We have a face and the French have it. The famous French composer Francis Le has died. Tatyana, you always had a desire to emigrate

Chapter fifteen

PERSON OF FRENCH NATIONALITY

Alain Delon, Alain Delon does not drink cologne...

Ilya Kormiltsev

Dumas had plenty of Russian acquaintances: the Karatygins, Muravyov, his son’s beloved (he, after Lydia Nesselrode in 1852, became acquainted with Nadezhda Naryshkina, the wife of the old prince, ex-girlfriend playwright Sukhovo-Kobylin); he also knew Dmitry Pavlovich Naryshkin, the chamberlain of the Russian imperial court, married to Dumas’s acquaintance from his youth, actress Jenny Falcon, who served in the troupe of the Mikhailovsky Theater in St. Petersburg; even Benckendorff, Uvarov and Nicholas I, one might say, were his acquaintances. In 1845, when the Karatygins arrived in Paris, he asked if he would be allowed into Russia. A. M. Karatygina: “We answered that with the exception of inveterate republicans and in general persons who are in bad standing with our government, the entry of foreigners into Russia is not prohibited; If our court does not with the same cordiality receive eminent or particularly remarkable French subjects who come to St. Petersburg, the reason for this is the vile ingratitude of the Marquis Custine. Dumas reacted with indignation to Custine’s action.” (We are, of course, talking about Custine’s book “Russia in 1839”.)

It is unlikely that they would have let him in: after “The Fencing Teacher” he was “in bad standing.” Since 1847, the “Library for Reading” published translations of “Viscount de Bragelon” and “Balsamo” (torn off with their hands), but “Balsamo” was banned in 1848 by the censorship committee on the instructions of the tsar. S. N. Durylin in the archives of the Third Department found correspondence between the spy Yakov Tolstoy and the Minister of Foreign Affairs K. V. Nesselrode: the chief of gendarmes Orlov wanted to know who the author of the pamphlet “Northern Nabab” allegedly published in Paris in 1852 was. No “nabab” was found, but Tolstoy reported that he met with both Dumas, who were among the suspects. “The Alexandres Dumas - father and son - told my bookseller that they knew nothing. Alexander Dumas the son added that he “wrote nothing either for or against Russia.” Orlov strained the authorities in Brussels, Dumas the father was interrogated again - with the same result. But now times have changed: instead of Nicholas there was Alexander I.

Once upon a time there lived Count Grigory Aleksandrovich Kushelev-Bezborodko, married to Lyubov Ivanovna Krol - the marriage excluded him from aristocratic circles and brought him closer to literary circles. In 1857, in Rome, the Kushelevs met the English spiritualist Daniel Hume, Lyubov's sister, Alexandra, became engaged to him, and they decided to have their wedding in St. Petersburg. In 1858, the Kushelevs and Hume opened a salon at the Three Emperors Hotel in Paris, Hume gave séances, Dumas attended them, however, nothing worked for the spiritualist with him (as did Dumas himself in front of witnesses), but Hume became interested in him, invited me to the wedding, and the Kushelevs invited me to their place. It was a good time for a journalistic trip: I was preparing Peasant reform(in Europe it was called “the abolition of slavery”), in November 1857 its first project was published (emancipation without land), and now a new one was being discussed - with the purchase of a land plot. Dumas wrote to the Naryshkins, and they also invited them to visit. He said that he wanted to see the village, the Volga and the Caucasus (his “conquest” by the Russians was just ending) - they promised to arrange this too. On June 17, he promised readers of “Monte Cristo” to meet “Indians and Cossacks” in Astrakhan, to show “the rock to which Prometheus was chained,” and “to visit the camp of Shamil, another Prometheus, who fights in the mountains against the Russian tsars.” Jules Janin: “We entrust him to the hospitality of Russia and sincerely wish that he receives a better reception than Balzac. Balzac arrived in Russia at the wrong time - immediately after Custine, and therefore, as often happens, the innocent suffered for the guilty. As for innocence... nothing could be more innocent than Mr. Alexandre Dumas. Believe me, dear sirs, that he will talk about everything he sees and hears, sweetly, harmlessly, with tact, with praise...”

The Russians did not believe it and bristled. Artist A.P. Bogolyubov, “Notes of a Sailor-Artist”: “Grigory Kushelev... was married to a lively woman, Mrs. Krol, whose sister was married to the then famous magician Leistin Hume. They lived quite openly on the Palais Royal in a hotel of the same name. The famous Alexandre Dumas was a regular here. He lied fascinatingly, ordered Lucullan's dinners, and it was truly very amusing to listen to him. Having never been to Russia, he spoke about it as if he were an old-timer in St. Petersburg... It was as if he was present at the death of Emperor Paul I, talking about some rescue paths that were deliberately damaged by the city. Palen... The matter ended with the count taking him to his home in Russia, and at his expense he traveled around our homeland and wrote a vulgar book, which misled even more French people about our fatherland, filling it everywhere with untruths and vulgar stories.”

