Rubtsov Nikolay Mikhailovich
Born: January 3, 1936.
Died: January 19, 1971 (age 35).

Biography

Nikolai Mikhailovich Rubtsov (January 3, 1936, village of Yemetsk, Northern Territory - January 19, 1971, Vologda) - Russian lyric poet.

Born on January 3, 1936 in the village of Yemetsk, Kholmogory district of the Northern Territory (now Arkhangelsk region). In 1937 he moved with his large family to Nyandoma. In 1939-1940, Rubtsov’s father Mikhail Andrianovich worked as the head of the Nyandoma Gorpo. In January 1941, “Mikhail Rubtsov left Nyandoma for the Vologda City Party Committee. In Vologda, the Rubtsovs were caught up in the war. In the summer of 1942, Rubtsov’s mother and younger sister died, the father was at the front, and the children were sent to boarding schools. This summer, 6-year-old Nikolai wrote his first poem.

Nikolai and his brother first ended up in the Krasovsky orphanage, and from October 1943 until June 1950, Nikolai lived and studied in an orphanage in the village of Nikolskoye, Totemsky district, Vologda region, where he graduated from seven classes of school (now the House is located in this building). Museum of N. M. Rubtsov). In the same village, his daughter Elena was subsequently born in a civil marriage with Henrietta Mikhailovna Menshikova.

In his autobiography, written upon entering Tralflot in 1952, Nikolai writes that his father went to the front and died in 1941. But in fact, Mikhail Adrianovich Rubtsov (1900-1962) survived, after being wounded in 1944 he returned to Vologda and in the same year he married again and lived in Vologda. Due to the loss of documents in the Krasovsky orphanage, he could not find Nikolai and met him only in 1955.

From 1950 to 1952, Rubtsov studied at the Totemsky Forestry College. From 1952 to 1953 he worked as a fireman in the Arkhangelsk trawl fleet of the Sevryba trust, from August 1953 to January 1955 he studied at the mine surveying department at the Mining and Chemical College of the Ministry of Chemical Industry in Kirovsk, Murmansk Region. In January 1955, he failed the winter session and was expelled from the technical school. Since March 1955, Rubtsov was a laborer at an experimental military training ground.

From October 1955 to October 1959, he served as a rangefinder on the Northern Fleet destroyer Ostry (with the rank of sailor and senior sailor). On May 1, 1957, his first newspaper publication took place (the poem “May has come”) in the newspaper “On Guard of the Arctic.” After demobilization, he lived in Leningrad, working alternately as a mechanic, fireman and charger at the Kirov plant.

Rubtsov begins studying at the literary association “Narvskaya Zastava”, meets young Leningrad poets Gleb Gorbovsky, Konstantin Kuzminsky, Eduard Shneiderman. In July 1962, with the help of Boris Taigin, he published his first typewritten collection, “Waves and Rocks.”

In August 1962, Rubtsov entered the Literary Institute. M. Gorky in Moscow and met Vladimir Sokolov, Stanislav Kunyaev, Vadim Kozhinov and other writers, whose friendly participation more than once helped him both in his creativity and in the matter of publishing poetry. Problems soon arose with his stay at the institute, but the poet continued to write, and in the mid-1960s his first collections were published.

In 1969, Rubtsov graduated from the Literary Institute and was accepted into the staff of the Vologda Komsomolets newspaper.

In 1968, Rubtsov’s literary merits received official recognition, and in Vologda he was allocated a one-room apartment No. 66 on the fifth floor in a five-story building No. 3 on a street named after another Vologda poet - Alexandra Yashina.

Writer Fedor Abramov called Rubtsov the brilliant hope of Russian poetry.

Death

He died on the night of January 19, 1971 in his apartment, as a result of a domestic quarrel with the aspiring poetess Lyudmila Derbina (Granovskaya) (born 1938), whom he was going to marry (on January 8 they submitted documents to the registry office). The judicial investigation established that the death was of a violent nature and resulted from suffocation - mechanical asphyxia from squeezing the neck organs with hands. Derbina, in her memoirs and interviews, describing the fateful moment, claims that a heart attack occurred - “his heart simply could not stand it when we grappled.” She was found guilty of the murder of Rubtsov, sentenced to 8 years, released early after almost 6 years, as of 2013 she lived in Velsk, did not consider herself guilty and hoped for posthumous rehabilitation. Publicist and deputy editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Zavtra” Vladimir Bondarenko, pointing out in 2000 that Rubtsov’s death somehow resulted from Derbina’s actions, called her memoirs “senseless and vain attempts at justification.”

Biographers mention the poem Rubtsova“I will die in the Epiphany frosts” as a prediction of the date of my own death. The Vologda Museum of Nikolai Rubtsov contains the poet’s will, found after his death: “Bury me where Batyushkov is buried.”

Nikolai Rubtsov was buried in Vologda at the Poshekhonskoye cemetery.

Creation

The Vologda “small homeland” and the Russian North gave him the main theme of his future work - “ancient Russian identity”, became the center of his life, “sacred land!”, where he felt “both alive and mortal” (see Borisovo-Sudskoe) .

His first collection, “Waves and Rocks,” appeared in 1962 in samizdat; his second book of poems, “Lyrics,” was officially published in 1965 in Arkhangelsk. Then the poetry collections “Star of the Fields” (1967), “The Soul Keeps” (1969), and “Pine Noise” (1970) were published. “Green Flowers”, which were being prepared for publication, appeared after the poet’s death.

Rubtsov's poetry, extremely simple in its style and themes, associated primarily with his native Vologda region, has creative authenticity, internal scale, and a finely developed figurative structure.

