Where did Mayakovsky study? Death of Mayakovsky: the tragic ending of the poet

Vladimir Mayakovsky is a famous Russian Soviet poet, playwright, director and actor. Considered one of the greatest poets of the 20th century.

During his short life, Mayakovsky managed to leave behind a large literary heritage, distinguished by a clearly defined style. He was the first to write poetry using the famous “ladder”, which became his “calling card”.

There, Vladimir continues his studies at the gymnasium, but soon he has to leave it because his mother did not have the funds to pay for the education.

Mayakovsky and revolution

After moving to Moscow, Mayakovsky made many revolutionary friends. This led to his joining the RSDLP workers' party in 1908.

The young man sincerely believed in the correctness of his views and did everything possible to promote revolutionary ideas to other people. In this regard, Mayakovsky was arrested several times, but each time he managed to avoid imprisonment.

Later, he was nevertheless sent to Butyrka prison, since he did not stop his propaganda activities, openly criticizing the tsarist government.

An interesting fact is that it was in “Butyrka” that Vladimir Mayakovsky began to write the first poems in his biography.

Less than a year later he was released, after which he immediately left the party.

Mayakovsky's work

On the advice of one of his friends, in 1911, Vladimir Mayakovsky entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture - the only place where he was accepted without a certificate of trustworthiness.

It was then that the most important event took place in Mayakovsky’s biography: he became acquainted with futurism - a new direction in art, from which he immediately became delighted.

In the future, futurism will become the basis of all Mayakovsky’s work.

Soon several poems come out from his pen, which the poet reads among his friends.

Later, Mayakovsky, together with a group of cubo-futurists, goes on tour around the city, where he gives lectures and his works. When he heard Mayakovsky's poems, he praised Vladimir, and even called him the only true poet among the futurists.

Feeling confident in his abilities, Mayakovsky continued to engage in writing.

Works by Mayakovsky

In 1913, Mayakovsky published his first collection “I”. An interesting fact is that there were only 4 poems in it. In his works he openly criticized the bourgeoisie.

However, in parallel with this, sensual and tender poems periodically appeared from his pen.

On the eve of the First World War (1914-1918), the poet decides to try himself as a playwright. Soon he will present the first tragic play in his biography, “Vladimir Mayakovsky,” which will be staged on the theater stage.

As soon as the war began, Mayakovsky volunteered for the army, but was not accepted into its ranks for political reasons. Apparently the authorities were afraid that the poet might become the initiator of some kind of unrest.

As a result, the offended Mayakovsky wrote the poem “To You,” in which he criticized the tsarist army and its leadership. Later, 2 magnificent works “Cloud in Pants” and “War Declared” came from his pen.

At the height of the war, Vladimir Mayakovsky met the Brik family. After that, he met with Lilya and Osip very often.

It is interesting that it was Osip who helped the young poet publish some of his poems. Then 2 collections were published: “Simple as a Moo” and “Revolution. Poetochronika".

When the October Revolution was brewing in 1917, Mayakovsky met it at the headquarters in Smolny. He was delighted with the events that took place and helped the Bolsheviks, whose leader he was, in every possible way.

During the biography of 1917‑1918. he composed many poems dedicated to revolutionary events.

After the end of the war, Vladimir Mayakovsky became interested in cinema. He created 3 films in which he acted as a director, screenwriter and actor.

In parallel with this, he painted propaganda posters, and also worked in the publication “Art of the Commune”. Then he became editor of the magazine “Left Front” (“LEF”).

In addition, Mayakovsky continued to write new works, many of which he read on stages in front of the public. It is interesting that during the reading of the poem “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” at the Bolshoi Theater, he himself was present in the hall.

According to the poet’s recollections, the years of the civil war turned out to be the happiest and most memorable of his entire biography.

Having become a popular writer in Russia, Vladimir Mayakovsky visited several countries, including the USA.

At the end of the 20s, the writer wrote satirical plays “The Bedbug” and “Bathhouse”, which were to be staged at the Meyerhold Theater. These works received many negative reviews from critics. Some newspapers even carried headlines “Down with Mayakovism!”

In 1930, his colleagues accused the poet of allegedly not being a real “proletarian writer.” However, despite the continuous criticism against him, Mayakovsky nevertheless organized the exhibition “20 Years of Work”, in which he decided to sum up his creative biography.

As a result, not a single poet from LEF came to the exhibition, nor, indeed, a single representative of the Soviet government. For Mayakovsky this was a real blow.

Mayakovsky and Yesenin

In Russia, there was an irreconcilable creative struggle between Mayakovsky.

Unlike Mayakovsky, Yesenin belonged to a different literary movement - imagism, whose representatives were the sworn “enemies” of the futurists.

Mayakovsky extolled the ideas of revolution and the city, while Yesenin paid attention to the countryside and the common people.

It is worth noting that although Mayakovsky had a negative attitude towards his opponent’s work, he recognized his talent.

Personal life

The only and true love of Mayakovsky’s life was Lilya Brik, whom he first saw in 1915.

Once upon a visit to the Brik family, the poet read the poem “A Cloud in Pants”, after which he announced that he was dedicating it to Lila. The poet later called this day “the most joyful date.”

Soon they began dating in secret from her husband Osip Brik. However, it was impossible to hide my feelings.

Vladimir Mayakovsky dedicated many poems to his beloved, among which was his famous poem “Lilichka!” When Osip Brik realized that an affair had begun between the poet and his wife, he decided not to interfere with them.

Then there was a very unusual period in Mayakovsky’s biography.

The fact is that since the summer of 1918, the poet and Briki lived together, the three of them. It should be noted that this fit well into the concept of marriage and love that was popular after the revolution.

They were developed a little later.

Mayakovsky provided the Brik spouses with financial support, and also regularly gave Lila expensive gifts.

One day he gave her a Renault car, which he brought from Paris. And although the poet was crazy about Lily Brik, there were many mistresses in his biography.

He was in a close relationship with Liliya Lavinskaya, from whom he had a boy, Gleb-Nikita. Then he had an affair with Russian emigrant Ellie Jones, who gave birth to his girl Helen-Patricia.

After that, his biography included Sofya Shamardina and Natalya Bryukhanenko.

Shortly before his death, Vladimir Mayakovsky met with emigrant Tatyana Yakovleva, with whom he even planned to connect his life.

He wanted to live with her in Moscow, but Tatyana was against it. In turn, the poet could not go to see her in France due to problems with obtaining a visa.

The next girl in Mayakovsky’s biography was Veronica Polonskaya, who was married at that time. Vladimir tried to persuade her to leave her husband and start living with him, but Veronica did not dare to take such a step.

As a result, quarrels and misunderstandings began to occur between them. It is interesting that Polonskaya was the last person to see Mayakovsky alive.

When the poet begged her to stay with him during their last meeting, she decided to go to a rehearsal at the theater instead. But as soon as the girl walked out the threshold, she heard a shot.

She did not have the courage to come to Mayakovsky’s funeral, because she understood that the writer’s relatives considered her to be the culprit in the poet’s death.

Death of Mayakovsky

In 1930, Vladimir Mayakovsky was often ill and had problems with his voice. At this period of his biography, he was left completely alone, since the Brik family went abroad. In addition, he continued to hear constant criticism from his colleagues.

As a result of these circumstances, on April 14, 1930, Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky fired a fatal shot into his chest. He was only 36 years old.

A couple of days before his suicide, he wrote a suicide note, which contained the following lines: “Don’t blame anyone for the fact that I’m dying, and please don’t gossip, the deceased didn’t like it terribly...”

In the same note, Mayakovsky calls Lilya Brik, Veronica Polonskaya, mother and sisters members of his family and asks to transfer all the poems and archives to the Briks.

After Mayakovsky’s death, for three days, amid an endless stream of people, a farewell to the body of the proletarian genius took place in the House of Writers.

Tens of thousands of admirers of his talent escorted the poet to the Donskoye Cemetery in an iron coffin while the Internationale was sung. The body was then cremated.

The urn with Mayakovsky's ashes was moved from the Donskoye Cemetery on May 22, 1952 and buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery.

