Lotman Yuri Mikhailovich - this is a huge world of thought, which we, the descendants, have to study. And although television has done a lot to make its versatility and complexity accessible to people, so that many can touch the depth of the material and the simplicity of its transmission, Yuri Mikhailovich still remains a mystery.
Information about childhood and youth
The family of Mikhail Lvovich Lotman, a mathematician and lawyer who already had three daughters, did not have a son. And in the hungry 1922 in Petrograd, the long-awaited heir, Lotman Yuri, was finally born. The house where he was born is very difficult. It was from him that Pushkin went to a duel with which he was brought mortally wounded.
For thousands of years, Jewish families have instilled respect for learning and books. Therefore, the seven-year-old Lotman Yuri was sent to study at the best school in Leningrad, which now received its original name "Petrishule". In this educational institution, people who made a huge contribution to Russian culture studied, for example: P.P. Vyazemsky, K. Rossi, N. Benois, M. Mussorgsky, Decembrist M. Fonvizin, Admiral P. Chichagov and many others.
Only at this school could Lotman Yuri have a deep, versatile education and excellent command of foreign languages, especially German, which Yuri Mikhailovich was fluent in. In the meantime, for nine years, Yuri Lotman comprehends science and prepares for admission to Leningrad University. He chose the Faculty of Philology and wrote his term paper under the scientific supervision of the outstanding philologist-folklorist V. Ya. Propp, who was internationally recognized and at the forefront of the development of text theory. The student’s interests included the study of Russian literature of the early 19th century, so he needed knowledge of French.
War
In 1939-1940 there was a military conflict with Finland. And from the second year, Lotman Yuri was sent to the Red Army. As an absolutely necessary subject, he took with him a dictionary of the French language and carefully studied it all the years of the war. From the beginning of the Patriotic War, he served as a signalman in the artillery troops, that is, on the front line, without hiding behind anyone's backs. First he is a sergeant, then the commander of a communications department.
In 1944 he was awarded two medals - “For Courage” and “For Military Merit”. After the concussion in 1945, Yuri Mikhailovich was awarded the Order of the Red Star and the Order of the Patriotic War II degree. So his military differences were noted. Yuri Lotman ended the war in Berlin.
Demobilization and getting started
From 1946 to 1950, he continued his studies, and then received the position of senior lecturer in Tartu, at the Pedagogical Institute. For him as a Jew, other ways were closed. In little Tartu, he will remain for life. A year later, Yuri marries a girl close to him in spirit, who studies Russian symbolism and the work of A. Blok.
Two years later, in 1952, Lotman Yuri Mikhailovich defended his thesis. The topic was chosen about the struggle of Radishchev with the aesthetics of the nobility at Karamzin. Two years later, work begins at the University of Tartu, which in the 20th century, thanks to Lotman’s work in it, will not only become famous throughout the world, but will also occupy a central place in world philology. And all this is only because the great scientist read his lectures there and created the school of semiotics. In 1961, Yuri Mikhailovich defended his doctoral dissertation on Russian literature before the Decembrist uprising, since 1963 he is a professor, head of the department of Russian literature.
People of the late 18th - early 19th century were living interlocutors for him. He talked with Pushkin, checked his assessments of life and culture and his conclusions. In 1981, his biography of Pushkin was published. The book “Conversations about Russian Culture”, which was published in 1993, just at the time when TV began the cycle of his lectures on this topic, is insanely interesting. This book can be opened from any page and read voraciously. Lotman's memory and knowledge are extraordinary. Students at lectures listened to his lectures, not knowing what to do - listen or record. Sure, he was an idol.
Attitude to culture
Memory, as Lotman believed, is the highest achievement of both man and humanity as a whole. It is she who is the guardian of culture as the most positive result of the activity of the human spirit. Culture as a memory is a way to understand the activities of a scientist. The last book that was published during his lifetime is called Culture and Explosion. It examines the cultural processes in a historical aspect, leading the country to what we have today. So thought Yuri Lotman, whose biography, despite the vicissitudes of war, is a biography of the thinker.
Family life
With his wife, Yuri Mikhailovich lived thirty-nine years, surviving her for three years. So they looked, being already married with experience. Spouses are buried nearby. They have three sons. The eldest followed in their footsteps, engaged in literary criticism and semiotics, the second is an artist, the third is a biologist.
Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman passed away in 1993. His biography continues in lectures, books, which are now read by descendants and ponder with him those thoughts that bothered and worried him.