On September 3, the Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy Museum on Prechistenka opened (until December 15) the exhibition “Great Date”, dedicated to the 180th anniversary of the birth of the writer’s wife, Sofya Andreevna Tolstoy.
He was born on August 22 (September 3, new style), 1844.
The exhibition was opened by the descendant of Sofia Andreevna and Lev Nikolaevich, director of the museum and great-great-grandson of the writer Vladimir Ilyich Tolstoy. In honour of his great-great-grandmother, he initiated a new “women’s” award. Its first laureates were the director of the museum-reserve Vasily Polenova and the artist’s great-granddaughter Natalya Polenova.
And actress Evgenia Simonova, who played Sofya Andreevna in the play “Russian Novel” (Mayakovsky Theatre).
As you know, Sofya Andreevna (née Bers) married Lev Nikolaevich when she was barely 18 years old. The husband was 16 years older. While Tolstoy was working on the novel War and Peace, the young wife wrote in her diary: “Nothing affects me as much as his thoughts, his talent… We often discuss the novel, and for some reason he (who is my pride) really believes and listens to my judgments.” The exhibition presents manuscripts of Tolstoy’s works, copied by hand by his wife.
Their marriage was happy and unhappy at the same time.
In later years, after Tolstoy’s spiritual turning point, the intonation of his notes, as well as his family life, changed: “… I cannot love these non-artistic, but tendentious and religious articles: they insult me and destroy something in me, producing sterile anxiety.”
The play “Russian Novel” is about the last period of Tolstoy’s life. Evgenia Simonova read a monologue from the play during the award ceremony. Sofia Andreevna’s words to her husband: “And you say that the family is evil and interferes with spiritual life… I took on everything earthly so that you could take care of your soul. And you drove me out of this soul… You created a deception.”
The exhibition reflects the dynamics of the Tolstoys’ married life. There are quotes from Sofia Andreevna’s diaries. Even Tolstoy, at the beginning of his family life, noted: “When you are not in a good mood, keep a diary.” “It’s fun to read your journal,” Sofia Andreevna herself admitted. – What contradictions, what an unhappy woman I seem. Is there anyone happier than me?…”
Among the first to see the new exhibition were Mikhail Shvydkoy, Natalya Solzhenitsyna, the writer Sergei Shargunov (who is married to Vladimir Tolstoy’s daughter), and numerous descendants of Tolstoy and Polenov.
The exhibition presents Sofia Andreevna’s artistic hobbies. There were many of them. Her paintings, notebooks with sketches of Yasnaya Polyana flowers, photographs that she even printed herself, music books, palette and brushes, her outfits, a silk cap that she sewed for her husband, manuscripts of her own stories are genuine things that allow one to understand the depth of her talent. Bunin believed: “Sofya Andreevna had a lot of artistic talent…”. Sofia Andreevna herself wrote about herself this way: “… all my life I have had the desire to fly, but life has tied my wings.”
Sofya Andreevna laid the foundations for Tolstoy museums, carefully preserving evidence of the life of her great husband and his family.
Her main achievement, without a doubt, was her children. Sofya Andreevna was married to Lev Nikolaevich for 48 years and had 13 children, who later gave birth to 25 grandchildren. Of the 13 children she had, she breastfed 11 babies. Of the first 30 years of her married life, she was pregnant for 10 years. And she breastfed for more than 13 years. This is a unique case today. It is good that her descendants remember it with gratitude.