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Russian Soviet poet, prominent futurist; one of the greatest poets of the 20th century; In addition to poetry, he clearly distinguished himself as a playwright, screenwriter, film director, film actor, artist, editor of the magazines “LEF” (“Left Front”), “New LEF”

Vladimir Mayakovsky

Brief biography

- Russian, Soviet poet, a bright personality of avant-garde art of the 10-20s of the last century, who showed himself as an artist, playwright, screenwriter, film director, film actor, publisher. His work, largely reformatory in terms of poetics and the use of linguistic means, had a significant influence on the poetry of the 20th century.

V.V. Mayakovsky was born in Georgia (Kutaisi province, village of Baghdadi) on July 19 (July 7, O.S.), 1893. Both his father and mother were descendants of Cossack families; his father, a nobleman by birth, served as a forester. During 1902-1906. Mayakovsky is a student of the Kutaisi gymnasium. After the family moved to Moscow in 1906, associated with the death of his father, Vladimir entered the local classical gymnasium, 4th grade, but in March 1908 he was expelled from 5th grade due to non-payment of tuition.

The future poet's further education was related to art. In 1908, he was among the students in the preparatory class of the Stroganov Art and Industrial School. At the same time, Mayakovsky actively contacted revolutionary youth and joined the ranks of the RSDLP. In July 1909 until January 1910 he was sent to Butyrka prison; In the dungeons, he composed poems and wrote them down in a notebook (not preserved) - from it the poet himself began counting his literary activity.

Determined to “make socialist art,” Vladimir Mayakovsky in 1911 became a student in the figure class of the School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Within its walls, the future poet had a largely fateful acquaintance with the organizer of the futuristic group “Gilea” D. Burliuk. It was in the almanac of this group - “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste” - that in December 1912 Mayakovsky made his literary debut with the poems “Morning” and “Night”. In the same publication, a manifesto of representatives of Russian Cubo-Futurists was published, in which the artists of words rejected the creative heritage of national literature. Among those who signed this program document was Mayakovsky.

In 1913, the poet published his first small collection of poems entitled “I”, wrote the tragedy “Vladimir Mayakovsky”, which was of a programmatic nature (he himself acted as the director of the production and the leading actor), and also traveled around the cities and towns of Russia as part of a group of futurists . Public speaking became the reason for his expulsion from the school. During 1915-1917. Vladimir Mayakovsky does military service at the Petrograd Automotive Training School, and at the same time composes poetry and poems, in particular, “Cloud in Pants”, “Man”, etc. In 1916, the first major collection “Simple as a Moo” was published.

In July 1915, an event occurred that turned out to be very significant in the biography of Vladimir Mayakovsky - his acquaintance with Lilya Brik, a married woman who was his muse almost all his life. They, as well as Lily’s husband Osip, had a complex relationship, which more than once became the cause of strong emotions for the poet.

The October Revolution of 1917 was greeted by Mayakovsky with joy and enthusiasm. He saw in radical social changes fair retribution for the humiliations and insults experienced by people in their “former” life, the path to the establishment of heaven on earth. His work in these years acquired a new social and aesthetic meaning. In the poet’s opinion, the futurist direction in art is consonant with the activities of the working class and the Bolsheviks leading it.

Mayakovsky supports the young state and the values ​​it proclaims with the artistic means available to him. In 1918, the poet became the organizer of the group “Comfut” (“Communist Futurism”), actively collaborated with the newspaper “Art of the Commune”, and in 1922 - the publishing house MAF (Moscow Association of Futurists). In 1919, he moved to Moscow and for three years, until 1921, he worked at Windows of ROSTA, producing propaganda and satirical posters with poetic lines. In total, during this period he authored about 1,100 such “windows”. In 1923, Vladimir Vladimirovich was the founder of the “Left Front of the Arts” (LEF), under whose auspices writers and artists who hold similar aesthetic positions gather. During 1923-1925. he acts as the publisher of the magazine “LEF” (during 1927-1928 the magazine was restored under the name “New LEF”). The years of the civil war were the best time in his life, according to the poet himself.

During 1922-1924. Mayakovsky undertakes a number of trips abroad, in particular to Germany and France; in 1925 he visited various cities in the USA, reading reports and his works. Impressions of travel in Europe and America formed the basis for a number of poems and essays, in particular, the poetic cycles “Paris” (1924-1925), “Poems about America” (1925-1926). The period from 1925 to 1928 is marked in the biography by a large number of Mayakovsky’s trips around the Soviet Union and public appearances in front of a wide variety of listeners.

This time was very fruitful creatively, however, at the end of the 20s, Mayakovsky experienced a deep internal conflict. The ideals of the revolution, which he lived by from a young age, on which he relied in building his private life, from his creative position to his manner of dressing, were in conflict with reality - social, political, everyday. With all the power of his uncompromising talent, Mayakovsky attacked a society that betrayed revolutionary values, became bourgeois, and began to wallow in the abyss of formalism (the comedies “The Bedbug” (1928), “Bathhouse” (1929)). He became too inconvenient and was subject to criticism, which considered him not a proletarian writer, as the poet perceived himself, but a temporary “fellow traveler.” When organizing an exhibition dedicated to the 20th anniversary of his creative activity, Mayakovsky faced insurmountable obstacles.

Joining the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers in February 1930 did not find understanding among his friends and like-minded people. The atmosphere of persecution and alienation in which the poet found himself was made even more unbearable by the problems in his personal life associated with his last passion, Veronica Polonskaya.

Against the confluence of all unfavorable circumstances, against the imperfect laws of this world, the poet-rebel protested for the last time, committing suicide on April 14, 1930. The ashes of the “agitator, loudmouth leader” who shot himself first rested at the New Donskoy Cemetery in May 1952. he was reburied at the Novodevichy cemetery.

Biography from Wikipedia

Vladimir Mayakovsky born in the village of Bagdati, Kutaisi province (in Soviet times the village was called Mayakovsky) in Georgia, in the family of Vladimir Konstantinovich Mayakovsky (1857-1906), who served as a third-class forester in the Erivan province, from 1889 in the Bagdat forestry. The poet's mother, Alexandra Alekseevna Pavlenko (1867-1954), from a family of Kuban Cossacks, was born in Kuban, in the village of Ternovskaya. In the poem “Vladikavkaz - Tiflis” of 1924, Mayakovsky calls himself a “Georgian”. One of the grandmothers, Efrosinya Osipovna Danilevskaya, is the cousin of the author of historical novels G. P. Danilevsky. The future poet had two sisters: Lyudmila (1884-1972) and Olga (1890-1949), and two brothers: Konstantin (died at the age of three from scarlet fever) and Alexander (died in infancy).

In 1902, Mayakovsky entered the gymnasium in Kutaisi. Like his parents, he was fluent in Georgian. He took part in a revolutionary demonstration and read propaganda brochures. In February 1906, his father died of blood poisoning after pricking his finger with a needle while stitching papers. Since then, Mayakovsky could not stand pins and hairpins, and bacteriophobia remained a lifelong one.

In July of the same year, Mayakovsky, along with his mother and sisters, moved to Moscow, where he entered the fourth grade of the 5th classical gymnasium (now Moscow school No. 91 on Povarskaya Street, the building has not survived), where he studied in the same class with his brother B.L. Pasternak Shura. The family lived in poverty. In March 1908, he was expelled from the 5th grade due to non-payment of tuition.

Mayakovsky published his first “half-poem” in the illegal magazine “Rush,” which was published by the Third Gymnasium. According to him, " it turned out incredibly revolutionary and equally ugly».

In Moscow, Mayakovsky met revolutionary-minded students, began to become interested in Marxist literature, and in 1908 joined the RSDLP. He was a propagandist in the commercial and industrial subdistrict, and in 1908-1909 he was arrested three times (in the case of an underground printing house, on suspicion of connections with a group of anarchist expropriators, on suspicion of aiding the escape of female political prisoners from Novinsky prison). In the first case, he was released under the supervision of his parents by a court verdict as a minor who acted “without understanding”; in the second and third cases, he was released due to lack of evidence.

