The grotesque step of the monkeys. Lev lunts

Source - Wikipedia
Lev Lunts

Date of birth: April 19 (May 2), 1901
Place of birth: St. Petersburg
Date of death: May 10, 1924 (aged 23)
place of death: Hamburg
Occupation: playwright, novelist
Years of creativity: 1919-1924

Lev Natanovich Lunts (April 19 (May 2), 1901, St. Petersburg - May 10, 1924, Hamburg) - Russian prose writer, playwright, publicist.

Father - Natan Yakovlevich Lunts (1871-1934) - a pharmacist, a dealer in optical instruments. Mother - Anna Efimovna, concert pianist. He began to write at the age of eighteen. Upon graduation in 1918 with a gold medal from the Petrograd 1st male gymnasium Lunts entered the Faculty of History and Philology of Petrograd University, graduating in 1922. Was left at the Department of Western European Literature for scientific work, knew Spanish, Italian, English, French, Old French, Hebrew.

Entered into literary group"Serapion brothers".

In 1923, the first signs of heart disease appeared, which forced Luntz to lie in bed all winter. Having achieved a scientific trip to Spain, he left for treatment in Germany, where his parents, who had emigrated earlier, lived. A year later, he died of a brain disease.

Obituaries for Lev Lunts were written by Nina Berberova, Yuri Tynyanov, Maxim Gorky, Konstantin Fedin, Mikhail Slonimsky.

Creation
I have been writing since the age of eighteen. led literary activity five years. During this time, he wrote the stories “In the Desert”, “Motherland”, “Outgoing No. 37”, “The Tale of the Eunuch”, “Walking Through the Torments”, “Across the Border”, feuilletons “In the Car”, “Faithful Wife”, “ The Patriot, the plays Outlaw, Bertrand de Born, The Monkeys Are Coming, The City of Truth, the screenplay The Rise of Things, and several theoretical articles. Valentin Kataev in the book "My Diamond Crown" also mentions "a hilariously funny story of a young man who died early Soviet writer- Petrograder Lev Lunts, who wrote about how a certain bourgeois family flees from Soviet power abroad, hiding their diamonds in a clothes brush.

The prose and dramaturgy of Lev Lunts was published during his lifetime in the USSR and in Europe. His plays were also shown in theaters both at home and abroad.

Later, however, Luntz's works were not published in the USSR even in the most comparatively liberal times, despite the fact that such a publication was dreamed of by the former Serapion Brothers, who had turned into literary generals.

The reason for the rejection of Luntz Soviet culture is found in his article “Why are we Serapion brothers”, which, by coincidence, began to be perceived as a manifesto of the Serapions. It was this article that A. A. Zhdanov quoted in 1946, proving the anti-Soviet nature of M. M. Zoshchenko and the Serapion Brothers in general. The main idea of the article could be used as an example of apoliticality and anti-Sovietism:

With whom are we, the Serapion Brothers? We are with the hermit Serapion.

The authorities were irritated by the tragedy “Out of Law”. Thus, Meisel points out that "however vague and detached the social contours and characteristics in Outlaw, the social sound of the tragedy remains profoundly reactionary."

Reviews
Not a single gathering could do without him [Lunts], he, of course, was the soul of the Serapions.

The young faun was remembered as an overproduction of energy.

He was a man of great temperament and instant reactions.<…>It was an active mind, intolerant of lethargy and rest.

In the 1930s, Luntz's work was forgotten and deleted from the history of Russian Soviet literature. 11 volume Literary Encyclopedia in 1932 she published an article about Luntz, where he was called "a militant bourgeois individualist" and "a typical exponent of the ideas of the liberal bourgeois intelligentsia of the pre-October formation."

Monographs dedicated to Luntz were published in Serbia and Poland.

Compositions
Outlaw. The play // "Conversation", Berlin, No. 1, 1921
The monkeys are coming! Play // "Merry Almanac", 1923
In the Desert // Serapion Brothers, Berlin, 1922
Outgoing No. 37 // "Russia", 1922, No. 1
Why are we the Serapion Brothers // Literary Notes, 1922, No. 3
Abnormal phenomenon // "Petersburg", 1922, No. 3
Seducer. In the car // "Amanita", 1922, No. 10
Bertrand de Born. The play // "City", 1923, No. 1
Motherland // European Almanac, 1923
To the West // "Conversation", No. 2, 1923
Patriot. The play // "Red Raven", 1923, No. 33
City of Truth. The play // "Conversation", No. 5, 1924
Rise of things. Screenplay // « New magazine", No. 79, 1965
Traveling in a hospital bed // "New Journal", No. 90, 1968

Editions
L. Lunts. The monkeys are coming. St. Petersburg; Inapress; 2003.
The most complete edition of the works of Lev Lunts. Excellent edition, quality paper, binding and print quality. Introductory article Valery Shubinsky, detailed commentary and afterword by Evgeny Lemming. The publication includes stories, plays, screenplays, articles and reviews, autobiography, correspondence, as well as articles and obituaries dedicated to Lunts, written by his contemporaries and friends - Berberova, Slonimsky, Tynyanov, Kaverin, Fedin and others.

L. Lunts. literary heritage. M; scientific world; 2007. - ISBN 978-5-91522-005-7
This edition, although somewhat more complete than The Monkeys Are Coming, was criticized in the press. See Felix Ikshin's review in UFO 2008, No. 91.

Father - Natan Yakovlevich Lunts (1871-1934) - a pharmacist, a dealer in optical instruments. Mother - Anna Efimovna, concert pianist. He began to write at the age of eighteen. In 1918-1922 he studied at the Faculty of History and Philology of Petrograd University. He was left at the Department of Western European Literature for scientific work, knew Spanish, Italian, English, French, Old French, Hebrew.

He was a member of the literary group "Serapion Brothers".

Obituaries for Lev Lunts were written by Nina Berberova, Yuri Tynyanov, Maxim Gorky, Konstantin Fedin, Mikhail Slonimsky.

Addresses in Petrograd

Creation

I have been writing since the age of eighteen. He has been writing for five years. During this time, he wrote the stories “In the Desert”, “Motherland”, “Outgoing No. 37”, “The Tale of the Eunuch”, “Walking Through the Torments”, “Across the Border”, feuilletons “In the Car”, “Faithful Wife”, “ The Patriot, the plays Outlaw, Bertrand de Born, The Monkeys Are Coming, The City of Truth, the screenplay The Rise of Things, and several theoretical articles. Valentin Kataev in the book “My Diamond Crown” also mentions “a hilariously funny story by a young, early-dead Soviet writer from Petrograd, Lev Lunts, who wrote about how a certain bourgeois family flees from Soviet power abroad, hiding their diamonds in a clothes brush.”

