Fet, Afanasy Afanasyevich

Born on November 23 ( December 5 ), 1820, in the estate of Novoselki, Mtsensk Uyezd, Orel Province ^[4] , on November 30, was baptized according to the Orthodox rite and named Athanasius.

Father, retired captain Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin, belonged to the old and extensive family of Shenshin, whose representatives owned half of the entire Mtsensk district. My father was a wealthy landowner, he lived in a village, thanks to which the poet grew up under the influence of landlord life.

The surname Feta happened so. Afanasy Neofitovich, while in Germany, in 1819 married in Darmstadt Charlotte Fet (Foeth), the daughter of Chief Kriegs Commissioner K. Becker. She bore the surname Fet for her first husband, whom she divorced, had a daughter from him. Afanasy Afanasyevich was born in marriage with A. N. Shenshin, who was listed as Shenshin until the age of 14, but then bore the name of his mother, as it turned out that the Lutheran blessing for marriage did not have legal force in Russia, and Orthodox marriage was performed after the birth of Athanasius ^[5] .

In 1834, the spiritual consistory abolished the baptismal record of Athanasius as the rightful son of Shenshin and identified him as fathers of the first husband of Charlotte Elizabeth - Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Fet. Together with the exclusion from the Shenshin family , Athanasius lost his hereditary nobility ^[6] .

“The special situation in the family, according to which he could not bear the name of his father, was of great importance in the life of Afanasy Afanasyevich. He had to earn his noble rights, in which he was not approved partly by chance, partly by the originality of his father, who launched this business. Therefore, he tried to finish the course at the university and then began to serve with zeal. ”(N. N. Strakhov, from there.)

In the years 1835-1837, Athanasius studied at the German private boarding house Kryummer. At this time, he began to write poetry, showed interest in classical philology . In 1838 he entered Moscow University , first at the Faculty of Law, then at the historical-philological (verbal) department of the Faculty of Philosophy. Studied for 6 years: 1838-1844.

During his studies, he began to print in magazines. In 1840, Fet's poetry collection “The Lyric Pantheon” was published with the participation of Apollo Grigoriev , a friend of Fet at the university. In 1842 - publications in the magazines Moskvityanin and Domestic Notes .

After graduating from the university, Athanasius Fet in 1845 entered the cuirassier of the Military Order regiment (his headquarters were in Novogeorgievsk, Kherson province ), in which he was promoted to cornet on August 14, 1846, and to staff captains on December 6, 1851.

In 1850, the second collection of Fet was released, which received positive reviews from critics in the magazines Sovremennik , Moskvityanin and Patriotic Zapiski ^[7] .

Then seconded (in 1853) to His Majesty's Life Guards regiment , Fet was transferred to this regiment stationed as lieutenant, stationed near St. Petersburg . The poet often visited St. Petersburg, where Fet met with Turgenev , Nekrasov , Goncharov and others, as well as his rapprochement with the editors of the journal Sovremennik .

During the Crimean War, he was in the Baltic Port as part of the troops guarding the Estonian coast.

In 1856, Fet's third collection was edited by I. S. Turgenev .

In 1857, Fet married Maria Petrovna Botkina, sister of the critic V.P. Botkin .

In 1858 he retired with the rank of guards headquarters captain and settled in Moscow.

Being one of the most sophisticated lyrics, Fet amazed contemporaries by the fact that this did not prevent him from being an extremely businesslike, entrepreneurial and successful landowner at the same time ^[8] .

In 1860, at the expense of his wife’s dowry, Fet bought the Stepanovka estate in Mtsensk district of the Oryol province - 200 acres of arable land, a master’s wooden one-story house with seven rooms and a kitchen. And for the next 17 years, he was engaged in its development - growing crops (primarily rye), launched a stud farm project, kept cows and sheep, poultry, raised bees and fish in a newly excavated pond. After several years of operating the current net profit from Stepanovka was 5-6 thousand rubles per year. The proceeds from the estate were the main income of the Fet family ^[6] .

In 1863, a two-volume collection of poems by Fet was published.

In 1867, Athanasius Fet was elected magistrate for 11 years.

In 1873, his family name and nobility were returned to him. “By Decree 26 Dec. In 1873, Athanasius Afanasevich finally approved his father's surname Shenshin, with all the rights associated with her ”(N. N. Strakhov, from there). The poet continued to sign literary works and translations with the surname Fet.

