Who was included in the satirikon magazine. History of satirical magazines satirikon and new satirikon. Arkady Averchenko - Early years
Name: Arkady Averchenko
Age: 43 years
Place of Birth: Sevastopol, Russia
A place of death: Prague, Czechoslovakia
Activity: Russian writer, satirist
Family status: unknown
Arkady Averchenko - biography
Arkady Averchenko is the author of many satirical stories. His works are also interesting to modern readers, because they contain subtle humor, with the help of which the writer managed to expose human weaknesses and vices that are invariably present in society at all times.
Arkady Averchenko - Early years
Arkady Averchenko was born on March 30, 1881. The satirist's hometown is Sevastopol. The father was a small merchant whose business was so unsuccessful that it led the family to complete ruin. The future writer, as evidenced by his autobiographical works, was forced to receive his education at home, with the help of his older sisters. At the age of fifteen, Averchenko left his hometown and entered service in the Donetsk mine as a clerk. And three years later he got a job at one of the Kharkov joint-stock companies. During this period, the future writer began to write short stories.
The beginning of the work of Arkady Averchenko
The first work in the creative biography of Arkady Averchenko, which was published in the Kharkov literary magazine, was created in 1902. The story was called “The ability to live.” But another creation attracted the attention of critics. “The Righteous” is a story that was published in St. Petersburg. The revolutionary events of 1905 inspired the young writer. During this period, he created many essays and feuilletons, which for the most part were prohibited by censorship.
Arkady Averchenko - Satyricon
Since 1908, Averchenko worked as a secretary in the editorial office of one of the St. Petersburg periodicals. He was able to completely reorganize the work in this organization. First of all, he changed the name of the magazine. "Satyricon" - this was the name literary magazine, which under Averchenko enjoyed particular popularity among readers. The publication paid great attention to revolutionary, political and public issues. Arkady Averchenko managed to involve not only authors working in the genre of satire, but also such outstanding prose writers and poets as Leonid Andreev and Alexander Kuprin in working on the magazine.
New Satyricon by Arkady Averchenko
Of course, the main employee of Satyricon - the readable magazine in St. Petersburg at the beginning of the century - Averchenko himself appeared. But eight years after Averchenko joined the editorial staff, a split occurred in the magazine. Averchenko’s magazine became “New Satyricon”. Not a single number of this periodical never appeared without a small satirical work by its founder.
Over the years, Averchenko’s literary skills have been honed, and a unique style of the writer has developed. The main and characteristic properties of Averchenko’s stories were exaggeration and depiction of some anecdotal situation, which the author often brought to the point of complete absurdity. His stories were not particularly plausible, and therefore enjoyed even greater success among the so-called intelligent public. By the way, the very word “intelligent” was introduced into everyday speech not without the assistance of the “Satyriconists.”
Arkady Averchenko - Special style
The magazine's employees, led by its editor-in-chief, extremely valued their reputation. They ignored base tastes, stupid buffoonery and direct political engagement were not inherent in them. In their essays and articles, the magazine's staff expressed a somewhat mocking disloyalty. Their position differed favorably in the literary world of that time, where there was a complete absence of censorship.
Averchenko and his comrades certainly welcomed the February revolution. But then unbridledness and “democratic” lawlessness reigned in Russia, which made the writer wary. Like many representatives of the intelligentsia, the Satyriconists perceived what was happening in the country as a monstrous misunderstanding. The works of the now Soviet writer began to contain the most acute humor, bordering on black. Such grotesqueness is inherent in the work of Bulgakov, Ilf, which indicates the influence of the greatest social change on literature and art.
Arkady Averchenko - Emigration and death
In 1918, the “New Satyricon” was banned by the new government. Averchenko fled to the South, where he continued to write and published several anti-Bolshevik essays. In 1920 he managed to leave for Constantinople. Abroad, the writer felt relatively comfortable, since he had the opportunity to communicate with Russian emigrants. Subsequently, Averchenko moved to the Czech Republic, where his works enjoyed wide popularity. Most of them were translated into Czech. In 1925, the Russian writer passed away after a long, serious illness. Averchenko was buried in Prague.
"Satyricon"- Russian weekly satirical magazine. Originated in the depths of an old Russian humor magazine "Dragonfly"(1875-1918), which lost popularity, and soon replaced it. Published in St. Petersburg from 1908 to 1913. The name is in honor of the ancient novel. The figures of Russian culture of the Silver Age who took part in the publication of the magazine are collectively called “ Satyriconists."
1913—1918 - "New Satyricon" published by some of the authors of the old edition. After the revolution, the magazine was closed, most of the authors ended up in exile.
