Срещи

From the partial publications that were made in the periodical press over the past two decades, we already knew about the literary conversations that the late Professor Spiridon Kazandjiev had with Yordan Yovkov, and in general we had certain impressions of them. However, these impressions were based on partial acquaintance with the text and were naturally fragmentary in nature. That is why the recently published book "Meetings and Conversations with Yordan Yovkov", which contains almost entirely the diary of Professor Kazandjiev (I say almost, since some passages have been omitted from it), now comes to satisfy our curiosity and introduce us to the spiritual world of one of the great Bulgarian writers. Yordan Yovkov, as is known, was neither particularly talkative nor particularly accessible. He did not easily fall into revelations and did not like literary confessions. Therefore, it was difficult to penetrate his creative laboratory and find out what his assessment of people, events and books was. This is precisely what determines the value of the diary "Meetings and Conversations with Yordan Yovkov": it speaks of facts and moods that we cannot glean from any other source - facts and moods that shed light on some very important aspects of the author's life and work.

Once Karaslavov reproached Zhendov that he, Smirnensky's best friend and comrade, had not thought of making at least one portrait sketch of him from life. Surprised by the sudden comradely reproach, the artist was embarrassed and sincerely replied: "How could I have known that he was a brilliant poet! Smirnensky was more ordinary than everyone else around me and no one suspected that one day his name would thunder throughout the four corners of Bulgaria." This short confession of our remarkable caricaturist contains an exceptional truth. So would anyone be able to notice and single out their close friend as something exceptional in the comradely collective, among which he is every day? Hardly! Therefore, Zhendov's wise answer can with full reason be set as the Motto of Georgi Karaslavov's entire book - Meetings and Conversations with Nikola Vaptsarov." Indeed, which of Vaptsarov's closest comrades (and the author was among them) could have imagined that one day Vaptsarov's name would travel to the four corners of the five continents and spread the glory of our small people? Which of them could have even for a moment assumed that Every moment of the poet's life, every creative impulse, idea and dream, every object he touched, every vital detail, every gesture even, . . would attract the curious attention of his millions of admirers? And precisely because no one noticed the extraordinary personality in their proverbially modest comrade, that is why they did not think of recording at least one of his conversations with all its colorful details. Nor did his artist friends think of making a portrait or a sketch from life. Should we reproach them in turn? It is hardly necessary. Nor is it appropriate now, with the appearance of an entire book of memories about Vaptsarov, in which the preface emphasizes: "Yes, even then in his work Vaptsarov had outgrown everyone, had risen to a level that we, his closest comrades, could not see. (p. b). And on the next page it is added: "But Vaptsarov was so modest, so "ordinary", so close to us, that we could not see and measure his gigantic stature during his lifetime."

Every time I look up at the bookshelf where I keep everything without which it is difficult for me to imagine my everyday life, my gaze involuntarily falls on a small collection of poems in dove color, already faded by the years, which bears the familiar title "Birds in the Night". Miraculously surviving the bombings and the endless journeys from apartment to apartment, this collection of poems with an Art Nouveau cover, on which the bird of wisdom stands with calm self-confidence on a large letter P, contrasts somewhat unusually with its colorful young sisters and hides among them with a slightly old-fashioned shyness, not particularly characteristic of our time. Born in another era, very different from the current one, it comes with its presence not only to resurrect in my mind a bygone stage of our literature, but also to remind me of my first contact with Nikolay Liliev - one of the poets who had a certain influence on the spiritual biography of my generation.

In literature, as in ordinary life, one has casual acquaintances, very often people of considerable cultural value, whom, either due to a lack of spiritual affinity or due to an unfavorable combination of circumstances, one has not been able to get to know, appreciate and include in the circle of one's relatives and friends. For many years, Georgi Raichev was just such a casual acquaintance for me. Of course, like all young people of my generation who were interested in fiction, I heard this name very early - back in the blissful times of my adolescence, when it seemed to me that I held the world in my hands. Even then, I had the opportunity more than once to read what Raichev published in periodicals and to leaf through his books - "The Little World", "Queen Neranza", and that "Song of the Forest", which gave rise to talk about him once again. However, these meetings were random in nature and I don't know why they didn't arouse in me a more lasting interest in the writer's personality and work.

Years ago, a fellow writer, with whom we used to go to Paris to gather culture in our youth, spoke in the magazine "Izkustvo" about his meeting with the great French poet Paul Eluard during the troubled year of 1939. I remember even now that with his account of what happened, he not only revived in my mind some dormant memories of our stay in France, but also awakened in me a painful feeling of regret that often overwhelms me on such occasions - regret that due to clumsiness and bad luck I had missed something irreparable this time too. Fortunately, the future turned out to be more generous to me and wished to correct the mistake of the past: although very late, I had the opportunity not only to meet Eluard, but in connection with a common work and to get closer to him, to breathe for a short time his spiritual and creative atmosphere, and even to become an involuntary witness to his last hours. Because of all this, I have lived with his image and for years now I have felt an urgent need to share with you my impressions of the man and the poet, whom, not only because of the geographical distance between us, I once considered untouchable. Needless to say, long before I saw Éluard, I had already heard of him and was to some extent familiar with his poetry. But unfortunately, for reasons beyond my control, even this purely literary meeting also took place very late - at a time when the poet's name had gained wide fame not only in France but also far beyond its borders.