Memory

The House-Museum of N. M. Rubtsov has been operating in the village of Nikolskoye since 1996.
In the city of Apatity, Murmansk region, on January 20, 1996, on the facade of the library-museum building, where Rubtsov’s readings have been held in Apatity since 1994, a memorial plaque in memory of the poet was installed.
In Vologda, a street was named after Nikolai Rubtsov and a monument was erected (1998, sculptor A. M. Shebunin).
In 1998, the name of the poet was assigned to St. Petersburg Library No. 5 (Nevskaya Central Library) (Address 193232, St. Petersburg, Nevsky district, Shotmana st., 7, building 1). In the library. Nikolai Rubtsov there is a literary museum “Nikolai Rubtsov: Poems and Fate”.
A monument by sculptor Vyacheslav Klykov was erected in Totma.
In Kirovsk, on January 19, 2000, on the facade of the new building of the Khibiny Technical College (formerly the Kirov Mining and Chemical College, where the poet studied in 1953-1955), a memorial plaque was installed in memory of the poet.
In 2001, in St. Petersburg, on the building of the administrative building of the Kirov plant, a marble memorial plaque was installed, with the famous cry of the poet: “Russia! Rus! Protect yourself, protect yourself! A monument to Rubtsov was also erected in his homeland, in Yemetsk (2004, sculptor Nikolai Ovchinnikov).
Since 2009, the All-Russian Poetry Competition named after. Nikolai Rubtsov, whose goal is to find and support young aspiring poets from among the pupils of orphanages.
In Vologda there is a museum “Literature. Art. Century XX" (branch of the Vologda State Historical, Architectural and Art Museum of the Reserve), dedicated to the work of Valery Gavrilin and Nikolai Rubtsov.
In Yemetsk secondary school named after. Rubtsov, Yemetsk Museum of Local Lore. N. M. Rubtsov, a monument to Rubtsov was erected.
In the village of Nikolskoye, a street and a secondary school are named after the poet; a house-museum of the poet was opened on Nikolai Rubtsov Street (in the building of a former orphanage). There is a memorial plaque on the facade.
A bust of Nikolai Rubtsov was erected in Cherepovets.
On January 19, 2010, at the Kirov Plant (St. Petersburg) in workshop 420, a musical and literary performance “Songs of the Russian Soul” was held, dedicated to the memory of the poet.
On November 1, 2011, the Nikolai Rubtsov Literary and Local History Center opened in the House of Knowledge in Cherepovets. It recreates the apartment of Galina Rubtsova-Shvedova, the poet’s sister, whom he often visited when coming to Cherepovets. The Center hosts literary and musical evenings and conducts research work related to the biography and work of Rubtsov.
Rubtsovsky centers operate in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Saratov, Kirov, and Ufa.
In the village of Pargolovo a street is named after the poet.
In Dubrovka a street is named after the poet.
In Murmansk, on the Writers' Alley, a monument to the poet was erected.
Since 1998, an open festival of poetry and music “Rubtsovskaya Autumn” has been held in Vologda.
In St. Petersburg, a street in a microdistrict near the Parnas metro station is named after the poet.

Editions

Collected works in 3 volumes. - M., Terra, 2000
"Lyrics". Arkhangelsk, 1965. - 40 pp., 3,000 copies.
"Star of the Fields" M., Soviet writer, 1967. - 112 pp., 10,000 copies,
"The soul keeps." Arkhangelsk, 1969. - 96 pp., 10,000 copies,
"Pine noise." M., Soviet writer, 1970, - 88 pp., 20,000 copies,
“Poems. 1953-1971" - M., Soviet Russia, 1977, 240 pp., 100,000 copies.
“Green Flowers”, M., Soviet Russia, 1971. - 144 pp., 15,000 copies;
“The Last Steamship”, M., Sovremennik, 1973, - 144 pp., 10,000 copies.
“Selected Lyrics”, Vologda, 1974. - 148 pp., 10,000 copies;
“Plantains”, M., Young Guard, 1976. - 304 pp., 100,000 copies.
First snow. - Vologda, 1975
First snow. - Barnaul, 1977
Poems. - M., Children's literature, 1978
With all my love and longing. - Arkhangelsk, 1978
Green flowers. - Barnaul, 1978
Martin. - Kemerovo, 1978

"I was born with the heart of Magellan..."

Nikolai Mikhailovich Rubtsov was born on January 3, 1936 in the village of Yemetsk, Arkhangelsk Region, and was left an orphan at an early age. While filling out the forms, in the column “Information about parents,” he briefly wrote: “I have almost no such information.” There is evidence that Nikolai was the fifth child in the family (Rubtsov corresponded with one of the brothers who lived in Leningrad in the sixties). The poet's mother died at the very beginning of the war, his father was at the front, and after the war he lived with another family. Obviously, this is why Rubtsov, who dedicated many heartfelt lines to his mother, mentions his father briefly and dryly:

Mother died...

Father went to the front.

The evil neighbor does not allow passage.

I vaguely remember the morning of the funeral

And outside the window there is meager nature.

From somewhere - like from underground! -

It was dark and damp...

Rubtsov generally said very little about his biography in his poems, but these few lines from the poem “Childhood” paint a fairly clear picture of the orphanhood of a very young child, who fully knew the harsh aspects of life from which there was no one to protect him: the funeral of his mother, the hostility of the neighbors, the dull landscape outside the window - that’s why it’s dull because here, on this side of the window, it’s also damp, gloomy and uncomfortable...

In such an atmosphere, the boy was left to his own devices for some time, but “one day everything changed”: in 1942 he was sent to the Krasnovsky orphanage, and a year later he was transferred to an orphanage in his mother’s homeland - to the village of Nikolskoye, Totemsky district, Vologda region, where local residents simply call the village Nikola. It became a small homeland for Rubtsov, to which he invariably returned in his poems.

After graduating from seven classes, Rubtsov goes to Riga to enroll in a nautical school, but returns with nothing: he was not accepted into the school due to his youth. The poet remembered the failure for a long time: there is no doubt that the poem “Violets” was written much later, but the picture of the hero’s experiences here was created quite reliable: “in a dirty sweatshirt,” walking along the embankment, he suddenly heard the song “Buy Violets,” popular at that time, which sounded almost mockingly, because he had no time for flowers at all:

Besides the sea and the sky,

In addition to the wet pier,

I need bread, bread!

Shut up, radio...

This poem already contains features characteristic of Rubtsov’s creative style: true sadness hidden behind light irony, and the seriousness of the parodic lines in tone, when the hungry hero, turning to the conductor with a request to carry him without a ticket, says: “I’ll kiss my mother for this.” a pen for you!” And during the first publication of this poem in the collection “Plantains”, and in “The Selected”, published by the publishing house “Soviet Russia” in 1977, an inaccuracy was made - “I will kiss”. In Rubtsov’s original text, I will “kiss” - the way this word sounded in the old Russian pronunciation, as it was sung, for example, by Russian pop stars Anastasia Vyaltseva, Varya Panina or Isabella Yuryeva, whose voices can now be heard on restored records. The poet needed to slightly parody the cruel romance in order to hide his mental pain: Rubtsov was a proud man...

Meanwhile, the orphanage was transferred from Nikolskoye to the regional center - the ancient town of Totma, founded ten years earlier than Moscow. Rubtsov did not want to return to the orphanage and entered the Totemsky Forestry Technical School (later reorganized into GPTU-19). It’s unlikely that studying at the forestry technical school interested him; he was simply passing the time until he received his passport. After graduating from the first year of technical school and receiving a passport, Rubtsov with reckless determination left for Arkhangelsk and entered the naval school. However, I didn’t study there for long...

For the time being, he had to become a hut - that was the name of the position of a hut-reading room worker, performing the duties of an administrator, a librarian, and a stoker. Obviously, at this time he began to write poetry seriously. In many of them, the influence of Yesenin was clearly felt, but soon Rubtsov learned, while sometimes developing a deliberately alien tune, not to drown out his own voice; even in the early poems it can be heard quite clearly. They contain something that will later become a characteristic feature of the poet’s work - light, radiant irony, a parody of himself. Feeling the imitation of his poems, the poet brings it to hyperbole, to dashing bravado. In a paraphrase of Yesenin’s “For bread, for oats, for potatoes, a man got a gramophone,” Nikolai Rubtsov so deliberately loudly declares himself to be that “simple man”: “Yesterday I bought an accordion for three bags of potatoes. He’s playing!”, which makes it clear that he is far from a simple man.

