During the Great Patriotic War, the country suffered irreparable losses, but, like any other tragic event in history, it gave rise to talented writers and poets. These were former war veterans who knew firsthand about battles, attack and shelling. One of them was Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov.
He spoke about the horrors of war, about the moral choice that a person must make at a critical moment in life. Vasil Bykov is a writer who was one of the first to talk about the “trench truth”, that there is a lot of fear in the war. Not only a coward and not only a German can be afraid. Soviet soldiers and officers experienced terrible fear of punitive organs.
early years
Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov was born in 1924, in Belarus. His childhood passed in poverty, and he did not like to remember him. The future writer spent the early years in the village of Bychki, Vitebsk region. Belarus still remembers the horrors of the occupation. Much of what Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov told readers about happened to his family and friends. During the war, every resident of Belarus was a warrior. Regardless of whether he had weapons, he knew how to shoot.
In the biography and books of Vasil Bykov, the theme of war has always been unchanged. In 1941, the future writer was already seventeen. What was Bykov's life in peacetime? At an early age he showed artistic abilities. He even studied at the sculpture department of the Vitebsk school. However, in 1940, some changes occurred in the education system: the scholarship was canceled. Bykov dropped out and went to work.
War
In 1941, the hero of today's story passed exams for grade 10 externally. The war found him in Ukraine. Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov is a representative of the generation that the war destroyed almost completely.
At the front, he was a platoon, that is, he held one of the most dangerous officer posts. He was wounded twice, had several awards. Bykov survived by a miracle. In the Kirovograd region there is a mass grave, for which for some time his name was listed. The mother of the future writer received a funeral. Only after years did she learn that her son was alive.
After the battle, he got to the hospital, from there he was sent again to the front. He fought in his native land, in Romania, Austria, Hungary. As Chingiz Aitmatov said, fate saved Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov so that he could write books on behalf of a whole generation.
The reporter
After the Great Victory, he served in the army for another ten years. He visited Ukraine and the Far East. In 1955, he got a job as a correspondent for the Grodno Pravda newspaper. He wrote essays and feuilleton. Very soon, in 1956, the first literary works of Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov began to appear in the local press. His books were mostly devoted to partisans, soldiers and all those who suffered about the fascist occupation. But there are several works in his bibliography that do not touch on the theme of war. So, at the very beginning of his career, he published a small collection of humorous stories.
Creation
Bykov himself believed that his writing began in 1951. While in the Kuril Islands, he wrote two stories: “Conspicuity” and “The Death of a Man”. Since that time, the war has become not only the main, but almost the only theme of his literary work. In his works he depicted people who found themselves in extreme conditions, borderline situations between death and life, which almost always end in death. His heroes are at the limit of their moral and physical strength.
Front story
One of the most famous books by Vasily Vladimirovich Bykov is Sotnikov. The genre of the work is a frontline novel. The high artistic value of his books lies in the fact that the author was able to tell readers not only about the hardships and hardships of Soviet people during the Second World War, but also about the painful moral trials that many had to endure.
In order to make the right choice in an extreme situation, you need to have mental strength. Sometimes the consciousness of one’s duty and the sense of responsibility make a person commit unthinkable acts. So, in the story “Wolf Pack” Levchuk saves a baby. In "Live Until Dawn," Lieutenant Ivanovsky fights even after a severe wound. In the story "Sotnikov" Vasil Vladimirovich Bykov told about the fluctuation of moral principles, about how a guy, in fact, a good one, makes a deal with his conscience, becomes a traitor.
Lieutenant prose
In the early sixties, several works were published. All of them were successful. This is the story Crane Shout, Front Page and Third Rocket, which put the author on a par with the most talented front-line writers. Around this time, a term such as “lieutenant prose” arose in Russian literature. The works of the representatives of the new genre had a great influence on the spiritual life in the sixties. True, critics greeted the lieutenant prose with hostility.
Criticism
Attacks from official censorship had to be experienced by many writers, including Bykov. He published most of his works in the journal New World. This publication, led by Twardowski, has long been the main target of the censors' crushing attacks. Particularly severely criticized were the works “Attack on the move”, “It Doesn’t Hurt the Dead”, “Kruglyansky Bridge”. The latter appeared in the book only ten years after its creation. "Attack on the move" - only in the early eighties. The story "It Doesn’t Hurt the Dead" was published 23 years after writing.
More than half a century has passed since the creation of Bykov's most famous works. The war ended long ago, there were almost no witnesses and participants in those terrible events. But the stories of Vasil Bykov are still relevant. The thing is their nationality, simplicity. After all, this writer did not tell about fearless heroes, but about ordinary people.
Bykova was primarily interested not in the war itself, not in battle technology, but in the moral world of a person, his spiritual qualities. The partisan movement that he wrote about so often could not have been without popular support from people who did not want to live under the yoke of the Nazis. There were many of them. Vasil Bykov could not neglect the role of ordinary people in the struggle against the invaders.
In the story "Kruglyansky bridge" we are talking about the son of a policeman who is ashamed of his father, wants to go to the partisans. The truth is on the side of the latter. And she is stronger than paternal authority.
Bykov and Russian literature
He wrote in his native language. In the early seventies he began to translate his works into Russian. Today, his work is part of Russian literature. Moreover, the moral and philosophical nature of his works influenced the development of Russian prose. For the story "Live Until Dawn" the writer was awarded a state prize. In the mid-70s, he received two more honorary literary awards.
The only romantic novel by Bykov is Alpine Ballad. But she is dedicated to the soldier. A soldier who saved his beloved at the cost of his life.
Last years
In the nineties, the writer was harassed by the authorities. In Belarus, a regime was established against which Bykov repeatedly spoke out very sharply. They stopped publishing it. In the late 90s, Vasil Bykov had to leave his native country. A year and a half he lived in Finland, where he worked fruitfully. Then he moved to Germany. He returned to his homeland shortly before his death. Vasil Bykov passed away in 2003.