In 1877, Fet sold Stepanovka and bought the old Vorobyovka estate ^[9] in the Kursk province - a manor house on the banks of the Tuskar River , near the house there is a century-old park of 18 acres, a village with arable lands across the river, 270 acres of wood three miles from the house ^{[ 6]} . He dealt a lot with economic issues, systematically traveled around his possessions on a donkey harnessed to a small wagon named Nekrasov ^[10] .

In 1883-1891 - the publication of four issues of the collection "Evening Lights".

In 1890, Fet published the book “My Memoirs,” in which he talks about himself as a landowner. And after the death of the author, in 1893, another book with memoirs was published - “The Early Years of My Life” ^[6] .

Fet died on November 21, 1892 in Moscow. According to the recollections of Fet’s secretary Ekaterina Kudryavtseva, his death from a heart attack was preceded by a suicide attempt using a “cutting” letter knife ^{[11] [12]} . He was buried in the village of Kleimenovo , the family estate of the Shenshin.

Father (according to other sources - the mother’s first husband) is Johann Peter Karl Wilhelm Föth (1789-1826), assessor of the city court of Darmstadt, son of Johann Föt and Sibylla Milens. After he was left by his first wife, in 1824, by a second marriage, he married the teacher of his daughter Carolina. He died in February 1826. On November 7, 1823, Charlotte Elizabeth wrote a letter to Darmstadt to her brother Ernst Becker, in which she complained about the ex-husband of Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Fet, who frightened her and offered to adopt his son Athanasius if his debts were paid. On August 25, 1825, Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker wrote a letter to Brother Ernst about how well Shenshin takes care of her son Athanasius: "no one will notice that this is not his blood child." In March 1826, she again wrote to her brother that her first husband, who died a month ago, left her and her child no money: “in order to take revenge on me and Shenshin, he forgot his own child, deprived him of his inheritance and stained him ... Try, if possible, to beg our dear father to help him return his rights and honor to this child; he should receive a surname ... "Then, in the following letter:" ... It is very surprising to me that Fet forgot and did not recognize his son in his will. A person may be mistaken, but denying the laws of nature is a very big mistake. Apparently, before his death, he was very sick ... "

Mother - Elizaveta Petrovna Shenshina , nee Charlotte Elizabeth ( Charlotte Karlovna ) Becker (1798-1844), daughter of the Darmstadt Ober-Krigskomissar Karl-Wilhelm Becker (1766-1826) and his wife Henrietta Gagern. On May 18, 1818, the marriage of 20-year-old Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker and Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Föth took place in Darmstadt. In 1820, a 45-year-old Russian landowner, the hereditary nobleman Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin, came to Darmstadt to the waters and stayed at the Fetov house. A romance broke out between him and Charlotte Elizabeth, despite the fact that the young woman was expecting a second child. On September 18, 1820, Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin and Charlotte Elizabeth Becker secretly left for Russia. November 23 (December 5), 1820 in the village of Novoselki, Mtsensk district, Orel province, near Charlotte Elizabeth Bekker, a son was born, who was baptized in the Orthodox rite on November 30 and was named Athanasius. In the metric book, he was recorded as the son of Athanasius Neofitovich Shenshin. However, the couple married only on September 4, 1822, after Charlotte Karlovna converted to Orthodoxy and began to be called Elizabeth Petrovna Fet. On November 30, 1820, Athanasius was baptized according to the Orthodox rite and at birth recorded (probably for a bribe) by the "legitimate" son of Athanasius Neofitovich Shenshin and Charlotte Elizabeth Becker. In 1834, when Afanasy Shenshin was 14 years old, a “mistake” appeared in the documents, and he was deprived of his surname, nobility and Russian citizenship and became the “Hessendarstadt subject Afanasy Fet.” In 1873, he officially regained the name Shenshin, but continued to sign literary works and translations with the surname Fet (through "e").

Stepfather (according to other sources - father) - Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin (1775-1854), retired captain, rich Oryol landowner, Mtsensk district judge, son of Neofit Petrovich Shenshin (1750-1800s) and Anna Ivanovna Pryanishnikova. Mtsensk district leader of the nobility. At the beginning of 1820 he was treated in Darmstadt, where he met Charlotte Fet. In September 1820 he took her to Russia to his estate Novoselki Mtsensk district of the Oryol province, where two months later A.A. Fet was born. September 4, 1822 they were married. A few more children were born in the marriage.

