The Obelisk (Bykau)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Wassil Bykau in 1944

The Obelisk ( Belarusian Абеліск, Russian Обелиск ) is a novella by the Belarusian writer Wassil Bykau from 1971. Galina Kurenewa translated the text in 1973 into Russian . The amendment was the twice a month in the same year in the magazine 24 Moscow appearing Roman newspaper printed. In 1974 the text was published by Mastazkaja litadela - the Belarusian state publisher for fiction in Minsk .

In 1974 the author received for his two novellas The Obelisk and Hang Out Until Morning! the State Prize of the USSR . Richard Viktorov's film adaptation of the Obelisk with Yevgeny Karelskich as Ales Maros and Valeri Nossik as a journalist brought the Moscow Gorky Film Studio to cinemas in 1976.

content

Frame narration

In the autumn of 1962 in northwest Belarus : The anonymous first-person narrator, a Belarusian journalist from an undisclosed city, arrives too late in the village of Sjalzo for the funeral of the village school teacher Pavel Ivanovich Miklashevich , who is only around thirty-five years old. The journalist had met Miklashevich at a teachers' conference. There in the Grodno region the journalist just met the guests at the funeral feast . Embarrassing - the chairman of the county people's education department Ksjandsou, an eloquent young Natschalnik has the presumably drunken war veterans Zimoch Zitawitsch Tkachuk for his inappropriate remarks cope. With the latter objections, the veteran alludes to the inscription of the Sjalzoer more than a man-sized obelisk, which was erected on the initiative of Miklashevich in the early 1950s. Tkachuk, who had arrived in Sjalzo in November 1939 on behalf of the People's Commissariat for Education , got to know and appreciate the popular teacher Ales Ivanawitsch Maros there. Tkachuk commented on the memorial that the name of their teacher Maros, which was later added in an amateurish way, should remain on the list of the five then 13 to 18-year-old classmates of Miklashevich's who were hanged by the Germans in 1942.

In the internal narrative (see below), Tkachuk travels back to Grodno with the journalist and uses the opportunity to justify his above-mentioned view. The two travelers meet Ksjandsou again on the way. When asked whether the teacher Maros, who was hanged with his students, was also one of the heroes of the war that was won, none of the three can give a concise answer.

Internal narration

Three days after the outbreak of war , the Germans are already in Sjalzo. No Red Army soldier can be seen. When Tkachuk wants to make his way with a few teachers in the direction of Minsk and the city is said to be already occupied, he goes back to Sjalzo. When he knocks on a friend's house, he is turned away. Tkachuk finally meets thirty encircled soldiers who, under cavalry major Selesnjow, live as partisans in earth huts in the nearby forest in the wolf pits for the next two years.

Tkachuk is disappointed when he learns that Maros continues to teach voluntarily among the Germans in Sjalzo. When Tkachuk was sent by Seleznjow to reconnaissance in Sjalzo in November 1941, he realized that Maros was an enemy of the Germans.

The Belarusian police chief Chwedar Hahum does not trust Maros. Hahm's raid on Maros' classroom brings no result. Hahum rages elsewhere; tracks down wounded Soviet commanders, kills them with his subordinates and burns down the farm of a peasant who sympathizes with the partisans. The farmer's relatives are killed. Hahum torments Jews . Because of such atrocities, Miklashevich and his five school friends - all of whom were students of Maros - hate him. Without the knowledge of their teacher Maros, they want revenge; saw the Sjalzoer wooden bridge in April 1942, which Hahum usually drives over with a German car. A German is crushed by that car when the bridge collapses. One of the fleeing youth is seen by a police officer. The six boys are arrested. Maros is warned at the last minute, is able to flee to the partisans and is accepted into their ranks.

The partisans receive a message. The six boys who are beaten and tortured are to be released if Maros surrenders. The teacher goes back to Sjalzo. All six are led to execution along with their teacher. On the way, Miklashevich flees, encouraged by Maros. Miklashevich was badly wounded by a shot. Hahum thinks the boy is dead and leaves him there. Miklashevich is the only one of the seven Sjalzos to survive.

reception

In May 1975 Lola Debüser explored Wassil Bykau's predilection for writing partisan stories. The author was never a partisan, but a frontline officer during the war. So why turn to the partisans? The answer is: While the soldier at the front first and foremost had to carry out the command of his superior, the partisan in Belarus from 1941 to 1944 - scattered or encircled - was often on his own. So also Maros, who against the will of his commander Selesnjow and without coordination with Tkachuk, the commissar of the Sjalzo partisans, goes back to Sjalzo and thus to certain death. Maros - similar to Janusz Korczak in Ales Adamowitsch's view - wants to accompany his young wards on their difficult final journey. Maros cheers up the six students and is hanged by the Germans. Thus, Maros is now considered a war hero, although he did not kill a single enemy. Thus, for us today, the dispute between the two school inspectors Ksjandsou and Tkachuk has been decided. Tkachuk is right and Ksjandsou thinks small.

German-language editions

  • The obelisk. Translated from the Belarusian by Norbert Randow , Gundula and Wladimir Tschepego . S. 173-266 in Wassil Bykau: Novellen. Volume 2. With an afterword by Lola Debüser. Publishing house Volk und Welt. Berlin 1976 (1st edition, edition used)
  • The obelisk. His battalion. Novellas. Publishing house Volk und Welt. Berlin 1980 (1st edition)

Web links

annotation

  1. ↑ Wassil Bykau means with the word police in each of his Belarusian partisan stories from 1942 the Belarusian police installed by the German occupiers. The latter was recruited from enemies of the Soviet power .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Russian: Галина Куренева, b. October 7, 1960 in Mtsensk
  2. ↑ Russian: Роман-газета
  3. ↑ Belarusian: Мастацкая літаратура
  4. ↑ Wassil Bykau: The Obelisk. His battalion. 1980 edition, p. 4. above
  5. ↑ Russian: Ричард Николаевич Викторов (1929–1983)
  6. ↑ Russian: Обелиск (фильм), The Obelisk (film)
  7. ↑ Russian: Евгений Константинович Карельских
  8. ↑ Russian: Валерий Бенедиктович Носик
  9. ↑ Russian: Киностудия имени М. Горького, Kinostudija imeni M. Gorkowo
  10. ↑ English: Entry IMDb
  11. ↑ Russian Сельцо
  12. ↑ Debüser, pp. 578-583