Tolmachev, Yakov Vasilievich

Yakov Vasilievich Tolmachev (1779-1873) - Russian philologist; Professor of St. Petersburg University, author of textbooks on literature and eloquence.

His father was the deacon of the church (since 1789 - a priest), but as Y. V. Tolmachev recalled, his great-grandfather was a nobleman who moved from Kursk to the Kharkov province and became a priest here.

As the best student of the Kharkov College , where he studied since 1793, in 1799 Yakov Tolmachev was sent to the Kiev Theological Academy . At the end of the course at the academy in 1803 he was determined at the Kharkov College, where he taught various subjects: pitetics , mathematics, Greek, Latin and French. Here, Y. V. Tolmachev compiled the textbook Russian Poetry, published by I. I. Glazunov in Moscow in 1805. Then followed four editions of French grammar. At the suggestion of the Rector of Kharkov University, I. S. Riga, Tolmachev translated “Latin Logic”, “Metaphysics” and “Moral Philosophy” from F. H. Baumeister , also published by Glazunov.

In January 1809, Tolmachev was called to St. Petersburg and appointed a teacher of the Russian language at the seminary , and then at the academy .

In the summer of 1814, at the suggestion of V.V. Kapnist , he joined the Ministry of Education , Secretary of A.K. Razumovsky . In 1816, Tolmachev was appointed an ordinary professor at the Main Pedagogical Institute in the new department of Russian literature, and after transforming the institute in 1819 into St. Petersburg University, he retained the department. In 1826, he was elected dean of the Faculty of History and Philology. At the university, Professor Tolmachev taught courses on the “Critical History of the Works of Russian Literature”, “The Theory of the Syllable and the Different Kinds of Prose Works,” “On the Elegant,” and in 1830, “The Science of Linguistics.” In 1823-1829 he was a teacher of the military syllable at the school of guards , for which he compiled the textbook "Military Eloquence" (1825). In 1831, even before the start of university reform, according to the proposal of the school district trustee, Tolmachev was dismissed as "deprived of pedagogical abilities." In 1839 he was appointed teacher of the Russian language of the Duke of Leuchtenberg .

Developing his theory in the direction set by A. F. Merzlyakov , Tolmachev shared the concepts of literature, eloquence, and whiteness: literature is “a natural, ordinary ability to express one’s thoughts and feelings with a voice”; eloquence - "the ability, showing the excellent art of expressing it clearly and beautifully"; whiteness - "the ability <...> to express strongly and convincingly." The ability is obtained by man from nature, and "art <...> is acquired by science: this science is called rhetoric."

In 1818-1819 he corrected the position of censor of printed books, including the 6th part of fables by I. A. Krylov ^[1] .

According to the memoirs of I.I. Panaev , who studied with him at the Noble Board at the University:

... Yakov Vasilievich had an inveterate hatred for everything living and modern.

He stubbornly stopped at Derzhavin and even reluctantly mentioned Batyushkov and Zhukovsky. He respected Karamzin for his story, and even more so because Karamzin read its first chapters to august persons and was officially recognized by the historiographer. <...>

When we spoke with him about Pushkin or recited his poems, he waved his hand and interrupted, plugging our ears:

- Stop it! stop it! it's all trifles and trinkets: nothing sublime, nothing moral ... and who gives you to read such books? ...

He could not hear indifferently about Polevoy ...

- Panaev I.I. Literary memories