He was born on December 5, 1820 in the Novoselki estate of the Mtsensk district of the Oryol province, on November 30 he was baptized according to the Orthodox rite and named Athanasius.
Father - Oryol landowner, retired captain Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin. Mother - Charlotte Elizabeth Becker.
In 1834, the spiritual consistory canceled the baptismal record of Athanasius as the legitimate son of Shenshin and identified him as the father of Charlotte-Elizabeth's first husband, Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Fet. Together with the exclusion from the Shenshin family, Afanasy lost his hereditary nobility.
In 1835-1837, Athanasius studied at the German private boarding school Krimmer. At this time, he began to write poetry, to show interest in classical philology. In 1838 he entered Moscow University, first at the Faculty of Law, then at the Historical and Philological (Verbal) Department of the Faculty of Philosophy. Studied for 6 years: 1838-1844
During his studies, he began to publish in magazines. In 1840, a collection of Fet's poems "Lyrical Pantheon" was published with the participation of Apollon Grigoriev, Fet's friend from the university. In 1842 - publications in the magazines "Moskvityanin" and "Notes of the Fatherland".
After graduating from the university, Afanasy Fet in 1845 entered as a non-commissioned officer in the cuirassier regiment of the Military Order (its headquarters was in Novogeorgievsk, Kherson province), in which on August 14, 1846 he was promoted to cornet, and on December 6, 1851 - to staff captain.
In 1850, Fet's second collection was published, which received positive reviews from critics in the journals Sovremennik, Moskvityanin, and Otechestvennye Zapiski.
Seconded then (in 1853) to His Majesty's Lancers of the Life Guards, Fet was transferred to this regiment stationed near St. Petersburg with the rank of lieutenant. The poet often visited St. Petersburg, where Fet met with Turgenev, Nekrasov, Goncharov and others, as well as his rapprochement with the editors of the Sovremennik magazine.
During the Crimean War, he was in the Baltic Port as part of the troops guarding the Estonian coast.
In 1856, the third collection of Fet was published, edited by I. S. Turgenev.
In 1857, Fet married Maria Petrovna Botkina, the sister of the critic V.P. Botkin.
In 1858 he retired with the rank of Guards Staff Captain and settled in Moscow.
In 1860, using his wife's dowry, Fet bought the Stepanovka estate in the Mtsensk district of the Oryol province - 200 acres of arable land, a wooden master's one-story house with seven rooms and a kitchen. And over the next 17 years he was engaged in its development - he grew crops (primarily rye), launched a stud farm project, kept cows and sheep, poultry, bred bees and fish in a newly dug pond. After several years of farming, the current net profit from Stepanovka was 5-6 thousand rubles a year. The income from the estate was the main income of the Feta family.
In 1863, a two-volume collection of Fet's poems was published.
I am embarrassed more than once alone:
How can I write in current affairs?
I am between the crying Shenshin,
And Fet I am only among those who sing.
In 1867, Afanasy Fet was elected justice of the peace for 11 years.
In 1873, the nobility and the surname Shenshin were returned to Afanasy Fet. The poet continued to sign literary works and translations with the surname Fet.
In 1877, Fet sold Stepanovka and bought the old Vorobyovka estate in the Kursk province - a manor house on the banks of the Tuskar River, near the house - a century-old park of 18 acres, across the river - a village with arable land, 270 acres of forest three miles from the house.
In 1883-1891 - the publication of four issues of the collection "Evening Lights".
In 1890, Fet published the book My Memoirs, in which he talks about himself as a landowner. And after the death of the author, in 1893, another book with memoirs was published - “The Early Years of My Life”.
Fet died on November 21, 1892 in Moscow. According to some reports, his death from a heart attack was preceded by a suicide attempt. He was buried in the village of Kleymenovo, the Shenshin family estate.