It is difficult to understand the hatred of Russian bohemia towards Dumas - it cannot be explained by envy! I didn’t like how he writes, Nekrasov called his style “variegated and pretentious” - apparently, he read it in translations, since Dumas has neither motley nor pretentiousness, and one can rather accuse him of being too smooth; Chekhov believed that there was a lot of unnecessary stuff in Dumas’s novels, and in the 1890s he mercilessly shortened it for the publication of Suvorin (before that, Dumas was published by Smirdin - more or less completely; the tradition of shortening Dumas was preserved by Soviet translators). Well, ignore it if it’s bad. But Sovremennik bit him incessantly. Annenkov: “In Dumas’s speech... every thought is an absurd claim and every word is hilarious self-praise. This is Khlestakov...” Belinsky - critic V. P. Botkin: “I’m not even talking about your protege A. Dumas: he is a scoundrel and a vagabond, Bulgarin in the nobility of instincts and convictions, and in talent - he really has talent, I’m against that not a word, but a talent that relates to art and literature in the same way as the talent of a rope dancer or a rider from the Franconi troupe relates to the performing arts.” (Botkin did not share this opinion.) For what? What does Bulgarin have to do with it? Okay, here is Bulgarin and Grech’s journal “Son of the Fatherland”: “There are rumors about the imminent arrival here of the long-awaited Hume and the completely unexpected great (sic!) Dumas the Father. The first is brought here by family circumstances, the second is the desire of people to see and show themselves, I think, the second is even more important than the first. Well, I think he will write magnificent impressions de voyage, what a rich subject! La Russie, les Boyards russes, our eastern morals and customs, after all, this is a treasure for the famous storyteller, enough for ten volumes of witty chatter!.. You will see that my words will come true, he will write, by God, he will write... and we will buy and read , and we’re not alone, the French will buy it, the Germans will buy it, and perhaps even transfer it! However, the same thing can happen to us, and we will find, of course, a swindler-translator who will convey French stories about Russia in an ugly language in Russian translation.”

For the time being, we tolerated the “French tales.” In 1800, Jean François Georgel gave a rather neutral account of the trip; in 1809, Joseph de Maistre in “St. Petersburg Evenings” praised order and serfdom (but in a private letter he noted: “Come on - as incredible as it may be - to the Russian emperor on he has the mind to burn down St. Petersburg, no one will tell him that this act is associated with some inconveniences... no, everyone will remain silent; in extreme cases, his subjects will kill their sovereign (which, as we know, does not mean in the least that they do not have respect for him) - but even here no one will utter a word." In 1812, Anne de Stael arrived, expelled by Napoleon, and in her book “Ten Years of Exile” issued a set of platitudes: “This people is created from opposites... it cannot be measured by ordinary measures...”, called Russia an ideal, but did not want to live in it. In 1815, Dupre de Saint-Maur arrived, described carnivals, customs, retold horror stories; in 1826, playwright Jacques Anselot published “Six Months in Russia”: a set of banalities in assessments, but many facts (Dumas used his book). In 1829, a freemason traveler under the pseudonym Jean Baptiste Mey in the book “St. Petersburg and Russia in 1829” described a people “deformed by a vicious regime,” but the effect was softened in 1834 by the sugary “Balalaika” of Paul de Julvécourt, who married a Russian. , and in 1839 thunder struck - the Marquis Astolphe de Custine (1790–1857): his “Russia in 1839,” released in May 1843, was already banned by the Foreign Censorship Committee on June 1; They even banned Grech’s abusive review of it - there was no such book! (Even before the publication of Custine’s book, “The Pilgrim” by Victor d’Arlencourt, who was in Russia a year later than the marquis, appeared: “everything is imbued with barbarism and despotism,” “nothing is subject to publicity and discussion. They do not comment there, but perform” - but Arlencourt’s flattery there were more, and they weren’t so offended by him.)

Custine did not want to offend anyone; however, his words “no one was more shocked than me by the greatness of their nation and its political significance” were not noticed. He wrote that his predecessors flattered the Russians “like little children”; he believed that he could talk to them like adults. Wrong. Who can tolerate, for example, this: “Seeing the Russian courtiers in the performance of their duties, I was immediately struck by the extraordinary humility with which they fulfilled their role; they are a kind of high-ranking slaves. But as soon as the monarch leaves, the ease of gestures, the confidence of manners, the ease of tone return to them, unpleasantly contrasting with the complete self-denial that they showed a moment ago; in a word, the behavior of both masters and servants reveals the habits of servants. It is not just court etiquette that reigns here... no, disinterested and unaccountable servility reigns here, not excluding pride..."; “Is it my fault if, having arrived in a country with unlimited state power in search of new arguments against despotism at home, against the disorder called freedom, I saw nothing there except abuses perpetrated by the autocracy?..” Pushkin - P A. Vyazemsky: “I, of course, despise my fatherland from head to toe - but it annoys me if a foreigner shares this feeling with me.” Stalin, apparently, thought the same thing and banned de Custine.

