TWO CAPTAINS
By
VENIAMIN KAVERIN
Translation from the Russian
Translated by Bernard Isaacs
/Abridged by the Author/
THE FOREIGN LANGUAGES PUBLISHING HOUSE
MOSCOW
1945
___________________________________________________
OCR: http://home.freeuk.com/russica2
В. КАВЕРИН
ДВА КАПИТАНА
/в сокращении автора/
На английском языке
Издательство Литературы на Иностранных Языках
CONTENTS
Author's Preface
BOOK ONE
PART ONE.
Childhood
CHAPTER ONE. The Letter. In Search of the Blue Crab
CHAPTER TWO. Father
CHAPTER THREE. The Petition
CHAPTER FOUR. The Village
CHAPTER FIVE. Doctor Ivan Ivanovich. I Learn to Speak
CHAPTER SIX. Father's Death. I Refuse to Speak
CHAPTER SEVEN. Mother
CHAPTER EIGHT. Pyotr Skovorodnikov
CHAPTER NINE. Stroke, Stroke, Stroke, Five, Twenty, a Hundred
CHAPTER TEN. Aunt Dasha
CHAPTER ELEVEN. A Talk with Pyotr
CHAPTER TWEL VE. Scaramouch Joins the Death Battalion
CHAPTER THIRTEEN. Journey's End
CHAPTER FOURTEEN. We Run Away. I Pretend to Be Asleep
CHAPTER FIFTEEN. To Strive, to Seek, to Find and Not to Yield
CHAPTER SIXTEEN. My First Flight
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. Clay Modelling
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN. Nikolai Antonich
PART TWO.
Food for Thought
CHAPTER ONE. I Listen to Fairy-Tales
CHAPTER TWO. School
CHAPTER THREE. The Old Lady From Ensk
CHAPTER FOUR. More Food for Thought.
CHAPTER FIVE. Is There Salt in Snow?
CHAPTER SIX. I Go Visiting
CHAPTER SEVEN. The Tatarinovs
CHAPTER EIGHT. Korablev Proposes
CHAPTER NINE. The Rejected Suito
CHAPTER TEN. I Go Away
CHAPTER ELEVEN. A Serious Talk
CHAPTER TWELVE. I Start Thinking
CHAPTER THIRTEEN. The Silver Fifty-Kopeck Piece
PART THREE.
Old Letters
CHAPTER ONE. Four Years
CHAPTER TWO. The Trial of Eugene Onegin
CHAPTER THREE. At the Skating-Rink
CHAPTER FOUR. Changes
CHAPTER FIVE. Katya's Father
CHAPTER SIX. More Changes
CHAPTER SEVEN. Marginal Notes
CHAPTER EIGHT. The Ball
CHAPTER NINE. My First Date. Insomnia
CHAPTER TEN. Troubles
CHAPTER ELEVEN. I Go to Ensk
CHAPTER TWEL VE. Home Again
CHAPTER THIRTEEN. The Old Letters
CHAPTER FOURTEEN. A Rendezvous in Cathedral Gardens. "Do Not Trust That Man"
CHAPTER FIFTEEN. We Go for Walks. I Visit Mother's Grave. Day of Departure
CHAPTER SIXTEEN. What Awaited Me in Moscow
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. I Burn My Boats
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN. An Old Friend
CHAPTER NINETEEN. It Could All Have Been Different
CHAPTER TWENTY. Maria Vasilievna
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE. In the Dead of Night
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO. It Isn't Him
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE. Slander
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR. Our Last Meeting
PART FOUR.
The North
CHAPTER ONE. Flying School
CHAPTER TWO. Sanyo's Wedding
CHAPTER THREE. I Write to Doctor Ivan Ivanovich.
CHAPTER FOUR. I Receive a Reply.
CHAPTER FIVE. Three Years
CHAPTER SIX. I Meet the Doctor
CHAPTER SEVEN. I Read the Diaries.
CHAPTER NINE. Good Night!.
CHAPTER TEN. The Flight
CHAPTER ELEVEN. The Blizzard
CHAPTER TWELVE. What Is a Primus-Stove?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN. The Old Boat-Hook
CHAPTER FOURTEEN. Vanokan
PART FIVE.
For the Heart
CHAPTER ONE. I Meet Katya
CHAPTER TWO. Korablev's Anniversary
CHAPTER THREE. Without Title
CHAPTER FOUR. News Galore
CHAPTER FIVE. At the Theatre
CHAPTER SIX. Still More Comes to Light
CHAPTER SEVEN. "We Have a Visitor!"
CHAPTER EIGHT. True to a Memory
CHAPTER NINE. It Is Decided-She Goes Away.
CHAPTER TEN. Sivtsev- Vrazhek
CHAPTER ELEVEN. A Hectic Day
CHAPTER TWELVE. Romashka
BOOK TWO
PART SIX. From the Diary of Katya Tatarinova YOUTH CONTINUES
PART SEVEN. From the Diary of Katya Tatarinova SEPARATION.