Family
Father - Johann Peter Karl Wilhelm Vöth(Johann Peter Karl Wilhelm Föth) (1789-1826), assessor of the city court of Darmstadt, son of Johann Föth and Sibyl Milens. After his first wife left him, in 1824 he married the tutor of his daughter Carolina in a second marriage. He died in February 1826. On November 7, 1823, Charlotte-Elizabeth wrote a letter to her brother Ernst Becker in Darmstadt, in which she complained about her ex-husband Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Fet, who frightened her and offered to adopt her son Athanasius if his debts were paid. On August 25, 1825, Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker wrote a letter to her brother Ernst about how well Shenshin takes care of her son Athanasius: "no one will notice that this is not his blood child." In March 1826, she again wrote to her brother that her first husband, who had died a month ago, had not left her and the child money: “in order to take revenge on me and Shenshin, he forgot his own child, disinherited him and put a stain on him ... Try, if possible, to beg our dear father to help restore this child his rights and honor; he must get a surname ... "Then, in the following letter:" ... It is very surprising to me that Fet forgot in his will and did not recognize his son. A person can make mistakes, but to deny the laws of nature is a very big mistake. Apparently, before his death, he was quite sick ... ".
Mother - Elizaveta Petrovna Shenshina, nee Charlotte Elizabeth ( Charlotte Karlovna) Becker (1798-1844), daughter of the Darmstadt Ober-Kriegskomassar Karl-Wilhelm Becker (1766-1826) and his wife Henrietta Gagern. On May 18, 1818, the marriage of 20-year-old Charlotte-Elisabeth Becker and Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Vöth took place in Darmstadt. In 1820, a 45-year-old Russian landowner, a hereditary nobleman Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin, came to Darmstadt and stayed at the Fetov house. An affair broke out between him and Charlotte Elizabeth, despite the fact that the young woman was expecting a second child. On September 18, 1820, Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin and Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker secretly left for Russia. On November 23 (December 5), 1820, in the village of Novoselki, Mtsensk district, Oryol province, Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker had a son, who on November 30 was baptized according to the Orthodox rite and named Athanasius. In the register of births, he was recorded as the son of Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin. However, the couple got married only on September 4, 1822, after Charlotte Karlovna converted to Orthodoxy and became known as Elizaveta Petrovna Fet. On November 30, 1820, Afanasy was baptized according to the Orthodox rite and at birth was recorded (probably for a bribe) as the "legitimate" son of Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin and Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker. In 1834, when Afanasy Shenshin was 14 years old, a “mistake” in the documents was discovered, and he was deprived of his surname, nobility and Russian citizenship and became “Hessendarstadt subject Athanasius Fet”. In 1873, he officially regained the surname Shenshin, but continued to sign literary works and translations with the surname Fet (through "e").
stepfather - Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin(1775-1854), retired captain, wealthy Oryol landowner, Mtsensk district judge, son of Neofit Petrovich Shenshin (1750-1800s) and Anna Ivanovna Pryanishnikova. Mtsensk district marshal of the nobility. At the beginning of 1820 he was treated in Darmstadt, where he met Charlotte Vöth. In September 1820, he took her to Russia to his estate Novoselki, Mtsensk district, Oryol province, where A. A. Fet was born two months later. On September 4, 1822, they got married. Several more children were born in the marriage.
Sister - Karolina Petrovna Matveeva, nee Carolina-Charlotte-Georgina-Ernestine Feth (1819-1877), wife since 1844 of Alexander Pavlovich Matveev, whom she met in the summer of 1841 during her stay with her mother in Novoselki. A.P. Matveev was the son of a neighboring landowner Pavel Vasilyevich Matveev, a cousin of Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin. After several years of marriage, he got along with another woman, and Carolina and her son went abroad, where she lived for many years, formally remaining married to Matveev. Around 1875, after the death of Matveev's second wife, she returned to her husband. She died in 1877, according to the Becker family tradition, she was murdered.
half-sister - Lyubov Afanasyevna Shenshina, nee Shenshina (05/25/1824-?), married to her distant relative Alexander Nikitich Shenshin (1819-1872).
half-brother - Vasily Afanasyevich Shenshin(October 21, 1827-1860s), Oryol landowner, was married to Ekaterina Dmitrievna Mansurova, granddaughter of Novosilsk landowner Alexei Timofeevich Sergeev (1772-1853), cousin of V.P. Turgeneva. They had a daughter, Olga (1858-1942), in the marriage of Galakhov, who, after the death of her parents, remained under the care of her uncle Ivan Petrovich Borisov, and after his death - Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet. She was not only Fet's niece, but also a distant relative of I. S. Turgenev, after his death she turned out to be Spassky's only heiress.
half-sister - Nadezhda Afanasievna Borisova, nee Shenshina (09/11/1832-1869), married since January 1858 to Ivan Petrovich Borisov (1822-1871). Their only son, Peter (1858-1888), after the death of his father, was brought up in the family of A. A. Fet.
half-brother - Petr Afanasyevich Shenshin(1834-after 1875), went to Serbia in the autumn of 1875 in order to volunteer in the Serbian-Turkish war, but soon returned to Vorobyovka. However, he soon left for America, where his traces are lost.
