“In the Dugout” - Soviet song from the Great Times Patriotic War. Music by Konstantin Listov, poetry by Alexey Surkov.
The memorial sign was installed in 1998 on the site of a dugout, in which in November 1941, front-line correspondent and poet Alexei Surkov wrote poems that later became the words of the song “In the Dugout” in the village of Kashino, Istrinsky district, Moscow region.
“The poem from which this song was born arose by accident,” Surkov recalled. - It wasn't going to be a song. And it didn’t even pretend to become a published poem. These were sixteen “homely” lines from a letter to his wife, Sofya Antonovna. The letter was written at the end of November, after one very difficult day at the front for me near Istra, when we had to fight our way out of encirclement at night after a heavy battle with the headquarters of one of the guards regiments...”
Meticulous researchers of the poet's work accurately name the day when that memorable battle took place on the outskirts of Moscow - November 27, 1941, and the part in which the correspondent of the newspaper "Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda" found himself and took the battle. Western Front, battalion commissar Alexey Surkov, 258th regiment of the 9th Guards Rifle Division.
Boris Nemensky. About distant and close ones. (1950).
After all the troubles, frozen, tired, in an overcoat cut by shrapnel, Surkov sat for the rest of the night over his notebook in the dugout, next to the soldier’s iron stove. Maybe it was then that his famous “Dugout” was born - a song that was included in folk memory as an integral companion of the Great Patriotic War..."
“These verses would have remained part of the letter,” he continues his memoirs, “if somewhere in February 1942 the composer Konstantin Listov, appointed senior musical consultant of the Main Political Directorate, had not arrived from evacuation Navy. He came to our front-line editorial office and began asking for “something to write a song on.” There was no “anything”.
Vasil Irina. Dugout.
And then, fortunately, I remembered the poems I had written home, found them in a notebook and, having copied them out completely, gave them to Lisztov, being absolutely sure that although I had cleared my comrade’s conscience, a song would not come out of this absolutely lyrical poem. Listov ran his eyes along the lines, mumbled something vague and left. He left and everything was forgotten.
But a week later the composer appeared again at our editorial office, asked the photographer Savin for a guitar and sang his new song “In the Dugout” with the guitar. Everyone free from work “in the room” listened to the song with bated breath. Everyone thought that the song “came out.” Listov left. And in the evening, after dinner, Misha Savin asked me for the lyrics and, accompanying himself on the guitar, sang a new song. And it immediately became clear that the song would “go” if an ordinary music consumer remembered the melody from the first performance...”
The “premiere” of the song at the editorial office of Frontovaya Pravda was also attended by the writer Evgeny Vorobyov, who then worked at the newspaper. Immediately after “Dugout” was performed, he asked Listov to record its melody. There was no music paper at hand. And then Lisztov, as he had to do more than once in those conditions, lined an ordinary sheet of paper and wrote down the melody on it.
On March 25, 1942, the song “In the Dugout” was first published in Komsomolskaya Pravda - words and melodic line. It just so happened that this publication turned out to be almost the only one in the first years of the war. The fact is that some “guardians of front-line morality” considered the lines “It’s not easy for me to get to you, but there are four steps to death” as decadent and disarming. They demanded to cross them out, replace them with others, and “move” death “further from the trench.” But to change anything, i.e. to spoil the song, it was too late, it, as they say, “went.” But it is known: “you can’t erase words from a song.”
From Surkov’s memoirs it follows that it was not he who made changes to the lyrics of the song (there is a statement that this was done by Konstantin Simonov). Olga Berggolts told Surkov about the indignation that this replacement caused among front-line soldiers. The poet himself received a letter from the front-line soldiers with the following request: “Write for these people that there are four thousand English miles to death, but leave us as it is, because we know how many steps there are to death.”
Nikolai Booth. Letter to mom. 1970
The tireless propagandists of “Dugout” during the war years were the wonderful Soviet song masters Leonid Utesov and Lidiya Ruslanova. Lidia Andreevna recorded it in August 1942 on a gramophone record along with “The Blue Handkerchief”. She was adored by Yuri Nikulin, who once performed the song with his fellow soldiers.
After the war, in 1946, Alexey Surkov received the Stalin Prize of the first degree, including for his poems “Beating in cramped stove fire..." And in May 1999, in the village of Kashino, Moscow region, the guys from the "ISTOK" club in the city of Istra erected a memorial sign, the opening of which was attended by veterans of the 9th Guards Division and the poet's daughter, Natalya Alekseevna Surkova. In the Istra region military song festivals are held, and in the city of Dedovsk a song and poetry festival named after Alexei Surkov “And an accordion sings to me in the dugout” was held.
Marat Samsonov. In a moment of calm. 1958
The fire is beating in the small stove,
There is resin on the logs, like a tear,
And the accordion sings to me in the dugout
About your smile and eyes.
The bushes whispered to me about you
In snow-white fields near Moscow.