In prison, Mayakovsky was a “scandal,” so he was often transferred from unit to unit: Basmannaya, Meshchanskaya, Myasnitskaya and, finally, Butyrskaya prison, where he spent 11 months in solitary confinement No. 103.

In prison in 1909, Mayakovsky began writing poetry again, but was dissatisfied with what he wrote. In his memoirs he writes:

It came out stilted and tearful. Something like:

The forests dressed in gold and purple,
The sun played on the heads of the churches.
I waited: but the days were lost in the months,
Hundreds of tedious days.

I filled a whole notebook with this. Thanks to the guards - they took me away when I left. Otherwise I would have printed it!

- “I myself” (1922-1928)

Despite such a critical attitude, Mayakovsky calculated the beginning of his creativity from this notebook.

After his third arrest, he was released from prison in January 1910. After his release, he left the party. In 1918 he wrote in his autobiography: “ Why not in the party? Communists worked at the fronts. In art and education there are still compromisers. I would have been sent to fish in Astrakhan».

In 1911, the poet’s friend, bohemian artist Eugenia Lang, inspired the poet to take up painting.

Mayakovsky studied in the preparatory class of the Stroganov School, in the studios of artists S. Yu. Zhukovsky and P. I. Kelin. In 1911, he entered the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture - the only place where he was admitted without a certificate of trustworthiness. Having met David Burliuk, the founder of the futurist group "Gilea", he entered the poetic circle and joined the Cubo-Futurists. The first published poem was called “Night” (1912), it was included in the futuristic collection “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste.”

On November 30, 1912, Mayakovsky’s first public performance took place in the artistic basement “Stray Dog”.

In 1913, Mayakovsky’s first collection “I” (a cycle of four poems) was published. It was written by hand, provided with drawings by Vasily Chekrygin and Lev Zhegin and reproduced lithographically in the amount of 300 copies. As the first section, this collection was included in the poet’s book of poems “Simple as a Moo” (1916). His poems also appeared on the pages of futurist almanacs “Mares’ Milk”, “Dead Moon”, “Roaring Parnassus”, etc., and began to be published in periodicals.

In the same year, the poet turned to drama. The program tragedy “Vladimir Mayakovsky” was written and staged. The scenery for it was written by artists from the “Youth Union” P. N. Filonov and I. S. Shkolnik, and the author himself acted as director and leading actor.

In February 1914, Mayakovsky and Burliuk were expelled from the school for public speaking. In 1914-1915, Mayakovsky worked on the poem “A Cloud in Pants”. After the outbreak of the First World War, the poem “War Has Been Declared” was published. In August, Mayakovsky decided to sign up as a volunteer, but he was not allowed, explaining this as political unreliability. Soon Mayakovsky expressed his attitude towards serving in the tsarist army in the poem “To you!”, which later became a song.

V.V. Mayakovsky in 1930

On March 29, 1914, Mayakovsky, together with Burliuk and Kamensky, arrived on tour in Baku - as part of the “famous Moscow futurists.” That evening, at the Mailov Brothers Theater, Mayakovsky read a report on futurism, illustrating it with poetry.

In July 1915, the poet met Lilya Yuryevna and Osip Maksimovich Brik. In 1915-1917, Mayakovsky, under the patronage of Maxim Gorky, served in Petrograd at the Automotive Training School. Soldiers were not allowed to publish, but he was saved by Osip Brik, who bought the poems “Spine Flute” and “Cloud in Pants” for 50 kopecks per line and published them. Anti-war lyrics: “Mom and the evening killed by the Germans”, “Me and Napoleon”, poem “War and Peace” (1915). Appeal to satire. The cycle “Hymns” for the magazine “New Satyricon” (1915). In 1916, the first large collection “Simple as a Moo” was published. 1917 - “Revolution. Poetochronika".

On March 3, 1917, Mayakovsky led a detachment of 7 soldiers who arrested the commander of the Automotive Training School, General P. I. Sekretev. It is curious that shortly before this, on January 31, Mayakovsky received a silver medal “For Diligence” from the hands of Sekretev. During the summer of 1917, Mayakovsky energetically worked to have him declared unfit for military service and was released from it in the fall.

In 1918, Mayakovsky starred in three films based on his own scripts. In August 1917, he decided to write “Mystery Bouffe”, which was completed on October 25, 1918 and staged for the anniversary of the revolution (dir. Vs. Meyerhold, art director K. Malevich)

On December 17, 1918, the poet first read the poem “Left March” from the stage of the Matrossky Theater. In March 1919, he moved to Moscow, began actively collaborating with ROSTA (1919-1921), and designed (as a poet and as an artist) propaganda and satirical posters for ROSTA (“Windows of ROSTA”). In 1919, the first collection of the poet’s works was published - “Everything written by Vladimir Mayakovsky. 1909-1919". In 1918-1919 he appeared in the newspaper “Art of the Commune”. Propaganda of world revolution and revolution of spirit. In 1920, he finished writing the poem “150,000,000,” which reflects the theme of world revolution.

In 1918, Mayakovsky organized the group “Comfut” (communist futurism), and in 1922 - the publishing house MAF (Moscow Association of Futurists), which published several of his books. In 1923 he organized the LEF group (Left Front of the Arts), the thick magazine LEF (seven issues were published in 1923-1925). Aseev, Pasternak, Osip Brik, B. Arvatov, N. Chuzhak, Tretyakov, Levidov, Shklovsky and others actively published. He promoted Lef’s theories of production art, social order, and literature of fact. At this time, the poems “About This” (1923), “To the workers of Kursk who mined the first ore, a temporary monument to the work of Vladimir Mayakovsky” (1923) and “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” (1924) were published. When the author read a poem about Lenin at the Bolshoi Theater, which was accompanied by a 20-minute ovation, Stalin was present. Mayakovsky mentioned the “leader of the peoples” himself in his poems only twice.

Mayakovsky considers the years of the civil war to be the best time in his life; in the poem “Good!”, written in the prosperous year of 1927, there are nostalgic chapters.

In 1922-1923, in a number of works he continued to insist on the need for a world revolution and a revolution of the spirit - “The Fourth International”, “The Fifth International”, “My Speech at the Genoa Conference”, etc.

In 1922-1924, Mayakovsky made several trips abroad - Latvia, France, Germany; wrote essays and poems about European impressions: “How does a democratic republic work?” (1922); “Paris (Conversations with the Eiffel Tower)” (1923) and a number of others. In 1925, his longest journey took place: a trip across America. Mayakovsky visited Havana, Mexico City and for three months spoke in various cities of the United States, reading poems and reports. Later, poems were written (the collection “Spain. - Ocean. - Havana. - Mexico. - America”) and the essay “My Discovery of America.” In 1925-1928, he traveled extensively throughout the Soviet Union and performed in a variety of audiences. During these years, the poet published such works as “To Comrade Nette, the Ship and the Man” (1926); “Through the Cities of the Union” (1927); “The story of the foundry worker Ivan Kozyrev...” (1928). From February 17 to February 24, 1926, Mayakovsky visited Baku, performed at the opera and drama theaters, and before oil workers in Balakhany.

In 1922-1926 he actively collaborated with Izvestia, in 1926-1929 - with Komsomolskaya Pravda. He was published in magazines: “New World”, “Young Guard”, “Ogonyok”, “Crocodile”, “Krasnaya Niva”, etc. He worked in agitation and advertising, for which he was criticized by Pasternak, Kataev, Svetlov.

In 1926-1927 he wrote nine film scripts.

In 1927, he restored the LEF magazine under the name “New LEF”. A total of 24 issues were published. In the summer of 1928, Mayakovsky became disillusioned with LEF and left the organization and the magazine. In the same year, he began writing his personal biography, “I Myself.” From October 8 to December 8 - a trip abroad, on the route Berlin - Paris. In November, volumes I and II of the collected works were published.

The satirical plays The Bedbug (1928) and Bathhouse (1929) were staged by Meyerhold. The poet’s satire, especially “Bath,” caused persecution from Rapp’s critics. In 1929, the poet organized the REF group, but already in February 1930 he left it, joining RAPP.