Sister (according to other sources - the uterine sister) - Karolina Petrovna Matveeva , nee Carolina-Charlotte-Georgina-Ernestina Fet (1819-1877), wife from 1844 Alexander Pavlovich Matveev, whom she met in the summer of 1841 during her stay with her mother in Novoselki. A.P. Matveev was the son of the neighboring landowner Pavel Vasilyevich Matveev, cousin of Athanasius Neofitovich Shenshin. After several years of marriage, he married another woman, and Carolina and her son went abroad, where she lived for many years, formally remaining married to Matveyev. Around 1875, after the death of Matveev’s second wife, she returned to her husband. She died in 1877, according to the family tradition of Beckers, was killed.

One-utero (according to other sources - his own (full-blooded) sister - Lyubov Afanasyevna Shenshina , nee Shenshina (05.25.1824—?), Married to his distant relative, Alexander Nikitich Shenshin (1819-1872).

The one-uterus (according to other sources - his brother (full-blooded) brother - Vasily Afanasevich Shenshin (10.21.1827-1860), the Oryol landowner, was married to Ekaterina Dmitrievna Mansurova, the granddaughter of the Novosil landowner Alexei Timofeevich Sergeyev (1772-1853), a cousin P. Turgeneva . They left their daughter Olga (1858-1942), in the marriage of Galakhov, who, after the death of her parents, remained under the care of her uncle Ivan Petrovich Borisov, and after his death, Afanasy Afanasevich Fet. She was not only Fet's niece, but and had a distant relative Turgenev , having appeared after his death, the sole heir to the Savior .

One-utero (according to other sources - his sister (full-blooded) sister - Nadezhda Afanasevna Borisova , nee Shenshina (09/11/1832-1869), married since January 1858 to Ivan Petrovich Borisov (1822-1871). Their only son Peter (1858-1888) after the death of his father, he was brought up in the family of A. A. Fet.

The one-uterus (according to other sources - sibling (full-blooded) brother - Pyotr Afanasevich Shenshin (1834 — after 1875), went to Serbia in the autumn of 1875 in order to volunteer in the Serbian-Turkish war , but soon returned to Vorobevka. However, he soon left for America, where its traces are lost.

One-utero (according to other sources - relatives) brothers and sisters - Anna (1821-1825), Vasily (1823 — before 1827), who died in childhood. Perhaps there was another sister, Anna (11/7/1830—?).

Wife (from 16 ( 28 ) August 1857 ) - Maria Petrovna Shenshina , nee Botkin (1828-1894), from the Botkin family . Her brothers were guarantors during the wedding: Nikolai Petrovich Botkin - by the groom, and Vasily Petrovich Botkin - by the bride; in addition, Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev was a guarantor for the bride ^[13] .

Afanasy Afanasevich and Maria Petrovna did not have children.

Fet is a late romantic. Three main themes of his work - nature, love, art, united by the theme of beauty.

I came to you with greetings

Tell that the sun has risen ...

Fett's understanding of the beautiful is close to the aesthetic views of the Parnassians : what is useless is beautiful. What is impossible to find practical application. The associative series is built on the basis of the details:

Wind. Everything buzzes and sways around

Leaves swirl at the feet.

Chu, there is suddenly heard in the distance

Thinly crying horn.

Images similar in emotional coloring determine the atmosphere of the poem. Gradually a whole is formed of them - Beauty. For the poet it is not so important who or what makes such an impression. After all

Only a song needs beauty

Beauty doesn’t need songs either.

In his work, the poet asserts the intrinsic value of beauty, its unconditional power. Therefore, the faces of the lyrical heroines are smeared into a collective image, and the descriptive-landscape part of the poem goes into philosophical reflection (“Learn from them - from oak, from birch ...”).

Fet's nature is spiritualized. Her condition is in harmony with the mood of the hero, so often the landscape sketch is a detailed metaphor. But regardless of whether the storm is being described or a sunny spring day, nature is majestic and beautiful.

Fet is a pure lyricist, and in this case, as you know, it is more difficult to talk about the poetic path and development. Yes, in mature creativity, reflections about human nature prevail, the word as an inferior form of expression of elusive thoughts, as well as the variability and finiteness of everything that was joyfully described in early creativity. But right up to the last line written, the poet-creator leads, beginning with his first poetic line, an incessant talk about Love, Beauty and Life.