The prose and dramaturgy of Lev Lunts was published during his lifetime in the USSR and in Europe. His plays were also shown in theaters both at home and abroad.

The reason for the rejection of Lunts by Soviet culture is found in his article “Why are we Serapion brothers”, which, by coincidence, began to be perceived as a manifesto of the Serapions. It was this article that A. A. Zhdanov quoted in 1946, proving the anti-Soviet nature of M. M. Zoshchenko and the Serapion Brothers in general. The main idea of the article could be used as an example of apoliticality and anti-Sovietism:

Reviews

In the 1930s, Luntz's work was forgotten and deleted from the history of Russian Soviet literature. The 11-volume Literary Encyclopedia in 1932 placed an article about Luntz, where he was called "a militant bourgeois individualist" and "a typical exponent of the ideas of the liberal bourgeois intelligentsia of the pre-October formation."

Monographs dedicated to Luntz were published in Serbia and Poland.

Compositions

Outlaw. The play // "Conversation", Berlin, No. 1, 1921
The monkeys are coming! Play // "Merry Almanac", 1923
In the Desert // Serapion Brothers, Berlin, 1922
Outgoing No. 37 // "Russia", 1922, No. 1
Why are we the Serapion Brothers // Literary Notes, 1922, No. 3
Abnormal phenomenon // "Petersburg", 1922, No. 3
Seducer. In the car // "Amanita", 1922, No. 10
Bertrand de Born. The play // "City", 1923, No. 1
Motherland // European Almanac, 1923
To the West // "Conversation", No. 2, 1923
Patriot. The play // "Red Raven", 1923, No. 33
City of Truth. The play // "Conversation", No. 5, 1924
Rise of things. Screenplay // "New Journal", No. 79, 1965
Traveling in a hospital bed // "New Journal", No. 90, 1968

Editions

L. Lunts. The monkeys are coming. St. Petersburg; Inapress; 2003.

The most complete edition of the works of Lev Lunts. Excellent edition, quality paper, binding and print quality. Introductory article by Valery Shubinsky, detailed commentary and afterword by Evgeny Lemming. The publication includes stories, plays, screenplays, articles and reviews, autobiography, correspondence, as well as articles and obituaries dedicated to Lunts, written by his contemporaries and friends - Berberova, Slonimsky, Tynyanov, Kaverin, Fedin and others.

L. Lunts. literary heritage. M; Scientific world; 2007. - ISBN 978-5-91522-005-7

This edition, although somewhat more complete than The Monkeys Are Coming, was criticized in the press. See Felix Ikshin's review in UFO 2008, No. 91.

1. Brother-Skomorokh Lev Lunts (1901–1924)

He was the most cheerful and most gifted of the Serapion Brothers, and fate turned out to be especially cruel and ruthless to him.

Lev Natanovich Lunts was born on May 2, 1901 in St. Petersburg. The reference book "All Petersburg" lists the heads of twelve different families named Lunts, who lived in the capital of the empire - attorneys at law, doctors, pharmacists. The writer's parents are from Siauliai (Lithuania). His father - Natan Yankelevich - graduated from the Yuryev (now - Tartu) University, having received the right to work as a pharmacist. In 1903, the Luntsy lived at 22 Zabalkansky (now Moskovsky), where the writer's father had a pharmacy store; then moved closer to the center, to the Five Corners. "All Petersburg" for 1914, erroneously calling Natan Yankelevich - Moiseevich, reports his address: Troitskaya Street (now Rubinshteina), 26. This house housed first a pharmacy, and then a medical equipment store Natan Lunts (now the publishing house "Academic Project" "and with him book Shop and cafe).

The family of Natan Lunts had three children: two boys - Yakov and the younger Leva - and daughter Zhenya. Leva Lunts' abilities for languages were determined very early. In 1918 (the Bolsheviks already ruled the country, and the store of N. Ya. Lunts was requisitioned) Lev graduated from the 1st St. Petersburg Gymnasium (as it was called when he began to study there), graduated with a certificate giving the right to a gold medal ( medals in 1918, however, were no longer given) and entered the Faculty of History and Philology of Petrograd University. Already in the first year, he passed the exams for three courses. At the same time, he studied at the Pedagogical Institute at the university, where the emphasis was not on theory, but on languages. And he also actively worked in the literary Studio of "World Literature" - in the seminars of Zamyatin and Chukovsky; then he fled from Chukovsky to Shklovsky, about which there is a penitential rhyme in the famous Chukokkala:

Once upon a time there was a crocodile

He walked around the studio

He spoke in Chukovsky,

Shklovitists taught

And he fooled me too.

Judas the Shklovites Leva Lunts

Lunts began writing and even publishing in 1919.

The son of Korney Chukovsky, Nikolai, recalled: “Leva Lunts was a curly brown-haired man, of medium height, with light gray eyes. He had a wonderful character - he was kind, modest, cheerful, industrious, serious and cheerful. I adored him and constantly admired him. He was two years older than me, but he was my friend on an equal footing, never offending my vanity as a teenager who fell into the company of elders. And I, and everyone around me, was especially struck by one of his properties in Lev Lunts - swiftness. He was a man of great temperament and instant reactions. His speech flowed swiftly, because his thoughts were swift, and it was not easy for the listener to keep up with them. As he spoke, he was constantly on the move, gesticulating, jumping from chair to chair. It was an active mind, not tolerating lethargy and peace. These are the impressions of the young man, but here is an entry about Luntz in the diary of a man of venerable age: “Dear, curly, with naive eyes. Laughs furiously. He is already a doctor of philology, he reads Spanish, French, Italian, English, and in appearance he is a schoolboy from good home, the brother of his dragonfly sister. When he was with us at the Studio, he was distinguished by the fact that he always talked about his mom or dad.

The foregoing refers to 1920, when Luntz wrote the tragedy Outlaw.

All the forces of Luntz were given to literature, and everything he wrote was literary. Lunts did not try, like many Serapions, to display his own worldly experience on paper (he, of course, is extremely modest), but in his purely literary constructions, nevertheless, he did not consider it possible to get away from the problems of real life. Outlaw is a play set in old Spain. But the Spanish material, well known to Lunts, does not take him away from reflections on modernity, on what is happening in Russia. And it is no coincidence that this play is about the revolution, about the mechanism of its rebirth, about how the just indignation of the people, crushed by the authorities, turns into the brutality of the crowd, who felt unlimited freedom, and about how the moment comes when the leader beloved by the people throws away the noble slogans (we will live according to the laws of honor!) and their ardent promises (no bloodshed!) and throws a stranglehold on the raging elements, much tougher than the one with which he called for an end.

