Jakub Kolas

Jakub Kolas, before 1940

Cyrillic ( Belarusian )
	Якуб Колас
Łacinka :	Jakub Kołas
Transl. :	Jakub Kolas
Transcr. :	Jakub Kolas

Yakub Kolas (actually Kanstantin Michailawitsch Mickiewicz , Belarusian Канстанцін Міхайлавіч Міцкевіч ; born October 22 ^{. Jul} / 3. November  1882 ^greg. In Akynzy in Rajon Stoubzy , Oblast Minsk , † 13 August 1956 in Minsk) was a Belarusian poet and writer.

He is considered a classic of Belarusian literature and, along with Janka Kupala, is one of the main characters of the Belarusian rebirth (Belarus: Адраджэнне ) at the beginning of the 20th century.

Life

youth

Jakub Kolas in 1908

Kanstantin Michailawitsch Mizkewitsch was born on a homestead in Akynzy, now part of Stoubzy , and was baptized Orthodox. His parents, the forester Mikhail Kasimirawitsch and the housekeeper Ganna Yurieuna, came from the village of Mikaleuschtschyna, 12 km away from Stoubzy. Of the thirteen children in the family, only nine reached adulthood. Shortly after his birth, the family moved to Lastok, from 1890 to 1904 they lived in Albuz near Mikaleuschtschyna. The picturesque landscapes and the stories of the passing travelers shaped the young Mitzkevich very much. His uncle Antos, who was able to inspire Mizkewitsch for literature, was particularly influential. He taught himself Russian grammar and was taught with his older brother in the house of a so-called "headmaster", a boy who had finished elementary school. From 1892 to 1894 Mitzkevich was able to attend the school in Mikaleuschtschyna himself. In 1898 he studied at the teachers' college in Nyasvish , which he graduated in 1902.

1902-1921

In the first decade of the 20th century, Mitzkevich was more active as a writer and his works were first printed. Between 1902 and 1905 he worked as a teacher in the villages of Ljusina in the Hanzavich district and in Pinkavichy in the Pinsk district . In November 1905, Mitzkevich wrote a request to the landlord on behalf of the residents of Pinkavichy, asking him to confirm the villagers' right to use the lake and the farmland. As a punishment for this, Mizkewitsch was transferred by the authorities to the school in Werchmen in the Smaljawitschy district. On July 9 and 10, 1906, he was suspended from his post for his participation in a banned teachers' congress in Mikaleuschtschyna, which involved the reorganization of the public education system. On September 1, 1906, Mitzkevich published his poem Our Fatherland in the Vilnius newspaper Nascha Dolia, in which he described his country as poor and God-forgotten. He used his pseudonym Jakub Kolas for the first time. In addition, he actively wrote for the newspaper Nascha Niwa , which was also published in Vilnius. In the winter of 1906/1907 Kolas lived in a forest farm in Smaliarnia, where he opened a private school without a permit. In early 1908 he taught again at a private school in Sani in Talachyn district . On September 15, 1908, Kolas was sentenced to three years in prison for his activities in the All-Russian Teachers' Union, which he served in Minsk . In the 1910s, Kolas turned to larger literary forms with philosophical interpretations of life. He began to work on his poems The New Land and Symon of Musicians . In 1909 Kolas's first book was published by The Sun Shine in Our Window in Saint Petersburg . In his early works, Kolas often deals with the life of Belarusian farmers who, despite social obstacles, believe in a rebirth of their country. Between September 1911 and 1914 Kolas worked again as a teacher. In August 1912 he met the poet Janka Kupala for the first time , with whom he had a lifelong friendship. In June 1913, Kolas married Maria Dzmitrieuna Kamenska, with whom he later had three children. During the First World War he served in a reserve regiment in the city of Perm in 1916 and was assigned as a sub-lieutenant on the Romanian front in the summer of 1917, but was able to leave the army early due to illness and move to his family in Obojan .

1921-1956

The book Symon of the Musicians by Jakub Kolas (1925)

In 1921, the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic asked Kolas to return to Minsk, where he began to work for the Scientific and Terminological Commission at the People's Commissariat for Education and for the Institute of Belarusian Culture. On October 18, 1926 Jakub Kolas received the title of People's Poet of Belarus and was thus entitled to a lifelong pension. In 1929 he became vice-president of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus . From 1929 to 1931 Kolas was a member of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic. In the mid-1920s, Kolas was under surveillance by the Soviet state organs. Kolas has been accused of being a "national democrat" for advocating for the ideas of a classless society in Belarus. In addition, his works would idealize the life of rich farmers and overestimate the role of the intelligentsia . In 1930 Kolas was forced to publicly regret his political "errors". On February 6, 1938, his home was searched for weapons. Despite these reprisals, Kolas, in contrast to Janka Kupala, was quite positive about the October Revolution . His works from the twenties and thirties often deal with socialist topics such as reconstruction, collectivization or party work. During the Second World War , the poet lived temporarily in Klyasma near Moscow , later in Tashkent and then in Moscow. At the end of 1944 he returned to Minsk and worked for the Belarusian Academy of Sciences. Kolas became the deputy of the Supreme Soviets of the USSR and the BSSR, a member of the Central Committee of the 20th, 21st and 22nd congresses of the Communist Party of Belarus, member of the All-Union Committee for State Awards for Literature and Art, deputy chairman of the Pan-Slavic anti-fascist committee, chairman of the Belarusian Peace Committee and member of the Soviet Peace Committee. In 1956, in a letter to the government, he expressed concern about the state of the Belarusian language and the proposed measures to defend the national language. Kolas died on August 13, 1956 at his desk in Minsk and was buried in the military cemetery.

Others

Jakub Kolas' uncle, Jasep Ljosik , was President of the Belarusian People's Republic from June 1918 to December 1919 .

Awards and honors

The Jakub Kolas Square in Minsk

Kolas has received various awards for his work. He received the Stalin Prize in 1946 and 1949 , the Order of Lenin five times, the Order of the Red Banner and the Order of the Red Banner of Labor once each . In 1926 he became the People's Poet of the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic . After the end of World War II he was awarded the Partisan Medal of the Great Patriotic War .

From 1959 to 1965 the Jakub Kolas Literature Prize and from 1965 the Yakub Kolas State Prize of Belarus for prosaic and literary works was awarded. The National Academy of Sciences of Belarus and the National Academic Drama Theater in Vitebsk were also named after him.

In Minsk there is Jakub Kolas Square , on which a monument to the poet and sculptures of figures from his works were erected.

Works (selection)

Poems

• A person disappeared (1913)
• New Earth (1923)
• Symon-Musyka (1925)
• Court in the Forest (1943)
• Retaliation (1946)
• Fisherman's Hut (1947)

Stories

• In the wilds of Poland (1923)
• In the vastness of life (1926)
• In the depths of Polesia (1927)
• Abandoned (1932)
• Drygwa (1934)

Web links

Commons : Jakub Kolas  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Jakub Kolas in the catalog of the German National Library
• Page in honor of Jakub Kolas
• Biography on belarusfacts.by (German)
• The too big cock by Jakub Kolas in German

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} biography on archives.gov.by (English)
2. ↑ Dirk Holtbrügge : Belarus. 2nd edition, Munich, Beck, 2002. p. 116
3. ^ Wojciech Roszkowski , Jan Kofman (Ed.): Biographical Dictionary of Central and Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century. Routledge, Abingdon et al. 2015, ISBN 978-0-7656-1027-0 , p. 581.