April 1, 1981
A 80-year-old woman died in Moscow. Agniya Barto — poet, screenwriter, and radio host. The number one children's writer in the Soviet Union.
There are such people
Serve them everything on a platter!
She was born in 1901 (according to another version - in 1906) in Kovno, which was part of the Russian Empire (now - Kaunas, Lithuania). Maiden name - Volova. The parents were wealthy people: the father worked as a veterinarian, the mother was a housewife.
She grew up in Moscow and wrote poetry since childhood.
In 1924, she graduated from the choreographic school. At her graduation ceremony, she recited her poem "Funeral March" to the music of Chopin, striking tragic poses while doing so—the People's Commissar of Education was in the audience. Lunacharsky and could hardly contain his laughter. He advised the girl to take children's literature seriously:
Listening to the Funeral March, I realized that you will definitely write funny poems.
Her first collection was published in 1925. Her literary career was also aided by her marriage: the writer Pavel Barto gave her not only a surname, but also a “pass” to the Writers’ Union and Detgiz.
In 1930, she wrote the famous cycle "Toys." At meetings, she was criticized for her overly complex rhymes, especially the famous lines:
They dropped Mishka on the floor,
Tear off Bear’s paw.
I still won't leave him -
Because he's good.
Her poetry was beloved by the people, and her books were published in huge print runs. However, critics often called it "pseudo-Soviet" and too avant-garde.
In our children's literature, there are Marshak and his lieutenants. I can't be Marshak, and I don't want to be a lieutenant.
With the start of the Great Patriotic War, she left with her family for the Urals. Her second husband, Andrey Shcheglyaev, He was a prominent power engineer and dean of MPEI – he was called “the most handsome dean of the Soviet Union.”
In order to write poems about teenagers who came from villages to work in defense factories, she herself received a lathe rank.
She spent a month on the front lines, reading children's poems to front-line soldiers.
In 1947 she wrote the poem “Zvenigorod” about children orphaned during the war.
Suddenly there will be silence,
The children will remember something...
And, like an adult, by the window
Suddenly Petya will become quiet.
He still remembers his mother...
It's only Lelka
Can't remember -
She is only three years old
After this, she was inundated with letters from all over the country asking for help in locating their relatives. From 1964 to 1973, she hosted a monthly radio program, "Find a Person," which helped reunite nearly a thousand Soviet families (this format was later used for the television program "Wait for Me").
There were broadcasts where I could report that several families had been reunited, and then there was a lull. Joy comes unscheduled.
Many of Barto's later poems were more adult than childish.
A town on the coast,
Palm trees, palm trees, palm trees…
You and I are in America, -
This is where we ended up
She wrote the scripts for the films “The Elephant and the Rope,” “Alyosha Ptitsyn Develops Character,” and “The Foundling” (together with Rina Zelenaya). I came up with it for the heroine. Faina Ranevskaya the famous phrase "Mulya, don't make me nervous!"
She loved practical jokes, danced well, and played tennis. She dressed elegantly.
Just like our Lyalya
There are almost a dozen dresses
I won't wear white
Poorly ironed!
In 1950, she received the Stalin Prize. She adhered to the official ideology. She participated in the persecution of her "fellow writers": her friend Korney Chukovsky and his daughters Lydia, Yuli Daniel, Alexander Galich, Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
So, in your opinion, Korney Ivanovich can't be criticized? I'm for freedom of opinion. I think like Shostakovich and Chingiz Aitmatov, and you think like Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov.
(Agnia Barto - Lydia Chukovskaya)
Do you remember when we were friends?
We were wrong - we are strangers
At the same time, she helped the families of her repressed acquaintances: she obtained scarce medicines, found good doctors, and secured apartments.
Almost every person has moments in life when he does more than he can.
She worked at the limit of her capacity until her last days. Even in the hospital, where she was admitted with a heart attack, she asked to be transferred to a room with a telephone so she could get things done.