There are two central figures in Luntz's play: the robber Alonzo, who robs the rich in order to help the poor, and therefore naturally becomes the leader of the crowds, and the court whore Clara (Countess Ursino) - there is an undoubted mockery in the fact that it was she who was instructed by Luntz to be, if not a hidden conductor actions, then every implacable judge, providing the retribution deserved by the hero. However, this retribution does not seem to amuse the audience (as well as the crowd acting on the stage - it is always supposed to remain in the cold).

The play "Outlaw" was written by an eighteen-year-old youth whose quick pen captured the essence of revolutionary process, over the intricacies of which then - that is, long before the denouement - much more experienced contemporaries of Lunts racked their brains. And this is doubly striking today, when Russia is again going through the next cycle of post-revolutionary “transformations” and the perplexed question froze on the faces of its respectable citizens: how did it all happen to us like this?

Although the action of the play "Out of Law" in space and time was prudently removed from Russia in 1920 to conditional old Spain, nevertheless, Lunts failed to print the play in Russia ("Out of Law" was published by Gorky, who loved Lunts, in his Berlin almanac "Conversation" in 1923). Moreover, as soon as the artistic director of the Alexandrinsky Theater Yu. M. Yuryev announced the upcoming production of the play “Outside the Law”, work on the play was banned, and soon Lunts’s play was banned as a counter-revolutionary one throughout Soviet Russia (more on this in the plot "The First Brand") ... The next play by Luntz - the tragedy "Bertrand de Born" - managed to be printed in the St. Petersburg almanac "City", but theatrical work over it (in the Bolshoi Theater) was also banned ... In 1923, in Soviet Russia, another play by Lunts "Monkeys are coming" was published - sharp and paradoxical (according to V. Kaverin, it reflected the defense of Petrograd from Yudenich in 1919, and Shklovsky believed that it was a play about future fascists ... “At the end of the play, everyone fought with monkeys, and even the dead got up to drive them away”) - but there was no talk of staging it on the Soviet stage. N. Chukovsky, who was very fond of Lunts, writes: “His dramaturgy is surprisingly temperamental, fresh, and independent in style, full of thoughts, and the fact that his plays have never been staged (this is inaccurate - B.F.), can only be explained by our ignorance and our love to cast a shadow on a clear day ”(N.K. was a man of the system and knew it well).

The prose heritage of Luntz is small - about a dozen stories. One of them - "Outgoing No. 37" - has the subtitle "Diary of the Head of the Office." His hero, who worked for 20 years as a clerk in the Senate, now serves in the Political Education. He comes up with the idea of using hypnosis to turn people into scarce items - into cows (to fight the milk crisis), into horses (to support Autoguzh), and, finally, into sheets of paper, which was in great short supply. When during the experiment the hero turned himself into paper, the instructor who came into his office took a piece of paper from the table, having previously checked whether it was soft enough ... These are quite Kafkaesque stories that the Soviet reality of 1921 gave rise to. By the way, Korney Chukovsky sadly recorded how the public did not understand Lunts when he read this story: “They laughed only in unfunny places related to the plot. If this happens in St. Petersburg, what about in the provinces! Our audience is not. There are no those who can appreciate the irony, subtlety, the play of the mind, the elegance of thought, style, etc. I laughed and deliberately watched the neighbors: they sat like stone.

Not only the "revolutionary" modernity occupied the writer Lev Lunts, but also distant history - the Bible, old Spain. His story "In the Desert", written in March 1921 and published in the first and, as it turned out, latest issue almanac "Serapion Brothers", was stylized as biblical texts. Y. Tynyanov admitted that “the story is written compactly and strongly”, and M. Shaginyan noted that Lunts leads this story “without interfering at all and allowing the logic of the action to unfold with almost musical severity” . This piece of Lunts was appreciated by Gorky (“Lunts wrote strongly”), who belonged to young author with rare even for him tenderness. In The Phone Book, Schwartz compares Luntz's stories and plays; the conclusion that he makes is all the more important because Schwartz is a great playwright: “His stories were rather dry, program-plot. But there was real heat in the plays, and they were made of precious material. He was a born playwright by the grace of God.

In 1922, the Petrograd journal "Literary Notes" took most of their third issue to the Serapions, inviting each of them to tell about themselves. Luntz replied: “It’s stupid to write an autobiography without publishing your works ... And wouldn’t it be better if, instead of talking about myself, I write about brotherhood?” This was followed by an article (then it was invariably called a declaration) “Why are we Serapion brothers?”. Luntz's article provoked a heated discussion both among the Serapion brothers and in the press. Lunts participated in the discussion, and his response article "On Ideology and Journalism" was printed in Moscow.

In 1946, at the suggestion of referents, Zhdanov quoted Luntz's declaration, smashing Zoshchenko. 10 years later it was cast into reinforced concrete lines Soviet Encyclopedia about the Serapion brothers; L. Lunts was declared the theoretician of this group hostile to Soviet literature. The stupid formula of the accusation, which was not subject to appeal, did not allow Lunts to enter the history of literature without the odious (at that time) stigma of an anti-Soviet.

As it turned out unexpectedly, Elizaveta Polonskaya kept the white manuscript of the Lunts declaration, and when I compared it with the text published in 1922, it turned out that the liberal editors of the magazine, fearing censorship, softened the sharpest parts in it (this did not save the magazine - it is here or covered). “Social and political criticism tortured Russian literature too long and painfully,” Lunts wrote. - It's time to say that "Demons" better than novels Chernyshevsky. That a non-communist story can be brilliant, and a communist story can be mediocre... We do not write for propaganda. Art is real, like life itself.

The stigma "theorist" of the group, which was later placed on Luntz, surprised his comrades, although the questions of "literature and ideology" Luntz really occupied. On March 13, 1923, Gorky wrote to Slonimsky: “But Lunts is theorizing, this is also not very good, in any case: somewhat premature ... By nature, in essence, Levushka is, first of all, an artist.”

Lev Lunts - Serapion from the very first day of the proclamation of the brotherhood, and the very name of the group "Serapion Brothers" was later definitely connected by some with Lunts, remembering his love for Hoffmann and professional knowledge of Western literature. Retrospectively, Lunts is given the place of the leader of the "left" flank of the Serapions. Lunts was a Westerner and storyteller, he considered sharp thought and a dynamic plot to be the basis of literature. And he was an ardent, furious polemicist. “I have never met debaters like him - he was incinerated by the heat of the dispute, you could suffocate next to him,” Fedin recalled. However, Lunts convinced rather than was convinced, notes the observant skeptic Schwartz.

