Writer Yuri Olesha: biography, photos and interesting facts

Unlike many other writers, he left behind not many works of Olesha Yuri Karlovich. His biography, although sad, but it is full of bright moments. Like many authors of the revolutionary period, Olesha reached the heights of glory, becoming a cult writer in a huge young country. Why then, at the peak of popularity, he almost ceased to create and turned into a miserable drunkard beggar?

Noble parents of the future writer

Yuri Olesha (a writer whom many, by misunderstanding, consider childish) was born in the family of the descendants of the ruined Polish nobles. Often in the biographies of this author they write that his father was a descendant of a noble family from Belarus. This is not entirely true. Indeed, Olesha is the surname of the famous Belarusian noblemen of the 16th century. However, over time, they adopted Catholicism and moved to Poland. For this reason, by the beginning of the 20th century. The family of Yuri Karlovich Olesha was one hundred percent Poles.

Although the mother of the future writer (Olimpia Vladislavovna) and his father (Karl Antonovich) - were people of noble birth, because of financial problems, the family had to live modestly. Karl Olesha was on duty as an excise official.

After the revolution, Olympia and Karl Olesha emigrated from the Russian Empire to Poland, where they lived until the end of their days. The writer himself refused to leave his native land, but he was very worried about separation from his relatives. Who knows, maybe in his old age even regretted that Yuri Olesha refused to leave with his parents. His biography could then be put down in a completely different way. Although, perhaps, his talent could fully reveal himself only in his homeland.

Yuri Karlovich Olesha: a short biography of childhood

The future author of Three Fat Men was born in Elisavetgrad (until 2016, Kirovograd, now Kropivnitsky) in February 1899.

In the first 3 years of life, Yuri Olesha did not distinguish anything remarkable. The biography for children in textbooks, as a rule, omits the period of his life in Elisavetgrad, placing emphasis on moving the writer's parents to Odessa. After all, this city became for him a real home, and also a cradle for his talent.

A few years after the move, Yuri Karlovich Olesha entered the Rishelyevskaya Gymnasium. Here he was carried away by playing football and even participated in city competitions on the side of the gymnasium. However, because of heart problems, the young man soon had to leave his favorite hobby. But soon he found a new - writing poetry.

Enchanted by Gumilev's works, young Yury Olesha began writing his own poems as early as the time he studied at the gymnasium. Writer, whose biography is published in all the country's textbooks - that's how a talented schoolboy saw his future. Particularly inspired by the hope that his "Clarimonde" was published in the "Southern Gazette". However, the management of the gymnasium did not like the enthusiasm of their pupil, so the boy was forbidden to write poetry, and for a while he left his literary experiments.

In the revolutionary year of 1917 Olesha graduated from the gymnasium and enrolled in the local university at the Faculty of Law.

Participation in the Odessa "Collective of Poets"

However, he did not become a lawyer Olesha Yuri Karlovich. His biography was changed by the Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent changes in the social structure of the country.

Like many of his literary friends - V. Kataev, I. Ilf, E. Bagritsky, Olesha met all this with joy and hopes for the emergence of a new, more perfect and just world. Wishing to become a part of it, after 2 years of study, the young man dropped his university and concentrated on building his literary career. Perhaps the impetus to this also served as the fact that in 1919 the future writer had been ill with typhus and barely survived.

No matter how it was in reality, but after leaving the university, Olesha, together with Ilf, Kataev and other associates, organized a literary group "The Collective of Poets".

This institution lasted 2 years. During this time in its ranks visited about 20 famous literary figures (including Vladimir Sosyuru, Vera Ibner and Zinaida Shishova).

At the collections of the "Collective of Poets", its participants read their own works, and also recited the poetry of Mayakovsky, which was for them a standard of modern poetry.

In addition to literary evenings, Olesha and his comrades were engaged in educational activities. In particular, they distributed books among workers and Red Army soldiers, and also created their own library.

The active and very fruitful activity of the "Collective of Poets" was noticed in Moscow, and by 1922 many of them were invited to move to the capital of the USSR or work in other important cities of the country. Due to the fact that the main leaders of the literary group left Odessa - it disintegrated.

Yuri Karlovich left the city by the sea a year before this event - he was invited to work in Kharkov.

Three Muses by Yuri Olesha

The novice writer had several reasons to leave his native city. One of them is a woman.