The essence of the magazine: combined both political satire (directed, for example, against foreign policy Germany before and during the First World War, against the Black Hundreds, and after October 1917 - against the Bolsheviks), and harmless humor.
In the first issue of the magazine, the editors addressed readers: “We will bitingly and mercilessly scourge all the lawlessness, lies and vulgarity that reign in our political and social life. Laughter, terrible, poisonous laughter, like the stings of scorpions, will be our weapon." "Satyricon" was something of an anomaly and allowed himself quite bold antics. The objects of his satire were the State Duma, its individual deputies and parties, the government and local authorities, including governors general, and reactionary journalists.
New satiricon.
In 1913, a split occurred in the editorial staff of the magazine, which resulted in the formation "New Satyricon". Reason: monetary misunderstandings and a quarrel between the main ones: the publisher Kornfeld, on the one hand, and Averchenko, Radakov and Remizov, - with another. According to the agreement concluded between the publisher and employees, Averchenko, Radakov and Remizov had the right to control the economic part of the magazine, and Kornfeld agreed not to increase the subscription and retail fees for the magazine.
So they quarreled and quarreled. And they parted ways.
together with Averchenko, Radakov and Remizov, most of the leading employees left the editorial office: Potemkin, Teffi, Azov, O.L. d "Or, Landau, Benois, Dobuzhinsky, //. Subsequently Bukhov joined them. In the old "Satyricon" remained: Knyazev, Geyer, Tikhonov, as well as young poets Goryansky, S.Ya. Marshak, Winkert, Agnivtsev, Aktil and others. The artist Denis (V. Denisov) took over the decoration, and after his illness - Kuzmin and Grigoriev.
Kornfeld made feverish attempts to save Satyricon. It was published until the end of 1913, and a subscription was announced for 1914. The appearance of the magazine during this period was very colorful.
Moving to a “new apartment”, the Satyriconians took with them their best forces and preserved those sections of the magazine that they especially valued: "Wolf Berries"(satire on the topic of the day), "Feathers from the Tail"(weekly polemics with publicists of a different direction) and your mailbox. The composition of the staff has remained almost unchanged.
The spirit of social protest and simply harsh criticism gradually disappeared in the New Satyricon. They were replaced by sophisticated versification, inflated paradox and eroticism. Evolving, the New Satyricon became more and more like an ordinary bourgeois publication, which was especially noticeable during the First World War.
Among the satirical magazines, of which there were a great many in Russia at the beginning of the last century, Satyricon occupies a special place. Without a doubt, he enjoyed the greatest fame of all of them, since he was the most prominent spokesman of his time: he was even quoted at meetings of the Duma.
Main authors
The Satyricon group took shape by 1908; The first issue of the magazine was published on April 3. On the pages of the new weekly magazine Humorous drawings and caricatures began to appear, signed by Radakov (1879-1942), Re-mi (pseudonym of Remizov-Vasiliev), Benois, Dobuzhinsky. These drawings were often accompanied by short poems; In addition, the magazine devoted a lot of space to satirical poetry. Among the permanent employees of Satyricon one should name Pyotr Potemkin (1886 - 1926), Vasily Knyazev (1877 - 1937 or 1938), acmeist Sergei Gorodetsky (1884 - 1967), Vladimir Voinov (1878 - 1938), Evgeny Vensky (pseudonym of Evgeny Pyatkin, 1885 - 1943), Krasny (pseudonym of Konstantin Antipov, 1883 - 1919), Samuil Marshak (1887 - 1964), Arkady Bukhov (1889 - 1946), Vladimir Likhachev (1849 - 1910), Dmitry Censor (1877 - 1947), Nikolai Shebuev (1874 - 1937).
Sasha Cherny, undoubtedly the most gifted of the group's authors, left the magazine in 1911, having published many works there.
Among the prose writers of the group, it is necessary to name, in addition to Averchenko, Teffi (pseudonym of Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, married to Buchinskaya, 1872 - 1952), Osip Dymov (pseudonym of Osip Perelman)...
"New Satyricon"
In 1913, a crisis occurred in the magazine; most of its authors left Kornfeld and founded the New Satyricon, the first issue of which was published on June 6. The old magazine still continued to be published: Knyazev, Valentin Goryansky (pseudonym of Valentin Ivanov, 1888 - 1944) and several other writers remained there, but in 1914, after the release of the 16th issue, the magazine ceased to exist. “New Satyricon” flourished for some time and attracted a number of young writers, among whom were Alexey Budishchev (1867 - 1916), Georgy Vyatkin (1885 - 1941), Chuzh-Chuzhenin (pseudonym of Nikolai Faleev, 1873-30s) and Mayakovsky, who published poems of 1915-1916 and his “hymns” in it.