Many researchers of Mayakovsky's creative development liken his poetic life to a five-act action with a prologue and epilogue. The role of a kind of prologue in the poet’s creative path was played by the tragedy “Vladimir Mayakovsky” (1913), the first act was the poem “Cloud in Pants” (1914-1915) and “Spine Flute” (1915), the second act was the poem “War and Peace” "(1915-1916) and "Man" (1916-1917), the third act - the play "Mystery-bouffe" (first version - 1918, second - 1920-1921) and the poem "150,000,000" (1919-1920), the fourth act - the poems “I Love” (1922), “About This” (1923) and “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” (1924), the fifth act - the poem “Good!” (1927) and the plays “Bedbug” (1928-1929) and “Bathhouse” (1929-1930), the epilogue is the first and second introductions to the poem “At the top of my voice” (1928-1930) and the poet’s suicide letter “To everyone” (12 April 1930). The rest of Mayakovsky's works, including numerous poems, gravitate toward one or another part of this overall picture, the basis of which is the poet's major works.

In his works, Mayakovsky was uncompromising, and therefore inconvenient. In the works he wrote in the late 1920s, tragic motifs began to appear. Critics called him only a “fellow traveler” and not the “proletarian writer” that he wanted to see himself. In 1930, he organized an exhibition dedicated to the 20th anniversary of his work, but he was interfered with in every possible way, and none of the writers or state leaders visited the exhibition itself.

In the spring of 1930, the Circus on Tsvetnoy Boulevard was preparing a grandiose performance of “Moscow is Burning” based on Mayakovsky’s play; the dress rehearsal was scheduled for April 21, but the poet did not live to see it.

Personal life

For a long period of Mayakovsky’s creative life, Lilya Brik was his muse.

Mayakovsky and Lilya Brik met in July 1915 at her parents’ dacha in Malakhovka near Moscow. At the end of July, Lily's sister Elsa Triolet, who had a superficial affair with the poet, brought Mayakovsky, who had recently arrived from Finland, to Brikov's Petrograd apartment on the street. Zhukovsky, 7. The Briks, people far from literature, were engaged in entrepreneurship, having inherited a small but profitable coral business from their parents. Mayakovsky read the yet unpublished poem “A Cloud in Pants” at their home and, after an enthusiastic reception, dedicated it to the hostess - “To you, Lilya.” The poet later called this day “the most joyful date.” Osip Brik, Lily's husband, published the poem in a small edition in September 1915. Infatuated with Lily, the poet settled in the Palais Royal hotel on Pushkinskaya Street in Petrograd, never returning to Finland and leaving the “lady of his heart” there. In November, the futurist moved even closer to the Brikovs' apartment - to Nadezhdinskaya Street, 52. Soon Mayakovsky introduced new friends to his friends, futurist poets - D. Burliuk, V. Kamensky, B. Pasternak, V. Khlebnikov and others. Brikov's apartment on the street . Zhukovsky became a bohemian salon, which was visited not only by futurists, but also by M. Kuzmin, M. Gorky, V. Shklovsky, R. Yakobson, as well as other writers, philologists and artists.

Soon, a stormy romance broke out between Mayakovsky and Lilya Brik, with the obvious connivance of Osip. This novel was reflected in the poems “Spine Flute” (1915) and “Man” (1916) and in the poems “To Everything” (1916), “Lilichka! Instead of a letter" (1916). After this, Mayakovsky began to devote all his works (except for the poem “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin”) to Lilya Brik. In 1928, with the publication of his first collected works, Mayakovsky dedicated to her all the works created before they met.

In 1918, Lilya and Vladimir starred in the film “Chained by Film” based on Mayakovsky’s script. To date, the film has survived in fragments. Photographs and a large poster depicting Lilya, entangled in film, also survived.

Since the summer of 1918, Mayakovsky and Briki lived together, the three of them, which fit well into the popular after the revolution marriage and love concept, known as the “Glass of Water Theory.” At this time, all three finally switched to Bolshevik positions. At the beginning of March 1919, they moved from Petrograd to Moscow to a communal apartment in Poluektovy Lane, 5, and then, from September 1920, they settled in two rooms in a house on the corner of Myasnitskaya Street in Vodopyanoy Lane, 3. Then all three moved to an apartment in Gendrikov Lane on Taganka. Mayakovsky and Lilya worked at Windows of ROSTA, and Osip served for some time in the Cheka and was a member of the Bolshevik Party.

Despite his close communication with Lilya Brik, Mayakovsky’s personal life was not limited to her. According to evidence and materials collected in the Channel One documentary “The Third Extra,” which premiered on the 120th anniversary of the poet on July 20, 2013, Mayakovsky is the father of the Soviet sculptor Gleb-Nikita Lavinsky (1921-1986). The poet became closely acquainted with Gleb-Nikita’s mother, artist Lilya Lavinskaya, in 1920, while working at ROSTA’s Windows of Satire.

According to the memoirs of A. A. Voznesensky:

Already in old age, Lilya Brik shocked me with this confession: “I loved making love with Osya. We then locked Volodya in the kitchen. He was eager, wanted to come to us, scratched at the door and cried” ... “She seemed like a monster to me,” Voznesensky admitted. - But Mayakovsky loved this one. With a whip..."

However, according to evidence given in the Channel One documentary “The Third Extra” (2013), the situation was just the opposite: during the period the Brikovs and Mayakovsky lived together in an apartment on Taganka, it was Osip, for a number of reasons, including health-related, who gave in his wife to Mayakovsky - as a stronger and younger partner, who, moreover, after the revolution and before his death, financially supported the entire family.

Since Mayakovsky began to be published a lot in Izvestia and other major publications from 1922, he and the Brikov family could afford to live abroad often and for long periods of time.

At the end of 1922, Brik, simultaneously with Mayakovsky, had a long and serious affair with the head of Industrial Bank A. Krasnoshchekov. This novel almost led to a break in relations with Mayakovsky. For two months Mayakovsky and Briki lived separately. This story is reflected in the poem “About This”.

In a narrow circle, Lilya Yuryevna allowed herself the following statements about Mayakovsky:

“Can you imagine, Volodya is so boring, he even makes scenes of jealousy”; “What is the difference between Volodya and a cab driver? One controls the horse, the other controls the rhyme.” As for his experiences, they apparently did not touch Lilya Yuryevna much; on the contrary, she saw a kind of “benefit” in them: “It is useful for Volodya to suffer, he will suffer and write good poetry.”

In 1923, after writing the poem “About This,” passions gradually subsided, and their relationship entered a calm, stable period.

In the summer of 1923, Mayakovsky and Briki flew to Germany. This was one of the first Deruluft flights from the USSR. They spent the first three weeks near Göttingen, then went to the north of the country, to the island of Norderney, where they vacationed with Viktor Shklovsky and Roman Yakobson.

In 1924, in the poem “Anniversary,” Mayakovsky wrote: “I am now free from love and from posters,” and also: “...here comes the boat of love, dear Vladim Vladimych.” As literary critic K. Karchevsky believes, these works mark “ irreparable fracture"in the poet's relationship with Lilya Brik, after which they never returned to their former closeness.

In 1926, Mayakovsky received an apartment in Gendrikov Lane, in which the three of them lived with the Briks until 1930 (now Mayakovsky Lane, 15/13). Weekly meetings of LEF participants were held in this apartment. Lilya, although not formally listed as an employee, took an active part in the creation of the magazine.

In 1927, the film “The Third Meshchanskaya” (“Love for Three”), directed by Abram Room, was released. The script was written by Viktor Shklovsky, taking as a basis the well-known “threesome love” between Mayakovsky and the Briks.

At this time, Lilya Yuryevna was also engaged in writing, translating (translating Gross and Wittfogel from German) and publishing Mayakovsky.

In 1927, in chapters 13-14 of the poem “Good!” for the last time in Mayakovsky’s work the theme of love for Lilya Brik arises.

