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Two captains: the main characters of the novel by Veniamin Kaverin

Veniamin Kaverin owns, perhaps, one of the key adventure novels, which were read to the children of the Soviet era. The novel was written in the 1940s, but the popularity and relevance of the novel continues today. We are talking about a cult thing - the novel "Two Captains", the main characters of which are complex and lively images.

“Fight and seek, find and never give up”

These words, as if cut out of Alfred Tennyson's poem "Ullis" (Odysseus), are the motto of Kaverin's novel. The work begins surprisingly: not with one's own memory, but with someone else's memory. In the city of Ensk, located on the periphery of Russia, they found the body of a deceased postman. He had a bag with him, and in the bag were letters. The protagonist lives on the first pages of the novel with these letters, and especially the young man remembers the lines associated with polar expeditions, with journeys to the north ... And the novel “Two Captains”, the main characters of which fight, search, find and do not give up, is imbued with the spirit of adventure. Therefore, the work, like the marine novels of Fenimore Cooper and Rafael Sabatini, occupies one of the main places on the shelf of young readers.

Since you are with us, we suggest that you familiarize yourself with Veniamin Kaverin.

It is curious that the lines that the writer made the motto of the novel are simultaneously taken as an epitaph. The words are engraved on a cross commemorating Robert Falcon Scott's polar expedition that never returned home.

Thus, the work of Veniamin Kaverin is dedicated to the theme of searches. If the French writer Marcel Proust's characters are looking for lost time, here the characters are busy searching for a lost polar expedition... and love.

Heroes of the novel "Two Captains"

The classification of the characters in the work is traditional: there are figures of the foreground and figures of the second plan, the main characters and, accordingly, the secondary characters. First, let's talk about who plays the main role in this literary scene.

main characters

Alexander Grigoriev

The name Alexander in the novel most often appears in an affectionate form - Sanya. Of course, Sanya is a positive character. The young man, like other heroes of the first plan, has a difficult fate and many trials. The first test of the young man is physiological in nature - it is dumbness. One day, Sanya's father is accused of murder and taken into custody. Little Sanya is the only one who knows the name of the real criminal, but the boy cannot tell the name, because he cannot speak. In the future, Sanya will be cured of a strange sound illness, but by that time his father will already die in custody.

Sanya's mother will marry again, and her stepfather, as befits the plot in works of this kind, will turn out to be a bad person - tough, callous, vile and selfish. Later, Sanya also experiences the death of her mother. He still has Aunt Dasha - the one who read letters to the boy from the bag of the deceased postman. But the aunt decides that Sanya and her sister should live in an orphanage. Then Sanya and the boy's close friend (Peter) flee - first to Moscow, and then to Turkestan. Adventures begin in the capital... Moscow presents friends not with gifts, but with yet another cruelty of "adult" life.

Fleeing to Moscow, Sanya plans to stay with his friend's uncle for the first time, but Petya's relative, as it turned out, was called to the front. Young guys will face thankless work and play hide and seek with checks in the capital. During one of these checks, Sanya fails to escape, and the boy is sent to a school for homeless children...

The novel spans many years, and in all the situations described in the novel, Sanya appears as a noble, purposeful, strong person in spirit and body. When, visiting a friend, through the fault of Sanya, the lactometer accidentally breaks down - a device for checking the composition of milk - Katya, the young man's girlfriend, wants to protect her friend, but Sanya does not let the girl take the blame. In this case, the hero shows nobility. Alexander is close to the struggle for justice, the young man is also courageous and proud. However, pride is not characteristic of the character. Sanya sincerely believes in her ideals and follows her principles. He is loyal and capable of desperate love. Meanwhile, rationality is not alien to the young man: in many situations, Sanya shows real analytical thinking.

After a quarrel with Katya - already during his youth - Sanya is studying at summer school and is preparing to fulfill his childhood dream - to find out what happened to the polar expedition, which he read about as a child, in strange letters half spoiled by sea water.

Ekaterina Tatarinova

Katya is Sanya's friend, whom we have already talked about above. Her parents' house becomes a whole "brave new world" for Sani, like Ali Baba's cave. The apartment seems like a hero strange world full of mysteries and dangers.

Katya is the daughter of Captain Tatarinov. However, Sanya will hear the story of this captain from a friend not now, but after 4 years. Then the heroes will meet again, get to know each other. Sanya will tell Katya that she is going to become a pilot, and Katya will tell him the story of her family.

In 1912, in June, Captain Tatarinov left on an expedition (from St. Petersburg the captain went to Vladivostok) on the ship "Saint Mary", but before that he came briefly to Ensk, already familiar to us, to say goodbye to his relatives. After that, the captain and the expedition disappeared. The captain's wife repeatedly turned to the emperor with a request for help in finding her husband, but it was believed that the captain could die: if so, and Tatarinov died, then only because of his own negligence and negligence in relation to state property.

Once, Sanya again got the opportunity to reread the letters that he had heard from his aunt in childhood. Suddenly the young man realized: these letters are about Captain Tatarinov and the expedition.

Nikolai Antonovich Tatarinov

In his apartment (and he was the head of the school where Sanya was sent to in Moscow) the Tatarinov family lived, including Katya, Sanya's friend. Nikolai was Katya's cousin uncle. The man did not feel affection and sympathy for the girl's father, that is, for his cousin, because, firstly, he was in love with his brother's wife, Marya Vasilievna, and secondly, he considered him ungrateful.

Sanya considered Nikolai Antonovich as the main "danger" of the Tatarinovs' apartment. One day, Nikolai acts meanly: Marya Vasilievna did not feel reciprocity towards him, but the woman, meanwhile, liked the geography teacher - a certain Korablev. Sometimes he came to visit, and one day he made a marriage proposal. Marya refused. But, despite this, in the mind of Nikolai Antonovich, an insidious plan still arose - to make sure that Korablev would no longer come, and for this - to interfere with his work, so that he would be limited in teaching geography. Sanya told the teacher about everything, and therefore Nikolai kicked the young man out of the house. Katya, not believing Sanya and his story about the meanness of her uncle, takes offense at her friend for a long time.

However, this was not the meanest act of Nikolai Antonovich. The most terrible thing was that the expedition was lost precisely through his fault - for the most part. Nikolai was responsible for the equipment of the polar explorers who went on an expedition, and through his fault this equipment was completely unusable. Sanya cannot prove it, because the facts were carried away by salt water, blurring the words in the letters. But the young man remembers what was written there.

Subsequently, Katya becomes Sanya's lover. Realizing the truth, the girl will leave the Tatarinovs' house: at that time, Katya will already be a respected person, a geologist, and the head of the expedition. Nikolai Antonovich will get his own: the scoundrel will be exposed, and he will be forced to leave, disgraced and humiliated.

And although Nikolai Antonovich is rather a minor character, we introduced him into this description in order to give the characterization integrity. Now, however, let's move on to the next figures of the novel.

Heroes of the second plan

Marya Vasilievna Tatarinova

We have already begun the story about Marya Vasilievna. The woman is very unhappy: firstly, Marya loses her husband, secondly, the heroine loses the company of Korablev, who she likes, and thirdly, she is forced to marry a man she does not love.

As you might guess, Marya Vasilievna becomes the wife of Nikolai Antonovich. All because the woman felt guilty and that she was allegedly indebted to Nikolai for the care rendered to her, mother and daughter. But one day Marya Vasilievna learns from Sanya about what a "terrible person" Nikolai Antonovich was. The young man did not know that the latter had already become the husband of a poor woman.