The French who visited us between Custine and Dumas were reserved. 1840: Henri Mérimée published “A Year in Russia” in 1847, where he wrote that the serfs were “happy in their own way.” 1842: Xavier Marmier published “Letters about Russia, Finland and Poland” with arguments that everything Russian “is an organic product of soil and character” - it is incomprehensible, and just in case the book was banned. 1843: art critic Louis Viardot visited and published enthusiastic “Memoirs of a Hunt” and guidebooks. 1851: Charles de Saint-Julien, a teacher of French literature at the university, who lived in St. Petersburg for 15 years, published “A Picturesque Journey through Russia,” stipulating that it was “a simple journey, and not a pamphlet.” Balzac came in 1843. He quarreled with Custine over “Russia in 1839”; he himself wrote “Letters about Kyiv” in 1847, but did not publish it during his lifetime. “Northern Bee”: “Balzac spent two months with us and left. Many are now wondering what he will write about Russia. For some time now, Russia knows its own worth well and is little interested in the opinion of foreigners about itself, knowing in advance that it is difficult to expect a true judgment from people who come here as tourists...” From Russia they offered him to write a “refutation” of Custine - he refused: “They tell me that I missed the opportunity to earn big money... How stupid! Your monarch is too smart not to understand that a hired pen will never inspire confidence. I write neither for nor against Russia.” And yet I wrote both “against” and “for”. “[Nevsky] Prospect is no more like the [Parisian] Boulevards than rhinestones are like a diamond, it is deprived of the life-giving rays of the soul, the freedom to be ironic at everything... Everywhere there are only uniforms, rooster feathers, greatcoats... Nothing unexpected, no maidens of joy, no joy itself. The people, as always, are poor and take the rap for everything.” But: “I, unlike other Europeans visiting Russia, do not have the slightest desire to condemn its so-called despotism. I prefer the power of one person to the power of the crowd, because I feel that I will never be able to come to an agreement with the people.” He noted that Russia is an “Asian” country and one cannot look at it “through constitutional glasses,” but he wrote more about how disgusting he was with Jews and Poles, all of them trying to get away with something, while Russians tend to “submit, no matter what.” that, to submit at the risk of life, to submit even when submission is senseless and unnatural” - and thanks to this submission they will be able to conquer Europe if they are told to. As for the serf peasant: “in the current order of things, he lives carefree. He is fed, he is paid, so that slavery for him turns from evil into a source of happiness.”

In 1858, Théophile Gautier came and wrote only about architecture. Hugo never visited Russia and could not stand it: it “devoured Turkey,” the Russian emperor was a “monster.” Michelet, Dumas' idol, called Russia a country without a future, whose population abhors the principles of property, responsibility and labor. Dumas did not share their hostility. But we expected insults. Did you wait?

There is a lot of confusion in the lists of Dumas' books about Russia. Let's figure it out. Firstly, there are “Letters from St. Petersburg”, published in “Vek” from December 21, 1858 to March 10, 1859, then banned in France and published in Belgium in 1859 as “Letters on the emancipation of slaves in Russia” " Actually, it doesn’t talk about the trip, it’s an essay about serfdom. The work “From Paris to Astrakhan” is dedicated to the journey - 43 essays in “Monte Cristo” from June 17, 1858 to April 28, 1859, also published in “Constitutional” in 1861, published as a separate book in Leipzig as “Impressions of the trip to Russia" together with "Letters on the Emancipation of Slaves in Russia", then in Belgium and France (by Levi) in nine volumes, and finally, in 1865–1866, Levi published the four-volume set "In Russia", including "Letters on the Emancipation of Slaves in Russia " Notes about the second part of the trip - around the Caucasus - were published in the newspaper "Caucasus" from April 16 to May 15, 1859 and simultaneously in four volumes in the "Theater Library" series, in Leipzig - as "Caucasus. New impressions" and in Paris as "The Caucasus from Prometheus to Shamil", then as "The Caucasus: impressions of the trip"; There were other options. Plus several texts about Russian writers, sometimes included or not included in the publications. These books were not translated for a long time, only notes about a trip to the Caucasus in an abbreviated form entitled “Caucasus. The Travels of Alexandre Dumas" appeared in Tiflis in 1861, translated by P. N. Robrovsky. But there were excellent review works by S. N. Durylin, as well as M. I. Buyanov (“Dumas in Dagestan”, 1992; “Marquis against the Empire”, 1993; “Dumas in Transcaucasia”, 1993; “Alexander Dumas in Russia”, 1996). In 1993, the book “From Paris to Astrakhan” was published in translation by M. Yakovenko under the title “Travel Impressions. In Russia”, and in 2009 it was published under its real name, translated by V. A. Ishechkin. Most full translation"Caucasus" - Tbilisi, 1988; a translation is being prepared (perhaps already published) at the Art-Business Center publishing house, which publishes the collected works of Dumas.

Dumas conspired to travel with the artist Jean Pierre Moinet (in the absence of cameras, it is impossible to travel without an artist); The Kushelevs' retinue also included the Italian singer Milleotti and the Frenchman Dandre, an accountant and secretary. In Stettin we boarded the ship "Vladimir" - to Kronstadt, then on the ship "Cockerill" we arrived in St. Petersburg. This is where the confusion with dates begins. In Europe Gregorian calendar, we have Julian; in the diary of P.D. Durnovo, a relative of Kushelev, it is noted that the guests arrived on June 10 (June 22, new style), the maid of honor A.F. Tyutcheva wrote in the diary dated June 10: “The arrival of Hume the table-spinner.” And Dumas claimed that he ended up in St. Petersburg on June 26, that is, on the 14th according to the old style. “We said goodbye to Princess Dolgoruky, said goodbye to Prince Trubetskoy, who repeated his invitation to me to go on a wolf hunt in Gatchina, and settled into three or four carriages of Count Kushelev, who were waiting to take us to Bezborodko’s dacha, located on the right bank of the Neva beyond St. “Petersburg, a kilometer from the Arsenal, opposite the Smolny Monastery.” (This is in the Petrovsky Park area.) Walks around the city, places that a foreigner should see, white nights; learned to communicate with cab drivers, learned the words “naprava”, “naleva”, “pachol”. But first of all - prisons.

