Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko
Encyclopedia
Arkady Timofeevich Averchenko ' onMouseout='HidePop("37776")' href="/topics/Sevastopol">Sevastopol
– March 12, 1925, Prague
), was a Russian playwright
and satirist
. He published his stories in the journal "Satyricon", of which he was also an editor, in the series of "New Satyricon", and other publications. He published a total of around 20 books. Averchenko's satirical writings can be described as liberal. After the Russian Civil War
, he emigrated to Central Europe and died in Prague.
Averchenko completed only two courses at the Gymnasia because of his poor eyesight, which rendered him unable to work on his studies for extended periods. His eye had been damaged by a childhood accident. However, as time went by, his lack of formal education was compensated by his natural intellect, as the writer N.N. Breshko-Breshkovskiy has described.
Averchenko started to work at the age of 15, employed by a private transport company. He remained there for slightly over a year before pursuing other employment. In 1897 Averchenko left for Donbass to work as a clerk in the Bryansk mine. He worked there for three years and later wrote several stories about life at the mine, including "In the Evening" and "Lightning."
In 1903, at the age of 22, he moved to Kharkiv
where his first story appeared in the newspaper "South Territory" on 31 October.
During 1906 to 1907 he edited the satirical magazines Bayonet and Sword. Finally in 1907 he was fired from this work, reportedly with the words, "You are a good man, but suitable for nothing." After this, in January 1908 Averchenko left for Saint Petersburg
where he was to achieve success in his career.
In 1908 Averchenko became secretary of the satirical magazine Dragonfly (later renamed to Satyricon
) and in 1913 he became its editor. For many years Averchenko worked successfully as a member of the magazine's staff together with many other notable people, including Nadezhda Teffi
, Sasha Chorny, and Aleksey Remizov
. His most lauded humorous stories were published in the magazine. During Averchenko's work at the Satyricon it became very popular, and theatrical works based on his stories were put on by many theatres throughout the country.
From 1910 to 1912 Averchenko more than once travelled to Europe with his friends and colleagues at the Satyricon (including Aleksey Remizov
). These travels served Averchenko as a rich source for his creative work, and inspired his book Expedition of Satyriconers in Western Europe which was published in 1912. Averchenko also wrote many theatre reviews under several pen name
s.
After the October Revolution
Averchenko's life was greatly changed. In August 1918 Bolshevik
leaders declared the Satyricon anti-Soviet and suppressed it.
Averchenko and all Satyricon staff took a negative position against Soviet authority. Averchenko struggled greatly in attempting to return to his own Sevastopol
; in particular, he had to travel through the Ukraine, which was being occupied by Germans. Beginning in June 1919 Averchenko worked for the newspaper South (later the The South of Russia) and urged aid for the Voluntary Army.
On the 15th of November 1920 Sevastopol was taken by the Reds. Some days before Averchenko had had time to flee via steamer ship to Constantinople
.
In 1921 in Paris
he published a satirical anthology, A Dozen Knives in the Back of Revolution which Lenin described as "a book of great talent by the embittered to distraction White Guard
." He followed this book with a collection of stories, A Dozen Portraits in the Boudoir Format.
On the 13th of April 1922 Averchenko moved to Sofia
and later moved to Belgrade
. Averchenko spent a brief time in both cities before moving again and taking up permanent residence in Prague on 17 June 1922. In 1923 his book of collected emigrant stories, The Notes of the Simple-Minded, was published by the Berlin publishing house Nord.
Averchenko found life away from his homeland and from his native tongue very hard. Many his stories dealt with his feelings of alienation, in particular the story "The Tragedy of the Russian Writer." He took on popularity in the Czech language
immediately. His writings have been very successful and many of his stories have been translated into Czech.
Working for the famous newspaper "Prager Presse" Arkadiy Timofeevich wrote many effervescent and witty stories, which nevertheless expressed great yearning for his homeland.
In 1925 Arkadiy Averchenko fell sick after an operation to remove his eye. On the 28th January he was moved to the Prague Municipal Hospital with the diagnosis of "weakness of the heart muscle, distension of the aorta and sclerosis of the kidneys." Doctors could not save his life and he died on the morning of 12 March 1925.
Averchenko was buried in the Olšany Cemetery
in Prague. His last work was the novel The Joke of Maecenas, written in Sopot
in 1923 and published in 1925 after his death.
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
– March 12, 1925, Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
), was a Russian playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
and satirist
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
. He published his stories in the journal "Satyricon", of which he was also an editor, in the series of "New Satyricon", and other publications. He published a total of around 20 books. Averchenko's satirical writings can be described as liberal. After the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...
, he emigrated to Central Europe and died in Prague.
The life before the Russian Revolution
Averchenko was born on the 27th of March 1881 in Sevastopol. He was the son of a poor merchant, Timofey Petrovich Averchenko.Averchenko completed only two courses at the Gymnasia because of his poor eyesight, which rendered him unable to work on his studies for extended periods. His eye had been damaged by a childhood accident. However, as time went by, his lack of formal education was compensated by his natural intellect, as the writer N.N. Breshko-Breshkovskiy has described.
Averchenko started to work at the age of 15, employed by a private transport company. He remained there for slightly over a year before pursuing other employment. In 1897 Averchenko left for Donbass to work as a clerk in the Bryansk mine. He worked there for three years and later wrote several stories about life at the mine, including "In the Evening" and "Lightning."
