire that had its own, as we would say now, university.
Only nobles were admitted to the Nezhinsky Lyceum, they studied there for nine years. Graduates of the gymnasium-lyceum, as well as those who graduated from the university, were exempted from exams for promotion to higher ranks. The lyceum was run by the trustee of the Kharkov district (Tsarskoye Selo lyceum reported directly to the Minister of Public Education), but it was maintained at the expense of the founders.
In the charter approved by Alexander I, it was written: "There are four types of management of the gymnasium: 1) moral, 2) educational, 3) economic, 4) police." The police approach to the education of morality, as a rule, gives rise to a very trivial product - the rod. They were also used within the walls of the Nizhyn gymnasium. Flogged and "Nikosha" by Gogol-Yanovsky, given by his father to the lyceum in 1821 after he graduated from the Poltava district (district) school. Nestor Kukolnik, who studied with Gogol in Nizhyn, recalled that during the flogging Gogol screamed piercingly. “He pretended so skillfully,” wrote the Dollmaker, “that we were all convinced of his insanity.”
However, the first director of the institution, Ivan Semenovich Orlai, very rarely and extremely reluctantly resorted to such educational measures. As the same Dollmaker testified, he "even fell ill while signing the verdict." In general, Orlai was a wonderful person in the full sense of the word. A native of Hungary, he found a second home in Russia and gave her his talents and knowledge. At the age of 19, he was already a professor, he listened to lectures in Vienna and Lvov, at the University of Königsberg, where philosophy was read "according to Kant's notebooks." At one time he was even a surgeon under Paul I, participated in the war of 1812 and operated on the wounded. When Orlai became a director in Nizhyn, he had the titles of both a doctor of medicine and a doctor of philosophy. A passionate admirer of the language of Horace, he called his students to him, treated them to dinner and talked to them at the table in Latin. At the lyceum, Orlai sought to introduce the methods of Pestalozzi, a very popular teacher in Europe at that time, the main thing in whose system was the provision on the need to establish mutual understanding between students and teachers. Choosing teachers, Orlai, with some exceptions, found, first of all, educated, thinking people, capable of instilling in their students the values of European culture. Many of the Nizhyn teachers (among them were Russians, Greeks, Hungarians, French, Italians, Swiss) had two higher educations, and many of them graduated from the university at one time, knew several languages and were encyclopedically educated. It was these teachers who were the junior professor of German literature Fyodor Ivanovich Singer and the professor of French literature Ivan Yakovlevich Landrazhin, who not only knew their subject perfectly, but also gave pupils to read books from their personal libraries, took them at home, where literary and scientific interviews took place , read French and German classics in the original, translated Schiller, German romantics, and even Voltaire himself. Among the outstanding Nizhyn teachers are Kazimir Varfolomeevich Shapalinsky, who knew both mathematics and Russian literature equally brilliantly, and professor of botany Nikita Fedorovich Solovyov.
An extract from the “Journal of the Conference of the Gymnasium of Higher Sciences” speaks of Orlai’s management style: “Mr. Director expressed his desire that each of those present at the meetings on the account of the management of the gymnasium declare his thoughts freely and freely, even if it happens against any measures proposed by the Master Director himself, and whose judgments will prove to be the most thorough, to be recorded in the paragraphs of the journal under his name.
Perhaps the greatest wealth of the gymnasium was the library, the beginning of which was laid by the honorary trustee Count A. G. Kushelev-Bezborodko, great-nephew of A. A. Bezborodko. He tried to rely on the experience of the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum (which he himself graduated from). The count donated two and a half thousand volumes to the gymnasium. These were mainly translated and historical books.
Not without reason in the gymnasium they loved history so much - it was the influence of the era. Representatives of the educated strata of society were impressed by the publication of eleven volumes of Karamzin's "History of the Russian State" (they also stood on the shelves of the lyceum library) and novels by Walter Scott. Gymnasium students even formed a historical society, where they independently translated the works of foreign historians and compiled a code of world history on the basis of compilations and independent research.
However, this was not the merit of the gymnasium historian Moiseev (Gogol called him a Cossack), who simply made me cram chapters from a textbook, and demanded to retell them at lectures. Once Moiseev, wanting to catch Gogol on not listening to the lesson, suddenly broke off the story and asked: “Mr. Gogol-Yanovsky, what happened after the death of Alexander the Great?” Gogol (who spent the whole lesson drawing the view outside the window) jumped up and cheerfully answered: "The funeral." The class crashed. They also laughed at the teacher of Russian literature, Nikolsky, who limited himself in his predilections to Kheraskov and Sumarokov. Lyceum students slipped him poems by Yazykov and Pushkin, passing them off as their own. he ruled "opuses" and said that poetic experiments were created in violation of the rules of syllable. But the senior professor of political sciences Mikhail Bilevich, who later played a downright fatal role in the history of the gymnasium, was not liked by the gymnasium students, they mocked him.
