Yvan Kyrlya

Yvan Kyrlya , also Yvan Kurly, (Russian: Kirill Iwanowitsch Iwanow ; born March 17, 1909 in Kupsola, Mari El region ; † July 1943 in Krasnoturjinsk ) was a Russian poet and actor of the Mari ethnic minority and his most famous personality.

Early life

Yvan Kyrlya was born on March 17, 1909 in the village of Kupsola (in the Mari El region ). He grew up, together with his two sisters, as an orphan in a poor peasant family because his father died early in a fight. As a result, Kyrlya had to beg on the streets to make a living with his sisters and mother.

education

Yvan Kyrlya began his school career at the elementary school in Marisol, a place close to Kupsola. After successfully completing primary school, he also finished secondary school in Sernur, where his interest in poetry, music, theater and cinema was already evident. In 1926 he was accepted to the technical college at the Kazan University , where he studied cinematography . Here his teachers noticed his extraordinary talent and recommended him to attend an acting school.

Film career

Instead of attending drama school, however, Kyrlya directly applied for a role in the first Soviet sound film Der Weg ins Leben (Putjowka w schisn) in 1931 . In the filming of the first episodes of the film, director Nikolai Ekk recognized Kyrlya's talent and gave him the leading role. The experiences of the protagonist in the film, Mustafa (street name: Firth), were very similar to those that Kyrlya himself had experienced in his childhood. The film had unprecedented success in Russia and allowed Kyrlya to break into the acting scene. However, Kyrlya's film career did not last long. He starred in only one other film, "Representative of the Buddha" (1934-1936), directed by Yevgeny Ivanov-Barkov, where he played the role of the lama .

Other pursuits

After his last film, Yvan Kyrlya moved to Yoshkar-Ola , where he worked in the Mari State Drama Theater . However, he had to break off his theater career prematurely because he was arrested and sent to a labor camp because of what the Soviet government saw as an incompatible ideology of nationalism. In addition to his brief theater career, Kyrlya also wrote poetry. After his death, three books were published containing poems and songs by him. Most of the poems he wrote center around two themes: the denial of his terrible childhood and the social breakthrough that, in his view, was possible because of his education.

Arrest and death

On the night of April 18, 1937, Yvan Kyrlya was in a hotel restaurant with a few friends after a number of prominent actors at the Mari State Drama Theater, but not himself, had been terminated. There he quarreled with a student who allegedly described him as nationalist. He allegedly replied to this accusation: "Long live the brotherhood of peoples!" A police officer whom Kyrlya had called earlier that evening to arrest the student, arrested Yvan Kyrlya. In the process that followed, the authorities called Kyrlya an "ardent nationalist", which is why he was an "enemy of the people". Yvan Kyrlya was sentenced to 10 years in a labor camp, of which he served in Karelia for the first five years . In 1942 he changed the labor camp: from Karelia to the Urals. According to official information, he died there in the mines of Krasnoturyinsk because of "serious illness and exhaustion". Yvan Kyrlya was officially rehabilitated by the Russian state in 1957.

Later meaning

For today's Mari , Yvan Kyrlya is still one of their most prominent figures. In 1969 a street in Yoskar-Ola was named after him, and in 2009 a memorial to him was placed in Yoskar-Ola. At the unveiling of the monument, the mayor of Yoskar-Ola said: “We recognize his talent and today we are opening a monument in honor of the great actor and poet.” Yvan Kyrlya's biography also served as the basis for the film “Son of Happiness”, a film about the lives of ethnic minority youth.

Web links

• http://finugor.ru/node/12121
• http://www.kino-teatr.ru/kino/acter/sov/33937/bio/
• Yvan Kyrlya in the Internet Movie Database (English)