Mikhail Sholokhov - biography, information, personal life. Interesting biography of Mikhail Sholokhov: briefly about the main thing Sholokhov’s life and creative path

Russian Soviet writer and screenwriter, journalist, colonel

Mikhail Sholokhov

Brief biography

Youth

M. A. Sholokhov born on May 24, 1905 in the Kruzhilin farmstead of the village of Vyoshenskaya (now the Kruzhilinskiy farmstead, Sholokhov district, Rostov region). At birth he received the surname Kuznetsov, which he changed to the surname Sholokhov in 1912.

Father - Alexander Mikhailovich Sholokhov (1865-1925) - came from the Ryazan province, did not belong to the Cossacks, was a “shibai” (livestock buyer), sowed grain on purchased Cossack land, served as a clerk in a commercial enterprise on a farm scale, as a manager at a steam mill and etc. My father’s grandfather was a merchant of the third guild, originally from the city of Zaraysk, he moved with his large family to the Upper Donshchina in the mid-1870s, purchased a house with a farmstead and started buying grain.

Mother - Anastasia Danilovna Chernyak (1871-1942) - Cossack on her mother’s side, the daughter of a peasant migrant to the Don, a former serf in the Chernigov province. For a long time she was in service on the master's estate Yasenevka. The orphan was forcibly married by the landowner Popova, for whom she served, to the son of the village ataman Kuznetsov. But later she left her husband and went to Alexander Sholokhov. Their son Mikhail was born illegitimate and was registered under the surname official husband mother - Kuznetsov. Only after the death of the official husband, in 1913, the boy’s parents were able to get married in the church of the Kargin farm (now the village of Karginskaya), and Mikhail received the surname Sholokhov.

In 1910, the family left the Kruzhilin farm: Alexander Mikhailovich entered the service of a merchant in the village of Karginskaya. The father invited a local teacher, Timofey Timofeevich Mrykhin, to teach the boy to read and write. In 1914, he studied for one year in Moscow in the preparatory class of a men's gymnasium. From 1915 to 1918, Mikhail studied at the gymnasium in the city of Boguchar, Voronezh province. He graduated from four classes of the gymnasium (at the same desk he sat with Konstantin Ivanovich Kargin, a future writer who wrote the story “The Bakhchevnik” in the spring of 1930). Before the German troops arrived in the city, according to Mikhail, he dropped out of school and went home to a farm. In 1920, the family moved to the village of Karginskaya (after the arrival of Soviet power), where Alexander Mikhailovich received the position of head of the procurement office of the Don Food Committee, and his son Mikhail became the clerk of the village revolutionary committee.

In 1920-1921 he lived with his family in the village of Karginskaya. After completing the Rostov tax courses, he was appointed to the position of food inspector in the village of Bukanovskaya, then joined the food detachment and participated in food appropriation. In 1920, a food detachment led by 15-year-old Sholokhov was captured by Makhno. Then he thought that he would be shot, but he was released.

On August 31, 1922, while working as a village tax inspector, M. A. Sholokhov was arrested and was under investigation in the regional center. He was sentenced to death. “I drove a cool line, and the time was cool; I was a commissioner very well, I was tried by the revolutionary tribunal for abuse of power... - the writer later said. “I waited for death for two days... And then they came and released me...” Until September 19, 1922, Sholokhov was in custody. His father gave him a large cash bail and took him home on bail until the trial. His parents brought a new metric to the court, and he was released as a minor (according to the new metric, his age decreased by 2.5 years). This was already in March 1923. The “troikas” were tried then, and the sentences were harsh. It was not difficult to believe that he was a minor, since Mikhail was short and looked like a boy. The execution was replaced by another punishment - the tribunal took into account his minority. He was given one year of correctional labor in a juvenile colony and sent to Bolshevo (near Moscow).

In Moscow, Sholokhov tried to continue his education, and also tried his hand at writing. However, it was not possible to enroll in the preparatory courses at the workers' faculty due to the lack of work experience and Komsomol direction required for admission. According to some sources, he worked as a loader, laborer, and mason. According to others, he worked in the house management of the workers’ housing-construction cooperative “Take an Example!”, the chairman of which was L. G. Mirumov (Mirumyan). He was engaged in self-education, took part in the work of the literary group “Young Guard”, attended training classes taught by V. B. Shklovsky, O. M. Brik, N. N. Aseev. Joined the Komsomol. Active assistance in organizing the daily life of M. A. Sholokhov in Moscow and in promoting the first literary works with his autograph was provided by a staff member of the EKU GPU, a Bolshevik with pre-revolutionary experience - Leon Galustovich Mirumov (Mirumyan), whom M. A. Sholokhov met in the village of Veshenskaya even before arriving in Moscow.

In September 1923, signed “Mich. Sholokh" in the Komsomol newspaper "Yunosheskaya Pravda" ("Young Leninist") (now - "Moskovsky Komsomolets") a feuilleton was published - "Test", a month later a second feuilleton appeared - "Three", and then a third - "The Inspector General". In December 1923, M.A. Sholokhov returned to Karginskaya, and then to the village of Bukanovskaya, where he wooed Lydia Gromoslavskaya, one of the daughters of the former village ataman Pyotr Yakovlevich Gromoslavsky. But the former chieftain said: “Take Maria, and I will make a man out of you.” On January 11, 1924, M. A. Sholokhov married his eldest daughter, Maria Petrovna Gromoslavskaya (1901-1992), who worked as a primary school teacher (in 1918, M. P. Gromoslavskaya studied at the Ust-Medveditsk gymnasium, whose director at that time consisted of F.D. Kryukov).