Marya Vasilievna felt guilty before her husband (captain), felt like a traitor. In the end, the heroine cannot stand it and commits suicide: the woman was poisoned, and the doctors could not help her in time and save her.

Here the reader is again faced with the drama in the relationship between Sanya and Katya: at her mother's funeral, Katya does not want to talk to Sanya, because Nikolai managed to convince the girl that it was Sanya who was to blame for the death of Marya Vasilievna, and the letters were about a completely different person.

In the end, Nikolai Antonovich will be exposed anyway. Sanya will do this, but only after the end of the war.

Romashov / Camomile

We encounter this hero when, while reading a book, we come to the story of Korablev. After all, Grigoriev told the young man about what he heard from Nikolai Tatarinov, and then considered Korablev a traitor who reported everything to Tatarinov.

But the traitor in this situation was not Korablev at all, but Romashov - nicknamed Chamomile.

Chamomile is an exclusively and completely negative hero. Vile, cowardly, capable only of low and vile deeds. From childhood, Chamomile is interested in his own benefit, and for her sake the hero can even go to blackmail friends and relatives.

The worst thing is that one day Sanya finds out: Romashka entered the Tatarinovs' house, got into trust and, it seems, a little more and marries Katya. The girl did not immediately understand that Chamomile was only familiar with betrayal, and that he himself was a two-faced and morally dirty person. It is Chamomile who will be Nikolai's accomplice in denigrating the name of Sanya Grigoriev, when Sanya wants to present materials about the fate of the captain of the missing expedition ...

However, falling in love with Katya will play a cruel joke with Romashka: he will offer Sana services in exposing Nikolai's guilt. The fee is Sanya's refusal to want to be with Katya. However, Grigoriev turned out to be more noble: Sanya talks about Romashka's proposal to Nikolai Antonovich. However, he could no longer play against a former accomplice.

When Sanya and Katya's trip to the north to search for the missing expedition fails, and Sanya goes to the front - to the war with Spain, Katya will meet her old "friend" again. Chamomile will convince the girl that he was saving Sanya, who was injured, but Grigoriev died tragically. However, now the girl does not believe. Romashka, indeed, lied: Romashov did not save Alexander at all, but betrayed him, taking away his things. As a result, justice will prevail, and Chamomile will be condemned.

Ivan Pavlovich Korablev

We go back again to study in more detail the already familiar personality of the geography teacher. Often Ivan takes precisely the position of the victim, because Korablev is unfairly tortured at school - out of love for Marya Vasilievna, Sanya accuses him of betraying his trust ...

In fact, Korablev embodies such traits as kindness, sincerity, naivety and simplicity, honesty, openness and justice. The teacher loves his job, work, worries about the children he teaches.

Ivan Pavlovich will play an important role in the relationship between Sanya and Katya: Korablev will help lovers many times.

Valentin (Valya) Zhukov

As we know, the theme of friendship occupies a particularly important place in the novel "Two Captains", the main characters of the work constantly find themselves in situations where friendship and betrayal collide with each other in an unequal struggle. According to the laws of the genre, at first it will seem to the reader that evil is winning, but then good will surely prevail.

So, Valya Zhukov is Comrade Sani. At first, Sanya was also friends with Petya (Peter Skovorodnikov). Together, the boys fled to the capital, but then their paths diverged. Petya managed to escape during the check, and subsequently Grigoriev found out that Petya was still in Moscow and was engaged in art. Also, Alexandra (Sasha) Grigorieva, Sanya's sister, who eventually became Petya's wife, studied at the Academy of Arts.

Valya Zhukov and Romashka are comrades who appeared with Sanya while studying at a school for homeless children. Valya is the antipode of Chamomile. Valya is smart, honest, fair, responsible and reliable, a wonderful and loyal friend. Zhukov becomes the husband of Katya's best friend, Kira, and the young man is also waiting for a career as a major scientist.

Sasha Grigorieva

Sister Sani is an artist and the wife of his friend Petya. Events are developing, and later Sana will be able to publish an article about the polar expedition and about Captain Tatarinov ... By that time Sasha will live in Moscow, raise his son. But then the girl will exude the disease. It is not possible to recover: Sasha will die.

Nina Kapitonovna

For Grigoriev, the old woman was a treasure in Ali Baba's cave, because she always treated him with goodies. Nina Kapitonovna introduces Sanya into the circle of the Tatarinov family: once, Sanya helped a woman carry heavy bags ... Nina is Marya Vasilievna's mother.

Ivan Ivanovich

This is a doctor who was able to cure Sanya of dumbness. But this was not the only meeting of our characters. Further, fate pushes them together at a time when Sanya managed to achieve that he was given an assignment to the North. Here, in the Arctic Territory, Ivan Ivanovich gives Sanya notes from the navigator of the St. Mary ship. The navigator, as it turned out, died in 1914, but from those letters Sanya learned about the fate that befell the missing captain.

Deciphering letters, love

A young man, carried away by the ideas of finding polar explorers, studies at the Leningrad summer school, reading and sorting out difficult notes of letters. The diligent young man learns that the captain, Katya's father, let his comrades go so that they would look for a new land and master it. The captain himself, Katya's father, did not leave the ship. Mary's Land is the location that Sanya's investigation points to, and there may be traces of a lost expedition.

Grigoriev will achieve great success in this endeavor. Later, the desire to find traces of the expedition again brings the young man to Katya. However, the expedition will not take place this time….

The reader will encounter the characters again when 5 years have passed for them: Sanya returns, having managed to escape after the war with Spain, but Katya is no longer in Moscow...

We see how much fate throws the heroes. Now Sanya is forced to go on a personal "expedition" - in search of his missing love. Grigoriev is looking for a wife in Moscow, then he goes to Yaroslavl, and then to Novosibirsk ... During his travels, Sana manages - by pure chance (due to the need to make an emergency landing) - to find the remains of the ship "Saint Mary", the body of the deceased captain and his notes . In Polyarny, a town not far from this place, Sanya also meets Katya.

A boy named Sanya Grigoriev lives in a small town called Ensk with his parents and sister. One day, a dead postman and a bag filled with letters are found near the river bank, which are willingly read aloud by the neighbor of the Grigorievs, Daria. At the same time, Sanya's father is mistakenly charged with murder, and the boy knows the truth, but he is unable to reveal it to others due to his dumbness.

Somewhat later, a kind-hearted doctor, who met on the way of Sanya, helps him to master speech, but the elder Grigoriev dies in custody, without waiting for justice. The mother immediately remarries, the stepfather turns out to be an unscrupulous and heartless person who mocks the members of his new family.

Sanya's mother, unable to bear the terrible existence with her second husband, also soon passes away. The neighbors intend to send the boy and his sister Sasha to an orphanage, but Sanya and his closest friend Petka manage to escape to Moscow. There, the guys are unsupervised for some time, but then Sanya is detained, and thus he finds himself in a recently opened school intended for children who have lost their parents.

The boy enthusiastically takes up his studies and finds a common language with classmates. One day, by coincidence, he ends up in an apartment where Nikolai Antonovich Tatarinov, who is in the position of head of the school, lives. Sanya's life includes Katya, his age, an active, emotional and fairly well-read girl, and her mother Marya Vasilievna, who is almost constantly in a dull and depressed state.