In such an environment, the pupil of "Nikosh" also studied. He often had a hard time, especially in the early years. There was everything here: ridicule (often very angry) from classmates, and difficulties in studies, especially in learning languages, and clashes with teachers (some of them frankly persecuted Gogol) ... True, Gogol himself was not a diligent student, and besides, he had difficult character. But here his great talent was formed: during the years of study, Gogol created his first literary works: the poetic ballad "Two Fish", the tragedy "The Robbers", "The Slavic Tale", "The Tverdislavich Brothers", the idyll "Hanz Kühelgarten", and also "Something about Nizhyn, or The law is not written for fools. Gogol's closest friends for life were his fellow students A. S. Danilevsky and N. Ya. Prokopovich. In the last years of his studies in Nizhyn, the future writer took an active part in the life of the gymnasium: he published handwritten journals, acted as a librarian, and played on the stage of the gymnasium theater, which appeared in 1824 with the permission of Orlai. The opening of the theater set off some kind of festive whirlwind that swirled the Nikosha as well. Gogol was accepted into the troupe and offered him the role of Creon in V. Ozerov's tragedy Oedipus in Athens. In general, it is clear why Gogol got it: Creon was ugly, proud and lonely.
By the way, all the troubles of the Nezhinsky Lyceum began from the theater. Rather, it became a formal reason for the emergence of these turmoil. In May 1825, professor of natural law Nikolai Grigoryevich Belousov appeared at the gymnasium. At the age of 15, he graduated from the Kyiv Theological Academy, then entered Kharkov University, which was considered the best educational institution in Ukraine (Kharkov was then called the Ukrainian Athens). Especially strong was the Faculty of Philosophy at the university, where from 1804 to 1816 Professor Johann Schad lectured, recommended to Kharkov by Goethe and Schiller. Two certificates issued to Belousov after graduation testified that he studied "with excellent success" at the ethical and philological department of the Faculty of Philosophy and at the Faculty of Law.
Orlai invited Belousov to teach natural and civil law, which Bilevich mentioned above was previously engaged in. Bilevich harbored a grudge against Belousov and began to wait for a convenient excuse to sit the young professor. Moreover, the situation favored this: in December 1825, well-known events took place on Senate Square, and the nature of Belousov’s lessons, his teaching methods and relations with students made it possible to expose the professor as a freethinker, a molester of youth and almost an accomplice of the Decembrists.
In August 1826 Orlai resigned. The period of his directorship began to be considered a time of unrest. But it was precisely because of these “disturbances,” because of the freedom of communication between professors and the director, and students with professors, that the spirit of the lyceum was born, which was not so easy to eradicate. However, there were plenty of people who wanted to eradicate it. Four months after Orlai left, the gymnasium conference received a petition, or rather, a denunciation from Bilevich, in which he reported (as if he had found out the news) about the creation of a theater where "the students of the boarding school will present various theatrical plays without special permission from the higher educational authorities." This was the first attack against Shapalinsky, who took the place of Orlai, and Belousov, who was patronized by the new director, who appointed him to the post of inspector. Bilevich, of course, knew that Orlai had given permission for the creation of the theater. But under Ivan Semenovich, he was silent, knowing about his connections at court.
The new denunciation was received by the Gymnasium Conference on April 16, 1827. It was Professor Nikolsky's report on the unlawful readings to which pupils indulge. It was also about the theater, for which they would have to be responsible "in the event of any government demands on this subject." Belousov was forced to inspect the personal property of the boarders and take away the forbidden works from them. Among them were Pushkin's poems The Prisoner of the Caucasus, The Fountain of Bakhchisaray, The Gypsies, The Robber Brothers, as well as Griboedov's Woe from Wit, Nalivaika's Confession and Ryleev's Voinarovsky. However, Belousov did not hand over the books and manuscripts to the administration of the gymnasium, but kept them.
But before the conference had time to discuss Nikolsky's report, a new paper arrived from Bilevich. The denunciation, dated May 7, 1827, was directed against students listening to law from Belousov. The pensioner Gogol-Yanovsky was also commemorated among them. Bilevich wrote: “I noticed in some students some grounds for free-thinking, and this, I believe, may come from a delusion in the grounds of natural law, which, although it is prescribed to be taught here according to the system of Mr. Demartin, he, Mr. Junior Professor Belousov, passes this natural right according to his notes, following in the foundations of the philosophy of Kant and Schad. So the word “freethinking” began to appear, which eventually grew into the “Case of Freethinking”.
Belousov lectured from his notes, not from a textbook. But the "crime" did not even consist in this, but in the very interpretation of natural law that Belousov gave. In the autumn of 1827, interrogations of high school students began about the nature of the lectures of the seditious teacher. Most of the evidence was in favor of the professor. Gogol also said that Belousov in the classroom "gave explanations according to the book", that is, according to the textbook.
Bilevich did not let up, there were rumors about the existence of some kind of society, the “Shapalinsky brotherhood”. The names of other "freethinkers" were mentioned - Singer and Landrazhin, the first of whom lived abroad and read Kant in the original, and the second fought in Napoleon's army against the Russians and in general could turn out to be a French agent. The "Case of Freethinking" ended with the dismissal of those responsible in 1829, after Gogol's departure from Nizhyn.
In an effort to prevent the spread of revolutionary ideas among young people, the authorities decided to change the profile of the gymnasium. In 1832 it was reorganized into a physics and mathematics lyceum, and in 1840 - into a legal lyceum. Their graduates were the famous Ukrainian fabulist L.I. Glibov, Ukrainian and Russian writer and ethnographer A.S. the founders of the Russian school of bridge building D. I. Zhuravsky and P. I. Sobko.
