Lev (Leib) Moiseevich Kvitko - Jewish (Yiddish) poet. Born in the town of Goloskov, Podolsk province (now the village of Goloskov, Khmelnitsky region of Ukraine), according to documents - November 11, 1890. He was orphaned at an early age, was brought up by his grandmother, studied in a cheder for some time, and was forced to work from childhood. He began writing poetry in 1902. The first publication was in May 1917 in the socialist newspaper Dos Frae Worth (Free Word). The first collection is "Lidelekh" ("Songs", Kyiv, 1917).
From the middle of 1921 he lived and published in Berlin, then in Hamburg, where he worked in the Soviet trade mission, published both in Soviet and Western periodicals. Here he joined the Communist Party, led communist agitation among the workers. In 1925, fearing arrest, he moved to the USSR. He published many books for children (17 books were published in 1928 alone). It is thanks to children's works that he gained fame.
For caustic satirical verses published in the magazine "Di roite welt" ("Red World"), he was accused of "right deviation" and expelled from the editorial office of the magazine. In 1931 he entered the Kharkov Tractor Plant as a worker. Then he continued his professional literary activity. Lev Kvitko considered the autobiographical novel in verse "Junge Yorn" ("Young Years"), on which he worked for thirteen years (1928-1941), to be his life's work. The first publication of the novel took place in Kaunas in 1941; the novel was published in Russian only in 1968.
Since 1936 he lived in Moscow. In 1939 he joined the CPSU (b).
During the war years, he was a member of the Presidium of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC) and the editorial board of the JAC newspaper "Einikait" ("Unity"), in 1947-1948 - the literary and artistic almanac "Motherland". In the spring of 1944, on the instructions of the JAC, he was sent to the Crimea.
Among the leading figures of the JAC, Lev Kvitko was arrested on January 23, 1949. On July 18, 1952, he was accused by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR of treason and sentenced to the highest measure of social protection. On August 12, 1952, he was shot. He was buried at the Donskoy cemetery in Moscow. He was posthumously rehabilitated by the VKVS of the USSR on November 22, 1955.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Lev Moiseevich Kvitko was born in the village of Goloskovo, Podolsk province. The family was in poverty, hunger, poverty. All children at an early age dispersed to work. Including from the age of 10, Lev began to work. He taught himself to read and write. Poetry began to compose even before he learned to write. Later he moved to Kyiv, where he began to publish. In 1921, on a ticket from the Kyiv publishing house, he went with a group of other Yiddish writers to Germany to study. In Berlin, Kvitko barely survived, but two of his collections of poems were published there. In search of work, he moved to Hamburg, where he began working as a worker in the port.
Returning to Ukraine, he continued to write poetry. It was translated into Ukrainian by Pavlo Tychyna, Maxim Rylsky, Volodymyr Sosiura. In Russian, Kvitko's poems are known in translations by Akhmatova, Marshak, Chukovsky, Helemsky, Svetlov, Slutsky, Mikhalkov, Naydenova, Blaginina, Ushakov. These translations themselves became a phenomenon in Russian poetry. With the outbreak of the war, Kvitko was not taken into the active army due to age. He was called to Kuibyshev to work in the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC). It was a tragic accident, because Kvitko was far from politics. The JAC, which had collected colossal funds from wealthy American Jews for arming the Red Army, turned out to be unnecessary to Stalin after the war and was declared a reactionary Zionist body.
However, in 1946 Kvitko left the JAC and devoted himself entirely to poetic creativity. But his work in the JAC was remembered during his arrest. He was charged that in 1946 he had established a personal connection with the American resident Goldberg, whom he informed about the state of affairs in the Union of Soviet Writers. He was also accused of leaving in his youth to study in Germany in order to leave the USSR forever, and in the port in Hamburg he sent weapons for Chai Kang Shi under the guise of dishes. Arrested January 22, 1949. He spent 2.5 years in solitary confinement. At the trial, Kvitko was forced to admit his mistake in writing poetry in the Hebrew language Yiddish, and this was a brake on the path of Jewish assimilation. Say, he used the Yiddish language, which has outlived its time and which separates the Jews from the friendly family of the peoples of the USSR. And in general, Yiddish is a manifestation of bourgeois nationalism. After going through interrogations and torture, he was shot on August 12, 1952.
Soon Stalin died, and after his death, the first group of Soviet writers went on a trip to the United States. Among them was Boris Polevoy - the author of "The Tale of a Real Man", the future editor of the magazine "Youth". In America, the communist writer Howard Fast asked him: what happened to Lev Kvitko, with whom I became friends in Moscow and then corresponded? Why did he stop responding to emails? Evil rumors are spreading here. “Don't believe the rumors, Howard,” Polevoy said. - Lev Kvitko is alive and well. I live in the same area with him in the writer's house and saw him last week.”
Place of residence: Moscow, st. Maroseyka, 13, apt. 9.
a lion (Leib) Moiseevich Kvitko(Yiddish לייב קוויטקאָ ; October 15 - August 12) - Soviet Jewish (Yiddish) poet.
Biography
Born in the town of Goloskov, Podolsk province (now the village of Goloskov, Khmelnytsky region of Ukraine), according to documents - November 11, 1890, but did not know the exact date of his birth and presumably called 1893 or 1895. Orphaned at an early age, brought up by his grandmother, studied for some time in a cheder, and was forced to work from childhood. He began writing poetry at the age of 12 (or, perhaps, earlier - due to confusion with the date of his birth). The first publication was in May 1917 in the socialist newspaper Dos Frie Worth (Free Word). The first collection is "Lidelekh" ("Songs", Kyiv, 1917).
From the middle of 1921 he lived and published in Berlin, then in Hamburg, where he worked in the Soviet trade mission, published in both Soviet and Western periodicals. Here he joined the Communist Party, led communist agitation among the workers. In 1925, fearing arrest, he moved to the USSR. He published many books for children (17 books were published in 1928 alone).
Translations
Lev Kvitko is the author of a number of Yiddish translations from Ukrainian, Belarusian and other languages. The poems of Kvitko himself were translated into Russian by A. Akhmatova, S. Marshak, S. Mikhalkov, E. Blaginina, M. Svetlov and others.
On the text of the poem by L. Kvitko "Violin" (translated by M. Svetlov), the second part of the Sixth Symphony by Moses Weinberg was written.
Editions in Russian
- On a visit. M.-L., Detizdat, 1937
- When I grow up. M., Detizdat, 1937
- In the forest. M., Detizdat, 1937
- Letter to Voroshilov. M., 1937 Fig. V. Konashevich
- Letter to Voroshilov. M., 1937. Fig. M. Rodionova
- Poems. M.-L., Detizdat, 1937
- Swing. M., Detizdat, 1938
- Red Army. M., Detizdat, 1938
- Horse. M., Detizdat, 1938
- Lyam and Petrik. M.-L., Detizdat, 1938
- Poems. M.-L., Detizdat, 1938
- Poems. M., Pravda, 1938
- On a visit. M., Detizdat, 1939
- Lullaby. M., 1939. Fig. M. Gorshman
- Lullaby. M., 1939. Fig. V. Konashevich
- Letter to Voroshilov. Pyatigorsk, 1939
- Letter to Voroshilov. Voroshilovsk, 1939
- Letter to Voroshilov. M., 1939
- Mihasik. M., Detizdat, 1939
- Talk. M.-L., Detizdat, 1940
- Ahahah. M., Detizdat, 1940
- Conversations with loved ones. M., Goslitizdat, 1940
- Red Army. M.-L., Detizdat, 1941
- Hello. M., 1941
- War game. Alma-Ata, 1942
- Letter to Voroshilov. Chelyabinsk, 1942
- On a visit. M., Detgiz, 1944
- Horse. M., Detgiz, 1944
- Sledging. Chelyabinsk, 1944
- Spring. M.-L., Detgiz, 1946
- Lullaby. M., 1946
- Horse. M., Detgiz, 1947
- A story about a horse and about me. L., 1948
- Horse. Stavropol, 1948
- Violin. M.-L., Detgiz, 1948
- To the sun. M., Der Emes, 1948
- To my friends. M., Detgiz, 1948
- Poems. M., Soviet writer, 1948.