The first story “Beasts” (later “Food Commissar”), sent by M. A. Sholokhov in the almanac “Molodogvardeets”, was not accepted by the editors. On December 14, 1924, the newspaper “Young Leninist” published the story “Birthmark”, which opened the cycle of Don stories: “Shepherd”, “Ilyukha”, “Foal”, “Azure Steppe”, “Family Man”, “Mortal Enemy”, “Bigwife” ”, etc. They were published in Komsomol periodicals, and then compiled three collections, published one after another: “Don Stories”, “Azure Steppe” (both 1926) and “About Kolchak, Nettles and Others” (1927).

After returning to Karginskaya, the family had the eldest daughter Svetlana (1926, Karginskaya station), then sons Alexander (1930-1990, Rostov-on-Don), Mikhail (1935, Moscow), daughter Maria (1938, Vyoshenskaya).

In 1938, Sholokhov was under threat of going to prison because the security officer Evdokimov petitioned Stalin for arrest.

Family

1923, December. M. A. Sholokhov’s departure from Moscow to the village of Karginskaya, to his parents, and with them to Bukanovskaya, where his fiancee Lydia Gromoslavskaya and future wife Maria Petrovna Gromoslavskaya lived (since their father Pyotr Yakovlevich Gromoslavsky insisted on M.A.’s marriage. Sholokhov on the eldest daughter Maria).

1924, January 11. The wedding of M. A. and M. P. Sholokhov in the Intercession Church of the village of Bukanovskaya. Marriage registration in the Podtyolkovsky registry office (Kumylzhenskaya village).

1930, May 18. Birth of son Alexander. Place of birth - Rostov-on-Don. Alexander was married to Violeta Gosheva, the daughter of Bulgarian Prime Minister Anton Yugov.

1942, June. During the bombing of the village of Vyoshenskaya in the courtyard of M. A. Sholokhov’s house, the writer’s mother died.

Works

• "Birthmark" (story)
• "Don Stories"
• « Quiet Don»
• "Virgin Soil Upturned"
• "They fought for their homeland"
• "The Fate of Man"
• "The Science of Hate"
• "The Word about the Motherland"

Early stories

In 1923, M. A. Sholokhov’s feuilletons were published in newspapers. Beginning in 1924, his stories appeared in magazines, later collected into the collections “Don Stories” and “Azure Steppe” (1926).

"Quiet Don"

Sholokhov's Russian and world fame was brought to him by the novel “Quiet Don” (1928 - 1-2 volumes, 1932 - 3 volumes, 4 volumes published in 1940) about the Don Cossacks in the First World War and the Civil War; this is a work that combines several storylines, called epic. Communist writer, in the years Civil War who was on the side of the Reds, Sholokhov devotes a significant place in the novel to the white Cossacks, and his main character- Grigory Melekhov - at the end of the story he never “comes to the Reds”. This caused criticism from communist critics; however, such a controversial novel was personally read by I.V. Stalin and approved by him for publication.

During World War II, “Quiet Don” was translated into European languages ​​and gained popularity in the West, and after the war it was translated into Eastern languages; the novel was also a success in the East.

"Virgin Soil Upturned"

The novel “Virgin Soil Upturned” (vol. 1 - 1932, vol. 2 - 1959) is dedicated to collectivization on the Don and the “25-thousander” movement. Here the author's assessment of the progress of collectivization is expressed; The images of the main characters and the pictures of collectivization are ambiguous. The second volume of “Virgin Soil Upturned” was lost during the Great Patriotic War and was restored later.

War works

Subsequently, M. A. Sholokhov published several excerpts from the unfinished novel “They Fought for the Motherland” (1942-1944, 1949, 1969), and the story “The Fate of a Man” (1956). In 1941-1945, while working as a war correspondent, he published several essays (“On the Don”, “In the South”, “Cossacks”, etc.) and the story “The Science of Hate” (1942), and in the first post-war years - several journalistic works texts of a patriotic nature (“The Word about the Motherland,” “The Struggle Continues” (1948), “Light and Darkness” (1949), “The executioners cannot escape the judgment of the people!” (1950), etc.).

Nobel Prize

In 1958 (for the seventh time) at Nobel Prize Boris Pasternak was nominated for literature. In March 1958, a delegation from the USSR Writers' Union visited Sweden and learned that among those nominated along with Pasternak were the names of Sholokhov, Ezra Pound and Alberto Moravia. Secretary of the Board of the Union of Writers of the USSR Georgy Markov said: "that among the highest circles<Шведской>The Academy has a definite opinion in favor of Pasternak.", which would need to be countered by the publication of materials “about the international popularity of Sholokhov, about his wide popularity in the Scandinavian countries”.

It would be desirable, through cultural figures close to us, to make it clear to the Swedish public that the Soviet Union would highly appreciate the award of the Nobel Prize to Sholokhov.

It is also important to make it clear that Pasternak as a writer does not enjoy recognition among Soviet writers and progressive writers in other countries.

In 1958, Boris Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. In official Soviet circles, the award of the prize to Pasternak was perceived negatively and resulted in persecution of the writer; under the threat of deprivation of citizenship and deportation from the USSR, Pasternak was forced to refuse the Nobel Prize.

In 1964 French writer and the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre refused the Nobel Prize in Literature. In his statement, in addition to personal reasons for refusing the prize, he also indicated that the Nobel Prize had become "Western highest cultural authority" and expressed regret that the prize was not awarded to Sholokhov and that “the only Soviet work to receive a prize was a book published abroad and banned in its native country”. The refusal of the prize and Sartre's statement predetermined the choice of the Nobel committee the following year.