Studying literature not for a grade in a class magazine, trying to write himself, Rubtsov undoubtedly thought about his purpose, strived for creative originality, although he said this in his characteristic slightly ironic manner, this time paraphrasing Lermontov’s: “No, I’m not Byron, I am different":

An obstinate verse, like a terrible beast,

Hunching over, he beats under his arm.

My style, alas, is imperfect...

But I’m not Pushkin, I’m different.

In order to take a new step in his creativity, Rubtsov needed fresh impressions, and he became a fireman on a fishing trawler-coaler of the Arkhangelsk trawl fleet and sailed on it for about a year. When the ship arrived at the port, the sailors went to the restaurant, and Rubtsov to the shooting range. This was the favorite pastime of a minor fireman, whose work was not easy even for a person in excellent health, and the boy who grew up on post-war orphanage rations was by no means a hero. “Them, what am I doing, why am I torturing my thin and small body?” - he asked with bitter humor in one of his early poems, which later became a popular song among people who personally knew the poet. But, despite the difficulties, a pupil of an orphanage who had no other family except a group of orphans like him, Rubtsov felt like a fish in water in the trawler crew. “I’m covered in fuel oil, covered in grease, but I work in the trawl fleet!” - not without irony, but joyfully he exclaimed in one of the poems of the “sea cycle”, which became a new step in poetry for him.

The main thing that Rubtsov acquired in his sea wanderings is not only poetic, but also spiritual freedom, a sense of self-confidence, significance and significance of his “I”: “I walk with the gait of a citizen... I breathe freely and easily.” After searching for a way out of a “sad to the point of resentment” life, this was undoubtedly a step forward. If earlier he stewed in his own juice, learning only from books and finding a source of inspiration in them, now he had fresh impressions that he could translate into poetic lines, trying out a new shock verse for himself in taste and hearing.

Rubtsov was captured by a different life. Having believed in his talent, he felt a lack of general culture and education, because by that time he had only graduated from the Nikolsk seven-year school. A new stage of Rubtsov’s wanderings began - now not along the seas, but along the land. Without money or a ticket, on the roof of a carriage, he arrives in the city of Kirovsk, Murmansk region, and enters a mining technical school. Sailor friends, having learned that all of Rubtsov’s money had been stolen along with his ticket, passed the hat around and sent him three times as much as was missing...

However, he studied at the mining technical school for only six months - geological sciences were too far from what the young poet was striving for. At the beginning of 1955, nineteen-year-old Rubtsov got a job as a laborer in the village of Priyutino near Leningrad, where the former estate of the President of the Academy of Arts A.A. Olenin, who often visited Pushkin, is located. Rubtsov also lived here during his leave from the Northern Navy destroyer, on which he served from 1955 to 1959. The poems of the young poet were published for the first time in the naval newspaper. They were dedicated to the May Day holiday.

"Between city and village."

Having been demobilized in the fall of 1959, Rubtsov came to Leningrad and worked at a factory until he entered the Gorky Literary Institute. He was a worker for three years, but did not leave a single poetic testimony about this. Already at the beginning of his creative career, he realized that you can’t write about everything, you can’t write about what you don’t really care about. “You took the theme of the sea and the theme of the field, and another poet will take the theme of the mountains,” he wrote in later poems, but it is obvious that he came to such a concept long before these lines were written. In any case, not a single poem is known so far in which Nikolai Rubtsov raised the factory theme.

The years of the poet's life in Leningrad are interesting because at this time he moves from the traditions of stressed verse to a strict classical form. The world of a big city, and even one like Leningrad, captivated the poet, and although his memory often returned to the sweet forest corners of his childhood, to untouched nature, he felt his involvement in the man-made beauty of the city, which was especially clearly manifested in the poem “Alta”:

How often, often, like a bird,

The soul yearns for the forests!

But he can’t help but merge with it,

What man built himself.

Hills covered with asphalt

And a bright scattering of lights,

Sometimes violas praise so noisily,

It’s as if their relatives don’t exist!

The awkward “erected” betrays the author’s student inexperience, but this poem is very important for understanding one of the leading features of Rubtsov’s mature work - his inextricable connection with music. Thus, in the rhythm of city life and the nature of its impact on a person, the poet hears the piercing sounds of violas that penetrate into the very soul...

The head of the Leningrad literary association “Narvskaya Zastava” I. Mikhailov recalled that in Rubtsov “what attracted attention was the deeply hidden power that was felt in his reading, and also the manner of reading - with a characteristic gesture, as if conducting with his right hand.” The poet seemed to be controlling a melody that was audible only to him, which would then echo so loudly in his poems: “I hear sad sounds that no one hears,” “And there is no singing, but I clearly hear invisible singers choral singing,” “It’s as if I can hear the singing of a choir.” , as if messengers were galloping in troikas, and in the wilderness of a dozing forest the bells kept ringing and ringing.”

However, the “noisy altos” do not yet speak of Rubtsov’s complete acceptance of the city - in the end, this is not where he will find his place and will not be remembered for this in literature - but attempts to become a city dweller not only by the mark in the passport, but also by the belonging of the soul there were him. This can also be understood from the full text of the poem “Fringes”, published only after the poet’s death, where the following lines were restored:

I'm a man

I suffered

Like an infection

Love for big cities!

A significant role here, obviously, was played by what can be traced in the development of the theme of love in the poet’s work. If the early poems spoke lightly about love, albeit unsuccessful, then in the Leningrad period, according to I. Mikhailov, “the sadly ended first love for a girl was already behind me, who “before did not come soon,” and once did not come at all.” . Much later, the poet recalled “her eyes, very close, and the sea that took them away”...

The poet’s life at that time was very eventful: he worked at a factory and studied at evening school, attended classes at a literary association, was published in the factory’s large-circulation newspaper “Kirovets”, the newspaper “Evening Leningrad” and some other publications, gradually became part of the circle of young Leningrad poets, performed a reading of his poems. At a poetry evening held on January 24, 1962 at the Leningrad House of Writers, Rubtsov achieved his first success.

In addition to the “sea cycle,” Rubtsov had already written such heartfelt poems as “Away,” “Visions on the Hill,” and “Morning of Loss.” It can be said that by 1962, when he graduated from school and applied to the Literary Institute, the poet stood on the threshold of creative maturity. Rubtsov outlined his clearly defined literary and moral positions in the preface to his first, handwritten collection, “Waves and Rocks,” composed of thirty-eight poems:

“I truly love very few contemporary poets.

I consider the clarity of the poet’s social position to be not obligatory, but an important and beneficial quality. In my opinion, none of the modern young poets fully possesses this quality. This is a characteristic sign of the times. So far I feel this sign on myself.”