I want you to hear
How my living voice yearns.
You are far, far away now.
Between us there is snow and snow.
It's not easy for me to reach you,
And there are four steps to death.
Sing, harmonica, in spite of the blizzard,
Call lost happiness.
I feel warm in a cold dugout
From my unquenchable love.
Often the last line of the song is sung as “From your undying love.”
I. Evstigneev. In the dugout. Harmonic. 1945
During the war, in some performances, the lyrics of the song looked completely different: after the first two verses (without changes), not two, but four followed:
You are now far, far away.
There is snow and snow between us.
It’s not easy for me to reach you -
And there are four steps to death.
Sing, harmonica, to spite the wind,
Call lost happiness.
It became warm in our dugout
From my unquenchable love.
I am the love that is in the soul, like a beacon
I will carry you through melancholy and battles,
To see my dear,
Your tears are happy to me.
And the harmonica, as if in response
Sings a song of joyful meeting,
It's like you're sending hello
It's like you're whispering my name.
In May 2014, the project “Police and Civil Society”, supported by the editorial office of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38,” was launched in the Moscow region, which is focused on the moral and spiritual education of the population and is associated with multifaceted cultural and educational activities.
The project organizers, together with the police community, purposefully implement a variety of socio-cultural and military-patriotic initiatives. Representatives of the movement actively participate in significant partner events, including car marathons, the routes of which run through the places of military glory of our country.
During one of the regular motor marathons, social activists drew attention to a modest memorial plaque installed near Istra - in the village of Kashino. Alas, this memorial sign is almost invisible due to its not very good location, although it is dedicated to famous song composer Konstantin LISTOV to the poems of Alexei SURKOV “In the Dugout” - a very bright, extremely sincere and incredibly touching work of wartime.
Recently, activists of this project, together with the editors of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38”, initiated the creation of a worthy folk monument to the great song - memorial complex, which includes a monument in her honor, a building with a museum exhibition and a room for holding heroic-patriotic events and viewing thematic feature films and documentaries.
The mission of a military officer and a poet!
In Kashin, a people's symbol of gratitude to the Soviet song masterpiece, in which front-line poet Alexei Surkov brilliantly expressed the beauty and impressive, all-conquering power of the feelings of two loving people, was
built in the spring of 1999.
The fire is beating in the small stove,
In the clearings there is resin like a tear.
And the accordion sings to me in the dugout
About your smile and eyes.
The bushes whispered to me about you
In the snow-white fields near Moscow,
I want you to hear
The grand opening of the original visible image of this legendary song on the Moscow region took place then on Victory Day - May 9, shortly before the 100th anniversary of the birth of Alexei Alexandrovich Surkov.
In 1941-1945, he valiantly coped with the duties of a military correspondent for the front-line newspaper “Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda” and a special correspondent for “Red Star”, and was also the “warring pen” of the newspaper “Battle Onslaught”.
A brave front-line chronicler, who became a battalion commissar in 1941, participated in the defense of Moscow and fought in Belarus. And the fighter of the word met the long-awaited Victory as a lieutenant colonel - this military rank he was assigned in 1944.
What the defender of the Motherland saw and experienced during the war and deeply sank into his heart seemed to crystallize and survive in confidential, accurate and imaginative descriptions of not only battle events. Readers received honest, intonationally and stylistically verified books written by Alexei Surkov, filled with faith in the coming hard-fought Victory and so-needed books of the military cycle.
This is how the mission of the military commander and poet turned out for Alexey Alexandrovich, who was awarded a number of military awards - the Order of the Red Banner (in 1945), the Order of the Red Star (in 1942; another Red Star was awarded to Surkov earlier - in 1940) and medals!
“...And there are four steps to death”
A special episode in the military biography of Alexei Surkov was the fulfillment of a difficult collective journalistic assignment on the outskirts of front-line Moscow, associated with the preparation for publication of materials about infantrymen who bravely fought the enemy, who, thanks to their valor, became guardsmen. At the end of the autumn of 1941, the 78th Rifle Division of the 16th Army defending the city of Istra received the name 9th Guards, and the Political Directorate of the Western Front invited Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda correspondents to cover this event. Among those who went to the front-line guards was military correspondent Surkov.
On November 27, 1941, journalists first visited the division headquarters, after which they went to the command post of the 258th (22nd Guards) Rifle Regiment, located in one of the local villages. However, by that time the command post itself was cut off by the advancing enemy tank formation, and enemy infantry was already approaching the village itself. Having found themselves in such a complex battle situation, the army reporters and the staff officers accompanying them were forced to sit in a dugout-like dugout because of the mortar shelling that had begun. Meanwhile, the current situation worsened even more, as the occupiers occupied neighboring houses. At a critical moment, the chief of staff of the regiment, Captain I.K., showed courage and determination. Velichkin: he crawled to the huts and began throwing grenades at the Nazis, which caused temporary confusion among the Germans and made it possible for those caught in an enemy trap to break through...