In 1875, on the basis of the legal lyceum, the Nizhyn Historical and Philological Institute was established, which trained teachers of classical languages, the Russian language and history for secondary schools. Peasants, philistines and representatives of other classes were allowed to enter here. Famous scientists E. F. Karsky, N. S. Derzhavin, N. N. Petrovsky, I. N. Kirichenko, V. I. Rezanov, artist N. S. Samokish, teacher P. K. Volynsky and other. In 1920, the educational institution was reorganized into the Nizhyn Institute of Public Education, in 1934 - into the Nezhin Pedagogical Institute. Today it is Nizhyn State University named after Mykola Gogol. It is in the same building with a "white swan" and the motto Labore et zelo. There is also a museum of the great Russian writer and a collection of paintings by Russian and Western European artists of the 16th-18th centuries. A memorial plaque was installed on the wall of the building in 1909: "Gogol studied here from May 1821 to June 1828."
Encyclopedic YouTube
1 / 1
✪ MIU Graduation 2010
Subtitles
Gymnasium of higher sciences (1820-1832)
The first steps towards founding the gymnasium were taken by Count I. A. Bezborodko. In 1805, the highest permission of Emperor Alexander I was received for its discovery. The gymnasium was named Gymnasium of Higher Sciences of Prince Bezborodko, because the main funds intended for its maintenance came from a capital of 210,000 rubles, bequeathed by the Chancellor of the Russian Empire, Prince A. A. Bezborodko. In addition to them, I. A. Bezborodko donated a “place with a garden”, which was supposed to house the building of the gymnasium, and additional cash(annually for 15,000 rubles). However, the opening of the gymnasium then did not take place.
The gymnasium was opened fifteen years later, after the death of Count I. A. Bezborodko, with funds donated by him for this purpose, by his grandson, Count A. G. Kushelev-Bezborodko. The highest rescript on the founding of the gymnasium was signed by Emperor Alexander I on April 19 (May 1). The charter of the gymnasium was approved only on June 27, 1824, and the charter of establishment - on February 19, 1825; however, classes began on September 4, 1820 (August 4, according to other sources).
The purpose of the gymnasium was to give the Little Russian nobles "convenience in raising their children in pious rules, to acquire knowledge in languages and general sciences." The term of study at the gymnasium was set at 9 years and was divided into categories of three classes each. Graduates of the gymnasium, depending on academic success, were entitled to the rank XII (for "candidates") or XIV (for "valid students") classes according to the "Table of Ranks". The certificates issued by the gymnasium had "equal power" with university certificates and exempted "those who received them from the test for promotion to higher ranks."
The structure of the gymnasium was very similar to the Demidov School created a little earlier in Yaroslavl.
The subjects of teaching were: the law of God, ancient languages, Russian, German and French, mathematics, history and geography, literature of Russian and ancient languages, philosophy, natural and folk law, technology with chemistry, natural history, public economy, financial science, Roman law with its history, Russian civil and criminal law and judiciary.
The composition of the students was defined as follows:
- 24 pupils at the expense of Bezborodko;
- 3 - from the children of military officials;
- free boarders in the amount of not more than 150 students;
- incoming listeners.
The gymnasium was donated by: the government - 28 books; honorary trustee - 2,610 volumes and 20 thousand rubles. for a physical office and initial equipment.
The first director of the gymnasium was V. G. Kukolnik (1820-1821)
Teachers - 2; students: in the boarding house - 17 (all are nobles).
The Gymnasium was donated by: individuals - 513 books.
Teachers - 9; students: in the boarding house - 44 and incoming - 13 (all are noblemen).
The gymnasium was donated by: the government - 46 books; by private individuals - a large silver medal for the conclusion of peace between Russia and the Ottoman Porte in 1791, as well as 90 books.
Teachers - 9; students in the boarding school: from the nobles - 56, from the Greeks - 6 and incoming students: from the nobles - 49, from the commoners - 4, merchants - 1, bourgeois - 6.
The gymnasium was donated by: the government - 19 books; honorary trustee - 34 books, 5 geographical maps, 8 chronological historical tables, 78 originals for drawing, a silver medal for the opening of trade in the Baltic Sea and various castings of Greek ancient vessels, a mineralogical cabinet of 642 mineral pieces; different persons - 154 books.
Teachers - 23; students in the boarding school: from nobles - 71, from Greeks - 6 and incoming students: from nobles - 57, raznochintsy - 4, merchants - 3, bourgeois - 7, Greeks - 7, Cossacks - 1. Total students - 156.
The gymnasium was donated by: the government - 17 books; private individuals - 55 books and 13 maps.
Teachers - 16; students in the boarding school: from nobles - 71, from Greeks - 6 and incoming students: from nobles - 98, raznochintsy - 6, merchants - 4, bourgeois - 7, Greeks - 9, Cossacks - 1. Total students - 202.
The number of students grew mainly due to volunteer students. The first issue took place in 1826. In 1827, 3 candidates were released. In 1828, 5 candidates were released, 5 were actual students.
Among the outstanding teachers of the gymnasium were Professor of Law N. G. Belousov (from May 1825), Professor of Mathematical Sciences K. V. Shapalinsky, Professor of French Literature I. Ya. Landrazhin, Professor of German Literature Fyodor Iosifovich (Friedrich-Joseph) Singer, Jr. professor of natural sciences N. F. Solovyov and others (the first four were dismissed in November 1830 after the investigation of the “Freethinking Case”). The Latin language was taught in 1825-1829 by I. G. Kulzhinsky.