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An excerpt characterizing Kvitko, Lev Moiseevich
Natasha was 16 years old, and it was 1809, the same year until which, four years ago, she counted on her fingers with Boris after she kissed him. Since then, she has never seen Boris. In front of Sonya and with her mother, when the conversation turned to Boris, she spoke quite freely, as if it were a settled matter, that everything that had happened before was childish, about which it was not worth even talking about, and which had long been forgotten. But in the most secret depths of her soul, the question of whether the commitment to Boris was a joke or an important, binding promise tormented her.Ever since Boris left Moscow for the army in 1805, he had not seen the Rostovs. Several times he visited Moscow, passing not far from Otradnoye, but he never visited the Rostovs.
It sometimes occurred to Natasha that he did not want to see her, and her guesses were confirmed by the sad tone in which the elders spoke of him:
“In this century, old friends are not remembered,” the countess said after the mention of Boris.
Anna Mikhailovna, who had lately visited the Rostovs less frequently, also behaved herself in a particularly dignified manner, and each time spoke enthusiastically and gratefully about the merits of her son and about the brilliant career in which he was. When the Rostovs arrived in St. Petersburg, Boris came to visit them.
He rode towards them not without emotion. The memory of Natasha was the most poetic memory of Boris. But at the same time, he rode with the firm intention of making it clear to her and her family that the childish relationship between him and Natasha could not be an obligation either for her or for him. He had a brilliant position in society, thanks to intimacy with Countess Bezukhova, a brilliant position in the service, thanks to the patronage of an important person, whose trust he fully enjoyed, and he had nascent plans for marrying one of the richest brides in St. Petersburg, which could very easily come true. . When Boris entered the Rostovs' living room, Natasha was in her room. Upon learning of his arrival, she flushed almost ran into the living room, beaming with more than an affectionate smile.
Boris remembered that Natasha in a short dress, with black eyes shining from under her curls and with a desperate, childish laugh, whom he knew 4 years ago, and therefore, when a completely different Natasha entered, he was embarrassed, and his face expressed enthusiastic surprise. This expression on his face delighted Natasha.
“What, do you recognize your little friend as a minx?” said the Countess. Boris kissed Natasha's hand and said that he was surprised at the change that had taken place in her.
- How you have improved!
“Sure!” answered Natasha's laughing eyes.
- Is your father old? she asked. Natasha sat down and, without entering into a conversation between Boris and the countess, silently examined her children's fiancé to the smallest detail. He felt the weight of that stubborn, affectionate look on himself, and from time to time glanced at her.
Uniform, spurs, tie, Boris's hairstyle, all this was the most fashionable and comme il faut [quite decently]. Natasha noticed this now. He was sitting a little sideways on an armchair near the countess, adjusting with his right hand the cleanest, drenched glove on his left, he spoke with a special, refined pursing of his lips about the amusements of the highest Petersburg society and with meek mockery recalled the old Moscow times and Moscow acquaintances. Not accidentally, as Natasha felt it, he mentioned, naming the highest aristocracy, about the ball of the envoy, which he was at, about invitations to NN and to SS.
Natasha sat all the time in silence, looking at him from under her brows. This look more and more disturbed and embarrassed Boris. He often looked back at Natasha and interrupted his stories. He sat for no more than 10 minutes and stood up, bowing. All the same curious, defiant and somewhat mocking eyes looked at him. After his first visit, Boris told himself that Natasha was just as attractive to him as before, but that he should not give in to this feeling, because marrying her - a girl with almost no fortune - would be the death of his career, and resuming the old relationship without the purpose of marriage would be an ignoble act. Boris decided on his own to avoid meeting Natasha, but, despite this decision, he arrived a few days later and began to travel often and spend whole days with the Rostovs. It seemed to him that he needed to explain himself to Natasha, to tell her that everything old should be forgotten, that, despite everything ... she cannot be his wife, that he has no fortune, and she will never be given for him. But he did not succeed in everything and it was embarrassing to start this explanation. Every day he became more and more confused. Natasha, according to the remark of her mother and Sonya, seemed to be in love with Boris in the old way. She sang his favorite songs to him, showed him her album, forced him to write in it, did not allow him to remember the old, letting him know how wonderful the new was; and every day he left in a fog, without saying what he intended to say, not knowing himself what he was doing and why he came, and how it would end. Boris stopped visiting Helen, received daily reproachful notes from her, and yet spent whole days with the Rostovs.
One evening, when the old countess, sighing and groaning, in a night cap and blouse, without overhead letters, and with one poor tuft of hair protruding from under a white calico cap, was laying prostrations of the evening prayer on the rug, her door creaked, and in shoes on her bare feet, also in a blouse and hairpins, Natasha ran in. The Countess looked back and frowned. She was finishing her last prayer: “Will this coffin be my bed?” Her prayer mood was destroyed. Natasha, red and animated, seeing her mother at prayer, suddenly stopped in her run, sat down and involuntarily stuck out her tongue, threatening herself. Noticing that her mother was continuing her prayer, she ran on tiptoe to the bed, quickly sliding one small foot against the other, kicked off her shoes and jumped onto that bed, for which the countess was afraid that he would not be her coffin. This bed was high, feather-bed, with five ever-decreasing pillows. Natasha jumped up, drowned in a feather bed, rolled over to the wall and began to fiddle under the covers, laying down, bending her knees to her chin, kicking her legs and laughing a little audibly, now covering her head, then looking at her mother. The countess finished her prayer and with a stern face went up to the bed; but, seeing that Natasha was covered with her head, she smiled her kind, weak smile.
“Well, well, well,” said the mother.
“Mom, can we talk, huh?” – said Natasha. - Well, in the darling once, well, more, and it will be. And she took her mother's neck and kissed her under the chin. In her treatment of her mother, Natasha showed outward rudeness of manner, but she was so sensitive and dexterous that no matter how she wrapped her arms around her mother, she always knew how to do it so that the mother would not be hurt, unpleasant, or embarrassed.
Lev (Leib) Moiseevich Kvitko- Jewish (Yiddish) poet. He wrote in Yiddish. Born in the town of Goloskov, Podolsk province (now the village of Goloskovo, Khmelnytsky region of Ukraine), according to documents - November 11, 1890, but did not know the exact date of his birth and presumably called 1893 or 1895. He was orphaned at an early age, was brought up by his grandmother, studied for some time in a cheder, was forced to work from childhood, changed many professions, self-taught mastered Russian literacy, and was engaged in self-education. He began writing poetry at the age of 12 (or, perhaps, earlier - due to confusion with the date of his birth). First publication in May 1917 in the socialist newspaper Dos Frae Worth (Free Word). The first collection is "Lidelekh" ("Songs", Kyiv, 1917).
Representatives of the Joint with the leaders of the Kyiv Culture League. Sitting (from left to right): artist M. Epshtein, poet L. Kvitko, artist I.-B. Rybak, artist B. Aronson, artist I. Chaikov. Standing: literary critic Ba'al-Mahashavot, unknown, E. Wurzanger (Joint), philologist Ba'al-Dimyon (N. Shtif), C. Spivak (Joint), philologist Z. Kalmanovich, writer D. Bergelson, former minister on Jewish Affairs in the Government of the Central Rada V. Latsky-Bertholdi. Kyiv. May-June 1920. From the book by M. Beiser, M. Mitsel “American Brother. Joint in Russia, USSR, CIS” (without year and place of publication).