PART EIGHT.
Told by Sanya Grigoriev. To Strive, to Seek
CHAPTER ONE. He
CHAPTER TWO. All We Could
CHAPTER THREE. "Is That You, Owl?"
CHAPTER FOUR. Old Scores
CHAPTER FIVE. In the Aspen Wood
CHAPTER SIX. Nobody Will Know
CHAPTER SEVEN. Alone
CHAPTER EIGHT. The Boys
CHAPTER NINE. Dealing with Love.
CHAPTER TEN. The Verdict
CHAPTER ELEVEN. I Look for Katya
CHAPTER TWELVE. I Meet Hydrographer R.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN. Decision.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN. Friends Who Were Not at Home
CHAPTER FIFTEEN. An Old Acquaintance. Katya's Portrait
CHAPTER SIXTEEN. "You Won't Kill Me"
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. The Shadow
PART NINE.
To Find and Not to Yield
CHAPTER ONE. This Is Not the End Yet.
CHAPTER TWO. The Doctor Serves in the Arctic
CHAPTER THREE. To Those at Sea
CHAPTER FOUR. Ranging Wide
CHAPTER FIVE. Back at Zapolarie
CHAPTER SIX. Victory
PART TEN.
The Last Page
CHAPTER ONE. The Riddle Is Solved
CHAPTER TWO. The Unbelievable
CHAPTER THREE. It Was Katya
CHAPTER FOUR. The Farewell Letters
CHAPTER FIVE. The Last Page
CHAPTER SIX. The Homecoming
CHAPTER SEVEN. Two Conversations
CHAPTER EIGHT. My Paper
CHAPTER NINE. And the Last.
Epilogue
AUTHOR 'S PREFACE
I recall a spring day in 1921, when Maxim Gorky first invited to his home a group of young Leningrad writers, myself among them. He lived in Kronwerk Street and the windows of his flat overlooked Alexandrovsky Park. We trooped in, so many of us that we took quite a time getting seated, the bolder ones closer to the host, the more timid on the ottoman, from which it was a job getting up afterwards—it was so soft and sagged almost to the floor. I shall always remember that ottoman of Gorky's. When I lowered myself on to it I saw my outstretched feet encased in shabby soldier's boots. I couldn't hide them away. As for getting up-it was not to be thought of. Those boots worried me until I noticed a pair just as bad, if not worse, on Vsevolod Ivanov, who was sitting next to Gorky.
Alice in her wonderland underwent strange transformations on almost every page of Carroll’s book. At one moment she becomes so small that she freely goes down a rabbit's hole, the next so tall that she can speak only with birds living in the tree-tops. Something like that was happening to me at Gorky's place. At one moment I thought I ought to put in a word of my own in the conversation that had started between Gorky and my older companions, a word so profound that it would make them all sit up. The next minute I shrank so small on that low uncomfortable ottoman that I felt a sort of Tom Thumb, not that brave little fellow we all know, but a somewhat timorous Tom Thumb, at once timorous and proud.
Gorky began to speak with approval about Ivanov's latest short story "The Brazier of Archangel Gabriel". It was this that started me on my transformations. Ivanov's story was far removed from anything that interested me in literature, and I took Gorky's high opinion of it as a harsh verdict on all my hopes and dreams. Gorky read the story out aloud. His face softened, his eyes grew tender and his gestures betrayed that benign mood so familiar to everyone who had seen Gorky in moments of pure rapture.
He dabbed his eyes with his handkerchief and began to speak about the story. His admiration for it did not prevent him from seeing its shortcomings. Some of his remarks applied even to the choice of words.
"What is the work of a writer?" he asked, and for the first time I heard some very curious things. The work of a writer, it appeared, was simply work, the daily, maybe hourly work of writing, writing on paper or in one's mind. It meant piles of rough copies, dozens of crossed-out versions. It meant patience, because talent imposed upon the writer a peculiar pattern of life in which patience was the most important thing of all. It was the life of Zola, who used to strap himself to his chair; of Goncharov, who took about twenty years writing his novel Obryv (Precipice); of Jack London, who died of fatigue, whatever his doctors may have said. It was hard life of self-dedication, full of trials and disappointments. "Don't you believe those who say that it is easy bread," Gorky said.
To describe a writer's work in all its diversity is no light task. I may get nearest to doing this by simply answering the numerous letters I have received in connection with my novel Two Captains and thus telling the story of how this one novel at least came to be written.