Rubtsov’s words about the clarity of the public position reflected the process of changing views on the citizenship of art. By this time, the equal sign between citizenship and declarativeness of a work of art had already been crossed out, it was already said loudly that civic motives and the degree of their impact on a person are determined by the content of the work and the level of skill of the artist. One can give many examples of works that were not intended by their authors to be specifically civic, but became so because they were made at a high artistic and aesthetic level. For example, the authors of the pre-war comedy film “The Circus” needed to include a song in it during the course of the film. And Lebedev-Kumach and Dunaevsky wrote it. For the film. Even those who had never heard of the film sang the song: “My native country is wide...”. In the same way, at the request of the film studio, Matusovsky and Solovyov-Sedoy wrote a simple lyrical song “Moscow Nights” for the film “In the Days of the Spartakiad,” but the artistic council of the music editor rejected the song as shallow. And she suddenly took it and became a civic work on a global scale, a musical and poetic symbol of the Russian soul. M. Isakovsky’s poems “Enemies burned their own hut...” were also considered tearful and sentimental.

During an exam at the Literary Institute, where Rubtsov entered in 1962, he said that, in his opinion, those loudmouths who at one time drowned out genuine poetry had nothing to do with Mayakovsky’s traditions. Nor were those “continuers of Mayakovsky’s traditions” close to him, with whom literary and semi-literary Moscow swarmed during the heyday of pop poetry. In response to frequent reproaches that his poetry evokes sad thoughts, Rubtsov defiantly declared that he had written and would write “pessimistic poems,” that is, he essentially denied the thoughtless, frivolous optimism characteristic of many young poets of that time. And in this Rubtsov remained consistent until the end. By that time, Rubtsov had already found his own poetic path, different from Yesenin’s. From one starting point - the feeling of instability, the precariousness of rural peace, which the city inevitably attacks, their paths went in different directions: Yesenin first received the city with hostility, right down to the image of the wolf poet hunted by the “iron guest”: “But he will taste the enemy’s blood the last death leap." However, this “leap” actually became one of the last in Yesenin’s development of the village theme: after “Sorokoust,” a memorial prayer to the departed village, in the poems that opened the cycle “Moscow Tavern,” he no longer “has no love for either the village or to the city."

With Rubtsov, the development of the theme went in exactly the opposite direction: from a tentative attempt to understand and accept the city in Leningrad poems, through a short period “between city and village” to a complete, all-encompassing sense of belonging to those who honored the beauty of rural nature with “almost a prayer ritual” .

Rubtsov had to return to the village much earlier than he could have expected: in mid-1964 he was expelled from the Literary Institute; however, six months later he was reinstated as a student, but only in the correspondence department. I couldn’t count on a scholarship or a hostel. And in the fall of 1964, Rubtsov returned to where he spent his childhood.

Here, in Nikolskoye, the flowering of his creativity began, here he finally decided for himself that his star of poetry burns “for all the anxious inhabitants of the earth,” casting its welcoming beam to the cities that “rose in the distance.” “But only here, in the icy darkness, does it rise brighter and more fully,” we read in the second and final edition of the poem “Star of the Fields.”

“In the village you can see nature and people better”

Love for his native village, its nature and people was one of the main motives of Rubtsov’s mature creativity, although he did not lose sight of all the diversity of modernity:

In the village you can see nature and people better.

Of course, I can’t speak for everyone!

More visible over the field with star fireworks,

How did great Rus' rise?

The metaphor “star fireworks” at first glance may not seem very successful, uniting too distant concepts: the sky is comparable to fireworks only during a starfall somewhere in mid-August, which is not mentioned in the poem. But these lines are filled with the deepest meaning! Rubtsov contrasts the short glow of the city's festive fireworks with the eternal stars above the field, in the light of which the poet can better see the source of the strength and greatness of Rus' - it, this very field, and the man on it...

This inextricable spiritual connection with native places is the most fertile soil on which true poetry grows. “Do you know why I am a poet?..” Yesenin asked his friend V. Erlich, and he himself answered: “I have a homeland!” I have Ryazan! I left there and, no matter what, I’ll come back there... Do you want to get good advice? Look for your homeland! You will find it - sir! If you don’t find it, everything will go down the drain. There is no poet without a homeland!” Rubtsov also spoke about this when he arrived in 1965 for an examination session at the Literary Institute and met there with young poets who had come to Moscow from distant places and found themselves “between city and village”: “What kind of poets are you? What do you write about and how? You swear your love, but you yourself are indifferent. They broke away from the village and did not come to the city. And I have my own theme, given from birth, rural. It's clear?!".

Rubtsov found his poetic homeland, but his life in Nikolskoye was not easy at first.

Nevertheless, despite the difficulties, this autumn was quite fruitful for him. Unable to listen to lectures at the Literary Institute, Rubtsov studied independently, read Russian classics, especially Tolstoy, tried his hand at prose and translation, and wrote a lot of his own poetry. However, the expression “write poetry” in relation to Rubtsov is not entirely accurate. He did not write poetry, but composed it in his mind: “In general, I almost never use pen and ink and do not have them,” he reported to S. Vikulov that autumn. “Further, I don’t type out all the final versions on a typewriter - so I’ll probably die with a whole collection, and a large one, of poems, “printed” or “written down” only in my disordered head.” Unfortunately, the poet was not so far from the truth, and we can only guess how many poems written then we do not know and will never know now.

The matter was further complicated by the fact that Rubtsov was not published as often as he wanted, and this sometimes led the poet to sad thoughts about the uselessness of his work, giving rise to a feeling of fatigue and indifference. However, it would be wrong to think that the poet was indifferent to what he wrote - on the contrary, he constantly polished his poems, striving to improve even those that he had already sent to print.

Somewhere at this time, Rubtsov prepared and submitted the manuscript of his first collection to the North-Western Book Publishing House.

“Lyrics” by Nikolai Rubtsov was published in 1965 in a circulation of three thousand and has now become a bibliographic rarity. The book opened with the poem “Native Village” with a clearly named address: “I love the village of Nikola, where I graduated from primary school.” This was the beginning of the development of the theme of “small homeland” in Rubtsov’s poetry. The theme was revealed somewhat more broadly in the poem “Mistress”: from the “orphan meaning of family photographs” - many of those captured in them did not return from the war - Rubtsov comes to comprehend the world of the past in the present world. It’s as if the owner of the hut, where the author dropped in for a glimpse, lives simultaneously in today’s and yesterday’s times. And although Rubtsov’s key lines revealing his vision of the world have already been found here, the poem “Mistress” has not yet turned into that “Russian Light”, which will later become one of the most famous poems.

But Rubtsov has already clearly defined the path along which his poetry will develop. The sense of the historical past is the main component of his worldview as a whole. This was most fully expressed in the poem “Visions on the Hill”, where the past is revealed in the modern, present, as if receiving a reverse perspective - the poet penetrates into the depths of past centuries:

I'll run up the hill and fall into the grass.

And suddenly there will be a breath of antiquity from the valley!

The arrows will whistle as if in reality,

Flash in the eyes with the curved knife of a Mongol!

