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A New Issue of the Journal “Mir Sholokhova” is Being Prepared for Release

Before the 110^th anniversary of the great writer a new issue of the scientific and educational national journal “Mir Sholokhova” (The World of Sholokhov) is being prepared for release. The founder of the journal is the National M.A.Sholokhov Museum-Reserve. In the “Editor’s Note” the editor-in-chief Yury Alexandrovich Dvoryashin, Doctor of Philological Sciences, professor, Honoured Scientific Worker of the Russian Federation, announces the materials presented on the pages of the third issue of the journal.

The all-Russia holiday of “Sholokhov Spring” is coming to the Don country again. Annually, for thirty years, this event has been attracting thousands of countrymen and foreign guests to Stanitsa Vyoshenskaya, where the great Russian writer lived and worked. Sholokhov still gathers people coming here not formally, but following the call of their hearts, trying to enter into the wonderful world of his creations. The preparations for the great countryman’s anniversary in the Rostov Region are paid a particular attention. Early this year, V.Y.Golubev, the Rostov Region Governor, held in Stanitsa Vyoshenskaya a working meeting on the celebration of the 110^th anniversary of M.A.Sholokhov. The Director of the Museum-Reserve, A.M.Sholokhov, told about the anniversary events being prepared by the Museum.

Some of the readers would reasonably complain that this All-Russia Sholokhov anniversary is approaching imperceptibly. There is no former number of mass media publications, bright TV programs; the unions of writers keep silent. But it does not mean that our changeable reality gradually drifts away from Sholokhov, from his images, ideas, predictions. It is rather an evidence of our unwillingness or inability “to face the truth and withstand the counter-glance” (P.V.Paliyevsky), fully understand and accept the logic of life regularities getting up on the pages of his books. An attentive eye here and there in the current diversity of everyday life would catch some steady time corrosion-resistant signs of truth embodied in the art world of Sholokhov. Most brightly they are reflected in the faces, characters and actions of our compatriots, who have found themselves in the centre of the historic struggle for the right to be masters of their own destiny. Thus, Zakhar Prilepin, who many times attended the area of combat operations in the Donbass, noted that the defenders of Novorossiya are “the heroes who have come directly… from “And Quiet Flows the Don” by Sholokhov.

The anniversary issue of the journal “Mir Sholokhova” presents the articles and materials intended for the professional philologists and a wide public. In the section “Literary Studies” E.Kostin investigates the problem of phenomenology of Russian speech in the works by L.N.Tolstoy, F.M.Dostoyevsky and M.A.Sholokhov; O.Golotvina (Riga, Latvia) reveals a typological proximity of the personages of M.A.Sholokhov and F.A.Abramov; a Chinese scholar Lyu Yadin writes about the perception of the personality and work of M.A.Sholokhov in the Soviet Union and in modern Russia; L.G.Satarova (Lipetsk) analyzes the features of depicting the First World War in the works by P.Krasnov and F.Kryukov; A.A.Anikin (Moscow) devoted his article to the style of S.N.Durylin, one of the outstanding writers of the Silver Age.

For the first time, an article by Robert Daglish, who translated into English the novel “And Quiet Flows the Don”, is published in Russian. In the section “Philosophy.History.Aesthetics” the reader will be attracted by the paper of A.L.Kazin (Saint-Petersburg) “Faith and Creative Work in the Era of Changes” about the fate of Russian culture in the XX century. In the section “Classics of Sholokhov Studies” there is the famous article by P.V.Paliyevsky “The World Significance of Sholokhov” first published in 1974, in the journal “Nash Sovremennik” (Our Contemporary). The archival materials are presented in the form of a shorthand record of the meeting of M.A.Sholokhov with Moscow writers in February of 1933.

In the midst of the work on the new issue of the journal there came sad news of the death of V.G.Rasputin. The death of the famous Russian writer is an irretrievable loss for Russia. It is especially difficult for all those involved in the creation of the journal. Valentin Grigoryevich ardently supported the idea of Sholokhov periodical and agreed to join its Editorial Board. He always distinguished Sholokhov among his immediate predecessors and creative teachers. On the sorrowful days of parting with Sholokhov in February of 1984, the writer said what was most sacred and fruitful in the creative experience of the author of “And Quiet Flows the Don”: “He will go down in our sensation of the Motherland, its spiritual power, which was manifested in him just when it was most essential.”

V.G.Rasputin, without hesitation, expressed his disagreement with the anti-Sholokhov campaign initiated by A.Solzhenitsyn: “I can’t understand and accept his blessing of the book «The Rapids of the Quiet Don» («СтремяТихогоДона»)”, because of him the book spread around the world and on the old yeast concocted new suspicions against Sholokhov. In Russia, literature is great, and no matter how many great writers it might have, they mustn’t feel cramped in it.”

The greatness of the author of “And Quiet Flows the Don” for V.G.Rasputin remained unchanged, he saw him among the most outstanding Russian artists. In his words, by “The War and Peace” Tolstoy set up a measure for a Russian writer in the tragic and bitter periods of Russian history, a measure, which Dostoyevsky and Sholokhov fit to later.”

In the third issue of the journal there are materials by V.Y.Kurbatov, E.A.Kostin and Y.A.Dvoryashin, devoted to the memory of V.G.Rasputin and a shorthand record of the speech of Valentin Grigoryevich to the students and teachers of the Surgut University in March of 2004.

The advice and wishes of V.G.Rasputin to the creators of the journal “Mir Sholokhova” (The World of Sholokhov) are indisputable and dear for us.

Y.A.Dvoryashin