Leo Tolstoy dressed as a goat
The celebration of Christmas and New Year in the Tolstoy family was held on a grand scale: friends and acquaintances from the house came to Yasnaya Polyana, the children of the yard were also invited to the holiday. On Christmas Day, celebrated in the old fashioned way, on December 25, the Tolstoys held a masquerade ball. The writer’s wife, Sofya Andreevna, organized this event for the first time in 1865 to please her husband’s nieces, Lisa and Varya, and it soon became a tradition.
Tolstoy was skeptical of the Christmas festivities and stressed that they were not celebrated in a Christian way. “And the women go to church in this attire, look at each other, clean themselves. After that, they begin to break the fast, drink wine. And break the fast, they go to the courtyards to drink. And all week long drunkenness and debauchery begin. The birthday child is Jesus, but his devil they celebrate – they make him happy, ”the classic thought.
Sofya Andreevna recalled that at first Lev Nikolaevich forbade children to buy toys and decorate a Christmas tree, so they put an orange tree in its place. However, later the writer’s wife nevertheless persuaded him to complete the festival with New Year’s attributes. In 1870, Tolstoy succumbed to the Christmas mood. “Lev Nikolaevich jumped in the guise of a goat like a little boy,” Sofya Andreevna wrote in her diaries.
On New Year’s Eve Tolstoy celebrated in the family circle. According to the memoirs of the author’s granddaughter, Anna Tolstaya-Popova, on December 31, a dinner was held in Yasnaya Polyana and champagne was served, and Lev Nikolayevich contented himself with tea with almond milk. After the clock rang, the people in the hall celebrated each other’s new year.
“We live, therefore we die. To live well means to die well. New Year! “I wish myself and everyone a good death,” Tolstoy wrote in his diary in 1883.
Alexander Pushkin is bored
According to a beautiful legend, two years after his birth, at midnight on January 1, 1801, little Alexander Pushkin went into the living room, where adults were noisily celebrating the New Year. Seeing the boy, the mother of the classic took him in her arms and said: “Here is who crossed the threshold of the new century and who will live in it!”
As an adult, Pushkin often celebrated the New Year with friends, but not always with success. “I’m bored here … From morning to evening they have different people: actors, retired cavalrymen, students, lawyers, gypsies, spies, especially lenders. Yesterday Nashchokin gave us a gypsy night; I’m not so used to it that I still get a headache from the crying of the guests and the singing of the gypsies. Tosca, my angel,” he wrote to his wife in 1831.
Pushkin met his last year at the Karamzins’ home in 1837, and died a month later from a wound he received in a duel.
Fyodor Dostoevsky wanted a Christmas tree
Writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky loved to celebrate Christmas and New Year with his family and rejoiced like a child at every holiday. The wife of the classic, Anna Grigorievna, recalled that she was especially interested in the Christmas tree. “He asked me to buy a large and branched one, he decorated it himself (decorations passed from year to year),” Dostoyevskaya wrote.
In the diaries, the writer’s wife recalled an interesting event that happened to them in 1872. Then Dostoevsky gave the children gifts: his daughter – a doll and a children’s tea set, and his son – a pipe. The sled, on which two toy horses ran, also pleased the children. Fyodor the last loved the sleigh so much that the writer had to watch the boy playing the sledge in the middle of the night. It was impossible to put him to sleep – the boy immediately cried. And despite the fact that the son tired his father at Christmas, the author liked the holiday. “Fyodor Mikhailovich was perhaps more satisfied with the holiday than his children,” Dostoyevskaya emphasized.
The author of Crime and Punishment also took the family to church services and the children to the festive ball on Christmas Day. There, they say he danced with them merrily. On New Year’s Eve the Dostoevsky family was together, but sometimes they went to friends, acquaintances and relatives. “We were at the Golenovsky’s in the morning, and in the evening we were at the place where we celebrated the New Year. Dostoevsky’s younger brother Andrei, Brother Fyodor, was in a good mood, like all those who were there, and we returned home long after midnight, as befits the New Year’s meeting, ”recalled.