In 1903, at the age of 22, he moved to Kharkiv
Kharkiv
Kharkiv or Kharkov is the second-largest city in Ukraine.The city was founded in 1654 and was a major centre of Ukrainian culture in the Russian Empire. Kharkiv became the first city in Ukraine where the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was proclaimed in December 1917 and Soviet government was...
where his first story appeared in the newspaper "South Territory" on 31 October.
During 1906 to 1907 he edited the satirical magazines Bayonet and Sword. Finally in 1907 he was fired from this work, reportedly with the words, "You are a good man, but suitable for nothing." After this, in January 1908 Averchenko left for Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
where he was to achieve success in his career.
In 1908 Averchenko became secretary of the satirical magazine Dragonfly (later renamed to Satyricon
Satyricon
Satyricon is a Latin work of fiction in a mixture of prose and poetry. It is believed to have been written by Gaius Petronius, though the manuscript tradition identifies the author as a certain Titus Petronius...
) and in 1913 he became its editor. For many years Averchenko worked successfully as a member of the magazine's staff together with many other notable people, including Nadezhda Teffi
Nadezhda Teffi
Nadezhda Teffi, known simply as Teffi, was a Russian humorist writer. Teffi is a pseudonym. Her real name was Nadezhda Aleksandrovna Lokhvitskaya after her marriage Nadezhda Alexandrovna Buchinskaya...
, Sasha Chorny, and Aleksey Remizov
Aleksey Remizov
Aleksei Mikhailovich Remizov was a Russian modernist writer whose creative imagination veered to the fantastic and bizarre. Apart from literary works, Remizov was an expert calligrapher who sought to revive this medieval art in Russia.-Biography:...
. His most lauded humorous stories were published in the magazine. During Averchenko's work at the Satyricon it became very popular, and theatrical works based on his stories were put on by many theatres throughout the country.
From 1910 to 1912 Averchenko more than once travelled to Europe with his friends and colleagues at the Satyricon (including Aleksey Remizov
Aleksey Remizov
Aleksei Mikhailovich Remizov was a Russian modernist writer whose creative imagination veered to the fantastic and bizarre. Apart from literary works, Remizov was an expert calligrapher who sought to revive this medieval art in Russia.-Biography:...
). These travels served Averchenko as a rich source for his creative work, and inspired his book Expedition of Satyriconers in Western Europe which was published in 1912. Averchenko also wrote many theatre reviews under several pen name
Pen name
A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...
s.
After the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
Averchenko's life was greatly changed. In August 1918 Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....
leaders declared the Satyricon anti-Soviet and suppressed it.
Averchenko and all Satyricon staff took a negative position against Soviet authority. Averchenko struggled greatly in attempting to return to his own Sevastopol
Sevastopol
Sevastopol is a city on rights of administrative division of Ukraine, located on the Black Sea coast of the Crimea peninsula. It has a population of 342,451 . Sevastopol is the second largest port in Ukraine, after the Port of Odessa....
; in particular, he had to travel through the Ukraine, which was being occupied by Germans. Beginning in June 1919 Averchenko worked for the newspaper South (later the The South of Russia) and urged aid for the Voluntary Army.
On the 15th of November 1920 Sevastopol was taken by the Reds. Some days before Averchenko had had time to flee via steamer ship to Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...
.
After emigration
Averchenko felt comfortable while in Constantinople as there were many other fellow Russian refugees in the city at the time.In 1921 in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
he published a satirical anthology, A Dozen Knives in the Back of Revolution which Lenin described as "a book of great talent by the embittered to distraction White Guard
White Guard
The term White Guard may refer to:* White Guard , part of the White Army of the 1918 Finnish Civil War* White Guard , part of the Axis colaborators in Slovenia during the Second World War* Military arm of the Russian White movement...
." He followed this book with a collection of stories, A Dozen Portraits in the Boudoir Format.
On the 13th of April 1922 Averchenko moved to Sofia
Sofia
Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...
and later moved to Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
. Averchenko spent a brief time in both cities before moving again and taking up permanent residence in Prague on 17 June 1922. In 1923 his book of collected emigrant stories, The Notes of the Simple-Minded, was published by the Berlin publishing house Nord.
Averchenko found life away from his homeland and from his native tongue very hard. Many his stories dealt with his feelings of alienation, in particular the story "The Tragedy of the Russian Writer." He took on popularity in the Czech language
Czech language
Czech is a West Slavic language with about 12 million native speakers; it is the majority language in the Czech Republic and spoken by Czechs worldwide. The language was known as Bohemian in English until the late 19th century...
immediately. His writings have been very successful and many of his stories have been translated into Czech.
Working for the famous newspaper "Prager Presse" Arkadiy Timofeevich wrote many effervescent and witty stories, which nevertheless expressed great yearning for his homeland.
In 1925 Arkadiy Averchenko fell sick after an operation to remove his eye. On the 28th January he was moved to the Prague Municipal Hospital with the diagnosis of "weakness of the heart muscle, distension of the aorta and sclerosis of the kidneys." Doctors could not save his life and he died on the morning of 12 March 1925.
Averchenko was buried in the Olšany Cemetery
Olšany Cemetery
Olšany Cemetery is the largest graveyard in Prague, Czech Republic, once having as many as two million burials. The cemetery is particularly noted for its many remarkable art nouveau monuments.- History :...
in Prague. His last work was the novel The Joke of Maecenas, written in Sopot
Sopot
Sopot is a seaside town in Eastern Pomerania on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea in northern Poland, with a population of approximately 40,000....
in 1923 and published in 1925 after his death.
English Translations
- A Friendly Letter to Lenin, "Ninochka", and Other Short Stories, Edwin Mellen Press, 2010.