Childhood

Vanechka Krylov was born in severe February frosts, February 2, 1769 (February 13, new style) in Moscow. His father, Andrei Prokhorovich, was poor and unsuccessful in his career: for a long time he languished in the rank of army captain, and received the officer rank only after a long and grueling thirteen years of military service. Mother, Marya Alekseevna, was a very pious, quiet and modest woman. After Krylov’s father retired in 1775, the whole family settled in Tver, where Krylov’s paternal grandmother lived.

The poor family, living from penny to penny, could not provide Ivan with a decent education, but he received a whole chest of books from his father, and the boy himself was very capable and persistent. By self-education, Krylov was able to become one of the most enlightened and literate people of his time.

Soon his father dies, leaving the family without any means of subsistence. This was the end of Vanyusha Krylov’s carefree childhood: he had to go to work as a scribe at the Tver Court, despite the fact that he was only 10 years old at the time! His meager earnings were not enough, and therefore his mother decided to leave for St. Petersburg in order to obtain a pension for herself there for the loss of her husband.

Petersburg period

In the northern capital, the mother never achieved anything, but Krylov successfully got a job as a clerk in the Treasury Chamber, and then began to actively engage in literary work. His first plays were a great success in St. Petersburg society and made his name famous in literary and theatrical circles.

Here he began his journalistic activity, opening one after another satirical magazines that raised the most pressing issues of the time for discussion. Sensitive censorship kept them covered every now and then, but patient and persistent Krylov, with enviable persistence, immediately opened a new magazine. In the end, the fabulist’s health and nervous system could not stand it, and he went to travel around the cities and towns of vast Russia.

Travel around Russia

Krylov devoted almost 10 years of his life (1791-1801) to traveling through provinces, villages and small towns. He visited Ukraine, Tambov, Nizhny Novgorod, Saratov and everywhere he found new subjects for his fables. He never stopped writing for a minute, but his works were subject to the strictest censorship and only rare works were published.

Theater activities

Krylov was able to breathe easily only with the death of Catherine II, who persecuted him for exposing her practices. He gets a job as a personal secretary and home teacher for the children of Prince S. Golitsyn himself, who allows Krylov’s topical tragicomedy “Trumph, or Podschipa” to be staged in his home theater.

In 1801, his comedy "Pie" was allowed to be staged, and then "Fashion Shop" and "A Lesson for Daughters."

Civil service

In 1812, he became a librarian at the Public Library, to which he devoted 30 years of his life: he collected books, compiled bibliographic indexes, and became the compiler of a Slavic-Russian dictionary.

Love and family life

According to official data, Ivan Andreevich was never married. However, many of his relatives and friends, who often visited his house, believed that the daughter of his cook named Sasha was also his daughter. When the cook died, Krylov raised Sasha and even gave her a large dowry. Shortly before his death, the fabulist bequeathed all his property, as well as the rights to his works, to Sasha’s husband.

Death

Krylov died at the age of 75 on November 9, 1844. There are several versions of the reasons for his death: either intestinal volvulus from overeating, or bilateral pneumonia. Krylov was buried in St. Petersburg, at the Tikhvin cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.

Krylov's main achievements

• He opened the fable genre for Russian literature.
• He wrote accusatory, topical works that have not yet lost their social significance.
• He replenished the Imperial Public Library with hundreds of copies of rare ancient books.
• He became the compiler of a Slavic-Russian dictionary.

