Libmonster ID: MD-1368
Author(s) of the publication: S. S. DMITRIEV

Moscow, Nauka Publishing House. 1975. 230 pp. The print run is 3,300. Price 77 kopecks

People (person) forties, sixties, seventies, eighties, ninties - words and stable phrases that have been used in our literary language for more than a hundred years to refer to certain types of people who acted at different times of the last century. These words are often found in the titles of books and articles. Back in the late sixties of the last century, A. F. Pisemsky's novel "People of the Forties" appeared. At the beginning of our century, A.V. Amfiteatrov's novels about the intelligentsia "Eighties" and "Ninties" were published. The book I am writing about is entitled "The Sixties Nikolai Nozhin"; its author is E. L. Rudnitskaya, Doctor of Historical Sciences (Institute of History of the USSR of the USSR Academy of Sciences).

The title shows the author's creative intention: choosing a historical and biographical letter, to present Nozhin as one of the "new people" of the era of the fall of serfdom in Russia, the sixties, both according to his scientific research (simultaneously directed to the problems of biology and to the acute topical social issues of that crucial time in our history), and according to his close relations with relations with the revolutionary circles of the 60s of the XIX century. The introduction concisely and clearly expresses the author's position: "The Sixties" is exactly the concept that most fully and accurately defines the individual and social image of Nikolai Nozhin" (p. 8).

Kozhin is often mentioned in the scientific and historical literature. And quite often with a characteristic epithet-not just Nozhin, but "forgotten Nozhin". The epithet appeared naturally. For several decades after Nozhin's untimely death, they were silent about him, forced to be silent. Nozhin's biography, activities, and views were often mentioned, but in general they were not studied. E. L. Rudnitskaya began to deal with these issues almost a decade and a half ago. She published Nozhin's documents and published her research on him in separate articles. All her long searches and discoveries are now brought together. The long-awaited book about Nozhin, the first book about him, the first special monograph of a historian, has been published. However, this book does not just bring together, summarize and repeat what the author has previously published. Here is a new book with a complex holistic concept of both Nozhin's personality and his place in the history of the ideological search for "new people", in their revolutionary and democratic - educational work, open, public and underground, secret work. The author clearly defines Nozhin's place in the social and ideological life of those years: "Nozhin stood at the junction of the trends represented by Russky Slovo and Sovremennik. Each of them strove to preserve a living continuity with Chernyshevsky's ideas, but was aware of them in different ways" (p. 18).

Many facts in the book become known for the first time; others are substantially supplemented or clarified, corrected. Some important statements contained in the author's previous publications about Nozhin are revised and given more precisely in the new work. Such, for example, is the case with the coverage of the difficult question of the essence of ideological differences and disputes between Nozhin and M. A. Bakunin in Florence at the beginning of 1864, according to the state of sources that have come down to us. In one of her first articles about Nozhin, E. L. Rudnitskaya wrote about "the revolutionary phrase of Bakunin's anarchism and rebelliousness" 1, a phrase that was allegedly heard in those disputes. In her book, however, she rightly noted that in 1864 Bakunin's "anarchism was not yet the rebellious anarchism of which he (S. D. Bakunin) later became a theorist and practitioner" (p.64). This means that the above-mentioned revolutionary phrase could not have been used in the disputes of 1864 either. Note that an edit of this kind is an expressive evidence of the author's scientific integrity.

