We are all readers. Each of us has read at least one book. And that is wonderful. Because writing has one amazing quality - it is not just a collection of information and information about historical realities or about human relationships, it is something more. Reading, we find ourselves in that time, understand and justify many things, remember the relationship between people.
The work touches our inner world, our soul. Do we often understand what is being written? For what purpose? What did the author want to say, describing these events? But there are people who raise these acute, often painful, questions: are the assessments of creativity fair, is this or that cultural figure deservedly forgotten or exalted. Literary historians such as Tolstoy Ivan Nikitich help us answer all questions.
Ivan Nikitich and his family
On January 21, 1958, Tolstoy Ivan Nikitich was born in Leningrad. The family in which he was born is known to everyone. Ivan Nikitich is the paternal grandson of the famous writer A.N. Tolstoy. On the part of the mother, Natalia Mikhailovna Lozinsky, is the poet’s grandson M. L. Father is a Soviet physicist, professor Tolstoy N. A. Brother Mikhail is also a physicist, and sisters Natalya and Tatyana are writers.
In 1975 he graduated from high school and entered the medical institute. He studied in it for three years, during which he was expelled from it twice. According to Ivan Nikitich, when he was expelled for the first time and reinstated, he realized that this would happen again, since he did not want to study there. Looks like the "grandfather" genes affected, medicine did not interest him. Once his wife told him that if you like philology, you have to be a philologist. So he entered the faculty of Leningrad University.
Passion for the history of emigration
He studied in absentia, because he worked as a guide in the Pushkin Mountains. Even then, he was worried about emigration. And somehow, seeing in Pushkin’s office the volume of Nabokov's commentary on the novel “Eugene Onegin” forbidden to be issued, he persuaded his superiors to give these books to him. They were in English, and in return Ivan Nikitich Tolstoy promised to translate it into Russian for employees.
Translated Nabokov’s comment for a long time, it was time to defend the diploma. He told the teacher that he would like to prepare this topic for the diploma. To which he replied that the name of Nabokov should not be pronounced in a Soviet university, we must look for another topic. I had to postpone my thesis briefly. After graduation, he taught Russian language and literature in high school.
Thaw and first publications
All this time he studied archives, accessible literature and wrote articles. I really wanted to be printed at 21, Ivan Tolstoy recalls. But knowing of his passion for emigre literature, not a single publication ventured to publish his materials. And at 25, he was completely forbidden to print. He reassured himself that it did not last forever. And so it happened. In 1986, the ban was lifted, and the attitude towards Nabokov in the country gradually became warmer. And in 1987, Ivan Nikitich appeared the first publication.
At the same time, he teaches at the Printing and Humanitarian Institutes. In 1994, conducts special courses on Nabokov at the university. He worked as an editor of the Zvezda magazine, and as a proofreader in the Russian Thought magazine. He specializes in emigrant literature and history, in literature of the Cold War period.
Literary work
In 1992, Ivan Nikitich Tolstoy - editor-in-chief of the publishing house Toviya Grzhebina. He publishes books by authors who are forced to emigrate, as well as works on emigrants and their lives abroad. Since 1994 he is the chief editor of the journal "Experiments". Published more than 500 of his reviews, articles and reviews. Author of books "Italics of the era", "Laundered Zhivago novel."
Workdays of a journalist
Since 1988, Ivan Tolstoy has been working as a journalist (freelancer) on Radio Liberty. At the end of 1994, the company invited him to the state. Since 1995, he lives and works in Prague. According to Ivan Nikitich, it works great there. Nobody imposes anything, does not force to cover some topics and does not determine what programs to do. He chooses topics himself. Life tells them fully, says Ivan Tolstoy, whose biography can itself serve as the topic of an interesting and fascinating program about the famous family of Count Tolstoy.
Ivan Nikitich is not only a master of telling stories wonderfully - vividly, figuratively, vividly. But the great master to find them. He works a lot with archives, from his words, it is very exciting, sometimes unexpected things appear that explain a lot from the life of emigration. If you know and imagine the context, then a surprisingly interesting picture looms against a historical background. This is exactly what a historian should do. Ivan Tolstoy studies the materials of yesterday, which inevitably leads to today.
Travels of Ivan Tolstoy
Ivan Nikitich never invents anything. All his stories are based on facts only. It is simply important to skillfully combine facts into a single whole - into history. Compare these facts. When comparing, we get an interesting story. The only task, says Ivan Tolstoy, is to make the historical story so fascinating that it can not only be listened to. But everyone was able to understand why this happened, what is the relationship between this or that event.
A unique researcher, he finds stunningly interesting stories for his readers and listeners. Ivan Nikitich - host of programs, including Myths and Reputations. The author of the program series “Radio Liberty. Half a century on the air. " Author and presenter of the programs “Historical Travels of Ivan Tolstoy” and “Keepers of the Inheritance” on the TV channel “Culture”.
In his programs completely unexpected stories about people, works, events are revealed. A connoisseur of Russian culture, a brilliant storyteller and an incredibly erudite person. He simply fascinates with his travels - in literature, in time.