Maxim Gorky: “I am the true voice of life ...”

March 28, 2020 marks the 152nd anniversary of the birth of Maxim Gorky (Alexei Maximovich Peshkov by birth), one of the most famous Russian writers and thinkers in the world - this is evidenced by the circulation of books, a huge number of translations of the writer's works in the main languages ​​of the world and five times nomination for Nobel Prize for Literature. The extensive electronic collection of the Presidential Library Maxim Gorky (1868–1936), dedicated to the writer, includes literary works, correspondence, his own memoirs and memoirs of his contemporaries, photographs and much more.

Maxim Gorky was born in the family of cabinetmaker Maxim Peshkov and Varvara Peshkova (nee Kashirina). It is the house of grandfather Kashirin that will be depicted by the writer Maxim Gorky in the novel “Childhood”. Kashirin was in poverty, could not cope with his early matured grandson and sent him “to the people” (according to a textbook expression).

Alexei did not succeed in becoming apprentice shoemaker, draftsman, icon painter he left each of the three in turn and felt relatively safe, only finding himself on the ship as an assistant cook.

On the boat, Alexei finds for himself an unexpected mentor in the person of cook Mikhail Smurago. “This old non-commissioned officer, a colossus of amazing strength and a very grumpy man, had a passion for reading. He had a dilapidated chest full of books: it was a mixed library where Gogol and Nekrasov occupied a place along with the lives of the saints, the Stone of Faith, folk novels and excerpts from Russian history”, - writes I. E. Poritsky in the book Maxim Gorky abroad. book 1 (M. Gorky, critical study). This first meeting with the library turned the life of a teenager upside down. Reading has become a passion. And later it pushed for writing to Alyosha Peshkov, who took in his memory of his father the literary pseudonym Maxim Gorky.

G. V. Aleksandrovsky, exploring the life and career of the writer in the book Maxim Gorky and his works (1900), available on the Presidential Library’s portal, continues the theme of the “universities” of the future writer and gives a quote from his autobiography: ““After 15 For years I had a fierce desire to study, for what purpose I went to Kazan, assuming that science was taught with a willing gift". But this assumption did not come true, and Gorky relinquished his ideas about science and entered a pretzel institution for three rubles a month”.  

It was the hardest time in his life. Aleksei was a hut at the mouth of a great river (it is no coincidence that Repin later invited him to pose for the painting “Haulers on the Volga”), sawed firewood, carried cargo, sold apples, served as a railway watchman, and read books that accidentally fell into his hands in his spare time.

Having found himself in railway workshops in Tiflis, Gorky wrote in fits and starts his story Makar Chudra, published in 1892 in the Kavkaz newspaper. Returning to his homeland, the novice author collaborated in various Volga publications until he met with V. G. Korolenko. “He did a lot for me”, - writes Gorky, - he pointed out a lot, taught a lot; I owe him that I got into great literature”.

In early 20th century, the writer decided to try himself in drama. He writes the plays “The Lower depths”, “Egor Bulychev and Others”, “Thomas Gordeev”, “Vassa Zheleznova”, “Summer Residents” and others - they are enthusiastically accepted not only in Russia but also in Europe.

The Great October Revolution found Maxim Gorky in Petrograd. The writer, of course, understood its catastrophic inevitability, looked at what was happening around very closely. In the article “Untimely Thoughts” (1918), he warned: “The great happiness of freedom should not be overshadowed by crimes against the individual, otherwise we will kill freedom with our own hands”.

For various reasons, the writer spent more than 18 years in exile, 15 of them in Italy. In 1932, he finally returned to the USSR.

Over the last years, Alexei Maksimovich wrote "The Life of Klim Samgin", the work on the novel continued for 11 years. This epic novel is the largest, final work of the writer.

One of the students of Alexei Maksimovich D. N. Semenovsky in the publication A. M. Gorky. Letters and Meetings (1938), available on the Presidential Library’s portal, sums up: “In the person of Maxim Gorky, we are dealing with a literary phenomenon that is highly original. His views and attitude to the surrounding reality were created quite distinctively, without the influence of any “systems” or “teachings”... Together with the hero of the story “Man” Gorky can say: “I am the true voice of life, the rude cry of those who stayed there below, releasing me to testify of their suffering".