The boy begins to constantly visit the Tatarinovs, he has long known that the cousin of Nikolai Antonovich was the husband of Marya Vasilievna and the father of young Catherine. Having sailed on an expedition to remote northern lands, Captain Tatarinov disappeared forever, and the head of the school does not tire of emphasizing how much he managed to do for his late brother, although there is no exact information about the fate of Katya's father even now, his wife and daughter do not know if he is alive or long dead.

At the age of seventeen, Sanya meets Katya again, before that he had not appeared at the Tatarinovs for several years, he was categorically forbidden to come to them, angry with the teenager Nikolai Antonovich. The girl tells her childhood friend the story of her father, it turns out that in 1912 he said goodbye to his family living in Ensk and sailed to Vladivostok on the schooner "Saint Mary". In the future, his relatives never met him again, and all the requests of Marya Vasilievna for help in searching for the captain in the name of the tsar remained unanswered.

One of Alexander's comrades, the cunning and dodgy Romashov or Romashka, as he was called at school, who is also not indifferent to Katya, reports to her cousin that the girl often communicates with Grigoriev. Ekaterina is immediately sent to Ensk to her aunt, Sanya leaves for the same city, having previously severely beaten Romashka.

Arriving at home, Grigoriev, after a long break, again sees his matured sister Sasha, from whom he learns that his old friend Petka is in Moscow and is going to study art. The young man once again reads the old letters that made such a huge impression on him in his childhood, and suddenly realizes that they are talking about the expedition led by the missing Tatarinov.

Carefully reading each line, Sanya understands that it was Katya's father who gave the name of Severnaya Zemlya Maria in honor of his wife, and almost all the equipment for the expedition turned out to be completely unusable thanks to his cousin, who took responsibility for the economic part. The guy immediately tells Catherine about everything, and the girl believes his words without hesitation.

Sanya also tells the truth to Marya Vasilievna, insisting that she accuse Nikolai Antonovich of actually killing his cousin and members of his crew. Only later does the young man realize that the truth literally killed Katya's mother, because by this time she had already managed to become the wife of Nikolai Antonovich. A woman who did not have enough mental strength for such a monstrous discovery commits suicide.

After the funeral, Nikolai Antonovich skillfully convinces people, including his niece, that the letters of his deceased relative were about a completely different person. The guy sees that everyone around him is considered to be the culprit of the tragic death of Marya Vasilievna, and he is going to find the expedition without fail and prove that he did not lie or slander at all about the head of the school.

Grigoriev is studying at a flight school in Leningrad, while his sister Sasha and her husband Petya are preparing to become artists. Upon graduation, Sanya becomes a polar pilot, and when he meets his old comrade Valya Zhukov, he learns that Romashka now regularly visits the Tatarinovs and, apparently, plans to marry Catherine.

Sanya does not stop thinking about this girl and decides to go to Moscow. But first he manages to discover the remains of the schooner, on which Captain Tatarinov sailed, and the young pilot is going to make a corresponding report and reveal the whole truth about the disappeared expedition.

However, Nikolai Antonovich manages to get ahead of Sanya, he himself publishes an article in the press dedicated to the late Tatarinov and his discovery, and at the same time places slander on Grigoriev everywhere, as a result of which the scheduled report is canceled. Korablev, who teaches geography at the school where Sanya previously studied, comes to the aid of the young man, and it is thanks to him that the guy again reaches mutual understanding with Katya and trust on her part. The girl flatly refuses to marry Romashka, as her relatives wish, and leaves home, because she has acquired the profession of a geologist and becomes the leader of the expedition.

Romashka does not give up, he informs Sana that he has some materials incriminating Nikolai Antonovich, but in return he must break off relations with Katya. But Grigoriev still manages to get permission for a trip dedicated to uncovering the secret of Catherine's father. Young people experiencing reckless mutual love feel happy, but at this time Grigoriev's sister Sasha gives birth to a son, but she soon dies due to complications.

It takes about five years. Alexander and Ekaterina, who became his wife, constantly move between the Far Eastern region, Moscow and Crimea. Then they decide to settle in Leningrad, but soon Sanya is forced to go to fight on Spanish territory, and then fight the enemy in the air after the German attack on the USSR.

When meeting with Romashka, he tells Katya how he supposedly tried to save the wounded Alexander, but failed. The young woman absolutely does not believe him, and in reality he really left the helpless Grigoriev to the mercy of fate, depriving him of documents and the weapons he had with him. But Sanya still survives and, after treatment in the hospital, hurries to the starving Leningrad, intending to find Katya.

Grigoriev's wife is no longer in this city, and all searches for Alexander are in vain. But during one of the sorties, his crew discovers traces of Tatarinov's expedition staying in these places, the body of the captain himself, as well as all his letters to relatives and reports. Soon Sanya discovers his wife from his old friend Dr. Pavlov, who once taught him to speak.

In 1944, the Grigorievs again ended up in Moscow, where they met many dear friends for them, whom they already considered dead. Sanya reveals all the meanness and unscrupulousness of Romashka, who is on trial, and then makes a detailed report for geographers, where he exposes all the secrets regarding Tatarinov's journey.

After the words of Grigoriev, no one has any doubts about whose fault the entire crew of the "St. Mary" died. Nikolai Antonovich is forced to leave the hall where the solemn meeting is taking place in disgrace, and it is clear to everyone that his career has ended forever and he will never be able to restore his good name.

Sanya and Katya go to Ensk, and the elderly judge Skovorodnikov, the father of Peter, a friend of Alexander from childhood, in his speech draws an equal sign between the deceased Tatarinov and Grigoriev. He argues that it is such captains that become the source of forward movement both for scientific thought and for all mankind.

Director: Evgeny Karelov
Writers: Evgeny Karelov, Veniamin Kaverin
THE USSR. Production: Mosfilm, 1976

A six-part adventure film directed by Yevgeny Karelov is an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Veniamin Kaverin. A fascinating picture tells about the fate of Sanya Grigoriev, who devoted his life to searching for the missing expedition of Captain Tatarinov. This is a film about heroism and courage, love and fidelity, honor and devotion to ideals.

Main characters:
Alexander Grigoriev (Boris Tokarev)
Sanya Grigoriev in childhood (Seryozha Kudryavtsev)
Ekaterina Tatarinova (Elena Prudnikova)
Katya Tatarinova in childhood (Lena Lobkina)
Mikhail Romashov (Yuri Bogatyrev)
Romashov in childhood (Alyosha Senchev)
Nikolai Antonovich Tatarinov (Nikolai Gritsenko)
Maria Vasilievna Tatarinova (Irina Pechernikova), Katya's mother
Ivan Pavlovich Korablev (Georgy Kulikov), Sleigh's teacher
Nina Kapitonovna (Vera Kuznetsova)
Ivan Ivanych (Vladimir Zamansky), doctor

Fight and seek, find and don't give up

The writer Veniamin Kaverin completed work on his famous novel "Two Captains" in 1944. The book immediately became incredibly popular among young people. No wonder, because the plot, taken from modern life, was filled with the spirit of adventure and courage, heroism and selflessness, high, pure love and devotion. And all this was presented without a gram of excessive pathos and falsehood.

The first attempt to film The Two Captains was made in 1955 by director Vladimir Vengerov. The film turned out to be good, but it could not fully reflect the spirit of the book. Insufficient timekeeping, and clichés typical of the 50s in the image of heroes, also affected.

