L. N. Tolstoy. "War and Peace". “Family Thought” in the novel. The Rostov and Bolkonsky, Berg and Kuragin families. Vladimir Golyakhovsky: The Berg Family The Rostov and Bolkonsky, Berg and Kuragin families

Adolf Karlovich Berg is a portrait of an officer Russian army German origin. The blood of Latvian knights flows in his body, who many years ago remained in Russia, earned the trust of the monarch and received the title of nobility. The image and characteristics of Berg in the novel “War and Peace” are revealed by Lev Nikolaevich in order to show the moral character of Russian officers of different nationalities.

Berg's appearance

The character’s calm, balanced behavior makes him stand out against the background of the cheerful fervor of the guardsmen of the Semenovsky regiment, where he served. The lieutenant always took care of himself, looked clean and fresh, despite the circumstances. beautiful face, flawlessly shaven, pink color indicated excellent health.

The uniform fit perfectly on the shoulders young man. Every hair on her smoothly combed head lay perfectly straight. Graceful rings of smoke rose from the amber mouthpiece, making the mouth even more attractive. A friendly smile placed the interlocutor at ease, and a respectful intonation testified to a noble upbringing.

Devotion to the Russian Emperor Adolf Karlovich demonstrated by wearing his hair at the temples in the same style as Alexander I, with the ends curled forward.

Berg's character traits

When the gentleman wooed Vera Rostova, he had a strong position in high society and prospects for a brilliant career. The man managed to establish himself in military affairs as an intelligent officer with courage. His superiors appreciated his devotion, modesty, and ability to show cool calm in a difficult situation.

The Rostovs called the main character trait of Breg, which was striking to those around him, good-natured egoism. Vera's parents liked that their daughter's groom was extremely courteous, as befits a noble nobleman. According to the charter, he was precise in his statements, according to court etiquette, attentive to others.

The hero’s inner world remained unknown to anyone; no one knew whether he existed at all. His stories sounded sedately, with conviction, they contained solid facts, real events, devoid of guesswork. It turned out involuntarily that Adolf Karlovich was talking only about himself, because this topic was perfectly known to him. And when it came to something else, he simply fell silent. He could remain silent for several hours at a time while they discussed abstract issues that had nothing to do with him.

Cold calculation

The man preferred to make better choices in life. I chose the branch of the army for service because of the higher salary. The officer takes care of his future by carefully saving money. Reasonable calculation does not cloud his mind; he regularly helps his old father with money, like a decent son.

Berg is not familiar with excitement, card games he is not attracted, there is always high risks lose what you have earned. Hospitality is not typical for an officer, as Leo Tolstoy mentions more than once. In the character traits of the hero, thriftiness sometimes smoothly turns into stinginess, which is typical of thrifty people.

Berg at war

Yours officer rank Adolf rightfully deserved it - he carried out the orders of the command exactly, without delay. The authorities could rely on the regimental commander during the offensive and during the retreat. The officer himself could not imagine that he could disobey the order given to him, but he often succeeded mysteriously improve your financial affairs during the military campaign.

Officer, possessing developed memory, knew the regulations by heart, could remember in detail all the orders for the regiment. In an emergency situation, the experienced warrior acted calmly, without losing composure, maintaining control. Berg was a true polyglot, like many representatives high society, knew French and German perfectly.

Family values

Adolf knows that every person has a friend in life, so he purposefully calls one of his colleagues a friend, although he does not have tender feelings for him. His family's social circle consists of people who can be useful in arranging profitable businesses. According to the young man, the choice of acquaintances determines the success of family affairs.

Berg chose Vera Rostova as his wife out of calculation; he did not hide this fact, taking his approach to choosing a wife naturally. All women in his eyes were frankly stupid creatures. Nature endowed the weaker sex with stupidity, lack of ingenuity and business acumen, so Adolf was happy to feel his superiority over his wife.

However, the couple loved each other. It was happy family in the understanding of Leo Tolstoy, because the priorities of the spouses coincided. People married out of the same need to start a family. Both found their relationship comfortable enough to feel fulfilled in their personal lives. Berg created the kind of family he wanted to have.