IN Peter and Paul Fortress they didn’t let me in, but he wrote about it and gave advice to Alexander I: “On the first anniversary of being on the throne, I would open all the casemates... and allow the people to inspect them; then I would call for volunteers, and they would publicly bombard them; behind them - masons who would brick the doors in front of everyone. And he would say: “Children, in previous reigns the nobles and peasants were slaves. And my predecessors needed prison cells. During my reign, the nobility and the peasants are all free. And I don’t need dungeons.” Through the Kushelevs, we managed to obtain permission to visit the prison “between Gorokhovaya and Uspenskaya streets.” IN early XIX century The third department was located on the corner of Gorokhovaya, the Okhrana appeared later; perhaps we are talking about the Administration of the Admiralty Unit, under which there was a Detective Department. Through an interpreter I spoke with a peasant who set fire to the manor house because his wife was breastfeeding puppies. “I shook his hand with all my heart, even though he was an arsonist. And he would not give his hand to his master, no matter what prince he was.”

In the first evenings at Kushelev’s, Dumas met “a writer who shares with Turgenev and Tolstoy the favorable attention of the young Russian generation” - Dmitry Vasilyevich Grigorovich (1822–1899), the son of a Russian landowner and a French woman. Grigorovich writes that they met at Hume's wedding. But the wedding was on July 20, old style (August 2), and guests to the Kushelevs began to come “to Dumas” right away; Durnovo wrote on June 27 that there were “too many people” there - everyone wanted to see the celebrity. Grigorovich agreed to be a guide, which cost him dearly. A.F. Pisemsky - A.V. Druzhinin: “Grigorovich, probably wanting to gain final European fame, became some kind of henchman of Dumas, travels with him everywhere and translates novels with him.” I. A. Goncharov - A. V. Druzhinin: “Now Petersburg is empty: only Grigorovich is busy with Dumas and spends his days with Kushelev-Bezborodko. Dumas also lives there: Grigorovich takes him around the city and the surrounding area and serves as his only source of information about Russia. What will come of this - God knows.” And Tyutchev called Grigorovich a “corn-leader” who leads the Frenchman “like a rare beast”...

The first excursion is Peterhof, the dacha of Ivan Ivanovich Panaev (Grigorovich: “Dumas asked to give him a chance to meet one of the real Russian writers. I told him Panaev and Nekrasov”), Oranienbaum. Dumas was preparing for the visit: “I heard a lot about Nekrasov, and not only as a great poet, but also as a poet whose genius meets today’s needs” - he bought Nekrasov’s collection and overnight, using Grigorovich’s interlinear translation, he translated two poems: “quite enough, to get an idea of ​​the caustic and sad genius of their author." Grigorovich: “I. I. Panaev, whom I warned, was also very pleased. We agreed on a day and the two of us set off on the ship. I sincerely thought to please both sides, but I was wrong in my calculations: this trip did not cost me in vain.” Evdokia Panaeva wrote in her memoirs that Dumas came to the dacha uninvited (I wonder how this would be possible?), ate a lot, the French are always hungry, she suggested taking a walk, but he wanted to eat more, after breakfast he started whining about lunch, somehow managed to kick him out, he imposed himself again and ate again, asked to spend the night “with swagger”, while swearing at the Kushelevs’ house, his secretary was a “nondescript fool” whom Dumas “pushed around like a lackey” (this is about Moine), then Dumas came a hundred more times and kept asking for food, but she did not give him pillows, etc. Womanish nonsense spread throughout the city. N. P. Shalikova - S. D. Kareeva: “Alex. Dumas, p?re in St. Petersburg. A good goose, they say! At dinner, Panaev appeared in front of his wife wearing something that looked like a shirt. Such, they say, self-praise and mauvais ton, which is terrible. Of course, he doesn’t value our people at all, only Nekrasov doesn’t worship him...” Grigorovich: “They later accused me in print that, without saying a word to anyone, out of nowhere, I unexpectedly brought Dumas to Panaev’s dacha and with him were several other unknown Frenchmen... On the occasion of this trip, Dumas was also punished. It is told how several times later, and also as a surprise, he appeared at Panaev’s dacha, accompanied by several unfamiliar Frenchmen, once brought as many as seven of them, and stayed overnight without ceremony, thus putting the owners of the house in a tragic position, who did not know what to do. to feed and where to lodge this uninvited gang... You will think that here we are not talking about a civilized, intelligent Frenchman, perfectly familiar with the conditions of decency, but about some wild bashi-bazouk from Adrianople. I was only once with Dumas at Panaev’s dacha; that same day, in the evening, we left back by boat for St. Petersburg.” Dumas, however, writes: “...we spent the night with Panaev and the next day, in the morning, we left for Oranienbaum.” He didn’t really say how Nekrasov received him, but apparently it was dry. (Later there was a conflict related to the fact that in 1856 a rumor spread in St. Petersburg social circles about the death of Countess A.K. Vorontsova-Dashkova: that in Paris she married an adventurer who abandoned her. Nekrasov in the poem “Princess”, as is considered to have described this story. In fact, in the month of publication of "The Princess" Dashkova was alive and her husband, Baron Poilly, was taking care of her. Dumas, commenting on his translation of the poem, said this, and Poilly then came to Russia and summoned Nekrasov to duel.)