E. L. Rudnitskaya was able to make this and other similar clarifications thanks to her systematic and purposeful identification and study of the entire corpus of sources related to and relating to Nozhin. These efforts paid off perfectly. Nozhin's own papers were considered lost after his untimely death on the eve of D. V. Karakozov's shooting. The idea of their disappearance is firmly established in the scientific literature. However, E. L. Rudnitskaya found ar-

1 E. L. Rudnitskaya. Nikolai Nozhin. In: "The Revolutionary situation in Russia in 1859-1861", Moscow, 1962, p. 460.

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khiva Nozhin in the "Appendices" to his case, stored in the Central State Academic Administration of the USSR. Now, thanks to her research, new texts of Nozhin himself are being introduced into scientific circulation (rough drafts of journal articles, various theses, notes of individual thoughts; manuscripts and drawings on biology; his translations from Proudhon; a certain number of his letters - at least 13) and - a whole wealth!- about 60 letters to Nozhin. Its correspondents include A. A. Herzen (son of A. I. Herzen), L. I. Mechnikov, N. S. Kurochkin, N. V. Shelgunov, A. O. Kovalevsky, S. A. Olkhin, and A. P. Maltisky. Just one list of these well-known names makes the scientific significance of E. L. Rudnitskaya's discovery clearly visible. The Nozhin archive discovered by her consists of nine folders containing 929 sheets. The totality of these papers, to use a modern term, is "Nozhin's personal archive fund"; from now on, it is before us. The materials of this fund are widely used in the study. In addition, the author has re-examined many other sources, partly previously known. Especially important of these were the articles and reviews published by Nozhshm in Knizhny Vestnik, Iskra, and Narodnaya Letopisi. The author found a lot of valuable and unknown things in the judicial and investigative cases of persons involved in the Karakozov case (I. A. Khudyakov, G. A. Lopatin, I. V. Vedernikov, the Fortakovs, etc.), and repeatedly turned to memoir sources (N. K. Mikhailovsky, L. I. Mechnikov, A. G. Troinitsky, A. I. Delvig, P. A. Kolesnikov, etc.). Cherevin, V. A. Cherkezov, A.V. Romanovich-Slovatinsky and other persons who wrote about Nozhin in their memoirs). The monograph is thus based on a very solid source base.

As a result of the study, the book for the first time recreates quite fully the factual side of the biography of Nikolai Dmitrievich Nozhin (December 8, 1841 - April 3, 1866), this bright and richly gifted figure. Ten chapters of the book, in the generally accepted manner of chronologically consistent historical and biographical narration, introduce the reader to a small-scale noble family from the Chernihiv province, the family in which Nozhin was born and with which, as soon as he grew up, he decisively broke. Then there are the years of his study-first (1854-1860) at the Alexander Lyceum (formerly the famous Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum), then (1861-1863) at the German Universities of Heidelberg and Tübingen. And in parallel with this teaching, as part of it, as its completion, Nozhin's scientific research on the biology of marine animals took place in Italy and on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea in 1863-1864. And then return to Russia, where Nozhin launched a stormy legal and underground activity that lasted until his tragic and very mysterious death in a bed at the St. Petersburg Mariinsky Hospital in April 1866. Along the way, one cannot but express regret that even after the publication of a special book about Nozhin, many circumstances of his last days and death remain unclear. The main reason for this situation is rooted not only in the poverty and insufficiency of the sources that have come down to us, but also in the fact that those who compiled these sources considered it more appropriate to remain silent in the current situation.

"How exactly one should live and what one should do..." is the title of the first chapter of the monograph. The end of this phrase vividly recalls the title of Chernyshevsky's famous book. The proximity is not accidental. What to do? Such a question was then in the air, constantly demanding an answer from young people. If Nozhin is a member of the Sixties, then Chernyshevsky is the head of the Sixties in Russia, so to speak, Sixties No. 1. The first of the closest chapters of the book shows in detail how its hero quickly developed from a pupil of an aristocratic educational institution (such as the Alexander Lyceum) to "the famous nihilist Nozhin..." (the title of the fourth chapter). This development was strongly promoted by the entire epoch: the fall of serfdom, which took place in the context of a revolutionary situation, the decisive influence of liberation ideas, the whole spirit of the late 50s and 60s of the last century, those very "sixties" that K. A. Timiryazev called "our renaissance" 2 . This spirit determined the fate of young Nozhin. "Coming from a privileged noble environment, Nozhin early comes to its complete rejection. By the age of nineteen (that is, in December 1860, when he completed the full six-year course at the Alexander Lyceum - S. D.), he clearly shows features that characterize, on the one hand, the type of " ka-

2 K. A. Timiryazev. Nauka I demokratiya [Science and Democracy], Moscow, 1920, p. 465.

page 155

on the one hand, the most colorful representative of the Raznochinsky - Democratic intelligentsia with its inherent moral and ethical principles" (p.39).