In the late 1820s, riots arose in the gymnasium and proceedings began on the case of the free-thinking of some professors, which was the reason for its transformation in 1832 into a physics and mathematics lyceum.
Nizhyn Physics and Mathematics Lyceum (1832-1840)
According to the new charter, approved on October 7 (19), the gymnasium was renamed the Physics and Mathematics Lyceum. At the same time, gymnasium classes were gradually (by 1837) closed and only three higher ones were left.
The staff of the Lyceum consisted of 6 professors who taught mathematics and applied mathematics, physics, chemistry and technology, Russian literature, natural history, Russian history with statistics, two lecturers in French and German literature and a teacher of the law who taught the Law of God. The professor of pure mathematics in 1835-1836 was Karl Kupfer; Chemistry was taught in 1833-1841 by court counselor I. Ya. Skalsky.
In total, five graduates of the Physics and Mathematics Lyceum were produced with the number of graduates with the right to the rank of XIV class - 147 people. By the end of the 1830s, the popularity of the lyceum had fallen sharply and there were no more people who wanted to enter the first year.
Teachers: N. H. Bunge (1845-1850; laws of state administration), P. N. Danevsky (1843-1853; civil laws),
In the early serene morning, the quiet provincial Nizhyn greeted the Gogols with the ringing of church bells. On the wooden sidewalks, burly old-timers from Nizhyn were marching importantly towards morning - local nobles, officials, merchants surrounded by their numerous households, tradesmen, artisans ... They looked indifferently at the village yellow carriage in which Vasily Afanasyevich, Nikosha and the serf assigned to him were driving Simon.
Passing the town square, where cows, pigs and other living creatures walked along the dusty grass, the Gogol carriage drove into a shady park laid out in front of the gymnasium. Having handed over all the necessary papers to the office, Vasily Afanasyevich introduced his son to the warden Zeldner, with whom Nikosha was to live in an apartment.
In June, the boy successfully passed the entrance exams and was enrolled in the second grade. The fee for studying at a privileged gymnasium was high - 1200 rubles a year, and the parents hardly managed to raise the necessary amount. After persistent efforts, with the support of Troshchinsky, Vasily Afanasyevich managed at the end of the first academic year to transfer his son "to the number of pupils supported by the gymnasium," that is, to the number of boarding students studying at the expense of the treasury. Gogol gladly parted with the pedantic and stingy Zeldner, who had bothered him, and moved to the gymnasium, within the walls of which he lived and studied until 1828.
The seven-year stay at the Nizhyn Gymnasium of Higher Sciences was of great importance in the ideological development and formation of the future writer. Here the public and literary interests of the young Gogol began to take shape and manifest themselves. Here the first works were written. The gymnasium of higher sciences was for Gogol the same vital and literary school that the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum was for Pushkin, and Moscow University for Belinsky, Herzen and Lermontov.
The Nizhyn Gymnasium, according to the idea of its creators, was supposed to be an educational institution with a wide encyclopedic, humanitarian profile. Pupils of the last three classes (study at the gymnasium was nine years old) were called students and listened to lectures according to the university program. It included courses in philosophy, literature, legal and physical and mathematical sciences. Serious attention has been paid to the study foreign languages. Class hours and students' free time were strictly regulated.
One of the first directors of the gymnasium, I. S. Orlai, a well-educated scientist, a supporter of progressive innovations in the system of school education, made a lot of efforts to select knowledgeable teachers for the new educational institution. Over time, the Nizhyn Gymnasium has become one of the best higher schools in Russia.
Among the remarkable teachers were professor of mathematics K. V. Shapalinsky, who acted as director in 1826 instead of Orlay, who left for Odessa, professor of German literature F. O. Singer, professor of French literature I. Ya. Landrazhin. More than others, the pupils loved the young professor of legal sciences N. G. Belousov, who read a course of lectures on natural law since 1826, at the same time he served as an inspector of the gymnasium.
In the first months of his stay at the gymnasium, the closed and uncommunicative Gogol was very upset by the separation from his loved ones, he yearned for Vasilievka. His letters, filled with the bitterness of loneliness, allegorical arguments about lost happiness, are a kind of reflection of the state of mind. “I see everything dear to my heart, I see you, I see my dear Motherland,” he wrote to his parents on June 13, 1824, “I see a quiet Psyol, flickering through a light veil that I will throw off, enjoying true happiness, forgetting the sorrows that flowed quickly. One happy minute can to reward years of sorrow." The only one to whom the boy could tell about his sad thoughts was the serf servant Simon. But even with him, he could only see him at night, since during the day Simon had to carry out various household assignments from the gymnasium authorities.
Gradually, Gogol got used to the new environment for him, soon recovered and from a frail, sickly child he became strong, cheerful and avid young men for various fun and pranks. Together with him, his childhood friend Sasha Danilevsky studied at the gymnasium. Gogol's closest friends are Nikolai Prokopovich, Konstantin Bazili, Pyotr Redkin, Gerasim Vysotsky. He was frank with them, trusted his dreams, devoted them to creative ideas, and sometimes, embarrassed and blushing, read the first works. Gogol was a favorite of his comrades, who were attracted to him by his inexhaustible imagination, natural humor and extraordinary talent for storytelling.
