Dostoevsky's posthumous words to his wife Anna. F.M
Typically, writers die near the end of a story. But not in Dostoevsky. There are several examples: “Humiliated and Insulted”, “Eternal Husband”, “The Village of Stepanchikovo”, “The Brothers Karamazov”, Crime and Punishment”. True, towards the end, as a rule, someone else dies.
So it was with the writer himself. He was to die on December 22, 1849. Arrested in the case of the Petrashevites, 8 months after his arrest, he was taken to the scaffold of the Semenovsky parade ground, where he was read a sentence to be shot and dressed in death attire. At the last moment, the death penalty was commuted to four years of hard labor.
For reference
Petrashevtsy– participants in meetings with the thinker and public figure Mikhail Butashevich-Petrashevsky. Being all "free-thinkers" in one way or another, the Petrashevites were heterogeneous in their views. Few had plans of a directly revolutionary nature, some were engaged in the study and propaganda of the social utopian thought of the 19th century (contemporaries often called the Petrashevists "communists").
"Rite of execution on the Semyonovsky parade ground",
drawing by B. Pokrovsky, 1849
ABOUT death penalty argues the hero of The Idiot, Prince Myshkin. Another hero of this novel also speaks of the guillotine.
Dostoevsky did not like to describe nature, but something about it is almost invariably present in many of his works. This is the setting sun. It is SUNSET, as a reminder of death.
He lost his parents early: his mother at 15, his father at 17. Buried his first wife and then, less than three months later, his brother. Later there was the loss of a 3-month-old daughter and a 3-year-old son. It was all the more painful that he became a father at the age of 47.
A noteworthy entry was made in the diary after the death of his wife. Numerous blots indicate that even at this moment Dostoevsky cared about the accuracy and expressiveness of the language. No fear, no confusion.
However, the image of one dead man still haunted Dostoevsky all his life - this is the image of his father. The fact is that his father was killed by peasants, to whom he came to check their work. It was this incident, and also what happened on the Semenovsky parade ground, that caused huge amount violent deaths and suicide in his writings.
Moreover, death in these works was for someone an ascension for a righteous life, for someone it was a punishment for sins. And most indicative in this sense, of course, is his last novel The Brothers Karamazov. The novel was completed on November 8, 1880. On this day, Dostoevsky sent an epilogue to the Russky Vestnik magazine. 
Lifetime publication of the novel "Brothers
Karamazovs" in the journal "Russian Messenger"
The epilogue was accompanied by a cover letter to the editor of the journal, Nikolai Alekseevich Lyubimov. In it, Dostoevsky wrote:
"Well, that's the end of the novel! He worked for three years, printed two - a significant minute for me ... Let me not say goodbye to you. After all, I intend to live and write for another 20 years.
However, Dostoevsky was mistaken. He had not 20 years or even 20 months to live, but ... 80 days. Launched catarrh of the lungs led to emphysema.
For reference
Qatar- inflammation of the mucous membranes, accompanied by their redness, swelling, swelling and the formation of serous, mucous or purulent secretions.
Emphysema- abnormal expansion of the lungs, making it difficult to breathe.
It is curious that a few months before the letter to Lyubimov, he wrote from Ems (Germany) in August 1879: “I am sitting here and constantly thinking that, of course, I will die soon, well, in a year or two ...”
Interestingly, the real term is named here, and not the mythical 20 years.
He died on January 28, 1881. The cause was a burst vessel in the chest, after which blood began to flow in the throat. It happened on the night of January 26, but he told his wife only in the morning. She immediately sent for the doctor, but he had already gone to the sick.
Dostoevsky, while waiting for the doctor, wrote a letter to the editors of Russky Vestnik (these were the last lines he wrote). In a letter, he said that he needed money, and added: "This may be my LAST request."
At this time, a guest appeared in the house, who was not expected. In her memoirs, Anna Grigorievna (Dostoevsky's wife) does not write who it was, but indicates that a dispute broke out between him and her husband.
This dispute sapped the strength of the writer, and after the departure of the guest, he again began to bleed in his throat. The doctor arrived. The blood, which seemed to have stopped while they were waiting for the doctor, gushed from new force. Fyodor Mikhailovich lost consciousness, and when he woke up, he said: “Immediately the priest! I want to confess and take communion!”
After confession and communion, Dostoevsky calmed down, blessed his children and wife, and thanked her for the years he had lived with him.
The next day, Fyodor Mikhailovich looked through the sheets from the Writer's Diary, which were sent to him from the printing house. The same "Diary of a Writer", which will be sold on Nevsky Prospekt on the day of his funeral. 
Page of the "Diary of a writer", year 1880
The last night Anna Grigorievna slept in her husband's study at his bedside. Around 7 am she woke up and, seeing that her husband was awake, asked how he felt. To which Dostoevsky replied: “You know, Anya, I have been awake for three hours now and I keep thinking, and only now I clearly realized that I will die today.” These were exactly the words of the heroine of his story "The Humiliated and Insulted." 
Dostoevsky on his deathbed
Two hours before his death, he called the children, said goodbye and ordered to hand over the Gospel, with which he had not parted from hard labor, to his son Fyodor. By evening, he fell into unconsciousness, and at 8:38 p.m. he died ... 
Death mask of F. M. Dostoevsky
On January 31, the coffin was taken out of the house and crowds of people filled all the streets around. More than 30 thousand people saw off the writer on his last journey. There were about 80 wreaths alone. There were especially many young people. In some educational institutions classes were even canceled, and where they were not canceled, gymnasiums and students simply skipped classes.
On February 1, a funeral liturgy and funeral service took place. The coffin was hardly taken out of the church, because the crowd did not allow people to do this. A crowd of people also came to the cemetery. Who did not have enough space at the grave, climbed trees, fences, monuments. 
Funeral of Dostoevsky
Fyodor Mikhailovich was buried next to Zhukovsky and Karamzin. 
Grave of Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky
at the Tikhvin cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra
Sun of his life
... It was a strange, uneven conversation - about everything at once. It was evident that Fyodor Mikhailovich was nervous, especially when he suddenly mentioned that nothing would come of the shorthand venture. And in parting, he still managed to tell her: I’m glad, they say, that since you are a girl, you won’t drink ...
Snitkina fell in love with Dostoevsky at first sight.
* * *
…And he began to dictate. No, rather tell some story that tormented him. He could no longer stop, and with some special instinct she realized that what happened next was no longer a romance, not fictional characters, and he himself, his life, full of suffering and torment.
He talked about his youth, his first steps in literature, his participation in the circle of Petrashevists, the civil execution on the Semyonovsky parade ground, and the Siberian penal servitude.
Then, interrupting, - about their debts, enslaving contract. He spoke simply, as if in confession, and from that touched his soul even more ...
She suddenly saw that in front of her was a deeply suffering, lonely person who had no one to really open up to. And so he trusted her, which means that he still considered her worthy of confession. And it became simple and good with him, as if they had known each other for a thousand years and understood each other perfectly.
She came every day. In the evenings and nights, she transcribed the transcripts, rewrote them cleanly and brought the finished pages.
Sometimes he broke down, was nervous, rude, even yelled, stamping his feet. But she endured, understanding: he lives there, in his world of images, he is not him, he is a medium, a storyteller and wants to speak out to the bottom ...
Once Anna was met by the owner of the house, in which Fyodor Mikhailovich rented an apartment. She tensed up: there was still not enough gossip that a young girl was visiting the lodger.
But the owner bowed politely and said: “God will reward you, Anna Grigoryevna, for your kindness, because you are helping a great worker, I always go to matins, the fire in his office glows - it works ... "
The case was coming to an end, the work progressed rapidly and successfully. The Gambler was completed right on time, October 29th. And the next day was Dostoevsky's birthday. Among other guests, he invited Anna.
Fyodor Mikhailovich was in high spirits, joking, and looking at his stenographer, he thought: how could she seem ugly to him the first time? Eyes, what wonderful eyes - gray, kind, radiant ... These are Maria Bolkonskaya's eyes - the novel "War and Peace" was published in the same "Russian Bulletin" by Katkov, along with his "Crime and Punishment".
Since then, both she and he felt that being close, working together has become a necessity for both of them.
She not only took shorthand, she advised, argued, rules, helped to better understand female psychology when revealing the images of women.
She not only helped him successfully write both great novels, she became not only his muse and adviser, but also his wife.
Apparently, Fate finally decided to reward the genius for his martyr, ascetic life.