However, I cannot agree with the author's statement that " it was not the lyceum course of sciences that determined Nozhin's research interests." This statement is clearly contradicted by the phrase literally following it: "Participation in the lyceum circle of natural scientists became a decisive fact in his (Nozhina - S. D.) biography of the scientist" (p. 38). Already in the last years of the lyceum, the appeal to natural science began to be considered by Nozhin "as a path to knowledge and solving social problems" (p. 38). This was the way many of the Sixties went. It is clear that at the same time they had to simultaneously engage in natural science (openly, publicly) and practical social science (participating in the democratic, educational and revolutionary activities of advanced youth). Therefore, the sixth chapter is emphatically titled: "In the interweaving of the legal and the conspiratorial." It thoroughly explores Nozhin's connections with the revolutionary elements of St. Petersburg and their associations, with figures of the Moscow and St. Petersburg underground, with the "Publishing Artel", with I. A. Khudyakov, N. V. Sokolov, N. S. Kurochkin, and his involvement in the plans hatched in the deepest secret to free N. A. Serno-Solovyevich from the tsarist shackles and N. G. Chernyshevsky.

In general terms, the monograph shows both purely scientific activities and Nozhin's works) carried out (in contrast to the above) quite legally. Here is Nozhin's report on his research in biology, and a report on his studies abroad, and the development of a plan for a course of public lectures on the topic "On the modern significance of the natural science method in relation to social and economic science", and finally, his translation from Latin of Van der Gauven's zoological treatise 3 , which Nozhin accompanied with his abundant additions. In passing, I note that E. L. Rudnitskaya, as a historian, acted prudently, not taking on the task of "analyzing and evaluating the scientific significance of the additions made by Nozhin to Van der Gauven's translation" (p. 134). This is a matter for biologists, zoologists, and natural history historians.

The monograph gives an idea not only of Nozhin's views and actions, but also of his character, temperament, and emotional structure. It contains the touching words of L. I. Mechnikov about the "meekness of a martyr" with which the 18-year-old Nozhin endured persecution by his relatives (p. 39); describes Nozhin's appearance, "his characteristic passion and energy" (p.50), mentions his "languishing interior" (p. 63). Carefully identifying "purely human moments that are extremely characteristic of him" (Nozhin), the author does not ignore the weaknesses of his hero, his contradictions and even breakdowns. It is true that "uncompromising attitude, both in relation to himself and to people close to him, is almost a defining trait of Nozhin's character, which sometimes took on a painfully acute character" (p. 79). Nozhin worked hard, worked in a fever of haste. It is not surprising that one of his articles, according to the author's apt remark, "is written passionately, but chaotically" (p. 61). The articles published during Nozhin's lifetime, despite the fact that "they were the result of many years of purposeful work", still left "the impression of improvisation: passionate, enthusiastic, with a clear lack of strict consistency, clarity of structure" (p.19). Touching briefly on the episode (which would have deserved more attention) of Nozhin's abduction of his sister from the family where she lived, the author quite rightly qualifies this act as an adventure, as one of the actions "that had a largely boyish, exalted character" (p. 101). From such seemingly cursory observations, the reader gets an idea of Nozhin's moral character. An image of a living person appears before us. This is a great advantage of the book.