The revolution
In 1917 Kvitko settled in Kyiv. The publication of his poems in the collection "Eigns" put him in the triad (together with D. Gofshtein and P. Markish) of the leading poets of the so-called Kyiv group. The poem Reuter Sturm, written by him in October 1918 (Red Storm, Dos Vort newspaper, 1918, and Baginen magazine, 1919), was the first work in Yiddish about the October Revolution. However, in the collections "Trit" ("Steps", 1919) and "Lyric. Geist ”(“ Lyrics. Spirit ”, 1921) next to the youthfully fervent perception of the revolution sounded anxious confusion before the gloomy and mysterious in life, which, according to S. Niger, made Kvitko and Der Nister’s work related.
In Kvitko's poems of these years, a simple-heartedly open view of the world (which makes all his work for children especially attractive), a refined depth of perception of the world, poetic innovation, and expressionistic searches were combined with the transparent clarity of a folk song. Their language strikes with richness and idiomatic coloring.
From the middle of 1921 he lived and published in Berlin, then in Hamburg, where he worked in the Soviet trade mission, published both in Soviet and Western periodicals. Here he joined the Communist Party, led communist agitation among the workers. In 1925, fearing arrest, he moved to the USSR. He published many books for children (17 books were published in 1928 alone).
At the end of the 1920s, he became a member of the editorial board of the magazine Di roite welt, in which his cycle of stories about life in Hamburg, Riogrander fel (Riogrand skins, 1926; separate edition 1928), his autobiographical story Lam un Petrik "("Lyam and Petrik", 1928–29; separate edition 1930; in Russian translation 1958) and other works. In 1928 alone, 17 books by Kvitko for children were published. Kvitko's satirical poems in "Di roite welt", which then formed the section "Caricature" ("Cartoons") in his collection "Gerangl" ("Fight", 1929), and especially the poem "Der Stinklfoigl Moili" ("Moili's Stinky Bird" , that is, My[she] Li[tvakov] / see M. Litvakov /) against the dictate in the literature of the leaders of the Evsektsiya, caused a devastating campaign, during which the “proletarian” writers accused Kvitko of a “right deviation” and succeeded in expelling him from the editorial board magazine. At the same time, writers-"fellow travelers" - D. Gofshtein, editor of the state publishing house H. Kazakevich (1883-1936) and others were subjected to administrative repressions.
30s
For caustic satirical verses published in the magazine "Di roite welt" ("Red World"), he was accused of "right deviation" and expelled from the editorial office of the magazine. In 1931 he entered the Kharkov Tractor Plant as a worker. Then he continued his professional literary activity. Only after the liquidation of literary associations and groups in 1932 did Kvitko take one of the leading places in Soviet literature in Yiddish, mainly as a children's writer. His poems, which compiled the collection Geklibene Werk (Selected Works, 1937), already fully met the standards of so-called socialist realism. Auto-censorship also affected his novel in verse "Junge Jorn" ("Young Years"), signal copies of which appeared on the eve of the invasion of German troops into the territory of the Soviet Union (the novel was published in Russian translation in 1968; 16 chapters in Yiddish were published in 1956–63 in the Parisian newspaper Pariser Zeitshrift). From 1936 he lived in Moscow. In 1939 he joined the CPSU (b).
Lev Kvitko considered his life's work to be the autobiographical novel in verse "Junge Jorn" ("Young Years"), on which he worked for thirteen years (1928-1941, first publication: Kaunas, 1941, published in Russian in 1968).
Creativity of the war years
during the war years he was a member of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee and the editorial board of the EAK newspaper "Einikait" ("Unity"), in 1947-1948. - literary and artistic almanac "heimland" ("Motherland"). His collections of poems Fire oif di sonim (Fire on the Enemy, 1941) and others called for the fight against the Nazis. Poems 1941–46 compiled the collection "Gezang fun mein gemit" ("Song of my soul", 1947; in Russian translation 1956). Kvitko's poems for children are widely published and translated into many languages. They were translated into Russian
In love with life...
(Notes on L.M. Kvitko)
Matvey Geyser
Becoming a sage, he remained a child ...
Lev Ozerov
"I was born in the village of Goloskov, Podolsk province ... My father was a bookbinder, a teacher. The family was poor, and all the children had to go to work at an early age. One brother became a dyer, another loader, two sisters dressmakers, the third a teacher. " So wrote the Jewish poet Lev Moiseevich Kvitko in his autobiography in October 1943.
Hunger, poverty, tuberculosis - this ruthless scourge of the inhabitants of the Pale of Settlement fell to the lot of the Kvitko family. "Father and mother, sisters and brothers died early from tuberculosis ... From the age of ten he began to earn money for himself ... he was a dyer, painter, porter, cutter, purveyor ... He never studied at school ... He learned to read and write". But the difficult childhood not only did not anger him, but also made him wiser, kinder. "There are people who radiate light," the Russian writer L. Panteleev wrote about Kvitko. Everyone who knew Lev Moiseevich said that goodwill and love of life come from him. To everyone who met him, it seemed that he would live forever. "He will certainly live to be a hundred years old," said K. Chukovsky. "It was even strange to imagine that he could ever get sick."
On May 15, 1952, at the trial, exhausted by interrogations and torture, he will say about himself: “Before the revolution, I lived the life of a beaten stray dog, the price of this life was worthless. And then, shortly after this phrase: "The end of my life is here in front of you!"
Poems, by his own admission, Lev Kvitko began to compose at a time when he still could not write. What was invented in childhood remained in the memory and later "poured out" on paper, was included in the first collection of his poems for children, which appeared in 1917. "Lidelah" ("Songs") was the name of this book. How old was the young author then? "I don't know the exact date of my birth - 1890 or 1893"...
Like many other recent inhabitants of the Pale of Settlement, Lev Kvitko greeted the October Revolution with enthusiasm. Some anxiety is captured in his early poems, but true to the traditions of the revolutionary romantic poet Osher Shvartsman, he sings of the revolution. His poem "Reuter storm" ("Red Storm") was the first work in Yiddish about the revolution, called the Great. It so happened that the publication of his first book coincided with the revolution. “The revolution pulled me out of hopelessness, like many millions of people, and put me on my feet. They began to publish me in newspapers, collections, and my first poems dedicated to the revolution were published in the then Bolshevik newspaper Komfon in Kyiv.
He writes about this in his poems:
We did not see childhood in childhood,
We roamed the world, children of adversity.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
And now we hear the priceless word:
Come, whose childhood has been stolen by enemies,
Who was destitute, forgotten, robbed,
With a vengeance, life returns your debts.
One of Kvitko's best poems, written in the same period, contains eternal Jewish sadness:
You left early in the morning
And only in the chestnut leaves
A fast run trembles.
Rushed off, leaving a little:
Only dust and smoke at the threshold,
Abandoned forever.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
And the evening is rushing towards.
Where will you slow down?
On whose door the rider will knock,
And who will give him a lodging for the night?
Does he know how they yearn for him -
Me, my home!
Translation by T. Spendiarova
Recalling the first post-revolutionary years, Lev Moiseevich admitted that he perceived the revolution more intuitively than consciously, but it changed a lot in his life. In 1921, he, like some other Jewish writers (A. Bergelson, D. Gofshtein, P. Markish), was offered by the Kiev publishing house to go abroad, to Germany, to study and get an education. This was an old dream of Kvitko, and, of course, he agreed.
Many years later, the Jesuits from Lubyanka knocked out a completely different confession on this matter from Kvitko: they forced him to recognize his departure for Germany as a flight from the country, since "the national question regarding the Jews was not resolved by the Soviet government correctly. Jews were not recognized as a nation, which, in my opinion view, led to the deprivation of any independence and infringed on legal rights in comparison with other nationalities.
Life abroad was far from easy. "In Berlin, I barely got along" ... Nevertheless, there, in Berlin, two of his collections of poems were published - "Green Grass" and "1919". The second was dedicated to the memory of those who died in the pogroms in Ukraine before and after the revolution.
“At the beginning of 1923, I moved to Hamburg and began working in the port when salting and sorting South American skins for the Soviet Union,” he wrote in his autobiography. until my return to my homeland in 1925."
We are talking about the propaganda work that he conducted among the German workers as a member of the German Communist Party. He left there, most likely because of the threat of arrest.