Perhaps, immersed in literature, in work, Fyodor Mikhailovich at first saw in Anna, first of all, a conscientious assistant and paid little attention to her as a woman. At the same time, his tormented soul wanted peace and consolation - after all, he was in his fifth decade. And Anna was 25 years younger ...
This age difference was common at the time. But Dostoevsky was also tormented by this circumstance. Although in a letter to his brother he admitted: “She has a heart ...”
On February 15, 1867, Fyodor Mikhailovich and Anna Grigoryevna got married in the Trinity Izmailovsky Cathedral.
Once, on the last day of Maslenitsa, they dined with sister Anna. Fyodor Mikhailovich drank and joked. Suddenly he fell silent, turned pale and, screaming, fell off the couch ... She knew about his illness, but knowing and seeing with her own eyes are two different things. And most importantly, to be able to help not only a loved one, but also someone whom Russia has already begun to call a great writer.
* * *
... Even the most loving people are forced to obey the prose of life.
Dostoevsky's brother Mikhail unexpectedly died, and Fyodor Mikhailovich once again demonstrated immense nobility by taking into his house his brother's widow with a child, whom he already generously helped and shared the last. In response to this, the widow began quite frankly to convince the writer that his young wife was bored with him ...
Here it must be borne in mind that Fyodor Mikhailovich was sometimes very naive, gullible and in everything he tried to see first of all his own mistakes and shortcomings. He plunged headlong into work, tried to be at home less, struggled with bouts of melancholy and depression.
The marriage seemed to be cracking at the seams. But Anna Grigorievna was truly great and wise woman, to match his great spouse. “In order to save our love,” she writes, “it is necessary to retire for at least two or three months. I am deeply convinced<…>that then my husband and I will get together for life and no one will separate us anymore.
There was another "damned question" that tormented Fyodor Mikhailovich, and then him and Anna Grigorievna - money! Where to get money?
True, a small dowry remained, but Anna's relatives, who initially did not approve of her marriage to the writer, were categorically against spending it.
And yet, a young, but spiritually strong, loving woman accomplishes the seemingly impossible - the Dostoevskys leave for Europe.
We thought - not for long, three months. It turned out - for four years ...
They settled first in Dresden. As the situation changed, their relationship seemed to change for the better.
Here, in Dresden, Anna Grigoryevna saw what a shock Fyodor Mikhailovich experienced in front of Raphael's "Sistine Madonna". The image of the Mother of God struck Anna herself - Eternal Mother with the Child, she seemed to rise above the horror, the abyss, the baseness of everyday, petty, vain life, elevating the one who looks at Her, giving hope for redemption ...
Dresden life flowed quite calmly and measuredly, but Anna Grigorievna, with all her loving being, felt signs of the rise of her husband's writing talent.
And then Fate plunged Fyodor Mikhailovich into a new test. He wanted to try "once" to play roulette. Bad news from Russia - creditors, debts - also pushed for this.
... By lunchtime, Dostoevsky managed to lose almost all the money he had, then he won back and even won a little more than that, but by the evening he again lost almost the entire amount ...
Anna Grigoryevna understood her husband's condition: it was all about his nervousness, unevenness of character, blind faith in Providence, chance. Not a word of reproach, disappointment. And the disease - what is now commonly called gambling addiction - tormented and tormented the writer, again and again drove him to the damned top.
They are going to Baden - on the eve of Katkov sent an advance payment for a novel that has not yet been written. But the insatiable roulette ate everything ... Anna Grigoryevna even pawned a brooch and earrings with diamonds - wedding gift husband. And the roulette seemed to mock them. Once Fyodor Mikhailovich suddenly won several thousand thalers, and after a couple of hours nothing was left of them ...
All this turned out to be worse than epilepsy!
Nevertheless, Dostoevsky already sketched new novel- "Idiot". And Anna Grigoryevna was preparing to become a mother. And the name has already been thought up: if a daughter, then definitely Sophia; he is in honor of his beloved niece, she is in honor of her beloved Sonechka Marmeladova ...
But life again strikes a merciless blow - a small, three-month-old, Sonechka suddenly dies in the arms of her father, almost distraught with grief.
They are trying to find at least some salvation in the work. Fyodor Mikhailovich dictates the next chapters of The Idiot, Anna Grigoryevna rewrites the completed ones and hurries to the post office to send them to the Russky Vestnik, where the publication of the novel has already begun. They worked without rest. According to the terms of the magazine, the novel had to be completed by the end of 1868.
... On September 14, 1869, in Dresden, the second daughter, Lyubov, was born to the Dostoevskys. Happy Fyodor Mikhailovich writes to a convinced bachelor Strakhov: “Ah, why are you not married, and why don’t you have a child, dear Nikolai Nikolayevich? I swear to you that this is three-quarters of the happiness of life, and the rest is only one quarter.
The four years the Dostoevskys spent abroad became whole era their family life. Along the way, they had to overcome a lot. And if not for the wisdom, fidelity, fortitude, patience and support of Anna Grigorievna, everything could have turned out differently.
She was always, inseparably, by his side: in moments of fall, despair, and in moments of sublime creativity, without rest, giving him, his genius, all her strength.
“There (abroad. - Yu. K.) began, - she recalled, - for me and my husband a new one, happy life».
Perhaps it was then that Fyodor Mikhailovich truly understood what kind of treasure he had found in the person of Anna Grigoryevna.
“If you knew what a wife means to me now!” he exclaims.
* * *
Anna Grigorievna returned to Russia a different person - matured, experienced a lot, confident in her feminine destiny, the mother of two children - Lyuba and Fedya. Finally, happy woman. And truly a saint, if she could endure the difficult cross of marriage, loss, deprivation.
She took over her husband's publishing and financial affairs, and led them so brilliantly that Dostoevsky finally managed to break out of the web of debts.
It seems that this image of the Sistine Madonna helped, instructed her, taught meekness, forgiveness. And the Lord rewarded her for it...
And if the first, early letters of Fyodor Mikhailovich to Anna Grigoryevna are still, in many ways, passion, carnal adoration, then over the years it is a quiet, peaceful, full of love and endless gratitude confession: “I don’t know a single woman equal to you ... God grant us to live longer together.”
On August 10, 1875, to their great joy, Anna Grigoryevna gave birth to a boy, who was christened in honor of her beloved Fyodor Mikhailovich hagiographic literature Alexei is a man of God.
Just like Vanechka, the beloved son of Leo Tolstoy, Alyosha played a huge role in the life, work, and worldview of Dostoevsky.
Back in 1878, he decided to write a new novel. I dreamed of creating a poem about Christ, a parable-poem, an image and a symbol of the current state of the world and Russia. At the same time, he asked for paper and a novel about a young man with a pure heart, like that of Prince Myshkin ...
Life went on: in tireless work, literary meetings and disputes. Sometimes it was not easy, but the faithful and reliable Anna Grigoryevna and Aleshenka, the youngest, three-year-old favorite, were nearby.
But one morning the boy, outwardly strong and healthy, suddenly lost consciousness, his body was shaking with convulsions.
They called the doctor. But it was too late. Baby, sunshine, hope (hope for what?), calmed down forever ...
He died of a sudden attack of epilepsy inherited from his father.
"Why he? Why not me?" - Fyodor Mikhailovich muttered, kneeling in front of his son's bed, shocked.
The tragedy changed and broke him. He became quiet, reserved, reserved. He suffered in silence, grief and sorrow seemed to burn him from the inside.
"For what?!"
Together with the young philosopher Vladimir Solovyov, he went to Optina Hermitage to the famous old man, Father Ambrose.
They talked for a long time about something in the cell. Fyodor Mikhailovich returned brighter. Such an old man in the novel should become the spiritual mentor of the protagonist, to whom he will give the name of his son - Alyosha, the man of God.
But the main thing is in it, it is in it that the fate of the future Russia will be embodied.
Something else was shocking: is it really a great feat that is preceded by a great test? ..
"The Brothers Karamazov" - this is how Fyodor Mikhailovich called his last, most complex, best and painful work, in which the secret of the national, Russian character was exposed with frightening sharpness, in which he saw the terrible and great future of Russia.
It is no coincidence that, leaving in 1910 from Yasnaya Polyana, Leo Tolstoy took with him his favorite books - the Bible and The Brothers Karamazov.
* * *
By the end of his life, Dostoevsky became a different person. Hot temper, resentment, pathological jealousy are gone. The terrible epilepsy is gone. He became confident in himself, his talent, his position as a man, husband, father.