In 1965, Sholokhov received the Nobel Prize in Literature “for the artistic strength and integrity of the epic about the Don Cossacks at a turning point for Russia.” Sholokhov is the only Soviet writer who received the Nobel Prize with the consent of the USSR leadership. Mikhail Sholokhov did not bow to Gustav Adolf VI, who was presenting the prize. According to some sources, this was done intentionally, with the words: “We, Cossacks, do not bow to anyone. In front of the people, please, but I won’t do it in front of the king, that’s all...”

In 2016, the Swedish Academy published a list of 90 nominees for the 1965 award on its website. It turned out that academicians discussed the idea of ​​dividing the prize between Anna Akhmatova and Mikhail Sholokhov.

Sholokhov vs. Sinyavsky and Daniel

In 1966, he spoke at the XXIII Congress of the CPSU and spoke about the trial of Sinyavsky and Daniel:

If these young men with a dark conscience had been caught in the memorable 1920s, when they were judged not based on strictly demarcated articles of the criminal code, but guided by a revolutionary sense of justice... (stormy applause)... Oh, these werewolves would not have received the same punishment! (stormy applause). And here, you see, they are still talking about the severity of the sentence! I would also like to appeal to foreign defenders of libels: don’t worry, dear ones, for the safety of our criticism. We support and develop criticism; it resonates sharply at our current congress. But slander is not criticism, and dirt from a puddle is not paint from an artist’s palette!

This statement made the figure of Sholokhov odious for some of the creative intelligentsia in the USSR and in the West.

Sholokhov M.A. v. Solzhenitsyn, Sakharov, 1973

• Sholokhov M.A. signed a Letter from a group of Soviet writers to the editors of the newspaper Pravda on August 31, 1973 about Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov.

Recent years

Until the end of his days he lived in his house in Vyoshenskaya (nowadays a museum). He donated the Stalin Prize to the Defense Fund, and donated the Lenin Prize for the novel “Virgin Soil Upturned” to the Karginsky village council of the Bazkovsky district of the Rostov region for construction new school, Nobel - for the construction of a school in Vyoshenskaya. He was interested in hunting and fishing. Since the 1960s, he actually moved away from literature. The writer died of laryngeal cancer on February 21, 1984. Mikhail Sholokhov was buried in the village of Veshenskaya on the banks of the Don, but not in the cemetery, but in the courtyard of the house in which he lived.

Membership in organizations

• All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) since 1932, delegate of the XVIII-XXVI Congresses;
• Central Committee of the CPSU since 1961;
• Deputy of the USSR Supreme Council of the 1st-10th convocations (since 1937);
• full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences (1939).

Awards and prizes

• Lenin Prize (1960) - for the novel “Virgin Soil Upturned” (1932-1960).
• Stalin Prize, first degree (1941) - for the novel “Quiet Don” (1928-1940).
• Nobel Prize in Literature (1965) - “For the artistic strength and integrity of the epic about the Don Cossacks at a turning point for Russia.”
• International Peace Prize for Culture of the World Peace Council.
• international literary prize"Sofia".
• International Prize "Lotus" for writers from Asia and Africa.
• twice Hero of Socialist Labor (1967, 1980).
• six Orders of Lenin (1939, 1955, 1965, 1967, 1975, 1980).
• Order of the October Revolution (1972).
• Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree (1945).
• medal "For the Defense of Moscow".
• Medal "For the Defense of Stalingrad"
• medal "For the victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War" Patriotic War 1941-1945."
• medal "Twenty years of victory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945."
• Medal "Thirty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945"
• medal "For valiant labor in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945."
• gold medal named after Alexander Fadeev (1972).
• Order "Georgi Dimitrov" (1975) (Bulgaria).
• Order of Cyril and Methodius, 1st degree (1975) (Bulgaria).
• Order of the People's Friendship Star, 1st degree (German Democratic Republic).
• Order of Sukhbaatar (Mongolia).
• Honorary Doctor of Sciences of Rostov state university, Karl Marx University Leipzig, University of St. Andrews (Scotland).

Memory

Lilac "Sholokhov"

Memorial museums

• State Museum-Reserve of M. A. Sholokhov (Rostov region)
• Memorial Museum of M.A. Sholokhov in Western Kazakhstan
• House-Museum of M. A. Sholokhov in Nikolaevsk, Nikolaevsky district (Volgograd region)

In philately

Postage stamps







The problem of text authorship

The problem of the authorship of texts published under the name of Sholokhov was raised back in the 1920s, when Quiet Don was first published. The main reason for opponents’ doubts about Sholokhov’s authorship (both then and at a later time) was the unusually young age of the author, who created such a grandiose work, and in a very short time, and especially the circumstances of his biography: the novel demonstrates a good familiarity with the life of the Don Cossacks , knowledge of many areas on the Don, the events of the First World War and the Civil War that took place when Sholokhov was a child and teenager. To this argument, researchers respond that the novel was not written by Sholokhov at the age of 20, but was written over almost fifteen years. The author spent a lot of time in the archives, often communicating with people who later became the prototypes of the heroes of the novel. According to some sources, the prototype of Grigory Melekhov was Sholokhov’s father’s colleague Kharlampy Ermakov, one of those who led the Veshensky uprising; he spent a lot of time with the future writer, talking about himself and what he had seen. Another argument of opponents is the low, according to some critics, artistic level of Sholokhov’s “Don Stories”, which preceded the novel.