He read a lot and closely followed modern literature. Almost every letter addressed to my father contained a request to send new magazines and almanacs, books, poetry collections, and dramatic compositions. A passionate admirer of Pushkin, Gogol carefully rewrote Pushkin's poems "Gypsies", "Robber Brothers", "Prisoner of the Caucasus", "The Fountain of Bakhchisarai" and other works of his beloved poet. At night, by the light of an oil lamp, hiding from the watchful eyes of the guards, he eagerly read and reread "Eugene Onegin", which then came out chapter by chapter. "This," Danilevsky recalled, "was then still smuggling; for our professor of literature, Nikolsky, even Derzhavin was a new person."
In a closed educational institution, which was the Nizhyn gymnasium, magazines and books were one of the few means of communication between pupils and the outside world, acquaintance with social and literary events. Together with his close friends, Gogol subscribed to books by Russian and foreign writers, many periodicals of that time: Decembrist almanacs, Delvig's Northern Flowers, Otechestvennye Zapiski, Moscow Telegraph, Moscow Bulletin and others.
He spent almost all his money on the purchase of books and magazines. “Thank you for sending money ... I sometimes need them very much,” he wrote to his relatives. to satisfy my thirst to see and feel the beautiful... For him, with the greatest difficulty, I collect my entire annual salary ... For Schiller, whom I ordered from Lemberg, I gave 40 rubles - money very important for my condition; but I was rewarded with a surplus and now I spend several hours a day with the greatest pleasure. I also do not forget the Russians and write out what only comes out the most excellent. Of course, I confine myself to one thing only, for a whole six months I do not get more than one book, and this crushes me extremely. It’s amazing how strong the attraction to good can be ... I don’t know what would happen to me if I still couldn’t feel joy from this - I would die of longing and boredom.
From the books and magazines subscribed by the students, a library was compiled, which was very popular among the students. Gogol took on the role of librarian.
At the time of Gogol's studies in the Nizhyn Gymnasium, there was a historical society, which was led by senior pupils - Pyotr Redkin and Vasily Lyubich-Romanovich. With extraordinary passion, members of the society began to compose "world history on a huge scale." Gogol's friend, Konstantin Bazili, presented to his peers a great work of 1500 pages on the history of the East. Young Gogol was a regular participant in the meetings of the historical society. Here, in a circle of friends who were fond of history, he had a bold dream to write a multi-volume essay on world history and a general geography called "Earth and People", on which he worked hard in the early 30s.
The future writer enters old legends, sayings, descriptions of the rites of the Ukrainian and Russian peoples into a notebook called "The Book of All Things, or the Handy Encyclopedia". In the gymnasium, he began to compile the Little Russian Lexicon (Ukrainian-Russian dictionary) and write down folk songs. The writer collected wonderful monuments of oral poetic creativity throughout his life. He regarded them as genuine historical documents of paramount importance, capturing in artistic form the heroic history of popular deeds.
The great hobby of the pupils of the gymnasium was the amateur theater, one of the founders of which was Gogol. He was not only a talented performer of a wide variety of roles, but also a director and artist, author of funny comedies and scenes from folk life. "If you can, send me canvases and other manuals for the theatre," Gogol wrote to his parents on January 22, 1824. "Oedipus in Athens, Ozerov's tragedy, will be presented in our first play."
Performances were usually staged on holidays. A lot of people gathered for them - residents of Nizhyn, landowners from the surrounding villages, parents of high school students. The audience was delighted. In one of his letters to a friend, the young man wrote: “We had a great Shrovetide. - We had a theater for four days in a row ... All the former visitors, experienced people, said that they could not see such a wonderful performance at any provincial theater. - The scenery (4 changes) was done masterfully and even magnificently. The beautiful landscape on the curtain completed the charm. The lighting of the hall was brilliant. The music was also distinguished ... "
Fonvizin's comedy "Undergrowth" was played out most successfully, by all accounts. Nikolai played the role of Prostakova, Mitrofan was performed by Nestor Kukolnik, Sophia - Alexander Danilevsky, Starodum - Konstantin Bazili. “I saw this play both in Moscow and in St. Petersburg,” Basili later recalled, “but I always retained the conviction that not a single actress succeeded in the role of Prostakova as well as the then sixteen-year-old Gogol played this role.”
Gogol's outstanding acting talent and natural comic talent were so great that his comrades predicted for him the glory of a comic actor. A few years later, having arrived in St. Petersburg, Gogol, who shared the opinion of his friends about his stage calling, tried to enter the Alexandrinsky Theater, but failed. The realistic manner of acting, alien to stage mannerisms, was negatively assessed by the examiners - supporters of the pseudo-classical theater school, and he was refused admission.
But most of all, Gogol was drawn to literature. The poetic and dramatic work of Vasily Afanasyevich, communication in childhood and youth with the family of the poet V.V. Kapnist, poetic writing, which the students of the gymnasium were fond of, all this prompted Gogol to test his strength.
The first literary experiments of Gogol, which became the property of his comrades, date back to 1823-1824. Two years after entering the gymnasium, he becomes one of the active participants in the literary circle. Its members published several handwritten journals and almanacs: Zvezda, Meteor of Literature, Northern Dawn, Parnassian Dung and others. These journals were edited by Gogol; he also appeared on their pages as a poet, playwright, prose writer, satirist and critic.