But, even cruelly arguing and disagreeing with him, everyone loved him, and in a biblical way Shklovsky called him Veniamin Serapionov. There was another property in Lunts that was very conducive to him - Fedin, who was the first to write about Lunts, spoke about this: adults: he passionately loved children - "I solemnly swear to you, friends: I will have at least twelve children." Undoubtedly, the children also loved him ... ".

Lev Lunts brought to the Brotherhood not only the spirit of incendiary discussion, but also the swiftness and fun of the game. His famous film parodies (of the then Western cinema) were described by many. “All those present were both actors and spectators. The playwright and director was Luntz. He instantly invented the next scene, dragged the performers needed for it from the chairs by the hands, took them aside for a few seconds, whispered to everyone what he should do (no words were allowed, the cinematography was silent), and the scene was performed. The audience fell to the floor with laughter. Polonskaya says that Zoshchenko usually helped Lunts, and Schwartz brilliantly led the entertainer. The writer A. Ivich (I. I. Bernshtein) recalled “live cinema, which was directed by Evgeny Schwartz and Leva Lunts”: “They were two entertainers and portrayed all sorts of tricks. I remember how Neldichen portrayed the statue of liberty - he was huge growth, With long legs... And I crawled between his legs, depicting a steamer that is mooring at New York Harbor ... ". On September 30, 1922, in a letter to Berberova, Luntz gave the names of his last three “films”: the tragedy “A Full Member of the House of Arts” (about H), “Monument to Mikh. Slonimsky" and "Family Diamonds of Vsevolod Ivanov". Olga Forsh portrayed Lunts in the novel Crazy Ship as a young faun: “Here he is B.F.> and that blue-eyed, light, possibly goat-legged young faun - filled the Crazy ship especially with laughter, noise and themselves. The young faun was remembered as an overproduction of energy, as a boyish mischief in a one-man movie with a public favorite number - “Family Diamond of the Proletarian Writer Foma Zhanov” ... Over the years, the faun was just a boy ... It seemed that he ran so far that there was no end to the run ... ".

Luntz's literary path began very confidently; it seemed that doubts were not peculiar to him at all. Meanwhile, it was not like that. In this regard, letters from Lunts to Gorky are characteristic (their correspondence testifies to the amazing mutual trust of writers different ages and different weight categories). One of Luntz's letters was especially confessional. On August 16, 1922, he wrote to Gorky in Germany: “I need to consult with a firm man whom I trust and respect. There are no such people in St. Petersburg now. Forgive me again that I dare to address you. The first doubt (and the most cruel one): did I do the right thing when I hit literature? It's not that I don't believe in my own strength: I believe in myself, maybe too boldly. But I - Jew. Convinced, faithful and rejoice in this. And I - Russian writer. But I am a Russian Jew, and Russia is my homeland, and I love Russia more than all other countries. How to reconcile this? I have reconciled everything for myself, for me it is clear and pure, but others say: "A Jew cannot be a Russian writer." They say - for what reason. I don't want to write the way 9/10 Russian novelists write and, after all, Pilnyak and most of the "serapions" write. I do not want a dense, regional language, a petty way of life, a tedious play on words, albeit flowery, albeit beautiful. I love a big idea and a big, fascinating plot, I am drawn to long things, to tragedy, to a novel, without fail a plot. But I can't stand Remizov and Bely. Western literature I love Russian more… I can be silent and want to be silent (if not for money!) for another 10 years, because I believe in myself. But all around they say that I'm not Russian. That I love the plot because I'm not Russian. And that nothing will come of me ... ". The answer of Alexei Maksimovich is unknown, but in the next letter to him, Lunts says: “I was infinitely touched when I received your letter, so touching and warm. It brought me complete peace and gave me complete and great joy. Thank you!".

In 1921, when Lunts' parents, having restored their Lithuanian citizenship, left St. Petersburg, younger son flatly refused to go with them. He was given a damp little room in the House of Arts. The disease that brought him to the grave so monstrously early was already beginning, and two years spent in the House of Arts, in dampness, cold and hunger, undoubtedly spurred it on.

One incident with Lunts, directly related to his illness, is described by Shklovsky: “When he graduated from the university, the Serapions in Sazonov’s house rocked him. All. And then gloomy Vsevolod Ivanov rushed forward with the battle cry of the Kirghiz. Nearly killed by being dropped on the floor. Then Professor Grekov came to them at night, ran his finger along the Luntsevo spinal column and said: “Nothing, you can not amputate your legs.” A little bit shattered. Two weeks later, Lunts was dancing with a stick.

Soon he was drafted into the army - then it turned out that he was seriously ill. Having received an exemption from the draft, Lunts continued to work, but the disease progressed. “In the winter from 1922 to 1923, he lay hopelessly on his bed in his tiny room in the House of Arts. People constantly crowded around his bed, he still joked, gesticulated rapidly, argued, laughed out loud. From time to time, he still crawled out of his kennel to general gatherings and arranged his dazzling "cinemas". He wrote a lot and took an ardent part in all the affairs of the Serapions. But I felt worse and worse."

In 1923, Lunts realized that without treatment in the West, he would die. He asked the University for an internship in Spain. “By spring, he felt so bad,” N. Chukovsky continues his story, “that my parents, who loved him very much, took him in, and we began to live in the same room with him. He didn't get out of bed." In May 1923, the GPU (on the recommendation of the University) released him. Schwartz describes the farewell evening almost frivolously (“The evening was noisy and cheerful ... Only its main culprit was sad ... he was unwell - he could hardly open his mouth - his jaw hurt in the joint ... We laughed at his jaw ... ") - he did not foresee anything. Luntz went by sea, but only reached Hamburg, where his parents settled. They carried him off the ship. Only for one day he was able to get out to Berlin - the then center of Russian emigration.

Lunts spent a whole year in sanatoriums and clinics ... This was the last year of a man's life, chained to a hospital bed. And during this year, Lunts wrote the play City of Truth, which he had conceived back in St. Petersburg, the screenplay The Rise of Things, and a lot of letters. Serapions received from him invariably cheerful long messages filled with the most genuine interest in their work, deeds, and life. Occasionally, Luntz's letters contained sad lines about his illness: “Everything is the same with me. I still hope to recover by the 25th anniversary of the Serapions.”