Panaev in Sovremennik: “Petersburg received Mr. Dumas with complete Russian cordiality and hospitality... and how could it be otherwise? Mr. Dumas enjoys almost the same popularity in Russia as in France, as throughout the world among lovers of light reading... During the month of June, all of St. Petersburg was engaged in nothing but Mr. Dumas. There were rumors and anecdotes about him in all layers of St. Petersburg society; not a single conversation was complete without his name, he was sought out at all festivities, at all public gatherings, God knows what gentlemen were mistaken for him. It was worth jokingly shouting: There's Dumas! - and the crowd began to get excited and rushed in the direction you were pointing to.” Tyutchev: “The other evening I met Alexandre Dumas... It was not without difficulty that I squeezed through the crowd that had gathered around the celebrity and was loudly making more or less ridiculous remarks in his face, caused by his personality, but this, apparently, did not anger him at all, and did not hinder the very lively conversation he was having with one too famous lady, the divorced wife of Prince Dolgorukov... Dumas had his head uncovered, as is his custom, as they say; and this already gray head... is quite attractive with its animation and intelligence.”

Many people were infuriated by this excitement. A. F. Pisemsky told how at one of the evenings at Kushelev’s, the writer L. A. Mei, “having drunk enough, explained to Dumas openly everything that they thought about him in Russia, which terribly insulted him, so that he wanted to challenge him to a duel " N. F. Pavlov, “Votyaki and Mr. Dumas” (“Russian Messenger” by Katkov): “Who is unfamiliar with the works of Mr. Dumas? It seems that you should be burned with shame if you are caught that you don’t know a word of them. Meanwhile, in any European salon, in the company of European scientists and writers, you can safely say: I have not read a single page from Mr. Dumas, and no one will suspect you of ignorance or indifference to art. On the contrary, you will give a favorable opinion of yourself..." Herzen, "The Bell": "With shame, with regret, we read how our aristocracy lies at the feet of A. Dumas, how it runs to look at the “great and curly man” through the bars of the garden, begging take a walk in the park to Kushelev-Bezborodko.” Panaev stood up for the guest, albeit sourly - “it is known what kind of talent he has,” but one cannot offend and “Dumas’s little finger is more significant than the little fingers of the gentlemen.” Grech and Bulgarin together.” Grech is here for a reason; between him and Sovremennik there was a literary and political war; he invited Dumas to dinner, but Dumas did not mention him. Actress P.I. Orlova-Savina: “N. I. Grech and my other friends... said that such a gentleman is not worth good work.” (We are talking about the blanket that she was supposedly going to give to Dumas.) The cartoonists had fun: N. Stepanov depicted how Kushelev shoved bags of money into Dumas, and later drew Dumas with Caucasians and the caption: “ Mr Dumas! We bow to you - we take off our hats; Why don’t you respond in kind? You might as well take off your hat. Dumas: I’m not wearing a hat; and that I don’t bow to anyone, walk the streets in a fantastic suit and appear in decent houses with dirty feet, it’s because I left politeness in the last European city - St. Petersburg.” This is some completely unimaginable nonsense. But there was also something witty: Dumas holds Shamil by the clothes, he asks to leave him - “I am in a hurry to repel the attack of the Russians,” Dumas replies: “You can think about this trifle later, but now I need to have a serious talk with you: I came here to write your notes are in 25 volumes and I wish to get down to business right away.”

Goncharov to Druzhinin: “I saw Dumas twice for about five minutes, and he told me that he intended to write up to 200 volumes of travel, and by the way he specified 15 volumes for Russia, 17 for Greece, 20 for Asia Minor, etc. d. By God, so!” He was reminded of Mirecourt’s book, the magazine “Illustration” called him a literary hack: “... for Dumas, this or that king is all the same and he doesn’t bother about history.” Dostoevsky, “A series of articles on Russian literature” (“Time”, 1861): “... the Frenchman knows everything, even without learning anything... he knew even in Paris that he would write about Russia; Even, perhaps, he will write his journey in Paris, even before his trip to Russia, sell it to a bookseller and only then come to us - to show off, captivate and fly away. The Frenchman is always sure that he has no one to thank and nothing for, at least they really did something for him... because he is absolutely sure that... with his very appearance he made happy, consoled, rewarded and satisfied everyone and everyone on his way... having learned in passing Russian boyars (les boyards) to turn tables or blow soap bubbles... he finally decides to study Russia thoroughly, in detail, and goes to Moscow. In Moscow, he will look at the Kremlin, think about Napoleon, praise the tea... attack Peter the Great and then, quite appropriately, tell his readers his own biography... By the way, he will also pay attention to Russian literature; will talk about Pushkin and condescendingly note that he was a poet not without talents... Then the traveler says goodbye to Moscow, travels further, admires the Russian troikas and finally appears somewhere in the Caucasus, where he shoots Circassians together with Russian plastuns, makes acquaintance with Shamil and reads with him "The Three Musketeers" ...

Soviet critics scolded Dumas for communicating not with Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, but with some third-rate fools. Maurois and Troyat (both, by the way, Russians) - too. Troyat: “I haven’t heard anything about an aspiring writer named Lev and last name Tolstoy... and about another debutant, Fyodor Dostoevsky, who at that time was in hard labor in Siberia...” In fact, Dumas wrote that Grigorovich “shares with Turgenev and Tolstoy favorable attention of the young Russian generation." Why didn't you go to Yasnaya Polyana or to Dostoevsky in Tver? Yes, no one invited.