In 1976, director Yevgeny Karelov undertook a new adaptation of the novel. For the main role of Sasha Grigoriev, he approved the young, but already popular, and most importantly, actor Boris Tokarev with positive charisma. By that time, Tokarev already had two dozen roles, including Lieutenant Osyanin, beloved by the audience, in the military drama “The Dawns Here Are Quiet…” and Lieutenant Nikolai Kuznetsov in the military film “Hot Snow”.

Boris Tokarev himself admitted that he was glad of this role, because Kaverin's book was among his favorites from childhood, and he looked at Vengerov's picture with the participation of Alexander Mikhailov and Evgeny Lebedev at least two dozen times and remembered it frame by frame. And here is such an opportunity to play in the new film adaptation, and even the main role!

Sanya Grigoriev, performed by Boris Tokarev, turned out to be courageous and uncompromising, perhaps sometimes too straightforward. But this straightforwardness came from an inflexible character, alien to the slightest manifestations of resourcefulness and opportunism. At the same time, the actor, when creating his character, managed not to go into the "monument to heroism", remaining a living person.

The role of Sanya Grigoriev in childhood was remarkably played by the young actor Seryozha Kudryavtsev, who very organically existed in the frame. It is worth noting that, together with Boris Tokarev, they managed to create a single convincing line of their character. The image of Sanya Grigoriev does not break up into temporary pieces, he is consistent in his inner world, and outwardly there is some similarity between the actors.

The choice of other characters was also excellent. Charming, life-loving, faithful in her love, Katya Tatarinova, performed by Elena Prudnikova, is exactly what many of his readers imagined the heroine of the novel. Just like Katya's mother - a beautiful, sad woman of a tragic fate, as she was played by Irina Pechernikova. And what a homely, kind, warm Nina Kapitonovna performed by Vera Kuznetsova turned out to be.

And of course, the negative characters, simply brilliantly played by the masters of domestic and world cinema, Nikolai Gritsenko and Yuri Bogatyrev, gave a special shine to the picture. The first created the image of Nikolai Antonovich Tatarinov, a man who sent his brother to his death, and then speculated on his memory, creating his career on his behalf. The second played the role of deceitful, cunning and very cautious Mikhail Romashov, nicknamed Chamomile, who, overwhelmed by passion for Katya Tatarinova, was ready to go to any meanness. Play in such a way that the whole country literally hates your character! This is exactly what Nikolai Gritsenko and Yuri Bogatyrev succeeded with brilliance. The audience clenched their fists in rage at the sight of the self-satisfied and self-confident Nikolai Antonovich, and the scoundrel Romashka just wanted to strangle!

The characters of the second plan turned out to be very bright. This is the wise teacher Ivan Pavlovich Korablev (Georgy Kulikov), and Sanya's mother Aksinya Fedorovna (Zinaida Kirienko), who tried to find her happiness, and Sanya's faithful friend Pyotr Skovorodnikov (Yuri Kuzmenkov), and Sanya's cruel stepfather Gaer Kuliy (Mikhail Pugovkin), and the doctor Ivan Ivanych (Vladimir Zamansky), who played the most important role in the fate of Sanya. Each of the characters is written out carefully, and therefore the images turned out to be full-blooded.

A significant contribution to the overall success of the film was made by the musical accompaniment. A separate bow to the composer Evgeny Ptichkin for the phenomenal overture that precedes each series, reflecting the general mood of the picture, the spiritual impulse of the characters. The songs to his music that sound in the film are also remarkable: “Letter Home”, “North - North” and “Final Song”.

Barely released on the screens, the picture immediately became a cult, became a hymn of courage, devotion, selflessness, and its motto "Fight and seek, find and never give up" for a long time excited the hearts of millions of boys all over the world Soviet Union. Boris Tokarev formulated the film's recipe for success in this way:

“There are films that guess the time and state of the viewer. And they go to eternity. In The Two Captains, the need for romantic love, amazing perseverance and human character is guessed.

First episode

The hero's childhood takes place in the city of Ensk - in a small wretched house by the river.

Once a postman drowned in a river. Aunt Dasha took the letters from her bag and read them aloud to the whole yard.

The hero especially remembered the letter addressed to a certain Maria Vasilievna. It spoke about the schooner "Saint Mary", which froze in the Kara Sea. The address was washed out by water.

The boy, on behalf of whom the story is being told, lives with his father, mother and little sister. Gradually it turns out that the boy is mute - he cannot speak.

However, he lives an ordinary boyish life: he goes out at night to catch blue crayfish. On the river, he witnesses a terrible event: a man killed a watchman!

Running away in fear, the boy (Sanya) lost his father's knife, on which his last name, Grigoriev, was carved.

Policemen (police) arrested Sanya's father for killing the watchman. The irrefutable proof for them was the very knife that the boy had lost. And he, the witness, could not tell anything!

Left without a breadwinner, the family began to starve.

The mother took the children to the village, where they lived alone in a small hut (father's inheritance). Grandmother Petrovna looked after them. The boy became very attached to his sister - a white-headed, funny and talkative girl, who was also called Sasha. How deftly she managed at the age of seven!

One night, in a terrible frost, the children let a bearded man into the hut, who could hardly move from fatigue. His name was Ivan Ivanovich. He was hiding from the police and asked no one to tell about him.

He was an extraordinary person: he showed tricks, often spoke in verse, made funny little animals from improvised material, and besides, he turned out to be a doctor.

It was a magical doctor! He began to teach Sanya to speak. And then mysteriously disappeared. The boy continued to learn to speak himself. And learned!

But there was no need to tell how he lost the knife: his father died in prison.

Having learned to speak, Sanya became more sociable. He became friends with his neighbor Petka Skovorodnikov, who encouraged him to read.

The boys read books (it turns out that Sanya has a very good memory), sell cigarettes, catch crayfish...

But a terrible person appears in Sanya's life. He calls himself: "I am poor Gaer Kuliy."

The boy's mother fell in love with this unpleasant, self-satisfied type, stupid and cruel. He teaches Sasha to live and write, and only with sticks: “until they are “popindicular”, you can’t move on in any case.”

The mother is getting married, the stepfather is so disgusting to the boy that he wants to kill him. Once "that scoundrel Gaer beat her (sister Sasha) half to death because she spilled a glass of vegetable oil."

Sanya is saved from her hated stepfather by Aunt Dasha, who continues to read letters from the drowned postman's bag. One letter seems to the boy to be something connected with a letter about the schooner "Saint Mary" frozen in the ice.

There are such lines: “... I beg you for one thing: do not trust this man! We can safely say that we owe all our failures only to him. It is enough that of the sixty dogs he sold to us in Arkhangelsk, most of them had to be shot in Novaya Zemlya. That's how much this service cost us. Not only I alone - the whole expedition sends him curses.

The letter, which mentions the girl Katyushka, apparently the daughter of the writer, presented a detailed account of the ship moving north.

The boy's mother fell ill and died - the stepfather was to blame. Widowed Aunt Dasha marries the widower "Old Man Skovorodnikov".

All actions take place during the revolution. Shots, fires... The Military Revolutionary Committee declared Soviet power in the city.