Despite his long relationship with Lilya Brik, Mayakovsky had many other novels and hobbies, both at home and abroad - in the USA and France. In 1926, from Russian emigrant Ellie Jones (Elizabeth Siebert), his daughter Helene-Patricia was born in New York; Mayakovsky saw her only once in 1928 in Nice. Other lovers are Sofya Shamardina, Natalya Bryukhanenko. Lilya Brik will remain on friendly terms with them until the end of her days. In Paris, Mayakovsky meets Russian emigrant Tatyana Yakovleva, with whom he falls in love and dedicates two poems to her: “Letter to Comrade Kostrov from Paris about the essence of love” and “Letter to Tatyana Yakovleva” (published 26 years later). Together with Tatyana, Mayakovsky chose a gift for Lilya in Paris - a Renault car. Brik will become the second female Muscovite behind the wheel.

Upon arrival in Moscow, Mayakovsky tries to persuade Tatyana Yakovleva to return to Russia, but these attempts were unsuccessful. At the end of 1929, the poet was supposed to come for her, but was unable to do so due to visa problems.

Mayakovsky's last novel was the young and beautiful Moscow Art Theater actress Veronika Polonskaya (1908-1994). At the time of their first meeting, she was 21, he was 36. Polonskaya was married to actor Mikhail Yanshin, but did not leave her husband, realizing that her affair with Mayakovsky, whose character Veronica assessed as complex, uneven, with mood swings, may be interrupted at any moment. And so it happened: a year later, they put an end to their relationship and the poet’s life. Comrade Mauser.

In 1940, L.K. Chukovskaya recalled how she went to Moscow to see the Briks regarding the publication of V. Mayakovsky’s one-volume work: “ It was difficult for me to communicate with them; the whole style of the house was not to my liking. It also seemed to me that Lilya Yuryevna had no interest in Mayakovsky’s poems. I didn’t like the hazel grouse on the table or the jokes at the table...»

Children

Mayakovsky was not in any registered marriage. Two of his children are known:

V.V. Mayakovsky at his exhibition “20 years of work”, 1930

• Son Gleb-Nikita Antonovich Lavinsky (1921-1986)
• Daughter Patricia Thompson (Elena Vladimirovna Mayakovskaya) (1926-2016)

Death

The year 1930 started poorly for Mayakovsky. He was sick a lot. In February, Lilya and Osip Brik left for Europe. Mayakovsky was described in newspapers as a “fellow traveler of the Soviet regime” - while he himself saw himself as a proletarian writer. There was an embarrassment with his long-awaited exhibition “20 Years of Work”, which was not visited by any of the prominent writers and state leaders, as the poet had hoped for. The premiere of the play “Bathhouse” was unsuccessful in March, and the play “Bedbug” was also expected to fail. At the beginning of April 1930, the greeting “ to the great proletarian poet on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of his work and social activities" There was talk in literary circles that Mayakovsky had written himself off. The poet was denied a visa to travel abroad. Two days before his suicide, on April 12, Mayakovsky had a meeting with readers at the Polytechnic Institute, which was attended mainly by Komsomol members; There were many unflattering shouts from the seats. The poet was haunted by quarrels and scandals everywhere. His mental state became increasingly unstable.

Since the spring of 1919, Mayakovsky, despite the fact that he constantly lived with the Briks, had for work a small boat-like room on the fourth floor of a communal apartment on Lubyanka (now this is the State Museum of V.V. Mayakovsky, Lubyansky proezd, 3/6 p.4). The suicide took place in this room.

On the morning of April 14, Mayakovsky had an appointment with Veronica (Nora) Polonskaya. The poet had been dating Polonskaya for the second year, insisted on her divorce, and even signed up for a writers’ cooperative in the passage of the Art Theater, where he planned to move to live with Nora.

As 82-year-old Polonskaya recalled in 1990 in an interview with the magazine “Soviet Screen” (No. 13 - 1990), that morning the poet picked her up at eight o’clock, because at 10.30 she had a rehearsal scheduled at the theater with Nemirovich - Danchenko.

I couldn’t be late, it angered Vladimir Vladimirovich. He locked the doors, hid the key in his pocket, began to demand that I not go to the theater, and generally left there. I cried... I asked if he would accompany me. “No,” he said, but promised to call. And he also asked if I had money for a taxi. I didn’t have any money, he gave me twenty rubles... I managed to get to the front door and heard a shot. I rushed about, afraid to return. Then she walked in and saw the smoke from the shot that had not yet cleared. There was a small bloody stain on Mayakovsky's chest. I rushed to him, I repeated: “What did you do?..” He tried to raise his head. Then his head fell, and he began to turn terribly pale... People appeared, someone told me: “Run, meet the ambulance... I ran out, met him. I returned, and on the stairs someone said to me: “It’s too late. He’s dead...”

Veronica Polonskaya

The suicide letter, prepared two days earlier, is clear and detailed (which, according to researchers, excludes the version of the spontaneity of the shot), begins with the words: “ Don’t blame anyone for the fact that I’m dying, and please don’t gossip, the dead man really didn’t like it..." The poet calls Lilya Brik (as well as Veronica Polonskaya), mother and sisters members of his family and asks to transfer all the poems and archives to the Briks. The Briks managed to arrive at the funeral, urgently interrupting their European tour; Polonskaya, on the contrary, did not dare to attend, since Mayakovsky’s mother and sisters considered her to be the culprit in the death of the poet. For three days, with an endless stream of people, farewell took place in the House of Writers. Tens of thousands of admirers of his talent escorted the poet to the Donskoye Cemetery in an iron coffin while the Internationale was sung. Ironically, Mayakovsky’s “futuristic” iron coffin was made by avant-garde sculptor Anton Lavinsky, the husband of the artist Lily Lavinskaya, who gave birth to a son from her relationship with Mayakovsky.

The poet was cremated in the first Moscow crematorium opened three years earlier near the Donskoy Monastery. The brain was removed for research by the Brain Institute. Initially, the ashes were located there, in the columbarium of the New Donskoye Cemetery, but as a result of the persistent actions of Lily Brik and the poet’s elder sister Lyudmila, the urn with Mayakovsky’s ashes was moved on May 22, 1952 and buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery.

Creation

Mayakovsky’s early work was expressive and metaphorical (“I’m going to cry that the policemen were crucified at the crossroads,” “Could you?”), combined the energy of a meeting and demonstration with the most lyrical intimacy (“The violin twitched begging”), Nietzschean fight against God and carefully disguised in the soul religious feeling (“I, praising the machine and England / Maybe simply / In the most ordinary Gospel / The Thirteenth Apostle”).

According to the poet, it all started with Andrei Bely’s line “I launched a pineapple into the sky.” David Burliuk introduced the young poet to the poetry of Rimbaud, Baudelaire, Verlaine, Verhaeren, but Whitman's free verse had a decisive influence. Mayakovsky did not recognize traditional poetic meters; he invented rhythm for his poems; polymetric compositions are united by style and a single syntactic intonation, which is set by the graphic presentation of the verse: first by dividing the verse into several lines written in a column, and since 1923 by the famous “ladder”, which became Mayakovsky’s “calling card”. The ladder helped Mayakovsky force his poems to be read with the correct intonation, since commas were sometimes not enough.

After 1917, Mayakovsky began to write a lot; in five pre-revolutionary years he wrote one volume of poetry and prose, and in twelve post-revolutionary years - eleven volumes. For example, in 1928 he wrote 125 poems and a play. He spent a lot of time traveling around the Union and abroad. While traveling, he sometimes gave 2-3 speeches a day (not counting participation in debates, meetings, conferences, etc.) However, subsequently, disturbing and restless thoughts began to appear in Mayakovsky’s works; he exposes the vices and shortcomings of the new system (from the poem “ The Satisfied”, 1922, before the play “Bath”, 1929). It is believed that in the mid-1920s he began to become disillusioned with the socialist system; his so-called trips abroad are perceived as attempts to escape from himself; in the poem “At the Top of My Voice” there is the line “rummaging through today’s petrified shit” (in the censored version - "shit") Although he continued to create poems imbued with official cheerfulness, including those dedicated to collectivization, until his last days. Another feature of the poet is the combination of pathos and lyricism with Shchedrin’s most poisonous satire.