Contents and focus of the magazine
The Satyricon magazine was very diverse in content and focus: it reflected the tastes of the public and certain literary trends of its time. The public wanted it to be satirical. Responding to this wish, the magazine was revived and became strengthen the old tradition of Russian literature. He proclaimed Saltykov-Shchedrin his teacher, as evidenced by the issue specially dedicated to his memory (New Satyricon, No. 17), published on the 25th anniversary of the writer’s death in 1914. Bukhov mentions this in his poem “Remember!”, published in the issue:
...There are many of you...
Picks up drops of caustic bile,
Dropped by a smart old man.
However, after the revolution of 1905, this tradition acquired a very special character in the world of the press. In the period 1905-1906, many satirical publications began to be published: “Hammer”, “Machine Gun”, “Bugbear”, “Masks”, “Gadfly”, “Zarnitsa”, “Red Laughter”, etc., in which they appear, alternating with each other friend, caricatures and poems, often signed by illustrious names from the “World of Art” or from the Symbolist school. Satire was usually extremely harsh and harsh, excluding any humor, in most cases painted in tragic tones: it was a time when images of death, blood, and murder filled both painting and literature.
The Satyricon group, responding to the tastes of the time (close to Leonid Andreev), picked up this tradition and made its own contribution to it. Many times the magazine carried hints of repression against the opposition in very dark tones, for example under the guise of descriptions of executions by impalement in Persia.
Thus, on the one hand, Satyricon develops themes that a priori exclude laughter. In his works there is a sound of despair, both political and moral, which sometimes really becomes a commonplace. Some poems openly fall into revolutionary pathos. Knyazev is especially inclined towards it.
“Now,” writes Averchenko, “the whole of Great Rus' is writhing in its sleep, immersed in mortal boredom.” This phrase was designed for a comic effect: boredom and vulgarity were considered shameful, and it was customary to constantly remind that they were opposed by ideals, enthusiasm, noble spiritual impulses; but this almost obligatory recommendation has long become more of a rhetorical formula than a real source of inspiration.
Who did Satyricon write about?
In fact, the only social layer that fills the pages of Satyricon is precisely the petty bourgeoisie, that philistinism whose presence is felt among both the readers and authors of the magazine. Krasny's poem, dated 1908, demonstrates, perhaps not entirely consciously for the author himself, that the old Russian myths are losing their power. The poem is built on the contrast between the topics of conversations in society (freedom, homeland, indignation, sacrifice) and their material basis - a restaurant, a party, etc. (No. 10, 1908):
Oh, what could be more beautiful?
Than walking into the world of quest,
Where the path is glorious only through sacrifice...
But much more interesting
Read about it in the novel
And take a breath over coffee...
Perhaps the poet's intention was to ridicule the softness of the average intellectual, but the effect produced by the poem is completely different, because the polarity of these ideas is too funny.
Parody in a magazine
The magazine's output was rich in both old and new techniques. The first place among them was occupied by parody - a genre that is satirical in itself. The authors of “Satyricon” did not neglect the opportunity to ridicule new literary movements, such as symbolism, futurism (for example, Bukhov’s poem “The Legend of the Terrible Book” (1913) presents the poems of the futurists as the most terrible torture for the reader imaginable). Egofuturism (Igor Severyanin) has become a favorite target for parody. The archaic style was readily used, with the help of which the most striking effect of the grotesque was created (for example, Shebuev’s ode to universities, designed in the style of the Russian XV111 century, No. 37, 1913).
Often parody coexisted with a serious tone so hidden that contemporaries did not even always notice it. For example, Goryansky gave his collection “My Fools” the subtitle “Lyrical Satires.” Sasha Cherny uses this technique almost everywhere, and one of the letters to Kranichfeld proves that the poet used it completely consciously. He writes: “Humor, satire and lyricism are combined in the same poem...” Some of Bukhov’s poems could be mistaken for being written by one of the Symbolists (“To the Poets”).
Potemkin especially shone in this crafty genre. He was associated with the symbolist environment, often visited the Stray Dog cabaret, and staged some of his plays at the Crooked Mirror miniature theater. His collection “Funny Love” (1908) also contains themes typical of Russian romantics and symbolists - masks, dolls, and it is not clear whether one should look for the funny in the serious or the serious in the funny. Later, namely in his collection of poems “Geranium” (1912), the poet would move away from this genre and come to a purely comic, more sincere and simpler.