Another reproach is that he misrepresented everything and wrote nonsense. Maurois: “His stories upon his return from Russia surpassed the adventures of Monte Cristo in their incredibleness. It’s good for someone who comes from afar to invent.” In parallel with the publication of travelogues in France, articles with refutations poured into Russia: he described the wolf hunt incorrectly, the tarantass wheel was incorrect... He described the hunt from the words of Prince Repnin and reported it - but what a difference! Fool! One of the first commentators on “From Paris to Astrakhan” N.I. Berzenov reproached Dumas for “French boasting”; at the beginning of the 20th century E.I. Kozubsky spoke about “The Caucasus”: “The famous novelist Alexander Dumas the father, having visited the Caucasus, left a description his journey in a book filled with fables and nonsense.” They also attributed to him the “spreading cranberry”, which was invented in 1910 by theater critic Kugel for the parody play “The Love of a Russian Cossack”...

We still speak disdainfully, even lovingly. Dmitry Bykov: “About half of his notes are descriptions of gastronomic wonders and female types who were here at his service.” In fact - 12 pages out of 450. We misrepresent it shamelessly. From the same article by Bykov in 2008 (very benevolent): “What prevented many from accepting Dumas’s point of view (especially unpleasant, of course, for any reformers, especially the Bolsheviks) was his quiet, benevolent amazement of a European at the natives: if they live so, that means they like it!.. In a conversation with Nekrasov (a traveler is obliged to see the opposition, this is as usual) Dumas dropped a revealing remark: “By abolishing serfdom, Russia will take the path of the whole of enlightened Europe - the path leading to all Damn it!'" At one time we were very fond of quoting this quote - Dumas is against revolutions, he said that after the abolition of serfdom the country would “go to hell”, and this is bad. In fact, the phrase is used in the following context: when we sailed to St. Petersburg, “with us on board, among other noble passengers, were Prince Trubetskoy and Princess Dolgorukaya. In all cases, calling loud Scandinavian, Russian, Muscovite, Mongolian, Slavic or Tatar name, we will not say what it will come to. With the decree of His Majesty Emperor Alexander on the liberation of the peasants, I think the entire Russian aristocracy will go with that the same way that ours from 1889 to 1893 is to hell... But I’ll tell you where it came from... I’ll try to find out everything thoroughly to help you distinguish hereditary princes from false ones.” Not the country to hell, but the aristocracy, and to hell with it...

We know that he wrote with inhuman scrupulousness. (Panaev admitted: “It’s hard to imagine a more active and hardworking person.”) People who took the time to read his books noticed this. Historian Pavel Nikolaevich Ardashev (“Petersburg Echoes”, 1896): “When I was in Narva, I read Dumas’ Impressions of a Travel through Russia. It is generally accepted that his stories about Russia and Russian history are examples of fantastic lies, but what turns out to be? Everything that he conveys, for example, about the behind-the-scenes history of the Russian court at the beginning of the reign of Catherine II, turned out to be already familiar to me - from Bilbasov’s book, written on the basis of archival documents. The only difference is that Bilbasov’s work was published two or three years ago, and op. Dumas is almost 50 years old. In addition, Bilbasov, of course, has all this in much more detail. It is curious that Dumas even cites (in translation, of course) Orlov’s letter to Catherine about the murder Peter III. Bilbasov’s “discovery” turned out to be anticipated by a whole half century.”

M.I. Buyanov conducted titanic investigations to establish how accurate Dumas was, and came to the conclusion: “He was neither mistaken nor inventive... as an observant person, he paid attention to such little things that people of a different type did not consider necessary to notice.” . V. A. Ishechkin, a translator, says that he was driven by “a growing sense of protest against the statements of literary scholars of the past and present, that the famous guest from France did not understand Russian life, got everything wrong in his essays, and they are unworthy of the reader’s attention... My trust in Dumas was completely justified. Every page turned confirmed that there was no confusion in the essays. The essays are written with travelogue precision. Knowing the old names, it is easy to find the trace of Dumas in the city on the Neva, in Moscow and the Volga cities, in the Caucasus. Traveling in his footsteps helped me verify this. For example, on Valaam, without questioning, according to the author’s descriptions, it was possible to identify the bay where Dumas got off the ship ashore; there, even the trees along the path leading to the monastery stairs stand the same.” The historian N. Ya. Eidelman noted that Dumas has almost no mistakes either in Russian history, or in geography, or in ethnography, that, having visited the Borodino field, he accurately reconstructed the course of the battle; botanist from Dagestan A. Adzhieva noted that Dumas is the first foreigner to describe Sarykum, the most high dune in Eurasia... He didn’t invent anything - he couldn’t do it.

Its thoroughness amazes the imagination. I wrote the word “king” - on two pages the etymology of the word with links to sources. Gave an overview of Russian journalism, indicating circulation, printing houses, trends, and authors. He explained how janitors differ from receptionists and concierges, and guards from police officers. I saw an eunuch in a shop - he cited research on eunuch. He described the views not approximately - “ah, white nights” - but precisely: “Right in front of the balcony there is an embankment, from it two large granite stairs with a 50-foot flagpole lead down to the river bank... Behind the landing stage, washing it with its waters, is the slow Neva ; it is 8–10 times wider than the Seine in Paris at the Pont des Arts; the river is dotted with ships under long red pennants fluttering in the wind, loaded with spruce timber and firewood coming from the center of Russia along the internal canals built by Peter the Great. These ships never return to where they came from; built for the delivery of timber, they are sold along with the timber, dismantled later and burned as firewood.” Fair on the Volga - when it was founded, everything with numbers, what goods, where from, for what amounts. Geology: “Having accepted the Kama, the Volga River becomes wider and islands appear; the left bank remains low, while the right, uneven, starting from the Lower Bank, rises to a height of 400 feet; it is composed of pottery clay, asp (roofing slates), limestones and sandstones without a single rock.” About the post office: “Each postmaster, moreover, always has on his desk a sealed postal book, sealed with the wax seal of the district, from the spine on a cord, which he is expressly forbidden to cut. He is deprived of his certificate if the wax seal is broken and the starosta does not provide sufficient reasons for its violation.” Ethnography: “The Kirghiz are not indigenous people at all, they come from Turkestan and, apparently, are natives of China... Previously, Kalmyks lived here, who occupied the entire steppe between the Volga and the Urals... Now about why the migration happened. Most possible reason: methodical limitation of the power of the leader and the freedom of the people, practiced by the Russian government..."