L. Kvitko and I. Fisherman. Berlin, 1922
At the trial in 1952, Kvitko will tell how weapons were sent from the port of Hamburg under the guise of dishes to China for Chiang Kai-shek.
The second time the poet joined the Communist Party, the CPSU (b), in 1940. But this is a different party and a different, completely different story ...
Returning to his homeland, Lev Kvitko took up literary work. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, his best works were created, not only in poetry, but also in prose, in particular the story "Lyam and Petrik".
By that time, he had already become a poet not only beloved, but also universally recognized. It was translated into Ukrainian by the poets Pavlo Tychyna, Maxim Rylsky, Volodymyr Sosiura. It was translated into Russian in different years by A. Akhmatova, S. Marshak, K. Chukovsky, Y. Helemsky, M. Svetlov, B. Slutsky, S. Mikhalkov, N. Naydenova, E. Blaginina, N. Ushakov. They translated it in such a way that his poems became a phenomenon of Russian poetry.
In 1936, S. Marshak wrote to K. Chukovsky about L. Kvitko: “It would be good if you, Korney Ivanovich, translated something (for example,“ Anna-Vannu ...) ”. S. Mikhalkov translated it some time later, and thanks to him this poem entered the anthology of world children's literature.
Here it is appropriate to recall that on July 2, 1952, a few days before the sentencing of him, Lev Moiseevich Kvitko turned to the military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR with a request to invite to court as witnesses who could tell the true truth about him, K.I. .Chukovsky, K.F. Piskunov, P.G. Tychin, S.V. Mikhalkov. The court rejected the petition and, of course, did not bring it to the attention of Kvitko's friends, in whose support he believed until the last minute.
Recently, in a telephone conversation with me, Sergei Vladimirovich Mikhalkov said that he did not know anything about this. “But he could still live today,” he added. “He was a smart and good poet. With fantasy, fun, fiction, he involved not only children, but also adults in his poetry. I often remember him, think about him.”
From Germany, Lev Kvitko returned to Ukraine, and later, in 1937, he moved to Moscow. They say that Ukrainian poets, especially Pavlo Grigoryevich Tychina, persuaded Kvitko not to leave. In the year of his arrival in Moscow, a poetic collection of the poet "Selected Works" was published, which was an example of socialist realism. In the collection, of course, there were also wonderful lyrical children's poems, but the "tribute to the times" (recall, the year was 1937) found a "worthy reflection" in it.
Around the same time, Kvitko wrote his famous poem "Pushkin and Heine". An excerpt from it translated by S. Mikhalkov is given below:
And I see a young tribe
And thoughts audacious flight.
Like never before, my verse lives on.
Blessed is this time
And you, my free people!
In the dungeons do not rot freedom,
Do not turn the people into a slave!
The fight is calling me home!
I'm leaving, the fate of the people -
Singer of the people's fate!
Shortly before the Patriotic War, Kvitko finished the novel in verse "Young Years", at the beginning of the war he was evacuated to Alma-Ata. His autobiography says: "I left Kukryniksy. We went to Alma-Ata with the aim of creating a new book there that would correspond to that time. Nothing worked out there ... I went to the mobilization point, they examined me and left wait..."
L. Kvitko with his wife and daughter. Berlin, 1924
One of the interesting pages of memoirs about the stay of L. Kvitko in Chistopol during the war was left in her diaries by Lydia Korneevna Chukovskaya:
"Kvitko comes to me ... I know Kvitko closer than the rest of the local Muscovites: he is a friend of my father. Korney Ivanovich was one of the first to notice and love Kvitko's poems for children, achieved their translation from Yiddish into Russian ... Now two- spent three days in Chistopol: his wife and daughter are here... He came to me on the eve of departure, to ask me in more detail what to tell my father from me if they meet somewhere ...
She spoke about Tsvetaeva, about the disgrace created by the literary fund. After all, she is not an exile, but just as evacuated as all of us, why is she not allowed to live where she wants ... "
About the bullying, ordeals that Marina Ivanovna had to endure in Chistopol, about the humiliations that fell to her lot, about the shameful, unforgivable indifference to the fate of Tsvetaeva on the part of the "writer's leaders" - everything that led Marina Ivanovna to suicide, we know today enough. None of the writers, except Lev Kvitko, dared, did not dare to stand up for Tsvetaeva. After Lidia Chukovskaya contacted him, he went to Nikolai Aseev. He promised to contact the rest of the "writer's functionaries" and assured with his characteristic optimism: "Everything will be fine. Now the most important thing is that each person should specifically remember: everything ends well." This is what this kind, sympathetic man said in the most difficult times. He consoled and helped everyone who turned to him.
Another evidence of this is the memoirs of the poetess Elena Blaginina: “The war scattered everyone in different directions ... In Kuibyshev, my husband, Yegor Nikolayevich, lived, suffering considerable disasters. They occasionally met, and, according to my husband, Lev Moiseevich helped him, sometimes giving work, and sometimes just sharing a piece of bread ... "
And again to the topic "Tsvetaeva-Kvitko".
According to Lydia Borisovna Libedinskaya, the only prominent writer who was then worried about the fate of Marina Tsvetaeva in Chistopol was Kvitko. And his troubles were not empty, although Aseev did not even come to the meeting of the commission that considered Tsvetaeva's request to hire her as a dishwasher in the writers' canteen. Aseev "got sick", Trenev (the author of the notorious play "Love Yarovaya") was categorically against it. I admit that Lev Moiseevich heard the name of Tsvetaeva from Lydia Chukovskaya for the first time, but the desire to help, protect a person was his organic quality.
So, "the people's war is going on." Life has become completely different and poems - others, unlike those that he wrote Kvitko in peacetime, and yet - about children who became victims of fascism:
Here from the forests, from where in the bushes
They go with their hungry lips closed,
Children from Uman...
Faces are a shade of yellowness.
Hands are bones and veins.
Six to seven year olds elders,
Runaways from the grave.
Translation by L. Ozerov
Kvitko, as was said, was not taken into the active army, he was called to Kuibyshev to work in the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. Apparently it was a tragic accident. Unlike Itzik Fefer, Peretz Markish, and even Mikhoels, Kvitko was far from politics. "Thank God, I don't write plays, and God himself protected me from communication with the theater and Mikhoels," he will say at the trial. And during the interrogation, talking about the work of the JAC: "Mikhoels drank most of all. Epstein and Fefer did the work, although the latter was not a member of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee." And then he will give an amazingly accurate definition of the essence of I. Fefer: "he is such a person that even if he is appointed as a courier, ... he will actually become the owner ... Fefer put only those issues for discussion by the presidium that were beneficial to him ..."
Kvitko's speeches at JAC meetings are well-known, one of them, at the III Plenum, contains the following words: "The day of the death of fascism will become a holiday for all freedom-loving mankind." But even in this speech, the main idea is about children: “The unheard-of torture and extermination of our children - these are the methods of education developed in the German headquarters. Infanticide as an everyday, everyday phenomenon - such is the savage plan that the Germans carried out on the Soviet territory they temporarily seized .. The Germans exterminate Jewish children to the last..." Kvitko worries about the fate of Jewish, Russian, Ukrainian children: "To return to all children their childhood is a huge feat performed by the Red Army."
L. Kvitko speaks at the III JAC Plenum.
And yet, work in the JAC, engaging in politics is not the fate of the poet Lev Kvitko. He returned to writing. In 1946, Kvitko was elected chairman of the trade union committee of youth and children's writers. Everyone who came into contact with him at that time remembers with what desire and enthusiasm he helped writers who returned from the war, and the families of writers who died in this war. He dreamed of publishing children's books, and with the money received from their publication, to build a house for writers who found themselves homeless due to the war.
About Kvitko of that time, Korney Ivanovich writes: "In these post-war years, we often met. He had a talent for disinterested poetic friendship. He was always surrounded by a tightly knit cohort of friends, and I proudly recall that he included me in this cohort."
