I. S. Turgenev “I want truth, not salvation ...”: - the Presidential Library’s collections dedicated to his 200th anniversary present

“Conversations and arguments with him relieved my feelings. It is gratifying to meet a person, whose original and characteristic opinion, clashing with yours, makes sparks ... ”, - writes Belinsky about Turgenev. This is quoted in the article by A. Smirnov “I. S. Turgenev” (1908) available on the Presidential Library’s portal.

November 9, 2018 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev (1818–1883), the leading figure of Russian literature, who left behind six novels, plays, many short stories, plenty of stories and unparalleled lyricism and originality of the genre of poems prose. Marking its anniversary, the Presidential Library will provide the richest collection “I. S. Turgenev”, in five sections of which it is available not only electronic copies of the writer's works, archival documents, modern research works about him, but also completely exclusive materials scattered in issues of the magazines Russky Vestnik, Nablyudatel, Russkaya Starina, Vestnik Evropy: "Critical articles about I. S. Turgenev and L. N. Tolstoy" by N. Strakhov (1885), "Turgenev in his works" by A. Nezelenov (1885), "I. S. Turgenev in the memoirs of the revolutionaries of the 70s" (1930), "Letters from I. S. Turgenev to Pauline Viardot" (1900) and others. 

The future writer was born in Orel in the family, the atmosphere of which can hardly be called prosperous. The father, who was married to the mistress of the estate Spasskoe-Lutovinovo of Mtsensk, never sought to be close to his son. “This marriage of a ruined Zhura was not one of the happy ones”, - writes A. Smirnov in the above-mentioned work “I. S. Turgenev”. – Turgenev’s mother, who was always the sovereign ruler of the house, personified the drunkenness of power that was created by serfdom. She lived in an environment of "beatings and tortures". She delighted with them and subjected them to her beloved son, Ivan Sergeevich. "They flapped me", -  said Turgenev, "for all sorts of nonsense almost every day". This is one of the reasons for "that deeply sad note that sounds in all the works of Turgenev, from the first to the last one".

What remained to an impressionable, over-the-years-old developed lad? The nature surrounding Spasskoe has become a refuge for him on gloomy days: woods, fishing, night-trips with peasant children were saved. The echoes of those early years fill his prose with the breath of native forests and fields. “This poetry does not catch bright shades in nature, major phenomena: on the contrary, it seems that it intentionally avoids them and catches subtle shades, follows nature in subtle, elusive phenomena with the attachment of a child to a nurse, with some superstitious adoration”, - notices Apollo Grigoriev in the Collected Works of Apollo Grigoriev available on the Presidential Library’s portal (1915).  

Starting to write, being a student at first Moscow, then Petersburg University, Turgenev quickly acquired a name in literature. The story in verses "Parasha" was published by a novice author in 1843. The publication evoked Belinsky’s enthusiastic response, who hurried to get familiar with the “Oryol talent”, especially appreciating in him a sense of humor: “Turgenev has a lot of humor. Once, in a dispute against me for the Germans, he said to me: “Why, a Russian man, who not only has his hat, but also has his own brain in a wrong way!” In general, he understands Rus’”. 

He understood it like no other. This was convinced by the readers of A Sportsman’s Sketches, published in early 1852. “The publication of a separate book“ notes ”against serfdom”, - writes A. Smirnov, “such an event was considered extremely undesirable, unacceptable”. Turgenev was sent by administrative order to reside in his estate Spasskoe-Lutovinovo "without the right to leave"".

According to Orest Miller in the study “Russian writers following Gogol” (1886), available in the electronic reading room of the Presidential Library, many people initially wondered how the censorship missed “A Sportsman’s Sketches”, the general meaning of which was reduced to denial of serfdom. “This fatal general meaning”, - Miller stresses, “of completely scattered and unintentionally truthful stories, was to discover all the unattractive aspects of the position of our common people under the serfdom of the landlords, along with quite a few quite attractive aspects of the character of a simple Russian, who knew how to be a man and in the most inhuman situation". 

Further, the author points out that Turgenev discovered all this in the forties, because “before that, our literature of the current century, represented by its large representatives, was somehow able to remain indifferent to all this. It is known that Pushkin almost did not approach the people from this side. Even in Gogol, he exhibited mainly in the most comic of his manifestations, the serfdom's ulcer was indicated only indirectly - by the inhuman vulgarity of our everyday life that was displayed in all its disgusting nudity - vulgarity, consisting in the ability to enjoy all the benefits, without adding even the smallest drops of labor".

The situation was complicated. The exiled, however, was not very discouraged. “Everything is for the better”, - wrote Ivan Sergeevich in his memoirs, quoted in an article by A. Smirnov “I. S. Turgenev“, - being under arrest in the village also brought me undoubted benefit: it brought me closer to such aspects of Russian life, which, in the ordinary course of things, would probably have escaped my attention”. 

"A Sportsman’s Sketches" finally consolidated Turgenev’s literary fame, and not only at home. “With Turgenev, there is a sharp turn in the attitude of Western European writers and society towards Russian literature. (Pushkin and Lermontov lost a lot when translating their poems into another language), - G. Aleksandrovsky wrote in his published lectures "Readings on the newer Russian literature" from the Presidential Library’s collections. - It was not the same with Turgenev. The brilliant art form, diverse, lively content, warmed by the soft light of high humane ideas, which are the shrine of all cultural humanity, immediately put it on a high pedestal in Western Europe. His writings <...> served as a kind of models, which were imitated by the representatives of naturalism in French literature. The influence of Turgenev on them is beyond doubt. Writers such as Maupassant, Zola, Flaubert, Goncourt, developed their aesthetic views, as some of them show, largely influenced by conversations with Turgenev and his works”.

Since 1847, Ivan Sergeevich lived for the most part abroad, mainly in Paris, where he became friends with the artistic couple Viardot. With the famous singer Pauline Viardot, the writer constantly corresponded during his or her departures from Paris. He spoke with her about the most important thing: “Whatever I am, I am my own ruler; I want truth, not salvation; I drink it from my mind, not from grace ... ”, - we read in the publication “Letters of I. S. Turgenev to Pauline Viardot”. “In the villa in Baden-Baden, presented to them by the singer Viardo-Garcia, Turgenev was visited by the German emperor Wilhelm and Prince Bismarck”, - writes N. Plissky in his biographical sketch “Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev”. “Although Turgenev was a “Westerner” but this did not prevent him from being a true Russian more than many of our compatriots who did not leave Russia”.

Ivan Sergeevich died on August 22 (September 3), 1883 in the place Bougival near Paris, tormented by a serious illness that was not diagnosed by doctors. According to the testimony of the critic and literary historian P. V. Annenkov, it was a confrontation between "an unimaginably painful affliction and an unimaginably strong organism". Only after the death of the writer, he was diagnosed with a cancer of the spine.

The writer’s death, who had thousands of fans, was a real shock for both France and Russia. About 500 people gathered at the Turgenev funeral in the Russian church in Paris, including famous writers and artists of that time. In accordance with the will of the deceased, his body was delivered to Petersburg. Even from the border station Verzhbolovo at all the stops of the funeral service memorial services with a large gathering of people served.

The writer was buried at the Literatorskye Mostki of the Volkovsky cemetery.