In 1929, on the instructions of I.V. Stalin, a commission was formed under the leadership of M.I. Ulyanova, which investigated this issue and confirmed the authorship of M.A. Sholokhov based on the manuscripts of the novel provided by him. Subsequently, the manuscript was lost and was discovered only in 1999. The main argument of supporters of Sholokhov’s sole authorship until 1999 was considered to be a rough autograph of a significant part of the text of “Quiet Don” (more than a thousand pages), discovered in 1987 and stored at the Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Supporters of Sholokhov's authorship have always argued that this manuscript testifies to the author's careful work on the novel, and the previously unknown history of the text explains the errors and contradictions noted by their opponents in the novel. In addition, in the 1970s, the Norwegian Slavist and mathematician Geir Hjetso conducted a computer analysis of the indisputable texts of Sholokhov, on the one hand, and “Quiet Don”, on the other, and came to the conclusion about Sholokhov’s authorship. A weighty argument was also that the action of the novel takes place in Sholokhov’s native places, and many of the characters in the book are based on people whom Sholokhov knew personally. In 1999, after many years of searching, the Institute of World Literature named after. A. M. Gorky RAS managed to find the manuscripts of the 1st and 2nd books of “Quiet Don” that were considered lost. Three examinations were carried out: graphological, textological and identification, certified the authenticity of the manuscript, its belonging to its time and with scientific validity solved the problem of the authorship of “Quiet Don”, after which supporters of Sholokhov’s authorship considered their position unconditionally proven. In 2006, a facsimile edition of the manuscript was released, giving everyone the opportunity to verify the true authorship of the novel.

Nevertheless, a number of supporters of the version of plagiarism, based on their own analysis of the texts, remained unconvinced. It boils down to the fact that Sholokhov, apparently, found the manuscript of an unknown white Cossack and revised it, since the original would not have passed Bolshevik censorship and, perhaps, the manuscript was still “raw”. Thus, Sholokhov created his own manuscript, but on someone else’s material.

Mikhail Alexandrovich Sholokhov is one of the most famous Russians of the period. His work covers the most important events for our country - the revolution of 1917, the Civil War, the formation new government and the Great Patriotic War. In this article we will talk a little about the life of this writer and try to look at his works.

Brief biography. Childhood and youth

During the Civil War he was with the Reds and rose to the rank of commander. Then, after graduation, he moved to Moscow. Here he received his first education. After moving to Boguchar, he entered the gymnasium. Upon graduation, he returned to the capital again, he wanted to get higher education, but couldn’t get in. To feed himself, he had to get a job. During this short period, he changed several specialties, continuing to engage in self-education and literature.

The writer's first work was published in 1923. Sholokhov begins to collaborate with newspapers and magazines, writing feuilletons for them. In 1924, the story “Mole”, the first of the Don cycle, was published in “Young Leninist”.

Real fame and last years of life

The list of works by M. A. Sholokhov should begin with “Quiet Don”. It was this epic that brought the author real fame. Gradually it became popular not only in the USSR, but also in other countries. The writer’s second major work was “Virgin Soil Upturned,” which was awarded the Lenin Prize.

During the Great Patriotic War, Sholokhov was at this time and wrote many stories dedicated to this terrible time.

In 1965 it became significant for the writer - he was awarded the Nobel Prize for the novel “Quiet Don”. Starting in the 60s, Sholokhov practically stopped writing, devoting his free time to fishing and hunting. He donated most of his income to charity and led a quiet lifestyle.

The writer died on February 21, 1984. The body was buried on the banks of the Don in the courtyard of his own house.

The life that Sholokhov lived is full of unusual and bizarre events. We will present a list of the writer’s works below, and now let’s talk a little more about the author’s fate:

• Sholokhov was the only writer who received the Nobel Prize with the approval of the authorities. The author was also called “Stalin’s favorite”.
• When Sholokhov decided to woo one of the daughters of Gromoslavsky, a former Cossack ataman, he offered to marry the eldest of the girls, Marya. The writer, of course, agreed. The couple lived in marriage for almost 60 years. During this time they had four children.
• After the release of Quiet Flows the Flow, critics had doubts that the author of such a large and complex novel was really such a young author. By order of Stalin himself, a commission was established that conducted a study of the text and made a conclusion: the epic was indeed written by Sholokhov.

Features of creativity

The works of Sholokhov are inextricably linked with the image of the Don and the Cossacks (the list, titles and plots of the books are direct proof of this). It is from the life of his native places that he draws images, motifs and themes. The writer himself spoke about it this way: “I was born on the Don, there I grew up, studied and was formed as a person...”.

Despite the fact that Sholokhov focuses on describing the life of the Cossacks, his works are not limited to regional and local themes. On the contrary, using their example, the author manages to raise not only the problems of the country, but also universal and philosophical ones. The writer's works reflect deep historical processes. Connected with this is another distinctive feature of Sholokhov’s work - the desire to artistically reflect the turning points in the life of the USSR and how the people who found themselves in this whirlpool of events felt.

Sholokhov was inclined towards monumentalism; he was attracted to issues related to social changes and the destinies of peoples.

Early works

Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov began writing very early. The works (prose always remained preferable for him) of those years were dedicated to the Civil War, in which he himself took a direct part, although he was still quite a youth.

Sholokhov mastered his writing skills from a small form, that is, from stories that were published in three collections:

• "Azure Steppe";
• "Don Stories";
• “About Kolchak, nettles and other things.”

Despite the fact that these works did not go beyond the boundaries of social realism and largely glorified Soviet power, they stood out strongly against the background of other works of Sholokhov’s contemporary writers. The fact is that already in these years Mikhail Alexandrovich paid special attention to the life of the people and the description folk characters. The writer tried to portray a more realistic and less romanticized picture of the revolution. There is cruelty, blood, betrayal in his works - Sholokhov tries not to smooth out the harshness of the time.