Techniques of fairy tales and folk art in "Satyricon"
Another favorite technique of Satyricon is a fairy tale. Here its authors willingly followed Kozma Prutkov, in whom they recognized their predecessor. In 1913, a special issue (No. 3) was dedicated to his memory. One of the Satyricon employees, Boris Vladimirovich Zhikovich, signed the name Ivan Kozmich Prutkov, as the son of a fictional writer. Nevertheless, his fairy tales, as a rule, are satirical; they do not contain absurdity, like Kozma Prutkov’s. Thus, the fable “Brains and Night” (1914) ridicules spiritualism, although it was written in the style of Prutkov.
"Satyricon" willingly used sources folk art: fairground comedy, quatrains in the style of ditties, which Potemkin and Knyazev collected from the villages. If Knyazev’s ditties serve to “simplify” poetry, then Potemkin, especially in “Geranium,” introduces very lively comic motifs in descriptions of the life of the St. Petersburg common people (“Groom”) with the help of folk style.
He didn’t drink fusel,
But I drank little by little
Copper in the ear
He wore an earring.
Here the comic is achieved by introducing into poetry the language and habits of the common people: clerk, artisan, worker, small trader, etc. Such poetry, typically urban and comically good-natured, anticipates the genres that would develop in the 1920s.
Pseudo-children's poetry
And finally, the authors of Satyricon willingly used the form of pseudo-children's poetry. Thus, Chuzh-Chuzhenin’s “Children’s Song” (1913), written in response to new restrictions on the press, depicted censors as obedient children:
Like Vanya-Vanyushka
The nannies got busy
Nannies are sad people,
Strict bosses...
But this literary device, created at first as a satirical one, gradually grows into a special genre, into a style that loses its original orientation. Subsequently, many of the poets of “Satyricon” write specifically for children and influence future authors of this genre (the most famous of them is Samuel Marshak). They often imitate English children's poems and songs, such as Vyatkin, who wrote a poem about the python “Fifth.”
English style of humor
Some authors adopted the style of English humor, and the first among them was Teffi, whose stylistic devices and turns are examples of a purely English manner. Such, for example, is “the captain who looked around with round eyes with the look of a man just taken out of the water” (“Instead of Politics”). Teffi's plots reproduce the technique of English humor, which achieves a comic effect by introducing absurdity into everyday situations - for example, the plot about a petty official who won a horse in the lottery and found himself in a hopeless situation, since it quickly brought him to complete ruin ("Gift Horse" ). In addition, Satyricon often published foreign humorists, in particular Mark Twain.
Play on words
However, the humor of Satyricon was not only borrowed. Its best authors managed to continue the Russian comic purely verbal direction, based not only on a pun, but also on a semantic collision of words, on a joke originating from a sound play on words, going back to Gogol.
Teffi's play on words is often carried to the point of absurdity; it causes laughter, as it introduces a whole family of words that sound like nonsense. So, for example, a boy, coming home from school, asks the adults: “Why do they say “Anthem-Asia” and not “Anthem-Africa”?” (“Instead of Politics”) Kulikov picks up Kozma Prutkov’s play on words on the sound of “villa” and “fork” in order to make a poem with a “social” sound from this material: the rich man’s dream of “villa” is contrasted with the peasant’s dream of new forks (“Two Dumas”, 1908). But here the social content pales next to the comic absurdity of the pun.
The Satyricon group, thus, in its work stands, as it were, on two stilts, on two traditions - satirical and humorous, which at that time were not too sharply divided, since humor was often mistaken for satire. This confusion prevented the magazine's authors, at least most of them, from reaching the heights of humor (in the metaphysical sense), while satire, in turn, lost its liveliness, degraded, fell into didactics and lost significance.
Nevertheless, Satyricon remained the legal heir of Kozma Prutkov and prepared the ground for the flourishing of humorous literature that came later, in the 20s.
Materials used from the book: History of Russian Literature: 20th Century: Silver Age / Ed. J. Niva, I. Serman and others - M.: Publishing house. group "Progress" - "Litera", 1995
Students of group 133
Yakovleva Olga
Shadrinsk, 2008
Satyricon…………………………………………………………………………………..3
A.T. Averchenko……………………………………………………..….5
“Two crimes of Mr. Vopyagin”……….7
Sasha Cherny………………………………………………………8
Poems………………………………………………………………………………….10
Teffi…………………………………………………………………..11
“Woman’s Book”………………………………………………………..14
Bibliography……………………………………………………….16
Satyricon
Speaking about the main trends of Russian poetry of the Silver Age, poetry schools and individual groups, one cannot fail to mention another association that went down in the history of literature called “Satyricon”.
"Satyricon" was the outlet that is always lacking under the regime in the old sense of the word. The regime was tsarist, life was so-so, and there were plenty of characters and plots to ridicule. This is how Satyricon arose - a caustic and mocking magazine.