... Often, speaking of a happy writer's, creative marriage, they cite the example of Lev Nikolaevich and Sofya Andreevna Tolstykh. But Leo Tolstoy himself once remarked: "Many Russian writers would feel better if they had wives like Dostoevsky's."
Fyodor Mikhailovich and Anna Grigorievna went hand in hand for fourteen bitter but happy years. And she was always by his side: wife, mother, mistress, guardian angel, manager, publisher, editor, stenographer - it seemed that she could replace the whole world for him!
Before he died, he asked for the gospel. It was revealed - from Matthew: “John was holding him back ... But Jesus answered him: do not hold back, for this is how we must fulfill great truth».
- You hear: "do not hold back ..." - that means I will die, - he said, closing the book.
I said goodbye to the children, asked Anna to stay, took her by the hand.
- I have always loved you dearly and have never cheated on you, even mentally ...
He always thought that he would die from epilepsy that had tormented him for years, but a rupture of the pulmonary artery happened.
He was buried at the Tikhvin cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra, next to the graves of Karamzin and Zhukovsky.
On the monument to Dostoevsky is carved: “... Truly, truly, I say to you: if a grain of wheat, falling into the ground, does not die, then only one will remain; and if he dies, he will bring forth much fruit.”
Anna Grigorievna remained faithful to her husband to the end. In the year of his death, she was only 35 years old, but she considered her women's life completed and devoted herself to the service of his name. She published complete collection of his writings, collected his letters and notes, forced friends to write his biography, founded the Dostoevsky school in Staraya Russa, and wrote memoirs herself. All free time she gave to the organization of his literary heritage.
In 1918, in Last year of her life, the then-novice composer Sergei Prokofiev came to Anna Grigorievna and asked him to make some kind of recording in his album, “dedicated to the sun”. She wrote: “The sun of my life is Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Anna Dostoevskaya ... "
This collection includes the correspondence of the Dostoevsky couple from 1866 to 1875. This is a kind of family chronicle of the first half of their married life, revealing to the reader new facets of the character of the great writer.
Y. Kirilenko
Letters of love
1866
F. M. DOSTOYEVSKY - A. G. SNITKINA
<В Петербург.>
My dear Anya, my lovely birthday girl, don't be angry with me, for God's sake, for my too stupid caution. Today I decided not to be with you; I don't feel healthy yet. Perfect trifles, but still some weakness and not quite pure language. You see, my angel: you must be at Bazunov's to the last extreme. But Bazunov is a verst from me, and four times further to you. Wouldn't it be better to be a little cautious, but surely recover tomorrow, than to be ill for another week? And Bazunov would not have followed at all. Yesterday I sat on the reworking of chapter 5 of chapter 2 until two in the morning (and after dinner I didn’t fall asleep; they didn’t let me, they disturbed me). This got me. I fell asleep at four in the morning. Today I'm somehow sluggish, and my face is not at all birthday 3, so I'd rather stay at home. I will dine again with only soup at home, like yesterday. - Do not be angry, my charm, that I write to you about such nonsense: I myself am too stupid today. And for God's sake, don't worry. I need to sleep tonight. I feel that sleep will strengthen me, and you will come to me tomorrow morning, as promised. Goodbye, dear friend, I hug and congratulate you.
Infinitely loving you and infinitely believing in you
your whole
F. Dostoevsky.
You are my future everything - and hope, and faith, and happiness, and bliss - everything.
Dostoevsky.
1 Alexander Fedorovich Bazunov (1825–1899) is a representative of a well-known family of book publishers and booksellers in Russia.
2 We are talking about the novel "Crime and Punishment".
3 In a note to this letter, A. G. Dostoevskaya writes: “December 9 was my name day, as well as the name day of my mother, Anna Nikolaevna Snitkina. According to custom, relatives and friends gathered on this day. I very much invited<едора>M<ихайловича>come that day for lunch. In addition to weakness after a recent seizure, the traces of which did not disappear, Fyodor Mikhailovich was embarrassed by unfamiliar faces that he could meet with me, and such meetings in his morbid mood were painful for him. Therefore F<едор>M<ихайлович>chose not to come, but sent to congratulate the birthday girls of his stepson, Pavel Alexandrovich Isaev, who delivered this letter and a gold bracelet to me.
F. M. DOSTOYEVSKY - A. G. SNITKINA
<В Петербург.>
DO NOT BE ANGRY WITH ME, my priceless and endless friend Anya, that this time I am writing to you only a few lines for the sole purpose of saying hello to you, kissing you and notifying you only about how I arrived and arrived, no more, because I have not yet shown my nose anywhere in Moscow. I drove safely. Sleeping cars are the worst absurdity: damp to the point of disgrace, cold, carbon monoxide. All day and all night until dawn he suffered from a toothache (but very strong); sitting still or lying down and incessantly evoking memories of the last 1½ months; 1 fell asleep in the morning, soundly; I woke up with subdued pain. I entered Moscow at 12 o'clock; at half past one was already with our 2 . Everyone was very surprised and delighted. Elena Pavlovna 3 was with them. She lost a lot of weight and even became stout. Very sad; met me quite lightly. After dinner the toothache started again. Sonya 4 and I were left alone for half an hour. Sona said everything. She's terribly happy. She quite approves; but finds and denies obstacles à la Junge 5 . Of course, everything was told without great details. We still have a lot to talk about. She shakes her head and has some doubts about Katkov's success 6 . Sad actually that such a thing hangs on such a thread. He asked her: did Elena Pavlovna remember me in my absence? She answered: Oh, how, continuously! But I don't think it could [could] be called love proper. In the evening I learned from my sister and from Elena Pavlovna herself that she had been very unhappy all the time. Her husband is terrible; he's better. He doesn't let her go a single step away from him. He gets angry and torments her day and night, jealous. From all the stories I drew the conclusion: that she had no time to think about love. (This is quite true). I am terribly glad, and this case can be considered finished. I will announce my marriage to you to my family at the first hope of success with Katkov. The whole first day<о>e<сть>yesterday, my teeth ached, my cheek swelled overnight, and therefore they don’t hurt today. Today I'm going to Lyubimov's, but in any case I don't think I'll be at Katkov's. And I don't even know what the plan is. I'll see the circumstances. I will try my best to hurry to return to you as soon as possible. I won't be left behind. I am often very sad, a kind of pointless even sadness - as if I had committed a crime against someone. I imagine you and I imagine you every minute. No, Anya, I love you very much! Sonya loves you too: she would terribly wish to see you. Worried and interested.
And now I hug you tightly and kiss you - until a close letter and a date. I will write to you in more detail and better in 2 or 3 days, as soon as I have done something. Now I'm in a hurry! I feel that I will be late everywhere (that will be trouble!). What to do - a holiday for everyone, and the time for everyone is abnormal.
How did you spend yesterday? I thought I saw you in a dream - I didn’t see you. Thought about you on the book, t<о>e<сть>open the book and read the first line on the right page; turned out very significant and by the way. Farewell, my dear, see you soon. I kiss your hand and lips a thousand times (which I remember very much). Sad, troublesome, somehow all the impressions are broken. Masenka is sweet and the child 7 . Fedya also arrived. All the other children are terribly sweet and happy, Yulia did not deign to go out 9 . But in the evening she sent me from other rooms to ask: can she make a wish on me? Her friends came to her and guess in the mirror. I replied that I was asking. I got a brunette dressed in White dress. I sent them to say that everything is nonsense, they did not guess.
Will you see, dear, Pasha 10 . Give him my regards and tell him that Sashenka 11 and Khmyrov 12 asked a lot about him and are terribly sorry that he did not come and will not come; they were waiting for him very much, they even wondered whether he would come or not.
I kiss you countless. Happy New Year and Happy New Year. Pray for our cause, my angel. That's how it came to business, I'm afraid ( a few words crossed out). However, I will work with all my might. I'll write to you in two or three days. However, he did not lose hope.
Your whole, your faithful, most faithful and unchanging. And I believe in you and hope as in all my future. You know, far from happiness, you value it more. I now want to hug you incomparably more strongly than ever. My bow to the lowest mother 13 . Convey my respects to my brother 14 .
Your infinitely loving
F. Dostoevsky.
P.S. Sonechka persuades and tells me to go to the post office myself, because if I submit a letter there, then maybe I will go today.
2 The family of the beloved sister of the writer Vera Mikhailovna Ivanova (1829–1896).
3 In a note to this letter, A. G. Dostoevskaya writes: “Elena Pavlovna Ivanova (1823–1883) was the wife of her husband’s brother.”