Career growth

The guy was ahead of all his fellow students in the career field of a military officer. He managed to find a place in the guard, where he had the opportunity to be the center of attention of his superiors. At the Battle of Austerlitz, he held the rank of company commander and was wounded in the arm, but continued to fight. Berg used his injury to the best advantage he could, including new rewards.

During the Finnish campaign (1808-1809) he managed to get two awards and become captain of the guard. Thanks to this, the trickster achieved good place in St. Petersburg, as the author claims, is a particularly advantageous place.

In 1812, Berg served at the headquarters of the First Army command, successfully surviving the war. The result of dedicated service was Vladimir and Anna around the neck, a secure future as a staff assistant.

· The theme of family and its significance in the development of a person’s character in the novel “War and Peace” is one of the most important. The author tries to explain many of the features and patterns in the lives of his characters by belonging to one or another family.

Only in the family does a person receive everything that subsequently determines his character, habits, worldview and attitude.

· In the novel, Tolstoy talks about different families- this is also the Bolkonsky family, which preserves aristocratic traditions; and representatives of the Moscow nobility Rostov; the Kuragin family, deprived of mutual respect and sincerity of connections; the Berg family, which begins its existence with the laying of the “maternal foundation”. And in the epilogue of the novel, Tolstoy introduces two new families to the readers - Pierre and Natasha, Nikolai and Marya - according to the author, this is exactly what a family should be, based on sincere and deep feelings.

Characteristic literary hero German, first the groom, and then the husband of Vera Rostova. This is “a fresh, pink guards officer, immaculately washed, buttoned and combed.” At the beginning of the work, Berg is a lieutenant, and at the end of the work he becomes a colonel, from which one can see that Berg has made a good career. He is precise, calm, courteous, but very selfish and stingy. He loves and can only talk about himself and his successes. Those around him laugh at him; he is a stranger in the Rostov house. They do not understand his prudence and stinginess. Berg proposes to Vera and demands the promised dowry from the old count, despite the difficult financial situation of the Rostovs. This hero is clearly unpleasant and alien to Tolstoy himself.

Essay on literature on the topic: Berg (War and Peace by Tolstoy L.N.)

Other writings:

1. Boris Drubetskoy Characteristics of a literary hero The son of Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskoy. From childhood he was brought up and lived for a long time in the house of the Rostovs, to whom he was a relative. Boris and Natasha were in love with each other. Outwardly, he is a “tall, blond young man with the correct, subtle features of a calm Read More ......
2. Petya Rostov Characteristics of a literary hero Youngest son Rostov. At the beginning of the novel we see P. as a small boy. He is a typical representative of his family, kind, cheerful, musical. He wants to imitate his older brother and follow the military line in life. In 1812 it was full Read More......
3. L. N. Tolstoy with his huge literary heritage is one of the ever-evolving phenomena: every time, every era perceives the writer in its own way. Our time responds especially sensitively to Tolstoy's moral sermons, to his call for moral improvement. Because now our Read More......
4. Natasha Rostova Characteristics of a literary hero One of the main heroines of the novel, the daughter of Count and Countess Rostov. She is “black-eyed, with a big mouth, ugly, but alive...”. Distinctive Features N. – emotionality and sensitivity. She is not very smart, but she has an amazing ability Read More......
5. Berg is a German, “a fresh, pink guards officer, impeccably washed, buttoned and combed.” At the beginning of the novel he is a lieutenant, at the end - a colonel who has made a good career and has awards. B. is precise, calm, courteous, selfish and stingy. Those around him laugh at him. B. could only speak Read More......
6. Andrey Bolkonsky Characteristics literary hero This is one of the main characters of the novel, the son of Prince Bolkonsky, the brother of Princess Marya. At the beginning of the novel we see B. as an intelligent, proud, but rather arrogant person. He despises people of high society, is unhappy in his marriage and Read More......
7. L. N. Tolstoy managed to combine, perhaps, two whole novels: a historical epic novel and psychological novel. Page after page reveals to the reader the characters of L.N. Tolstoy’s heroes, conveying the finest details, nuances of their similarity or diversity, staticity or variability. “People like Read More......
8. Tolstoy’s path to “War and Peace” was difficult - however, there were no easy paths in his life. Tolstoy brilliantly entered literature with his very first work - the initial part autobiographical trilogy“Childhood” (1852). “ Sevastopol stories” (1855) strengthened the success. Young writer,Read More......

