The patch on Kutuzov’s eye turned out to be a fiction: I never wore it in my life
[ad_1]
The State Pushkin Museum launched the exhibition project “Or is it new for us to argue with Europe?..”, named after a line from Alexander Sergeevich’s program poem “To the Slanderers of Russia.” The story about the foreign campaigns of the Russian army of 1813–1815, which followed the defeat of Napoleonic army on the territory of Russia, turned out to be stereoscopic and detailed, although it seemed that the narrator was not the Museum of the Patriotic War of 1812, and not a military museum at all.
Russia’s internal and external messages of the first two decades of the century before last are very similar to today’s or yesterday’s Soviet ideologies. Here we “can repeat” to you, but what was said through the mouth of Pushkin (“Or is the Russian unaccustomed to victories? Or from Perm to Taurida… the Russian land will not rise”). And the familiar rejection of the Western habit of criticizing Moscow (“…why are you threatening Russia with anathema?”, “You are formidable in words – try it in deeds!”), and much more. The universality of Pushkin’s creativity, which, like the Bible, contains everything, allows it to be applied in any situation. But the museum workers not only highlighted the “imperial character” of the main poet, but, as it were, looked through his eyes at the military campaign of the Russian army, which became a continuation of the Patriotic War of 1812.
And here historical parallels with the events of the Second World War are appropriate, when allied countries rallied against the aggressor (anti-Napoleonic/anti-Hitler coalition), the Russians, having achieved a turning point in the fight over the enemy on their territory (Borodino-Stalingrad), crossed their borders and continued the onslaught, liberating the enslaved peoples and reached the capital of the state that attacked them (Paris, Berlin – it doesn’t matter).
How did the organizers create a panoramic picture of foreign campaigns? In glass display cases in the center of the main exhibition halls, they placed complete sets of the dress uniform of a huntsman of the old guard of Emperor Napoleon, a chief officer of the Russian hussar regiment and a private of the Don Cossack army – with pistols, sabers and everything else. True, the uniform is a modern reconstruction, but it works great as a visualization. This is the macro level; at the micro level, voluminous illustrations were provided by several beautiful sets of scale models (it’s hard to call them “soldiers”) of military personnel of the French, Russian and allied armies, extremely detailed (even Napoleon can be seen in one figure, it seems).
In addition, visitors see a number of authentic items designed to help them get in touch with the era: these are real buckshot and bullets from the Borodino field, a Prussian iron cross that belonged to Muravyov-Apostol, a silver Cross of St. George, an award medal “For the capture of Paris on March 19, 1814,” commemorative medals and a crystal goblet in memory of this event.
No less reliable monuments of history have become ancient engravings, in which we see Tsar Alexander I, who received the title of Liberator, key commanders of the Russian army, including Kutuzov – by the way, his engravers depicted him without a bandage (the real commander did not wear it, unlike the movie one), – Napoleon and French commanders.
Again, engravings and ancient paintings show burning Smolensk and Moscow, scenes of major battles, including the Battle of Borodino, the Battle of Brienne, the Russian siege of Danzig, Waterloo, and even a picture of the death of Field Marshal Kutuzov far from his homeland. A dying commander, above him a priest reading a prayer, people in officer uniforms. Candles. Black shadows on the wall. The effect of presence is one hundred percent.
We perceive the chronology of the Second World War as a single one – from June 22, 1941 to May 9, 1945, but then 1812 and the troops crossing the border became like two separate volumes of one epic novel. The medallion “The First Step of Alexander I Outside Russia” is dedicated to the event of entering foreign lands. Here we are again faced with personalization – thousands of soldiers actually crossed the border, but on a plaster circle this is done by one emperor – he is the liberator, and not, as in the USSR, all the soldiers who were called liberators.
The segment of history when Napoleon had already been finished off in his lair is displayed in the exhibition through paintings and posters about the “Union of Sovereigns” (the Holy Alliance of the Russian Empire, Prussia and Austria) and the Congress in Vienna, which established the post-war order in Europe, which then seemed unshakable and was considered the only possible. And here the most catchy thing is the numerous German and French (!) caricatures of Bonaparte. Caustic satire. “Oh, dad, how many wonderful soap bubbles you have blown” – this is about the emperor who promised a lot to his people. And here is another beautiful example – the picture “Gone with the Wind”, that is, unable to withstand the “northern wind” – this is what Napoleon’s contemporaries called the joint forces of Austria, Prussia and the Russian Empire. It’s hard to believe that in 1814, his fellow tribesmen laughed at a man whose rise to power and conquests by Alfred de Musset in the canonical novel “Confessions of a Son of the Century” are described as follows: “Napoleon shook everything in his path, sweeping through the world. The kings felt how their crowns swayed, and, clutching their heads, they felt only their hair, which stood on end from insane fear.” But the earthly glory of the most famous Frenchman faded. “Eternal peace” was approved in Vienna.
In any case, you can watch the exhibition in the mansion on Prechistenka without thinking about literature at all. But if we follow the chronology from Pushkin, then the beginning will be the lines about the lyceum years, when the poet-youth looked with envy at his older comrades in uniforms going to war (“Under the shadow of the sciences they returned with annoyance, / Envying that they were dying / Walking past us “…).
And the epilogue is this stanza:
Ross in Paris! -Where is the torch of vengeance?
Lower your head, Gaul.
But what do I see? Ross with a smile of reconciliation
Coming with a golden olive.
Need I explain that the “golden olive” here is a symbol of peacefulness, and if the Parisians greeted their allies warily, it was only at first, but they soon realized how the behavior of the French in Moscow and the Russians in Paris differed. There was no one to come up with “two million raped French women” in the 19th century.
Newspaper headline:
Kutuzov without a bandage
[ad_2]
Source link