Translations

• both parts of Goethe 's Faust ( 1882–83 ),
• a number of Latin poets:

• Horace , all of whose works in Fetov's translation came out in 1883,
• satire of Juvenal (1885),
• poems by Catullus (1886),
• Elegy of Tibull (1886),
• XV books of "Transformations" by Ovid (1887),
• The " Aeneid " of Virgil (1888),
• Elegy of Propertia (1888),
• Satyrs of Persia (1889),
• epigrams of Martial (1891)
• the comedy "Pot" by Plavt (1891).

In 1884, Athanasius Fet for the translation of Horace's works was awarded the full Pushkin Prize , becoming the first of her laureates (before that the prize was awarded only in half).

Fet's plans included a new translation of the Bible into Russian, since he considered the synodal translation unsatisfactory, as well as “ Critics of pure reason, ” however, N. Strakhov discouraged Fet from translating this book by Kant , indicating that its Russian translation already exists. After this, Fet turned to the translation of Schopenhauer . He translated two works by Schopenhauer: “The World as Will and Representation ” (1880, 2nd ed. In 1888) and “On the Four-Rooted Root of the Law of Sufficient Basis” (1886).

• Fet A. A. Poems and poems / Entry. Art., comp. and note. B. Y. Bukhstaba. - L .: Owls. writer, 1986. - 752 p. (The poet’s library. A large series. Third edition.)
• Fet A. A. Evening lights / Ed. preparation. D. D. Blagoy , M. A. Sokolova; open ed. D. D. Good. - M .: Nauka, 1971. - 800 p. - (Literary monuments / Chairman of the editorship of the board N.I. Konrad ). - 50,000 copies.
• Fet A. A. Collected works and letters in 20 vol. - Kursk: Publishing house of the Kursk state. University, 2003- ... (publication continues).
• “A complete collection of poems by A. A. Fet with introductory articles by N. N. Strakhov and B. V. Nikolsky and with a portrait of A. A. Fet. Supplement to the Niva magazine for 1912. ”St. Petersburg, edition of A. F. Marx, 1912

• 25 мая 1997 года в Орле на улице Салтыкова-Щедрина около Дома писателей был открыт памятник поэту .
• В городе Мценске по адресу ул. Ленина 14 находится памятник писателю.
• Имя А. А. Фета носит борт VP-BEO « Аэрофлота » модели Airbus A320-214 ^[14] .

• Благой Д. Д. Мир как красота (О «Вечерних огнях» А. Фета) : статья // Вечерние огни / А. А. Фет ; ed. preparation. Д. Д. Благой, М. А. Соколова ; open ed. Д. Д. Благой. — М. : Наука, 1971. — С. 495—635. - 800 s. — (Литературные памятники / Председатель ред. коллегии Н. И. Конрад). - 50,000 copies.
• Бухштаб Б. Я. А. А. Фет. Очерк жизни и творчества. - Ed. 2-е — Л.: Наука, 1990. — ISBN 5-02-028014-3
• Карпенко А. Н. Космогонии Афанасия Фета (рус.) . reading-hall.ru . Дата обращения 14 января 2019. // Поэтоград, № 9 (60), 2013.
• Лотман Л. М. А. А. Фет (рус.) . fet.ouc.ru . Дата обращения 14 января 2019. // История русской литературы. В 4-х томах. Т. 3. — Л.: Наука, 1980.
• Монин М. А. Толстой и Фет: два прочтения Шопенгауэра // Вопросы философии . 2001. № 3.
• Трубачёв С. Фет, Афанасий Афанасьевич // Русский биографический словарь : в 25 томах. - SPb. - M. , 1896-1918.
• Чешихин В. Е. Шеншин, Афанасий Афанасьевич // Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона : в 86 т. (82 т. и 4 доп.). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
• Эйхенбаум Б. М. Фет // Эйхенбаум Б. М. О поэзии. — Л.: Советский писатель , 1969.

• Собрание стихотворений Фета (неопр.) . www.school-city.by . Дата обращения 14 января 2019.
• Poetry Fet (рус.) . www.stihi-rus.ru . Date of treatment January 14, 2019. In the Anthology of Russian poetry (рус.) . www.stihi-rus.ru . Date of treatment January 14, 2019.
• Collected works of Athanasius Fet (Shenshin)
• Poetry Fet (рус.) . strochki.ru . Date of treatment January 14, 2019.
• Fet, Afanasy Afanasyevich - Philosophical and aesthetic views. Bibliography (рус.) . vpn.int.ru . Date of treatment January 14, 2019.