Along with Pushkin, romantic poetry and prose of the Decembrists also had a great influence on the formation of the literary tastes of the future writer. Periodicals and literature were the only mass medium dissemination of freedom-loving ideas, their political platform. The themes of the heroic past of the Russian people, the national liberation war of 1812, the revolutionary struggle for the freedom of the fatherland, groaning under the yoke of the autocracy, were leading in the literary and journalistic speeches of the Decembrists.
“The influence of the conspirators on public opinion was very significant,” Herzen wrote. “Educated, energetic and pure people ... they dominated part of the aristocracy and, thanks to the literature in their hands, over the entire young generation. Ryleev’s energetic poems, Bestuzhev’s stories , "Polar Star" - the yearbook that they published together, "Mnemosyne" - the journal of Kuchelbecker and Prince Odoevsky - were distributed at universities, lyceums and even military schools. Among the students of the gymnasium, there were manuscripts with forbidden works by Ryleev, A. Bestuzhev, Griboyedov. They were read and memorized with enthusiasm. Some of Ryley's poems, "concerning the call to freedom," appeared in handwritten journals and were translated into foreign languages during class sessions.
Few of Gogol's early works have come down to us. Most of them, with the exception of three poems and one epigram, can only be judged by the titles and stories of contemporaries about their content.
Recalling in the "Author's Confession" in 1847 about his literary performances within the walls of the gymnasium, Gogol wrote: "My first experiments, the first exercises in compositions, for which I got the habit in the last time of my stay at school, were almost all in lyrical and serious kind".
He enthusiastically writes stories "in the taste" of A. Bestuzhev (Marlinsky), where romantic heroes acted against the backdrop of lush nature. The works of this kind included "The Brothers Tverdislavichi - a Slavic story", the tragedy "Robbers", the poem "Russia under the yoke of the Tatars" and others.
The explicit influence of the romantic school is felt both in the poem "Hans Küchelgarten" and in the excerpts from the historical novel "Hetman" published later, in the early 1930s. Gogol, in all likelihood, also began to work on these works in the last years of his stay at the gymnasium.
Already from the first steps in literature, the future writer tried to be "original in his own way." This desire for originality was not approved by many members of the literary circle, who tried to follow "anyone who became famous for his literary works poets and made themselves dependent on his influence.
The originality of Gogol's first literary performances was associated with his democratism, which was clearly manifested in his behavior, judgments, in relation to students who came from aristocratic families. The latter kept themselves apart and arrogantly treated Gogol the "provincial".
Unlike them, the future writer was looking for rapprochement with ordinary people. In his free time, he could often be found at Nizhyn bazaars and fairs. "Noise, scolding, lowing, bleating, roaring - everything merges into one discordant conversation. Oxen, bags, hay, gypsies, pots, women, gingerbread, hats - everything is bright, motley, discordant, rushing about in heaps and scurrying about before your eyes. Discordant speeches drown each other, and not a single word will be snatched out, will not be saved from this flood ... Only the clapping on the hands of the merchants is heard from all sides ... "
Gogol felt free and at ease in the midst of this bazaar rumble and crowd. His slender, uniformed figure flickered now between carts with all sorts of food, now in a circle of people silently listening to the sad songs of a blind lyre player, then among peasants, lads and girls crowding in front of a nativity scene - a puppet theater, on a small stage of which merry comedies from folk life.
Uncomplicated stories about a stupid Cossack and a cunning gypsy in a red scroll, about devils and witches, a grumpy Khivra and her cowardly deacon admirer, about young lovers - Gritsko and Odarka - caused genuine delight, friendly laughter and approving exclamations of the audience. Everything he saw amazed and delighted Gogol, deeply sunk into his memory.
In the evenings, when twilight was gathering over the fading Nizhyn, he went to the outskirts of the city - Magerka - where ordinary villagers lived. Here he was already known and welcomed cordially. Gogol was also a guest at merry peasant weddings, he was also invited to "vecherniki", at which those gathered took turns telling fairy tales and all kinds of stories. He also took part in folk games organized by rural youth on holidays.
“This rapprochement of him with people who do not pretend to the elegance of manners, sophistication of speech and the choice of the subject of conversation, obviously gave him a kind of pleasure in life, satisfied his aesthetic needs and evoked poetic moods in him,” recalled one of Gogol’s comrades at the gymnasium. - So, at least, we noticed it because, after each such new acquaintance somewhere, he locked himself in his room for a long time and put down his impressions on paper.
Gogol's closeness to the people, to ordinary people, the desire to alleviate their plight did not leave the writer throughout his life. Herzen had every right to say about him: "Not being, unlike Koltsov, a native of the people in his origin, he was them in his tastes and in his mindset."
In March 1825, Gogol suffered a heavy grief - his father died. Vasily Afanasyevich had been ill for a long time, but his unexpected and premature death shocked the young man. “True, at first I was terribly shocked by this news,” he wrote to his mother, “however, I didn’t let anyone notice that I was saddened. Left alone, I indulged in all the power of crazy despair. I even wanted to encroach on my life ... is there nothing left to bind me to life? Do I not yet have a sensitive, tender, virtuous mother who can replace my father and friend and everything that is sweeter, that is more precious? .. "
With a heavy heart he rode to Vasilievka on summer vacation. Sad and painful was the meeting of the son with his mother. For a long time they sorted out father's papers, separating manuscripts with poetic and dramatic compositions from business correspondence. Gogol highly appreciated the work of Vasily Afanasyevich, especially his Ukrainian comedies. From the dramatic heritage of Vasily Afanasyevich, only one play, "The Simpleton ...", has come down to us, from another, "Dog-vivtsya", known only by its content, Gogol took the epigraphs to four chapters of the "Sorochinsky Fair".