While still one of the leaders of the "Collective of Writers", he was in a romantic relationship with Serafima Gustavovna Suok Yuri Olesha.

Biography of the beloved writer clearly shows that she was a woman of dubious moral principles. However, at that time in the bohemian sphere such behavior seemed fashionable and even progressive.

Consisting in an actual marriage with Olesha, Serafima (Sima) started a short-lived romance with one of the businessmen. There were rumors that this was done almost at the request of Olesha and Kataev. Allegedly, the men hoped that the beautiful Sima would be able to get food cards or other scarce goods from the wealthy boyfriend, who were so short of that hungry time. However, when Suok moved to live with the "sponsor", Yuri Karlovich was afraid that he would lose his beloved forever, and took her home.

Unfortunately, after returning soon windy Simochka was carried away by the Soviet poet Vladimir Narbut and left Olesha, becoming the wife of her new and promising candidate.

In despair, the abandoned writer married her sister Olga, who became his faithful companion for life.

Both Suk's sisters became the prototype of the main character of the "Three Fat Men". And if officially this work was dedicated to Olesha's wife, the nature of the heroine was copied from the restless Simochka, who managed to marry twice after the divorce with the repressed Narbut.

In addition to Suok's sisters, Yuri Karlovich had another muse, for which he wrote "Three Fat Men". The name of this beauty is Valentina Leontyevna Grunzaid. Although when they met - she was still a girl named Valya. Olesha was fascinated by her childish grace and promised to write a fairy tale for her, which he later did. He also sometimes joked that when Grunzaid grows up - not marry her. But after growing up, Valentina became the wife of his friend - Petrova.

Felietist in the "Goody"

Having moved to Kharkov in 1921, I began to work as the author of poems and satirical articles by Yuri Olesha. His biography briefly at that time can be described as: work and once again work. The works of Yuri Karlovich at that time are becoming more popular. And in order not to think about the heart wound after the break with Simoy, Olesha completely focuses on the work - and not in vain. After a year of work in Kharkov, he was transferred to the capital of the USSR.

Here he becomes an active participant in literary life and gets acquainted with many of his idols.

Having received a post in the newspaper "Gudok", the writer publishes in it his stingy, sparkling satirical articles that win the readers' love across the country. In doing so, he uses the alias "Chisel".

Success in the literary field and the recognition of the authorities compels the writer to think about writing large prose.

The revolutionary-romantic tale "Three Fat Men"

The first major work by Yuri Karlovich Olesha was the legendary Vale Grunzayd fairy tale - "Three Fat Men". Although it was published in 1929, the author wrote it much earlier - in 1924.

In this story of the struggle of the industrious people with fatty parasites, the writer embodied all his revolutionary ideals. This book is full of metaphors and fairy-tale, although in its plot there is no place for magic.

Despite the fact that this book was written for Valentina Grunzayd, the main heroine of this tale (acrobat Suok), Yuri Karlovich named in honor of the former lover and current wife.

Although it has been many years since the creation of the "Three Fat Men" - no doubt, this is the most optimistic work that Yury Olesha wrote. His biography, unfortunately, after the creation of this tale gradually began to turn into a nightmare. After all, the Soviet government gradually began to oppress dissenters. The tragedy of this situation was also the fact that most artists had a choice: to submit to power and to become the oppressor himself or to surrender and be crushed by a totalitarian machine.

In the years to come, many of the writer's friends and acquaintances were, to one degree or another, victims of a new cultural policy. His frustration Yuri Karlovich described in another major work - the novel "Envy".

"Envy" by Yuri Olesha

In 1927, in the "Red Novi" for the first time published a novel Olesha - "Envy". Strictly speaking, this work was not the first major work of Yuri Karlovich. Since by that time the Three Fat Men had already been written, they would be published two years later.

The novel "Envy" was very warmly received by critics and readers. Most likely, this was due to the fact that Olesha described in it the tragedy of the fate of the contemporary intellectual who is not needed in the new Soviet society.

However, only a couple of years later the novel "Envy" was subjected to harsh criticism, as it did not correspond to socialist realism.

Meanwhile, Yuri Olesha's biography briefly described not only his own, but also hundreds of other cultural figures who did not need a new country, but did not have the opportunity to leave it. It was rumored that the image of Andrei Babichev was written off from Mayakovsky.