Important dates in Krylov’s biography

• 1769, February 2 - born in Moscow
• 1775 - move to Tver
• 1779 - death of father, work as a scribe in the Tverskoy court
• 1782 - move to St. Petersburg
• 1784 - creation of the opera \"Coffee Pot\"
• 1785 - creation of the tragedy \"Cleopatra\"
• 1786 - the tragedy "Philomela" was released
• 1787-1788 - work on the comedy \"Pranksters\"
• 1788 - death of mother
• 1789 – publication of the magazine \"Mail of Spirits\"
• 1792 – publication of the magazine \"Spectator\"
• 1793 - transformation of the magazine \"Spectator\" into the magazine \"St. Petersburg Mercury\"
• 1791-1801 – travel around Russia
• 1797 - work as a personal secretary for Prince Golitsyn
• 1800 – production of the tragicomedy \"Trumph, or Podschipa\"
• 1801 - production of the comedy \"Pie\"
• 1806 - the comedy \"Fashion Shop\" was published
• 1807 - the end of the comedy \"Lesson for Daughters\"
• 1809 - the first book of Krylov’s fables
• 1811 – elected member of the Russian Academy
• 1812 – work as a librarian at the Imperial Public Library
• 1823 - receives a gold medal from the Russian Academy for literary merits
• 1825 - two volumes of Krylov’s fables were published in Russian, Italian and French.
• 1841 - resignation
• 1841 - received the honorary title of Academician of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences
• 1844, November 9 - died at home in St. Petersburg

• "Grandfather Krylov" had an excellent appetite. One day, after eating about a dozen pies, he was surprised at their disgusting taste. Opening the pan from which he took them, he saw mold. This did not stop him from finishing the dozen more pies left in the pan.
• Krylov had an inexplicable mania: he loved to look at fires and tried not to miss a single fire in St. Petersburg.
• His favorite item in Krylov’s house was the sofa, on which he could lie for days. Above this sofa, hanging somehow, on one small nail, a painting of enormous size. Everyone who visited Krylov advised him to fix the painting on the wall, otherwise it could pierce his head. Krylov answered everyone the same way that he had already calculated everything and was in no danger: even if the picture fell off, it would fall tangentially and would not hurt him. But the most interesting thing: this legendary painting, which became the talk of the town in Krylov’s life, hung on the wall until the end of his life, never falling.
• The prototype of Goncharov’s Oblomov was Ivan Andreevich Krylov.
• If Krylov found himself at a dinner party, he happily devoured pies, three plates of fish soup, five chops, and a whole roast turkey at a time. Arriving home, he could eat it all with a bowl of cabbage and black bread.
• Once, at a dinner with the Empress, Krylov sat down at the table and, without greeting or waiting for anyone, immediately began to eat. The cultured and usually self-possessed V. A. Zhukovsky grabbed his head in horror and shouted to the fabulist: “Stop it, let the queen at least treat you!” To which Krylov answered him in fear and sincerely: “What if he doesn’t treat you?”
• Krylov was gambling and loved to play cards for money. He played masterfully, sometimes winning entire fortunes. There was a period when it was decided to expel him from both capitals for his excessive passion for cards. In addition, Krylov’s passion was cockfights, and he tried not to miss any of them.
• Many jokers tried to offend or insult Krylov for his gluttony and corpulence, but they did not know that Krylov reacted completely calmly to criticism and even knew how to parry. One day, while walking, he heard someone from a group of young people passing by call him a cloud. He was not taken aback, looked thoughtfully at the sky and added: “Yes, it really is going to rain.” That's why the frogs started croaking."

Ivan Krylov was born in 1769 and died in 1844. Over the 75 years he lived, he achieved everything he wanted and entered world literature as an outstanding Russian nugget.