4 Sofya Alexandrovna Ivanova (1846-1907) - Dostoevsky's niece, daughter of Vera Mikhailovna Ivanova, "a glorious, intelligent, deep and cordial soul."
5 When Dostoevsky told the professor of eye diseases, Eduard Andreevich Junge (1833–1898), who was treating him, about his upcoming marriage, “Junge, having learned that between Fyodor Mikhailovich and his future wife 25 years difference (I just turned 20, F<едору>M<ихайловичу>was 45), began to advise him not to marry, assuring him that with such a difference in years there could be no happiness in marriage.
6 Dostoevsky came to Moscow on purpose to ask Mikhail Nikiforovich Katkov (1818–1887) and the physicist Nikolai Alekseevich Lyubimov (1830–1897), a professor at Moscow University (1830–1897), mentioned below, to be editors of the journal Russkiy vestnik, where the novel Crime and Punishment was published in 1866, 3,000 rubles. on account of a future romance for marriage and a trip abroad.
7 Ivanova Maria Alexandrovna (1848-1929) - the second daughter of V. M. Ivanova, "an excellent musician, a student of H. G. Rubinstein."
8 Dostoevsky Fedor Mikhailovich Jr. (1842-1906) - the writer's nephew, son of his brother Mikhail Mikhailovich Dostoevsky, pianist, student of A. G. Rubinstein, director of the Saratov branch of the Russian Musical Society.
9 Yulia Alexandrovna Ivanova (1852-1924) - the third daughter of V. M. Ivanova.
10 Pavel Alexandrovich Isaev (1846-1900) - stepson of Dostoevsky, son of his first wife Maria Dmitrievna Isaeva (1825-1864).
11 Ivanov Alexander Alexandrovich (1850-?) - the eldest son of V. M. Ivanova, a railway engineer.
12 Khmyrov Dmitry Nikolaevich (1847-1926) - a teacher of mathematics, later the husband of Sofia Alexandrovna Ivanova.
13 Mother of A. G. Dostoevskaya - Snitkina Anna Nikolaevna (1812-1893).
14 Snitkin Ivan Grigorievich (1849–1887). Graduated from the Petrovsky Agricultural Academy in Moscow.
There are many examples where people probably foresaw the day of their death. One of these visionaries was the brilliant Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky. He died on the evening of January 28 (February 9), 1881. Two days before, the author of the great novels felt bad. At night, as usual, he worked in his office. I accidentally dropped a pen, which rolled under the bookcase. Fyodor Mikhailovich decided to get it and tried to move the whatnot. She was surprisingly heavy. The writer tensed, and then he became ill. Blood flowed from his mouth. He wiped it with the back of his hand. Later, the state of health improved, and he did not attach serious importance to this episode. He did not call for help and did not wake his wife. In the morning his condition became even better. By dinner Dostoevsky was cheerful. He was waiting for the arrival of his sister from St. Petersburg. At dinner, the writer laughed, joked, reminisced about his childhood, about the time when they lived in Moscow. But sister Vera did not come with good intentions.
family scene
The Dostoevsky family had an estate near Ryazan. By that time, all their relatives had quarreled over this estate. Vera was sent by the sisters. She did not support her brother's carefree conversation at dinner, but started talking about part of the inheritance. The sister asked him to give up his share in favor of the sisters.
During the conversation, the woman became inflamed, spoke sharply, and, in the end, accused the writer of cruelty towards relatives. Her conversation ended in tears and almost hysteria. Being an emotional person, Fyodor Mikhailovich was very upset and left the table without finishing the meal. In the office, he again felt a taste on his lips. The writer screamed, his wife Anna Grigorievna Snitkina ran up to the sound. The doctor was urgently called. But by the time he arrived, the bleeding had passed, Fyodor Mikhailovich's health had returned to normal. The doctor found him in a good mood. The father, along with the children, read a humorous magazine. But soon the bleeding resumes. It is very strong and cannot be stopped. After a great loss of blood, Dostoevsky loses consciousness.
“There will be one room there, something like a village bath, smoky, and spiders in all corners, and that’s all eternity” F. Dostoevsky But everything turned out not so bad. Gradually, the bleeding stops and the patient falls asleep. In the morning, well-known doctors come to the ruler of thoughts: Professor Koshlakov and Dr. Pfeifer. They carefully examine the patient and reassure the wife:
Everything will be fine, he will recover soon.
And indeed, the next morning, Fedor Mikhailovich wakes up cheerful and charged to work. On his desk lies the proofreading of the "Diary of a Writer" and he starts editing. Then he has lunch: he drinks milk, eats some caviar. Relatives calm down.
Anna Snitkina - Dostoevsky's wife
And at night he calls his wife. She approaches the patient's bed in alarm. Fyodor Mikhailovich looks at her and says that he has not slept for several hours, because he realized that he would die today. Anna Grigorievna freezes in horror.
Anna Snitkina In the afternoon everything was so good, things were on the mend. And suddenly such a statement. The wife does not believe him, tries to dissuade him, says that the bleeding has ended, and that he will live for a long time. But Dostoevsky is sure of an imminent death. Where did this knowledge come from? Where does this confidence come from? No answer! It even seems that he is not very upset, in any case, he holds himself courageously. He asks his wife to read the Gospel. She doubtfully takes the book, reads: "But Jesus said to him in answer: do not hold back ...". The writer smiled prophetically, repeated: "Do not hold back, you see, do not hold back, then I will die."
But to the joy of Anna Grigoryevna, he soon falls asleep. Unfortunately, the dream was short-lived. Fyodor Mikhailovich woke up abruptly and the bleeding resumed. The doctor arrives at eight o'clock. But by this time great writer already agonizing. Half an hour after the doctor's arrival, Dostoevsky bursts out of his mouth last breath. He dies without regaining consciousness.
Dr. Wagner
Soon after the death of her husband, a certain doctor Wagner comes to Anna Grigoryevna. This is a professor from St. Petersburg University, at that time a well-known and popular spiritist in Russia. He has a long conversation with Anna Grigorievna. The essence of his request is to evoke the spirit of a great writer. The frightened woman categorically refuses him.
But in the same night dead husband comes to her
Anya was born in St. Petersburg at the end of August 1846, on the day of the memory of St. Alexander Nevsky. The girl's father, Grigory Ivanovich, a petty official, "an extremely cheerful character, a joker, a joker, as they say," the soul of society "" and her mother, Anna Nikolaevna, "a woman of amazing beauty - tall, thin, slender, with surprisingly regular features faces" *, managed to create a friendly and benevolent atmosphere in the family. And this despite the fact that they lived with the old mother of Grigory Ivanovich and his four brothers, one of whom was also married and had children. Anya never heard any quarrels or mutual claims between relatives. “They lived amicably and hospitably in the old-fashioned way, so that on birthdays and name days of family members, on Christmas and the Holy Day, all close and distant relatives gathered at their grandmother’s in the morning and had fun until late at night” *.
In her youth, the girl made an uncompromising decision to go to the monastery. Resting in Pskov, she realized that there would be no better moment to implement the decision. Anya is on her way. She was only 13 years old. Needless to say, what the parents experienced when they heard about such a desire of their beloved daughter. They had to make a lot of effort to turn the unreasonable child. Only the news of her father's serious illness (exaggerated to put it mildly) forced her to submit and return to St. Petersburg.
From her mother, a Swede of Finnish origin, Anya inherited not only accuracy, composure, a desire for order and purposefulness, but also a deep faith in God.
Anna Nikolaevna Snitkina (née Miltopeus) was a Lutheran, among her ancestors there is even a Lutheran bishop. At the age of nineteen, she became engaged to an officer who soon died during the Hungarian campaign. The grief of the girl was extraordinary. She decided never to marry. “But the years passed, and little by little the bitterness of loss softened,” her daughter wrote much later. - In that Russian society where my mother revolved, there were lovers of wooing (this was the custom of that time), and at one meeting, in fact for her, they invited two young people who were looking for a bride. They liked my mother very much, but when they asked her if she liked the young people presented, she replied: “No, I liked that old man who talked and laughed all the time.” She was talking about my father.
Grigory Ivanovich was 42 years old. Anna Nikolaevna - 29. They were introduced to each other. “... he really liked her, but since she spoke Russian poorly, and he spoke French poorly, the conversations between them did not drag on very long. When the words of my mother were conveyed to him, he was very interested in the attention of a beautiful young lady, and he began to intensively visit the house where he could meet her. They ended up falling in love and decided to get married.