Berg is German, "a fresh, pink guards officer, immaculately washed, buttoned and combed." At the beginning of the novel he is a lieutenant, at the end - a colonel who has made a good career and has awards. B. is precise, calm, courteous, selfish and stingy. Those around him laugh at him. B. could only talk about himself and his interests, the main one of which was success. He could talk about this subject for hours, with visible pleasure for himself and at the same time teaching others. During the campaign of 1805, B. is a company commander, proud of the fact that he is efficient, careful, enjoys the trust of his superiors, and has arranged his material affairs favorably. When meeting him in the army, Nikolai Rostov treats him with slight contempt.

B. first the intended and desired groom of Vera Rostova, and then her husband. The hero makes a proposal to his future wife at a time when refusal is impossible for him - B. correctly takes into account the Rostovs’ financial difficulties, which does not prevent him from demanding part of the promised dowry from the old count. Having achieved a certain position, income, having married Vera, who meets his requirements, Colonel B. feels contented and happy, even in Moscow, abandoned by the residents, taking care of purchasing furniture.

The image of Berg in the novel "War and Peace" (2nd version)

In addition to exceptional people with exceptional qualities and actions, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy in “War and Peace” paints completely different portraits. These are mask portraits, contrast portraits, and so on. Tolstoy creates mask portraits for satirical purposes, for example, when characterizing negative characters: Kuraginykh, Boris Drubetsky, Berg. Twice the mask of a seducer is torn off from Vasily Kuragin, and the features of a court flatterer, careerist and self-interested person are revealed.
Berg's good looks are also deceiving. It does not correspond to his inner appearance, but hides emptiness and insignificance. This man from a secular society has long ago lost all the moral ideals and principles of an honest and pure person. Although, it is unlikely that he ever had them at all.
Berg was interested in what was fashionable, what all young people of high society were interested in - he strived to be happy and successful. It would seem that what's wrong with this? It seems to me that Berg always and everywhere saw only himself and tried to transfer the views of others to himself in any situation. The word “I” sounded most often in his speech.
The most ordinary careerist... How can he not mention in the conversation that “by transferring to the guard, he has already won a rank in front of his comrades in the corps, how in wartime a company commander can be killed, and he, remaining senior in the company, can very easily become a company commander, and how in everyone loves him, and how happy is his daddy with him? And Berg boasted about these terrible things with such naivety that he probably would have been very surprised if someone had opened his eyes to his immorality. Tolstoy calls this character trait of this hero “naive egoism.” I think this is a very accurate definition.
“The son of a dark Livonian nobleman,” “a modest, moral young man with a brilliant career ahead and even a strong position in society,” Berg quickly took a good position. But he constantly strives higher, guided by the thirst for money and the desire to take a better place. At the same time, nothing else around this hero is of interest. Tolstoy shows that this was normal for the secular society of that time.
Tolstoy sneers at Berg in the story of how “in the Battle of Friedland he managed to distinguish himself”: “He picked up a fragment of a grenade that killed the adjutant next to the commander-in-chief, and brought this fragment to the commander...” For such “valor” Berg received two awards. But why is he telling everyone this? It seems to me that in order for everyone to believe that this ridiculous act was simply necessary to commit. And Berg talks so persistently and often about how he was wounded in the Battle of Austerlitz that he receives two awards for this.
This hero is what the norms of behavior dictate to him to be. secular society. And it's truly scary. The situation when the hero did to Vera Rostova is amazing. “I’m not marrying for money, I think it’s ignoble!” - says Berg, and after a while he himself declares to the count that if “he does not receive in advance at least part of what is assigned to her, then he will be forced to refuse.” But soon he again claims that he sincerely loves Vera for amazing character. In fact, don’t tell the bride that he couldn’t find a better match financially! After all, this hero is really poor, and Vera, in addition to her financial advantages, also turned out to be a beauty.
Of course, the Rostovs, to some extent, were happy to give Vera away in marriage. They were afraid that their eldest daughter would no longer receive an offer from anyone, and she was already twenty-four years old. The Rostov father and mother decided: let Vera be the wife of this poor young man. Moreover, they were brought up in the same spirit.
Unfortunately, hopes for Vera's happiness were not justified. Soon financial calculation on Berg’s part became clearly visible, for he considered even his children a burden, and his wife stupid and weak.
But Tolstoy describes Berg in such a way that this hero does not cause us much irritation. It doesn’t evoke any emotions at all, you don’t notice it. Only the dead cause such a reaction, which, in essence, is what Berg is.
Berg is a neat person, but this is not an enviable trait in him. It boils down to the fact that at his reception “everything was like everyone else”: “old people with old people, young people with young people, the hostess at the tea table, on which there were exactly the same cookies in a silver basket that the Panins had at the evening , everything was exactly the same as with others.” And this is the most important thing for Berg - “the smile of joy did not leave his face for a long time.”
According to Tolstoy’s classification, Berg belongs to the “little Napoleons.” During his flight from Moscow to the War of 1812, he does not show a drop of patriotism - he buys furniture for next to nothing, and then goes to Ilya Rostov with a request to take him on a cart. Did he really think that he could sell it all later?
Berg does not miss the slightest opportunity to get an extra penny - be it fodder money, a successful marriage, or something else. He talked about money in public, although high society this was unacceptable. But they listened to him, treating him with irony. After all, it is better to listen than to convince a person who is sacredly confident that he is doing everything right.
At the same time, it seems to me that there is no harm from Berg’s actions. And even a calculated marriage to Vera does not bring anything bad - these young people were a match for each other.
Berg's image is designed to contrast with others actors novel. This hero just joined the camp of people like himself. And his example is enough to understand what such people are like.