Already gray-haired, aged, but still bright-eyed and gracious, Kvitko returned to his favorite topics and in new poems began to glorify both spring showers and morning chirps of birds.
It should be emphasized that neither a bleak beggarly childhood, nor a youth full of worries and difficulties, nor the tragic years of the war could destroy the delightful attitude to life, optimism sent down by Heaven to Kvitko. But Korney Ivanovich Chukovsky was right when he said: “Sometimes Kvitko himself realized that his childhood love for the world around him takes him too far away from painful and cruel reality, and tried to curb his praises and odes with good-natured irony over them, to present them in in a humorous way."
If one can argue, even argue about Kvitko's optimism, then the feeling of patriotism, that true, not feigned, not false, but high patriotism, was not only inherent in him, but to a large extent was the essence of the poet and man Kvitko. These words do not need confirmation, and yet it seems appropriate to give the full text of the poem "With my country" written by him in 1946, a wonderful translation of which was made by Anna Andreevna Akhmatova:
Who dares to separate my people from the country,
There is no blood in that - it was replaced with water.
Who separates my verse from the country,
He will be full and empty shell.
With you, the country, the people are great.
Everyone rejoices - both mother and children,
And without you - in the darkness of the people,
Everyone is crying - both mother and children.
The people working for the happiness of the country,
Gives a frame to my poems.
My verse is a weapon, my verse is a servant of the country,
And rightfully belongs to her.
Without a Motherland, my verse will die,
Alien to both mother and children.
With you, country, my verse is tenacious,
And his mother reads to his children.
The year 1947, just like 1946, did not seem to bode well for the Jews of the USSR. In GOSET there were new performances, and although the audience was getting smaller, the theater existed, a newspaper was published in Yiddish. Then, in 1947, few Jews believed (or were afraid to believe) in the possibility of the revival of the State of Israel. Others continued to fantasize that the future of the Jews was in the creation of Jewish autonomy in the Crimea, not realizing and not assuming what a tragedy was already hovering around this idea...
Lev Kvitko was a true poet, and it was no coincidence that his friend and translator Elena Blaginina said about him: "He lives in a magical world of magical transformations. Lev Kvitko is a child poet." Only such a naive person could write a few weeks before his arrest:
How not to work with these
When the palms itch, they burn.
Like a strong stream
takes away the stone
The wave of work will carry
trumpeting like a waterfall!
blessed with work
How nice to work for you!
Translation by B. Slutsky
On November 20, 1948, the Decree of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks was issued, approving the decision of the Council of Ministers of the USSR, according to which the USSR Ministry of State Security was instructed: "Do not hesitate to dissolve the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, since this Committee is the center of anti-Soviet propaganda and regularly supplies anti-Soviet information to foreign intelligence agencies" . There is an indication in this resolution: "For the time being, no one should be arrested." But by that time they had already been arrested. Among them is the poet David Gofshtein. In December of the same year, Itzik Fefer was arrested, and a few days later, a seriously ill Veniamin Zuskin was brought from the Botkin hospital to Lubyanka. Such was the situation on the eve of the new year, 1949.
Valentin Dmitrievich read Chukovsky's poems from memory, warning that he could not vouch for accuracy, but the essence was preserved:
How rich I would be
If the money was paid by Detizdat.
I would send to friends
A million telegrams
But now I'm ruined to the skin -
Children's publishing house only brings losses,
And it is necessary, dear Kvitki,
Send congratulations to you in a postcard.
Whatever the mood, in January 1949, as Elena Blaginina writes in her memoirs, the 60th anniversary of Kvitko was celebrated at the Central House of Writers. Why is the 60th anniversary in the 49th? Recall that Lev Moiseevich himself did not know exactly the year of his birth. "The guests gathered in the Oak Hall of the Writers' Club. A lot of people came, the hero of the day was greeted cordially, but he seemed (did not seem, but was) preoccupied and sad," writes Elena Blaginina. Valentin Kataev presided over the evening.
Few of those who were at the party are alive tonight. But I was lucky - I met Semyon Grigorievich Simkin. At that time he was a student at the theater college at GOSET. Here is what he said: “The Oak Hall of the Central House of Writers was overcrowded. The entire literary elite of that time - Fadeev, Marshak, Simonov, Kataev - not only honored the hero of the day with their greetings, but also spoke the warmest words about him. What I remember most is this performance Korney Ivanovich Chukovsky.Not only did he say about Kvitko as one of the best poets of our time, he also read in the original, that is, in Yiddish, several poems by Kvitko, among them "Anna-Vanna".
L. Kvitko. Moscow, 1944.
On January 22, Kvitko was arrested. "They go. Really? .. / This is a mistake. / But, alas, it does not save from arrest / Confidence in innocence, / And purity of thoughts and deeds / Not an argument in an era of lack of rights. / Simplicity along with wisdom / Not convincing either for the investigator, / Not for the executioner" (Lev Ozerov). If this day, on the afternoon of January 22, it were possible to finish the biography of the poet Lev Kvitko, what happiness it would be both for him and for me, who is writing these lines. But from that day begins the most tragic part of the poet's life, and it lasted almost 1300 days.
In the dungeons of the Lubyanka
(Chapter almost documentary)
From the protocol of a closed court session of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR.
The secretary of the court, senior lieutenant M. Afanasiev, said that all the accused were brought to the court session under escort.
The presiding judge, Lieutenant General of Justice A. Cheptsov, ascertains the identity of the defendants, and each of them tells about himself.
From the testimony of Kvitko: "I, Kvitko Leib Moiseevich, born in 1890, a native of the village of Goloskovo, Odessa region, a Jew by nationality, have been in the party since 1941, before that I had not been in any parties before (as you know, Kvitko was a member before that in the Communist Party of Germany - M. G.) Profession - poet, marital status - married, I have an adult daughter, education at home. I have awards: the Order of the Red Banner of Labor and the medal "For Valiant Labor in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945." Arrested on January 25, 1949 (in most sources on January 22.- M.G.). I received a copy of the indictment on May 3, 1952."
After the announcement of the indictment presiding finds out whether each of the defendants understands his guilt. Everyone answered "Understood". Some pleaded guilty (Fefer, Teumin), others completely denied the charge (Lozovsky, Markish, Shimeliovich. Doctor Shimeliovich will exclaim: "I have never recognized and I will not recognize!"). There were those who admitted their guilt in part. Among them is Kvitko.
Chairperson: Defendant Kvitko, what do you plead guilty to?
Kvitko: I recognize myself guilty before the party and before the Soviet people that I worked in the Committee, which brought a lot of evil to the Motherland. I also plead guilty to the fact that, being for some time after the war the executive secretary or head of the Jewish section of the Union of Soviet Writers, I did not raise the question of closing this section, did not raise the question of helping to accelerate the process of assimilation of Jews.
Chairman: Do you deny the guilt that you carried out nationalist activities in the past?
Kvitko: Yes. I deny it. I don't feel this guilt. I feel that with all my soul and with all my thoughts I wished happiness for the land on which I was born, which I consider my homeland, despite all these case materials and testimonies about me ... My motives must be heard, since I will corroborate with facts.
Chairman: We have already heard here that your literary activity was devoted entirely to the party.
Kvitko: If only I were given the opportunity to calmly reflect all the facts that have taken place in my life and which justify me. I am sure that if there were a person here who could read thoughts and feelings well, he would tell the truth about me. All my life I considered myself a Soviet person, moreover, even though it sounds immodest, it is true - I have always been in love with the party.
Presiding: All this is at odds with your testimony during the investigation. You consider yourself in love with the party, but then why are you asserting a lie. You consider yourself an honest writer, but your mood was far from what you say.
