Аннотация: Chief (East-Republican) historian of Russia of the 20th century. An essay on the Antonina Pikul's book "Valentin Pikul".
Chief (East-Republican) historian of Russia of the 20th century. An essay on the Antonina Pikul's book "Valentin Pikul".
After reading the story by Valentin Pikul "How to get into the encyclopedia?" I found Antonina Pikul's book "Valentin Pikul" and read it.
I tried to analyze the illegible general impression that this book made on me and to present the result of my reflections in the form of separate biographical and creative elements.
(1) Gyrocompass. An intuitive, very accurate, biographical steps of Valentin Pikul: A junge (cabin boy) - "Anshutist" - the writer.
A little boy, evacuated from besieged Leningrad, Valentin Pikul, makes a sudden decision to become a cabin boy. His main argument is that he can name all the points of the compass rose. His knowledge and his notebooks make an impression - little Pikul is enrolled in the school of junges (of cabin boys).
At the school of junges (of cabin boys), Pikul pays special attention to the study of the gyrocompass.
After school, on a warship, Pikul manages to become an "Anschutist" - a specialist in the Anschütz Gyro Compass.
The war years are coming to an end. For Pikul's family and cultural environment, the profession of "writer" is something distant and incomprehensible. But Valentin Pikul makes a firm decision - to become a writer.
(2) A person striving to live apart from the collective. Approximation to the officer environment. Chief in a sphere of "naval military heroism."
In Valentin Pikul, there is a desire to live "separately from the team."
He moves from Leningrad to Riga, but he remains in the Leningrad Writers' Organization.
So he manages to move away from the Writers' Organization.
Pikul and his wife are renting a dacha on the island next Riga. The distance from the "team" becomes more and more.
Pikul, as soon as he has money, mainly uses taxis. Apparently, public transport does not appeal to him.
Pikul is being treated in a sanatorium. He does not go to the common dining room. Outside the sanatorium, he finds a place where truck drivers and other people eat. Here, away from the collective of the sanatorium, he has breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Pikul will receive an invitation to receive a literary education. He emotionally refuses such prospects.
There is a local writers' organization in Riga. Pikul is not particularly close to her. In Riga, the social environment is different from Leningrad. But there is a separate social segment - this is the fleet and the officer environment. In this environment, Pikul feels more or less comfortable.
According to the old Russian custom, each sphere should have a "chief".
The "Chief" directs the respective sphere and feeds from it.
Let's say one of the outstanding cultural figures (about whom I wrote) - he aspired to become "the main one in the theme of Heinrich Schliemann."
There were "chiefs" in various fields: in "front-line lieutenants", in "marine arctic heroism", etc.
Valentin Pikul "receives" "possession" of the sphere of "naval military heroism". There are smaller segments within this large sphere. The Pikul's superiority in the segment of "front-line junges (cabin boys)", for example, is undeniable.
(3) Before the Last Frontier (or Before the Last Limit). The transition from the role of "main" in "naval military heroism" to the "position" of the main Russial historian of the 20th century.
The strong position of the 'chief' in 'naval military heroism' makes it possible for Valentin Pikul to take an unusual and, to a certain extent, forbidden step - to move to the role of the main (East-Republican) historian of Russia of (80-90s) the 20th century.
Somewhere in the cultural air, the worthlessness of the historical concept of Karamzin and his History was felt, slightly.
More obvious was the well-known rottenness of party-class historical science.
Pikul crosses the "forbidden" line.
He is not only and not so much the 'chief' in 'naval heroism', but he is the main historian of the USSR (Russia) of his time.
Valentin Pikul has qualities that are strange for an ordinary Soviet person (who does not have a higher education and work experience in the scientific field).
He maintains a file cabinet (file cabinets?). He collects historical collections. Before writing each book, he makes detailed lists of literature to be read and studied. He makes chronological plans (tables) for each of his future books.
(Valentin Pikul has collected a valuable library, which including many rarities and super rarities. His archive - it is of literary and historical value).
Each historical book by Valentin Pikul is the result of a huge, detailed historical research.
Each book by Pikul is reviewed by several professional historians from the scientific community.
The shaky edifice of Soviet historical science sways and vibrates under the influence of the typhoons of new historical knowledge, the historical typhoons generated by Valentin Pikul.
The people feel that a new, unusual figure has appeared on the scientific and historical horizon.
People are sweeping Valentin Pikul's books off store shelves. [are actively buying]
Little historical and literary "bosses", whose "power" and whose feeding in their separate "spheres" become in doubt (in such situation), experience anger and jealousy.
(4) Historical Atlas did not spread [stretch] his shoulders.
Pikul had no experience of presenting material in a scientific style.
A huge historical researches were presented in an interesting, but scientifically dubious, style of an adventure (heroic) historical novel. A wide admiration is a valuable, but not always reliable "historical currency".
An attempt by one of Pikul's supporters to reach the getting the writer the title of Doctor of Historical Sciences - without defending a dissertation - was unsuccessful. They are not such a figures.
Valentin Pikul did not fulfill out a direct torpedo attack onto the Karamzin's historical concept and on his "The History". This is the main shortcoming of the chief historian of Russia of (80-90s) the 20th century.
In the book under consideration, we see the attention of Valentin Pikul to the partition of the Commonwealth (1795), as well as the general opposition (confrontation) of the cultural environment to a comprehensive consideration of the significance of this issue. Valentin Pikul tried to resist this pressure, but yielded. An attempt at open confrontation would have taken him even further beyond the forbidden line.
The birthplace of Valentin Pikul's father is known. As well as the general manner of the writer's existence in Soviet conditions. ('Savva Mikhailovich (Valentin's father) was born on December 5, 1901 in the town of Kaharlyk, Kyiv province'). Pikul can be effortlessly called an "East-Republican" writer and an "East-Republican" historian.
'During his short life he wrote 22 novels, four of them in two volumes and 151 historical miniatures. The range of his work extends from the era of Ivan the Terrible to the events of the Great Patriotic War,' writes Antonina Pikul in her book. [unofficial translation]
So, the reader has the opportunity to get acquainted with the results of the broadest and most detailed historical research - studies that are not presented in the form of historical monographs, studies that have not reached the level of a direct and obvious controversy with the historical concept of Karamzin and of his "The History".
Pikul's works are interesting. But for me, even more interesting is the phenomenon of Valentin Pikul as the main - albeit not very successful from a scientific point of view - (East-Republican) historian of Russia of (80-90s) the 20th century.
[MMCMXCIV. Starchevsky, Schliemann and Ponomarev. A culturological note about the Valentin Pikul's story "How to get into the encyclopedia?". -28 May 2022.].
May 31, 2022 02:14
Translation from Russian into English: May 31, 2022 04:01.
Владимир Владимирович Залесский 'Главный (восточно-республиканский) историк России 20 века. Очерк о книге Антонины Пикуль 'Валентин Пикуль''.
{ 3028. Главный (восточно-республиканский) историк России 20 века. Очерк о книге Антонины Пикуль 'Валентин Пикуль'.
MMCMXCIX. Chief (East-Republican) historian of Russia of the 20th century. An essay on the Antonina Pikul's book "Valentin Pikul". }