April 1, 1908 became a symbolic date. On this day, the first issue of the new weekly magazine “Satyricon” was published in St. Petersburg, which then had a noticeable influence on public consciousness for a whole decade. The first editor-in-chief of the magazine was the artist Alexey Aleksandrovich Radakov (1877-1942), and from the ninth issue this post passed to the satirist writer, playwright and journalist Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko.
The editorial office of the magazine was located on Nevsky Prospekt, in house No. 9. “Satyricon” was a cheerful and caustic publication, sarcastic and angry; in it, witty text interspersed with caustic caricatures, funny anecdotes were replaced by political cartoons. At the same time, the magazine differed from many other humorous publications of those years in its social content: here, without going beyond the bounds of decency, representatives of the authorities, obscurantists, and Black Hundreds were uncompromisingly ridiculed and scourged. The position of the magazine in the last point was determined not so much by writers and journalists with Jewish roots - V. Azov, O. Dymov, O. L. D'Or, but by purebred Russians: A. Averchenko, A. Bukhov, Teffi and others, who gave to anti-Semites far more violently rebuffed than their Jewish counterparts.
Such satirists as V. Knyazev, Sasha Cherny and A. Bukhov were published, L. Andreev, A. Tolstoy, V. Mayakovsky were published, famous Russian artists B. Kustodiev, I. Bilibin, A. Benois provided illustrations. For comparatively short term- from 1908 to 1918 - this satirical magazine (and its later version “New Satyricon”) created a whole trend in Russian literature and an unforgettable era in its history.
Particular credit for such a resounding popularity of "Satyricon" largely belonged to the gifted poets - satirists and humorists who collaborated in the magazine.
The reader quickly appreciated everything that the satirists were trying to convey to him. All of Russia was engrossed in stories, poems, humoresques, epigrams and parodies, which were complemented by brilliant caricatures, cartoons and drawings. “Satyricon” attracted readers because its authors practically abandoned denunciations of specific high-ranking officials. They also did not have the “generally obligatory love for the junior janitor.” After all, stupidity remains stupidity everywhere, vulgarity remains vulgarity, and therefore the desire to show a person such situations when he himself is funny comes to the fore. Objective satire is replaced by “lyrical satire,” self-irony, which allows one to reveal character “from the inside.” This was especially evident in poetry, where the object of satirical or humorous depiction is the lyrical hero.
The work of Sasha Cherny, Teffi, P. Potemkin, V. Goryansky, V. Knyazev, E. Vensky and other leading poets of the Satyricon was presented on its pages in various genres: poetic cartoons, pamphlets, humoresques, parodies, fables, epigrams.
During the heyday of the magazine, in 1911, its publisher M. G. Kornfeld published “General History, processed by Satyricon” in the magazine library. The authors of this brilliant parody-satirical work were Teffi, O. Dymov, Arkady Averchenko and O. L. D’Or; The book was illustrated by satirical artists A. Radakov, A. Yakovlev, A. Yunger and Re-Mi (N. Remizov).
The popularity of Teffi and Averchenko in those years is difficult to find analogues. Suffice it to say that Nicholas II himself read these authors with pleasure and bound their books in leather and satin. And it was not at all by chance that Teffi was assigned to “edit” the beginning of “General History”; knowing whose favorite writer she was, there was no need to fear censorship objections. Thus, speaking against the Duma, the government, officials, bureaucrats of all stripes, Satyricon, with the highest favor, unexpectedly fell into the role of legal opposition; its authors managed to do much more in politics with their poetic and prose creativity than any politician.
However, in May 1913, the magazine split over financial issues. As a result, Averchenko and all the best literary forces left the editorial office and founded the magazine “New Satyricon”. The former Satyricon, under the leadership of Kornfeld, continued to publish for some time, but lost its best authors and, as a result, closed in April 1914. And “New Satyricon” continued to exist successfully (18 issues were published) until the summer of 1918, when it was banned by the Bolsheviks for its counter-revolutionary orientation.
Alas, the fates of the Satyricons were not happy. Someone left their homeland, someone was repressed and died... An attempt to revive the magazine by Russian emigrants was unsuccessful. But a considerable legacy remains, which must certainly find its reader.
A 
Rkadiy
Timofeevich Averchenko
Born on March 15, 1881 in Sevastopol in the family of a poor businessman Timofey Petrovich Averchenko.
Arkady Averchenko graduated from only two classes of the gymnasium, since due to poor eyesight he could not study for a long time and, moreover, in childhood, as a result of an accident, he severely damaged his eye. But the lack of education was compensated over time by natural intelligence, according to the testimony of the writer N. N. Breshkovsky.
Averchenko began working early, at the age of 15, when he joined a private transport office. He didn't last long there, just over a year.
