December 14th
December 14 ( Russian декабря Четырнадцатое , Tschetyrnadzatoje dekabrja ) is a Decembrists - Drama of the Soviet writer Yuri Tynyanov from the year 1939th
Emergence
Tynyanov wrote the play in 1939 and completed the writing in 1940. In doing so, he was able to fall back on previously unknown materials about his Küchelbecker material found in archives . The drama was accepted by the Leningrad Academic Pushkin Theater . Vsevolod Meyerhold had already prepared its performance in February 1939 with Nikolai Cherkassov as Wilhelm Küchelbecker , the set by Yevgeny Lansere and the music by Dmitri Shostakovich . Meyerhold was a victim of the Stalin purges . During the war , Tynyanov, now seriously ill, was evacuated from Leningrad first to Yaroslavl and then to Perm . The author died in Moscow.
overview
In eight pictures - the plot runs over years - a tragic-comic hero Küchelbecker is shown in the midst of his decabristic circle of friends. The first four pictures play before and the last three after the eponymous date December 14, 1825 .
The narrated time can be seen from the content: Between the third and fourth picture Küchelbecker made his trip to Europe in 1820–1821 . The encounter with Pushkin in the last picture is dated October 14, 1827 . The piece therefore consists of highlights on historical events within a period of seven years.
content
- 1. The duel
The high school days are over. Schoolmates Dansas and Pushchin meet in the Volkovo Cemetery . Dansas, now a justice of the peace, asks the friend about the reason for the meeting. It turns out that the quick-tempered Küchelbecker wants to shoot himself with Pushkin for defamatory verses. Pushkin is against it, but still appears to the duel in the cemetery.
Pushkin, who has the second shot according to the regulations, gets away with his life because Küchelbecker - before the actual duel starts - shoots Delwig through the visor cap. Delwig remains unharmed. He had laughed at his friend Küchelbecker.
- 2. The Belvedere
After finishing school, Küchelbecker found a job as a teacher of Russian literature at the Petersburg Pedagogical Institute. Unlike in the novel, Küchelbecker meets his future bride Dunja in the play before his stay in the Caucasus (not mentioned in the play). He tells the young girl that the institute management has fired him. During the conversation it turns out that the future bridegroom is a have-nothing. Dunja apparently loves him anyway.
Küchelbecker exchanges ideas with his poet colleagues Delwig and Puschtschin on current creative issues. The phantast Küchelbecker is currently working on his story “A journey of someone living in the north in the twenty-fifth century”.
- 3. At Naryshkin
Delwig does not want to go to Paris with the Lord Chamberlain, Alexander Naryschkin, and recommended Küchelbecker - the "pleasant chat and great storyteller" - as secretary to those who love traveling. Küchelbecker's inaugural visit to the former director of the Imperial Theater in Petersburg is a success; is the prelude to the aforementioned recreational trip incognito to Western Europe. Naryschkin recognizes the confused head in his new secretary, who is said to be able to correspond in English, French and German and who speaks ancient Greek, and takes him on a trip because such people are fashionable.
- 4. The horse race
Küchelbecker, back from Paris, meets with Kawerin , Obolenski , Odojewski , Jakubowitsch , Bestuschew and Trubezkoi on the outskirts of Petersburg at the racecourse. Küchelbecker wrested such a high advance fee from his publisher Gretsch that he could marry Dunja. Instead, he loses all the money - the equivalent of a year of work - with the bookmaker after betting on the wrong horse.
Dunja looks for and finds her groom on the racetrack. Immediately after tomorrow's marriage she wants to leave Petersburg with him. Küchelbecker doesn't pour pure wine for his bride, but just babbles: “Now one single day will have to decide.” But he by no means means the upcoming wedding day, which Dunja might suspect. Küchelbecker certainly has the day ahead in the following 5th picture in mind.
- 5. December
Dusk on December 14th over Senate Square . The insurgents have repulsed the attack by the cavalry guard, but the artillery is firing with grapeshot . None of the aristocrats on the racecourse is near Küchelbeckers when he cheers on the guards, the chancellor, the man in the long skirt, the sailors, the masons, the flautist and the old man: “Nobody surrenders! ... We have to set up battle rules. "And adds:" ... I know nothing about commanding! We have to fight the cannons. ”Insurgents around Küchelbäcker fall.
- 6. In the aunt's house
There is no longer any question of marriage. Dunja grasps the new situation. Wanted posters are hanging on the stakes outside ; also written out on Küchelbäcker. Dunja got her lover a passport. Küchelbäcker escapes, disguised as an illiterate farmer Matwej Sakrewski, together with his servant Semjon. The peasant smock and bast shoes are popular with the refugee. Treacherous letters are burned before they flee - for example that from Kondrat Rylejew .
- 7. The fortress
Jump in time to May 26th. The guard forbids speaking, but smuggles letters in and out for kitchen bakers even though it says the gauntlet . The prisoner writes a tragedy because it is less arousing than poetry while writing. The clerk thinks he is in the year 1829. The fortress commander removes paper, ink and pen from the delinquent.
- 8. The encounter
After Küchelbecker got to know the Peter and Paul Fortress , the Reval Fortress and the Schluesselburg Fortress , he happened to meet the traveler Pushkin on the way to the next prison. The friends are talking about the Petersburg theater. There is talk of karatygin .
Used edition
- December 14th. Drama. Translated from the Russian by Elena Panzig. P. 121–213 in Juri Tynjanow: The monkey and the bell. Stories. Drama. Essays . 624 pages. Verlag Volk und Welt, Berlin 1975 (1st edition)