The lyrical side of Mayakovsky was revealed in “Unfinished” (1928-1930)…

let the gray hair be revealed by haircut and shaving
Let the silver of the years call
a lot
I hope I believe it will never come
disgraceful prudence towards me

Unfinished. I. “Loves? doesn't like it? I'm wringing my hands..."

Look how quiet the world is
The night has covered the sky with starry tribute
at hours like these you get up and talk
centuries of history and the universe

Unfinished. IV. “You must have already gone to bed for the second time...”

Lyrical lines from the American cycle, written back in 1925:

I want to be understood by my native country,
but I won’t be understood -
Well?!
By home country
I'll pass by
How's it going?
slanting rain.

The author then did not dare to include the poems in the text, but in 1928 he published them as part of a critical article, albeit with the explanation: “Despite all the romance sensitivity (the audience grabs their scarves), I tore out these beautiful, rain-soaked feathers.” There is an opinion that even in the panegyric poem “Good,” Mayakovsky mocks the ceremonial officialdom: “He rules with a rod, so that he goes to the right. / I'll go right. / Very good".

Mayakovsky had a great influence on the poetry of the 20th century. Especially on Kirsanov, Voznesensky, Yevtushenko, Rozhdestvensky, Kedrov, and also made a significant contribution to children's poetry.

Mayakovsky fearlessly addressed his descendants into the distant future, confident that he would be remembered hundreds of years from now:

My verse
labor
the vastness of years will break through
and will appear
weighty,
rough,
visibly
like these days
the water supply came in,
worked out
still slaves of Rome.

Bibliography

• Mayakovsky V.V. Complete works in 13 volumes. - M.: State Publishing House of Fiction, 1955-1961.
• Mayakovsky V.V. Collected works in 12 volumes. - M.: Pravda, 1978. Shooting range. 600,000 copies (Series “Library “Ogonyok”. Domestic classics”).
• Mayakovsky V.V. Complete works in 20 volumes. M.: Nauka, 2013-.

In music

• 1957 - “Left March” (German: Linker Marsch) by composer Hans Eisler to poems by V. Mayakovsky in a German translation by Hugo Huppert. Best known by Ernst Busch.
• 1958-1959 - “Pathetic Oratorio”, a musical work by Georgy Sviridov based on poems by V. V. Mayakovsky.
• 1983 - “Mayakovsky Begins”, opera extravaganza. Composer: Andrey Petrov, libretto: Mark Rozovsky.
• 1984 - “Night”, a song by composer David Tukhmanov based on fragments of V. Mayakovsky’s dying poem.
• 1986-1988 - Program of the Pesnyary ensemble “At the top of my voice”, consisting of songs by V. Mulyavin to poems by V. Mayakovsky.
• 2007 - “Mayak”, a song by the Russian rock band “Splin” based on the text of V. Mayakovsky’s poem “Lilichka! (Instead of a letter).”
• 2016 - “Cloud in Pants” studio album of the Russian punk band “Lomonosov Plan” based on the verses of the poem of the same name.
• On April 14, 2005, the AnTrop company released the tribute album “Living Mayakovsky” - a disc with songs based on his poems, the music for which was composed by modern musicians. On July 19, 2008, the second disc was released.
• In 1997, the group “Banda of Four” released a song about Mayakovsky - “Mayakovka” (album “Ugly Time”).
• There is a song “Self-Recusal” dedicated to Mayakovsky.
• The Kharkov musical art-rock group “Che Orchestra” has a song and video “Guten Morgen, Mayakovsky”, archival footage is used in the video.
• The punk band “The Last Tanks in Paris” has a song of the same name based on Mayakovsky’s poem “To you!”
• In 1986-1990 there was a rock group "Mystery-Buff". Most of their repertoire are songs based on poems by Mayakovsky.
• The rock group "Prav" wrote the song "Left March", the words of which are poems by Mayakovsky.

In cinema

• 1914 - “Drama in the Futurist Cabaret No. 13.” Mayakovsky played a “demonic” role in the film.
• In 1918, Mayakovsky wrote the script for the film “Not Born for Money,” based on Jack London’s novel “Martin Eden.” The poet himself played the main role of Ivan Nov. Not a single copy of this film has survived.
• 1918 - “Chained by Film.” A fragment of the first part (with the participation of Mayakovsky) has been preserved.
• 1918 - “The Young Lady and the Hooligan.” The directors of the film are Vladimir Mayakovsky and Evgeny Slavinsky. The plot is based on the short story "The Workers' Teacher" by Edmond D'Amicis. Screenplay by Vladimir Mayakovsky, starring him and Alexandra Rebikova.
• 1928 - “Oktyabryukhov and Dekabryukhov.” The script for this eccentric comedy was written by Vladimir Mayakovsky for the tenth anniversary of the October Revolution.
• 1928 - “Three rooms with a kitchen.” Based on the script by V.V. Mayakovsky “How are you?”
• 1955 - “They Knew Mayakovsky”, historical-revolutionary film directed by Nikolai Petrov, Leningrad newsreel studio.
• 1958 - “Mayakovsky began like this.” Biography film based on Mayakovsky’s autobiographical story “I Myself.” Rodam Chelidze plays the role of Mayakovsky. Georgia-film.
• 1962 - “The Flying Proletarian,” a cartoon based on the poem of the same name.
• 1962 - “Bath”, a cartoon based on the play of the same name.
• 1970 - “The Young Lady and the Hooligan,” a television film-ballet based on the 1918 script directed by Apollinary Dudko.
• 1975 - “Mayakovsky laughs.” The collage film, a comedy directed by Sergei Yutkevich, is based on the play “The Bedbug” and the script “Forget About the Fireplace” by V. Mayakovsky.
• 1977 - “Forward, time!” Cartoon based on the poems of V. Mayakovsky.

Documentaries

• 1955 - Mayakovsky
• 1972 - Living Mayakovsky
• 1976 - Mayakovsky with us
• 1984 - Mayakovsky Museum in Moscow
• 1990 - Vladimir Mayakovsky
• 2002 - Mayakovsky's Deadly Game
• 2002 - Mayakovsky. Death of a Poet
• 2005 - Living Mayakovsky
• 2006 - About this, about the poet and about Lilya Brik
• 2013 - Vladimir Mayakovsky. Third wheel
• 2013 - Mayakovsky. Last love, last shot
• 2015 - Vladimir Mayakovsky. Last April

Educational films

• 1971 - Mayakovsky. Comrade Netta
• 1980 - A story about Kuznetskstroy and the people of Kuznetsk

Participation in the anti-religious campaign

In 1928-1929, serious changes took place in the internal policy of the USSR: the NEP was curtailed, the collectivization of agriculture began, and materials from show trials of “pests” appeared in newspapers.

In 1929, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee issued the Decree “On Religious Associations,” which worsened the situation of believers. In the same year, Art. 4 of the Constitution of the RSFSR: instead of “freedom of religious and anti-religious propaganda,” the republic recognized “freedom of religious confessions and anti-religious propaganda.”

As a result, a need arose in the state for anti-religious works of art that responded to ideological changes. A number of leading Soviet poets, writers, journalists and filmmakers responded to this need. Mayakovsky was among them. In 1929, he wrote the poem “We Must Fight,” in which he stigmatized believers and called for atheism.

Also in 1929, he, together with Maxim Gorky and Demyan Bedny, took part in the Second Congress of the Union of Militant Atheists. In his speech at the congress, Mayakovsky called on writers and poets to participate in the fight against religion.

“We can already unmistakably discern a fascist Mauser behind a Catholic cassock. We can already unmistakably discern the edge of a fist behind the priest’s cassock, but thousands of other intricacies through art entangle us in the same damned mysticism.<…>If it is still possible to somehow understand the brainless ones from the flock, who have been hammering religious feeling into themselves for decades, the so-called believers, then we must classify a religious writer who works consciously and still works as a religious person either as a charlatan or as a fool .