Anton Chekhov wanted to see Beelzebub
Dmitry Medvedev, “The New Year is just as ridiculous as the old one, the only difference is that the old year is bad, and the new one is always worse.” Graveyard” by Anton Chekhov. But Chekhov cannot be called the rival of the New Year and Christmas.
“There are holidays that have their own scent. At Easter, the Trinity, and Christmas, the air smells something special. Even non-believers love these holidays,” the satirist wrote.
And, for example, as a child, Chekhov looked forward to the Christmas holidays, when a stormy theatrical life and balls began for students of the Taganrog gymnasium. The author’s family also baked a Christmas cake in which they put a penny for the feast, and the one who received the money was considered lucky. Also, the festive table in the Chekhov family could not do without oranges, because at that time this citrus was more popular than tangerines.
As an adult, Chekhov preferred written congratulations to festivities and personal meetings. For example, the satirist wrote to his older brother Alexander: “I congratulate your family, as the New Year is coming soon, and I wish you all the best, but I wish you to see Beelzebub in a dream.”
Anna Akhmatova met 1945
When Christmas and New Year’s were banned in the 1920s, poet Anna Akhmatova preserved her Christian traditions. For example, researcher Lyudmila Tikhvinskaya said: “MK”That they decorated the Christmas tree with Japanese paper lanterns while Akhmatova was living with her third husband, Nikolai Punin. Punin mastered the origami technique during his trip to Japan and made these decorations alone with his children.
Memories of the Christmas tree, which was arranged in the house of the Punins in 1945, have also been preserved. It was very cold in the apartment that year, so those present did not take off their outer clothing. Despite the difficult times, the organizers of the holiday held a children’s meeting with Santa Claus, who distributed gifts to everyone. “And Anna Andreevna played a huge role in this, she really liked it, it warmed her heart. Punin’s granddaughter, Anna Kaminskaya, played with all the children.
Korney Chukovsky hated parties.
Author Korney Chukovsky said he has “an old hatred of table celebrations, anniversaries, parties, and banquets of all kinds.” And he spent most of the New Year holidays at his desk.
“Suddenly I woke up, ran to look at the clock; I get it: exactly 12 hours. Two minutes after he stood up, a ball rumbled and the church rang. New Year. I’ll sit for Konrad again – this finishes off the bun I got from Betz yesterday,” Chukovsky wrote.
The author of “Moidodyr” met once on January 1 at the Writers’ House. “I couldn’t sleep, so I went right away. Ltd! Longing – and old age – and orphanhood. I would forbid 40-year-olds to celebrate the New Year,” he reminded of the celebration.
Mikhail Bulgakov painted with lipstick
In 1937, Mikhail Bulgakov was at home with his last wife, Elena, and friends. “They burned the tree. There were gifts, surprises, big balloons, a masquerade, ”the wife wrote in her diaries. Bulgakova also spoke about an unusual New Year’s tradition: for each of those present at the home holiday, they specially bought a mug with the inscription “1936”, and later It had to be broken.
After the Bulgakovs handed out gifts to the children, they put on a show. For example, Bulgakov once wrote two scenes based on Dead Souls: one with Sobakevich, the other with Sergei Shilovsky. “For the role of Sergei, MA wore panties over Sergeyev’s coat, which barely reached his waist, and a sailor suit on his head. I put lipstick on my mouth, ”recalled the author’s wife. After the show, the Bulgakovs had dumplings and dessert for dinner.
Evgenia Ginzburg celebrated in prison
The suppressed Soviet journalist and writer Yevgenia Ginzburg met 1937 in prison for participating in a Trotskyist terrorist act. In his book The Steep Route. The history of the cult of personality “is the first New Year’s Eve in custody, she stressed.
“If only we knew then that we had at least seventeen in front of us! <…> A kind of sixth sense made us simultaneously reach out from under the prickly gray blankets and clink tin mugs and glasses in which fresh water was prepared in advance,” wrote Ginzburg.
According to the author, this festival was felt at that moment as a real Lucullus feast. “I solemnly read congratulatory poems to Yulia, and we fell asleep sweetly in New Year’s dreams,” concluded Ginzburg. The author spent a total of 10 years in prison and more than seven years in exile.