Kvitko: I say that the party does not need my lies, and I show only what can be supported by facts. During the investigation, all my testimony was distorted, and everything was shown the other way around. This also applies to my trip abroad, as if it were for a harmful purpose, and this also applies to the fact that I slipped into the party. Take my poems 1920-1921. These verses are collected in a folder from the investigator. They are talking about something completely different. My works, published in 1919-1921, were published in a communist newspaper. When I told the investigator about this, he answered me: "We don't need it."
presiding: In short, you deny this evidence. Why did you lie?
Kvitko: It was very difficult for me to fight with the investigator ...
Chairperson: And why did you sign the protocol?
Kvitko: Because it was difficult not to sign it.
defendant B.A. Shimeliovich, the former chief physician of the Botkin hospital, stated: "The protocol ... was signed by me ... with an unclear consciousness. This state of mine is the result of a methodical beating for a month every day and night ..."
Obviously, not only Shimeliovich was tortured at the Lubyanka.
But back to the interrogation Kvitko in that day:
Presiding: So you deny your testimony?
Kvitko: I absolutely deny ...
How can one not recall the words of Anna Akhmatova here? "Those who did not live in the era of terror will never understand this"...
The presiding judge returns to the reasons for Kvitko's "flight" abroad.
Presiding: Show the motives for the flight.
Kvitko: I don't know how to tell you to believe me. If a religious criminal stands before the court and considers himself wrongly convicted or wrongly guilty, he thinks: well, they do not believe me, I am condemned, but at least G-d knows the truth. I don't have a god, of course, and I never believed in a god. I have the only god - the power of the Bolsheviks, this is my god. And I say before this faith that in my childhood and youth I did the hardest work. What kind of job? I don't want to say what I did as a 12 year old. But the hardest job is to be in front of the court. I will tell you about the flight, about the reasons, but give me the opportunity to tell.
I have been sitting alone in a cell for two years, this is of my own free will, and for this I have a reason. I do not have a living soul to consult with anyone, there is no more experienced person in judicial matters. I am alone, I think and worry with myself ...
A little later, Kvitko will continue his testimony on the issue of "flight":
I admit that you do not believe me, but the actual state of affairs refutes the above nationalist motive for leaving. At that time, many Jewish schools, orphanages, choirs, institutions, newspapers, publications and the whole institution were created in the Soviet Union " Culture League"was abundantly supplied with material by the Soviet government. New centers of culture were established. Why did I need to leave? And I did not go to Poland, where terry Jewish nationalism then flourished, and not to America, where many Jews live, but I went to Germany, where there were no Jewish schools, no newspapers, etc. So this motif is meaningless... If I had fled from my native Soviet land, I could have written "In a foreign land" then - poems that curse the turbulent stagnation of life, poems of deep longing for the motherland, for its stars and for its deeds? If I were not a Soviet person, I would have had the strength to fight sabotage at work in the port of Hamburg, to be mocked and abused by "honest uncles" who disguised themselves with complacency and morality, covering predators "If I wasn't loyal to the party cause, could I volunteer to take on a secret workload of peril and persecution? Without remuneration, after a hard underpaid working day, I performed the tasks needed by the Soviet people. This is only part of the facts, part of the material evidence of my activities from the first years of the revolution until 1925, i.e. until I returned to the USSR.
The presiding judge repeatedly returned to the question anti-assimilatory activities of the EAC. ("Blood is accused" - Alexander Mikhailovich Borshchagovsky will name his outstanding book about this process and, perhaps, will give the most accurate definition of everything that happened at this trial.) Concerning assimilation and anti-assimilation testifies Kvitko:
What do I blame myself for? What do I feel guilty about? The first is that I did not see and did not understand that the Committee, by its activities, brings great harm to the Soviet state, and that I also worked in this Committee. The second thing I consider myself guilty of is hanging over me, and I feel that this is my accusation. Considering Soviet Jewish literature to be ideologically sound, Soviet, we Jewish writers, including myself (perhaps I am more to blame for them), at the same time did not raise the question of facilitating the process of assimilation. I'm talking about the assimilation of the Jewish masses. By continuing to write in Jewish, we unwittingly became a brake on the process of assimilation of the Jewish population. In recent years, the Hebrew language has ceased to serve the masses, as they - the masses - have left this language, and it has become a hindrance. As head of the Jewish section of the Union of Soviet Writers, I did not raise the question of closing the section. It's my fault. To use the language that the masses have abandoned, which has outlived its time, which separates us not only from all the great life of the Soviet Union, but also from the bulk of the Jews who have already assimilated, to use such a language, in my opinion, is a kind of manifestation of nationalism.
Other than that, I don't feel guilty.
Presiding: All?
Kvitko: Everything.
From the indictment:
Defendant Kvitko, returning to the USSR in 1925 after fleeing abroad, joined the mountains. Kharkov to the nationalist Jewish literary group "Boy", headed by the Trotskyists.
Being at the beginning of the organization of the JAC the Deputy Executive Secretary of the Committee, he entered into a criminal conspiracy with the nationalists Mikhoels, Epstein and Fefer, assisted them in collecting materials on the economy of the USSR for sending them to the USA.
In 1944, following the criminal instructions of the leadership of the JAC, he traveled to the Crimea to collect information about the economic situation in the region and the situation of the Jewish population. He was one of the initiators of raising the issue before government bodies about the alleged discrimination of the Jewish population in Crimea.
Repeatedly spoke at meetings of the Presidium of the JAC with a demand to expand the nationalist activities of the Committee.
In 1946, he established a personal relationship with the American intelligence officer Goldberg, whom he informed about the state of affairs in the Union of Soviet Writers, and gave him consent to publish a Soviet-American literary yearbook.
From Kvitko's last word:
Citizen chairman, citizen judges!
Before the most joyful audience, with pioneer ties, I spoke for decades and sang the happiness of being a Soviet person. I end my life with a speech before the Supreme Court of the Soviet people. Accused of the heaviest crimes.
This fabricated accusation has fallen upon me and is causing me terrible agony.
Why is every word I say here in court soaked in tears?
Because the terrible accusation of treason is unbearable for me - a Soviet person. I declare to the court that I am not guilty of anything - neither in espionage, nor in nationalism.
While my mind is not yet completely clouded, I believe that in order to be accused of treason, some act of treason must be committed.
I ask the court to take into account that there is no documentary evidence of my allegedly hostile activities against the CPSU(b) and the Soviet government in the prosecution, and there is no evidence of my criminal connection with Mikhoels and Fefer. I did not betray the Motherland and I do not recognize any of the 5 charges brought against me ...
It is easier for me to be in prison on Soviet soil than to be "free" in any capitalist country.
I am a citizen of the Soviet Union, my homeland is the homeland of the geniuses of the party and humanity, Lenin and Stalin, and I believe that I cannot be accused of grave crimes without evidence.
I hope that my arguments will be accepted by the court as they should.
I ask the court to return me to the honest work of the great Soviet people.
The verdict is known. Kvitko, like the rest of the defendants, except for Academician Lina Stern, was sentenced to VMN (the highest penalty). The court decides to deprive Kvitko of all government awards he received earlier. The sentence is carried out, but for some reason in violation of the traditions that exist in the Lubyanka: it was passed on July 18, and carried out on August 12. This is another of the unsolved mysteries of this monstrous farce.
I cannot and do not want to end my article about the poet Kvitko with these words. I will return the reader to the best days and years of his life.
L. Kvitko. Moscow, 1948.
Chukovsky-Kvitko-Marshak
It is unlikely that anyone will dispute the idea that the Jewish poet Lev Kvitko would have received recognition not only in the Soviet Union (his poems have been translated into Russian and 34 other languages of the peoples of the USSR), but throughout the world, if he had not had brilliant translators of his poems . Korney Ivanovich Chukovsky "discovered" Kvitko for Russian readers.