February 1, 1924 - the third anniversary of the Serapions and the first, which was celebrated in St. Petersburg without Lunts. He sent the brothers a fantastic story-parody "Walking through the torments", which takes place in 1932. The story contains nine chapters - each Serapion has its own chapter. "Walking through the torments" was read out at the Serapion gathering, and in response to Lunts, a huge collective letter was sent - each of its authors wrote several heartfelt lines to Lunts. These were (in order) - Schwartz, Dusya (the future Slonimskaya), Aguti Miklashevskaya, Shklovsky's wife Vasilisa, Zamyatin, Zoshchenko, Kaverin, Gruzdev, Shklovsky, D. Vygodsky, Tikhonov and his wife M. K. Neslukhovskaya, Polonskaya, Shaginyan, Slonimsky, Valentina Khodasevich, Zhak Izrailevich, Fedin and his wife Dora Sergeevna, Lydia Khariton. (In the 1960s, the American Slavist Gary Kern tracked down Lunts' sister Evgenia Natanovna Gorshtein in England and found a suitcase with letters to Lev Lunts in her attic; their publication in 1966 in two issues of the New York "New Journal" became a sensation and aroused a new wave of interest to the Luntz figure).

It was getting harder and harder for him to control himself. On March 22, 1924, Lunts wrote to Fedin: “Kostya, it’s bad with me. Spring has come, but the disease has not moved. I sleep all day, I can't write or read. I'm rusting, Kostya! .. I can't take it anymore - I want to go outside, walk, move! .. Oh, it's bad! Don't forget me, damn it!" .

On Sunday, May 11, 1924, the Berlin newspaper Rul’ published a message in a black frame: “On Friday, May 9, at 10 o’clock in the morning, LEV NATANOVICH LUNTS, aged 23, died after a long and serious illness, about which his parents, sister, brother and daughter-in-law of the deceased. Burial Monday 12 p.m. m. at 4 o'clock in the afternoon at the Jewish cemetery in Hamburg ". On the same page was printed without a signature a short obituary "The Death of L. N. Lunts", which mentioned the play "Out of Law" and "journalistic-critical" articles of the deceased. In the homeland of Lunts, a short obituary for him was published by Leningradskaya Pravda only on May 23.

Of all the Serapions, only Fedin had a chance to visit Luntz's grave. On June 24, 1928, he wrote in his diary: “In the morning at the grave of Lunts. His old people are inconsolable… A grave without a mound, flat, with a high black stone. There is an inscription on it - in Russian, German, Jewish. On German Lunts is called a doctor ... "

“His departure united us with its suddenness, its tragedy, squeezed us into a tight ring,” Fedin later recalled, “and this was the apogee of our friendship, its full flowering, and from that moment, from this year, the ring began to weaken ... ". And one more paragraph from Fedin's book: "The death of Lunts left marks on the history of our development: with it we lost the traits of impassioned gaiety in our literary temperament, and it was, as it were, the threshold of trials for our friendly connection." All the Brothers felt it then - it was not for nothing that M. Slonimsky wrote in 1929: “Lev Lunts was central figure Serapionov, the main organizer of the group ".

Luntz's first book in Russia was published only in 1994.

Dedicatory inscription of L. N. Lunts A. I. Khodasevich on the imprint: Lev Lunts. "The monkeys are coming!" The play ("Merry Almanac", ed. "Circle", 1923).

“Dear Anyuta (Anna Ivanovna), with gratitude for the compresses and for pleasant conversations. Just don't read this crap. Lev Lunts.

Collection of A. L. Dmitrenko (St. Petersburg). (Further in the book, all autographs, the location of which is not indicated, are from the author's collection).

Dedicatory inscription of L. N. Lunts and M. L. Slonimsky to B. M. Eikhenbaum on the book: “The Serapion Brothers. Almanac the first "(" Alkonost ". St. Petersburg, 1922).

"To the esteemed Boris Mikhailovich Eichenbaum from the esteemed Serapions M. Slonimsky, Lev Lunts."

Collection of the Anna Akhmatova Museum in the Fountain House.

Occupation:

writer, playwright

Years of creativity: Genre:

prose, play, journalism

Art language:

Lev Natanovich Lunts(April 19 (May 2), St. Petersburg - May 10, Hamburg) - Russian prose writer, playwright and publicist from the Serapion Brothers group.

Biography

Born into a Russian-Jewish family. Father - Natan Yakovlevich Lunts (1871-1934) - a pharmacist, a dealer in optical instruments. Mother - Anna Efimovna, concert pianist.

He began to write at the age of eighteen. After graduating in 1918 with a gold medal from the Petrograd 1st Men's Gymnasium, Lunts entered the Faculty of History and Philology of Petrograd University, from which he graduated in 1922. He was left at the Department of Western European Literature for scientific work, knew Spanish, Italian, English, French, Old French, Hebrew.

Obituaries for Lev Lunts were written by Nina Berberova, Yuri Tynyanov, Maxim Gorky, Konstantin Fedin, Mikhail Slonimsky.

Creation

The prose and dramaturgy of Lev Lunts was published during his lifetime in the USSR and in Europe. His plays were also shown in theaters both at home and abroad.

Subsequently, however, the works of Lunts were not published in the USSR even in the most comparatively liberal times, despite the fact that such a publication was dreamed of by the former Serapion Brothers, who had turned into literary generals.

The reason for the rejection of Lunts by Soviet culture is found in his article "Why are we Serapion brothers", which, by coincidence, began to be perceived as a manifesto of the Serapions. It was this article that was quoted in A. A. Zhdanov, proving the anti-Soviet nature of M. M. Zoshchenko and the Serapion Brothers in general. The main idea of the article could be used as an example of apoliticality and anti-Sovietism:

With whom are we, the Serapion Brothers? We are with the hermit Serapion.

Reviews

Not a single gathering could do without him [Lunts], he, of course, was the soul of the Serapions.

The young faun was remembered as an overproduction of energy.

He was a man of great temperament and instant reactions.<…>It was an active mind, intolerant of lethargy and rest.

Monographs dedicated to Luntz were published in Serbia and Poland.