The image of Berg in the novel "War and Peace" (3 version)

Berg resembles Molchalin: he has two qualities - moderation and accuracy,” this, in turn, “having received a company during the campaign, managed to earn the trust of his superiors with his diligence and accuracy.” Indeed, Molchaliv and Berg are officials of the same kind. But they are different people, and maybe Berg is more complicated. We are not yet familiar with him when we hear his name for the first time - Natasha, “getting excited,” says to Vera: “Everyone has their own secrets. We won’t touch you and Berg... You flirt with Berg as much as you want...” The very fact that Vera flirts with Berg - beautiful, cold, calm Vera, always saying unpleasant things, so unlike the rest of the Rostovs - this alone is alarming. But here he himself - “fresh, pink... impeccably washed, buttoned up and combed” - sits in the office of the old Count Rostov and with “pink lips” releases smoke “from his beautiful mouth.”

Berg is immediately unpleasant to us, just as he was unpleasant to Tolstoy, and he will not change; from the first pages to the last he will remain the same neat, reasonable, clean-washed pink officer; only his ranks will change.

“Berg always spoke very precisely, calmly and courteously. His conversation always concerned himself alone; he always remained calmly silent when they talked about something that had no direct relation to him... But as soon as the conversation concerned him personally, he began to speak at length and with visible pleasure.”

All his stories are arguments out loud about his own benefits: “If I were in the cavalry, I would receive no more than two hundred rubles a third, even with the rank of lieutenant; and now I get two hundred and thirty...”, “I, you know, Count, without boasting, I can say that I know the regiment’s orders by heart... Therefore, Count, there are no omissions in my company. So my conscience is calm.” It is beneficial for Berg not only to receive two hundred and thirty rubles, but also to be honest. He cares not only about promotion, but also about a calm conscience. He is a patriot in his own way: having met Rostov during the war, “he put on a clean frock coat, without a stain or a speck, fluffed his temples up in front of the mirror, as Alexander Pavlovich wore, and... left the room with a pleasant smile.” His patriotism lies in imitation and devotion to the king. He also has his own moral ideal: “In our race, the von Bergs, Count, were all knights...” According to this moral ideal, he accomplished a “feat” at Austerlitz: he took a sword in left hand and went forward. He was scared, but he overcame his fear. He had the right to leave the battlefield, but he didn’t leave, he stayed...