So, we present to you interesting facts about Ivan Krylov

1. Krylov was a very plump and literally thick-skinned creature. Those around him sometimes got the impression that he had no emotions or feelings, since everything was covered in fat. In fact, hidden inside the writer was a subtle understanding of the world and an attentive attitude towards it. This can be seen from almost any fable.
2. It should be noted that Ivan Andreevich loved to eat. Moreover, his appetite sometimes impressed even seasoned gluttons. They say that once he was late for a social evening. As “punishment,” the owner ordered Krylov to be served a huge portion of pasta, several times higher than the daily allowance. Even two grown men could hardly do this. However, the writer calmly ate everything and happily continued the lunch. The audience's surprise was immeasurable!
3. Krylov loved books extremely much and worked in a library for 30 years.
4. By the way, it was in the library that Ivan Andreevich developed a tradition of sleeping after a hearty lunch for about two hours. His friends knew this habit and always saved an empty chair for their guest.
5. The writer was never married, although it is believed that from an extramarital affair with a cook he had a daughter, whom he raised as his legitimate and his own.
6. Despite his size (and Krylov was plump from his youth), he traveled a lot around Russia, studying the customs and way of life of his people. It was on such trips that new subjects for fables were born.
7. By the way, it should be noted that in his youth the future fabulist was fond of wall-to-wall fighting. Thanks to his size and height, he has repeatedly defeated quite old and strong men!
8. An interesting fact is that Krylov did not like changing clothes or combing his hair at all. One day he asked a lady he knew what outfit to buy for a masquerade, and she told him that if he washed and combed his hair, no one would recognize him. Wow!
9. Some argue that the fabulist was a completely insensitive creature, and when his mother died, he went to the performance. They also say that on the day when his close maid passed away, he calmly played cards with friends. But these facts are not confirmed, so we will not take them seriously.
10. By the way, it is quite remarkable that Krylov was incredibly attracted to fires. No matter where the house was burning in St. Petersburg, he urgently went there and observed the process of the conflagration. Strange hobby!
11. Once in the theater, eyewitnesses told an interesting fact about Krylov. He was unlucky enough to sit next to an emotional person who kept shouting something, sang along with the speaker and behaved quite noisily. - However, what kind of disgrace is this?! – Ivan Andreevich said loudly. The twitchy neighbor perked up and asked if these words were addressed to him. “What are you talking about,” answered Krylov, “I turned to the man on the stage who is preventing me from listening to you!”
12. All the writer’s friends told another interesting fact related to Krylov’s house. The fact is that above his sofa there was a huge painting hanging at a rather dangerous angle. He was asked to remove it so that it would not accidentally fall on the fabulist’s head. However, Krylov only laughed, and indeed, even after his death, she continued to hang at the same angle.
13. By the way, the sofa was Ivan Andreevich’s favorite place. There is information that Goncharov based his Oblomov on Krylov.
14. This one is also known interesting fact about Krylov. Doctors prescribed him daily walks. However, as he moved, merchants constantly lured him to buy furs from them. When Ivan Andreevich got tired of this, he spent the whole day walking through the traders’ shops, meticulously examining all the furs. At the end, he asked each merchant in surprise: “Is this all you have?”... Having not bought anything, he moved on to the next merchant, which greatly frayed their nerves. After that, they no longer pestered him with requests to buy something.
15. It is reliably known that Ivan Andreevich Krylov is the author of 236 fables. Many plots are borrowed from the ancient fabulists La Fontaine and Aesop. Surely you have often heard popular expressions that are quotes from the work of the famous and outstanding fabulist Krylov.

28.02.2016

Modern ideas about Krylov are something like this: a plump, even obese, good-natured grandfather who spent most of his time making friendly visits to fellow writers. He read his fables to them, and they read their literary experiments to him, and all this happened over rich dinners with an abundance of various delicacies and champagne. Yes, such “literary and gastronomic meetings” really took place in the life of the fabulist, but they did not take up the lion’s share of Krylov’s free time. The writer lived a fairly long (for those times) and very eventful life. What was she like?