It was decided to give brother and sister - Sanya and Sasha - to an orphanage. “We knew the orphanages. They were pale guys in gray jackets and crumpled gray trousers. They beat the birds well with slingshots, and then roasted them in their garden and ate them. This is how they were fed in the shelter! In general, they were "prisoners", and we fought with them ... "

Petka Skovorodnikov and Sanya decide to run away, first to Moscow and then to Tashkent. The boys give each other an oath: “Whoever changes this word of honor will not receive mercy until he counts how much sand is in the sea, how many leaves are in the forest, how many raindrops fall from the sky. If he wants to go forward - send back, if he wants to go to the left - send to the right. As I hit my hat on the ground, so will the thunder strike the one who breaks this word of honor. Fight and seek, find and not give up.

Homeless, the fugitives reached Moscow, but it was too difficult to get to Tashkent.

In Moscow, the boys have suffered a lot. By chance, they broke up and could not find each other.

Sanya ended up in a commune school. Its director was Nikolai Antonovich. He was to play an important role in the life of Sanya Grigoriev.

Sanya began to study at the orphanage. He made comrades: Romashov, nicknamed Romashka, and Valka Zhukov, who was very fond of animals, especially dogs.

Sleigh's sympathy is evoked by a geography teacher named Korablev.

Once the boy helped an unfamiliar old woman to carry bags to the house. It turned out that Nikolai Antonovich lives in the apartment where the old woman lives. There the boy met his age-mate Katen-koy - a very pretty, but terrible nerd.

It turns out that the old woman is from Ensk. From the same place as Sanya! The old woman's daughter, the girl's mother, had long since lost her husband. He was the captain of the ship, went on an expedition and went missing. Nikolai Antonovich Tatarinov is the cousin of this captain.

Sanya begins to visit the Tatarinovs often. He is delighted with the atmosphere of the house, where there are many books and paintings.

The boy helps Katya's grandmother with the housework: bring water, chop firewood. The teacher Korablev often comes to the Tatarinovs. It is noticeable that there is a strong sympathy between the geographer and Katya's mother.

Korablev arranged a theater in the orphanage. Oddly enough, he invited hooligans to the main roles. And after that they began to behave much better.

The geographer at school is beginning to be respected and loved. And the director, Nikolai Antonovich, does not like this, because he is, as it were, relegated to the background.

And then Korablev made Katya's mother, Marya Vasilievna, an offer. But she did not agree to become the teacher's wife. And after that, Nikolai Antonovich launched an offensive against Ivan Pavlovich (Korablev) - he gathered a council demanding that the geographer be expelled from school.

Sanya overheard the meeting of the council and told Korablev and some of his friends about it.

Nikolai Antonovich summoned the boy to his place, called him an informer and forbade him to visit the house. Sanya was terribly upset: it turns out that Korablev reported the conversation to the director of the school?

This means that there is no point in continuing to stay at school, since even beloved Ivan Pavlovich is a traitor!

Sanya ran away from school, tried to sell a jacket at the market ... Then he fell down with a cruel illness - the flu, then meningitis. He woke up in the hospital, where a familiar face bent over him - the same Ivan Ivanovich who had once taught him to speak!

Korablev also visits Sasha in the hospital - it becomes clear that the teacher is not at all a traitor, as the boy thought. After discharge, the hero returns to school, he is immediately instructed to draw a poster for the Komsomol cell (the boy has good artistic abilities). He enthusiastically sets to work. The poster invites everyone to join the Society of Friends of the Air Fleet.

Sanya has a dream of becoming a pilot.

He begins to temper the will. He does gymnastics with an open window in winter, douses himself with ice-cold water, tries to be bold and resolute, reads books about the conquest of the North - the schooner "Saint Mary" is firmly stuck in his head.

Sanya is already seventeen years old. He had not seen Katya for a long time (Nikolai Antonovich forbade him to visit his house). And suddenly, at a strange public event - "The Trial of Eugene Onegin" (such were popular in the twenties) - Sanya sees Katya. She has changed, matured - but her nose is still the same "decisive" and above her forehead - all the same rings.

Katya and Sanya renew their relationship, the girl tells the future pilot about her father - it turns out that he was the captain of the ship "Saint Mary", which died, wiped with ice. What an incredible coincidence!

The expedition was outfitted by Nikolai Antonovich - according to him, everything was organized flawlessly: both supplies and dogs. And if his brother died, it was solely through his own fault: he was too frivolous.

Sanya dreams of conquering the Pole.

During the school ball, Katya and Sanya retire to an empty classroom. Sanya does what he has long wanted to do: he kisses Katya.

At first, the girl is indignant: they say, her old friend did it under the influence of the moment, and not at all because he loves her. But then he believes: Grigoriev's feelings are sincere. It suddenly turns out that the class is not empty at all: Chamomile, a disgusting, vile type, was peeping on the lovers.

The next day, Sanya is waiting for Katya outside in the bitter cold. But she doesn't come! Sanya is not angry with Katya: he is truly in love. Previously, he could say: "Katka is a fool," but now he can only think of her with tenderness.

Sanya calls Katya, but unsuccessfully hits Nikolai Antonovich. He refuses to call the girl to the phone.

From Katya's grandmother, whom Sanya met in the market, he learns that he is forbidden to appear at their house. Yes, what's the matter? School friend Valka says that Romashov was the scammer. He wrote down everything “unlawful” in a little book and reported to Nikolai Antonovich.

Katya was sent to Ensk, supposedly to visit her aunt who had fallen ill.

Sanya is also going to go to the city of her childhood to talk to Katya. However, before leaving, he commits an irreparable deed: having caught Romashka behind the fact that this "informer" digs into his, Sanya's, box, Grigoriev kicks him in the face.

Now there is no going back to school. The hero rides in a train in terrible excitement - and here is his native city! So many changes have taken place over the years. "Old Man Skovorodnikov" became a judge. He lives in a beautiful house with his wife, Aunt Dasha, and Sanya's sister (as you remember, also Sasha).

The white, talkative sister turned into a swarthy, pretty girl with black hair parted in the middle. Brother and sister meet happily, talk about many things. Petka Skovorodnikov, it turns out, lives in Moscow.

Sanya Grigoriev, through his sister, sends Katya a note asking for a meeting.

In Aunt Dasha's chest, Sanya finds old letters from Katya's father from the expedition - some of them have been lost, but he remembers the key words: "greetings from Montigomo Hawkclaw ... I'm incredibly sorry that I entrusted the expedition's equipment to Nikolai ..." So after all it was Nikolai Antonovich who thwarted the expedition! And certainly on purpose!

These letters, read by Katya during the meeting, upset her very much - and they would have upset Maria Vasilievna even more. For Sanya, it comes as a surprise that Nikolai Antonovich has long been in love with Maria Vasilievna, and she recently became his wife.

On the same train with Katya, Sanya returns to Moscow. Korablev stuns the young man with the news that he is threatened with expulsion from school: for beating Romashka and for running away for nine days. Ivan Pavlovich stood up for Sanya, got his “case” heard at the Pedagogical Council. It will be necessary to apologize to Chamomile!

Apologize? Never! Romashov is a scammer! He informed not only about Sanya, but also about all the other guys! As soon as someone says something against Nikolai Antonovich, he will immediately write it down in a little book and report it.

At the pedagogical council, Sanya makes a diatribe against Romashov and Nikolai Antonovich. The principal of the school had a heart attack.

Sanya is not expelled from school, they get by with a strict reprimand along the Komsomol line.

Grigoriev becomes the hero of the school. Petka Skovorodnikov is looking for him - cheerful, with lush red hair. He managed to visit Tashkent, but he decided to return to Moscow. Unlike Sanya, Petka Enska did not forget. He draws beautifully and is going to enter the Academy of Arts.