It would seem that the hill behind the village outskirts is not such a great height, but from it the poet can see the entire Motherland - not spatially, but historically, in time, right up to the Tatar-Mongol invasion, which brought so much grief to Rus'. Returning from the depths of centuries to the present, the poet, as it were, connects them, ties them into a single whole, which is why Rubtsov’s paintings today are deeply historical:

For all your suffering and battles

I love your old Russia,

Your forests, graveyards and prayers,

I love your huts and flowers,

And the skies burning with heat,

And the whisper of willows by the muddy water,

I love you forever, until eternal peace...

However, in “Lyrics” there were many lines that did not yet express, but only anticipated Rubtsov’s subtle elegance.

At that time it was still difficult to talk about Rubtsov’s continuation of the traditions of Tyutchev and Fet. However, it is no coincidence that the poem “Tyutchev’s Arrival,” published already in Rubtsov’s first book, was included unchanged in many subsequent books, although criticism after its publication in “Star of the Fields” noted that the words that “ ladies throughout the capital whispered about him at night” or “And he shone... playing with his eyes.”

Nikolai Rubtsov proved with all his creativity that Tyutchev was not a random guest in his poems. Already in the first collection, his lyrics surprised with their purity and watercolor transparency, in which something chillingly pre-autumnal was felt:

Cranes are flying high

Under the dome of bright skies,

And the boat, rustling with sedge,

Floats along the canal into the forest.

And it’s so cold and clean,

And the light channel is wavy,

And from the tree with a slight whistle

An autumn leaf flies.

In these poems published in Lyrics, the strong handwriting of a talented artist is already clearly visible. However, the first collection of poems by N. Rubtsov did not attract the attention of critics. In addition to the fact that the poet’s voice had not yet sounded in full force, there was another, and perhaps the main reason why “Lyrics” went unnoticed. “You don’t need to resort to computer technology,” M. Isakovsky wrote around the same time in the article “How Long?” “To come to the conclusion that in our country every day (I emphasize - every day!) there are five or even seven collections of poetry, or about 1700 - 2400 collections a year!.. Unfortunately, we have many people (including among poets) who, in the excessive abundance of paper filled with poetry, see only the growth of our poetry and nothing else: they say, poetry rose to a new level, we began to write better than, let’s say, before the war, poetry collections sold out almost on the same day, etc. and so on. All this would be simply wonderful if we sometimes did not deceive ourselves, if there was the necessary amount of sober and objective truth in this. But this truth just doesn’t exist. The exorbitant abundance of poetry is, to my great regret, not at all the growth of our poetry. This is inflation, its depreciation.”

It is not surprising that in the general flow of book production, the first book by Nikolai Rubtsov, which was published in a meager circulation, was lost and did not add to the literary fame of its author.

In the meantime, in the fall of 1964, the poet found himself at a crossroads. There was no work in Nikolskoye... “Sometimes I sit at my almost toy window and reluctantly think about what I should do in the future,” he informed S. Vikulov. - I wrote a letter to “Vologda Komsomolets” in which I asked if there was any (any) job for me there. The fact is that even if the regional newspaper found a place for me, as they say, I still wouldn’t get out of here until mid-December. After all, steamships will stop running, and cars will also not be able to pass along the Sukhona while the ice is thin. So there is only one road left - to Vologda - on the other side of the village, first on foot, then by different trains.”

At the end of November - beginning of December, Rubtsov appears in Vologda and lives for some time in the house of the poet B. Chulkov, who had a free room. He continued to engage in self-education, read a lot - Pushkin, Blok, Lermontov, but he was especially attracted to such lyricists of the 19th century as Polonsky, Maikov, Fet, Apukhtin, Nikitin and, as is now widely known from articles about Rubtsov, Tyutchev. It was then that he laid the foundations “to continue the book of Tyutchev and Fet with the book of Rubtsov!”

Tyutchev's poems and letters, published before the revolution, were Rubtsov's only personal book. “Now there are legends,” recalls B. Chulkov, “that when he went to bed, he put it under his pillow. I can only say that, in any case, Nikolai did not value the rest of the books that were given to him or came across, and used to be left anywhere. Tyutchev’s book, which belonged to Rubtsov, was not threatened by such a fate.”

Since 1965, Rubtsov lived in Moscow, taking exams at the correspondence department of the Literary Institute, then in Nikolskoye, then in Vologda. And in the summer of 1966, he went on a business trip for the magazine “October” to Altai, which resulted in the famous poem “Katun is making noise.”

By that time, Rubtsov had already begun to appear on the pages of central publications. He was not without disappointment, because most of his poems are imbued with a sense of drama, and sometimes tragedy, based on reflections on his own fate and personal experiences. Not everyone accepted this, not everyone understood the depth and originality of the poet’s feeling of connection with the Motherland. In everything, even the smallest, he saw a reflection of the existence of his native land, the Vologda region, which he did not forget even in Siberia: “If only there was a church by the river, and everything would be like Vologda.” On June 28, 1966, Rubtsov wrote from Altai to Vologda to A. Romanov: “My selections can be read in “Znamya” (6th issue) and in “Youth” (also 6th issue). Firsov could not publish my poems in Sovremennik. What was needed was a different theme, or rather, a different mood. Well, this is not Pushkin’s Sovremennik, but ours! Onion grief!

Literary recognition and wide fame came to Rubtsov after the publishing house “Soviet Writer” published a book of poems “Star of the Fields” in 1967, which the poet presented to the Literary Institute as his thesis, which he defended on December 26, 1968.

Today we have more than just a thesis defense. “Today is our holiday,” said the rector of the institute, V.F. Pimenov. - We are escorting into great literature not a beginner, but an already established poet, and an original and talented poet.

Critic F. Kuznetsov and teachers of the institute N. Sidorenko, V. Druzin, E. Isaev also highly appreciated Rubtsov’s thesis. “Star of the Fields” marked the beginning of the poet’s mature period of creativity.

N. Rubtsov subjected some of the poems included in the first collection to partial - such as “Visions on the Hill” - or radical revision. Thus, “Russian Light”, in comparison with “Mistress” - a version of the poem published in Lyrics - became clearer and stricter. Instead of “And she looked at me dimly again”, “And for a long time looked at me!” appeared. The poet also removed the jarring word “epitaphs,” and the newly written beginning and end seemed to put the poem into a framework. The light of a peasant house acquired a deep inner meaning of “Russian light”.

In Rubtsov's further exploration of the theme of his homeland, he already developed features that were not present in Lyrics: he almost always writes about life with tart sadness, he is consistent in his sense of the fragility and transience of the world, its mysterious beauty and the inner incomprehensibility of nature.

Without a sense of the beauty of nature, without love for it, it is impossible to create beauty in art. Rubtsov speaks quite clearly on this topic: “And having stopped loving this beauty, I probably won’t create another.” He wanders “through his native wilderness in the thin northern forests” and there he finds beauty, without which he cannot imagine life. Even the scary fairy-tale characters - witches, goblins, kikimors who inhabit Rubtsov’s poetic forest, live there not to scare, but to heal the soul of the traveler...

