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This Summer in Irkutsk

The head of the Sholokhov State Museum – Reserve was the guest of the literary meetings called «This Summer in Irkutsk» which were held early in June. The citizens of Irkutsk and the Irkutsk Region were visited by poet Vladimir Kostrov, literary critic Igor Zolotussky, prosaic and literary researcher Alexey Varlamov  and the headmasters of the two well-known museum- reserves – Vladimir Tolstoy and Alexandre Sholokhov.

The literary meetings were arranged for the second time. For four days on the stage of the Irkutsk Academic Drama Theatre named after N.P. Okhlopkov the author’s meetings were held with one of the participants. After Irkutsk the guests visited three more cities- Kutulik, Sayansk, Bratsk. The organizers of the activity were editor Gennady Sapronov and Irkutsk Academic Drama Theatre, supported by the Department of Culture and Archives of the Region.

The meetings lasted more than two hours and gathered full houses of those who are interested in the problems of Russian culture, literature, who would like to find and read good books of modern writers, to learn something new about museums, about the people who keep the memory, about the great writers and their descendants.

The meeting with A. Sholokhov was called «The Novel in the Open Air». It was conducted by the head of the Tolstoy Museum Manor- Reserve «Yasnaya Polyana».  Vladimir Tolstoy, who  when introducing the writer’s grandson, said: «Alexandre is not merely a grandson of the famous person, he is one of the best museum headmasters in Russia, and the museum in Veshenskaya is really wonderful. There incredible things take place. This institution is a laureate of the All- Russia Prize  «Intermuseum». Some years before it was recognized the best Russian museum, it is a nominate  of the European Museum Forum and so on. So he is a family member of the great Russian writer as well as quite an independent and brilliant figure in modern Russian culture».

A.M. Sholokhov’s participation in the literary meetings roused a true interest and a lot of questions from the participants of the meeting which lasted more than three hours. Speaking in Irkutsk Alexandre Mikhailovich said: «I am feeling excited because my grandfather was greatly fond of travelling and he kept in mind several  places he wanted to visit very much, but every time sometimes prevented him from doing it. These places are: the Altai, the Ussuriysky Region and the Baikal. So it came out that his dream has realized by my visiting these places. For me the Baikal was not easily accessible either. I am not a man of letters, not a philologist, I am a biologist by training and dealt with biology of lakes, so I have visited all the lakes of the Soviet Union, from the Ladoga to the Pacific Ocean. And only the Baikal was left aloof. And  when I was invited to come here I realized that the great chance had come».

At the meetings the headmaster of the museum, and a grandson of the writer spoke  about the creative work and complicated destiny of   M. A. Sholokhov, who had gone through severe trials of the stormy XX century together with his generation, about the contemporary life of the museum – reserves, about the unfavourable tendencies in developing of Russian museums, forced to survive under the conditions of «constant change in game rules».

Surely Alexandre  Mikhailovich paid a great attention to the museum-reserve, of which he had been the director for 7 years. Explaining the main conception of the contemporary development of the museum called «The Novel in the Open Air», he said: «We want to give a better  comprehension and feeling of Sholokhov’s works by plunging into a wide, bright and passionate world of the Don Cossaсks. Now it is not only a novel of Mikhail Alexandrovich, it is a novel which we, contemporaries, create together , realizing new educational projects, restoring monuments of culture. Reviving the traditions, preserving folklore – all  these make up spiritual life of Russia, and the literary meetings in Irkutsk are a great event».

The literary meetings in the remote Siberian region, the full houses, a sincere interest of the participants in the literary world of the contemporary writers and classics, such as M.A. Sholokhov, in the museum heritage prove about the revival of the best cultural traditions of our society, it’s spiritual recovery.

Lora Akolzina