But then he will squeeze everything possible out of his “knightly” behavior.

This is not a rough calculation, no. This is such self-confident egoism that one would be surprised at it if it were rare in people. But, unfortunately, it is not so rare.

Berg is not just calculating, selfish, stingy - he is firmly convinced that it is impossible to live otherwise; therefore, he is not ashamed to talk about how, by transferring to the guard, he has already won a rank in front of his comrades in the corps, how in wartime a company commander can be killed and he, remaining senior in the company, can very easily become a company commander...” This no longer reminds Molchalin, but Skalozub: “I am quite happy in my comrades; vacancies are just open: then the older ones will turn off the others; some, you see, were killed..." But Skalozub is a stupid, semi-literate martinet, and Berg is sweet, polite, neat...

For Countess Vera Rostova, Berg is not at all a brilliant match. Several years ago, his proposal would undoubtedly have been rejected, and he himself, having shown Vera to his friend four years ago and said: “She will be my wife,” was in no hurry to propose. He was an unknown nobleman from the Russified Germans; she is a girl from a rich and noble family. But Berg was patient - he waited four years, and during this time a lot changed: “the Rostovs’ affairs were very upset... and most importantly, Vera was twenty-four years old, she went everywhere, and, despite the fact that she was undoubtedly good and reasonable, Until now, no one has ever proposed to her.”

Count Ilya Andreevich explains Verin’s dissimilarity from his entire family by the fact that “the countess was wise” with eldest daughter. It is unlikely that a loving mother could “make so much sense.” The Rostovs, who lived openly, in the old-fashioned way, without thinking, simply did not notice how their eldest girl became colder and more selfish as new children appeared and demanded their share of maternal care. Of course, she was spoiled, just as Nikolai, Natasha, and Petya were spoiled, but those three loved each other, learned from their father to be kind and think not only about themselves. Sonya and Boris grew up next to them, in need of spiritual warmth... Vera realized from childhood that the other children were bothering her, that they were superfluous; No wonder she reprimands Nikolai for taking the inkwell from her; No wonder she is indignant at the “secrets” of Natasha and Sonis; they all irritate her; She has one concern - about herself.

Berg chose his wife correctly and correctly calculated the time when to propose. By 1809, he was no longer the unknown officer who sat in the office of Count Rostov in 1805.

“It was not for nothing that Berg showed everyone his wounded woman in the Battle of Austerlitz right hand and held a completely unnecessary sword in his left. He told everyone this concealment so stubbornly and with such significance that everyone believed in the expediency and dignity of this act - and Berg received two awards for Austerlitz.” He received two more awards for his Finnish War“I picked up a fragment of a grenade, which killed the adjutant next to the commander-in-chief, and presented this fragment to the commander.” The most striking thing is that, persistently repeating stories about these exploits, Berg does not think about his career at all: he loves himself and is convinced that his every action is significant and important to other people, that everyone is interested in knowing how he distinguished himself. As a result, in “1809 he was a captain of the guard with orders and occupied some special advantageous places in St. Petersburg.”

And he did not marry for convenience. Vera had long made an impression on him. Back in 1805, he “spoke with Vera with a tender smile that love is not an earthly, but a heavenly feeling,” and believed what he said. Vera is the kind of wife he needs, “a beautiful, respectable girl... Her other sister has the same last name, but a completely different one, and an unpleasant character, and no intelligence, and such, you know?.. Unpleasant...” Berg married for love how he understands love, “but the wife must bring hers, and the husband his,” so he bargains with the old count in the most natural way: “Berg, smiling pleasantly, explained that if he does not know correctly what will be given for Vera, and does not receive in advance at least part of what is assigned to her, then he will be forced to refuse. he is lost, he is ashamed of something, and he wants to quickly end the calculations. It's hard to imagine such different people, like Ilya Andreevich Rostov and Berg. The old count went bankrupt, treating the whole of Moscow to lunch and dinner, and Berg even wanted to say to his comrade: “You’ll come to us for dinner,” but he said: “Drink tea.” But the wasteful Count Rostov left his children without money, and his wife, having become a widow, will get by only thanks to her son’s self-denial; and Berg arranged rent for his parents, and will leave a decent fortune for his children.