Half-brothers and sisters - Anna (1821-1825), Vasily (1823-before 1827), who died in childhood. Perhaps there was another sister Anna (7.11.1830-?).
Wife (since August 16 (28), 1857) - Maria Petrovna Shenshina, nee Botkina (1828-1894), from the Botkin family. Her brothers were guarantors during the wedding: Nikolai Petrovich Botkin - for the groom, and Vasily Petrovich Botkin - for the bride; in addition, Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev was the guarantor for the bride.
Creation
Being one of the most sophisticated lyricists, Fet amazed his contemporaries by the fact that this did not prevent him from being an extremely businesslike, enterprising and successful landowner at the same time.
A famous phrase written by Fet and included in A. N. Tolstoy's "The Adventures of Pinocchio" is "A rose fell on Azor's paw."
Fet is a late romantic. Its three main themes are nature, love, art, united by the theme of beauty.
I came to you with greetings To tell you that the sun has risen, That it trembled with hot light On the sheets.
Translations
- both parts of Goethe's Faust (1882-83),
- a number of Latin poets:
- Horace, all of whose works in Fetov's translation were published in 1883,
- satires by Juvenal (1885),
- poems by Catullus (1886),
- elegies of Tibullus (1886),
- XV books of "Transformations" by Ovid (1887),
- "Aeneid" by Virgil (1888),
- elegy Propertius (1888),
- satires Persia (1889) and
- epigrams of Martial (1891).
Fet's plans included a new translation of the Bible into Russian, since he considered the synodal translation unsatisfactory, as well as the Critique of Pure Reason, but N. Strakhov dissuaded Fet from translating this book of Kant, pointing out that a Russian translation of this book already exists. After that, Fet turned to Schopenhauer's translation. He translated two works of Schopenhauer: The World as Will and Representation (1880, 2nd edition in 1888) and On the Fourfold Root of the Law of Sufficient Reason (1886).
Editions
- Fet A. A. Poems and poems / Entry. Art., comp. and note. B. Ya. Bukhshtaba. - L.: Owls. writer, 1986. - 752 p. (Library of the poet. Large series. Third edition.)
- Fet A. A. Collected works and letters in 20 vols. - Kursk: Publishing House of the Kursk State. un-ta, 2003-… (publication continues).
Memory
On May 25, 1997, a monument to the poet was unveiled in Orel on Saltykov-Shchedrin Street near the House of Writers.
Afanasy Fet, whose biography and work will be discussed below, is a very interesting person. His fate, which from the outside seems carefree and easy, is actually full of difficult episodes. And even the birth of the poet, his origin and sonship was shrouded in mystery for a long time.
background
Biography of Fet, no matter how strange it may sound, began long before the birth of the poet. In 1818, in distant Darmstadt, a young German girl, Charlotte-Elisabeth Becker, was legally married to a 29-year-old local court assessor, Johann Föth (Foeth). A year later, the couple had a daughter, Carolina. But the husband got into debt, began to mistreat his wife. How Charlotte met Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin in Darmstadt, who at that time was forty-five, is silent in the documents. What is clear is that on September 18, 1820, this couple crossed the Russian border. Two months later, on November 21 (December 3, according to the new style), Fet, who converted to Orthodoxy, had a son, Athanasius.
Childhood
What happened next? The poet Fet, whose biography began so scandalously, was recorded in the church metric book of the village of Novoselki (this is the Mtsensk district as the son of Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin. Until the age of 14, the boy bore this surname. Judging by the letters of his mother, who wrote to her brother Ernst in Darmstadt, his stepfather took care about Athanasius as a blood son.
The couple had three more children, two of whom died in infancy. Athanasius left only two sisters: the elder Karolina Fet and the younger Lyubov Shenshina. In 1824, Athanasius' blood father married the tutor of his eldest daughter and completely deleted his son from his will.