Compositions

Outlaw. The play // "Conversation", Berlin, No. 1, 1921
The monkeys are coming! Play // "Merry Almanac", 1923
In the Desert // Serapion Brothers, Berlin, 1922
Outgoing No. 37 // "Russia", 1922, No. 1
Why are we the Serapion Brothers // Literary Notes, 1922, No. 3
Abnormal phenomenon // "Petersburg", 1922, No. 3
Seducer. In the car // "Amanita", 1922, No. 10
Bertrand de Born. The play // "City", 1923, No. 1
Motherland // European Almanac, 1923
To the West // "Conversation", No. 2, 1923
Patriot. The play // "Red Raven", 1923, No. 33
City of Truth. The play // "Conversation", No. 5, 1924
Rise of things. Screenplay // "New Journal", No. 79, 1965
Traveling in a hospital bed // "New Journal", No. 90, 1968

Editions

Outlaw. - St. Petersburg: Composer, 1994. - ISBN 5-7379-0001-0

The monkeys are coming. - St. Petersburg: INAPRESS, 2003. - ISBN 5-87135-145-X

literary heritage. - M.: Scientific world; 2007. - ISBN 978-5-91522-005-7

This edition, though somewhat more complete than The Monkeys Are Coming, was criticized in the press.

Write a review on the article "Lunts, Lev Natanovich"

Notes

An excerpt characterizing Lunts, Lev Natanovich

When asked about the stocks who were sitting in the pit, the count angrily shouted at the caretaker:
“Well, shall I give you two battalions of an escort, which is not there?” Let them go and that's it!
- Your Excellency, there are political ones: Meshkov, Vereshchagin.
- Vereshchagin! Hasn't he been hanged yet? shouted Rostopchin. - Bring him to me.

By nine o'clock in the morning, when the troops had already moved through Moscow, no one else came to ask the count's orders. All those who could ride rode by themselves; those who remained decided for themselves what they had to do.
The count ordered the horses to be brought in to go to Sokolniki, and, frowning, yellow and silent, he sat with his hands folded in his office.
In a calm, not turbulent time, it seems to each administrator that it is only through his efforts that the entire population under his control is moving, and in this consciousness of his necessity, each administrator feels the main reward for his labors and efforts. It is clear that as long as the historical sea is calm, it should seem to the ruler-administrator, with his fragile boat resting against the ship of the people with his pole and moving himself, that the ship against which he rests is moving with his efforts. But as soon as a storm rises, the sea is agitated and the ship itself moves, then delusion is impossible. The ship moves on its own huge, independent course, the pole does not reach the moving ship, and the ruler suddenly passes from the position of a ruler, a source of strength, into an insignificant, useless and weak person.
Rostopchin felt this, and this irritated him. The police chief, who was stopped by the crowd, together with the adjutant, who had come to report that the horses were ready, entered the count. Both were pale, and the police chief, reporting on the execution of his order, reported that a huge crowd of people stood in the yard of the count, who wanted to see him.
Rostopchin, without answering a word, got up and with quick steps went to his luxurious bright living room, went to the balcony door, took hold of the handle, left it and went to the window, from which the whole crowd was visible. A tall fellow stood in the front rows and with a stern face, waving his hand, said something. The bloody blacksmith stood beside him with a gloomy look. Through the closed windows a murmur of voices could be heard.
Is the crew ready? - said Rostopchin, moving away from the window.
“Ready, Your Excellency,” said the adjutant.
Rostopchin again went to the balcony door.
- What do they want? he asked the police chief.
- Your Excellency, they say that they were going to go to the French on your orders, they were shouting something about treason. But a wild crowd, Your Excellency. I forcibly left. Your Excellency, I dare to suggest...
“If you please go, I know what to do without you,” Rostopchin shouted angrily. He stood at the balcony door, looking out at the crowd. “This is what they did to Russia! That's what they did to me!" thought Rostopchin, feeling uncontrollable anger rising in his soul against someone to whom one could attribute the cause of everything that had happened. As is often the case with hot people, anger already possessed him, but he was still looking for an object for him. “La voila la populace, la lie du peuple,” he thought, looking at the crowd, “la plebe qu” ils ont soulevee par leur sottise. whom they raised by their stupidity! They need a sacrifice."] It occurred to him, looking at the tall fellow waving his hand. And for that very reason it occurred to him that he himself needed this sacrifice, this object for his anger.
Is the crew ready? he asked again.
“Ready, Your Excellency. What do you want about Vereshchagin? He is waiting at the porch, answered the adjutant.
- A! cried Rostopchin, as if struck by some unexpected memory.
And, quickly opening the door, he stepped out with resolute steps onto the balcony. The conversation suddenly ceased, hats and caps were removed, and all eyes went up to the count who came out.
- Hello guys! said the count quickly and loudly. - Thank you for coming. I'll come out to you now, but first of all we need to deal with the villain. We need to punish the villain who killed Moscow. Wait for me! - And the count just as quickly returned to the chambers, slamming the door hard.
A murmur of approval ran through the crowd. “He, then, will control the useh of the villains! And you say a Frenchman ... he will untie the whole distance for you! people said, as if reproaching each other for their lack of faith.
A few minutes later an officer hurried out of the front door, ordered something, and the dragoons stretched out. The crowd moved greedily from the balcony to the porch. Coming out on the porch with angry quick steps, Rostopchin hastily looked around him, as if looking for someone.
- Where is he? - said the count, and at the same moment as he said this, he saw from around the corner of the house coming out between two dragoons young man with a long thin neck, with a half-shaven and overgrown head. This young man was dressed in what used to be a dapper, blue-clothed, shabby fox sheepskin coat and in dirty, first-hand prisoner's trousers, stuffed into uncleaned, worn-out thin boots. Shackles hung heavily on thin, weak legs, making it difficult for the young man's hesitant gait.
- A! - said Rostopchin, hastily turning his eyes away from the young man in the fox coat and pointing to the bottom step of the porch. - Put it here! The young man, rattling his shackles, stepped heavily onto the indicated step, holding the pressing collar of the sheepskin coat with his finger, turned his long neck twice and, sighing, folded his thin, non-working hands in front of his stomach with a submissive gesture.
There was silence for a few seconds as the young man settled himself on the step. Only in the back rows of people squeezing to one place, groaning, groans, jolts and the clatter of rearranged legs were heard.
Rostopchin, waiting for him to stop at the indicated place, frowningly rubbed his face with his hand.
- Guys! - said Rostopchin in a metallic voice, - this man, Vereshchagin, is the same scoundrel from whom Moscow died.
The young man in the fox coat stood in a submissive pose, with his hands clasped together in front of his stomach and slightly bent over. Emaciated, with a hopeless expression, disfigured by a shaved head, his young face was lowered down. At the first words of the count, he slowly raised his head and looked down at the count, as if he wanted to say something to him or at least meet his gaze. But Rostopchin did not look at him. On the long, thin neck of the young man, like a rope, a vein behind the ear tensed and turned blue, and suddenly his face turned red.

With its large format, color, and embossing (gold on a green field), this book brings to mind the series “Literary Monuments”. This is indeed a monument - to a writer who lived an absurdly short life and strangely - especially after death - influenced Soviet literature. And monuments, as you know, are erected for a long time.