1. Ivan Andreevich was born into the family of an army officer. His father was a poor man who failed to achieve wealth and rank in life. But he loved books passionately and instilled in his eldest son the same love of reading. True, little Ivan’s father turned out to be a useless teacher: he quickly lost patience and grabbed the rod, which is why the child initially hated classes and did not learn to read and write well. Only thanks to the help of his mother (who herself learned to read in the process of teaching her son) and then the teachers of the Lvov family familiar to his father, Vanyusha gradually fell in love with books, and a whole new world opened up to him.
2. Ivan's father died early, leaving his wife with two children. Ivan had to enter the service. He became a sub-office clerk - that is, an assistant to the office clerk, repaired pens, and ran errands. At that time, the teenager was not yet 13 years old.
3. Krylov wrote his first play at the age of 16, when he was already living in St. Petersburg. It was called “Coffee House” and was clearly satirical in nature. True, it was rather weak: the theaters rejected it, but it was bought by one book publisher, who offered the young man a fee of as much as 60 rubles (Ivan’s salary at that time was 7 rubles a month). But the young man preferred to “take it with books” and brought home a whole stack of works by Moliere, Racine and Boileau.
4. Krylov never had his own family. Once, in his youth, he wooed a 15-year-old girl who seemed to have sincere love for him, but she refused the future fabulist, saying that she did not love him, but only respected him very much.
5. Krylov outlived several emperors: Catherine the Great, Paul, Alexander I. He died under Nicholas I. That is why, probably, his contemporaries looked at him as an immortal writer, as if he had become his own monument during his lifetime.
6. Ivan Andreevich independently, without any help or patronage, rose “from the bottom”, achieved a position in the world and wealth. Therefore, he believed that every person is famous not for his origin, but for his exploits and labors.
7. Krylov was very smart. During the time of Catherine, when there was a struggle against various rebellions and riots, against “revolutionary ideas” that posed a threat to society, as the enlightened empress believed, he managed to publish a satirical magazine, on the pages of which very topical issues were discussed. But they were discussed so wittily and in such a veiled form that there was nothing to complain about. True, years later, Catherine “had a friendly conversation” with the publishers, but Krylov and his comrades, as a result of the “conversation,” managed to remain free. Unfortunately, the magazine was closed down.
8. Krylov began publishing fables closer to the age of 40. Previously, he became famous as a playwright. Many of the writer’s fables are brilliant free translations of La Fontaine and Aesop, but then his own works appeared.
9. Krylov served for decades in the Imperial Public Library. In recent years, he was retained in his position mainly out of respect, because during the service Ivan Andreevich settled down with a book on the sofa and fell asleep. He didn't like to be bothered.
10. After leaving service at the age of 70, Krylov took custody of his goddaughter’s family. He worked with children, taught them, and provided them with financial support. They also loved “grandfather” and took care of him until the end of his days. So Krylov found a family and relatives in his declining years.

Ivan Andreevich lived a happy life, managed to get out of poverty, acquired money and luxurious furnishings. It is interesting that his sharp pen turned out to be so skillful that, even scratching crowned persons, it did not cause the exile or disgrace of the famous satirist. His satire could be harsh or soft, but it was always accurate. Krylov seemed to be a lazy and good-natured person, but in fact he was an eternal, tireless worker.

Glorified throughout the centuries as a writer, and almost unknown as a person - this is a brief summary of Krylov’s biography.

A brilliant satirist and one of the most talented writers of his time, whose artistic thought is accessible even to children.

Having come to all-Russian fame from ignominy and poverty, Ivan Andreevich, apart from his literary heritage, left almost no personal documents.

Biographers had to reconstruct information about life events and character from the memories of friends and acquaintances of the famous Muscovite.

I. A. Krylov - Russian writer and fabulist

The small genre of fables glorified the son of a poor army officer. This says a lot about a person.

About the ability to grasp the very essence of complex moral issues and modern historical problems and present it in an accessible form with accuracy and humor, sometimes with malicious satire.

The small size of the work requires the highest concentration of language, thoughtfulness of the system of images and artistic and expressive means. Knowing about such nuances, you are only surprised how many fables Krylov wrote: 236!

The list of collections published during his lifetime includes 9 editions - and all of them sold out with a bang.

However, he took a long time to get into shape and started with high drama. Answering the question of when Krylov wrote his first play, biographers give an approximate answer - in 1785. After all, the tragedy “Cleopatra” has not been preserved. But just by the title you can understand that the young author tried to create within the framework of classicism.