"Stain" of the illegitimate
When the boy was 14 years old, the secret of his origin was revealed, and he turned from a Russian citizen into a “Hessendarstadt subject” Athanasius Fet. The poet went through this very hard and all his life he sought the return of the Shenshin surname. He succeeded only in 1873. And Fet's creative biography began in a private boarding school for German boys "Krimmer" in Vyru (modern Estonia). There he became addicted to poetry and wrote his first poems.
Awakening Talent
However, Afanasy Fet did not immediately choose the creative path. In 1838, on the advice of his parents, he entered the University of Moscow in order to become a lawyer. But cramming laws, acts and various decrees was too tough for Athanasius, and he transferred to the department of history and philology. The first collection of poems was published when Fet was still sitting on the university bench, in 1840. He published his works in several magazines (these are Moskvityanin, Domestic Notes, and others). After a short military service, he was awarded the rank of officer. After the death of her beloved Maria Lazich, the biography of Fet A.A. has changed. He decided to pursue a military career.
glory coming
Already the first collections of poems were received favorably by Russian critics. He becomes a member of the literary circles of venerable writers, gets acquainted with Goncharov, Nekrasov, Turgenev and others. In the 1850s, he became close to the editors of the Sovremennik magazine. In 1857, the poet married Maria Botkina, the sister of a famous doctor, retired and settled in Moscow. Further, FetaA's biography. made a sharp turn in the direction of servility to the emperor. Athanasius broke with the Sovremennik magazine, which seemed to him too politicized, and devoted himself to the chanting of nature, weather, and female beauty. For which he was favored by the authorities. The venerable lyric poet and corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy in Moscow died in November 1892, on the 21st.
In memory of Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet (1820-1892)Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet is a famous Russian poet with German roots,lyricist,translator, author of memoirs. Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences of St. Petersburg
In the Oryol province, not far from the city of Mtsensk, in the 19th century, the Novoselki estate was located, where on December 5, 1820, in the house of a wealthy landowner Shenshin, a young woman, Charlotte-Elizabeth Bekker Fet, gave birth to a boy, Athanasius.
Charlotte Elisabeth was a Lutheran, lived in Germany and was married to Johann-Peter-Karl-Wilhelm Feth, an assessor at the Darmstadt city court. They got married in 1818, the girl Caroline-Charlotte-Dahlia-Ernestine was born in the family. And in 1820, Charlotte-Elizabeth Becker Fet left her little daughter and husband and left for Russia with Afanasy Neofitovich Shenshin, being seven months pregnant.
In the pastures of the dumb I love in the crackling frost
In the light of the sun, the brilliance of the sun is prickly,
Forests under hats or in gray hoarfrost
Yes, the river is sonorous under dark blue ice.
How they like to find thoughtful eyes
Winded ditches, winded mountains,
Sleepy blades of grass among the bare fields,
Where the hill is bizarre, like some kind of mausoleum,
Sculpted at midnight - or clouds of distant whirlwinds
On white shores and mirror polynyas.
Afanasy Neofitovich was a retired captain. During a trip abroad, he fell in love with the Lutheran Charlotte Elizabeth and married her. But since the Orthodox wedding ceremony was not performed, this marriage was considered legal only in Germany, and in Russia it was declared invalid. In 1822, the woman converted to Orthodoxy, becoming known as Elizaveta Petrovna Fet, and soon they married the landowner Shenshin.
When the boy was 14 years old, the Oryol provincial authorities discovered that Athanasius was registered with the surname Shenshin earlier than his mother.
I got married to my stepfather. In this regard, the guy was deprived of his surname and title of nobility. This hurt the teenager so deeply, because in an instant he turned from a rich heir into a nameless person, and then he suffered all his life because of his dual position.
From that time on, he bore the surname Fet, as the son of a foreigner unknown to him. Athanasius took this as a shame, and he had an obsession,which became decisive in his life path - to return the lost surname.
Athanasius received an excellent education. A capable boy was easy to learn. In 1837 he graduated from a private German boarding school in Verro, Estonia. Even then, Fet began to write poetry, showed interest in literature and classical philology. After school, in order to prepare for entering the university, he studied at the boarding house of Professor Pogodin, a writer, historian and journalist. In 1838, Afanasy Fet entered the law department, and then - the philosophical faculty of Moscow University, where he studied at the historical and philological (verbal) department.
wonderful picture,
How are you related to me?
white plain,
Full moon,
the light of the heavens above,
And shining snow
And distant sleigh
Lonely run.