The feeling of the Motherland makes the poet the voice of the people, the exponent of their thoughts and aspirations, even if it covers only a modest part of it within the radius of the village outskirts: “the whole Mother of Russia is a village, maybe this corner.” The ability to see the big in the small gives Rubtsov’s lyrics depth and capacity:

Between the swamp trunks the fire-faced east flaunted...

When October comes, the cranes will suddenly appear!

And they will wake me up, the cranes will call me

Above my attic, above the swamp, forgotten in the distance...

Widely throughout Rus', the designated period of withering

They proclaim like the legend of ancient pages...

“It’s somehow difficult to imagine now,” V. Kozhinov said about this poem, “that ten years ago these lines did not exist, that in their place there was emptiness in Russian poetry.” They are so deep and truly poetic that even they are alone! - allow us to talk about Rubtsov’s continuation of the traditions of Russian poetic classics. Quite rare in the practice of versification, but surprisingly organic here, the pentameter anapest sets the mood for a leisurely philosophical flight of thought from its attic following the cranes, first over the swamps forgotten in the distance, and then over all of Russia, modern and ancient...

The feeling of inextricable unity with the world found its complete embodiment in the poem “My Quiet Homeland.” It amazes with amazing authenticity. The confidence of the intonation captivates the reader and forces him to go with the poet to places close to him, to be imbued with his feelings. It would seem, what new can he say about the willows over the river, the church, the nightingales in his quiet homeland? But, reading these lines, we again and again experience the joy of discovering the beautiful, a deep sense of aesthetic pleasure. When the poet names the signs of this, precisely his, homeland, it is as if he cannot stop, he wants to show as many unassuming, but so dear signs as possible, and they move from line to line: willows, river, nightingales, churchyard, mother’s grave, a church, a wooden school, hay meadows, a wide green expanse... And - like a flash of lightning that illuminated all this, like a powerful discharge of love that filled the soul - the ending of the poem:

With every bump and cloud,

With thunder ready to fall,

I feel the most burning

The most mortal connection.

Life would be incomplete not only without mystery, but also without sadness - this is a very important judgment for understanding the essence of Rubtsov’s work. The very nature of his talent contained that sensitive premonition of the impending departure, which in art has enormous attractive power and, according to Blok, “alone can give the key to understanding the complexity of the world.”

Rubtsov’s image of his rural homeland, starting with “Star of the Fields,” is colored with sadness, his soul is increasingly “taken over by a bright sadness, as moonlight takes over the world,” and this sadness arises because the poet feels the fragility, fragility, fragility of the sacred peace dear to him . He painfully feels that he himself sometimes loses contact with him. That is why the rural peace in his poems is not at all calm and not frozen - no, it is all lurking in anticipation of impending changes: clouds are hovering over the “native village”, a blizzard is spinning and moaning over the “hut in the snow”, and the nights are full of incomprehensible horror, approaching directly to the “living eyes” of a person. The poet experiences an oppressive feeling of loneliness, which one could have guessed even when he said thanks to the “Russian light” for the fact that it burns for those who are “desperately far from all friends.” And short-term fun, when friends occasionally come for a few hours, fun “with sad eyes” can hardly change anything. Next to the images of the “quiet homeland,” the poet increasingly appears an equally generalized image of the wind, symbolizing mental anxiety, wanderlust, dissatisfaction, fatigue...

"In anticipation of autumn"

After “Stars of the Fields,” Rubtsov managed to publish two more collections - “The Soul Keeps” in 1969 in Arkhangelsk and “Pines Noise” in 1970 in Moscow - and several cycles of poems in the magazines “Youth”, “Young Guard”, “Nash” contemporary", "October", "North".

In poems reprinted from previous collections to subsequent ones, Rubtsov makes amendments that enhance minor feelings. This amendment in the poem “Sailing” is interesting and indicative. In the collection “The Soul Keeps,” the end of the second stanza of this poem sounded like this: “But looking into the distance and listening to the sounds, I have not yet regretted anything.” A year later, in the book “The Sound of Pines,” the line was changed: “I haven’t regretted anything yet.” Only one letter has been replaced, but the semantic meaning has changed very significantly: “regretted” expresses a short, time-limited action, a phenomenon, so to speak, one-time, and the imperfect form “regretted” speaks of a constant, unlimitedly lasting feeling, state of mind, and not an action even. And Rubtsov has a lot of such replacements.

Not only a constant mood passes from poem to poem, but also images, the echo of which gives the poems a particularly deep meaning. So, in “The Last Autumn,” the poet says about Yesenin that “he lived then in the premonition of the autumn, which was far from better changes,” and in the poem “Beautiful Blue Sky,” he says the same about himself: “I lived in the premonition of the autumn already not the best changes." Or in the earlier “For the seventh day the rain does not stop...” there were such gloomy lines: “The coffins are tossing and turning like crocodiles among the thickets of flooded coffins, breaking, floating up...”. It would seem that the ending of the poem set one in an optimistic mood: “Weaker rain... Just about... A little more, and everything will go as usual,” but in one of Rubtsov’s last poems, “I will die in the Epiphany frosts,” the lines, repeated, became even gloomier: “From my flooded grave, the coffin will emerge, forgotten and sad, it will break with a crash, and terrible fragments will float into the darkness. I don’t know what it is... I don’t believe in the eternity of peace!”

Rubtsov lived the last time allotted to him in Vologda, only occasionally leaving it and immediately returning back. But if the poet traveled across the seas bravely and joyfully, then on earth it was completely different, and from the very beginning of his creative career: the poem “Train”, very indicative in this sense, was written by him even before entering the Literary Institute. It repeats twice the line that the train was rushing “just before, perhaps, the crash.” Then the author emphasizes again:

Together with him I am in the misty expanse

I don’t dare think about peace, -

I'm rushing somewhere with clanging and whistling,

I'm rushing somewhere with a roar and a howl,

I'm rushing somewhere with full tension

I, as I am, am a mystery of the universe.

Just before, perhaps, the crash...

However, then the poet convinced himself that his premonitions were deceiving him, that “how could there be a crash if there are so many people on the train?” And now, when he was left alone, this crash still happened.

In Rubtsov’s last poems one can already hear not so much love for the homeland, but rather a defiant, bitter mockery of both patriarchal peace and the “good Fili”, about which the poet once wrote with warm, kind irony...

Oh Rus', Russia!

Why am I not calling enough?

Why are you sad?

Why did you doze off?

Let's wish

Good night everybody!

Let's go for a walk!

Let's have a laugh!

And we'll have a holiday,

And we'll reveal the cards...

Eh! The trump cards are fresh,

But the fools are still the same.