Reproach: all this information is taken from books and newspapers. Excuse me, was he supposed to invent them? Of course, he worked on the basis of oral stories and written sources, immediately upon arriving in St. Petersburg he ran to Dufour’s bookstore, read Karamzin... “From Paris to Astrakhan” - short course the history of Russia with all the murders and coups that we were forbidden to write and read about. Tyutchev to his wife on August 6, 1858: “I was rudely interrupted by the arrival of a courier sent by Minister Kovalevsky with a very urgent letter in which he asks me to make sure whether our censorship committee missed a certain issue of a magazine published by Dumas and called Monte Cristo. Just yesterday I learned by chance in Peterhof from Princess Saltykova about the existence of this issue, which apparently contains rather immodest details about the Russian court...” It was about the destruction of the will of Catherine II, who gave the throne to her grandson; it was a state secret. The follies of Pavel, the pacification of the Streletsky rebellion, the favoritism of Biron - of course, Dumas’s book is not suitable for a dissertation, but he did not make gross mistakes, and if he told a story, he said that it was a story. Naturally, he liked Peter I: “it’s scary to think where Russia would be if Peter’s heirs shared the progressive ideas of this brilliant man,” more or less Catherine II; Alexander I is a “kind, subtle, unhappy man.” There is nothing good to say about the rest.

That he poked our noses at our history is not so bad; What he wrote about us in general seemed terrible. Revelry: “Russians are more than ghosts: ghosts; with a serious look they walk next to each other or behind each other and walk neither sad nor joyful, not allowing themselves a word or a gesture.” “Poor people! Hasn't it been the habit of slavery that has brought up dumbness in you? Well, speak, well, sing, well, read, be cheerful! You are free today. Yes, I understand that, all you have to do is acquire the habit of freedom... To believe in something, you need to know it, but the Russian peasant does not know what freedom is.”

He compiled a kind of Russian dictionary. Scaffolding erected for the restoration of the bell tower of Peter and Paul: “It’s been a year since these scaffolding was raised, and they will stand for another year, and two, and maybe three years. In Russia this is called un frais - Milch cow. Milch cow- this is abuse. There are no words in Russian to translate our common expression - “arr”; “ter les frais” - to put an end to unnecessary expenses. In Russia, costs of this kind are not transferred at all: new ones appear or the old ones continue to be increased.” “These two sous were inflated to 1,500 rubles. This is what they call un frais - postscripts, fraud."“In Russia, everyone is in charge rank Chin- translation of the French word “rank”. Only in Russia rank is not earned, it is acquired; men serve there according to rank, not personal merit. According to one Russian, the rank is also a hothouse for intriguers and swindlers.” “When in Russia they are dissatisfied with some colonel, he is promoted to general. And now you will see how the colonels operate there; this is done quite easily and without sin, as they say in Russia, so that all tricks or maneuvers do not look like armed robbery.” Kickbacks: “Official prices are discussed between the colonel and the authorities. The authorities issue certificates according to which colonels are reimbursed for their expenses. Prices are inflated; the authorities receive a third, the colonels two-thirds of the profits. And all this is hidden from the emperor, so as not to upset His Majesty... Don't upset owner“This is the greatest concern of the Russian person - from the serf to the prime minister.” “Philanthropic institutions are mainly oriented towards providing a living opportunity for a certain number of employees. Those for whom the shelters were created only get there later, and sometimes they don’t get there at all. Nothing! The establishment exists; that's all it takes." “What the Russian clergy is is known - corruption that corrupts a person, but corruption with its head held high, with a venerable beard and in luxurious clothes.” “The most typical story during my travels: firefighters extinguishing a house. For water you have to run half a mile to the pond. In response to my proposal to organize a chain, the head of the fire brigade explains that this is not provided for by law...”

“Russia is a huge facade. But no one deals with what is behind the façade. Anyone who tries to look behind the facade resembles a cat that first saw itself in the mirror and goes behind it, hoping to find a second cat on the other side. And what’s funny is that in Russia, a country of abuses, everyone, from the emperor to the janitor, wants to end them. Everyone talks about the abuses, everyone knows about them, analyzes them and regrets them... But as soon as they touch on any abuse in Russia, you know who raises a cry? Those who were hurt? No, that would be too awkward. Those who have not yet been touched, but who are afraid that their turn will come, are screaming.” “What is unheard of is what is heard in the stories of the Russians themselves about the thefts that are committed in administrations... Everyone knows about thefts and thieves, however, the swindlers continue to steal, and the thefts are becoming more and more loud. The only one who supposedly does not know about thefts or thieves is the emperor.” “But there are laws against abuse, right? Oh yeah. Ask what the local police are doing, ispravnik. Police officer “II touche la dome du vol” - beret. Yes, these abuses are prohibited by law. But the thing that needs to be shouted rather than talked about is that the law in Russia is in the hands of officials who receive salaries not for observing the law, but for trading it.” “We talked about the difficulties of eliminating abuses in Russia: as soon as you touch one of the perpetrators, the rest begin to shout indignantly in defense. In Russia, the holy ark is abused: whoever touches it will suffer harm.” Oh really?!

