Is it possible to say about Zurbagan that this is a city that does not exist? Yes and no. Half a century ago, only fans of Alexander Greene knew about him - this toponym appears in a good half of his works. Living under the generous Crimean sun and next to unpredictably beautiful sea expanses, Green created the fictional Zurbagan in his books.
City on the map
The city is described in sufficient detail in the story of Alexander Stepanovich "Zurbagan shooter." Contemporaries of the writer claim that the city of Sevastopol could be a prototype of a fabulous place. The Alexander Green Museum in Feodosia (where a writer lived there since 1924) has a map on which the bay and the city of Zurbagan very much resemble the cartographic appearance of Sevastopol.
Dream symbol
Once upon a time, a fabulous city with a ring-shaped arrangement of streets, with arches and bridges, with gabled tiled roofs has become a symbol of dream, romance, and magic. Poets write poetry about him, composers compose music, and adventurers make attempts to find this place on the face of the planet. And now there is news that scientists have found its coordinates and visited a wonderful city called Zurbagan. Is this a hoax, a hoax or the truth? There are rumors that the city is being opened to the eyes of the most talented creators and dream-obsessed inventors. As if Lewis Carroll, after visiting the amazing city, said that the world is not what it seems, and that by fantasizing we can see its true face.
Parallel universe
Attentive readers claim that Green wrote about a city that exists in a different reality. The writer insisted that his mysterious Zurbagan lives in a different time, that this is something like a parallel world. Perhaps the portal to this world was his imagination and creative obsession, and perhaps other worlds really exist.
Cultural code
In the mid-80s of the last century, the musical “Above the Rainbow” appeared on Soviet screens; musical compositions for it were written by Yuri Chernavsky and Leonid Derbenev. There for the first time the legendary song about Zurbagan was sounded, which became the hallmark of the young Vladimir Presnyakov. Zurbagan rhymed with a hurricane, in the poetry of the song the dream of happiness was read and the very secret that enveloped the magnificent and alluring Zurbagan was living.
Today, the name of the Green Town can be found in the names of tourist camps, water parks, cafes and in the name of creative groups. The name of the exotic city is the pass near Elbrus. Rumor has it that the Crimean authorities want to make happy the residents of one of the local villages by renaming it from Ordzhonikidze to Zurbagan. If this happens, we will see a cute name on the map, and we can only hope that its inhabitants will be a little happier than they were before.