In the posthumous edition of the poet’s poems “Plantains”, poems were published for the first time in which this discord with people takes on a truly tragic coloring. Now the poet is overcome not by the former “light sadness,” but by a “dark,” “anxious” sadness, and the word “sadness” itself becomes the most common in Rubtsov’s vocabulary. Repeated seven times in one poem - “Farewell” - the epithet “sad” fits organically into the context and does not allow any semantic replacement. Here Rubtsov managed to melt into himself both the dense, excessive, gloomy imagery of Klyuev, and Yesenin’s sadness for the passing village, and Koltsovskaya slightly bitter daring, and sublime sadness of Blok... It is difficult to catch another poet in obvious borrowings, and yet his poems are similar to thousands of others. Here, on the contrary, the most characteristic features of Rubtsov’s poetic personality appeared. Sadness, suffering in him appear as the apotheosis of the human personality , as an affirmation of true humanity and humanism. Such poems awaken both compassion and a feeling of cleansing the soul from everything small, superficial, unnecessary, temporary, alien...

I'll put aside my meager food

And I will go to eternal rest.

May they still love and search for me

Over my lonely river.

May every possible good come

They promise on the other side

Don't buy me a hut over a ravine

And I can’t grow flowers...

The sad meaning of these lines will be revealed even deeper if we compare them with others written a little earlier: “The village is on the right bank, and the cemetery is on the left bank...”. Speaking about all sorts of benefits on the other side, the poet feels himself already on this side, where the cemetery is...

After such verses, one could expect the worst, and it happened: in the Epiphany frosts, on the night of January 18-19, 1971, Nikolai Rubtsov died.

Cycles of Rubtsov’s latest poems in many magazines, poetry collections “Green Flowers”, “The Last Steamboat”, “Selected Lyrics”; the most complete publications - “Plantains” from the publishing house “Young Guard” and a one-volume volume from the series “Poetic Russia” from the publishing house “Soviet Russia” - were published after the death of their author. But the poet is alive as long as his poems are alive. And Rubtsov’s poems, apparently, will join the ranks of long-lasting, imperishable creations.

The miracle of Nikolai Rubtsov's poetry has firmly taken its place in Russian literature, and its value will undoubtedly increase over time. The poet can speak his “new words” even after death.

Rubtsov did not have time to reveal the full power of his poetic gift; some of his work may seem controversial and objectively incorrect. But he was a great Russian poet. And the work of great masters, as Blok noted, is not like a French park, regularly trimmed and weeded, “but like a freely growing Russian garden, where the pleasant and the useful and the beautiful and the ugly are always united. Such a garden is more beautiful than a beautiful park; the work of great artists is always a beautiful garden with flowers and thistles, and not a beautiful park with compacted paths.”

Rubtsov's creativity, which has become a significant phenomenon in our literature, will be able to give the joy of discovery and aesthetic pleasure not only to modern, but also to future readers.

Rubtsov N.M. Star of the fields. / Compilation and preparation of texts by L.A. Melkova /

In 2016, Nikolai Rubtsov could have celebrated his 80th birthday, but the poet lived only to 35. His life, like a comet flash, ended unexpectedly and strangely. But Rubtsov managed to do the main thing - confess his love for Russia. Poetry and the biography of the poet are compared with creative destiny. The same short, tragically cut short life. The same piercing poems full of hidden pain.

Childhood and youth

The poet was born in 1936 in the North. In the village of Yemetsk, near Kholmogory, the first year of Nikolai Rubtsov’s life passed. In 1937, the Rubtsov family moved to the town of Nyandoma, 340 kilometers south of Arkhangelsk, where the head of the family ran a consumer cooperative for three years. But the Rubtsovs did not live long in Nyandoma either - in 1941 they moved to Vologda, where the war found them.

My father went to the front and lost contact with him. In the summer of 1942, his mother passed away, and soon his one-year-old sister Nikolai passed away. The pain of loss resulted in the 6-year-old boy's first poem. In 1964, Nikolai Rubtsov recalled his experience in the poem “My Quiet Homeland”:

“My quiet homeland!
Willows, river, nightingales...
My mother is buried here
In my childhood."

Nikolai Rubtsov and his older brother were sent as orphans to an orphanage in “Nikoly,” as the village of Nikolskoye was popularly called. The poet recalled the years of orphanage life with warmth, despite his half-starved existence. Nikolai studied diligently and graduated from 7 classes at Nikolskoye (the N. M. Rubtsov House Museum was built in the former school). In 1952, the young writer went to work at Tralflot.

Rubtsov's surviving autobiography states that he is an orphan. In fact, the father returned from the front in 1944, but due to the lost archive he did not find the children. Mikhail Rubtsov married for the second time. Looking ahead, 19-year-old Nikolai met his father in 1955. 7 years later, Rubtsov Sr. died of cancer. For two years, starting in 1950, Nikolai was a student at the forestry technical school in Totma.

After graduation, he worked as a fireman for a year, and in 1953 he went to the Murmansk region, where he entered the mining and chemical technical school. In his second year, in the winter of 1955, student Nikolai Rubtsov was expelled due to a failed session. And in October, the 19-year-old poet was called to serve in the Northern Fleet.

Literature

Nikolai Rubtsov's literary debut took place in 1957: his poem was published by a regional newspaper in the Arctic. Having been demobilized in 1959, the northerner went to the city on the Neva. He made his living by working as a mechanic, fireman and factory loader. I met the poets Gleb Gorbovsky and Boris Taigin. Taigin helped Rubtsov break through to the public by releasing his first poetry collection, “Waves and Rocks,” in the summer of 1962 using samizdat method.

In the same year, Nikolai Rubtsov became a student at the Moscow Literary Institute. His stay at the university was interrupted more than once: due to his rough character and addiction to alcohol, Nikolai was expelled and reinstated. But during these years the collections “Lyrics” and “Star of the Fields” were published. In those years, the cultural life of Moscow was seething: poems, etc. thundered on the stage.

The provincial Rubtsov did not fit into this loudness - he was a “quiet lyricist”, not “burning with a verb.” The almost Yesenin-esque lines of the poem “Visions on the Hill” are characteristic:

“I love your old days, Russia.
Your forests, graveyards and prayers."

The work of Nikolai Rubtsov differed from the works of the fashionable sixties, but the poet did not strive to follow fashion. Unlike Akhmadulina, he did not pack stadiums, but Rubtsov had fans. He was also not afraid to write seditious lines. In the “Autumn Song,” which the bards loved, there is a verse:

"That night I forgot
All good news
All the calls and calls
From the Kremlin Gate.
I fell in love that night
All the prison songs
All forbidden thoughts
All the persecuted people."

The poem was written in 1962, and the authorities did not pat it on the head for this.

In 1969, Nikolai Rubtsov received a diploma and became a staff member of the Vologda Komsomolets newspaper. A year before, the writer was given a one-room apartment in a Khrushchev building. In 1969, the collection “The Soul Keeps” was published, and a year later the last collection of poems, “The Noise of Pines.” The collection “Green Flowers” was ready for publication, but was published after the death of Nikolai Rubtsov. In the 1970s, poetry collections “The Last Steamboat”, “Selected Lyrics”, “Plantains” and “Poems” were published.

Songs based on poems by Rubtsov

The poetic works of Nikolai Rubtsov became songs that were first performed in the 1980s and 90s. He sang the same “Autumn Song”, only without the seditious verse. The music for it was written by composer Alexey Karelin. At the “Song-81” competition, Gintare Jautakaite sang “It’s Light in My Upper Room” (composer). The following year, the poem “Star of the Fields” was set to music. Performed the composition (album “Star of the Fields”).