But marriage with a loved one was possible for Anna Nikolaevna only if she accepted Orthodoxy. For the girl, the choice was not easy. She prayed for a long time in the hope of hearing an answer to the torment of her heart. And then one day she saw in a dream how she enters Orthodox church, kneels before the shroud and prays ...
The answer was heard. And when a young couple arrived at the Simeonovskaya Church on Mokhovaya to perform the rite of chrismation, lo and behold! - in front of Anna Nikolaevna was the same shroud and the same situation that she saw in a dream!
Anna Nikolaevna joyfully entered the life of the Orthodox Church, went to confession, took communion and raised her daughter in the faith. “She never repented that she had changed religion, “otherwise,” she said, “I would feel far from my husband and children, and it would be hard for me.”*
Profession - stenographer
Anya - Netochka, as she was called in the family - spoke with unfailing warmth about life under the wing of her parents. “I remember my childhood and youth with the most gratifying feeling: my father and mother loved us all very much and never punished in vain. Life in the family was quiet, measured, calm, without quarrels, dramas or disasters.
Except for the sudden "escape" to the monastery, Anya did not make her parents worry about herself. She was among the first students at St. Anna's School, graduated from the Mariinsky Women's Gymnasium with a silver medal and entered the Pedagogical Courses. The serious illness of the father made its own adjustments: pedagogy had to be abandoned.
“... I, regretting leaving my dear patient alone for whole days, decided to leave the courses for a while. Since dad suffered from insomnia, I read Dickens novels to him for hours and was very pleased if he had the opportunity to fall asleep a little under my monotonous reading.
But her father literally insisted that Anya still get a profession and complete at least shorthand courses. Already at sunset own life Anna Grigorievna wrote: "My good father I foresaw exactly that thanks to shorthand I would find my happiness.
In 1866, Grigory Ivanovich reposed in the Lord. The orphaned Snitkin family had a hard time. For Anna, this was the first misfortune in her life. “My grief was expressed violently: I cried a lot, spent whole days on Bolshaya Okhta, at the grave of the deceased, and could not come to terms with the heavy loss”*. By that time the shorthand lectures had been interrupted for summer holidays, but the teacher P.M. Olkhin, knowing about the difficult state of mind girls, invited her to take up shorthand correspondence. “Twice a week I had to send him two or three pages of a certain book, written by me in shorthand. Olkhin returned the transcripts to me, correcting the mistakes he had noticed. Thanks to this correspondence, which lasted for three summer months, I was very successful in shorthand. When the lectures resumed, Anna already mastered the skill of shorthand so much that the teacher could recommend her for literary work.
Ask Dostoevsky
On a dank November evening in 1866, the whole future life fragile girl - and not only her.
Olkhin offered Anna shorthand work for the writer and handed her a four-fold piece of paper on which it was written: “Stolyarny lane, corner of M. Meshchanskaya, Alonkin’s house, apt. No. 13, ask Dostoevsky.
“Dostoevsky's name was familiar to me from childhood: he was my father's favorite writer. I myself admired his works and wept over Notes from dead house". The idea of not only getting to know a talented writer, but also helping him in his work excited and delighted me greatly.
On the eve of a significant meeting, the girl hardly managed to close her eyes.
“For joy and excitement, I did not sleep almost all night and kept imagining Dostoevsky. Considering him a contemporary of my father, I assumed that he was already very old man. He was drawn to me now as a fat and bald old man, now tall and thin, but certainly stern and gloomy, as Olkhin found him. I was most worried about how I would talk to him. Dostoevsky seemed to me so learned, so clever, that I trembled in advance for every word I said. I was also embarrassed by the thought that I did not clearly remember the names and patronymics of the heroes of his novels, but I was sure that he would certainly talk about them. Never meeting in my circle with outstanding writers, I imagined them as some special creatures with whom it was necessary to talk in a special way. Remembering those times, I see what a small child I was then, despite my twenty years.
Many years later, Anna Grigoryevna will describe in detail all the circumstances of the first meeting and her feelings from it:
“At first glance, Dostoevsky seemed to me rather old. But as soon as he spoke, he immediately became younger, and I thought that he was hardly more than thirty-five to seven years old. He was of medium height and carried very straight. Light brown, even slightly reddish hair was heavily pomaded and carefully smoothed. But what struck me was his eyes; they were different: one was brown, in the other the pupil was dilated to the whole eye and the irises were imperceptible. This duality of the eyes gave the look some enigmatic expression. Dostoyevsky's face, pale and sickly, seemed extremely familiar to me, probably because I had seen his portraits before. He was dressed in a cloth jacket of blue color, rather second-hand, but in snow-white linen (collar and cuffs) (...) Almost from the first phrases, he announced that he had epilepsy and had a seizure the other day, and this frankness surprised me very much (...) Looking through the rewritten, Dostoevsky found that I missed the point and vaguely put a firm sign, and sharply noticed this to me. He was visibly annoyed and could not collect his thoughts. Now he asked me my name and immediately forgot it, then he began to walk around the room and walked for a long time, as if forgetting about my presence. I sat without moving, afraid to disturb his thoughts ... "*.
From the writer Anna Grigorievna came out broken. “I didn’t like him and left a heavy impression. I thought that I would hardly get along with him in work, and my dreams of independence threatened to crumble into dust ... "*.
That day, Anna visited Dostoevsky twice: for the first time, he was “decidedly unable to dictate,” so he asked the girl “to come to him today, at eight o’clock.” The second meeting went more smoothly. “I answered all the questions simply, seriously, almost sternly (...) I don’t think I even smiled once when speaking with Fyodor Mikhailovich, and he really liked my seriousness. He admitted to me later that he was pleasantly surprised by my ability to behave. He was accustomed to meeting nihilists in society and seeing their treatment, which revolted him. All the more he was glad to meet in me the complete opposite of the then dominant type of young girls. The conversation imperceptibly touched on the Petrashevites and the death penalty. Fedor Mikhailovich plunged into memories.
“I remember,” he said, “how I stood on the Semyonovsky parade ground among the condemned comrades and, seeing the preparations, I knew that I had only five minutes left to live. But these minutes seemed to me years, tens of years, so it seemed that I had to live a long time! We were already put on death shirts and divided into threes, I was the eighth in the third row. The first three were tied to poles. In two or three minutes both rows would have been shot, and then our turn would have come. How I wanted to live, Lord my God! How dear life seemed, how much good, good things I could do! I remembered all my past, not quite a good use of it, and so I wanted to experience everything again and live for a long, long time ... Suddenly I heard the all-clear, and I cheered up. My comrades were untied from the poles, brought back and a new sentence was read: I was sentenced to four years in hard labor. I don't remember another have a good day! I walked around my casemate in Alekseevsky ravelin and sang all the time, sang loudly, I was so glad that life was given to me! Then they allowed my brother to say goodbye to me before parting, and on the eve of the Nativity of Christ they sent me on a long journey. I keep the letter that I wrote to my late brother on the day of the reading of the verdict, a letter was recently returned to me by my nephew.
"Execution" on the Semenovsky parade ground. Drawing from the book by Leonid Grossman "Dostoevsky"
Anna Grigorievna was amazed: this “seemingly secretive and stern person” poured out his soul before her, sharing his most intimate experiences. “This frankness on that first day of my acquaintance with him pleased me extremely and left a wonderful impression” *.
When this long day was coming to an end, Anna enthusiastically told her mother how frank and kind Dostoevsky had been with her ... and to herself she noted a heavy, depressing, never-before-experienced impression: “for the first time in my life I saw a smart, kind, but unhappy man, as if abandoned by everyone, and a feeling of deep compassion and pity arose in my heart ... "*.
“It’s good that you are not a man”
By the time of the meeting with Anna, Fedor Mikhailovich was in an extremely difficult financial situation. He assumed the debts of his deceased elder brother. The debts were bills of exchange, and the creditors constantly threatened the writer to describe his property, and to put him in the debt department. In addition, Fyodor Mikhailovich maintained a 21-year-old stepson and the family of his deceased brother. The younger brother, Nikolai, also needed help.
There was no way to negotiate with creditors. The writer fell into despair. At this time, a cunning and enterprising person appeared in his life - the publisher F.T. Stellovsky. He offered three thousand for the publication of Dostoevsky's complete works in three volumes. At the same time, Fyodor Mikhailovich was obliged to write a new novel on account of the same amount on time - by November 1, 1866. In case of failure to fulfill this obligation, Dostoevsky had to pay a penalty to the publisher, and the rights to all works became the property of Stellovsky. “Of course, the predator was counting on this,” Anna Grigoryevna summarized in “Memoirs”.