However, it is in subsequent comedies that fans of Krylov’s work find his inherent courage of thought, accuracy of expression, sensitivity to the native language and a sense of the potential of Russian national culture.

Brief biography of Ivan Andreevich Krylov

The years of the writer's life cover a period of 75 years. And although the writer’s birthplace remains speculative, the year is precisely established – 1769. We will cite only the most important events.

Father and mother

The future writer was born into the family of a poor army officer, Andrei Prokhorovich, who rose to the rank through his own strength and abilities, without connections. The soldier was the organizer of the defense of Yaitsk from the Pugachevites, and subsequently anonymously published a story about this in Otechestvennye zapiski.

The first-born appeared in the family during the years of life in the capital, Troitsk or Trans-Volga region - one can only guess. Already at the age of 10, little Ivan, then living with his parents in Tver, lost his father - he died and left his son and widow in complete poverty.

The mother of the great Russian writer Maria Alekseevna was a poorly educated woman, perhaps even illiterate. But energetic, enterprising, smart and loving her children. Unlike her husband, she was not keen on reading books, but she encouraged her son to study them in every possible way.

Childhood

Information about childhood is extremely scarce. As a young child he lived in Yaitsk; during the Pugachev riot his mother took him to Orenburg, after which the family moved to Tver. His father instilled in the future famous writer a love of books and an interest in literature.

After the death of his father, the young man began working in the Kalyazin zemstvo court, and later transferred to the Tver magistrate.

Education

Homely and unsystematic: no gymnasium, no home teacher, no theological seminary or municipal school. During the years of living in Tver, Ivan Krylov, who had lost his father, out of mercy studied with the children of the local influential and wealthy Lvov family.

In 1783, the benefactors moved to St. Petersburg, taking Ivan Andreevich with them. He entered the service of the local Treasury Chamber, while at the same time reading a lot and studying science on his own.

As a result, he learned to play the violin, showed great talent in mathematics, and mastered the French, Italian and German languages ​​- enough for a deep acquaintance with world classical literature.

Of the fateful meetings pointing to the future of the brilliant writer, only two are known from this period of his life. At Lvov, Krylov met the famous classicist playwright Yakov Borisovich Knyazhnin and the great poet Gavriil Romanovich Derzhavin.

Krylov's creative path

The writer had to search for himself for a long time, paying tribute to the fashion for classicism (creating high tragedies “Cleopatra” and “Philomela” and comedies “The Coffee House”, “The Writer in the Hallway”, etc.).

The young writer felt the breath of time. Russian literature turned from imitating European models to itself: language, themes, cultural customs.

Krylov worked as a publisher on the magazine “Mail of Spirits”. One of the sections was devoted to the correspondence of elves ridiculing among themselves the morals of Catherine’s enlightened absolutism. In 1790, censorship banned the publication (the government everywhere saw the threat of the French Revolution). The following magazines, Spectator and Mercury, suffered the same fate, although the editor in them toned down his tone somewhat.

In 1794, Ivan Andreevich was forced to leave the northern capital and move to Moscow, a year later he was asked to move from there. The disgraced young author had a hard time experiencing the social and literary blockade. He found shelter and support in the family of General Sergei Fedorovich Golitsyn, who had also fallen out of favor. He worked as the secretary of the head of the family and was involved in the education of children, and over the years he wrote only a couple of poems and a few stories.

After Alexander the First came to power, at the dawn of the 17th century, Ivan Andreevich returned to Moscow and began to create again. Yes, with such passion that the censorship vetoed the publication of the comedy “Podchipa or Triumph” - and the manuscripts circulated throughout Russia.

The author boldly ridiculed the height of the classicist Triumph and Podshchipa, which was alien to Russian political life - they say, the Russian writer has already outgrown patriarchy. The subsequent plays “Pie” and “Fashion Shop” were staged and became part of the theater repertoire for a long time.