What is wrong with the neat, diligent Berg, who very firmly adheres to his idea of ​​​​duty and honor? This will be revealed with all clarity much later, when Napoleonic’s army approaches Moscow, and the Russians, who only yesterday sold their hay at exorbitant prices, today will burn it so that the enemy does not get it; Natasha will begin to throw the whole family’s belongings out of the carts in order to take the wounded with her; the whole people - that is, every person! - will think not only about himself. But people like Berg will remain themselves - and he himself, as clean as always, will be preoccupied with buying wardrobe glasses for his beloved wife.

I will not assure you that Berg will ever pay for the fact that he lived so petty and complacently. No. He will feel happy all his life and will raise children like him; he will never repent of anything. Chatsky was right in his own way when he said: “Silent people are blissful in the world.” They are blissful because their happiness is easily achievable. Yes, Berg is happy. But it’s not difficult to achieve his ideal of happiness. Here he sits, already a colonel, in a “clean uniform, with temples oiled in front, sovereign Alexander Pavlovich”, in his “new, bright office, decorated with busts, and pictures, and new furniture”, next to his beautiful wife in a new lace cape , which Princess Yusupova was wearing... Guests come to them, and Berg is happy because “the evening was like every other evening... everything was like everyone else’s,” and in the silver basket there were exactly the same cookies, “ what the Panins had at the evening, everything was exactly the same as the others.”

This ideal of life is hostile to Tolstoy, first of all, to the idea that people should not be the same. The desire to be like everyone else gives birth to a philistine, and philistinism may be the most serious disease of society. Where citizens have turned into philistines, it stops spiritual development people and countries, progress is impossible there. Berg's neat and harmless psychology at first glance brings with it the death of morality. Do not rush to laugh at Berg - he is not funny, but scary. And especially because his ideal of happiness has not died, it still exists today; a beautiful wife, brand new clothes, an apartment - everything is like others, like everyone else... Look around you - don’t you see people falling silent as soon as the conversation does not concern them personally, passionately convinced that the main thing in life is their well-being and promotion. Look into your soul - are you sure that Berg is not hiding there?

The Berg family are the only ones fictional characters novel. Everything else - both people and events - is real and reflects historical truth first two decades Soviet Russia. Storylines intersect with the history of the Bergs, which is why the book can be called a “history novel.”

In the first book, Pavel Berg participates in Civil War, and then enters the Institute of Red Professorship: for short term a young man from a poor Jewish family becomes a professor, a specialist in military history. But the family's well-being suddenly ends, hard times. The second book, “The Cup of Suffering,” tells about this period.