Our soldiers, who safely reached another rural settlement that was completely controlled by a guards unit, were placed in a shelter-dugout. Almost all of them settled down near the stove, and someone began to quietly play the accordion to cheer up their comrades. Surkov, remembering his military task, began to write sketches for the report.
But here the lyrical mood of the soul of the journalist of the Krasnoarmeyskaya Gazeta had already fully made itself felt, and he essentially had the final idea of a sincere front-line message in verse. It should be explained that when the combat reporter, as part of the group that had escaped from the encirclement, reached his own people, Surkov’s overcoat was cut by shrapnel. And one more specific detail: when crossing the minefield, our soldiers tried to maintain a distance of four steps from each other. This was done so that, in the event that one of them was blown up, there would still be a chance for other participants in the forced, deadly forced march to survive. This is the real background of this expressive image in the poetic basis of the future song: “...And there are four steps to death.”
At night, the military commander returned to the capital, where he completed his truly confessional and essentially very intimate, personal poetic appeal-generalization - the poem “In the Dugout”. It is not for nothing that Alexey Alexandrovich sent this perfect rhyming text filled with warmth from the heart in his letter to the city of Chistopol of the Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, where Surkov’s family lived in evacuation. On the back of a simple soldier’s triangle, addressed by the sender-poet to his wife Sofya Antonovna - nee Krevs, a touching, laconic dedication was inscribed: “You are my sunshine!”
The thorny path of singing classics
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| Konstantin Listov |
Those present at the premiere of the song approved of the new product, as this melodic composition was remembered literally from the very first listen. And the writer Evgeny Vorobyov, who worked in the editorial office of a front-line printed organ, copied the notes and rewrote the lyrics of the song and, in company with the amateur musician Savin, came to “ Komsomolskaya truth" There they, visitors from “trench truth,” presented to their colleagues the joint creation of Listov and Surkov: at an impromptu presentation of their work, Vorobyov sang, and journalist-guitarist Savin accompanied him.
The discerning audience from the editorial office of the order-bearing youth publication also liked the song, and it was published in the issue of the central newspaper on March 25, 1942. As a matter of fact, the confident and powerful march of the song began with her submission. It sounded everywhere: “Dugout” was sung by soldiers in the active army and home front workers, popular solo artists, professional and amateur creative groups...
In fact, the author’s version of the poem stated: “I feel warm in the cold dugout / From my unquenchable love.” But simple people and recognized performers, instead of the word “mine,” preferred to sing “yours,” and once on this occasion, a wise wife-muse, in a conversation with her poet husband, spoke very witty and aphoristic: “Here, Alyoshenka, the people corrected you...”.
Now it’s even hard to believe, but nevertheless, in the summer of 1942, an unspoken ban was suddenly declared on the song. This overly harsh administrative measure was explained by the fact that someone at the top regarded the truthful poetic postulate: “It’s not easy for me to get to you, / And to death there are four steps” was regarded as decadence.
And yet the song, thanks to its truly massive popularity at the front and in the rear, survived and continued its triumphant march. And, as the highest justice, for the triumphant Soviet victorious soldiers the song “In the Dugout” performed by Lydia Ruslanova was heard at the walls of the defeated Reichstag and at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.
Prototype for a poetic theme
Several decades later, it became clear which “nameless dugout” served the poet-military correspondent real prototype for a poem-song. In the article by correspondent I. Myasnikov, “A Song Was Born Here,” published in the Moscow region regional newspaper “Leninskoe Znamya” in the issue of February 14, 1982, it says:
“In October 1971, the author of “Dugout” again, thirty years later, came to Istra. At a meeting with townspeople and residents of nearby villages, Alexey Aleksandrovich Surkov told how the poem was written, which later, in combination with the music of K. Listov, became one of the most beloved songs of the wartime.
...In November 1941, in the village [village] of Kashino near Istra, in one of the surviving houses, the headquarters of the rifle regiment was located. “On the plot [opposite] this house,” the poet recalls, “a dugout was dug. And in this very dugout, after the Nazis infiltrated the village, everyone gathered. The Nazis have already occupied the nearest huts and are chopping with machine guns. Just along that very spot where a group of commanders and Red Army soldiers were concentrated in a dugout...”
A. Surkov ended his story with these words: “I wrote the warmest poem in my life, “Dugout,” in my editorial office, and it sank into my heart in the village of Kashino, in the dugout I was talking about...”