Katya informs Sana that she gave her father's letters to her mother. Maria Vasilievna came to Korablev and talked for a long time with the geographer and Sanya. She didn't want to believe that she had married the actual killer of her husband.

This visit of Maria Vasilievna to Ivan Pavlovich, who loved her so much, was a farewell: the unfortunate woman poisoned herself and died in the hospital. Katya does not want to talk to Sanya - it was he who pushed her mother to commit suicide!

Only the dream of a flight school supports the young man - he passes the final exams perfectly.

Korablev calls Sanya to him and says that Nikolai Antonovich showed the geographer evidence of his innocence: the expedition was let down by a completely different Nikolai. Katya and her grandmother refuse to communicate with Sanya, they turn away from him at school - he remains almost alone. All the more important for him is the goal: to become a polar pilot and find the schooner "Saint Mary", the expedition of Captain Tatarinov, to figure out who is really to blame.

Before leaving for flight school, Sanya says goodbye to Katya - she considers him guilty. However, Sanya and Katya still love each other, although they say goodbye, as it seems to them, forever.

Years pass. Sanya graduates from flight school and makes her dream come true. He not only becomes a polar pilot, but also searches for the missing expedition. He managed to decipher the navigator's diaries and find a hook from the schooner "Saint Mary".

Sanya comes to Moscow to submit a report to the Glavsevmorput and, of course, to see Katya. Katya's eyes became sad. She does not allow to talk badly about Nikolai Antonovich and often communicates with Romashov. The meeting with Katya at the Bolshoi Theater upsets Sanya very much. He thinks that Katya stopped loving him. Here is perhaps some good news - Petka Skovorodnikov became a theater artist, his name is on the poster.

Sanya came from the Far North to Moscow just in time for the anniversary of his beloved teacher, Ivan Pavlovich Korablev. Many students came, everyone carried bouquets of flowers, and how many beautiful words sounded!

However, for Sanya the evening was ruined by a meeting with Nikolai Antonovich and Romashov. They also came to greet the hero of the day. How handsome, how successful Romashov became! He writes a dissertation under the guidance of Nikolai Antonovich and blackmails him with papers that he obtained by deception - papers that testify to the vile role of Nikolai Antonovich in the fate of Captain Tatarinov. Nikolai Antonovich not only married the widow of Tatarinov (which he had long dreamed of), but also warmed his hands on the supply of low-quality products and unusable sled dogs.

Sanya learns from Korablev that Katya still loves him, he knows about his love from correspondence with Grigoriev's sister.

After a serious conversation with Korablev, Katya, not wanting to communicate with Nikolai Antonovich anymore, moves in with her friend Kira (Kiren), who lives in Sivtsevo Vrazhek (Moscow street) with her mother. Katya has become an excellent geologist (she travels on expeditions), her photographs take first place at exhibitions. How little Sanya knew about Katya in recent years!

Romashov builds intrigues - he knows a lot of bad things about his teacher. But he hides this, demanding one thing: let Nikolai Antonovich persuade Katya to marry his faithful student.

With the help of Romashov, Nikolai Antonovich blackens the name of the pilot Grigoriev in the press, undermining confidence in Sana. However, the pilot Grigoriev finds honest and courageous people who are ready to understand and protect him. The Pravda newspaper publishes an article by Alexander Grigoriev about the search for Tatarinov's expedition.

Sanya again flies to the Arctic - and Katya promises to come to him.

Katya and Sanya became husband and wife. Their life was not easy. The pilot has to move from one airfield to another, change his place of residence, and his wife has to wait and worry. Katya's grandmother, after long emotional hesitation, leaves Nikolai Antonovich and moves in with her granddaughter and her young husband.

One of the parts of the work is written on behalf of Katya (all the rest - on behalf of Sanya Grigoriev). The captain's young wife tells about the death of his sister Sasha - she married Petka Skovorodnikova, gave birth to a son. And suddenly she became seriously ill with pneumonia. Doctors fought for her life for a long time, but Sani's sister dies. Katya undertakes to take care of the boy Petenka, she takes the baby to a dacha near Leningrad - and then the war begins ... A very small child is taken out of Leningrad.

During the years of the Great Patriotic War Sanya and Katya lost each other. Occasionally, only rumors reached: “Katya is alive!”; "Sanya is alive!"

Captain Grigoriev serves in the North and sinks Nazi ships. There he again meets with Dr. Ivan Ivanovich, who still serves medicine and people.

The life work of Captain Grigoriev - the search for the expedition of Captain Tatarinov - was crowned with success. She has been found! The body of Tatarinov himself, frozen in the ice, was also found - letters were preserved in the mail bag. Some of them are addressed to daughter Katya - with the belief that she will ever read them.

Alexander proved the guilt of Nikolai Antonovich and exposed many of the vile deeds of Romashov.

Romashov was arrested and sentenced to ten years.

And Sanya and Katya finally manage to meet. The war is over. The survivors can unite: Katya, Petka Skovorodnikov, his son and the steadfast Nina Kapitonovna (Katya's grandmother) will now live in the same apartment.

And wait for the return of Captain Grigoriev from long-distance flights ...

"Two Captains" is perhaps the most famous Soviet adventure novel for young people. It was reprinted many times, was included in the famous Adventure Library, was filmed twice - in 1955 and in 1976. In 1992, Sergei Debizhev filmed an absurd musical parody "Two Captains - 2", which in the plot had nothing to do with Kaverin's novel, but exploited its name as well-known.. Already in the 21st century, the novel has become literary basis the musical "Nord-Ost" and the subject of a special museum exposition in Pskov, the hometown of the author. - Monuments are erected to the heroes of "Two Captains" and named after the square and the street. What is the secret of Kaverin's literary success?

Adventure novel and documentary investigation

Cover of the book "Two Captains". Moscow, 1940 "Detizdat of the Central Committee of the Komsomol"

At first glance, the novel looks like just a socialist realist opus, although with a carefully crafted plot and the use of some modernist techniques that are not too familiar to socialist realist literature, such as changing the narrator (two of the ten parts of the novel are written dignity on behalf of Katya). This is not true.--

By the time he began work on The Two Captains, Kaverin was already a fairly experienced writer, and in the novel he managed to combine several genres: an adventure travel novel, a novel of education, a Soviet historical novel about the recent past (the so-called novel with a key) and, finally, a military melodrama. Each of these genres has its own logic and its own mechanisms for keeping the reader's attention. Kaverin is an attentive reader of the works of formalists Formalists- scientists representing the so-called formal school in literary criticism, which arose around the Society for the Study of Poetic Language (OPOYAZ) in 1916 and lasted until the end of the 1920s. The formal school united theoreticians and literary historians, versifiers, and linguists. Its most famous representatives were Yuri Tynyanov, Boris Ei-khen---baum and Viktor Shklovsky.- I thought a lot about whether genre innovation is possible in the history of literature. The novel "Two Captains" can be considered the result of these reflections.