Any meticulous reader who decides to look at the imprint will be surprised to find that the book, which was put into typesetting in the summer of 2002, was signed for publication only in the spring of 2003. And this is in the time of computer technology and the book market-Moloch, which daily requires new sacrifices. But much more surprising is what the imprint did not reflect: contrary to the indication on the title, the book was published only in the summer of 2004 (a clarification important for bibliophiles and bibliographers).

However, what about two years, if we recall the fate of the writer himself. A brisk boy from an intelligent Jewish family (his father is a pharmacist, and later a pharmacist who sold, among other things, optics, his mother is a musician), gifted, easily assimilating science, and in a sense elevated by the era, in a sense bewildered by the era.

A certificate that gives the right to receive a gold medal (in fact, it allows you to buy this medal with your own money and then lock it in a box with family heirlooms) - what was such a certificate worth in 1918, when Lunts graduated from the gymnasium, and where to get money not for a medal - for a living, if the pharmacy, which was owned by the venerable Natan Yakovlevich Lunts, was requisitioned, and the former owner had to become an ordinary pharmacist again.

However, what young Levushka - and he was born in 1901, according to our concepts, is infinitely young - to any insignia. After all, he entered the university at the Faculty of History and Philology not for the sake of academic degrees(later he was left at the department), but for the sake of knowledge and deep love to Roman culture. Because of the same inexhaustible thirst for knowledge, he visits Volfila and the literary studio at the publishing house "World Literature", where he gets acquainted with the future "serapions".

Two major events in his short life almost coincided. February 1, 1921 is considered the day of the formation of the Serapion Brothers group, one of the founders of which was Lunts, at the very beginning of the same year he leaves his family and settles in the DISK, where both old and new writers live, where they try to drown out hunger with stormy disputes , where they write page after page, forgetting about the cold and discomfort.

As for Luntz, the fury of the prophets and the knowledge of the scribes lived in a weak, sickly body, life turned out to be clearly beyond his strength. V. F. Khodasevich, in an essay dedicated to the House of Arts, says:

“After passing through the kitchen and descending two stories down the cast-iron spiral staircase, one could find oneself in yet another corridor, where a blackened electric light bulb burned day and night. The right wall of the corridor was blank, and the left had four doors. Behind each door is a narrow room with one window, located at the level of a cramped, gloomy well-shaped courtyard. The rooms were in perpetual darkness. The red-hot potbelly stoves were unable to fight the semi-basement dampness, and steam hung in the warm but stale air. All this was reminiscent of those winter quarters that are arranged for monkeys in zoological gardens. The corridor was called "monkey". The first room was occupied by Lev Lunts - probably, it was partly what ruined his health. His neighbor was Green, the writer of adventurous stories, a gloomy tubercular man who led an endless and hopeless litigation with the bosses of the "Disk", who did not know almost anyone and, they say, was engaged in training cockroaches. The last room was occupied by the poet Vsevolod Rozhdestvensky, at that time a modest student of Gumilyov, now a diligent translator of all kinds of jambuls.

Between Grin and Rozhdestvensky was Vladimir Pyast, a little poet, but clever and educated person, one of those romantic losers that Blok loved. Piast was Blok's faithful and noble friend for many years. Seizures were the main misfortune of his life. mental illness, from time to time forcing him to be placed in a hospital. Somewhere on Vasilyevsky Island lived his wife with two children. He gave all his rations and all his meager earnings to his family, while he himself led a completely beggarly existence.

A bleak picture: everything mentioned by the memoirist is doomed in its own way - translations of the Soviet era are the same mortal occupation, although it does not kill immediately, it promises at least poetic anemia to a diligent translator. Lunts, on the other hand, preferred to translate other authors, and in a different way. So, he translated Alfieri's drama for the Habima Theater, alas, not staged, so he was going - he was just going - together with E. Polonskaya, "Serapion's sister", to translate Balzac's Mischievous Tales.

His plans did not come true. Flatly refusing to go abroad with his family (Lunts' parents, as natives of Lithuania, could leave Soviet Russia without hindrance, Lunts had to take Lithuanian citizenship for this), he was nevertheless forced to go to Germany for treatment, from where he did not return. The oft-repeated claims that Luntz emigrated are unfounded. To be convinced of this, it is enough to read his letters to relatives and friends. He looked forward to the opportunity to return to his homeland and died without waiting. He was twenty-three years old.

Here, in fact, the plot of this review begins. And it starts with a paradox. If editors in the twenties of the twentieth century had been a little more reckless, Lunts would have been careful not to quote A. Zhdanov in his report, interpreting the decision of the Central Committee on the magazines Zvezda and Leningrad. What are the words about freedom from any parties: “We have gathered in the days of revolutionary, in the days of powerful political tension. “Whoever is not with us is against us! - they told us from right and left, - with whom are you, the Serapion brothers, with the communists or against the communists, for the revolution or against the revolution?

“With whom are we, Serapion brothers? The hermit Serapion and I”…”

Well, what if not these words about the rejection of utilitarianism and propaganda in literature were publicized, but what was written at the same time by the obsessed Lunts, but blacked out by a prudent editor: “Social and political criticism tortured Russian literature for too long and painfully. It's time to say that The Possessed is better than Chernyshevsky's novels. Such statements are not suitable for official quotations, they are capable of blowing up any text. In the same way, a person like Luntz can destroy any community, even a community of like-minded people. The maximalist Luntz also disturbed the peace of the “Serapions”, and the article “Why are we Serapion brothers”, published together with Serapion’s autobiographies in No. 3 of the journal “Literary Notes” for 1922, is one of a string of examples of annoying “unkindness” of Luntz.

With this article, again, there is no complete clarity, but in general terms you can understand what's what. The publication of ironic, scandalous autobiographies could have been excellent advertising for the “serapions”, if not for Luntsev's article. It was perceived as a general declaration (who really read the lines there that the “serapions” do not have charters and chairmen), understood as a direct challenge (the public did not bother to figure out where it was directed). It could not have been otherwise - the article came at the right moment, the "serapions" posed an increasing threat to other associations and groups. Talent, aggressiveness, love of freedom made it possible to be in the first roles. The “serapions”, who were gradually tamed by the powers that be (both L. Trotsky and A. Voronsky), were jealous - and who would? - Lefovtsy. Say, we are the only revolutionaries in art (and further attacks, perceived as an indirect denunciation).