At the same time, the author does not at all romanticize death or poeticize cruelty. He places emphasis differently. The main thing remains kindness and the ability to preserve humanity. Sholokhov wanted to show how “ugly the Don Cossacks perished in the steppes.” The uniqueness of the writer’s work lies in the fact that he raised the problem of revolution and humanism, interpreting actions from a moral point of view. And what worried Sholokhov most was the fratricide that accompanies any civil war. The tragedy of many of his heroes was that they had to shed their own blood.

"Quiet Don"

Perhaps the most famous book what Sholokhov wrote. We will continue the list of works with this, since the novel opens the next stage of the writer’s work. The author began writing the epic in 1925, immediately after the publication of the stories. Initially, he did not plan such a large-scale work, wanting only to depict the fate of the Cossacks in revolutionary times and their participation in the “suppression of the revolution.” Then the book received the name “Donshchina”. But Sholokhov did not like the first pages he wrote, since the motives of the Cossacks would not be clear to the average reader. Then the writer decided to start his story in 1912 and end in 1922. The meaning of the novel has changed, as has the title. Work on the work took 15 years. The final version of the book was published in 1940.

"Virgin Soil Upturned"

Another novel that M. Sholokhov created for several decades. A list of the writer’s works is impossible without mentioning this book, since it is considered the second most popular after “Quiet Don”. “Virgin Soil Upturned” consists of two books, the first was completed in 1932, and the second in the late 50s.

The work describes the process of collectivization on the Don, which Sholokhov himself witnessed. The first book can generally be called a report from the scene. The author very realistically and colorfully recreates the drama of this time. Here there is dispossession, and meetings of farmers, and murders of people, and slaughter of cattle, and the theft of collective farm grain, and a women's revolt.

The plot of both parts is based on the confrontation between class enemies. The action begins with a double plot - the secret arrival of Polovtsev and the arrival of Davydov, and also ends with a double denouement. The entire book is based on the confrontation between the Reds and the Whites.

Sholokhov, works about the war: list

Books dedicated to the Great Patriotic War:

• Novel “They Fought for the Motherland”;
• Stories “The Science of Hate”, “The Fate of Man”;
• Essays “In the South”, “On the Don”, “Cossacks”, “On Cossack collective farms”, “Infamy”, “Prisoners of War”, “In the South”;
• Journalism - “The struggle continues”, “The Word about the Motherland”, “The executioners cannot escape the judgment of the people!”, “Light and darkness”.

During the war, Sholokhov worked as a war correspondent for Pravda. Stories and essays describing these terrible events had some distinctive features, which defined Sholokhov as a battle writer and even survived in his post-war prose.

The author's essays can be called a chronicle of the war. Unlike other writers working in the same direction, Sholokhov never directly expressed his views on events; the heroes spoke for him. Only at the end did the writer allow himself to draw a small conclusion.

Sholokhov's works, despite the subject matter, retain a humanistic orientation. At the same time, the main character changes a little. He becomes a person who is able to realize the significance of his place in the world struggle and understand that he is responsible to his comrades, relatives, children, life itself and history.

"They fought for their homeland"

We continue to disassemble creative heritage What Sholokhov left behind (list of works). The writer perceives war not as a fatal inevitability, but as a socio-historical phenomenon that tests the moral and ideological qualities of people. The fates of individual characters form a picture of an epoch-making event. Such principles formed the basis of the novel “They Fought for their Motherland,” which, unfortunately, was never completed.

According to Sholokhov's plan, the work was to consist of three parts. The first was supposed to describe the pre-war events and the fight of the Spaniards against the Nazis. And already in the second and third the struggle of the Soviet people against the invaders would be described. However, none of the parts of the novel were ever published. Only individual chapters were published.

A distinctive feature of the novel is the presence of not only large-scale battle scenes, but also sketches of everyday soldier life, which often have a humorous overtones. At the same time, the soldiers are well aware of their responsibility to the people and the country. Their thoughts about home and their native places become tragic as their regiment retreats. Consequently, they cannot justify the hopes placed on them.

Summing up

Passed a huge creative path Sholokhov Mikhail Alexandrovich. All of the author's works, especially if considered in chronological order, confirm this. If you take early stories and later ones, the reader will see how much the writer’s skill has grown. At the same time, he managed to preserve many motives, such as loyalty to his duty, humanity, devotion to family and country, etc.

But the writer’s works have not only artistic and aesthetic value. First of all, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov aspired to be a chronicler (biography, list of books and diary entries confirm this).

In Soviet schools, the novel was part of the compulsory literature curriculum, so the name of the author and Sholokhov’s biography were briefly “in the public eye.” Today we read his works “The Fate of Man”, “Cossacks”, “They Fought for the Motherland” and think about the fate of the heroes. To better understand the novels, you need to trace the life and creative path of the writer.

Mikhail Sholokhov lived for quite a long time - 78 years. Among the twists and turns of a difficult fate, it is difficult to note the most important turns, but let's try to list the most important things.

So, Sholokhov’s biography briefly:

1. Birth in the family of a clerk (a native of the Ryazan province) and a woman from a Cossack family (a former maid).
2. Childhood, mother's stories, games in the vastness of the great native Don.
3. Training - first in elementary school, then at the Bogucharskaya gymnasium.
4. Working life: work as a teacher, laborer, clerk... Wherever fate took Mikhail Alexandrovich!
5. Active participation in the struggle for the establishment of Soviet power. Marriage.
6. Work on works.
7. Work as a war correspondent.
8. Public activities, including in the role of people's deputy.
9. Recent years, the fight against disease, death in the village of Veshenskaya, where the writer spent many years with his wife and four children born in a single marriage.