At the university, Athanasius became close to the student Apollon Grigoriev, who was also fond of poetry. Together they began to attend a circle of students who were intensively engaged in philosophy and literature. With the participation of Grigoriev, Fet released his first collection of poems "Lyrical Pantheon". The creativity of the young student earned Belinsky's approval. And Gogol spoke of him as "an undoubted talent." This became a kind of "blessing" and inspired Afanasy Fet to further work. In 1842, his poems were published in many publications, including the popular journals Otechestvennye Zapiski and Moskvityanin. In 1844, Fet graduated from the university.
Spruce covered the path with my sleeve.
Wind. In the forest alone
Noisy, and creepy, and sad, and fun -
I do not understand anything.
Wind. All around is buzzing and swaying,
Leaves swirl at your feet.
Chu, there is suddenly heard in the distance
Subtly calling horn.
Sweet call to me herald copper!
Dead sheets to me!
It seems that the poor wanderer came from afar
You warmly greet.
After graduating from the university, Fet entered the army, he needed this in order to regain his title of nobility. He ended up in one of the southern regiments, from there he was sent to the Lancers Guards Regiment. And in 1854 he was transferred to the Baltic regiment (he later described this period of service in his memoirs "My Memoirs").
In 1858, Fet finished his service as a captain and settled in Moscow.
In 1850, the second book of poems was published.Feta, which was already positively criticized in the Sovremennik magazine, some even admired his work. After this collection, the author was received among famous Russian writers, which included Druzhinin, Nekrasov, Botkin, Turgenev. Literary earnings improved the financial situation of Fet, and he went to travel abroad.
In the poems of Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet, three main lines were clearly traced - love, art, nature. The following collections of his poems were published in 1856 (under the editorship of I. S. Turgenev) and in 1863 (immediately a two-volume collected works).
Despite the fact that Fet was a refined lyricist, he managed to perfectly manage economic affairs, buy and sell estates, making a fortune.
In 1860, Afanasy Fet bought the Stepanovka farm, became the owner, lived there all the time, only briefly appearing in Moscow in winter.
In 1877, Fet bought the Vorobyovka estate in the Kursk province. At 18
8
1 he bought a house in Moscow, he came to Vorobyovka only for summer vacations. He again took up creativity, wrote memoirs, translated, released another lyrical collection of poems "Evening Lights".
Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet left a significant mark on Russian literature. In the first verses, Fet sang the beauty of nature, wrote a lot about love. Even then, a characteristic feature appeared in his work - Fet spoke about important and eternal concepts in hints, knew how to convey the subtlest shades of mood, awakening pure and bright emotions in readers.
After the tragic deathsweetheartMaria Lazich Fet dedicated the poem "Talisman" to her. It is assumed that all subsequent poems by Fet about love are dedicated to her. In 1850 a second collection of his poems was published. It aroused the interest of critics, who did not skimp on positive reviews. Then Fet was recognized as one of the best contemporary poets.
The night shone. The garden was full of moonlight. lay
Beams at our feet in a living room with no lights.
The piano was all open, and the strings in it were trembling,
Like our hearts for your song.
You sang until dawn, exhausted in tears,
That you are alone - love, that there is no other love,
And so I wanted to live, so that, without dropping a sound,
Love you, hug and cry over you.
And many years have passed, languid and boring,
And in the silence of the night I hear your voice again,
And blows, as then, in these sonorous sighs,
That you are alone - all life, that you are alone - love.
That there are no insults of fate and hearts of burning flour,
And life has no end, and there is no other goal,
As soon as you believe in sobbing sounds,
Love you, hug and cry over you!
Afanasy Fet remained a staunch conservative and monarchist until the end of his life. In 1856 he published a third collection of poems. Fet sang beauty, considering it the only goal of creativity.
In 1863
the poet published a two-volume collection of poems, and then a twenty-year break came in his work.
Only after the surname of his stepfather and the privileges of a hereditary nobleman was returned to the poet, he took up creativity with renewed vigor.
Towards the end of his life, Afanasy Fet's poems became more philosophical. The poet wrote about the unity of man and the universe, about the highest reality, about eternity. In the period from 1883 to 1891 Fet wrote more than three hundred poems, they were included in the collection "Evening Lights". The poet published four editions of the collection, and the fifth came out after his death. With a thoughtful smile on his forehead.