There is ample evidence of how highly Chukovsky valued Kvitko's poetry. In his book "Contemporaries (portraits and sketches)" Korney Ivanovich, along with portraits of such prominent writers as Gorky, Kuprin, Leonid Andreev, Mayakovsky, Blok, placed a portrait of Lev Kvitko: "In general, in those distant years when I met him, he really did not know how to be unhappy: the world around him was unusually comfortable and blissful ... This fascination with the world around him made him a children's writer: on behalf of a child, under the guise of a child, through the lips of five-year-old, six-year-old, seven-year-old children, it was easiest for him to pour out his own overflowing love of life, his own simple-hearted faith that life was created for endless joy... Another writer, when writing poems for children, tries to restore his long-forgotten childhood feelings with a fading memory.Lev Kvitko did not need such a restoration: between he and his childhood there was no barrier of time.On a whim, at any moment he could turn into a little boy poisonous excitement and happiness ... "
Chukovsky's ascent to the Hebrew language was curious. It took place thanks to Kvitko. Having received the poet's poems in Yiddish, Korney Ivanovich could not overcome the desire to read them in the original. Deductively, spelling out the name of the author and the captions under the pictures, he soon "set off to read the titles of individual verses, and then the verses themselves" ... Chukovsky informed the author about this. “When I sent you my book,” Kvitko wrote to him in response, “I had a double feeling: a desire to be read and understood by you and annoyance that the book would remain closed and inaccessible to you. And now you unexpectedly overturned my expectations in such a miraculous way and turned my annoyance into joy."
Korey Ivanovich, of course, understood what to introduce Kvitko in great literature is possible only by organizing a good translation of his poems into Russian. S.Ya. was a recognized master among translators in that pre-war period. Marshak. Chukovsky turned with Kvitko's poems to Samuil Yakovlevich not only as a good translator, but also as a person who knew Yiddish. "I did everything I could so that the reader, who does not know the original, would recognize and fall in love with Kvitko's poems from my translations," Marshak wrote to Chukovsky on August 28, 1936.
Lev Kvitko, of course, knew the "price" of Marshak's translations. "I hope to see you soon in Kyiv. You should definitely come. You will make us happy, help us a lot in the struggle for quality, for the flourishing of children's literature. We love you," L. Kvitko wrote to Marshak on January 4, 1937.
Kvitko's poem "Letter to Voroshilov", translated by Marshak, became super popular.
For three years (1936-1939) the poem was already translated from Russian into more than 15 languages of the peoples of the USSR, published in dozens of publications. “Dear Samuil Yakovlevich! With your light hand, the “Letter to Voroshilov” in your masterful translation went around the whole country ... ”, Lev Kvitko wrote on June 30, 1937.
The history of this translation is as follows.
In his diary, Korney Ivanovich wrote on January 11, 1936, that on that day Kvitko and the poet-translator M.A. Froman. Chukovsky thought that no one would translate the "Letter to Voroshilov" better than Froman. But something else happened. On February 14, 1936, Marshak called Chukovsky. Korney Ivanovich reports this: “It turns out that it was not without reason that he stole two Kvitko books from me in Moscow - for half an hour. He took these books to the Crimea and translated them there - including "comrade Voroshilov", although I asked him not to do this, because. Froman has been sitting on this work for a month already - and for Froman, translating this poem is life and death, and for Marshak - only a laurel out of a thousand. My hands are still trembling with excitement.
Then Lev Moiseevich and Samuil Yakovlevich were connected mainly by creative friendship. They, of course, met at meetings on children's literature, at children's book holidays. But the main thing that Marshak did was that with his translations he introduced the Russian reader to Kvitko's poetry.
Kvitko dreamed of cooperation with Marshak not only in the field of poetry. Even before the war, he approached him with a proposal: "Dear Samuil Yakovlevich, I'm collecting a collection of Jewish folk tales, I already have a lot. If you haven't changed your mind, we can start work in the fall. I'm waiting for your answer." I did not find an answer to this letter in Marshak's archives. It is only known that Kvitko's plan remained unfulfilled.
Letters of Samuil Yakovlevich to L.M. Kvitko, full of respect and love for the Jewish poet, have been preserved.
Marshak translated only six of Kvitko's poems. Their real friendship, human and creative, began to take shape in the post-war period. Kvitko ended his congratulations on the 60th anniversary of Marshak with owls: "I wish you (Emphasis mine.- M.G.) many years of health, creative forces to the joy of all of us. "On" you "Marshak allowed very few to refer to him.
And about Marshak's attitude to the memory of Kvitko: "Of course, I will do everything in my power to ensure that the publishing house and the press pay tribute to such a wonderful poet as the unforgettable Lev Moiseevich ... Kvitko's poems will live for a long time and delight true connoisseurs of poetry. .. I hope that I will succeed ... to ensure that the books of Lev Kvitko take their rightful place ... "This is from a letter from Samuil Yakovlevich to the poet's widow, Berta Solomonovna.
In October 1960, an evening in memory of L. Kvitko was held at the House of Writers. Marshak, for health reasons, was not present at the evening. Before that, he sent a letter to Kvitko's widow: "I really want to be at the evening dedicated to the memory of my dear friend and beloved poet ... And when I get better (now I am very weak), I will certainly write at least a few pages about a big man who was a poet both in poetry and in life. Marshak, alas, did not have time to do this ...
There is nothing accidental in the fact that Chukovsky "gave" Kvitko to Marshak. One can, of course, assume that sooner or later Marshak himself would have paid attention to Kvitko's poems and, probably, would have translated them. The success of the Marshak-Kvitko duet was also determined by the fact that both of them were in love with children; this is probably why the translations of Marshak from Kvitko turned out to be so successful. However, it is unfair to speak only of a "duet": Chukovsky managed to create a trio of children's poets.
L. Kvitko and S. Marshak. Moscow, 1938.
“Somehow in the thirties,” K. Chukovsky wrote in his memoirs about Kvitko, “walking with him along the distant outskirts of Kyiv, we suddenly got caught in the rain and saw a wide puddle, to which the boys ran from everywhere, as if it were not a puddle, They splashed so zealously in the puddle with their bare feet, as if they were deliberately trying to smear themselves up to their ears.
Kvitko looked at them with envy.
Every child, he said, believes that the puddles are created especially for his pleasure.
And I thought that, in essence, he was talking about himself."
Then, apparently, the verses were born:
How much spring mud
Puddles deep, good!
How nice to spank here
In shoes and galoshes!
Getting closer every morning
Spring is coming to us.
Getting stronger every day
The sun is shining in the puddles.
I threw the stick into a puddle -
In the water window;
Like golden glass
The sun suddenly broke!
The great Yiddish Jewish literature that originated in Russia, literature dating back to Mendel-Moyher Sforim, Sholom Aleichem and ending its existence with the names of David Bergelson, Peretz Markish, Lev Kvitko, perished on August 12, 1952.
Prophetic words were uttered by the Jewish poet Nachman Bialik: "Language is a crystallized spirit" ... Yiddish literature perished, but did not sink into the abyss - its echo, its eternal echo will live as long as the Jews are alive on earth.
POETRY WITHOUT COMMENTS
In conclusion, let's give the word to the poetry of L. Kvitko, we will present the poet's work in its "pure form", without comment.
In the translations of the best Russian poets, it has become an integral part of Russian poetry. The remarkable writer Ruvim Fraerman accurately said about the Jewish poet: "Kvitko was one of our best poets, the pride and adornment of Soviet literature."
Obviously, Kvitko was extremely lucky with the translators. In the selection offered to the attention of readers - the poet's poems translated by S. Marshak, M. Svetlov, S. Mikhalkov and N. Naydenova. The first two poets knew Yiddish, but Sergei Mikhalkov and Nina Naydenova performed a miracle: not knowing the poet's native language, they managed to convey not only the content of his poems, but also the author's intonations.
So, poetry.
HORSE
Didn't hear at night
Behind the wheel door
Didn't know that dad
Brought the horse
black horse
under the red saddle.
Four horseshoes
Shine silver.
Inaudible in the rooms
Papa passed
black horse
I put it on the table.
Lit on the table
lonely fire,
And looks into the bed
Saddled horse.
But behind the windows
It became brighter
And the boy woke up
In his bed.
Woke up, got up
Leaning on the palm
And sees: worth
Wonderful horse.