This is in general terms. For more detailed information, you can break down life path by dates.

It will be easier to isolate the main thing if you display the main dates in a table: Mikhail Sholokhov: biography by dates

This is the path Sholokhov took; the chronological table of his life shows that the writer waged a constant struggle with circumstances and difficulties. Difficult times required each person to make their own choice. Mikhail Alexandrovich’s position has always been this: with the people and for the people.

Key dates

The life and work of a writer are inextricably linked, therefore, knowing what events happened, it will be easier to understand the mental mood and definitely get on the wavelength of each of his works. It is impossible to remember everything, so when studying this issue it is worth paying attention to the most interesting facts from the writer’s biography (and the most significant).

This is definitely:

• 1912 – beginning of studies, acquisition of knowledge;
• years of civil war - developing one’s own views, determining one’s civic position;
• WWII - the experience gained by Sholokhov near the front line is invaluable;
• 1965 – world recognition: Nobel Prize.

Important! Mikhail Alexandrovich passionately loved his native Don steppe and the harsh, hardworking and fair people inhabiting it - the Cossacks, which was reflected in his work.

Creation

What is important in a person's life? Of course, first of all, his parents, family. Then - teachers, environment, friends. The writer never moved away from his roots; the word “Motherland” was not an abstract concept for him.

A writer’s biography by date is not the most important thing to remember. And turn his life into chronological table, consisting of dry facts and dates, is also not necessary.

The most important thing is to understand that Sholokhov’s work is a consequence of his life’s path.

If it were not for the revolution and the Civil War, if the writer had not had the chance to take part in the Great Patriotic War, it is unlikely that the most powerful of his works would have been born:

• "Quiet Don";
• "The Science of Hate";

His creativity and inspiration depended on what happened in Sholokhov’s life. The writer never invented his heroes, and therefore the characters turned out to be so real and alive.

Pay attention! Each of the characters is an almost exact portrait of a person whom the author met in life.

And Aksinya, and Grigory Melekhov, and his brother Peter - Mikhail Alexandrovich knew all these people (of course, under other names).

Of course, I had to work a little on the images, soften something, add something, but we can say with confidence: the heroes of the novels are people who really lived, loved, suffered, fought and hoped for that hard time, when the author had a chance to grow up and gain life wisdom.

One of the main dates can easily be attributed to the period 1918-1921, when there were battles for power between the Reds and the Whites. Most likely, it was then that the character of the future writer was formed and his views were determined.

The second stage of personality formation is the years of the Great Patriotic War. It is during great trials that it becomes clear what a person is like and what he is capable of.

In addition, the author of “Quiet Flows the Don” had to endure more than one arrest and face death. These dates are 1920 and 1938. First, the young man ended up in the hands of Nestor Makhno. The second is arrest by the very authorities that Mikhail considered the fairest on earth.

Some facts from the writer’s life evoke a feeling of respect and admiration for this outwardly very modest man. While still very young, Mikhail actively participated in the fight against the gangs of marauders that swarmed the Don in the turbulent and terrible post-revolutionary times.

Pay attention! All his life, despite recognition in Russia and in the world, he remained unpretentious in his personal needs.

Place of birth

You can tell something interesting about the place where the future writer was born. Place of birth
writer Sholokhov - the village of Veshenskaya, which is part of the modern Rostov region.

Nowadays, it is a large populated area: about 10 thousand people live here. A small note: the writer was born not in Veshenskaya itself, but on a farm near it.

At the beginning of the 20th century. Veshenskaya was also not small: it had 1,200 inhabitants. In the years of Mikhail Alexandrovich’s youth, the village became the center of the Verkhnedon uprising, here the White Cossacks tried to overthrow Soviet power and establish a different order.

So Sholokhov’s small homeland is one of the largest centers of the Civil War, which split Russia into two camps.

When the unrest of the Civil War was left behind, Mikhail Alexandrovich chose Veshenskaya as his permanent place of residence. Being a deputy of the people, he managed to make life easier for his fellow villagers: at his insistence, they laid railway to the village of Bazkovskaya, and then built a bridge connecting the right and left banks of the Don. Today, the writer’s museum-estate is carefully guarded in Veshenskaya.

Many facts from Sholokhov’s life are described in textbooks and have not been a secret for a long time. But there are also “blind spots” that have opened up for us relatively recently.

Thus, Mikhail Alexandrovich’s mother, who served as a maid for a landowner, was forcibly married to a Cossack Kuznetsov. However, she did not love her husband, from whom she left for the manager of a steam mill (one of his professions) Alexander Sholokhov.

The lovers had a son, but the boy initially bore the surname Kuznetsov, since it was impossible to legitimize the relationship until the death of Kuznetsov, the official husband of the mother of the future writer. Therefore, Mikhail did not immediately become Sholokhov.

Mikhail Alexandrovich spent his entire life educating himself.

• because of revolutionary events I had to leave one school after another;
• teach literacy to children and adults;
• work in a food detachment, work as a loader.

Interesting facts from his biography: he graduated from the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University and the Faculty of History and Philology of Rostov University. At the university, he met his future wife, who initially worked for him as an assistant secretary.

During the Civil War, young Mikhail and his squad came across a gang of the “father” Nestor Makhno himself. If the guy was older, he wouldn't have fared well. But the 15-year-old teenager behaved so courageously that the chieftain liked it, and he did not deal with him. He only promised: “If you get caught again, I’ll hang you.”

