More than one generation of children grew up on good stories and short stories of the talented Soviet writer Nikolai Nikolaevich Nosov. His characters are good-natured and direct. But their special charm is that real schoolchildren are easily recognized in them, with their children's joys and sorrows, victories and defeats.
How was the writer born?
Nikolai Nikolayevich himself was born in 1908. But the writer was born in it only after many years. Unlike many figures of the pen, neither being a little boy Kolya, nor a matured youth Nikolai, Nosov did not even think about literary work. In his life, everything changed the birth of a son.
Being a caring father, Nikolai Nikolayevich spent a lot of time with his little son. One of the favorite entertainments for the child was listening to funny stories that dad composed on the go. History is silent about whether Nikolai Nikolayevich himself decided to publish his creations or who thought of it, but it is known for certain that in 1938 the story of the future famous writer was first published in the popular children's magazine Murzilka. So modestly Nosov’s works for children were born. The list was opened with the story "The Fans."
The beginning of a literary career
This was only the first swallow. Nosov’s subsequent stories for children were not long in coming. In the same year, about a dozen more works were published on the pages of Murzilka.
And already in 1945 the first collection “Knock-knock-knock” was published. Over the next two years, two more collections were published. More and more readers searched Nosov’s works for children on the shelves, the list of which was constantly updated.
Prerequisites for the Creation of a New Civilization
The writer lived in a difficult time. Two world wars fell on his century, he suffered hunger and deprivation. Almost all his life Nikolai Nikolaevich huddled with his family in a tiny communal apartment. Only when he was 60 years old, it became possible to move with his wife to a separate apartment.
The need to constantly save space on a more than modest living space imperceptibly gave rise to a love of miniature things. The grandson of N. Nosov recalls that he often went with his grandfather to admire the toy railway. And as a gift to him, Nikolai Nikolaevich often chose small cars that did not exceed the size of matchboxes.
It is likely that these circumstances pushed the talented writer to create a special country for little men. In our time, he would have been dubbed the founder of the new universe, but then such things were treated much easier. And as a reward for his work, N. Nosov was content with the recognition of grateful readers.
The famous shorty conquers the world
The works of N. N. Nosov for children gained popularity far beyond the borders of the Soviet Union during the life of the writer. In many ways, this became possible due to the fact that he managed to avoid the presence of an obsessive communist ideology in his stories.
One episode from the writer's life is very indicative in this respect. When he was persuaded to mention the name of Joseph Stalin at least in passing in a book for which he was awarded the Stalin Prize (which was incredibly honorable), he replied that in his stories he did not write about honors pupils, but to put the words about the great leader worthless ....
Nosov's works for children, the list of which is rightfully headed by the adventures of the restless Dunno, are translated into 68 languages. This hero is very popular in Japan. Cheerful Xiao Wuji, which translates as “little ignoramus,” is one of the favorite characters in Japanese comics. Little Danno is known in English-speaking countries, and in Hungarian his name sounds - Namtudomka.
In 1957, one of the authoritative international journals conducted a study on the topic of which works of Russian writers are translated into other languages ​​most often. The list of Nosov's stories for children was in third place. Only Maxim Gorky and Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin were ahead of Nikolai Nikolaevich.
Vitya Maleev and others
However, no matter how popular Dunno is, Nosov’s stories for children are not limited to this character alone. Nikolai Nikolaevich wrote a lot about ordinary guys. And their adventures were not fabulous at all, but the most ordinary ones. What did not stop them from being no less exciting and exciting.
Probably, this is the talent of the writer. After all, he took ordinary situations and told them so that they turned into entertaining stories. And the special charm of these short stories is that many people very easily recognize themselves in them. Well, who did not build houses in childhood from a bedspread stretched over a table and chair? Or didn't quarrel with your best friend over nonsense?
Once Nikolai Nikolaevich received a letter, the sender of which was Vitya Maleev. There was a question: “How did you learn stories from my life?” A similar question could be asked by hundreds and thousands of young readers.
Prototypes of heroes
If you carefully study all the works of Nosov for children, the list of main characters will be surprisingly modest. In addition to the community of shorties living in fairy-tale cities, Nikolai Nikolaevich introduces us to a dozen or two schoolchildren. Moreover, in these works, the author prefers to narrate in the first person. Does this mean that Nosov’s funny stories for children were written off from himself ?!
Nikolai Nikolaevich did not hide the fact that he himself served as a prototype of the character of Dunno. But the images of the other guys were more collective. The writer was very fond of watching the games of children. At first he spent time with his son, then with his grandson and his friends.
Serious creator of carefree characters
Nosov’s contemporaries say that he was quite reserved and unsociable. The grandson remembers him as a silent and serious person. It seems that the author carefully invested the entire supply of his humor in his works, not allowing him to splash into the surrounding reality.
Or maybe it's just in the difficult historical era. It was very difficult to maintain the position of non-partisanship in those days. Especially the figure who is in full view of the public. In itself, this fact can already tell a lot about a person’s personality. Under the then existing regime, one extra word could drastically change a person’s life. So I had to keep silent involuntarily.
In fact, it was precisely the incessant remarks that it was necessary to bring social consciousness to his writings to switch from everyday stories to the writer’s fairy genre. He was encouraged to write about pioneer organizations and insisted that he mention at least the description of Stalin in the description.
However, Nikolay Nosov was not such a person . Works for children that came out of his pen, remained unmarked political instructions. And this is one of the reasons why the current generation of schoolchildren reads his stories with the same rapture as their predecessors more than sixty years ago.
Heroes move from the pages of books to the big screen
Many of Nosov’s stories for children were made into films. And the majority is still during the author’s lifetime. The first feature film, based on short stories from the collection “Vitya Maleev at School and at Home,” was presented to the general public in 1954. It was called “Two Friends” and was shot in black and white.
This picture was a great success with the audience. And therefore, less than four years have passed since the next full-length movie "Friend" was released. This time he was shot already in color film.
Not forgotten what N. N. Nosov did for children in our time. In 1997, the wonderful animated series “Dunno on the Moon” was shot. The whole cycle takes a little more than two and a half hours and consists of 12 series. Thanks to the series, children today can get acquainted with the restless Dunno in the format most familiar to them. And after that it is already much easier to continue friendship with him already on the pages of N. Nosov’s ageless books.