About once upon a question of the questionnaire of the daughter of Leo Tolstoy Tatyana “How long would you like to live?” Fet replied: "The least long." Nevertheless, the writer had a long and very eventful life - he not only wrote many lyrical works, critical articles and memoirs, but also devoted whole years to agriculture, and apple marshmallow from his estate was even supplied to the imperial table.
Non-hereditary nobleman: childhood and youth of Athanasius Fet
Afanasy Fet in childhood. Photo: pitzmann.ru
Afanasy Fet was born in 1820 in the village of Novoselki near the city of Mtsensk, Oryol province. Until the age of 14, he bore the surname of his father, the wealthy landowner Athanasius Shenshin. As it turned out later, Shenshin's marriage to Charlotte Fet was illegal in Russia, since they got married only after the birth of their son, which the Orthodox Church categorically did not accept. Because of this, the young man was deprived of the privileges of a hereditary nobleman. He began to bear the name of his mother's first husband, Johann Fet.
Athanasius was educated at home. Basically, he was taught literacy and the alphabet not by professional teachers, but by valets, cooks, courtyards, and seminarians. But Fet absorbed most of his knowledge from the surrounding nature, the peasant way of life and rural life. He liked to communicate for a long time with the maids, who shared news, told tales and legends.
At the age of 14, the boy was sent to the German boarding school Krummer in the Estonian city of Vyru. It was there that he fell in love with the poetry of Alexander Pushkin. In 1837, young Fet arrived in Moscow, where he continued his studies at the boarding school of Professor of World History Mikhail Pogodin.
In quiet moments of complete carelessness, I seemed to feel the underwater rotation of flower spirals, trying to bring the flower to the surface; but in the end it turned out that only spirals of stems were striving outward, on which there were no flowers. I drew some verses on my slate board and erased them again, finding them meaningless.
From the memoirs of Afanasy Fet
In 1838, Fet entered the law faculty of Moscow University, but soon switched to the historical and philological department. From the first year he wrote poems that interested classmates. The young man decided to show them to Professor Pogodin, and he to the writer Nikolai Gogol. Soon Pogodin gave a review of the famous classic: "Gogol said this is an undoubted talent". The works of Fet and his friends were approved - the translator Irinarkh Vvedensky and the poet Apollon Grigoriev, to whom Fet moved from Pogodin's house. He recalled that "the house of the Grigorievs was the true cradle of my mental self." The two poets supported each other in their work and life.
In 1840, Fet's first collection of poems, Lyrical Pantheon, was published. It was published under the initials "A. F." It included ballads and elegies, idylls and epitaphs. The collection was liked by critics: Vissarion Belinsky, Pyotr Kudryavtsev and the poet Yevgeny Baratynsky. A year later, Fet's poems were already regularly published by Pogodin's magazine "Moskvityanin", and later by the magazine "Domestic Notes". In the last year, 85 Fetov's poems were published.
The idea to return the title of nobility did not leave Afanasy Fet, and he decided to enter the military service: the officer rank gave the right to hereditary nobility. In 1845, he was accepted as a non-commissioned officer in the Order's cuirassier regiment in the Chersonese province. A year later, Fet was promoted to cornet.
Well-known metropolitan author and "agronomist-master to the point of desperation"
Friedrich Mobius. Portrait of Maria Fet (detail). 1858. State Literary Museum, Moscow
In 1850, bypassing all the censorship committees, Fet released a second collection of poems, which was praised on the pages of major Russian magazines. By this time, he was transferred to the rank of lieutenant and quartered closer to the capital. In the Baltic port, Afanasy Fet participated in the Crimean campaign, whose troops guarded the Estonian coast.
In the last years of his life, Fet received public recognition. In 1884, for the translation of Horace's works, he became the first recipient of the full Pushkin Prize of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Two years later, the poet was elected its corresponding member. In 1888, Athanasius Fet was personally introduced to Emperor Alexander III and awarded the court title of chamberlain.
While still in Stepanovka, Fet began to write the book “My Memoirs”, where he talked about his life as a landowner. The memoirs cover the period from 1848 to 1889. The book was published in two volumes in 1890.
On December 3, 1892, Fet asked his wife to call a doctor, and in the meantime he dictated to his secretary: “I don’t understand the conscious increase in inevitable suffering. Volunteering towards the inevitable" and signed "Fet (Shenshin)". The writer died of a heart attack, but it is known that at first he tried to commit suicide by rushing after a steel stiletto. Afanasy Fet was buried in the village of Kleymenovo, the Shenshin family estate.