Another time death stared Sholokhov in the face in 1922, when he showed “excessive zeal” during the collection of taxes. An arrest followed, but after 2 days the death sentence was replaced by a year of correctional labor. Another arrest followed in the terrible year of 1938. Someone slandered Sholokhov, and he was arrested, but imprisonment and death were avoided.

He had many awards: State Prizes, Stalin, Lenin, International Peace Prize. He was elected honorary doctor of the University of Leipzig. In 1941, Mikhail Alexandrovich donated 4 of his state awards to the needs of the front: rocket launchers were purchased for the entire amount.

What did he die from?

In recent years, the author of the novels has been seriously ill. How did a talented prose writer, an outstanding writer and public figure die? Soviet Union? Doctors have determined exactly what exactly the Soviet prose writer died from. His health was undermined by vascular diseases: he suffered two strokes in adulthood.

But the writer died due to another illness. He was diagnosed with cancer that had metastasized to the larynx. Sholokhov died in his homeland, in the village of Veshenskaya, where he spent almost his entire life.

Useful video: The life and creative path of M. A. Sholokhov

Conclusion

The fate of our great contemporary turned out to be difficult. Many times life seemed to test this person’s strength of character and courage. Sholokhov withstood all the tests - just like the heroes of his works, and to the end remained a man for whom the ideals of justice, mutual assistance, sincerity and honesty were above all.

Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov was born on May 24, 1905 in the Kruzhilina farm of the village of Vyoshenskaya, Donetsk district of the Don Army Region (now Sholokhovsky district of the Rostov region).

In 1910, the Sholokhov family moved to the Kargin farm, where at the age of 7 Misha was admitted to a men's parish school. From 1914 to 1918 he studied at men's gymnasiums in Moscow, Boguchar and Vyoshenskaya.

In 1920-1922 works as an employee in the village revolutionary committee, a teacher to eliminate illiteracy among adults in the village. Latyshev, a clerk in the procurement office of the Donfood Committee in Art. Karginskaya, tax inspector in Art. Bukanovskaya.

In October 1922 he left for Moscow. He works as a loader, mason, and accountant in the housing administration on Krasnaya Presnya. He meets representatives of the literary community, attends classes at the Young Guard literary association. The first writing experiments of the young Sholokhov date back to this time. In the fall of 1923, “Youthful Truth” published two of his feuilletons - “Test” and “Three”.

In December 1923 he returned to the Don. On January 11, 1924, he got married in the Bukanovskaya Church to Maria Petrovna Gromoslavskaya, the daughter of the former village ataman.

Maria Petrovna, having graduated from the Ust-Medveditsk Diocesan School, worked in Art. Bukanovskaya was first a teacher in an elementary school, then a clerk in the executive committee, where Sholokhov was an inspector at that time. Having got married, they were inseparable until the end of their days. The Sholokhovs lived together for 60 years, raising and raising four children.

December 14, 1924 M.A. Sholokhov publishes the first work of art- story “Birthmark” in the newspaper “Young Leninist”. Becomes a member of the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers.

Sholokhov’s stories “The Shepherd”, “Shibalkovo Seed”, “Nakhalyonok”, “Mortal Enemy”, “Alyoshkin’s Heart”, “Two Husband”, “Kolovert”, the story “Path-Road” appeared on the pages of central publications, and in 1926 they published collections “Don Stories” and “Azure Steppe”.

In 1925, Mikhail Alexandrovich began creating the novel “Quiet Don”. During these years, the Sholokhov family lived in Karginskaya, then in Bukanovskaya, and since 1926 - in Vyoshenskaya. In 1928, the magazine “October” began publishing “Quiet Don”.

After the publication of the first volume of the novel, difficult days begin for the writer: the success among readers is stunning, but an unfriendly atmosphere reigns in writing circles. Envy of a young writer, who is called a new genius, gives rise to slander and vulgar fabrications. The author's position in describing the Verkhnedon uprising is sharply criticized by RAPP; it is proposed to remove more than 30 chapters from the book and make the main character a Bolshevik.

Sholokhov is only 23 years old, but he endures attacks steadfastly and courageously. Confidence in his abilities and in his calling helps him. In order to stop malicious slander and rumors of plagiarism, he turns to the executive secretary and member of the editorial board of the newspaper “Pravda” M.I. Ulyanova with an urgent request to create an expert commission and transfers to her the manuscripts of “Quiet Don”. In the spring of 1929, writers A. Serafimovich, L. Averbakh, V. Kirshon, A. Fadeev, V. Stavsky spoke in Pravda in defense of the young author, based on the conclusions of the commission. The rumors stop. But spiteful critics will more than once make attempts to denigrate Sholokhov, who honestly speaks about the tragic events in the life of the country and does not want to deviate from the historical truth.

The novel was completed in 1940. In the 30s, Sholokhov began work on the novel “Virgin Soil Upturned.”

During the war years, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov was a war correspondent for the Sovinformburo, the newspapers Pravda and Krasnaya Zvezda. He publishes front-line essays, the story “The Science of Hate,” and the first chapters of the novel “They Fought for the Motherland.” Sholokhov donated the state prize awarded for the novel “Quiet Don” to the USSR Defense Fund, and then purchased four new missile launchers for the front with his own funds.

For participation in the Great Patriotic War he received awards - the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree, medals “For the Defense of Moscow”, “For the Defense of Stalingrad”, “For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945”, “Twenty Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War”. Patriotic War."