In essence, Fyodor Mikhailovich had no choice. He agreed to the enslaving terms of the contract. The documents were drawn up, Stellovsky paid the money, but Dostoevsky did not receive a penny. The entire amount was transferred to creditors.
Fedor Mikhailovich was absorbed in work on the novel "Crime and Punishment", and when he finally remembered the contract, there was catastrophically little time to create a new full-fledged novel. The writer was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
When Anna Grigorievna first came to help Dostoevsky, twenty-six days remained before the deadline for submitting the novel The Gambler. The work existed only in rough notes and plans.
In such difficult circumstances, in the person of Anna Grigoryevna, Fedor Mikhailovich first met active help: “friends and relatives sighed and groaned, lamented and sympathized, gave advice, but no one entered his almost hopeless situation. Except for a girl, a recent graduate of shorthand courses, with virtually no work experience, who suddenly appeared at the door of his apartment.
“It’s good that you are not a man,” Dostoevsky said after their first brief acquaintance and “test of the pen.”
Because the man would probably drink. You won't drink, will you?"
Thus began the joint work of Fyodor Mikhailovich and Anna Grigoryevna. And from that moment on, the young girl belonged less and less to herself every day, taking on her fragile shoulders the burden of sacrificial service ...
"What would you answer me?"
In twenty-six days, The Gambler was created. The almost impossible happened. The writer's talent would hardly have played a decisive role if there had not been a modest girl nearby who selflessly rushed into battle for the prosperous future of the writer, and, as it turned out very soon, her own.
Anna Grigoryevna came to Dostoevsky every day, took shorthand of the novel, returning home, often at night, rewrote it in plain language and brought Fyodor Mikhailovich to the house. By October 30, 1866, the manuscript was ready.
The shock work was over, and Fyodor Mikhailovich returned to the last part and the epilogue of Crime and Punishment. Of course, with the help of a stenographer (“I want to ask for your help, kind Anna Grigorievna. It was so easy for me to work with you. I would like to continue to dictate and I hope that you will not refuse to be my collaborator…”*).
When Anna Snitkina came to the writer on November 8, 1866 to arrange a job, Dostoevsky started talking about a new novel. Main character- an elderly and sick artist, who has experienced a lot, who has lost relatives and friends - meets a girl. “Let's call her Anya, so as not to call her a heroine,” the writer said. - This is a good name ... "*. Half a century later, Anna Grigorievna recalled: “Put yourself in her place,” he said in a trembling voice. - Imagine that this artist is me, that I confessed my love to you and asked you to be my wife. Tell me, what would you answer me? Fyodor Mikhailovich's face expressed such embarrassment, such heartfelt anguish, that I finally realized that it was not just literary conversation and that I would deal a terrible blow to his vanity and pride if I gave an evasive answer.
I glanced at Fyodor Mikhailovich's agitated face, so dear to me, and said:
- I would answer you that I love you and will love you all my life!
Anna Grigorievna modestly continues: “I will not convey those tender, full of love words that Fyodor Mikhailovich spoke to me in those unforgettable moments: they are sacred to me ...” *.
The explanation took place. The proposal was made, consent received. And on February 15, 1867, Anna Grigoryevna Snitkina and Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky got married. She is 20, he is 45. “God gave her to me,” the writer will say more than once about his incomparable Anna.
“I loved Fyodor Mikhailovich infinitely, but it was not physical love, not a passion that could exist in persons of equal age. My love was purely head, ideological. It was rather adoration, admiration for a man so talented and possessing such high spiritual qualities. It was a soul-searching pity for a man who had suffered so much, who had never seen joy and happiness and was so abandoned by his loved ones.
Cheerful and serious, cheerful and keenly aware of someone else's pain, Anna entered the thorny path family life. Living with a genius
"Days of Undeserved Happiness"
The young woman was forced to be under the same roof with the stepson of Fyodor Mikhailovich Pavel, spoiled and dishonorable. Moreover, the “stepmother” was a year younger than the “undergrowth”. He constantly complained to his stepfather about Anna Grigorievna, and when he was alone with her, he did not disdain any means to offend her more painfully. In front of his father, Pasha had foresight itself: he looked after Anna during dinners, picked up the napkins she had dropped.
“This is my stepson,” Fyodor Mikhailovich softly admitted, “a kind, honest boy; but, unfortunately, with a surprising character: he positively promised himself, from childhood, not to do anything, without having at the same time slightest state and at the same time having the most absurd notions about life.
And with other relatives it was no easier. They behaved arrogantly with Dostoevskaya. As soon as Fyodor Mikhailovich received an advance for a book, out of nowhere, his brother's widow Emilia Fedorovna appeared, or his younger unemployed brother Nikolai, or Pavel had "urgent" needs - for example, the need to buy a new coat to replace an old one that had gone out of fashion. The writer could not refuse to help anyone ...
Another inevitability was Dostoyevsky's illness. Anna knew about her from the first day they met, but she hoped that Fyodor Mikhailovich, being under her close supervision and care, would be healed. Once, when the couple were visiting, there was another seizure:
“Fyodor Mikhailovich was extremely lively and told something interesting to my sister. Suddenly he interrupted his speech in mid-sentence, turned pale, got up from the sofa and began to lean towards me. I looked in amazement at his changed face. But suddenly there was a terrible, inhuman scream, or rather, a scream, and Fyodor Mikhailovich began to lean forward.<…>Subsequently, dozens of times I had to hear this "inhuman" cry, common in an epileptic at the beginning of an attack. And this cry always shocked and frightened me.<…>It was here that I saw for the first time what a terrible disease Fyodor Mikhailovich was suffering from. Hearing his cries and groans that did not stop for hours, seeing a face distorted from suffering, completely unlike him, madly stopping his eyes, not at all understanding his incoherent speech, I was almost convinced that my dear, beloved husband was going crazy, and what horror this thought inspired me!
Anna Grigoryevna confessed to the writer and critic A.A. Izmailov: “... I remember the days of our life together as the days of great, undeserved happiness. But sometimes I redeemed him with great suffering. The terrible illness of Fyodor Mikhailovich threatened to destroy all our well-being any day ... As you know, this illness cannot be prevented or cured. All I could do was unbutton his collar, take his head in my hands. But see favorite face, turning blue, distorted, with full veins, to realize that he is tormented and you can’t help him in any way - this was such suffering, which, obviously, I had to atone for my happiness of being close to him ... "*.
Dostoevskaya could not help remembering - with quiet sadness - parental home, quiet family comfort, devoid of hardships and upheavals.
When it became completely unbearable, Anna asked herself: “Why doesn’t he, the “great heart specialist”, see how hard it is for me to live?” *.
Gradually exhausted, Anna comes to the conclusion that a change of scenery is the only way to escape. The husband didn't mind. And Dostoevskaya set about organizing the trip with all her energy. For lack of finances (her husband's relatives with their urgent needs miraculously appeared every time the writer received even the merest fee), Anna Grigoryevna had to pawn her dowry. But she did not regret anything - after all, a happy family life was at stake. And on April 14, 1867, the couple went abroad.
Roulette and wedding ring
“We went abroad for three months, and returned to Russia after more than four years,” recalled Anna Grigoryevna. – During this time, many joyful events happened in our lives, and I will forever thank God that he strengthened me in my decision to go abroad. There a new, happy life began for Fyodor Mikhailovich and me, and our mutual friendship and love grew stronger, which continued until the very death of my husband.
Dostoevskaya started notebook in which she wrote down, day by day, the history of their journey. “This is how the diary of Dostoevsky's wife appeared - a unique phenomenon in memoir literature and an indispensable source for all those involved in the writer's biography. “At first I wrote down only my road impressions and described our everyday life- recalls Anna Grigorievna. “But little by little I wanted to write down everything that so interested and captivated me in my dear husband: his thoughts, his conversations, his opinions about music, about literature, etc.”*
In addition to joys, the trip brought many difficult moments. Here, Fyodor Mikhailovich's morbid passion for playing roulette was revealed, which he became interested in as early as 1862, during his first trip abroad. The already skinny purse of the spouses was emptied instantly. “A simple everyday motive - to win“ capital ”in order to pay off creditors, live without needing for several years, and most importantly - to finally get the opportunity to work quietly on your works - at the gambling table lost its original meaning. Impetuous, passionate, impetuous, Dostoevsky surrenders to unbridled passion. The game of roulette becomes an end in itself.
The depth of humility with which Anna Grigoryevna endured this “illness” of her husband is amazing, and in fact he pledged literally everything in excitement, even ... wedding ring and her earrings.