Smart and new
under the red saddle.
Four horseshoes
Shine silver.
When and where
Did he come here?
And how did he manage
Climb up on the table?
tiptoe boy
Suitable for the table
And now the horse
It's on the floor.
He strokes her mane
Both back and chest
And sits on the floor -
Look at the legs.
Takes by the bridle -
And the horse is running.
Lays her on her side
The horse is lying.
Looking at the horse
And he thinks:
"I must have fallen asleep
And I dream.
Where is the horse from
Appeared to me?
Probably a horse
I see in my dream...
I will go with my mother
I'll wake mine up.
And if it wakes up
I'll show you the horse.
He fits
Pushing the bed
But mom is tired -
She wants to sleep.
"I'll go to my neighbor
Peter Kuzmich,
I will go to my neighbor
And I'll knock on the door!"
Open doors for me
Let me in!
I will show you
Raven horse!
Neighbor replies:
I saw him,
I've seen it for a long time
Your horse.
You must have seen
Another horse.
You weren't with us
Since yesterday!
Neighbor replies:
I saw him:
Four legs
At your horse.
But you didn't see
Neighbor, his legs,
But you didn't see
And I couldn't see!
Neighbor replies:
I saw him:
Two eyes and a tail
At your horse.
But you didn't see
No eyes, no tail -
He stands outside the door
And the door is locked!
Yawns lazily
Behind the door neighbor -
And no more words
Not a sound in response.
Bug
Rain over the city
All night long.
Rivers in the streets
Ponds are at the gate.
The trees are shaking
Under frequent rain.
Wet dogs
And they ask for the house.
But through the puddles
Spinning like a top
Crawling clumsy
Horned beetle.
Here it falls down
Tries to get up.
kicked up my feet
And he got up again.
To a dry place
In a hurry to crawl
But over and over
Water on the way.
He swims in a puddle
Not knowing where.
Carries him, circles
And the water runs.
heavy drops
They hit on the shell,
And whip, and knock down,
And they don't let you swim.
It's about to choke -
Ghoul ghoul! - and the end...
But boldly plays
With death swimmer!
Would be gone forever
horned beetle,
But then turned up
Oak knot.
From a distant grove
He sailed here
It was brought
Rainwater.
And by doing on the spot
sharp turn,
To the bug for help
He walks fast.
Hurry to grab
Swimmer for him
Now not afraid
Bug nothing.
He swims in oak
Your own shuttle
By stormy, deep,
Wide river.
But here they come
House and fence.
Bug through the crack
Went into the yard.
And lived in the house
Small family.
This family is dad
Both mom and me.
I caught a bug
planted in a box
And listened to the rub
About the walls of the bug.
But the rain is over
The clouds are gone.
And in the garden on the path
I took the beetle.
Kvitko translated by Mikhail Svetlov.
VIOLIN
I broke the box
Plywood chest.
very similar
to the violin
Barrel boxes.
I attached to a branch
Four hairs -
No one has yet seen
Such a bow.
glued, adjusted,
Worked all day...
Such a violin came out -
There is no such thing in the world!
In my hands obedient,
Playing and singing...
And the hen thought
And the grain does not bite.
Play it, play it
violin!
Tri-la, tri-la, tri-la!
Music sounds in the garden
Lost away.
And the sparrows chirp
They shout at each other:
What a pleasure
From such music!
Kitten lifted its head
The horses are galloping.
Where is he from? Where is he from,
Unseen violinist?
Tri-la! Silenced
violin...
fourteen chickens,
Horses and sparrows
They thank me.
Didn't break, didn't stain
I carefully carry
little violin
I'll hide in the forest.
On a high tree,
Among the branches
Quietly slumbering music
In my violin.
WHEN I GROW UP
Those horses are crazy
With wet eyes
With necks like arches
With strong teeth
Those horses are light
What stand obediently
At your feeder
In a bright stable
Those horses are smart
How worrisome:
Only a fly sits -
Skin trembles.
Those horses are fast
With light feet
Just open the door
Jumping in herds
Jumping, running away
Unrestrained agility...
Those horses are light
I can't forget!
Quiet horses
They chewed their oats
But, seeing the groom,
They neighed happily.
grooms, grooms,
With a hard mustache
In quilted jackets,
With warm hands!
grooms, grooms
With a strict expression
Give out oats to friends
Four-legged.
horses trample,
Cheerful and full...
Grooms at all
Hooves are not terrible.
They walk, they are not afraid
All of them are not dangerous ...
These same grooms
I love terribly!
And when I grow up -
In long trousers, important
I will come to the stables
And I will boldly say:
We have five children
Everyone wants to work
There is a poet-brother,
I have a pilot sister
There is one weaver
There is one student...
I am the youngest
I will be a racing rider!
Well, funny guy!
Where? From afar?
And what muscles!
And what shoulders!
Are you from the Komsomol?
Are you a Pioneer?
Choose your horse
Join the cavalry!
Here I am rushing like the wind ...
Past - pines, maples ...
Who is this towards?
Marshal Budyonny!
If I'm an excellent student
So I will tell him:
"Tell me, to the cavalry
Can I be enrolled?"
Marshall smiles.
Speaks with confidence:
"You grow up a little -
Let's enlist in the cavalry!"
"Ah, Comrade Marshal!
How long do I have to wait
time!.." -
"Do you shoot? You kick
Can you reach the stirrup?"
I'm jumping back home -
The wind won't pick up!
I'm learning, growing big
I want to be with Budyonny:
I will be a Budenovite!
Kvitko translated by Sergei Mikhalkov.
FUNNY BEET
He is cheerful and happy
From toe to top -
He succeeded
Run away from the frog.
She didn't have time
Grab by the sides
And eat under the bush
Golden beetle.
He runs through the thicket
Moves his mustache
He is running now
And meets friends
And little caterpillars
Does not notice.
green stems,
Like pines in the forest
On his wings
Showered with dew.
He would like a big
Catch for lunch!
From little caterpillars
There is no satiety.
He's little caterpillars
Do not touch with a paw,
He is honor and solidity
He won't drop his.
Him after all
Sorrows and troubles
More booty of all
Needed for lunch.
And finally
He meets such
And runs up to her
Rejoicing with happiness.
Fatter and better
He cannot be found.
But it's scary for such
Come up to one.
He's spinning
blocking her way,
beetles passing
Calling for help.
Fight for prey
It wasn't easy:
She was divided
Four beetles.
TALK
Dub said:
I am old, I am wise
I am strong, I am beautiful!
Oak from oaks -
I am full of fresh energy.
But still I envy
horse, which
It rushes along the highway
at a trot.
Horse said:
I'm fast, I'm young
smart and hot!
Horse of horses -
I love to run.
But still I envy
flying bird -
Eagle or even
little tit.
Eagle said:
My world is high
the winds are under my control
my nest
on a terrible slope.
But what compares
with the power of man
free and
wise from the age!
Kvitko translated by Nina Naydenova.
LEMELE HOSTS
Mom is leaving
Hurry to the store.
Lemele, you
You remain alone.
Mom said:
You serve me
my plates,
Put your sister down.
chop firewood
Don't forget my son
catch the rooster
And lock it up.
Sister, plates,
Rooster and wood...
Lemele has only
One head!
He grabbed his sister
And locked in a shed.
He said to his sister:
You play here!
Firewood he diligently
Washed with boiling water
four plates
Smashed with a hammer.
But it took a long time
Fight with a rooster -
He did not want
Get into bed.
CAPABLE BOY
Lemele once
Ran home.
Oh, - said my mother, - What is the matter with you?
You've got blood
Scratched forehead!
You with your fights
Drive your mother into the coffin!
Answered by Lemele,
Pulling on a hat:
This is me by accident
He bit himself.
Here is a capable boy!
The mother was surprised. -
How are you teeth
Did you manage to get the forehead?
Well, I got it, as you can see, - Lemele in response. -
For such a case
Get on the stool!
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