Fyodor Grigoryevich Volkov

Portrait of Fyodor Volkov

Fjodor Grigorjewitsch Wolkow ( Russian: Фёдор Григорьевич Волков , scientific transliteration Fëdor Grigorʹevič Volkov ; * February 9th ^July / February 20,  1729 ^greg. In Kostroma ; † April 4 ^jul. / April 15,  1763 ) was a ^greg. In Moscow Russian theater director and amateur actor, who is considered the founder of the first public drama theater in the Russian Empire .

Life

Fyodor Volkov grew up in his hometown of Kostroma and from the age of eight in the Volga-up located Yaroslavl on. He was the son of a wealthy businessman and, thanks to him, received an education in Moscow. There he made the acquaintance of theatrical art when he saw several guest performances by German and Italian theater companies. The young Fyodor Volkov was so fascinated by the drama that he dreamed of founding a theater in his adopted home Yaroslavl, at that time an extremely important trading town. After inheriting a considerable part of his stepfather's fortune at the age of 18, he returned to Yaroslavl and began to build his own theater company there. The newly formed collective was able to give its first performance in the summer of 1750, at that time in a temporarily converted warehouse. A year later a separate theater building was built. Mainly plays by well-known European playwrights were translated into Russian and staged, with Volkov doing a large part of this work himself.

Since the Volkov Theater was the first permanent establishment of its kind in Russia - even in the metropolises of St. Petersburg and Moscow there were no theaters open to the general public at that time - it became known nationwide relatively quickly. The Yaroslavl theater was also heard at the Tsar's court . In 1751, Empress Elisabeth ordered the troops from Yaroslavl to be called up to Saint Petersburg . After a debut performance by the Volkov troupe in Petersburg in February 1752, which Elizabeth also attended, Volkov, a promising young talent from non-aristocratic circles, was sent, together with some of his Yaroslavl colleagues, to a distinguished military school for further training. Only after its graduation in 1756 was he officially appointed “first Russian actor” by decree of the Empress, and the “Imperial Russian Theater”, the first public theater in the capital Saint Petersburg, was established. Its head was initially the prominent poet and playwright Alexander Sumarokow , and in 1761 Volkov took over this post himself.

Volkov Theater in Yaroslavl, new building (built in 1911 by NA Spirin)

Wolkow wrote a total of around 15 plays in his theater career, all of which are now forgotten. The highlight of his career is a solemn performance that he staged in Moscow at the beginning of 1763 on the occasion of the coronation ceremony of the new Empress Catherine II . This included, among other things, a mask game dedicated to Katharina called Jubigling Minerva and a large carnival parade. This spectacle, however, was fatal: During the rehearsals, some of which had to take place at freezing temperatures, he caught a severe cold and died on April 15 at the age of only 34.

The theater in Yaroslavl founded by Volkov ceased to exist when the troupe was called up to Petersburg; only decades after Volkov's death did a permanent stage emerge again in Yaroslavl, for which a separate building was erected in the 1810s and which was also in Volkov at that time was named. At the beginning of the 20th century, when the Volkov Theater was already one of the most renowned theaters in Russia, it was given a new building in the city center, where it is still located today (also known as the Drama Theater on Volkov Square (Russian: Ploshchad Wolkowa) ). Not far from the theater, a monument was erected in 1973 for its founder, who is still considered a pioneer of Russian theater today.

literature

• AV Fedorčuk: Jaroslavl ʹ. Istorija tvoego goroda . Akademija razvitija, Yaroslavl 2006, ISBN 5-7797-0630-1 .
• Aglaya Sintschenko, Christian Funk: Moscow & Golden Ring . Travel Guide: Tips for Individual Explorers. 1st edition. Iwanowski, Dormagen 2007, ISBN 978-3-933041-31-9 , pp. 328 ff .
• Hans-Peter Riese, Heiderose Engelhardt, Klaus Bednarz , Wladislaw Goworukhin, Fritz Dressler (photographer): Russia: Moscow St. Petersburg, The Golden Ring . Bucher , Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-7658-1503-4 (special edition: Weltbild , Augsburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-8289-3206-7 ).

Web links

Commons : Fyodor Volkov  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Biography Fyodor Grigoryevich Volkov on krugosvet.ru (Russian). Retrieved September 9, 2009 . 
• Short biography Fyodor Grigoryevich Volkov on hrono.ru (Russian). Retrieved September 9, 2009 . 
• German-language website of the city of Yaroslavl with a presentation of the Volkov Theater. Retrieved September 9, 2009 . 
• Olga Rusanova: Father of russian theater. 270 years since the founder of Russia's first public theater accessible to all Fyodor Volkov was born. ( Memento from August 17, 2007 in the Internet Archive )