“I realized,” Dostoevskaya recalled, “that this is not a simple “weakness of will”, but an all-consuming passion, something spontaneous, against which even a strong character cannot fight. We must come to terms with this, look at it as a disease against which there are no remedies.
Anna Grigorievna, with her humble love, created a miracle: her husband was cured of passion. He played for the last time in 1871, before returning to Russia, in Wiesbaden. On April 28, 1871, Dostoevsky wrote to his wife from Wiesbaden to Dresden: “A great deed has been done to me, the vile fantasy that has tormented me for almost 10 years has disappeared. For ten years (or, better, since my brother's death, when I was suddenly overwhelmed by debt), I kept dreaming of winning. I dreamed seriously, passionately. Now it's all over! It was quite the last time. Do you believe, Anya, that now my hands are untied; I was bound by the game, and now I will think about the matter and not dream for whole nights about the game, as it used to be. And so, things will get better and go faster, and God bless! Anya, save your heart for me, do not hate me and do not fall out of love. Now that I am so renewed - let's go together and I will make you happy!
The writer kept his oath.
Gradually, the spouses grew together with each other inextricably, becoming, according to the word of the Lord, "one flesh." In letters, Fyodor Mikhailovich often repeated that he felt "glued" to the family and could not bear even a short separation.
Flowers for a sweet daughter
During the trip, the happiness of waiting and the birth of the first child fell, which rallied the spouses. Anna Grigoryevna recalled: “Fyodor Mikhailovich turned out to be the most tender father: he was certainly present when the girl was bathing and helped me, he wrapped her in a pique blanket and pinned it with safety pins, carried and rocked her in his arms and, abandoning his studies, hurried to her as soon as he heard her voice (...) spent hours sitting by her bed, then singing songs to her, then talking with her, moreover, when she was in her third month, he was sure that Sonechka would recognize him, and this is what he wrote to A.N. She began to know me, love me and smiled when I approached. When I sang songs to her with my funny voice, she loved to listen to them. She didn't cry or wince when I kissed her; she would stop crying when I came up.”*
Is it possible to describe the grief of parents when, after a short illness, their three-month-old baby Sonya died. “I am unable to portray the despair that took possession of us when we saw our dear daughter dead,” Dostoevskaya recalled. “Deeply shocked and saddened by her death, I was terribly afraid for my unfortunate husband: his despair was stormy, he sobbed and cried like a woman.” Misfortune brought them even closer. “Every day my husband and I went to her grave, carried flowers and cried.”*
Their second child, the girl Lyuba, saw the light abroad. The happy father wrote a criticism of Strakhov: “Ah, why are you not married, and why do you not have a child, dear Nikolai Nikolayevich. I swear to you that this is ¾ of the happiness of life, and the rest is only one quarter.
Quiet family happiness seemed now to be firmly established under their roof in Dresden. The catastrophic lack of money was covered with love, complete mutual understanding and optimism.
Fyodor Mikhailovich jokingly complained:
For two years we live in poverty,
We have only one pure conscience.
And we are waiting for money from Katkov
For a failed story.
Anna Grigoryevna scolded him in response:
You took money from Katkov,
I promised the essay.
You are the last capital
He whistled on the roulette wheel.
But life outside the homeland gradually became more and more painful. Tickets were bought with the last money, and the family went to Russia.
Main way
On July 8, 1871, the Dostoevskys arrived in St. Petersburg. Soon the spouses had an heir - Fedor.
Creditors quickly found out about the return of the writer to St. Petersburg and had serious intentions to overshadow the life of the Dostoevskys. But Anna Grigoryevna decided to take matters into her own hands. Secretly from her husband, she managed to meet with the most impatient and agree with them on the waiting time.
This was no longer the modest Netochka who had set foot on the threshold of Dostoevsky's apartment four years earlier. “From a timid, shy girl, I developed into a woman with resolute character who could no longer be frightened by the struggle with everyday hardships, or rather, with debts that had reached twenty-five thousand by the time we returned to Petersburg.
In an effort to improve financial position family, Anna Grigorievna decided on her own edition of the novel "Demons". It should be noted that there were no precedents for an independent publication by a writer of his work and the proceeds from this real profit at that time.
The indefatigable Dostoevskaya delved into the matter to the smallest detail, and as a result, "Demons" were sold out instantly and extremely profitably. From that moment on, the main activity of Anna Grigorievna was the publication of her husband's books ... Finally, there was a little more freedom in the means, one could breathe easy.
In 1875, the second son, Alexei, appeared in the family. A bolt from the blue of a happy family life broke out three years later - beloved Alyoshenka died of a fit of epilepsy.
Fyodor Mikhailovich was heartbroken, because the cause of the boy's death was his father's illness, which was transmitted to the child. The very first attack of epilepsy turned out to be fatal for Alyosha. For the sake of other children, for the sake of her husband, Anna initially restrained her suffering and even insisted on Dostoevsky's trip - together with the philosopher Solovyov - to Optina Pustyn. But there was no strength to withstand the tension of grief.
“I was so lost, so sad and crying that no one recognized me,” she wrote many years later. - My usual cheerfulness disappeared, as well as the usual energy, in the place of which apathy appeared, I cooled off to everything: to the household, business, and even to my own children. Such was found by her returned husband. Now he, spiritually comforted, began to save his beloved.
In Optina Pustyna, Fyodor Mikhailovich twice met alone with Elder Ambrose, who conveyed his blessing and words of consolation to Anna Grigoryevna.
Upon his return from Optina, Dostoevsky set about writing The Brothers Karamazov. The work, coupled with the care of Anna Grigorievna, helped to return to life. In the mouth of his hero, Elder Zosima, Fyodor Mikhailovich put the very words that Father Ambrose conveyed to Anna: “Rachel weeps for her children and cannot be comforted, because they are not there, and such is the limit for you mothers on earth. And do not be comforted, and you do not need to be comforted, do not be comforted and cry, only every time you cry, remember steadily that your son - there is only one from the angels of God - looks at you from there and sees you, and rejoices at your tears, and points to them to the Lord God. And for a long time you will still have this great maternal crying, but in the end it will turn to you in quiet joy, and your bitter tears will be only tears of quiet tenderness and heartfelt cleansing, saving you from sins.
Dostoevsky went all his life to the creation of this novel. In it, the writer poses the fundamental problems human being: about the meaning of life of each person and the whole human history, about spiritual and moral foundations the existence of people, about faith and unbelief.
The novel was completed in November 1880 and was dedicated to Anna Grigorievna.
The Lord determined their life together for 14 years. All his great novels and The Diary of a Writer, that is, significantly more than a half written in a lifetime, Fyodor Mikhailovich created during these years. "The Gambler", "Crime and Punishment", "Idiot", "Demons", "Teenager", "The Brothers Karamazov", "A Writer's Diary" with the famous Pushkin speech passed through the hands of Anna Grigoryevna, a stenographer and scribe. Its importance in the life and posthumous fate of the writer cannot be overestimated.
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At the beginning of her "Memoirs" Anna Grigorievna wrote how much important points her life is connected with the Alexander Nevsky Lavra: the wedding of her parents, baptism, infancy, spent in a house belonging to the Lavra ... Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was buried at the Tikhvin cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra. She also dreamed of being buried next to him.
“Walking behind the coffin of Fyodor Mikhailovich, I took an oath to live for our children, made a vow to devote the rest of my life, as much as I could, to glorifying the memory of my unforgettable husband and spreading his noble ideas”*.
Anna Grigorievna was 35 years old.
She kept her promise. Seven times Dostoevskaya published the complete works of her husband, created his museum, opened a school named after him.
It's amazing how much humility, kindness, and most importantly - love - was in this woman. In one of her letters, she addressed her husband: “I am such an ordinary woman, the golden mean, with petty whims and demands ... And suddenly the most generous, noble, pure, honest, holy person loves me!” *.
After the death of Fyodor Mikhailovich, Anna Grigoryevna lived for another 37 years. She did not marry again.
Anna Dostoevskaya confessed to L.P. Grossman, the writer's biographer: “I do not live in the twentieth century, I stayed in the 70s of the nineteenth. My people are Fyodor Mikhailovich's friends, my society is a circle of departed people close to Dostoevsky. I live with them. Everyone who works on the study of the life or works of Dostoevsky seems to me to be a kindred person.
“I gave myself to Fedor Mikhailovich when I was 20 years old. Now I am over 70, and I still only belong to him with every thought, every deed.