After the war, the writer finishes the 2nd book of “Virgin Soil Upturned”, works on the novel “They Fought for the Motherland”, writes the story “The Fate of a Man”.

Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov - laureate of the Nobel, State and Lenin Prizes in Literature, twice Hero of Socialist Labor, full member of the USSR Academy of Sciences, holder of an honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Leipzig in Germany, Doctor of Philology from Rostov State University , deputy of the Supreme Council of all convocations. He was awarded six Orders of Lenin, the Order October Revolution, other awards. During his lifetime, a bronze bust was erected in the village of Veshenskaya. And this is not a complete list of prizes, awards, honorary titles and public responsibilities of the writer.

Mikhail Sholokhov (1905-1984) - Russian prose writer, journalist, screenwriter. Received the 1965 Nobel Prize for his contributions to world literature(epic novel about the Russian Cossacks “Quiet Don”). In 1941 he became a laureate of the Stalin Prize, in 1960 - the Lenin Prize, in 1967 and 1980 - Hero of Socialist Labor.

The future outstanding writer was born in 1905 (Kruzhilin farm, Veshenskaya village) in a wealthy family, his father was a clerk in a commercial store and the manager of a steam mill, his mother was a Cossack by birth, she was a servant in the Yasenevka manor estate, she was forcibly married to a Cossack village ataman Kuznetsova. After breaking up with him, Anastasia Chernyak began to live with Alexander Sholokhov, their son Mikhail was born out of wedlock and was called Kuznetsov (after her last name ex-husband), until they officially divorced and she married Alexander Sholokhov in 1912.

After the head of the family received new job in another village, the family moved to a new location. Little Misha was taught to read and write by a local teacher invited to his home; in 1914 he began studying in the preparatory class of the Moscow Men's Gymnasium. 1915-1918 - studying at the gymnasium in Boguchary (Voronezh province). In 1920, after the Bolsheviks came to power, the Sholokhovs moved to the village of Karginskaya, where his father began to manage the procurement office, and his son began to conduct office work in the village revolutionary committee. Having completed the Rostov tax courses, Sholokhov became a food inspector in the village of Bukanovskaya, there, as part of food detachments, he participated in food appropriation, and was captured by Makhno. In September 1922, Mikhail Sholokhov was taken into custody, a criminal case was initiated against him and even a court sentence was issued - execution, which was never carried out. Thanks to the intervention of his father, who paid a large bail for him and corrected his birth certificates, according to which he became a minor, he was released in March 1923, sentenced to a year of correctional labor in a juvenile colony and sent to Bolshevo (Moscow region).

Having gone to the capital, Sholokhov tries to become a workers' faculty member, which he fails to do, since he lacks work experience and the direction of the Komsomol organization. The future writer worked part-time as a laborer, attended various literary clubs and educational classes, the teachers of which were well-known personalities at that time such as Alexander Aseev, Osip Brik, Viktor Shklovsky. In 1923, the newspaper “Yunosheskaya Pravda” published the feuilleton “Test”, authored by Sholokhov, and later several more works “Three”, “The Inspector General”.

In the same year, after visiting his parents who lived in the village of Bukanovskaya, Sholokhov decided to propose to Lydia Gromoslavskaya. But convinced by his future father-in-law (former village ataman) to “make a man out of him,” he takes as his wife not Lydia, but her older sister, Maria, with whom they had four children in the future (two sons and two daughters).

At the end of 1924, the newspaper “Young Leninist” published Sholokhov’s story “The Birthmark”, which was included in the cycle of Don stories (“Shepherd”, “Foal”, “Family Man”, etc.), later combined into the collections “Don Stories” ( 1926), “Azure Steppe” (1926), “About Kolchak, nettles and other things” (1927). These works did not bring the author much popularity, but they marked the arrival of a new writer in Soviet Russian literature, capable of noticing and reflecting in a bright literary form important trends in life at that time.

In 1928, living with his family in the village of Veshenskaya, Sholokhov began work on his most ambitious creation - the epic novel in four volumes “Quiet Don”, in which he reflected the fate of the Don Cossacks during the First World War and subsequent civil bloodshed. The novel was published in 1940 and was highly praised by both the country's party leadership and Comrade Stalin himself. During World War II, the novel was translated into many Western European languages ​​and gained great popularity not only in Russia, but also far beyond its borders. In 1965, Sholokhov was nominated for the Nobel Prize, and became the only Soviet writer, who received it with the personal approval of the then leadership of the Soviet Union. In the period from 1932 to 1959, Sholokhov wrote another of his famous two-volume novel about collectivization, “Virgin Soil Upturned,” for which he received the Lenin Prize in 1960.

During the war years, Mikhail Sholokhov served as a war correspondent; at that difficult time for the country, many stories and stories were written that described the fate of ordinary people caught in the millstones of war: the stories “The Fate of Man”, “The Science of Hatred”, the unfinished story “They Fought” for the Motherland." Subsequently, these works were filmed and became true classics of Soviet cinema, which made an indelible impression on viewers, striking them with their tragedy, humanity and unchanging patriotism.

In the post-war period, Sholokhov published a series of journalism “The Word about the Motherland”, “Light and Darkness”, “The Fight Continues”, etc. In the early 60s he gradually moved away from literary activity, returns from Moscow to the village of Veshenskaya, goes hunting and fishing. He donates all the prizes he receives for his literary achievements to the construction of schools in his native places. IN recent years Throughout his life, he was seriously ill and stoically endured the consequences of two strokes, diabetes, and, ultimately, cancer of the larynx - throat cancer. His earthly journey ended on February 21, 1984, his remains were buried in the village of Veshenskaya, in the courtyard of his house.