This is not the place to describe the vicissitudes of the struggle with the “serapions” and the “serapions” with opponents, an instructive and tough struggle. The collection under review contains collective letters, written by the “serapions” during the polemic (not so much literary as political, since any statement and action was regarded in a political context), and private correspondence, where much that was forbidden to speak publicly was stated directly.

The reader generally has a rare opportunity to look at the history of the “Serapion brothers” (and short life Luntsa is firmly connected with the history of the brotherhood) both from the outside, and from the inside, and point-blank, and through the perspective of time, which, in addition to correspondence and documents of the era, make it possible to make fragments from the memoirs of K. Fedin and V. Kaverin, telling both about a deceased friend, and about themselves, as they were in the early twenties and as they will never be again. Obituaries and commemorations of Lunts, brought together for the first time, and written by such different people as N. Berberova, S. Neldihen, Yu. Tynyanov, A. M. Gorky, give a lot.

Well, the reader has a huge collection of valuable sources, on the basis of which one can judge not only the formation of aesthetic and literary canons, but also the emergence of that mentality, which should be called the “mentality of the Soviet writer of the first call”. This must be no less important, because the problem has not been exhausted in the well-known works of E. Dobrenko - due to the fact that the type of writer that appeared during the conscription of shock workers in literature differs from the type of writer that arose after the Great Patriotic War, etc.

Nevertheless, let's not forget about such an important thing as the fact that we still have before us not a collection of materials on the history of this or that issue, but a collection of works by a gifted writer, whose work is presented as fully as possible. And the collection is one of a kind.

Assessing what Luntz wrote, one is once again surprised how contemporaries can be deceived. Luntz's dramaturgy - and he was perceived primarily as a playwright - is very imperfect. The desire to revive the romantic theater in the deserted and escheated spaces of Petrograd in 1919-1920 is, again, a romantic desire. Sharp collisions underlying the plays; This inevitable conflict poet and rulers and the inevitable conflict of the poet with himself, when, forced by circumstances, he surrendered and lost his independence. Another thing is the play that gave the name to the collection. Lunts was guided here by the theater of S. Radlov, the aesthetics of mass theatrical productions, characteristic of the first revolutionary years. And this experience is much more successful.

Despite home education (greenhouse, we would say, whenever everything, including greenhouses, would not whistle through the wind of the era), despite the academic nature of his studies, Lunts turned out to be very receptive to modern trends. He heard new language, caught unexpected intonations. His stories and feuilletons, in which the writer himself soon became disillusioned, anticipated both the “bent” word of Zoshchenko and the “thieves” lexicon of the early Kaverin (it’s funny that the Kaverin story “The End of the Khaza” is poorer in jargon than the short Luntsev story “The Faithful Wife”). A dozen surviving prose experiments of Luntz contain a kind of avenue for the future Soviet prose twenties and thirties. And what a pity that the works of this author come with a delay of eighty years, instead of having long been read and assimilated by both the public and literary historians.

They tried to publish Luntz's book and a book about Luntz shortly after his sudden death (those who knew him did not expect that this eternally ill young man, wandering from hospital to clinic and from hospital to sanatorium, would still die, there was so much vitality in him and in moments of desperate fun). Issues of publication were discussed in correspondence, but the books never saw the light of day. The issue of publication arose again in the sixties, when a commission was even created for literary heritage Luntsa, who prepared a collection for publication, which was rejected after long publishing ordeals.

Foreign publications - the correspondence of the “Serapions”, published in two issues of the “New Journal” for 1966 by G. Kern, collections prepared by M. Weinstein (Jerusalem, 1981) and V. Shrik (Munich, 1983), - played important role both in collecting and in assimilation of the Luntsev heritage, but at the present moment, unfortunately, they are outdated (for example, the comments do not stand up to any serious criticism). And many issues are not addressed by the publishers at all. It would seem, where, if not in Israel, to study the “Jewish theme” in the work of the “Serapions”, a productive and multifaceted topic, but to this day it is still waiting for its researcher. Luntz's collection, published in St. Petersburg in 1994, was, in fact, a reprint of the Jerusalem collection (the collection was recently republished again).

All this is clearly not enough. minula whole era, a great many facts were discovered hidden in public and private archives, the years and circumstances of the life and death of certain persons, heroes and characters were clarified Russian history. So the collection prepared by the competent commission and deposited in the TsGALI is now out of date.

The compiler had to start the work again and alone. The circumstances listed here, of course, were reflected in the book finally published. It was already reflected in the fact that foreign publications, which, as mentioned above, were not always performed at the proper level, had to be taken as initial ones.

I had to start with such basics that may seem like ridiculous trifles. Let's say the name of the collection. “Monkeys are coming!”, the title of Luntsev’s play of 1920, is a warning, a cry heard at the most inopportune moment, which means that one must be on the alert, prepare to repel an attack, because not some abstract enemy is advancing on the city, but wild monkeys , funny in their antics, but infinitely cruel to the conquered. In the title of the St. Petersburg book of 1994, these words lost the quotation marks and the exclamation point, which is undoubtedly a mistake. And how many more errors and inaccuracies have been corrected ...

A lot of things have been done for the first time. And a pointer to all known this moment artistic and literary-critical works of Luntz, and brief chronicle his life and work, which can and must continue to be supplemented. And what about an eleven-page bibliography or a twelve-page annotated name index in two columns? small print. And in the tradition of publishing literary monuments- a separate block of comments, which occupied more than 10 author's sheets; in addition, all the documents presented in the appendices are commented, lengthy comments are given to each letter. And the comments on the pamphlet "Walking Through the Torments" can only be called exemplary.

E. Lemming chose the only correct approach: Luntz's work is presented with the utmost completeness (both plays, and screenplays, and stories, and articles), presented in a biographical context (a special section is devoted to Luntz's statements, notes, etc., which clarify his fate, and the fate of his works, in particular plays) and in the context of the era (letters, collective speeches, obituaries). Foreword by Valery Shubinsky, where Lunts is included in the series famous writers, who tragically ended their days - what are T. Chatterton, R. Radige, W. G. Wackenroder - and is decisively excluded from this series, because it does not fit into it, gives a probable model of his literary fate. Afterword by E. Lemming offers a different reading of the same fate, in addition, the author notes that outside the volume there are materials and observations that have not yet been introduced into scientific circulation. Well, the title of the book again sounds like a warning in an era when many scientific and cultural skills have been lost.

Of course, Luntz's works will still be republished. This impressive collection is the first in a series of scientific publications, and the circulation of 600 copies is by no means large, given the interest shown by readers and Slavists in the literature of the Soviet period. However, the priorities are set.

Marina Krasnova

Magazine " New world", 2005, No. 3