The “Letters on the Emancipation of Slaves” have not yet been translated into Russian, and there is the most unpleasant thing that not only the official, but also the oppositionist is unlikely to like. From Dumas you expect a fiery statement: long live freedom, how can slavery be tolerated! - but this is a very dry work, which sets out the comparative history of slavery in the Roman Empire, Gaul and Ancient Rus'. Dumas studied (with the help of translators) Russian Truth (code of legal norms medieval Rus'), Code of Laws of 1497 and 1550 - how many of us have even opened them? He explained who the smerds, ryadovichi, zakup, izorniks, ognishchans, tiuns, housekeepers, serfs and servants were, and where they all came from; do we know this? the main idea Dumas: if in Europe slavery arose through the capture of prisoners and the liberation struggle was a struggle against a stranger (here he incidentally gave short essay French revolutions with complete justification of the Great Revolution, because of this “Letters” were banned), then “Russian chronicles will positively say that Russian slavery began not by conquest, but by voluntary conscription.” Self-sale into slavery, entry into service (tiuns, key-keepers) “without a row” (without reservations), bankruptcy; As a result, “the landowner, the ruler, is not, as in France, a conqueror and, therefore, an enemy from whom the people strive to free themselves. This is the protector, as people call him, too weak to defend themselves, they transfer to him the right to defend them and the rights to themselves... A people who are incapable of self-government and every now and then call on a foreign ruler, whom they allow to take for themselves and his confidants as much land as he wishes; a people who do not set limits to the power of the ruler, because they do not like struggle and love passivity... a people who themselves give up their freedom, without taking precautions, in order to receive payment for the loss of freedom, to retain some rights for themselves, who, having received food and shelter , does not care about freedom for his children, just as he did not care about his own; such a people one day finds themselves, incapable of resistance, in the hands of usurpers and murderers... They complain, but do not rebel, still hoping for the justice of the ruler whom they call their father, like God...”

He described the situation of serfs in the 19th century in great detail - the intricacies of corvée, quitrent, conscription into the army, corporal punishment. He outlined the published draft reform and described the parties that discussed it - reactionaries, moderates and radicals; he himself is on the side of the third, who “want emancipation at any cost, as a return to moral consciousness, as atonement for centuries-old injustice.” But it is not enough to abolish serfdom - “it is necessary to change the system where the desire of the ruler stands above the laws.” What changes can await a country whose genes include voluntary servitude? According to the “Letters” it turns out that there are none. But in “Caucasus” Dumas made a prediction: “Russia will break apart... There will be a northern empire with its capital in the Baltic, a western with its capital in Poland, a southern one in the Caucasus and an eastern one, including Siberia... An emperor who will rule at the time when this great upheaval takes place , will retain St. Petersburg and Moscow, that is, the true Russian throne; the leader supported by France will be elected king of Poland; the unfaithful governor will raise troops and become king in Tiflis; some exile... will establish a republic from Kursk to Tobolsk. It is impossible for an empire covering a seventh part globe, remained in one hand. A hand that is too firm will be broken, a hand that is too weak will unclench, and in both cases it will have to let go of what it is holding.” I was wrong about Siberia... but he didn’t say when all this would happen.

He not only wrote about Russians, but also translated them: in St. Petersburg, Grigorovich made for him interlinear translations of Lermontov, Pushkin, Bestuzhev, Vyazemsky; He reached other poets in Tiflis; there were enough assistants everywhere. “And no one, including the real hereditary boyar Naryshkin, always dissatisfied with the translations of others, who would deign to make his own translation... Women were especially disposed towards Lermontov.” Lermontov was translated for him by Princess Dolgorukaya (he calls her Anna, but it seems that he means Olga Dmitrievna Dolgorukaya, the wife of Prince P.V. Dolgorukov, nicknamed Kolchenogiy - Tyutchev wrote that he saw Dumas with her). Back in 1854-1855, Dumas published “A Hero of Our Time” in “The Musketeer” translated by Eduard Schaeffer (this was the fourth translation into French, Dumas mistakenly indicated that it was the first). Now he wrote off and met (in August 1858 in Moscow) with E. P. Rostopchina, who knew Lermontov closely, she wrote an essay about him, which Dumas included in “Caucasus”. He assessed it this way: “This is the spirit of the scale and strength of Alfred de Musset, with whom he has a great resemblance... only, in my opinion, better built and of a more durable structure, it is intended for a longer life...” Translated and published “Gifts of the Terek”, “ Duma", "Dispute", "Cliff", "Clouds", "From Goethe", "Gratitude", "My Prayer" and gave literary scholars a riddle: a poem he called "The Wounded". There are still debates whether this refers to some famous thing that Dumas translated in such a way that it is unrecognizable, or (in Lately are inclined to this point of view) he actually found the lost text in the albums.

Chapter 19 Second Person in the State A few weeks after the fiasco of our community, around the beginning of May 1943, Goebbels was not slow to discover in Bormann precisely those virtues that he had so recently attributed to Goering. He gave Bormann assurances that in future everything would be