In the memorial album of S.S. Prokofiev, the future author of the opera "The Player", where the owner asked to dedicate all records only to the sun, in January 1917, Anna Grigorievna wrote: "The sun of my life is Feodor Dostoevsky" ***.
They weren't perfect people. From the correspondence of the spouses it is clear that there were quarrels, bewilderment, and outbursts of jealousy between them. But their history proves once again: the Lord, who sanctified the sacrament of marriage with his first miracle in Cana of Galilee and sanctifies it every time when two stand before the altar with martyr's crowns over their heads, the Lord, for the humble joint bearing of suffering and upheavals, will not fail to send down that precious gift, without which a person is only “ringing brass or a sounding cymbal”.
Anna Grigorievna wrote: “Feelings must be handled with care so that they do not break. There is nothing more precious in life than love. You should forgive more - look for guilt in yourself and smooth out the roughness in yourself.
Fyodor Mikhailovich echoes the words of his elder Zosima: “Brothers, love is a teacher, but you need to be able to acquire it, because it is difficult to acquire, it is expensive to buy, long work and after a long time, for it is not necessary to love only the accidental for a moment, but for the whole period. And by chance, anyone can fall in love, and the villain will fall in love.
In the last year of her earthly life in the war-torn Crimea, Anna Grigoryevna was seriously ill and starving.
Anna Dostoevskaya died on June 22, 1918 in Yalta and was buried at the city's Polikurovsky cemetery.
Half a century later, in 1968, her ashes were transferred to the Alexander Nevsky Lavra and buried next to her husband's grave.
On the gravestone of Dostoevsky, on the right side, a modest inscription appeared:
Anna Grigoryevna Dostoevskaya. 1846-1918".
This question was asked by biographers of many famous people. How often are great women next to great men who become like-minded people, helpers, friends? Be that as it may, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was lucky: his second wife, Anna Grigorievna Snitkina, was just such a person.
In order to understand the role of Anna Grigorievna in the fate of the classic, it is enough to look at Dostoevsky's life "before" and "after" the meeting with this amazing woman. So, by the time he met her in 1866, Dostoevsky was the author of several stories, some of which were highly acclaimed. For example, "Poor people" - they were enthusiastically received by Belinsky and Nekrasov. And some, for example, "Double" - suffered a complete fiasco, having received devastating reviews from these same writers. If success in literature, although variable, was still there, then other areas of Dostoevsky's life and career looked much more deplorable: participation in the Petrashevsky case led him to four years of hard labor and exile; the magazines created with his brother were closed and left behind huge debts; health was so undermined that practically most life the writer lived with a feeling of "on last days»; bad marriage with Maria Dmitrievna Isaeva and her death - all this did not contribute to either creativity or peace of mind.
On the eve of his acquaintance with Anna Grigoryevna, one more catastrophe was added to these: under a bonded agreement with the publisher F.T. Stelovsky Dostoevsky had to submit a new novel by November 1, 1866. There was about a month left, otherwise all rights to subsequent works by F.M. Dostoevsky passed to the publisher. By the way, Dostoevsky was not the only writer who found himself in such a situation: a little earlier, on unfavorable terms for the author, the works of A.F. Pisemsky; V.V. got into the "bondage" Krestovsky, author of Petersburg Slums. For only 25 rubles, the works of M.I. Glinka at his sister L.I. Shestakova. On this occasion, Dostoevsky wrote to Maikov: “He has so much money that he will buy all Russian literature if he wants to. Does that person not have money who bought Glinka for 25 rubles».
The situation was critical. Friends suggested that the writer create the main line of the novel, a kind of synopsis, as they would say now, and divide it between them. Each of the literary friends could write a separate chapter, and the novel would be ready. But Dostoevsky could not agree to this. Then friends suggested finding a stenographer: in this case, the chance to write a novel on time still appeared.
Anna Grigoryevna Snitkina became this stenographer. It is unlikely that another woman could be so aware and feel the situation. During the day the novel was dictated by the writer, at night the chapters were transcribed and written. By the appointed date, the novel "The Gambler" was ready. It was written in just 25 days, from October 4 to October 29, 1866.
Stellovsky was not going to give up the opportunity to outplay Dostoevsky so quickly. On the day the manuscript was handed over, he simply left the city. The clerk refused to accept the manuscript. The discouraged and disappointed Dostoevsky was again rescued by Anna Grigoryevna. After consulting with acquaintances, she persuaded the writer to hand over the manuscript against receipt to the bailiff of the unit in which Stellovsky lived. The victory remained with Dostoevsky, but in many respects the merit belonged to Anna Grigorievna Snitkina, who soon became not only his wife, but also a true friend, assistant and companion.
To understand the relationship between them, it is necessary to turn to events much earlier. Anna Grigorievna was born in the family of a petty St. Petersburg official Grigory Ivanovich Snitkin, who was an admirer of Dostoevsky. In the family, she was even nicknamed Netochka, after the name of the heroine of the story "Netochka Nezvanova". Her mother, Anna Nikolaevna Miltopeus, a Swede of Finnish origin, was the complete opposite of her addicted and impractical husband. Energetic, imperious, she showed herself to be the complete mistress of the house.
Anna Grigorievna inherited both the understanding character of her father and the determination of her mother. And she projected the relationship between her parents onto her future husband: “... They always remained themselves, not echoing or imitating each other in the least. And they did not get entangled with their soul - I - in his psychology, he - in mine, and in this way my good husband and I - we both felt free in soul.
Anna wrote about her attitude to Dostoevsky: My love was purely head, ideological. It was rather adoration, admiration for a person who was so talented and possessed of such high spiritual qualities. It was a soul-searching pity for a man who had suffered so much, who had never seen joy and happiness, and who had been so abandoned by those close ones who would be obliged to repay him with love and care for him for everything that (he) did for them all his life. The dream of becoming his companion in life, sharing his labors, making his life easier, giving him happiness - took possession of my imagination, and Fyodor Mikhailovich became my god, my idol, and I, it seems, was ready to kneel before him all my life X".
The family life of Anna Grigorievna and Fyodor Mikhailovich also did not escape misfortunes and uncertainty in the future. They happened to survive years of almost beggarly existence abroad, the death of two children, Dostoevsky's manic passion for playing. And yet, it was Anna Grigorievna who managed to put their life in order, organize the work of the writer, free him, in the end, from those financial debts that had accumulated since the unsuccessful publication of magazines. Despite the difference in age and the difficult nature of her husband, Anna was able to fix them life together. His wife also struggled with the addiction of playing roulette, and helped in the work: she took shorthand of his novels, rewrote manuscripts, read proofs and organized the book trade. Gradually, she took over all the financial affairs, and Fedor Mikhailovich no longer interfered in them, which, by the way, had an extremely positive effect on the family budget.
It was Anna Grigorievna who decided on such a desperate act as her own edition of the novel "Demons". There were no precedents at that time when a writer managed to independently publish his works and get real profit from it. Even Pushkin's attempts to receive income from the publication of his literary works failed completely. There were several book firms: Bazunov, Volf, Isakov and others who bought the rights to publish books, and then published and distributed them throughout Russia. How much the authors lost on this can be calculated quite easily: Bazunov offered 500 rubles for the right to publish the novel "Demons" (and this is already a "cult" and not a novice writer), while income after the independent publication of the book amounted to about 4,000 rubles.
Anna Grigoryevna proved herself to be a true business woman. She delved into the matter to the smallest detail, many of which she learned literally in a “spy” way: ordering Business Cards; asking in printing houses on what conditions books are printed; pretending to be bargaining in a bookstore, I found out what extra charges he makes. From such inquiries, she found out what percentage and at what number of copies should be ceded to booksellers.
And here is the result - "Demons" were sold out instantly and extremely profitably. From that moment on, the main activity of Anna Grigoryevna was the publication of her husband's books ...
In the year of Dostoevsky's death (1881), Anna Grigorievna turned 35 years old. She did not remarry and devoted herself entirely to perpetuating the memory of Fyodor Mikhailovich. She published the collected works of the writer seven times, organized an apartment-museum, wrote memoirs, gave endless interviews, and spoke at numerous literary evenings.
In the summer of 1917, events that disturbed the whole country threw her into the Crimea, where she fell ill with severe malaria and died a year later in Yalta. They buried her away from her husband, although she asked otherwise. She dreamed of finding peace next to Fyodor Mikhailovich, in the Alexander Nevsky Lavra, and that at the same time they would not put a separate monument to her, but would only cut out a few lines on the tombstone. The last will of Anna Grigorievna was fulfilled only in 1968.
Victoria Zhuravleva