Now the dugout, which A. Surkov told about ten years ago, can be seen in the people's museum of military and labor glory in Snegiri. In the village, near which the enemy rushing to Moscow was stopped on the Volokolamsk highway, you can see not only the dugout sung by the poet, but also the plot of land where it was dug, and the house where the regiment’s headquarters was located. Of course, all this is on the layout. The explanatory text to it states that the plot belonged to A. Kuznetsova, and the dugout was dug by her son Mikhail. […]
...After this material was prepared for publication, I introduced it to the Hero of Socialist Labor, laureate of the USSR State Prize, secretary of the board of the Union of Writers of the USSR Alexei Aleksandrovich Surkov. Here's what he said:
You know, again, in 1980, I visited near Istra, where in 1941 I met with soldiers of the 9th Guards Division. Unfortunately, the place in Kashin where the dugout I remember was located was covered with earth and overgrown with bushes. But I’m glad that the model of the dugout, which suggested the theme of the poem to me, is in the folk museum in Snegiri.
Not only the model, but everything that is collected in this museum must be passed on as a relay from generation to generation, so that the memory of the battle of Moscow, of the feat of our people, is forever preserved...”
Heroes of the Fatherland - memorials of memory!
Correspondent of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38” Alexander Nesterov, author of the project idea and sketches of the monument-memorial, laureate of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs photo competition “Open View”.
For quite a long time, the Support Fund social spheres The creative association KINO Press Club is implementing a socially significant program “Heroes of the Fatherland - Memorials of Memory!” Within the framework of this program, it is planned to implement the project for the construction of the “Dugout” memorial complex. At the House of Veterans of the Istrinsky District, we have already presented a series of design projects “Dugouts”, and at these first public hearings, everyone present approved in their own way original idea construction of the monument itself. After all, as we expect, a comprehensive memorial infrastructure will appear and thus a promising platform will be formed for holding large cultural events of a civic and patriotic nature.
DIRECT SPEECH
Honorary citizen of the Istrinsky district of the Moscow region, Mikhail KUZNETSOV, was awarded the Order of the Red Star, the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree, medals “For the Defense of Moscow”, “For Military Merit” and others:
I have almost a century behind me: November 21 of this year is my 95th birthday. Despite all the difficulties and trials that have befallen me, I consider my life interesting and eventful.
When the Great Patriotic War began, I was not even eighteen years old. First I worked in Tushino, and then as a riveter at a defense plant in Khimki.
The front was moving closer and closer to our area... On the radio then they advised us to dig cracks in courtyards and near houses in which to hide from bombs and shrapnel. Together with his younger brother Volodya, they decided to build a shelter in case of bombing. In the summer of forty-one, they began to dig in their garden. Neighborhood kids joined in the work - brothers Kolya and Vitya Mikhailov, Volodya Senatov. They dragged heavy logs from the forest, built a flooring from them, which was covered on top with straw and a layer of clay - it turned out to be a fairly reliable roof. But the walls were left earthen. They built a door at the entrance to the dugout and cut steps into the ground. The result was a trench in the shape of the letter “g” and the height of a person. Later, with the onset of cold weather, I installed a cast-iron stove in our “bomb shelter”.
It’s September, it’s raining, it’s a little cold, but we’re warm in the dugout. About eight village boys and girls gathered to chat... I played the harmonica...
When the Nazis retreated, they burned down all of Kashino in two days. By that time, to be precise - December 5, 1941, I volunteered for the front. And my brother remained in the village, who saw all this terrifying barbarity committed by the occupiers.
...Years passed, and suddenly it became clear that it was our Kashin dugout that was depicted by the poet Alexei Surkov in his famous poem, set to music and which became the popular song “The fire beats in a cramped stove...”.
The fact is that in 1971, a former front-line correspondent, poet Alexei Surkov came to our city for a meeting with the public and said that in November 1941 he was in the village of Kashino...
Unfortunately, I was not in Istra that day, as I was present in Moscow at an important regional event.
...For many years, a model of a dugout created by the hands of director Istrinsky was exhibited in the Snegirevsky Museum of Military Glory drama theater Yuri Shcheglov. Two photographs were placed nearby: Alexey Surkov’s and mine... I drew a sketch of my former “bomb shelter”.
I remember an old episode. Myasnikov, a correspondent for the regional newspaper Leninsky Znamya, came to me to find out details about my dugout. Then he called Alexey Alexandrovich Surkov to ask about the birth of his “Zemlyanka”. And again - come to me to agree on the resulting article. From my office, the journalist dialed Surkov’s phone number, asked him something, and then turned to me: “Do you want to talk?” I picked up the phone and said hello. Alexey Alexandrovich, in turn, asked: “Mikhail Mikhailovich, is the accordion intact?” I replied that I was intact, but only different. Because during the war our house burned down, and nothing was left of our property. The poet gave the go-ahead for the publication of the article...
In Surkov’s magnificent poem, it seems to me that everything is mine - the dugout, the stove, and the accordion. I willingly joined the wonderful modern project“Dugout” and I really hope for its speedy implementation as a monument to a beautiful and literally unique song.
Unfortunately, a few days ago, on November 6, my brother, retired lieutenant colonel Vladimir Mikhailovich Kuznetsov, holder of the Order of the Patriotic War, II degree, passed away at the age of 92.