Film studio "Mosfilm"

The plot outline of the journey-investigation in the wake of the letters of Captain Tatarinov, about the fate of whose expedition no one knows anything for many years, Kaverin borrowed from the famous novel by Jules Verne "Children of Captain Grant". Like the French writer, the text of the captain's letters has not been completely preserved, and the place of the last stop of his expedition becomes a mystery that the heroes have been guessing for a long time. Kaverin, however, reinforces this documentary line. Now we are talking not about one letter, the traces of which are being searched, but about a whole series of documents that gradually fall into the hands of Sanya Grigoriev In early childhood, he reads many times the letters of the captain and navigator of the “St. about the same expedition. Then Sanya gets acquainted with the family of Captain Tatarinov, gets access to his books and sorts out notes on the fields about the prospects for polar research in Russia and the world. While studying in Leningrad, Grigoriev carefully studies the press of 1912 to find out what they wrote at that time about the expedition of "St. Mary". The next stage is the discovery and painstaking decoding of the diary of the very navigator who owned one of the letters from En. Finally, in the very last chapters main character becomes the owner of the captain's suicide letters and the ship's logbook..

"Children of Captain Grant" - a novel about the search for the crew of a sea vessel, the story of a rescue expedition. In The Two Captains, Sanya and Tatarinov's daughter, Katya, are looking for evidence of Tatarinov's death in order to restore the good memory of this man, once not appreciated by his contemporaries, and then completely forgotten. Taking up the reconstruction of the history of Tatarinov's expedition, Grigoriev assumes the obligation to publicly expose Nikolai Antonovich, the captain's cousin, and later Katya's stepfather. Sanya manages to prove his disastrous role in the expedition's equipment. So Grigoriev becomes, as it were, a living deputy of the deceased Tatarinov (not without allusions to the story of Prince Hamlet). From the investigation of Alexander Grigoriev, another unexpected conclusion follows: letters and diaries need to be written and stored, since this is a way not only to collect and save information, but also to tell later about what contemporaries are not ready to hear from you yet. . It is characteristic that Grigoriev himself, in the last stages of his search, begins to keep a diary - or, more precisely, to create and store a series of unsent letters to Katya Tatarinova.

Here lies the deep "subversive" meaning of The Two Captains. The novel asserted the importance of old personal documents in an era when personal archives were either confiscated during searches or destroyed by the owners themselves, fearing that their diaries and letters would fall into the hands of the NKVD.

The American Slavist Katherine Clark called her book about the socialist realist novel History as Ritual. At a time when history appeared on the pages of countless novels as ritual and myth, Kaverin portrayed in his book a romantic hero who restores history as an ever-elusive secret that needs to be deciphered, endowed with personal meaning. Probably, this dual perspective was another reason why Kaverin's novel retained its popularity throughout the 20th century.

Novel parenting

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

The second genre model used in The Two Captains is the educational novel, a genre that emerged in the second half of the 18th century and developed rapidly in the 19th and 20th centuries. The focus of the novel of upbringing is always the story of the hero growing up, the formation of his character and worldview. "The Two Captains" adjoins that kind of genre that tells about the biography of the orphan hero: Henry Fielding's "The Story of Tom Jones, the Foundling" and, of course, the novels of Charles Dickens, above all "The Adventures of Olivier Twist" and "The Life of David Copperfield".

Apparently, the last novel was of decisive importance for The Two Captains: when she first saw Sanya’s classmate Mikhail Romashov, Katya Tatarinova, as if anticipating his sinister role in her and Sanya’s fate, says that he is terrible and similar to Uriah Heep, the main villain from The Life of David Copperfield. Other plot parallels lead to Dickens's novel: a despotic stepfather; an independent long journey to another city, towards a better life; exposing the "paper" machinations of the villain.

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

However, in the history of Grigoriev's growing up, motives appear that are not characteristic of the literature of the 18th and 19th centuries. Sanya's personal formation is a process of gradual accumulation and concentration of will. It all starts with overcoming dumbness Due to an illness suffered in early childhood, Sanya lost the ability to speak. Silence actually becomes the cause of the death of Sanya's father: the boy cannot tell who actually killed the watchman and why his father's knife ended up at the crime scene. Sanya gains speech thanks to a wonderful doctor, a runaway convict Ivan Ivanovich: in just a few sessions, he shows his patient the first and most important exercises for training the pronunciation of vowels and short words. Then Ivan Ivanovich disappears, and Sanya makes the further path to gaining speech himself., and after this first impressive act of will, Grigoriev undertakes others. While still at school, he decides to become a pilot and begins to systematically temper himself and go in for sports, as well as read books that are directly or indirectly related to aviation and aircraft construction. At the same time, he trains the ability to self-control, as he is too impulsive and impressionable, and this greatly interferes in public speaking and when communicating with officials and bosses.

The aviation biography of Grigoriev demonstrates even greater determination and concentration of will. First, training at a flight school - in the early 1930s, with a lack of equipment, instructors, flight hours and just money for life and food. Then a long and patient wait for an assignment to the North. Then work in civil aviation beyond the Arctic Circle. Finally, in the final parts of the novel, the young captain struggles with external enemies (fascists), and with the traitor Romashov, and with illness and death, and with longing for separation. In the end, he emerges from all the tests as a winner: he returns to the profession, finds the place of the last stop of Captain Tatarinov, and then Katya, lost in the evacuation upheavals. Romashov is exposed and arrested, and his best friends - Dr. Ivan Ivanovich, teacher Korab-lev, friend Petka - are again nearby.

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

Behind all this epic of the formation of the human will, one can read the serious influence of the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche, assimilated by Kaverin from the original and from indirect sources - the works of authors who had previously been influenced by Nietzsche, for example, Jack London and Maxim Gorky. In the same strong-willed Nietzschean vein, the main motto of the novel, borrowed from the poem by the English poet Alfred Tennyson "Ulysses", is rethought. If Tennyson has the lines "fight and seek, find and not give up" In the original - "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield". describe an eternal wanderer, a romantic traveler, then with Kaverin they turn into a credo of an unbending and constantly educating warrior.

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

The action of The Two Captains begins on the eve of the 1917 revolution, and ends on the same days and months when the last chapters of the novel (1944) are written. Thus, we have before us not only the life story of Sani Grigoryev, but also the history of a country that goes through the same stages of development as the hero. Kaverin is trying to show how, after being downtrodden and "mute", the chaos of the early 1920s and the heroic labor impulses of the early 1930s, by the end of the war, she begins to confidently move towards a brighter future, which Grigoryev, Katya, their close friends and other nameless heroes with the same reserve of will and patience.

There was nothing surprising and especially innovative in Kaverin's experiment: the revolution and the Civil War quite early became the subject of historizing descriptions in complex synthetic genres, combining, on the one hand, the features of a historical chronicle, and on the other, a family saga or even quasi-folklore epic. The process of including the events of the late 1910s - early 1920s in historical fiction began already in the second half of the 1920s. For example, “Russia, washed with blood” by Artem Vesely (1927-1928), “Walking through the agony” by Alexei Tolstoy (1921-1941) or “Quiet Flows the Don” by Sholokhov (1926-1932).. From the genre of the historical family saga of the late 1920s, Kaverin borrows, for example, the motive for dividing the family for ideological (or ethical) reasons.

But the most interesting historical layer in The Two Captains is perhaps not connected with the description of the revolutionary Ensk (under this name Kaverin portrayed his native Pskov) or Moscow during the Civil War. Of interest here are later fragments describing Moscow and Leningrad in the late 1920s and 1930s. And in these fragments the features of another prose genre appear - the so-called novel with a key.