In Rostov-on-Don,
RERZ plant

Bas-relief of Mayakovsky with a commemorative text in Azerbaijani and Russian languages ​​in Baku, on the side facade of the building of the Azerbaijan State Pedagogical University

• Many streets in cities of Russia and other countries are named after Mayakovsky: Berlin, Dzerzhinsk, Donetsk, Zaporozhye, Izhevsk, Kaliningrad, Kislovodsk, Kyiv, Kutaisi, Minsk, Moscow, Odessa, Penza, Perm, Ruzaevka, Samara, St. Petersburg, Tbilisi, Tuapse, Grozny, Ufa, Khmelnitsky.
• In many cities there are monuments to Mayakovsky - Dzerzhinsk, Yekaterinburg, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Tbilisi, Ufa, Novokuznetsk, Vologda.
• In the Moscow and St. Petersburg metro there are stations named after Mayakovsky - Mayakovskaya station in Moscow, Mayakovskaya station in St. Petersburg
• Many theaters, cinemas, etc. are named after Mayakovsky:
  • Moscow Theater named after. Vl. Mayakovsky,
  • Norilsk Polar Drama Theater named after. Vl. Mayakovsky,
  • Bryansk Drama Theater named after. Mayakovsky
  • State Russian Drama Theater in Dushanbe,
  • Palace of Culture named after Mayakovsky in Novokuznetsk,
  • Central Park of Culture and Culture named after. Mayakovsky in Yekaterinburg,
  • “Park of Culture and Leisure named after. Mayakovsky" in Belaya Kalitva,
  • cinema named after Mayakovsky in Novosibirsk,
  • cinema named after Mayakovsky in Omsk,
  • library named after V.V. Mayakovsky in Kaliningrad,
  • Central City Public Library named after V.V. Mayakovsky in St. Petersburg
  • House of Writers named after V.V. Mayakovsky (Leningrad / St. Petersburg)
• The minor planet (2931) Mayakovsky, discovered on October 16, 1969 by L. I. Chernykh, is named in honor of Vladimir Mayakovsky.
• In 1937, the V.V. Mayakovsky Library-Museum was created in Moscow; in 1968, it was transformed into the State V.V. Mayakovsky Museum.
• In 1997, the All-Russian Literary Prize named after V.V. Mayakovsky was established.
• In Soviet times, the poet’s native village was called Mayakovsky. A village in the Kaliningrad region also bears his name.
• The A330 VQ-BCU aircraft, owned by Aeroflot, was named in honor of V.V. Mayakovsky.

Mayakovsky Museum in Moscow

Monument to Vladimir Mayakovsky in Zyryanovsk

Metro station "Mayakovskaya" in St. Petersburg

• The steamship, which sank in Riga in 1950, was named after Mayakovsky.
• In Baku, on the wall, on the side facade of the ancient building of the current Azerbaijan State Pedagogical University, there is a memorial plaque with a bas-relief of Mayakovsky and a memorable text in Azerbaijani and Russian: “Here, in the large hall of the Azerbaijan Pedagogical Institute, the great Soviet poet Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky repeatedly read his works.”.
• The four-deck cruise ship Project 301, built in Germany in 1978, is named after the poet.
• School No. 1 in the city of Jermuk (Armenia) was named in honor of Mayakovsky.
• A school in Moscow was named in honor of Vladimir Mayakovsky (since 2017 - the school named after V.V. Mayakovsky, before that - gymnasium No. 1274 named after V.V. Mayakovsky).

Museums

In 1937, the Mayakovsky Library-Museum was opened in Moscow (formerly Gendrikov Lane, now Mayakovsky Lane). In January 1974, the State Mayakovsky Museum was opened in Moscow (on Bolshaya Lubyanka). In 2013, the main building of the museum was closed for reconstruction, but exhibitions are still held. You can visit them at the address: Moscow, Malaya Dmitrovka 29, building 4 (“Chekhov’s House”). In 1941, the Mayakovsky Museum was opened in the village of Baghdadi in Georgia.

In philately

Postage stamp of the USSR, Postage stamp of the USSR, Postage stamp of Russia, 2000:
Vladimir Mayakovsky and ROSTA Windows.

Mayakovsky is also depicted on a 1955 Bulgarian postage stamp.

In numismatics

• 1 ruble. 100th anniversary of the birth of V.V. Mayakovsky. (Date of issue 07/14/1993; materials copper, nickel; quality proof, uncirculated; series Outstanding personalities of Russia). Artist A. A. Kolodkin.

• Token 2009 Vodka tokens. Series "Culture and Art".

Facts

• Excerpt from the book “Mayakovsky travels through the Union”:

On Sunday, we went to the sledges to see the grave of the last Russian Tsar.<…>But it is important for me to give the feeling that the last reptile of the last dynasty, who drank so much blood over the centuries, has left us, lying here.

• Mayakovsky loved gambling and was fond of playing billiards. He played very well for an amateur level; he had an amazingly accurate and powerful shot. He rarely played with professional players, as he hated the tricks of the professional game. But he also didn’t like “empty” games, that is, without any bets. In his opinion, the players should have some, even a small, “interest” (that is, some kind of material interest). He made exceptions only for partners who were obviously weak; this is how he played, for example, with Lunacharsky, who loved the game very much, took advantage of every free minute to “roll the balls,” but played extremely weakly.
• For verses and excerpts from the poem “Good!” Vladimir Mayakovsky Georgy Sviridov wrote “Pathetique Oratorio” for bass, mezzo-soprano, choir and symphony orchestra (1959).
• On August 31, 2016, Dilma Rousseff was finally removed from the post of President of Brazil by a decision of the Brazilian Senate. After the vote on impeachment, she addressed her comrades and ended her speech with lines from Mayakovsky’s poem “Well, well!” ("Não estamos alegres, é certo, Mas também por que razão haveríamos de ficar tristes? O mar da história é agitado As ameaças e as guerras, haveremos de atravessá-las, Rompê-las ao meio, Cortando-as como uma quilha corta “[I opened my eyes to the pages with a quiet rustle... And I felt a sense of gunpowder from all the borders. Not again, those in their twenties, growing up in a thunderstorm.] We have nothing to rejoice about, but we have nothing to be sad about. The stormy waters of history will cut us apart. space, as a keel cuts a wave.").

Mayakovsky literally burst into the world with his soul-stirring, unusual poems. Handsome, powerful, broad in gestures, thoughts and feelings - such is this poet, speaking first name to the Sun.

Childhood and youth

Mayakovsky's life began in the Georgian village of Baghdadi, Kutaisi province, where he was born on July 19, 1893 into an impoverished noble family. Mayakovsky was born on his father’s birthday, so they named him Vladimir.

The family did not live well. The father, filled with a sense of responsibility for his household, worked a lot and hard. In 1906 he passed away - he died of blood poisoning. At this time, Volodya is thirteen, he is a student at the Kutaisi gymnasium. After the death of the father, the mother and her children, son and daughters, moved to Moscow. Having studied a little at the fifth classical gymnasium, the future poet was expelled from it for non-payment.

And then the rebellious beginning of Vladimir Mayakovsky began to be realized in revolutionary activity. In 1908 he became a member of the Bolshevik Party. The result of this is eleven months in Butyrka prison. It was from here that the young man took out his first notebook of poems. After his release from prison, his party work is interrupted.

Active creative activity

He begins to actively engage in literature, joining futurism - a scandalous movement in art. In their program collection “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste,” the poet’s first poems, “Morning” and “Night,” were published in 1912. The poem with the unusual title “Cloud in Pants” was published in the second half of the 1910s thanks to Osip Brik, whom Mayakovsky met in the summer of 1915. Since then, Osip and Lilya Brik became his friends. Lilichka, as Vladimir Vladimirovich affectionately called her, is associated with sincere love feelings, later expressed in poetry.

Taking an active life position, Mayakovsky always responded to political events. Thus, the poem “War and Peace” is dedicated to the First World War, “Left March” - to the revolutionary events of 1917.

This man-tribune not only wrote brilliant poetry, but also wrote scripts, acted in films, was an excellent reader, and painted propaganda and satirical posters in “Windows of ROSTA” - the Russian telegraph agency that dealt with propaganda art.

