Love and death of Vysotsky’s second wife Lyudmila Abramova: a noble woman forgave Marina Vladi

At 83, after two strokes, the second wife of Vladimir Vysotsky, Lyudmila Abramova, a woman of rare nobility, the mother of his two sons, Arkady and Nikita, passed away. Lyudmila Vladimirovna, after parting, did not say a single bad word about Vysotsky. Until the end of her days, she kept his memory, a quarter of a century she worked in a museum dedicated to her ex-husband.

She did not speak badly about Marina Vladi, to whom Vladimir Semenovich had gone. Moreover, she defended her rival when several years ago Vladi decided to auction Vysotsky’s archive.

Vysotsky and Abramova met during the filming of the film “713th asks for landing” – and from the very beginning it was clear that this novel would not be easy. Vysotsky staged a brawl in the hotel, they demanded money from him for broken dishes.

Seeing a girl on the street, the artist, without hesitation, offered to lend him a considerable amount, “mortgaging something” in buying. Lyudmila agreed and pledged her ring. It looked strange, but Abramova later said that a fellow student at VGIK committed suicide because of unrequited love for Lyudmila, and after that, tormented by guilt, she promised to help those in trouble and marry the first of those who would make her offer.

Vysotsky bought the ring back, almost immediately called Lyudmila to marry, and she heard the artist sing and realized that Vladimir was her destiny.

There was one obstacle: Vysotsky was married to actress Isolde Zhukova. As she told MK, by the time Vladimir Semenovich met Lyudmila, the marriage had actually broken up.

The tragedy was the loss of an unborn child – and this is Isolde vinyl Vysotsky’s mother Nina Maksimovna, with whom the couple lived: “We were expecting a baby, but this did not happen. There was a miscarriage. But not by itself … At first there was a scandal. Nina Maksimovna stood in the middle of the room and screamed. could not insert a word. Now I understand that it was a tantrum: we will have a child, and she has her own life … I ended up in the hospital. And flew away from Moscow, it was impossible to keep me. “

Vysotsky, however, officially married Abramova when they had already had two sons (the couple was officially married for five years). Moreover, both Lyudmila’s parents and friends at the beginning of the relationship dissuaded her from this marriage. Colleagues knew about the artist’s alcohol addiction, the actress’s parents, scientists, believed that Vladimir was no match for her. Vysotsky’s mother also greeted Abramova with hostility, saying when her son introduced her to the chosen one: “They don’t marry from a living wife.”

Time has put everything in its place. Abramova devoted herself to her family, stopped acting, tried to treat her husband for alcoholism – and had no doubt that he could be cured. For three years, the artist did not take alcohol in his mouth. But the restless nature of Vladimir Semenovich and quiet family life were incompatible. He meets Marina Vlady and leaves the family.

Lyudmila Abramova explained what happened to MK in this way: “I myself realized that it was time for me to leave, because he went to a completely different level, at which I could no longer help. I am not a secular person, and Volodya, as a great actor, was able to do this All I could do for him was to believe in him, to sincerely admire his every line.

There was no doubt that we would not hold out. I even had to leave early. We divorced while I was in the hospital. Volodya took me for a few hours, everything was fast in court. Then we went to Cheryomushki, and Volodya sang songs that I admired, but they did not seem like masterpieces to him. In particular, “Half an hour before the attack” – I couldn’t listen to it without sobs. He sang it and all my favorite songs.”

Lyudmila Abramova subsequently had an even relationship with Marina Vlady, they sat side by side at the funeral of the artist. In a conversation with us Abramov justified Vladi’s decision to sell Vysotsky’s archive at auction: “We must eat something, excuse me, and help our sons, who are also beggars. She saved everything, didn’t burn a single manuscript or throw it away. But we know examples when the wives of famous people burned their diaries.

Lyudmila Vladimirovna again arranged her personal life – she married mechanical engineer Yuri Ovcharenko, gave birth to a daughter, Serafima. She taught rhetoric at school and worked for a quarter of a century in the Vysotsky Museum. She suffered two severe strokes and passed away on February 18, 2023, surrounded by the love of loved ones.

“I am the mother of his two children, and this status is enough for me,” – spoke “MK” Lyudmila Abramova. But she did not hide the fact that life with Vysotsky and parting were hard for her: “These were, of course, fruitful, happy, significant years, but they broke my life a little. Priest Father Alexei Uminsky diagnosed me: “You are Vysotsky’s disabled person.” He was right”.

But Abramova always considered personal relationships incomparably less significant than Vysotsky’s contribution to culture: If you think about it, only two percent of the world’s population needs poetry. And Volodya multiplied this figure tenfold. He saved souls with his poems and songs.”