I was offended to see how indifferently the sad news was received even by those whom it most of all should have touched. How selfish we are! He was a strong man, fought all his life and achieved everything he wanted: he won a name, wealth, literary celebrity and a place in high society, even at court. He appreciated all this and enjoyed everything, but I am sure that his poems were dearest of all in the world and that he knew that their charm is incomparable, the very heights of poetry. The further, the more others will understand it.
From a letter from Nikolai Strakhov to Sofya Tolstoy, 1892
Already after the death of the writer, in 1893, the last volume of memoirs "The Early Years of My Life" was published. Fet also did not have time to release the volume that completes the cycle of poems “Evening Lights”. The works for this poetic book were included in the two-volume Lyric Poems, which was published in 1894 by Nikolai Strakhov and Grand Duke Konstantin Romanov.
Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet was born in 1820 in the Oryol province. He was the son of the landowner Shenshin and a German woman, whose last name was written in German Foeth. Their marriage, which took place abroad, was invalid in Russia. Thus, Fet was officially illegitimate and remained a foreign citizen until his majority. This discovery, which he made when he left home to study, was a cruel test for him, and he spent his whole life trying to obtain the rights of a nobleman and the name of his father. In the end, he achieved this in 1876, when he received "by the highest command" the right to bear the name Shenshin. However, in literature, he retained his former name until his death.
Afanasy Afanasyevich Fet (1820 - 1892). Portrait by I. Repin, 1882
Fet studied at a private educational institution in Livonia, and then in Moscow, where for some time he was a boarder with Pogodin which nearly starved him to death. Entering Moscow University, he turned out to be a classmate Apollon Grigoriev, in whose house he lived, paying for a stay. In 1840, at his own expense, he published a book of very immature poems, in which nothing foreshadowed the future great poet. But already in 1842 Fet published in Muscovite several poems that are still considered the best.
Afanasy Fet. Poetry and fate
After graduating from the university, he entered the military service and served for fifteen years in various cavalry regiments, firmly determined to achieve the officer rank that the nobility gave. But, unfortunately for him, during his service in the army, the rank necessary for the nobility was twice raised, and only in 1856, having become the captain of the guard, he was finally able to retire as he wanted - a Russian nobleman. After a short trip abroad, he married (without any sentimentality, very profitable) and acquired a small estate, thinking of making a fortune.
In the meantime, poetry made him a name, and in the late fifties he was a prominent figure in the literary world. He became friends with Turgenev and Tolstoy, who valued his common sense and did not blame him for his extreme secrecy. It is from Fet that we know the details of the famous quarrel between two great novelists. Subsequently, it was Fet who reconciled them. But here the younger generation of anti-aesthetic radicals, irritated by the apparently uncivil direction of his poetry and his rabidly reactionary predilections, launched a systematic campaign against him. In the end they managed to silence him by whistling and hooting; having printed the third edition of his poems in 1863, Fet disappeared from literature for twenty years. He lived on his estate, actively and successfully increasing his fortune and, as a justice of the peace, waging a stubborn struggle against the peasants for the interests of his own class. He gained fame as an extreme conservative and acquired a new, even better estate in the Kursk province. The main joys in his subsequent life were the return to him of his family name, the title of chamberlain, granted by Alexander III and the flattering attention of Grand Duke Constantine. In his relations with the royal family, Fet is a toady and a sycophant.
Although he stopped publishing poems after 1863, he never stopped writing them, and his poetic genius matured during a time of apparent silence. Finally, in 1883, he again appeared before the public and from that time began to publish small volumes under the general title Evening lights. He was never prolific as a poet and devoted his free time to broad undertakings of a more mechanical nature: writing three volumes of memoirs, translating his favorite Roman poets and his favorite philosopher Schopenhauer. Under the strong influence of Schopenhauer, Fet became a staunch atheist and anti-Christian. And when, in the seventy-second year of his life, his suffering from asthma became unbearable, he naturally thought about suicide. Relatives did everything to prevent him from fulfilling his intention, and watched him very closely. But Fet showed extraordinary perseverance. Once, left alone for a moment, he took possession of a blunt knife, but before he could use it, he died of a broken heart (1892).
