Butkevich, Anna Alekseevna

Came from a middle-class noble family from the Yaroslavl province . The daughter of a major ^[3] and landowner Alexei Sergeyevich Nekrasov (1788-1862) ^[4] and Elena Andreevna (nee Zakrevskaya) (1801-1841). The family had 13 brothers and sisters.

Anna was the poet’s beloved sister. “You are my one true friend,” N.A. Nekrasov wrote to her. In the poetry of N. A. Nekrasov there are images of native people - mother, father, brother Andrei (he died in his youth) and sisters - Elizabeth and Anna. The image of the mother is the main positive hero of the Nekrasov poetic world. The father acts as the despot of the family, the unbridled savage landowner. Elizabeth is shown as a victim, and the poet compares her fate with that of her mother. Anna acts as a tender friend and even partly a literary critic and adviser. N. A. Nekrasov, being very attached to her, dedicated to Anna in 1863 his poem " Frost, Red Nose ": "You again reproached me that I was separated from my muse ...".

Anna Alekseevna studied for some time at Madame Butkevich's guesthouse in Yaroslavl and remained with him a governess. Reporting this to her elder brother, Anna wrote that her father refused the slightest help (as before to Nikolai Alekseevich himself for his masterful refusal of a military career), but did not abandon attempts to reconcile. It should be noted that it was Anna who initiated the break with her father, because, like Nikolai Alekseevich, she could not agree with the characters. Therefore, the brother approved her departure from home and, reluctantly, a device in a boarding house. From the letters of that period it is clear that he worries about the fate of his sister and does not consider her arrangement successful, but he can offer nothing else to her, therefore he adds: “If this is inevitable, then God forbid that you find a place with good and honest people” .

Two years later, Anna Alekseevna married Heinrich Stanislavovich Butkevich, the brother of the husband of the hostess of the guesthouse, and thus her fate was settled. Anna Alekseevna’s husband was a military man; during the Crimean War he was seriously wounded and lost his leg. He retired with the rank of lieutenant colonel. Probably, by this time, that is, in the second half of the 1850s, family photography also began, where thirty-five-year-old Anna Alekseevna was standing next to an elderly military man whose chest was decorated with military crosses. The marriage was unsuccessful, and Anna Alekseevna left her husband. Despite this, the Nekrasov family continued to communicate with him. N. A. Nekrasov even thought of making Heinrich Stanislavovich an editor of the comedy appendix of Sovremennik magazine Whistle and repeatedly received it in his Yaroslavl estate Karabikha.

A. Butkevich found her family happiness with the famous engineer Alexander Nikolayevich Erakov. Initially, after breaking up with her husband, Anna Alekseevna got a job as a governess in the family of widowed Erakov, but soon became his common-law wife. Alexander Nikolayevich himself was a great lover of literature, a close friend of N. A. Nekrasov, his executor and executor of his will. Nikolai Alekseevich dedicated several poems to him, including the famous Elegy. The daughters of A.N. Erakov, Vera and Nadezhda, also tried themselves in the literary field as translators. Together with Anna Alekseevna they were published in "Translations of the Best Foreign Writers", a magazine published by the famous Marco Vovcek, and in which women worked exclusively.

Possessing brilliant abilities, Anna Alekseevna studied French , and also was fluent in German and English. Gifted with a subtle mind and a wonderful memory, she was very well-read and well acquainted with outstanding works of not only modern European, but also ancient writers. Her knowledge and advice was often used by N. A. Nekrasov, in whose life she was of no small importance. Associated with her sister by the most tender and close friendship, N. A. Nekrasov greatly appreciated her opinion and often read her his new works before giving them to print. From the poet’s letters it is known that the sister made translations for him, however, unfortunately, the full list of Anna Alekseevna’s works has not yet been identified.

After the death of his beloved brother, A. A. Butkevich completely devoted herself to serving his memory. Twice published his "Poems" (St. Petersburg, 1879 and 1882), putting a lot of effort to ensure that the published was worthy of his memory. Published in 1879 according to the copyright bequeathed to her by Nekrasov, “Poems by N. A. Nekrasov”, still remain one of the most complete and best editions of the Russian poet, it is provided with valuable notes and a bibliographic index by S. M. Ponomarev and is now a bibliographic a rarity.

She also published illustrated selected poems of her brother under the title “Nekrasov to Russian Children” (St. Petersburg, 1881, drawings by Baron M. P. Klodt ) and separately the poem “ Who Should Live Well in Russia ”. She gave all the proceeds from these publications, as well as a significant part of her funds, to perpetuate her brother's memory. On April 12, 1879, P.V. Annenkov wrote to her: "You do your duty to the poet, like few, and no matter what monument you put on his grave, he will not be better than this."

Anna Alekseevna provided permanent and lump-sum allowances and donations in his memory, bought from his brother Konstantin his share in the estate of N. A. Nekrasov "Chudov Luka" in the Novgorod province, for the construction of the poet's craft school in it, erected a monument at his grave in the cemetery Novodevichy Convent (sculptor - Chizhov), along with his younger brother Fedor Alekseevich, established a scholarship named after N. A. Nekrasov at St. Petersburg University.

She was buried near the grave of her brother N. A. Nekrasov in the cemetery of the Novodevichy Convent (middle part, 1 section). ^[five]

• Biographical Dictionary. 2000.

• Butkevich, Anna Alekseevna // Russian Biographical Dictionary : in 25 volumes. - SPb. - M. , 1896-1918.
• Butkevich, Anna Alekseevna // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
• Butkevich Anna Alekseevna