The years 1826-1827 were a turning point in the spiritual development of the future writer. At this time, under the influence of socio-political events in the country, caused by the Decembrist uprising and the subsequent Nikolaev reaction, a noticeable turn took place in Gogol's views.
Directly or indirectly, political repressions affected almost all parties public life. "On the surface of official Russia, the 'façade empire'," wrote Herzen, "only losses, cruel reaction, inhuman persecution, and strengthening of despotism were visible." But among the young forces of the "new generation", among the masses of the people, "great work was being done - deaf and silent work, but active and uninterrupted; discontent grew everywhere."
Did not escape the police repression, and educational institutions. In 1824, the reactionary A.S. Shishkov became the minister of education. At the very beginning of his activity, he stated that he sees his main task in the fight against the "spirit of the times" and that "to literate the whole people or a disproportionate number of people would do more harm than good."
In educational institutions, on the direct orders of Nicholas I, purely barracks methods of education were implanted. The rough soldier's formula "should obey, not argue" served as a measure of behavior and success in studies. At the direction of the higher authorities, the honorary trustee of the Nizhyn Gymnasium demanded from the teachers to strictly "implant in the young hearts of pupils love for God and neighbor, obedience to the authorities and, in general, the fear of God."
But all these reactionary measures did not give the expected results. Convincing evidence of this was the "case of political and religious free-thinking" that arose in 1827 in the Nizhyn gymnasium.
The young pupils of the gymnasium were witnesses and participants in the sharp struggle that began immediately after the defeat of the Decembrist movement within the walls of the educational institution. It was conducted between the leading representatives of Russian culture, close in their social ideals to the Decembrists, professors Belousov, Shapalinsky, Andrushchenko, Solovyov, Landrazhin, Singer and reactionary teachers Bilevich, Nikolsky, Kulzhinsky, Moiseev, Archpriest Volynsky and director of the gymnasium Yasnovsky.
The "case of freethinking" in the Nizhyn Gymnasium, which began as a result of denunciations by loyal professors, had a direct bearing on many pupils of the senior classes. Nikolai Gogol, who testified in favor of his beloved teacher, was among the students involved in the inquiry in the "free-thinking case" of professor of legal sciences N. G. Belousov and his colleagues.
After the end of the investigation, which dragged on for more than three years, the enrollment of students in the lower grades of the gymnasium was stopped by the highest command, and in 1832 it was closed altogether. Progressive professors were expelled from the gymnasium and expelled from Nizhyn without the right to engage in teaching activities.
Young Gogol and his closest comrades at the gymnasium, to the best of their ability, tried to save Belousov, Shapaliisky and other teachers from reprisal. Gogol had to pay for this. At the request of Belousov's enemies, he was released from the gymnasium as an official of the XIV, and not the XII class, which he had every right to according to the results of the final exams.
The events connected with the "case of freethinking", police lawlessness and arbitrariness, which Gogol had to face personally, did not pass without a trace for him. He begins to look more closely at the reality around him, learns to hate evil and vulgarity.
"I don't know, somehow next year I will endure this time! .. - he wrote to his friend in the summer of 1827. - How hard it is to be buried together with the creatures of low obscurity in the silence of the dead! You know all our existences, all who inhabited Nizhyn. With the bark of their earthliness, their insignificant self-satisfaction, they crushed the high purpose of man. And between these beings I must grovel... Our dear mentors are not excluded from them either. Only among comrades, and then only a few, I sometimes find someone to say something to ... "
Childhood is gone forever. Youthful maturity set in, and with it clarity and certainty of thought, the desire for vigorous activity.
New motives sounded in his works. He talks about this more and more often in his letters to family and friends. "You will not recognize my writings," he wrote to his mother on November 23, 1826. "A new upheaval overtook them. Their family is now completely special." “You alone have seen,” he said in another letter, “that under the guise sometimes for others of a cold, gloomy lurked an seething desire for gaiety ... and often in hours of thought, when I seemed sad to others, when they saw or wanted to see in me signs of sentimental daydreaming, I unraveled the science of cheerful, happy life, was surprised how people, greedy for happiness, immediately run away from him, meeting with him ... Until now, I have been happy, but if happiness consists in being satisfied with your condition, then not quite.
Gogol gradually moves away from the vague romantic dreams inherent in his early work, and begins to judge life more seriously and deeper. According to him, already in his early years he was able to notice in those around him "those features that escape the attention of other people, both large and small and funny ... to guess a person, that is, to guess what he should say in such and such cases , with the retention of the warehouse itself and the way of his thoughts and speeches.
The passion to observe people, their actions, and speech gave Gogol's first works the features of life's truth. An example of this is the satire written by him during these years "Something about Nizhyn, or the law is not written for fools." The very name of the work speaks of its satirical sharpness and critical orientation. Here one can see an attempt to paint a picture of the dull, boring life of the inhabitants of Nizhyn, whom the author contemptuously called "existents".