I think that the national monument “Dugout” will not only become a worthy memorial sign in honor of the great song, but will also remind descendants of our valiant generation of winners.
Memorial sign in Kashin
Members of the local local history club "Istok", led by its leader Sergei Borisovich Lavrenko, who became the author of the project for a memorial sign to the song "In the Dugout", carried out on their own necessary work. Along with the creation of a graphic sketch of the mini-stele and wood carving, the required assembly of the metal structure and welding of the frame were carried out memorial plaque, turning work and installation of this song symbol in the village of Kashino. Two consulting artists and employees of the research institute took part in its construction.
The poet’s daughter, Natalya Alekseevna Surkova, spoke at the opening ceremony of the memorial sign. Among the participants in the exciting event, along with other villagers, were the very same residents of Kashin who built a solid dugout in 1941. The village “bomb shelter” was the work of Mikhail Mikhailovich Kuznetsov, who was helped by his younger brother Vladimir Mikhailovich and several of their friends.
Senior Sergeant Mikhail Kuznetsov, as part of the 367th separate machine-gun and artillery battalion (the so-called 152nd fortified area), fought in battles near Moscow, and later in the Smolensk region, in Belarus. Due to the serious wound he received, he, a front-line soldier, was declared unfit for further work in May 1944. military service and, having a second group of disability, returned to his native Kashino. Having graduated from the Faculty of Economics of the Agricultural Institute in 1968, Mikhail Mikhailovich worked in his specialty for three decades and was the head of the city’s financial department and the head of the district’s financial department in Istra. The team, led by Mikhail Kuznetsov, twice won top places in the All-Union Socialist Competition. A successful specialist-manager was awarded the honorary title “Excellent Achiever” for his achievements in the professional field financial work" and "Honored Economist of the RSFSR."
Having subsequently restored - already in the twenty-first century - the memorial sign, local historians and craftsmen expressed the hope that, over time, some more fundamental, monumental composition would be installed in honor of the song “In the Dugout”. And now the public of the Moscow region, with the assistance of a number of organizations, institutions and representatives of electronic and print media, have taken the initiative to create a truly iconic monument- the monument-memorial “Dugout” in the village of Kashino, Istrinsky municipal district, Moscow region.
The authors and co-chairs of the project are a correspondent of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38”, director of the Fund for Support of Social Spheres (Moscow), member Creative Union artists of Russia Alexander Nesterov and the head of the Istrinsky district branch of the public organization “Union of Disabled Persons “Chernobyl” Alexander Shabutkin from city near Moscow Dedovska - participant in the liquidation of the Chernobyl accident, holder of the Order of Courage.
IN this project Currently actively participating: public organization“Union of Disabled People “Chernobyl” (Istra branch); House of Veterans of Istrinsky District; district branch of the party United Russia"; unification of the search engine movement; editorial office of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38” of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for the city of Moscow and the same name Charitable Foundation; cultural foundation and the editorial board of the magazine “My Moscow”.
Active support for the noble undertaking is provided by: the rector of the Church of the Exaltation of the Cross in the village of Darna, Father Konstantin (in the world - Volkov); folk artist Russian sculptor Sergei Kazantsev; film critic Alexander Shpagin, artistic director festival “The Truth about War and Peace”; Professor, Doctor of Cultural Studies Olga Shlykova; TV journalist from Istra Polina Gromova; the heads of the project's press centers are journalists Mikhail Mosalev (in Istra) and Valery Senkevich (in Moscow).
The Fund for Support of Social Spheres in partnership with Chernobyl victims and the editorial office of the newspaper “Petrovka, 38” will soon be removed documentary on the history of the song “In the Dugout”. The film will include its collective performance, in particular, by Moscow law enforcement officers representing various structural units of the city police. According to the creators of the documentary, each creative team that will take part in the beautiful, extraordinary event will sing a line from the legendary work.
Also in the immediate plans of like-minded social activists is to hold a ceremony to lay a memorial stone at the site of the future monumental landmark in Kashin. The initiators of the project are confident that a majestic monument to the favorite song of generations of our compatriots will definitely be erected. And this, which is very important, will be a people's memorial.
Archpriest Konstantin Volkov said that such a thing is right, necessary for everyone, and with God's help it will work out. Father Konstantin supported the choice of location for the monument, which will be erected at the crossroads of three roads - near the temple and the local historical and cultural symbol: the precisely established “address” of the dugout immortalized in the song.
Citizens and organizations are invited to participate in this good cause, the motto of which is memory and warmth. In order to implement the project, a collection will be organized folk remedies, or better yet, “Dugout” will allow many, many people to unite and feel their direct involvement in the cultural and spiritual values of society and preserving the memory of the glorious historical past of our Fatherland.