Novel with a key

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

This ancient genre, which arose in France in the 16th century to ridicule court clans and groups, suddenly found itself in demand in Soviet literature of the 1920s and 30s. Main principle roman a clef consists in the fact that real persons and events are encoded in it and displayed under other (but often recognizable) names, which makes it possible to make prose both chronicle and pamphlet, but at the same time draw the reader's attention to what transformations the "real life" in the writer's imagination. As a rule, very few people can unravel the prototypes of a novel with a key - those who are familiar with these real persons in person or in absentia.

"Goat's Song" by Konstantin Vaginov (1928), "Crazy Ship" by Olga Forsh (1930), "Theatrical Novel" by Mikhail Bulgakov (1936), finally, Kaverin's early novel "Brawler, or Evenings on Vasilyevsky Island" (1928) - all these works represented modern events and real persons acting in fictional literary worlds. It is no coincidence that most of these novels are devoted to people of art and their collegiate and friendly communication. In The Two Captains, the basic principles of the novel with the key are not consistently maintained - however, depicting the life of writers, artists or actors, Kaverin boldly uses techniques from the arsenal of the genre familiar to him.

Remember the scene of the wedding of Petya and Sasha (Grigoriev's sister) in Leningrad, where the artist Filippov is mentioned, who "draws [a cow] into small squares and writes each square separately"? In Filippov, we can easily recognize him " analytical method". Sasha takes orders from the Leningrad branch of Detgiz, which means that she collaborates with the legendary Marshakov editorial office, which was tragically destroyed in 1937 Kaverin was clearly taking a risk: he began writing his novel in 1938, after the editorial board was dissolved and some of its employees were arrested.. The subtexts of theatrical scenes are also interesting - with visits to various (real and semi-fictional) performances.

One can talk about the novel with a key in relation to The Two Captains quite conditionally: this is not a full-scale use of the genre model, but the re-re-not-shine of only some of the techniques; most of the heroes of The Two Captains are not encrypted historical figures. Nevertheless, it is very important to answer the question of why such heroes and fragments were needed in The Two Captains. The genre of a novel with a key involves the division of the reader's audience into those who are capable and those who are not able to pick up the right key, that is, into those who are initiated and perceive the story as such, without restoring the real background . In the "artistic" episodes of "The Two Captains" we can observe something similar.

Production novel

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

In "Two Captains" there is a hero whose last name is encrypted only ini-tsial-lom, but any Soviet reader could easily guess it, and no key was required for this. Pilot Ch., whose progress Grigoriev watches with bated breath, and then, with some timidity, turns to him for help, is, of course, Valery Chkalov. Other "aviation" initials were easily deciphered: L. - Sigismund Levanevsky, A. - Alexander Anisimov, S. - Mauritius Slepnev. Begun in 1938, the novel was supposed to sum up the turbulent Soviet Arctic epic of the 1930s, where polar explorers (land and sea) and pilots equally manifested themselves.

Let's briefly restore the chronology:

1932 - icebreaker "Alexander Sibiryakov", the first voyage along the Northern Sea Route from the White Sea to Beringovo in one navigation.

1933-1934 - the famous Chelyuskin epic, an attempt to sail from Murmansk to Vladivostok in one navigation, with the death of the ship, landing on an ice floe, and then rescuing the entire crew and passengers with the help of the best pilots in the country: after many more years, the names of these pilots could be listed by heart any Soviet student.

1937 - Ivan Papanin's first drifting polar station and Valery Chkalov's first non-stop flight to the North American continent.

Polar explorers and pilots were the main characters of our time in the 1930s, and the fact that Sanya Grigoriev not only chose an aviation profession, but also wanted to link his fate with the Arctic, immediately gave his image a romantic halo and great attractiveness.

Meanwhile, if we consider separately professional biography Grigoryeva and his steady attempts to send an expedition to search for the crew of Captain Tatarinov, it will become clear that "Two Captains" contain the features of another type of novel - a production novel that has become widespread in the literature of socialist realism in the late 1920s, with the onset of industrialization. In one of the varieties of such a novel, the center was a young enthusiastic hero who loves his work and country more than himself, ready for self-sacrifice and obsessed with the idea of ​​a “breakthrough”. In his desire to make a “breakthrough” (introduce some kind of technical innovation or just work tirelessly), he will definitely be hindered by a pest hero The role of such a pest can be a bureaucrat leader (of course, a conservative by nature) or several such leaders.. There comes a moment when the protagonist is defeated and his cause, as it seems, is almost lost, but nevertheless the forces of reason and goodness win, the state, represented by its most reasonable representatives, intervenes in the conflict, encourages the innovator and punishes the conservative.

"Two Captains" is close to this model of a production novel, most memorable to Soviet readers from Dudintsev's famous book "Not by Bread Alone" (1956). The antagonist and envious of Grigoriev Romashov sends letters to all instances and spreads false rumors - the result of his activity is the sudden cancellation of the search operation in 1935 and the expulsion of Grigoriev from his beloved North.

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

Perhaps the most interesting line in the novel today is the transformation of the civilian pilot Grigoriev into a military pilot, and peaceful research interests in the Arctic into military and strategic interests. For the first time, such a development of events is predicted by an unnamed sailor who visited Sanya in a Leningrad hotel in 1935. Then, after a long "exile" to the Volga meliorative aviation, Grigoriev decides to change his fate on his own and volunteers for the Spanish war. From there, he returns as a military pilot, and then his entire biography, as well as the history of the development of the North, is shown as a military one, closely connected with the security and strategic interests of the country. It is no coincidence that Romashov turns out to be not just a pest and a traitor, but also a war criminal: the events of the Patriotic War become the last and ultimate test for both heroes and anti-heroes.

Military melodrama

A still from the serial film "Two Captains", directed by Yevgeny Karelov. 1976 Film studio "Mosfilm"

The last genre that was embodied in The Two Captains is the genre of military melodrama, which during the war years could be realized both on the theater stage and in the cinema. Perhaps the closest analogue of the novel is Konstantin Simonov's play "Wait for me" and the film of the same name (1943) based on it. The action of the last parts of the novel unfolds as if following the plot outline of this melodrama.

In the very first days of the war, the plane of an experienced pilot is shot down, he ends up in the occupied territory, and then, under unclear circumstances, disappears for a long time. His wife does not want to believe that he is dead. She changes the old civilian profession associated with intellectual activity to a simple rear one and refuses to evacuate. Bombing, digging trenches on the outskirts of the city - she experiences all these trials with dignity, never ceasing to hope that her husband is alive, and in the end waiting for him. This description is quite applicable to the film "Wait for me" and to the novel "Two Captains" Of course, there are differences: Katya Tatarinova in June 1941 does not live in Moscow, like Simonov's Lisa, but in Leningrad; she has to go through all the trials of the blockade, and after her evacuation to the mainland, Grigoriev cannot get on her trail..

The last parts of Kaverin's novel, written alternately on behalf of Katya, then on behalf of Sanya, successfully use all the techniques of military melodrama. And since this genre continued to be exploited in post-war literature, theater and cinema, "Two Captains" still long time exactly fell into the horizon of readers' and viewers' expectations waiting horizon(German Erwartungs-horizont) is a term of the German historian and literary theorist Hans-Robert Jauss, a complex of aesthetic, socio-political, psychological and other ideas that determine the author's attitude to society, and also the reader's attitude to pro-out-of-doing.. Youthful love, born in the trials and conflicts of the 1920s and 30s, passed the last and most serious test of the war.