September 19, 2005
A 82-year-old man died in Moscow. Grigory Pozhenyan. A front-line poet, writer, and screenwriter.
The chill of retribution at the victorious line,
not the noon of revenge, but the day of righteousness.
And the song, will it be me, or not me, who will finish singing it,
it is the song of the soldiers who survived the battle.
On behalf of those who are in the swamps, in the rye
remained. And we were ordered: tell us!
Was born in Kharkov in 1922. Father - director of a research institute, was arrested in 1937. Mother - a doctor.
He began the Great Patriotic War as a petty officer on the Black Sea cruiser Molotov and ended it with the rank of lieutenant captain. He served as a reconnaissance officer and saboteur, blowing up bridges.
The first bridge to be blown up was Varvarovka, in Mykolaiv. The last was in Belgrade.
At seventeen - farewell to home,
At nineteen - two thin cadet stripes,
And then a three-hour flash of landing,
And the sister at the head of the bed with a bottle of bromine
He was wounded twice and shell-shocked once. His awards include the "Southern Bow" (a set of medals for the defense of Odessa, Sevastopol, and the Caucasus).
I've never met a more hooligan and risky officer in my navy! I nominated him for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but he threw a cowardly political officer overboard from a landing craft.
(Admiral Philip Oktyabrsky)
In 1946, he entered the Gorky Literary Institute. He was expelled twice. The first time was for supporting the "cosmopolitan" poet Pavel Antokolsky.
I'm not afraid, I was killed at the front too. I carried his book on my chest when I went into battle. You wanted me to condemn my teacher? Watch my hand [made an obscene gesture].
(from a speech at a party committee meeting)
The second expulsion was for possessing a personalized Browning pistol. He had to prove in court that "Ugolek" was his front-line nickname and that the Browning was a gift from the Black Sea Fleet command.
In 1952 he graduated from the institute, and three years later he published his first collection of poems, “Wind from the Sea.”
Sweep, sweep, blizzard of my fate.
Poetry isn't scary. I have nothing to hide behind.
It's all decided. Just as there can't be two deaths,
So, thank God, there are no two Fatherlands
He wrote screenplays for films, including the social drama "Never" and the melodrama about the defense of Odessa "Train to Distant August".
Some of his screenplays are autobiographical. For example, the plot of "Thirst" (1959) is based on a military operation in which Pozhenyan participated: his reconnaissance group recaptured a water tower from the Germans and supplied the town with water.
In 1966, he made his directorial debut with a film about the defense of Sevastopol, "Farewell." In 1972, he co-authored the anti-war novel and spy thriller parody, "Gene Green: The Untouchable."
He published 30 books and wrote 50 songs for films and Soviet pop stars. His most popular songs are "Two Shores" from the film "Thirst" and "Song of a Friend" from the film "The Path to the Pier."
The night was rainy,
And the grass is in the dew,
About me "happy"
Everyone spoke
And I myself believed
Contrary to the heart:
We are two shores
By the same river
If there’s only one joy
There is only one trouble for all.
In the sea, wave after wave rises,
And behind the back there is a back.
Here, at the very edge of the sides,
A friend will cover for a friend.
A friend is always ready to give in
A place in the boat and a circle
His legendary "Poppies" were performed at different times Eduard Khil, Yuri Antonov, Joseph Kobzon.
Poppies, poppies - red poppies!
Bitter memory of the Earth.
Do you dream of attacks,
Do you dream of attacks
Those who have not come from these hills?
In 1993 he signed the “Letter of Forty-Two” in support Boris Yeltsin.
In 2001, at 78, he survived a bandit attack at his dacha in Peredelkino, sustaining serious injuries. He underwent craniotomy to regain his health, but the consequences proved too severe.
He died half an hour before his 83rd birthday.
I'm as old-fashioned as a jackboot
on the deck of a missile carrier.
Like a barque that will not return
from filibustering to a new port.
Like that rejected law,
which no longer has the same force as before.
And like a hermit who becomes dumb
at the newly revealed icons