The popular Leningrad group “Forum” also introduced into its repertoire a song based on the poet’s poems “The Leaves Flew Away.” The composition of the same name was included in the album “White Night”, released in the mid-1980s. He sang the verse “Bouquet”: the melody and words “I will ride the bike for a long time” are known to more than one generation of Soviet people. In the late 1980s, the song was played at all concerts.

The lines of the poem “Bouquet” were written by Nikolai Rubtsov during his years of service in the Northern Fleet. In the 1950s, in the village of Priyutino near Leningrad, where Rubtsov’s brother Albert lived, Nikolai met a girl, Taya Smirnova. In 1958, the poet came on leave, but the meeting with Taya turned out to be farewell: the girl met someone else. In memory of youthful love, there was a poem written by Rubtsov in 15 minutes.

In the 2000s, they returned to the poetry of Nikolai Rubtsov: they sang the song “The cloudberry will bloom and ripen in the swamp,” and the group “Kalevala” introduced a composition based on the poem “They Came Up” into their repertoire.

Personal life

The year 1962 was eventful for the poet. Nikolai Rubtsov entered the literary institute and met Henrietta Menshikova, the woman who bore him a daughter. Menshikova lived in Nikolskoye, where she ran a club. Nikolai Rubtsov came to Nikola to see his classmates, relax and write poetry. At the beginning of 1963, the couple got married, but without formalizing the relationship. In the spring of the same year, Lenochka was born. The poet visited Nikolskoye on visits - he studied in Moscow.

In 1963, in the institute dormitory, Rubtsov met the aspiring poetess Lyudmila Derbina. The fleeting acquaintance then led to nothing: Nikolai did not make an impression on Lyusya. The girl remembered him in 1967, when she came across a fresh collection of the poet’s poems. Lyudmila fell in love with the poetry of Nikolai Rubtsov and realized that her place was next to him.

The woman already had a failed marriage and a daughter, Inga, behind her. In the summer, Lyudmila came to Vologda and stayed with Nikolai, for whom the poetess Lyusya Derbina became a fatal love. Their relationship could not be called equal: Rubtsov had an addiction to alcohol. In a state of intoxication, Nikolai was reborn, but the binges were replaced by days of repentance. The couple quarreled and broke up, then made up again. At the beginning of January 1971, the lovers came to the registry office. The wedding day was set for February 19.

Death

The poet did not live exactly a month before the wedding. His lines “I will die in the Epiphany frosts” turned out to be a prophecy. The events of that terrible night are still debated today. Nikolai Rubtsov was found dead on the floor of the apartment. Lyudmila Derbina admitted to manslaughter.

Pathologists agreed that the cause of death was strangulation. The woman was sentenced to 8 years, released under an amnesty after 6. In an interview with journalists, she said that during a quarrel that Epiphany night, Rubtsov, who had been drinking, had a heart attack. Lyudmila never admitted guilt. Nikolai Rubtsov was buried, as he wished, at the Poshekhonskoye cemetery in Vologda.

Bibliography

1962 – “Waves and Rocks”
1965 – “Lyrics”. Arkhangelsk
1967 – “Star of the Fields”
1969 – “The soul keeps.” Arkhangelsk
1970 – “The Noise of Pines”
1977 – “Poems. 1953-1971"
1971 – “Green Flowers”
1973 – “The Last Steamer”
1974 – “Selected Lyrics”
1975 – “Plantains”
1977 – “Poems”

(1936 - 1971)

Rubtsov Nikolai Mikhailovich (1936 - 1971), poet. Born in the village of Yemetsk, Arkhangelsk region, he was left an orphan early: his childhood years were spent in the Vologda region in the Nikolsky orphanage. The Vologda “small homeland” gave him the main theme of his future work - “ancient Russian identity”, became the center of his life, “a sacred land”, where he felt “both alive and mortal.”
He does military service in the Northern Fleet, then lives in Leningrad as a worker, in Moscow as a student at the Literary Institute. M. Gorky, makes a trip to Siberia.
In 1962, he entered the Literary Institute and met V. Sokolov, S. Kunyaev, V. Kozhinov and other writers, whose friendly participation more than once helped him both in his creativity and in publishing his poems.
The first book of poems, “Lyrics,” was published in 1965 in Arkhangelsk. Then the poetry collections “Star of the Fields” (1967), “The Soul Keeps” (19691) and “The Noise of Pines” (1970) were published. Green Flowers, which were being prepared for publication, appeared after the death of the poet, who died tragically on the night of January 19, 1971.
After the death of N. Rubtsov, his collections were published: “The Last Steamship” (1973), “Selected Lyrics” (1974), “Poems” (1977).
Nikolai Rubtsov himself wrote about his poetry:
I won't rewrite
From the book of Tyutchev and Fet,
I'll even stop listening
The same Tyutchev and Fet.
And I won't make it up
Myself special, Rubtsova,
I'll stop believing for this
In the same Rubtsov,
But I'm at Tyutchev and Fet's
I'll check your sincere word,
So that the book of Tyutchev and Fet
Continue with Rubtsov’s book!..
Materials from the book were used. Russian writers and poets. Brief biographical dictionary. Moscow, 2000.

Rubtsov Nikolay Mikhailovich
Born: January 3, 1936.
Died: January 19, 1971 (age 35).

Biography

Nikolai Mikhailovich Rubtsov (January 3, 1936, village of Yemetsk, Northern Territory - January 19, 1971, Vologda) - Russian lyric poet.

Born on January 3, 1936 in the village of Yemetsk, Kholmogory district of the Northern Territory (now Arkhangelsk region). In 1937 he moved with his large family to Nyandoma. In 1939-1940, Rubtsov’s father Mikhail Andrianovich worked as the head of the Nyandoma Gorpo. In January 1941, “Mikhail Rubtsov left Nyandoma for the Vologda City Party Committee. In Vologda, the Rubtsovs were caught up in the war. In the summer of 1942, Rubtsov's mother and younger sister died, their father was at the front, and the children were sent to boarding schools. This summer, 6-year-old Nikolai wrote his first poem.

In 1969, Rubtsov graduated from the Literary Institute and was accepted into the staff of the Vologda Komsomolets newspaper.

In 1968, Rubtsov’s literary merits received official recognition, and in Vologda he was allocated a one-room apartment No. 66 on the fifth floor of a five-story building No. 3 on a street named after another Vologda poet, Alexander Yashin.

Writer Fyodor Abramov called Rubtsov the brilliant hope of Russian poetry.

Biographers mention Rubtsov’s poem “I will die in the Epiphany frosts” as a prediction of the date of his own death. The Vologda Museum of Nikolai Rubtsov contains the poet’s will, found after his death: “Bury me where Batyushkov is buried.”

Nikolai Rubtsov was buried in Vologda at the Poshekhonskoye cemetery.

Creation