The questions my correspondents ask chiefly concern the two heroes of my novel—Sanya Grigoriev and Captain Tatarinov. Many of them ask whether it was my own life that I described in Two Captains. Some want to know whether the story of Captain Tatarinov was invented by me. Others search for the name in books of geography and encyclopaedias and are surprised to find that the activities of Captain Tatarinov have left no visible traces in the history of Arctic exploration. Some want to know where Sanya Grigoriev and Katya Tatarinova are living at present and what rank Sanya was promoted to after the war. Others ask the author's advice as to what job they should devote their lives. The mother of a boy, known as the terror of the town, whose pranks often verged on hooliganism, wrote me that after reading my novel her son had become a different person, and shortly afterwards I received a letter from Alexander Rokotov himself which showed that the boy was intelligent and talented as well as mischievous. Some years have passed since then, and student Rokotov of the Aviation Institute has acquired expert knowledge in aircraft construction.
It took me about five years to write this novel. When the first book was finished the war started, and it was not until 1944 that I returned to my work. The idea of writing this novel originated in 1937, after I had met a man whom I have portrayed in Two Captains under the name of Sanya Grigoriev. This man told me the story of his life-a life filled with hard work, self-dedication and love of his country. I made it a rule from the very first page not to invent anything, or hardly anything. In fact, even such a curious detail as the muteness of little Sanya has not been invented by me. His mother and father, his sister and friends have been described exactly as they first appeared to me in the narrative of my chance acquaintance, who afterwards became my friend. Of some of the personages of my future book I learned from him very little. Korablev, for example, was sketchily described in his narrative as a man with a quick searching eye, which invariably made the schoolchildren speak the truth; other characteristics were a moustache and a walking stick and a habit of sitting over a book late into the night. This outline had to be filled in by the author's imagination in order to create a character study of a Soviet schoolteacher.
The story, as told to me, was really a very simple one. It was the story of a boy who had had a cheerless childhood and was brought up by Soviet society, by people who had taken the place of his dead parents and had sustained in him the dream he had cherished in his ardent and honest heart since early childhood.
Nearly all the circumstances of this boy's life, and later of his youth and manhood, have been retained in the novel. His childhood years, however, were spent on the Volga and his school years in Tashkent-places with which I am not very familiar. I have therefore transferred the early scene of my book to my own hometown, which I have named Ensk. No wonder my fellow townsmen have so easily deciphered the town's real name. My school years (the senior forms) were spent in Moscow, and I have been able to describe in my book a Moscow school of the early twenties with greater authenticity than I could have achieved with a Tashkent school.
I might mention another question which my correspondents ask me, namely, to what extent the novel Two Captains is autobiographical. To a considerable extent everything, from the first to the last page, that Sanya Grigoriev has seen has been seen by the author with his own eyes. Our two lives ran parallel, so to speak. But when Sanya Grigoriev's profession came into the book I had to drop the "personal" material and make a study of the life of pilots, of which I had known very little until then.
Invaluable assistance in studying aeronautics was given me by Senior Lieutenant S. Y. Klebanov, who died the death of a hero in 1943. He was a talented pilot, a brave officer and a fine, upright man. I was proud of his friendship. During my work on the second volume I came across (among the materials of the War Study Commission) testimonials of Klebanov's brother-officers showing that my high opinion of him was shared by his comrades.
It is difficult, well nigh impossible, to give any complete answer to the question of how one or another character of a literary work is created, especially if the narrative is in the first person. Apart from those observations, reminiscences, and impressions which I have mentioned, my book contains thousands of others which had no direct bearings on the story as told to me and which served as the groundwork for Two Captains. Imagination, as everyone knows, plays a tremendous role in a writer's work. And it is on this that one must speak before passing to the story of my second principal character Captain Tatarinov.
Don't look for his name in encyclopaedias or handbooks. Don't try to prove, as one pupil did at a geography lesson, that it was Tatarinov and not Vilkitsky who discovered Novaya Zemlya. For the older of my two captains I used the story of two brave explorers of the Arctic. One of them supplied me with the courageous character of a man pure in thought and clear in aim-qualities that bespeak a noble soul. This was Sedan. From the other I took the actual story of his voyage. This was Brusilov. The drift of my St. Maria repeats exactly the drift of Brusilov's St. Anne. The diaries of Navigating Officer Klimov quoted in my novel are based on the diary of Albanov, Navigating Officer of the St. Anne, one of the two surviving members of that tragic expedition. The historical material alone, however, did not seem enough to me. I knew that there lived in Leningrad a painter and writer by the name of Nikolai Pinegin, a friend of Sedov's and one of those who had brought his schooner the St. Phocas back to the mainland after the death of Sedov. We met, and Pinegin not only told me a lot more about Sedov and gave me a vivid picture of the man, but explained the tragedy of his life, the life of a great explorer slandered and refused recognition by reactionary circles of society in tsarist Russia. Incidentally, during one of my meetings with Pinegin the latter treated me to some tinned food which he had picked up at Cape Flora in 1914, and to my amazement I found it excellent. I mention this trivial detail because it is characteristic of Pinegin and of the range of interests into which I was drawn during my visits to this "Arctic home".