Numerous trips

In the first half of the twenties, the poet visited Western countries - Latvia, Germany, France, and in 1925 - the USA, Cuba, Mexico. He wrote poems and articles about European impressions, read his poetic works, and gave presentations. The poet dedicated a whole cycle of poems and the essay “My Discovery of America” to America.

In the second half of the 20s, he traveled a lot around the Soviet Union, speaking to various audiences.

Satirical orientation of creativity

One of the important directions of Mayakovsky’s work is satire. It manifested itself in numerous poetic works and comedies of the late twenties, “The Bedbug”, “Bathhouse”, staged at the Meyerhold Theater - about a society that had forgotten about true revolutionary values. At this time, tragic motives are already heard in creativity.

The end of a short fiery journey

The life of the great poet was cut short on April fourteenth, 1930. He shot himself with a pistol directly in the heart. Disputes about the ambiguity of this death continue to this day.

Mayakovsky remained in the hearts of his descendants as a man who did not tolerate lies and falsehood, and as a poet who wrote poems that seared the soul.

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Who was Vladimir Mayakovsky? A genius or a simple poet? A lot is known about this great man, but at the same time practically nothing can be said clearly about him. He was and will remain a mystery even to the most sincere admirers of his work. As for his biography, there are practically no empty spaces in it, but the spiritual make-up and personality of the poet are shrouded in mystery. In order to understand at least a little the views and feelings of this great artist of words, it is necessary to learn some interesting facts from the life of Mayakovsky.

Brief biography

Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky was born on July 7, 1893 in the Kutaisi province, the village of Baghdadi. Both parents were direct descendants of Zaporozhye Cossacks. The father of the great poet, Vladimir Konstantinovich, was a hereditary nobleman and worked as a forester. Mother, Pavlenko A.A., was involved in raising children; besides Vladimir, there were two more children in the family.

Studies

In the period from 1902 to 1906, the future poet studied at the Kutaisi gymnasium, where, probably, he managed to get acquainted with the liberal democratic intelligentsia. In 1905, he even took part in a major demonstration of Russian and Georgian youth.

Interesting facts from Mayakovsky’s life confirm that his father actually died from a needle prick, which resulted in blood poisoning. After the death of the head of the family, the Mayakovsky family moved to Moscow in 1906.

The financial situation was quite difficult, so in 1908 Vladimir Mayakovsky was expelled from the Moscow gymnasium because his mother did not have the funds to further pay for his studies. Nevertheless, thanks to his talent for fine arts, he was accepted to study at But even here, the future poet’s studies did not go smoothly due to his political views.

Prison sentences

In 1908, many facts from Mayakovsky’s life concerning his political beliefs led to his being imprisoned. The poet's arrest was caused by the revolutionary agitation that he carried out among representatives of the working class. But this was not the last time; Mayakovsky was later imprisoned twice more. After the next imprisonment ended, Mayakovsky stopped taking an active part in the work of the party.

Despite the complexity of Mayakovsky’s position at that time, it was during this period that his situation finally took shape and he mastered the tenets of Marxism and the Bolsheviks on the class struggle. Most likely, the views of the young poet were partly romantic, and he was not fully aware of everything that was happening in the political arena in that period, but at this time he decided to try on the mask of the “leader”. It was then that some interesting facts from the life of Mayakovsky took place, because it was here that he began to write his first poems, which were later selected by prison servants.

Lilya Brik in the life of a poet

Lilya Brik occupied a special place in Mayakovsky's life. She was his muse, his lover, his icon. Like any creator, the poet and his inspiration had a very complex relationship.

The love triangle between Mayakovsky and the Brikovs was nonsense even in Moscow in the 1920s, which at that time could hardly boast of the purity of personal relationships. Mayakovsky and Lilya Brik did not hide their feelings at all, and what is most surprising is that Osip Brik, Lily’s legal husband, was also not against this state of affairs.

The muse helped Mayakovsky in creating new works, because it was she who managed to understand what the poet needed in order to create, and he needed suffering and sadness. It cannot be said that Brik was absolutely sincere in her feelings for the poet, but the fact that she influenced his work cannot be ignored.

Tatiana Yakovleva

Another woman played an important role in Mayakovsky’s life; she was a Russian emigrant who lived in Paris. Despite the fact that she rejected the great poet, he committed an incredibly romantic act. Mayakovsky deposited an impressive amount into the flower shop’s account with one condition: that Yakovleva be brought flowers “from Mayakovsky” several times a week.

Even after the poet’s death, his muse continued to receive flowers, which saved her from starvation during the war. Although it has not been proven that the poet and Yakovleva had a romantic relationship, he still dedicated more than one poem to her.

• Few people know, but the great poet was extremely generous and often gave money to elderly people. He himself found the elderly and supported them financially, wanting to remain anonymous.
• Mayakovsky worked diligently to find the most suitable, ideal rhyme that would fit into the poem in all respects. He could walk 15-20 km until he found exactly what he needed.
• The story connecting the poet with the famous artist Repin remains noteworthy. During their first meeting, the painter was quite surprised by Mayakovsky’s chestnut curls and offered to paint his portrait. When Mayakovsky again came to Repin, he was incredibly surprised, because as soon as the poet took off his headdress, the painter saw that his chestnut curls were now shaved to zero.

• Mayakovsky and Lilya Brik, whose relationship was complex to the extreme, were, in essence, an excellent tandem of creator and muse. The Swedish Brik family and Mayakovsky created favorable conditions not only for communication with Lilya. He also took part in the poet’s life personally. He corrected the punctuation and spelling of the poems of the brilliant creator. These three people had such a strange relationship.
• It was Mayakovsky who became the creator of the famous “ladder”. This was an obvious trick on the part of the writer, since at that time poets were paid for the number of lines in written poems, and the “ladder” led to the fact that he received 2-3 times more than his colleagues in the workshop.

So many years have passed since the death of the great poet, but they still remember him, he is still studied in schools, his poems are quoted by young men in love to their ladies, he still remains alive in the souls of his fans. Creativity that calls for active activity, creativity in which you want to dissolve - this is exactly the kind of poetry that the brilliant poet created, who will be remembered for centuries.

Brief biography of Vladimir Mayakovsky

Vladimir Mayakovsky is one of the greatest Russian poets of the 20th century. He was also a brilliant playwright, film scriptwriter, artist and magazine editor. Born on July 19, 1893 in the Georgian village of Bagdati, a forester. The writer's grandmother was related to the writer G. P. Danilevsky. Vladimir received his primary education at the Kutaisi gymnasium. As a teenager, he took part in various revolutionary demonstrations and agitations. In 1906, his father accidentally pricked himself with a needle and died from blood poisoning. After this, Vladimir developed a lifelong bacteriophobia and hatred of all kinds of pins. At the same time, his family moved to Moscow, where he enrolled in a classical gymnasium.

The first poem of the young Mayakovsky appeared in the illegal publication “Rush”. In Moscow, he made friends with revolutionary-minded youth, participated in agitations and became interested in Marxism. In his youth he was arrested more than once. In 1911, inspired by the bohemian artist Eugenia Lang, he became interested in painting and even studied in the studios of the Stroganov School. In 1913, the poet’s first collection, entitled “I,” was published. A few years later he turned to dramaturgy, and the stage tragedy “Vladimir Mayakovsky” appeared. In 1915, he met his muse and the love of his life, Lilia Brik.

Mayakovsky guessed that a revolution was just around the corner. For this reason, many of his poems during this period were imbued with tragedy. For example, “Cloud in Pants”, “War and Peace”. He worked hard on poems for “squares and streets,” that is, appeals to the broad masses. In 1918-1919, “Ode to the Revolution” and “Left March” glorifying the revolution were published. Since 1919, he actively participated in the activities of the Russian telegraph agency ROSTA. In 1924, the poem “Vladimir Ilyich Lenin” was published. During this period he worked for the newspapers Komsomolskaya Pravda and Izvestia. In the last years of his life, Mayakovsky wrote the satirical plays “Bathhouse” and “Bedbug” and began working on the poem “At the top of his voice.” In April 1930, the poet, unable to bear the internal conflict, committed suicide. Mayakovsky is buried in Moscow at the Novodevichy cemetery.