In 1897, Averchenko left to work as a clerk in the Donbass, at the Bryansk mine. He worked at the mine for three years, subsequently writing several stories about life there (“In the Evening,” “Lightning,” etc.).
In 1903, he moved to Kharkov, where on October 31, his first story appeared in the Yuzhny Krai newspaper.
In 1906-1907 he edited the satirical magazines “Bayonet” and “Sword”, and in 1907 he was fired from his next duty station with the words: “You good man, but you’re no good for hell.” After this, in January 1908, A. T. Averchenko left for St. Petersburg, where in the future he would become widely known.
So, in 1908, Averchenko became the secretary of the satirical magazine “Dragonfly” (later renamed “Satyricon”), and in 1913 - its editor.
Averchenko has been successfully working for many years in the magazine’s team with famous people - Teffi, Sasha Cherny, Osip Dymov, N.V. Remizov (Remi), etc. It was there that his most brilliant humorous stories appeared. During Averchenko's work at Satyricon, this magazine became extremely popular; plays based on his stories were staged in many theaters across the country.
In 1910-1912, Averchenko repeatedly traveled around Europe with his satirical friends. These travels provided Averchenko with rich material for creativity, so that in 1912 his book “The Satyricon Expedition to Western Europe” was published, which caused a lot of noise in those days.
After the October Revolution, everything changed dramatically. In August 1918, the Bolsheviks considered the New Satyricon anti-Soviet and closed it. Averchenko and the entire staff of the magazine took a negative position towards Soviet power. To return to your place native Sevastopol(to Crimea, occupied by the whites), Averchenko had to get into numerous troubles, in particular, making his way through German-occupied Ukraine.
From June 1919, Averchenko worked for the newspaper “Yug” (later “South of Russia”), campaigning for help for the Volunteer Army.
On November 15, 1920, Sevastopol was captured by the Reds. A few days before this, Averchenko managed to sail on a ship to Constantinople.
In Constantinople, Averchenko felt more or less comfortable, since at that time there were a huge number of Russian refugees there, just like him.
In 1921, in Paris, he published a collection of pamphlets, “A Dozen Knives in the Back of the Revolution,” which Lenin called “a highly talented book ... by a White Guard embittered to the point of insanity.” It was followed by the collection “A Dozen Portraits in Boudoir Format.”
Averchenko did not stay in any of these cities for a long time, but moved on June 17, 1922 to Prague for permanent residence.
In 1923, the Berlin publishing house Sever published his collection of emigrant stories, Notes of the Innocent.
Life far from the Motherland, from the native language was very difficult for Averchenko; Many of his works were devoted to this, in particular, the story “The Tragedy of the Russian Writer.”
In the Czech Republic, Averchenko immediately gained popularity; his creative evenings were a resounding success, and many of his stories were translated into Czech.
Speaking about the main trends of Russian poetry of the Silver Age, poetry schools and individual groups, one cannot fail to mention the association that went down in the history of literature under the name “Satyricon”.
"Satyricon" was the outlet that is always lacking under the regime in the old sense of the word. The regime was tsarist, life was so-so, and there were plenty of characters and plots to ridicule. This is how Satyricon arose - a caustic and mocking magazine.
In the fall of 1907, a young man came to the editorial office of the St. Petersburg humor magazine “Dragonfly”. He introduced himself as Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko and expressed a desire to work in the magazine. It was accepted by the publisher - M.G. Kornfeld, who had just inherited from his father a magazine known throughout Russia, but which by this time had lost not only its former popularity, but also most of its subscribers. Having learned that Averchenko edited the magazine Beach in Kharkov, whose circulation was slightly less than that of Dragonfly, Kornfeld invited the stranger to an editorial meeting.
This is how Averchenko describes his first appearance in the editorial office of Dragonfly:
You had no right to invite any provincial crooks to the meeting! - the impetuous Radakov roared like a storm. - Southern trains bring hundreds of pounds of provincial meat every day - why drag them all here, right?
“Yeah,” the restrained Re-Mi shook his head. - Not good, not good. That way, I’ll invite someone from the street to a meeting - will you be pleased?
However, when at the second meeting I proposed a couple of topics for drawings, they listened to me, discussed the topics, accepted them - and the distressed Kornfeld raised his head again.
A week later, I was already invited as the editorial secretary and A.T. Averchenko solemnly assumed his duties. Favorites. - M.: Satyricon, 1913, No. 28, - 7 pages. .
In 1907, young artists Re-Mi (N.V. Remizov-Vasiliev), A. Radakov, A. Yunger, A. Yakovlev, Miss (A.V. Remizova) and the poet Krasny (K. M. Antipov). All of them were dissatisfied with the colorless, empty "Dragonfly" and persistently suggested that the publisher reform it. Oddly enough, Averchenko’s appearance seemed to serve as the final impetus for the cautious Kornfeld to agree.