Alexander TARASOV,
photo by Alexander NESTEROV
and from the archive of Mikhail KUZNETSOV
From the editor:
Additional information about the project of the Dugout memorial complex in the village of Kashino can be found on the website:
www.fond-sfer.ru.
The history of the creation of the song "In the Dugout"
“The poem from which this song was born arose by accident. It wasn't going to be a song. And it didn’t even pretend to become a published poem. These were sixteen “homely” lines from a letter to his wife, Sofya Andreevna. The letter was written at the end of November, after one very difficult day at the front for me near Istra, when at night after a heavy battle we had to fight our way out of encirclement with the headquarters of one of the guards regiments... So these verses would have remained part of the letter, if it had already been somewhere In February 1942, composer Konstantin Listov, appointed senior music consultant of the Navy, did not return from evacuation. He came to our front-line editorial office and began asking for “something to write a song on.” “Something” was missing. And then, fortunately, I remembered the poems I had written home, found them in a notebook and, having copied them outright, gave them to Lisztov, being absolutely sure that although I had cleared my comrade’s conscience, a song would not come out of this absolutely lyrical poem. Listov ran his eyes over the lines, mumbled something vague and left. He left and everything was forgotten.
But a week later the composer appeared again at our editorial office, asked the photographer Savin for a guitar and sang his new song “In the Dugout” with the guitar.
Everyone free from work “in the room” listened to the song with bated breath. Everyone thought that the song “came out.” And in the evening, after dinner, Misha Savin asked me for the lyrics and, accompanying himself on the guitar, sang a new song. And it immediately became clear that the song would “go” if an ordinary music consumer remembered the melody from the first performance.
Alexey SURKOV
“The enemy was rushing east through Kashino and Darna along the road parallel to the Volokolamsk highway; fascist tanks broke through onto the road and cut off the regimental headquarters, located in the village of Kashino, from the battalions. It was necessary to break out of the encirclement. All staff workers had to take up arms and grenades. He became a fighter and a poet. Brave, decisive, he rushed into the thick of battle. The old, brave soldier passed the combat test with honor, together with the regiment headquarters he escaped from the enemy encirclement and ended up... in a minefield. It was truly “four steps to death”, even less...
After all the troubles, frozen, tired, in an overcoat cut by shrapnel, Surkov sat for the rest of the night over his notebook in the dugout, next to the soldier’s iron stove. Maybe it was then that his famous “Dugout” was born - a song that entered the people’s memory as an integral companion to the Great Patriotic War.”
A. P. BELOBORODOV, Army General, twice Hero of the Soviet Union
In the dugout
Poems by A. SURKOV, Music by K. LISTOV
The fire is beating in the small stove,
There is resin on the logs, like a tear.
And the accordion sings to me in the dugout
About your smile and eyes.
The bushes whispered to me about you
In snow-white fields near Moscow.
I want you to hear
How my living voice yearns.
You're far, far away now
Between us there is snow and snow.
It's not easy for me to reach you,
And there are four steps to death.
Sing, harmonica, in spite of the blizzard,
Call lost happiness.
I feel warm in a cold dugout
From my unquenchable love.
Material from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia
“In Zemlyanka” (“Zemlyanka”, “Fire is beating in a cramped stove...”) is a Russian Soviet song from the times of the Great Patriotic War. Music by Konstantin Listov, poetry by Alexey Surkov.
Creation
Since the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, journalist and poet Alexei Surkov was a war correspondent for the Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda newspaper. At the end of the autumn of 1941, the 78th Rifle Division of the 16th Army defending Istra received the name 9th Guards, in connection with which the Political Directorate of the Western Front invited correspondents from Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda to cover this event; Surkov, among others, went. On November 27, journalists first visited the division headquarters, after which they went to the command post of the 258th (22nd Guards) Rifle Regiment, located in the village of Kashino.
Upon arrival, it turned out that the command post was cut off from the battalions by the advancing 10th German Panzer Division, and enemy infantry was approaching the village itself. The start of mortar fire forced officers and journalists to sit in the dugout. The Germans occupied neighboring houses. Then the chief of staff of the regiment, Captain I.K. Velichkin, crawled towards the buildings, throwing grenades at the enemy, which caused a weakening of enemy fire and made it possible to make a breakthrough. Having safely passed the minefield, everyone went to the river and crossed it along another thin ice- under renewed mortar fire - to the village of Ulyashino, where the battalion was stationed.
Staff officers and correspondents were housed in the dugout. Everyone was very tired - so much so that, according to Surkov’s recollections, Chief of Staff Velichkin, sitting down to eat soup, fell asleep after the second spoon, having not slept for four days. The rest settled down near the stove, someone began to play the accordion to relieve tension. Surkov began to make sketches for the report, but it turned out to be poetry.
At night he returned to Moscow and in a letter to his wife and mother of his daughter and son, Sofya Antonovna, under the heading “You are my sunshine!” subsequently wrote the famous lines. The next day, the letter was sent to the city of Chistopol, where Surkov’s family was evacuated.