Satire has not reached us, Gogol destroyed it. Perhaps one of the reasons for this was the "case of freethinking" that began in the spring of 1827. But the fact of its creation is a confirmation of the fact that the future writer tried his hand at the accusatory genre in his early youth and criticized those who "crushed the high and noble purpose of man with the bark of their earthliness".
At this time, Gogol begins to painfully think about his future activities. “From the very times of the past,” he wrote confidentially to his uncle, from the very years of almost misunderstanding, I burned with unquenchable zeal to make my life necessary for the good of the state, I boiled to bring at least the slightest benefit ... I went over in my mind all the states, all the positions in "I saw that there would be more work here, that here only I can be a benefactor, here I will only be truly useful to mankind. Injustice, the greatest misfortune in the world, most of all tore my heart. I vowed not to lose a single minute of his short life without doing good.
Gogol invariably connected the realization of his noble youthful ideals with St. Petersburg, the center of political and cultural life Russia. “If I’m thinking about anything now, it’s all about my future life. In a dream and in reality I dream of Petersburg,” he wrote to his mother in early 1827.
By this time, Gogol's lively correspondence with his friend Gerasim Vysotsky, who, after graduating from the gymnasium in 1826, left to serve in the capital, also dates back. The main content of Gogol's letters to a friend was bright dreams about St. Petersburg and future service. More practical and sensible, Vysotsky tried to cool off his enthusiastic friend, telling him about the difficulties of life in St. Petersburg, the extraordinary high cost. But Gogol's decision remained unshakable. At that time, by his own admission, "the thought of a writer ... never entered" his mind. "I thought, simply, I will curry favor and all this will be delivered by the state service. Because of this, the passion to serve was very strong in my youth."
The high state field, service "for the happiness of citizens", seemed to Gogol at that time very indefinite, vague. In his understanding, it came down to the eradication of numerous abuses of officials, to the fight against injustice, which he encountered during the investigation of the case of freethinking.
In June 1828, Gogol graduated from the Nizhyn Gymnasium. He spent the second half of the year in Vasilievka. Maria Ivanovna managed with difficulty the economy of the ruined estate, mortgaged and re-mortgaged after the death of Vasily Afanasyevich. Gogol was painfully worried about the difficult situation of his mother and, being unable to help her to establish neglected economic affairs, he strove more and more persistently to St. Petersburg.
But now the long and troublesome fees are over. The prudent mother asked D.P. Troshchinsky for a letter of recommendation to a prominent St. Petersburg official, L.I. Golenishchev-Kutuzov, in which the "benefactor" asked to help a young relative get a job. Finally, winter came, and as soon as the sledge track was established, Gogol, together with his friend A. S. Danilevsky, on December 13, 1828, left for St. Petersburg.
Big biographical encyclopedia
Gogol- Nikolai Vasilyevich (1809 1852) one of the largest representatives of the local style of the 30s and early 40s. R. in Ukraine, in the town of Sorochintsy, on the border of Poltava and Mirgorod counties. The main stages of his life are as follows: his childhood up to 12 ... ... Literary Encyclopedia
Gogol Nikolay Vasilievich- , Russian writer. Born into a family of poor landowners V. A. and M. I. Gogol Yanovsky. G.'s father wrote several comedies in Ukrainian. Education G. ... ...
GOGOL- N. V. Gogol. Portrait. Artistic F. A. Muller. 1841 (TG) N. V. Gogol. Portrait. Artistic F. A. Muller. 1841 (TG) Nikolai Vasilyevich (03/20/1809, locality Sorochintsy, Mirgorod district of Poltava province, 02/21/1852, Moscow), writer. Great-grandfather G. was ... ... Orthodox Encyclopedia
Gogol- I Gogol Nikolai Vasilievich, Russian writer. Born into a family of poor landowners V. A. and M. I. Gogol Yanovsky. Father G. wrote several comedies on ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia
Gogol- Gogol, Nikolai Vasilievich "Gogol" redirects here; see also other meanings. Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol Birth name: Nikolai Vasilyevich Yanovsky ... Wikipedia
Gogol Nikolay Vasilievich- Gogol, Nikolai Vasilievich one of the greatest writers of Russian literature (1809 1852). He was born on March 20, 1809 in the town of Sorochintsy (on the border of Poltava and Mirgorod counties) and came from an old Little Russian family; in troubled... Biographical Dictionary
Gogol, Nikolai Vasilievich- Request "Gogol" redirects here; see also other meanings. Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol Photo portrait of N. V. Gogol from the group daguerreotype of S. L. Le ... Wikipedia
Gogol Nikolay Vasilievich- (1809 1852) one of the greatest writers of Russian literature, whose influence determines its newest character and reaches to the present moment. He was born on March 19, 1809 in the town of Sorochintsy (on the border of Poltava and Mirgorod counties) and ... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary F.A. Brockhaus and I.A. Efron
N. V. Gogol
N.V. Gogol- "Gogol" redirects here. See also other meanings. Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol Birth name: Nikolai Vasilievich Yanovsky Pseudonyms: V. Alov; P. Glechik; N. G.; OOOO; Pasichnik Rudy Panko; Rudy Panko; G. Yanov; N.N.; *** ... ... Wikipedia