On one of regular meetings The editors decided to turn Dragonfly from a humorous magazine into a satirical one, reflecting current events in social and political life in the country. They immediately came up with a different name for the magazine. It was suggested by Radakov. He remembered the famous ancient Roman novel "Satyricon" - a motley kaleidoscope of the nightmarish era of Nero, where the vivid details of life are intricately mixed with grotesque images of a dissolute, disgusting world. Its author reads Gaius Petronius Arbiter
I liked Radakov's proposal. The free presentation of events in Satyricon seemed to the editors a happy find: without constraining the author with any boundaries, it gave greater freedom to his creative imagination. The young editors of "Dragonfly" also found the author's position of the creator of "Satyricon" suitable: he treats the creepy and vulgar world as a calm observer, not a stranger to humor, and sometimes poisonous irony, but without feelings of sorrow or anger.
This is how the creative face of the new organ was determined. On April 3, 1908, instead of the boring Dragonfly, the satirical magazine Satyricon began to be published, which set itself the task of moral correction of society through satire on morals. And “Dragonfly” soon ceased to exist completely.
“Everyone who has recently been following the Dragonfly magazine, of course, paid attention to those more or less noticeable reforms that were gradually incorporated into the foundation of our magazine,” said one of her latest numbers. “And while steadily reforming Dragonfly, we simultaneously made an experiment in a broad sense - we founded new magazine"Satyricon". Currently, in view of the growing success of "Satyricon", we have decided to unite both editions from June 1." Averchenko A.T. Feuilletons. - M.: Strekoza, 1908, No. 21, - 2 pages.
Meanwhile, the time for satire to flourish was most inopportune. The first Russian revolution was suppressed. On June 3, 1907, Nicholas II, breaking the promises that he was forced to give to the people in the revolutionary days of 1905, dispersed the Second State Duma. A period of gloomy reaction began, which went down in history under the name “Stolypin”. Step by step, the “freedoms” won with blood were taken away.
“Those were the times,” Blok wrote, “when the tsarist government achieved what it wanted for the last time: Witte and Durnovo tied the revolution with a rope; Stolypin tightly wrapped this rope around his nervous noble hand.” A.A. Blok. Collection essays. - M.: Small book publishing house, 1962, - 9 pages.
And if, through the lips of Gogol, Russia complained: “it’s boring to live,” and in the 80s, following Chekhov, it said: “it’s sad to live,” now it could only moan: “it’s scary to live.”
Remembering the first days of the magazine’s life, one of its employees, V. Voinov, wrote:
That was in the time of Nicholas, In the time of royal undertakings, In the era of gallows, lashes, When from end to end there was an evil flock of stupid slaves.
The fire of the cause was blazing, choking the elders and children - That was here, in our capital, Where the cracks are devilishly cramped, Where stone dreams freeze, Where - thin, pale-faced - Intelligent wood lice wished for the joys of the morning and political spring.
Among the frowning creatures, dressed in a pink uniform, in the silent caverns of dark buildings - a little Satyr was born. Voinov V. On the brink. - M.: Red Laughter, 1917, No. 1, - 4 pages.
"Satyricon" appeared at a time when progressive satirical literature was finally strangled by censorship terror. The book market was dominated by proven “veterans” of Russian humor: “Alarm Clock”, “Oskolki” and “The Jester”. Remembering this, A. Averchenko wrote:
“It was as if a blood-red rocket took off in 1905. It soared, burst and scattered into hundreds of blood-red satirical magazines, so unexpected, frightening in their unusualness and eerie boldness. Everyone walked around with their heads raised in admiration and winking at each other at this bright rocket.” Here it is, freedom!... And when the foggy, bad morning came, at the place where the rocket took off, they found only a half-burnt paper tube tied to a stick - a bright symbol of every Russian step - whether forward or backward.
The last sparks of the rocket gradually faded back in 1906, and 1907 was already a year of complete darkness, gloom and despondency.
From the horizon represented by a newsboy's leather bag, such magnificent, invigorating names as “Machine Gun”, “Zarya”, “Bogey”, “Spectator”, “Zarevo” disappeared - and the quiet ones, previously driven into a corner, still took pride of place , peaceful "Birzhevye Vedomosti" and "Slovo".
During this period, everyone who had already become accustomed to the laughter, irony and caustic insolence of the “reds” in the color and content of the satirical magazines, again remained with the four old men, all of whom were about a hundred and fifty years old: with “Dragonfly”, “Alarm Clock”, “ Jester" and "Shards".