In 1805, the fables “The Oak and the Reed” and “The Picky Bride” were published, and four years later the first collection was published. This became an event, as evidenced by the controversy surrounding Krylov’s work in Vestnik Evropy.

The recognized genius poet V. A. Zhukovsky reproached the fabulist for the rudeness of expressions, fashionable and following his own path A. S. Pushkin - sees in them the merit of hiding behind a pseudonym (the first fables, who experienced the disfavor of those in power, were signed by Krylov Navi Volyrk).

It is the simple language that makes these works unique not only for the genre, but for all Russian poetry in general.

The fables were circulated for quotations not only in Russia: a two-volume set was published in Paris, they are being translated into Italian. International popularity is also explained by the genre itself - an ancient one, actively using allegories and symbols, plots and themes common to many European peoples.

A Russian writer could borrow the image of his Italian or French predecessor - and they speak and think like modern Russian people. That’s what they say: the speech of the fables is lively and natural, almost freely conversational. Krylov was able to find his own unique winged language of apt expressions.

During his lifetime, Ivan Andreevich was revered as a luminary. However, taught by experience, he preferred to live in the shadows - not to participate in political and literary disputes, not to go out into the world, to dissuade himself from the attention of journalists by laziness and absent-mindedness, in his clothes and manners he showed eccentricity and carelessness, he preferred a hearty dinner to everything and loved to play cards. Therefore, many speculations have been generated about Krylov’s life and work - he has become a constant hero of jokes.

This image is contradicted by his friendship with A.S. Pushkin, which seems to be deep: only the great poet, already mortally wounded in a duel, said goodbye to his “grandfather.” An interesting fact from Krylov’s biography - already being an old man, the poet studied ancient Greek.

Personal life

I. A. Krylov was not officially married. However, biographers believe that his actual wife was the housekeeper Fenyushka, who gave birth to his daughter Sasha. The child lived in the Krylov house as a goddaughter. One can understand why the writer never officially recognized his own child and did not marry his mother.

Fenyushka was one of the simple ones, close and dear in spirit. However, the world would not forgive the “grandfather of Russian literature” for his misalliance. And it didn’t matter that he himself came from a poor and unborn family. He who kissed the hand of the empress could not kiss the hands of a rootless housekeeper.

However, it seems that Ivan Andreevich loved his wife and daughter very much. He sent Sasha to a boarding school, provided her with a dowry, did not alienate her from him after the death of his wife, and married her to a completely worthy man. After his death, he transferred all his fortune and rights to Sasha’s husband, whose origins did not allow him to challenge the will and deprive his daughter of his inheritance.

Last years of life and death

He was treated kindly by the royal family. He received a pension, was awarded a government order and the rank of state councilor.

Krylov's seventieth birthday was celebrated throughout the country.

He died of severe pneumonia in the house of his daughter - everyone's goddaughter - in St. Petersburg in 1844.

He was buried at the Tikhvin Cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg.

The writer was distinguished by a strange love for observing fires. There were legends about him as a great glutton. They even said that he died after eating too many pancakes. He posed for many artists; at least three portraits were written by famous painters of those times.

Famous fables and works of Ivan Krylov

It is difficult to single out the most famous ones. But, probably, every reader will be able to remember at least a line from the fables “The Dragonfly and the Ant,” “The Fable of the Crow and the Fox,” or “The Swan, the Pike and the Crayfish.”

But the latter, for example, was the writer’s deeply personal response to the political events of his time - the inconsistency of the allies in the war against Napoleon (according to another version - conflicts in the State Council).

But the magic of the genre and the extraordinary talent of the author made the work a fable for all time. There are many such creations in the works of Ivan Andreevich, and reading them is a real pleasure.

Conclusion

Many writers in Russia turned to short allegorical poems with a didactic meaning. Including A. S. Pushkin, L. N. Tolstoy, D. Bedny and S. Mikhalkov.

But no one was called the best fabulist after Krylov. Reading Krylov's fables, comparing them with previous and subsequent ones, you understand and even feel why.