1. Meeting at the embassy gate 1

2. Jewish boys Shloma and Pinchas 4

3. Russian hero Pavel Berg 8

4. Red terror and the “ships of philosophers” 12

5. Formation of Berg's worldview 15

6. Regiment commander 18

7. Meeting with the artist Minchenkov 19

8. Urban transformations 21

9. B Tretyakov Gallery 25

10. “Why do we need someone else’s Argentina?” 27

11. At the Institute of Red Professors 29

12. Shakhty case 30

13. What led to the dictatorship of Stalin 31

14. Pavel Berg's teacher 33

15. Brothers meet again 35

17. Future poet Alyosha Ginzburg 39

18. Like a bolt from the blue 41

19. Avochkin salon 44

21. Seekers of happiness 47

22. Jewish Passover in the house of the old Bondarevskys 49

23. Paul and Mary 50

24. Punishing "Truth" 53

25. White Sea-Baltic Canal 55

26. Paul writes article 58

27. Article by Pavel Berg “Two Russian Jews and their patrons” 60

28. In the Sochi sanatorium 62

29. Commander Tukhachevsky 63

30. Birth of Lily Berg 65

31. Pashka Sudoplatov in Moscow 67

32. Return of Tarle 68

33. Terror Soviet socialism and German fascism 69

34. First interrogation of Paul 70

35. The exodus of the Jews begins again 71

36. Spain, journalist Mikhail Koltsov 72

37. Semyon Ginzburg becomes minister 74

38. Takeoff of Marshal Tukhachevsky 77

39. 1937 - "Yezhovshchina" 78

40. The trial of Professor Pletnev 81

41. Growing up Alyosha Ginzburg 83

42. The Bergs get apartment 85

43. Wolfgang joins the Komsomol 87

44. The new year 1938 begins 88

45. The fate of Mikhail Koltsov 90

47. Stalin's dream is the murder of Trotsky 93

48. Arrest of Pavel Berg 93

49. World Wreck 94

50. Guest from province 97

51. Female share 98

52. Invasion of Poland 99

53. On the Polish farm 101

54. Accession of Latvia. Riga Jew Zika Glik 102

55. On the eve of the war 104

56. Vorkuta and Katyn Forest 105

Notes 107

Vladimir Golyakhovsky
Jewish saga
Book 1
Berg family

...I see myself and all my contemporaries written in some book, in historical novel, from a long, long time ago.

Korney Chukovsky.

Diaries, 1925

From the author

In this novel, only the Berg family itself - Pavel, Maria and their daughter, Lilya - are fictional characters. All other characters and all events described are real people and historically reliable, documented facts. That's why I called this book a historical novel.

1. Meeting at the embassy gates

In the early 1950s in Moscow, on the old and quiet Pogodinskaya Street, paved with cobblestones since the last century, there was extraordinary activity: its far end, where a grove of old trees was hidden, was fenced off with a high fence and observation towers were placed at the corners of the fence. In the morning hours, when the street residents were still sleeping, three-ton trucks with tarpaulin-covered bodies drove behind the fence, and sentries with rifles stood on the towers. This meant that prisoners were brought in to work. All day long the roar of construction could be heard from behind the fence, and in the evenings the workers were taken away and the sentries disappeared.

This is how old Pogodinka, on which there were only a few small houses, came to life. IN mid-19th century, the first of them was built for himself by the famous historian Pogodin. Gogol, Lermontov, and Aksakov came to his house, which was called “Pogodinskaya Izba”. But at the end of the century, the estate was fenced off from Prechistenka Street by new buildings of the medical faculty clinic. And part of the street behind the clinic was named, in honor of the first resident, Pogodinskaya, and although almost a century had passed, it still remained sparsely built up and deaf. Now, few of its residents looked with surprise in the direction of the new building. It immediately became clear that prisoners were working, but in those years this was commonplace - almost everything in the country was built by the hands of the so-called prisoners (an abbreviation for the word “prisoner”, invented because this word had to be written millions of times on millions of papers) . What surprised people was not this, but the speed, even haste, with which construction was carried out: all the years of Soviet power, Moscow was built sluggishly and slowly, and suddenly, in a matter of days, everything changed on a forgotten street.

And a few months later, behind the fence, the brick skeleton of a three-story house with a tower in the middle appeared: while it gaped with wide clearings of future windows. Then they covered it with slabs of white marble, the voids sparkled with large glass, poplar seedlings were brought behind the fence - and immediately after that the cars with prisoners stopped arriving. The fence was removed, revealing a cast-iron grate with a gate behind it. On the gate there was a board with a strange foreign coat of arms - a black eagle in an oval - and the inscription: "Embassy People's Republic Albania." And outside the gate stood a small white mansion of graceful proportions.

The Pogodin residents were even more amazed: no one really knew anything about Albania, this small country was located somewhere far away, Mediterranean Sea, and the speed with which the construction proceeded, even the beauty of the building itself was in no way linked in the minds of Muscovites with anything important. And soon the entire street was blocked by road workers, in two days they covered the cobblestones with asphalt and rolled heavy rollers along it. The street immediately changed, important limousines and beautiful diplomatic cars glided softly along it. This happened after Stalin's death - in March 1953.

One quiet spring evening, Pogodinka was suddenly filled with KGB agents: passers-by's documents were checked and only local residents were allowed through. A cavalcade of long black limousines of ZIS, ZIM and foreign brands passed by: apparently, members of the government and diplomats were going to celebrate moving into the embassy. Locals they told each other that in one car someone spotted Nikita Khrushchev himself, the new first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party.