“When I arrived in St. Petersburg (this was at the beginning of 1908), the ominous faces of the “mother-in-law” and “merchant drunk at a masquerade”, “dacha resident oppressed by the dacha”, and other characters from Russian humorous films were already looking into the windows of the editorial offices. sheets of paper that had been feeding on this half-rotten rubbish for decades. The feast was over. The guests, intoxicated by free speeches, were taken to different stations, to various “transit stations”, “singles”, and were left sitting at a table drenched in wine and littered with scraps only - resigned: “country husband”, "evil mother-in-law" and "tipsy merchant at a masquerade."
What are called poor relatives. Thus, I arrived in the capital at the most unfortunate moment - not only for the hat analysis, but even towards the end of this hat analysis, when almost everyone had already received a hat." Averchenko A.T. Selected stories. - M.: New Satyricon, 1913, No. 28, - 6 pages.
The period of the Stolypin reaction and the years that followed it are notable precisely because they completed the process of delimitation of various groups within the Russian intelligentsia. A significant part of it, openly or secretly, went into the service of the bourgeoisie that had seized control; a small minority joined the movement of the proletariat. Finally, that part of her that wanted to remain “independent”, stubbornly believing in her “super-class” existence and saving mission, began to slowly perish or decay. By 1917, when the disengagement political parties reached the highest degree, the illusory nature of the “supra-class” position became obvious. But until this happened, this part of the intelligentsia stubbornly believed that its position was the only correct one and in every possible way glorified its “non-partisanship.”
All this should be remembered when speaking about the character and direction of the Satyricon. The disagreements that subsequently arose within the satiricon editorial staff clearly reflected the process of ideological delimitation of the Russian intelligentsia.
Nevertheless, at the beginning, Satyricon actively resisted two negative trends in the development of satire of that time: the wretched malice of Black Hundred humor and the shameless mockery of the street press. The editors of the new magazine have set themselves the goal of cheering up the despondent Russian society with the help of “resisting evil with laughter” or giving it “magic alcohol.”
The appearance of "Satyricon" became an event in the literary life of Stolypin's Russia. The reader, who had just experienced the era of “free speech,” urgently demanded from satirists topical responses to all the questions that worried him. Meanwhile, the last of the magazines glorifying the “political spring” is “ Gray wolf" - was banned in 1908 by order of the government. O. Dymov, S. Gorny, N. Verzhbitsky and other satirical writers collaborated with it.
The satiricists contrasted their creativity with the toothless humor of “The Jester,” “The Alarm Clock,” and “Oskolkov.” After the revolution of 1905-1907. The demand for these publications has completely fallen. The Russian public, who bought banned issues of “Machine Gun” and “Signal” under the counter, could no longer be satisfied with empty, frivolous humor. Making fun of his “neighbors” in satire, A. Averchenko defined their faces as follows:
"Alarm Clock": An old man with trembling hands, half-sighted, giggling with a creaky, causeless laugh. He comes out in an old man's robe with bright stains, and if you open this robe, then, like Plyushkin, you can see that there is nothing under the robe.
“The Jester,” who once shone among the dreary, colorless publications, has himself turned into a wretched clown, without the slightest sign of originality or a spark of wit. Now his decrepitude is premature, and his appearance is extremely sad."
And finally - "Fragments". Averchenko spoke about them even angrier:
“There was an honest, nice magazine in which Chekhov, Budishchev and others worked under Leikin. Now this is a cocotte who has fallen in her declining days, painted with cheap paints, joyless, with her primitive seduction with the help of a badly drawn leg or a dashingly drawn female thigh.” Averchenko A.T. Selected stories. - M.: Satyricon, 1908, No. 34, - 5-6 pp.
Naturally, the satiricists tried in every possible way to distance themselves from such literary brethren.
In the first issue of Satyricon the editors stated:
“We will bitingly and mercilessly scourge all the lawlessness, lies and vulgarity that reign in our political and social life. Laughter, terrible poisonous laughter, like the stings of scorpions, will be our weapon.” Black S. Red and white. - M.: Satyricon, 1908, No. 1, - 2 pages.
The first eight issues of the magazine were edited by A. Radakov, from the ninth issue A. Averchenko became the editor and soul of the magazine. Under his leadership, Satyricon turned into a publication born alive modern life. The Russian reader found on the pages of Satyricon an apt description of the political situation in Russia, a satirical depiction of social mores.
The magazine widely promoted foreign humor: English, French, German. "Satyricon" from issue to issue reprinted cartoons from German humor magazines: "Simplicissimus", "Fliegende Blatter", "Meggendorfers Blatter", "Kladderadatsch", "Jugend", etc. Therefore, contemporaries perceived "Satyricon" as a Russian "Simplicissimus".