It was one morning in the first days of September, we had breakfasted at one of the coastal hotels of Montreux, where we had happened to be at night, and after taking a short walk through the park to enjoy the Swiss nature, we set off again. We had a long journey to Paris ahead of us, but at the same time we did not want to miss a happy opportunity - to visit the famous Chillon Castle, which we had passed the night before. We had no time to waste, so we had to choose quickly. And, of course, we chose what could turn out to be unique. So instead of heading for Lausanne, as prudence dictated, we turned in the opposite direction and headed for Chillon. And suddenly we were once again immersed in the Swiss landscape: on the right the calm azure expanse of Leman, on the left the foothills of the Swiss Alps, and in the far southeast the feminine cones of the Danne-du-Midi, slightly gilded by the September sun. I looked at this picture, full of picturesque grandeur, and imperceptibly the visible began to give way to an excitement that the night's sleep had interrupted. As at the first meeting with the snow-capped mountains, I felt myself once again in the spiritual and emotional atmosphere of one of my poets, who had once passed through here and had populated the Alpine landscape with the shadows of his imagination. But instead of the gloomy ghosts of the previous evening, now, under the influence of the morning clarity, I had involuntarily sought in it that which foreshadowed the end of a nightmarish night. And I had found it in these two verses that unexpectedly floated into my mind:

Unexpectedly for myself, about a month or a month and a half after the meeting at the Royal aperitif, a not very pleasant change occurred in my life. Since I had to prepare for a state exam, which more than any other exam implies better working conditions and less occupation with side pursuits, I thought about what to do and, finding no other way out, decided to return temporarily to the province. Thus, no matter how unpleasant it was for me, I distanced myself from literary circles and for a while lost track of Khrelkov. However, what I learned later alarmed me. It turned out that Khrelkov had suffered a hemorrhage and, at the insistence of the doctors and people close to him, had finally agreed to be admitted to a sanatorium. And indeed, I heard afterwards that he had gone for treatment in Iskrets, later, I think, in Plovdiv and some other places, and in the summer of 1937 I quite unexpectedly found him in Chepino-Banya at the home of my classmate and friend Vasil Sotirov - an unusually kind-hearted and generous man, with whom he had come into contact through some unspeakable means. As a result of these efforts, the acute attacks of the disease were stopped, but his health still remained irreparable. There was no way he could even think of returning to normal life, so with the help of close people Khrelkov had settled in Gorna Banya - at first only for treatment, and then as a permanent residence. It was here, precisely with his behavior and his intransigence, that he moved from literature, where he had already made a name for himself, to another field, which I would call a literary legend.

When it comes to Alexander Balabanov, the first thing that comes to mind is the celebration of the Czech writer and diplomat František Kubka - the last of the series of celebrations that the Union of Bulgarian Writers organized in the spring of 1946 in the salons of the Bulgarian-Soviet Society. Of course, I knew Balabanov for a long time before that. I first remember one of his stories on ancient Greek literature from the idyllic times of my student days in Pazardzhik. His fame as an eccentric and absent-minded person was already spreading and the audience had filled the "Videlina" community center, warned by the rumor that they would hear an amusing professor. I have forgotten the details, but I well remember the joyful excitement of the listeners from that strange combination of the grotesque and the serious, which was a basic feature of his entire personality. What we learned from this story - I don't know, but one thing was indisputable: it turned out that ancient Greek literature is not as uninteresting and distant from us as some textbooks presented it to us. A few years later, already as a student in Sofia, I had the opportunity to meet Balabanov almost every day. I still see him anxious and perpetually in a hurry, moving along Tsar Osvoboditel Boulevard with a bag in his hand, a carelessly placed soft hat on his head, under which his curly, uncombed hair peeked out, surrounded by students and acquaintances, talking excitedly or arguing with some imaginary opponent. I even had the opportunity to stop in front of the University and watch with defiant curiosity whether he took off his galoshes before getting on the tram, as the legend created around him claimed. And after September 9th, I don't know exactly when or how, we became close, and since we lived in the same neighborhood, we would walk the distance from the then club of cultural figures to the Doctor's Garden almost every evening. And despite all this, when it comes to him, I first remember that celebration on Mizia Street, which I mentioned.

Still a beardless high school student from the countryside, when both distance and circumstances separated me from those extraordinary people who write books and who at that time were for me a kind of unattainable human beings, I had the chance privilege of meeting Dimitar Polyanov and talking to him for nearly half an hour. So he is the first writer with whom I established any direct contact. Moreover, if I did not consider that two years earlier in Rakitovo my acquaintances had pointed out to me from afar the then young K. Konstantinov, I could say that he was the first writer I had ever seen. However, I would like to go back a little and begin my story with another meeting - the meeting not with the man, but with the author and editor, which took place much earlier and without which the second one would hardly ever have taken place.

Acad. Prof. Dr. Mihail Arnaudov is one of the great Bulgarian scholars and literary historians. His name is well known not only in our country, but also abroad. For many years he was a full professor at Sofia State University and the head of the Department of General Literary History. Arnaudov was a beloved and respected university lecturer. His lectures were listened to with great interest by students. He patronized many of them in life. Acad. Arnaudov was a sweet-talking and fascinating storyteller. With his pathetic, lively and inspired speech, he always captivated the audience. The reading rooms and public universities could barely accommodate the listeners who were thirsty for more knowledge. His rare scientific erudition made a deep impression on me.

Choosing November to stay in Paris has, on the one hand, the convenience that cultural life has already begun there, people are in their places, theaters and various institutions related to science, literature, art are open; on the other hand, it is - in terms of weather - the most fickle month, at that - unpleasantly cool, unwelcoming, with fog and rain that ties one hand to the umbrella, while with the other you have to clutch under your arm the bag with the address book, with all sorts of notes, with one or another purchased book... The "metro" card should also be at hand, because, although the fares have increased, it still remains the most convenient and cheapest means of transport.