5 myths about Pushkin that many believe for some reason

1. Pushkin looked like this

Walks on the web like this photograph allegedly depicting Pushkin. They say that this daguerreotype was made by the French inventor Louis Daguerre in 1836 in St. Petersburg and this is the only lifetime photo of the poet.

But in reality the image is a fake. Yes, the first experiments in the field of photography were carried out during the life of Pushkin, but then the pictures looked not as detailed as its intended portrait.

For example, to take such a photo, it took an exposure of several days:

Therefore, in the first pictures there are only landscapes: not a single model will sit out so long.

Besides, invented Louis Daguerre's photography method was made public in 1839, two years after Pushkin's death. And there is no evidence that the latter was familiar with Daguerre at all. So the daguerreotype with the poet is not real.

And here is the famous portrait of Pushkin by Orest Kiprensky wrote from nature, so that Alexander Sergeevich on him is approximately the same as he was in reality.

2. Pushkin wrote "Luka Mudishchev"

No, the author of the indecent poem "Luka Mudishchev" is unknown. It is attributed either to Pushkin or to the poet Ivan Barkov, famous for his "shameful" poems, but to find the real author failed.

Pushkin did indeed write a fair amount of obscene poems that you weren't told about in school.

It is enough to read “Shadow of Barkov” or “Tsar Nikita and his forty daughters”. Yes, and "Gavriliada" with the elegance of form is distinguished by an extremely frivolous content. However, the philologist Kirill Taranovsky, having studied the poem "Luka Mudishchev", came to conclusionthat it is not in the Pushkin style. In addition, it describes the life of merchants and philistines, with whom poet was little known. So he did not create this masterpiece.

3. Pushkin wrote the poem "Ruslan and Lyudmila" for children

If we are talking about frivolity in poetry, here is another related myth. Usually Pushkin's fairy tales are read At school, from an early age instilling in children a love for "The Tale of the Dead Princess" and "The Tale of Tsar Saltan." "Ruslan and Lyudmila" is also considered a children's work.

However, the version that you will find in most publications is a cleaned up and censored version prepared by Pushkin himself. In early editions of the poem was much more spicy moments.

The famous poet Ivan Dmitriev, after reading "Ruslan and Lyudmila", noted that "the prudent mother of her daughter orders to spit on this fairy tale." Pushkin was dissatisfied with such a review and in 1828 from the second edition of the poem all erotic moments cut out. And he also added the well-known prologue “At the seashore there is a green oak ...”. It is this version of the tale that is given to children to read - the poet did not create the original version for them at all.

4. Dantes defeated Pushkin in a duel because he was wearing a bulletproof vest

There is a story on the Web that Dantes won the duel thanks to some kind of protection under his clothes - like a bulletproof vest of that time.

There are various assumptions in different sources that this could be - for example, custom-made mail or cavalry cuirass. And the truth was revealed, allegedly due to the fact that the daughter of Dantes, Leonia-Charlotte, who was terribly fond of Pushkin's work, exposed her father. For which he put her in a madhouse.

However, this story is does not have no evidence underneath. Pushkinist Yanina Levkovich in detail explored versions about the chain mail, cuirass and armor of Dantes and came to the conclusion that they are all implausible.

Even with modern Kevlar and polymers, to make a reliable body armor, which can be easily hidden under clothing - the problem is still the same. And in the 19th century, dressing up in a cuirass or chain mail of hidden wearing was completely impossible.

Unless, of course, you are Frodo with his mithril shirt.

Dante during duel was also wounded in the arm. His examined Head Doctor of Horse Artillery Stefanovich. And if the duelist brought to him was in a bulletproof vest, the doctor would certainly have noticed this.

And yes, there are none. evidenceso that Dantes quarreled with his daughter, and even more so sent her to a madhouse.

5. Pushkin staged his own death and became the writer Alexandre Dumas, the father of

Pretty original conspiracy theory, which is as follows. Pushkin conspired with Dantes to arrange a fake duel under a fictitious pretext. He wounded the poet not in the stomach, as the official version says, but in the thigh. Pushkin staged his own death and fled to France, where he became famous as a prose writer Alexandre Dumas - Father!

The poet, by the way, did not forget about the help of Georges Dantes and named the main character of the novel The Count of Monte Cristo, Edmond Dantes, in his honor.

The theory is fun, but it breaks down into a couple of simple facts. Firstly, by the time of Pushkin's death Dumas was already a fairly well-known writer - even his Russian critic Belinsky was a genius. called. You can, of course, complicate the hypothesis a little more and assume that Pushkin, who escaped from Russia, killed the poor fellow and took his place... But this is already a bit stretched.

Secondly, the names of Georges and Edmond Dantes in the original are written differently - d'Anthès and Dantès, respectively.

And finally, Pushkin would hardly have been able to easily leave for France and create there under a pseudonym, because his body subjected opening under close supervision. Therefore, if not for Dantes' bullet, then Vladimir Dahl's scalpel would definitely put an end to the escape plans.

Yes, the compiler of the "Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language" was a friend of Pushkin and part-time doctor. It was he who subjected the body of the poet to an autopsy.