In February 1942, composer Konstantin Listov came to the editorial office of the newspaper Frontovaya Pravda, where Surkov also began working, looking for lyrics for songs. Surkov remembered the poems he had written, drew them up and gave them to the musician, in his own words, confident that nothing would work out. However, a week later Listov returned to the editorial office and, taking a guitar from photojournalist Mikhail Savin, performed a new song, calling it “In the Dugout.” Those present approved the composition, and in the evening Savin, having asked for the lyrics, performed the song himself - the melody was remembered from the first performance.
Full lyrics
words by A. Surkov, music by K. Listov
The fire is beating in the small stove,
There is resin on the logs, like a tear.
And the accordion sings to me in the dugout
About your smile and eyes.
The bushes whispered to me about you
In snow-white fields near Moscow.
I want you to hear
How my living voice yearns.
You're far, far away now
Between us there is snow and snow -
It's not easy for me to reach you,
And there are four steps to death.
Sing, harmonica, in spite of the blizzard,
Call lost happiness!
I feel warm in a cold dugout
From your unquenchable love.
Other articles in the literary diary:
- 31.01.2013. Written in the dugout by A. Surkov
- 01/28/2013. Yu. Drunina
- 01/21/2013. A. S. Pushkin
- 01/20/2013. Stichirsky bad manners
- 01/17/2013. Igor Kolyma
- 01/16/2013. Konstantin Simonov
- 01/10/2013. Yulinka
- 01/02/2013. Lev Smirnov
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IN ZEMLYANKA
Words by Alexey Surkov
Music by Konstantin Listov
The fire is beating in the small stove,
There is resin on the logs, like a tear.
And the accordion sings to me in the dugout
About your smile and eyes.
The bushes whispered to me about you
In snow-white fields near Moscow.
I want you to hear
How my living voice yearns.
You're far, far away now
There is snow and snow between us...
It's not easy for me to reach you,
And there are four steps to death.
Sing, harmonica, in spite of the blizzard,
Call lost happiness.
From my unquenchable love.
I feel warm in a cold dugout
From my unquenchable love.
Words - November 1941
music - February 1942
We cannot forget these roads. Songwriter. Comp. A. P. Pavlinov, T. P. Orlova. SPb., “Composer - St. Petersburg”, 2005.
The song is also known under the title “Dugout” and by the first line - “The fire is beating in a cramped stove...”. This is one of the most popular and most humane songs of the Great Patriotic War (and in general, one of the best songs created in Soviet era). Moreover, on the other side of the trenches, the soldiers also preferred not patriotic anthems, but the “anti-war” song “Lili Marlene” - no matter how much they pumped up the people with patriotism, they still sang about the usual: about love, about home, about the end of the war. As a result, they tried to ban performance of both “Dugout” in the USSR and “Lili Marlene” in Germany (“Dugout” - for the phrase "And there are four steps to death"). But the fighters continued to sing them. Part of the repertoire of Lydia Ruslanova.
The poem was written by Alexei Surkov in the fall of 1941 at the front as a letter to his wife, Sophia Krevs, without a title. Surkov did not count on publication. However, in 1942, Konstantin Listov, the author of “The Song of the Cart,” decided to set the text to music.
There are front-line folk adaptations of the song - see “I heard the song with longing...”, “The fire is beating in a cramped stove...” (climbing), etc.
Alexey Surkov (1899-1983)
Memoirs of Alexey Surkov:
HOW THE SONG WAS COMPOSED
Enough for me long life In literature, I had the great fortune of writing several poems, which were set to music and became popular songs, losing the name of the author. Such songs include “Chapaevskaya”, “Konarmeyskaya”, “Those are not clouds, thunderclouds”, “Early, early”, “Lilac is blooming”, “Song of the brave”, “Fire is beating in a cramped stove...” and some other.
I’ll tell you the story of a song that was born at the end of November 1941 after one very difficult day at the front for me near Istra. This song is “The fire is beating in a small stove...”. If I'm not mistaken, it was the first lyrical song born from the flames of the Great Patriotic War, accepted both by the heart of the soldier and the heart of those who were waiting for him from the war.
And it was like this. On November 27, we, correspondents of the Western Front newspaper "Krasnoarmeyskaya Pravda", and a group of workers from the Political Directorate of the Western Front arrived at the 9th Guards Rifle Division to congratulate its soldiers and commanders on the Guards rank they had just been awarded, and to write about the military deeds of the heroes. In the afternoon, having passed the division command post, we drove a truck to the command post of the 258th (22nd Guards) Rifle Regiment of this division, which was located in the village of Kashino. This was just at the moment when German tanks, passing through a ravine near the village of Darny, cut off the regiment’s command post from the battalions.
