Igor Shaitanov Biography

It's not a lack of time. You simply, you know, want certainty ... ”It was this certainty that the famous Russian literary critic, Doctor of Philology and the largest modern Shakespearean researcher in Russia Igor Olegovich Shaitanov tried to introduce into the new biography of the most famous playwright William Shakespeare - published in the ZhZL series. Is it appropriate to compare his work with the works of the playwrights of antiquity - Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides?

In any case, Shakespeare of those great with whom cultural eras begin. Or Shakespeare is the peak unattainable and, in comparison with it, all the further development of dramaturgy - only the grinding of heroes, plots, forms? .. All the rest - in the shadow. They are local, and he is a discoverer of situations in which we still live, although, perhaps, now we are living these situations.

In addition to the show, which of the playwrights of the twentieth century do you evaluate the highest? Who do you consider the best Russian playwright if you take classical Russian literature? Only he, by the way, is equal to Shakespeare in Russian in speech aphoristic. Do you like to go to the theater? If so, how often? What theaters are loved? Which of the latest productions did you remember the most?

I think that my attitude is explained by the fact that the directorial theater has outlived itself. We must again recall that the main characters on stage are the author and actor. And for sure in your life you have seen many Hamlets on stage. Who, in your opinion, managed to get used to this complex, tragic role best? Such communication with Shakespeare is more also more and more.

Kenneth Branii is very good and modern, he is probably the best Shakespearean actor today. How does Shakespeare's perception change over time? Only at the Russian State University I got the opportunity to conduct special seminars with students who are well -owned by the language. It seems to me that one of them will not forget this experience. In any case, something will remain from the sounding texts memorized by heart.

Unfortunately, today it is difficult to captivate the student in the field of serious science. They understand too early that the efforts spent do not pay off and the material reward that awaits them is humiliating. The student, as a rule, is only eighteen - nine years old. And what, in your opinion, is the hypothetical average age of a person who really “experiences the need” in Shakespeare?

And how many years were you when you finally realized what depth opens in the texts of this Englishman? Who can take away so much as much as possible. So it was with his contemporaries: for some, “Hamlet” is a bloody blockbuster with a mountain of corpses, for others a high tragedy of a modern person who read Montaeny, chose “illness of the century” - melancholy, etc.

For the first time I began not to read Shakespeare, but to teach by heart the linguistic task of four years. I remember that the monologue of Mark Anthony made a strong impression of his rhetorical simplicity: “Friends, Romans, CountryMen, Lend Me You Ears ...” II. What is the peculiarity of Shakespeare's teaching there? And I never taught Shakespeare. He only arose in the course of comparative studies, that is, a comparative study of literature.

Abroad, I often talked about the other side of my profession - about Russian poetry. I have books about Tyutchev, about modern poetry - a “taste of taste”. Are there many more white spots in its study? Or Shakespeare and a genius that each new era will discover more and more contexts and new readings? By the way, I write not so often - there is a special sense of responsibility.

And I have two or three such “eternal companions”: Shakespeare, Tyutchev and Pushkin ... I don’t know if I would risk writing more about Pushkin, although I am quite satisfied with a couple of my articles, especially one about the “copper horseman”. As for the new word, you do not need to be afraid to approach the great: so the world has changed and in it that it became "visible to all the ends" that used to be in the shadow.

Moreover, we live in the age of information. So we will use its advantages, try to turn it into new knowledge, do not limit ourselves to a simple accumulation of facts or computer games! Will your answer to a similar question be similar? Moreover, the previous biography of Shakespeare went to ZhZL almost half a century ago - in the year. I tried to add something from myself. Binding in a new way, I saw some things differently, suggested a different fate of texts, other dates than those that are considered more or less generally accepted.

With regard to Shakespeare, it is always dangerous to say that you noticed something first. Alexander Abramovich did a great job in the Soviet years: gathered people, directed efforts, summarized the material of English -speaking research within the limits that were available. He was a scientific popularizer - a very noble mission. The idea of ​​how to write the biography of Shakespeare has changed a lot.

In England today they prefer to write it fragmented as “scenes from life”, thereby making it clear that we are not ready to summarize.

And yet - they separate life from creativity.I tried to write a creative biography, correlating the facts of life and biography, showing that it was this work that fits into the biographical outline of this person who was born and died in Stretford-on-Evonon. Gililova "Game of William Shakespeare, or the Secret of the Great Phoenix." Some admired it, while others doubted the professional competence and scientific scrupulousness of the author.

Is it possible to say that your book “Shakespeare” is the final answer to all attempts to “rewrite” the life and work of the great playwright? Doubts will always remain. And I talk about the “Shakespearean question” and about Gililov. Like alchemy for science. But what is useful for the biographer can be very harmful to the reader, who is proposed as the truth in the last instance, obtained by inhuman tension of the mind and through a cunning investigation, and not as detective reading, suitable to pass the time in the train.

” The experience of the literary biography ”, published in the“ ZhZL ”series in the year, Lev Vladimirovich Losev stipulated that his essay was not just a biography, but a literary biography. The author simply turned “information about the life and work of his hero into a coherent narrative, with the beginning and end, the highlight of the main and the missing less significant.” Do you agree with such a concept?

And what principles were you guided by the principles of the biography of Shakespeare? One of the English biographers, far from the most famous, - Peter Levy - formulated a simple thought: "Shakespeare's secret - not in his biography, but in his works." It may seem like a banality, but simple thoughts are sometimes so erased that, again said, they sound almost a revelation. The same Levy says that the main event of the writer's biography is his work.

I completely agree with this, but if I wrote a book simply about Shakespeare's work, then it would be completely different. The book in the series "ZhZL" is a creative biography, where creativity is a life fact. In what ratio are the purely vital and downs of William Shakespeare and the analysis of his plays, sonnets done? I tried, as far as possible, to trace the birth of the main Shakespearean legends, guessing what could suggest or give rise to hearing.

Gossip is very often born in the language - from a joke, puns, metaphors. It is difficult to biographically read the plays not to catch the glitches of the biography in them, but to guess life correspondences. It is difficult to find out the dates, trying to understand what moment the relevance of a plot could suggest. And he attracted Shakespeare, I am sure, also because the new English king Jacob the first Stewart wanted to become the king of Britain again after centuries, uniting two countries - England and Scotland.

The parliament did not allow, but he nevertheless proclaimed himself in the year the king of Britain. About a year later, the playwright of the royal troupe William Shakespeare writes “King Lear” ... I do not believe in this kind of chance! Shakespeare worked in the theater, which picked up everything, transferred everything to the stage, as they once talked about the populists: in the morning-in the newspaper, in the evening-in the piece of paper.

The only difference here is that the relevant in the Shakespearean plays spoke with eternal plots. Tell us about your literary activity. Although I am very careful with the books: there are too many of them, so I make a book only when there is a feeling that the statement has matured and someone may be needed. I hope that this will be my Shakespeare. I have been engaged in the magazine "Questions of Literature" for 11 years.

First, as the first deputy of the editor -in -chief, now he is leading the magazine himself. All the time I direct it towards modern literature and, of course, modern philological thought. What are your favorite. But I have quite a lot of books of the ZhZL series, a few dozen. In my reader experience in different years there were several strong impressions: “Three Dumas” A. Morua, Robert Burns, and a particularly strong impression - with the next left in my style - “Lunin” by N.

Eidelman ... If you recover, there will be others. In general, many books of recent times I have a simple reader claim - they are redundant. Moreover, their longs bring the old phrase to memory: "I am writing to you long, because I have little time." Sergey Korostelev.