The book also includes a lot of information about Nozhin's contemporaries - his friends, comrades, enemies and opponents from the camp of the "authorities in power". This book is not only about Nozhin, it mentions 345 names of various figures from among his contemporaries. It is good that a named index is placed at the end, which makes it easier to use the rich content of the monograph.

Serious research is presented in an entertaining way. The book is written with scientific precision of style and language, precision brought to the point of elegance in some places. To so pi-

3 C. P. Van der Hoven. Philosophia zoologica, Lugdini Batavorum. Leiden. 1864.

page 156

So, you need not only to know the subject perfectly, but also to appreciate and love it.

After the appearance of the work of E. L. Rudnitskaya, we will no longer have to talk about the"forgotten knife". The book provided strong evidence of Nozhin's rights to a prominent place in the history of the revolutionary movement in Russia, in our memory of him.

The high evaluation of the monograph obliges me to pay attention to certain issues that still need further research after its publication, as well as to particular shortcomings and omissions.

The author's rather categorical judgments about the allegedly extremely thorough, perfect and skilful conspiracy of the landowners of the 60s do not seem convincing and proven (pp. 88, 90, 91, 92). Unfortunately, it has not always been so. It is hardly legitimate to call the entire social and revolutionary movement of the turn of the 1950s and 60s, the time of the revolutionary situation and the fall of serfdom, a time richly saturated with very complex and heterogeneous ideological and theoretical searches, only the "era "of Land and Freedom" (p.12). This name was clearly an exaggeration of the significance of this remarkable organization, its unjustified personification, so to speak.

The reproduction and interpretation of individual data from memoir sources is sometimes inaccurate, and these data are sometimes interpreted broadly. We will point out a few such places. Quoting extensive texts (pp. 62, 63, 64) from L. I. Mechnikov's memoir article "M. A. Bakunin in Italy in 1864", the author allows the reader to think about the duration and frequency, about the constant nature of meetings and disputes between Bakunin and Nozhin in Florence. The memoirist's statement is particularly impressive: "Clashes between Bakunin and Nozhin happened every time fate brought them together" (p. 63). However, it is known that Bakunin settled in Florence only in January 1864 (p. 59), and Nozhin lived in Florence during the winter of 1863/64 (p.53) and left this city in February 1864 (p. 66). From the comparison of these dates (given in the book), it can be seen that Bakunin and Nozhin were in Florence at the same time for no longer than one month (during some days in January and February 1864). The memoirist wrote 33 years after the meetings he recalls (Mechnikov's article is marked 1897). Therefore, it should be noted that the author of the memoir is not to draw the reader's attention to these dates.

Presenting one of I. I. Mechnikov's works and giving two quotations from it, the author writes:: "At the same time, in his essay on the history of biology in Russia, which we cite, I. Mechnikov notes..." (p.70). However, another Mechnikov article is presented and quoted here, namely " Alexander Onufrievich Kovalevsky (An Essay from the history of Science in Russia)".

Analyzing the memoir sources, the author reports that:" In the Pages of Memoirs, I. I. Mechnikov expresses his opinions about Nozhin as a natural scientist " (p. 25). In the 1946 edition of Pages of Memoirs (which is indicated in the footnote), Nozhin is actually mentioned twice in the texts of I. I. Mechnikov himself (on pages 19 and 21 of this edition). In the first case, it was reported that A. O. Kovalevsky's closest friend and cohabitant, Nozhin, translated Fritz Muller's short pamphlet "Fur Darwin"into Russian. From the second mention, we learn that in 1864, at the congress of German naturalists and doctors in Giessen, "several young Russian scientists arrived from Heidelberg, not far from there. Among them was Baron Stewart, who reported that his friends Kovalevsky and Nozhin were actively engaged in the history of lower animals in Italy." Where are the opinions of I. I. Mechnikov in his "Pages of Memoirs" about Nozhin as a natural scientist?

The comments made relate to particulars. They cannot obscure or diminish the high merits of the study of the Sixties artist Nozhin.

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