It was getting dark quickly. Two of our tanks, throwing up snow dust, went towards the forest. The soldiers and commanders who remained in the village huddled in a small dugout, equipped somewhere in the outskirts of the command post by the regiment commander, Lieutenant Colonel M.A. Sukhanov. There was no room left for me, the photojournalist, and someone else who arrived in the dugout, and we decided to take cover from mortar and machine gun fire on the steps leading to the dugout.
The Germans were already in the village. Having settled in two or three surviving houses, they fired at us continuously.
Well, are we just going to sit in the dugout? - said the chief of staff of the regiment, Captain I.K. Velichkin. After talking about something with the regiment commander, he turned to everyone who was in the dugout: “Come on, whoever has “pocket artillery”, come on!
Having collected a dozen and a half hand grenades, including taking away two of my treasured lemons, which I kept just in case, the captain, tightening the belt on his padded jacket, left the dugout.
Cover up! - he said briefly.
We immediately opened fire on the Nazis. Velichkin crawled. Grenades. An explosion, another explosion, and the house became quiet. Then brave captain crawled to another house, then to a third. Everything repeated itself, as if according to a pre-drawn scenario. The enemy fire thinned out, but the Germans did not let up. When Velichkin returned to the dugout, it was almost dark. The regiment commander was already leaving: the command post was changing its location.
We all began to retreat to the river in an organized manner. We crossed the ice under mortar fire. The Nazis did not abandon us with their “mercy” even when we were already on the opposite bank. From the explosions of the mines, the frozen earth scattered in all directions, hitting their helmets painfully.
When we entered a new village, it seems Ulyanovo, we stopped. The worst thing happened here. The head of the engineering service suddenly says to Sukhanov:
Comrade Lieutenant Colonel, you and I walked through our own minefield!
And then I saw that Sukhanov, a man who usually did not lose his presence of mind for a second, turned as pale as snow. He knew that if anyone had stepped on the mine's tendon during this retreat, none of us would have survived.
Then, when we got a little accustomed to the new place, the chief of staff of the regiment, Captain Velichkin, the one who threw grenades at the enemy machine gunners, sat down to eat soup. I ate two spoons and, lo and behold, I dropped the spoon and fell asleep. The man did not sleep for four days. And when the telephone call came from the division headquarters - by that time the connection had been restored - we could not wake up the captain, no matter how hard we tried.
People endured inhuman stress during the war! And just because they were like that, nothing could intimidate them.
Impressed by what I experienced that day near Istra, I wrote a letter to my wife, who then lived on the Kama. It contained sixteen “homemade” poetic lines that I had no intention of publishing, much less handing over to anyone to write music...
My poem “The fire beats in a cramped stove” would have remained part of the letter if in February 1942 the composer Konstantin Listov had not arrived in Moscow from evacuation, came to our front-line editorial office and asked for “something for which he can write a song." And then, fortunately, I remembered the poems I had written home, found them in a notebook and, having copied them outright, gave them to Lisztov, being absolutely sure that although I had cleared my conscience, no song would come out of this lyrical poem. Listov ran his eyes over the lines, mumbled something vague and left. He left and everything was forgotten. But a week later, the composer appeared again at our editorial office, asked photojournalist Mikhail Savin for a guitar and sang his new song, calling it “In the Dugout.”
Everyone, free from room work, listened to the song with bated breath. Everyone thought the song worked. Listov left. And in the evening, after dinner, Misha Savin asked me for the text and, accompanying him on the guitar, performed the song. And it immediately became clear that the song would “go” if the melody was remembered from the first performance.
The song really went. On all fronts - from Sevastopol to Leningrad and Polyarny. It seemed to some guardians of front-line morality that the lines: “...it’s not easy for me to reach you, and there are four steps to death - decadent, disarming. They asked and even demanded that the death line be crossed out or moved further from the trench. But I was sorry change the words - they very accurately conveyed what was experienced and felt there, in battle, and it was already too late to spoil the song, it “went.” And, as you know, “you can’t erase a word from a song.”
The warring people found out that they were playing tricks with the song. In my chaotic army archive there is a letter signed by six tank guardsmen. Having said kind word Addressing the song and its authors, the tank crews write that they heard that someone didn’t like the line “there are four steps to death.”
The guards expressed the following caustic wish: “Write for these people that there are four thousand English miles to death, but leave us as it is - we know how many steps there are to death.”
The poetess Olga Bertgolts told me such a case during the war. She arrived in Leningrad on the cruiser "Kirov". The cruiser's officers gathered in the wardroom and listened to the radio broadcast. When the song “In the Dugout” with an “improved” version of the lyrics was performed on the radio, cries of angry protest were heard, and people, turning off the loudspeakers, demonstratively sang the song three times in its original text.
Here's a short story about how the song "In the Dugout" came together.
From the collection "Istra, 1941". M. "Moscow Worker", 1975
Letter from Alexey Surkov to his wife with the lyrics of a future song