This novel has done a lot of noise and lifted its creator to the top. And after the publication of the Three Fat Men, his author became an acknowledged Soviet writer. Now almost in any textbook there was a large or small biography of Yuri Olesha. It seemed that a long-awaited bright future awaits him - but this did not happen.

Olesha's creative depression

As a creative person, Yuri Karlovich was quite sensitive and did not notice the changes in society in the late 20's - early 30's. Simply could not. Besides the bitter disappointment in the ideals of the revolution, Olesha suffered another tragedy. What he wanted to write about did not interest the authorities. Moreover, it was not simply considered not topical, but also gradually acquired the status of illegal.

In the conditions of Soviet realism, it was necessary to write either what the Party expects of you or not to write at all. That's just what to live on if you do not write anything? Especially since the non-publishing author was automatically ranked as a parasite. And this was already a crime.

Disappointed in contemporary literature, Yuri Olesha fell into depression and began to drink often. A couple of years later he became a chronic alcoholic. He was aggravated by his state of news of the repression of his colleagues. And the suicide of Mayakovsky (who once was a lamp in the literature for the writer) and even shattered the health of Yuri Karlovich.

Last years

Despite health problems, chronic alcoholism and the writer's depression, he lived for another 30 years and died in May 1960.

The brightest achievement of Olesha in this period were his diaries. They were published as a separate book "Not a day without a line" after the author's death.

However, if the diaries are creativity for the soul, then Yuri Karlovich earned a living "for the body" by writing plays and screenplays. Most of them - the adaptation of the works of Chekhov, Dostoevsky, Kuprin, as well as "Three Fat Men" and "Envy".

At the same time there were plays of his own composition. In particular, the "Death of Zanda". In this unfinished work about the fate of the writer-communist Zanda, Olesha tried to present his views on the surrounding socialist reality.

In the last decades of his life, Olesha Yuriy Karlovich practically begged. The biography for children, which is given in many textbooks, seldom pays attention to this fact. However, during this period the writer led the life of a homeless person practically.

The fact is that he did not have his own housing, and the author of "Envy" often lived with someone from friends or acquaintances. In addition to rare literary earnings, he was helped by begging on the street to get money for food. And it was possible to drink at the expense of the more successful young Soviet writers, who treated him out of respect for the great talent.

Being in his youth a dandy, in his old age Yuri Karlovich had to walk in rags.

The writer died from a banal heart attack.

As a former literary man, he was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow. In the first row of the first section.

Even in the years of his alcoholic depression, Yuri Olesha joked that he would prefer that his funeral was much more modest than that for his literary merits. At the same time he would like in life to receive in money the difference in the cost of both ceremonies.

Yuri Olesha: biography, interesting facts

• From the childhood, this wonderful Soviet writer considered his native language Polish. He learned Russian later, while living in Odessa. In this he helped his grandmother, who at the same time taught the boy arithmetic.
• Yuri Karlovich had his own sister Wanda. The girl was born two years before her brother. The future writer from the very childhood was very attached to her, and hard survived her death from typhus. The biggest blow was that Wanda got infected from Yuri, who recovered, and she did not.
• In the book of Valentin Kataev, "Diamond my crown", in addition to Esenin, Ilf and Babel, Yury Olesha was portrayed. His biography, however, was somewhat disguised, and the writer himself appears under the name of the artist-metaphorist Klyuchik. By the way, in this same work, Sima Suok is not quite likable. She was given the alias "Druzhochek".
• Olga Gustavovna Suok, who became the first and only wife of the writer, was already married and had a son at the time of his matchmaking. After the marriage, Olesha took Olga with his stepson to himself.
• In the period from 1936 to 1956. Olesha's works were not published. After the abolition of this secret ban began to be positioned as a children's writer Yuri Olesha. A short biography for children accompanied virtually every publication of the Three Fat Men. At the same time, it rarely mentioned his depression and more serious works.
• Even the shortest biography of Yuri Karlovich Olesha contains information about what he dreamed of traveling since his childhood. However, in his youth he had no money for this. Growing up and not fitting into the literature of socialist realism, the author was not traveling, and was forever deprived of the opportunity to see the world, as his friend Ilf managed to do. Almost during all periods of his life (and at the height of his fame, and during the years of depression) Olesha regretted it most of all.