Ilya Varshavsky is a famous Soviet science fiction writer. The writer, who left a noticeable mark in Russian literature, his most famous works - a book of essays entitled "Around the World Without a Ticket", as well as collections of short stories "Molecular Cafe", "The Man Who Saw the Anti-World", "The Sun Sets in Donomagh," There are no alarming symptoms. "
Writer Biography
Ilya Varshavsky was born in Kiev, when he was still part of the Russian Empire, in 1908, December 14. However, for family reasons, a different date was written in the metric book - March 12, 1909.
When the writer decided to change his passport, another curious incident occurred, he asked him to change his birthday in the documents for February 10 in order to celebrate it simultaneously with his wife.
In his youth, Ilya Varshavsky dreamed of an acting career and even passed the entrance examinations of the FEKS, under this abbreviation the Factory of an Eccentric Actor was known. But the hero of our article failed the test, going to the Leningrad Naval College. He graduated from it, having received a diploma in mechanics of the merchant fleet. He devoted several years to serving in the Navy .
Literary debut
In 1929, Ilya Varshavsky, whose biography is given in this article, writes his first book entitled "Around the World Without a Ticket." He works on this publication with reporter Nikolai Slepnev and his older brother, whose name was Dmitry. Essays are published under the pseudonym Nikolai Aldim, behind which three authors are hiding at once.
Before the start of the war against the fascists, Ilya Varshavsky worked at the Russky Diesel enterprise as an engineer, but he was not called to the front because of an injury received as a child. Instead, he is evacuated to Altai, where he remains until 1949.
Having returned to the city on the Neva, Ilya Iosifovich Varshavsky returns to his native factory, where he devotes two more decades of his life to work.
The first fantastic work
Surprisingly, Warsaw since childhood did not like science fiction, by his own admission, he simply could not tolerate it. However, after a dispute with his son, who liked this genre, he decided to write his first fantastic story. This happened in 1962, when he was already 54 years old. It was with this curiosity that his career as a science fiction writer began.
Soon his works were recognized so successful that it was Warsawsky who was invited to head the newly organized workshop of young writers in Leningrad. In 1972, Boris Strugatsky replaced him in this post.
Warsaw also worked on Leningrad television, he had his own program called “Molecular Cafe”.
The friends of the hero of our article have always noted that he was a witty and good-natured person. Varshavsky closely communicated with the Strugatsky brothers, it was he who prompted them the amazing surname Farfurkis. It can be seen in the Strugatsky’s novel "The Tale of the Three."
Critics Vladimir Dmitrievsky and Eugene Brandis, describing science fiction writer Ilya Varshavsky, emphasized that he looked like the character of Mine Reid’s novels was lean, with an energetic profile, it was immediately clear that he was a brave sailor who had seen a lot in life.
Science fiction family
Varshavsky’s father was a graduate of the Polytechnic Institute in Zurich, specializing in heat engines, his name was Joseph Viktorovich. The writer’s mother, Klara Ilinichna Ginzburg, was a member of the translators section of the Soviet Writers Union , and was the aunt of the famous translator Rita Wright.
In 1929, Warsaw married Luella Aleksandrovna Krasnoshchekova, who was two years younger than him. His adopted daughter was Lily Brick. This is the legendary “avant-garde muse”, which became the mistress of one of the most famous and fashionable art and literary salons of the XX century. She played an important role in the fate of Vladimir Mayakovsky, it was to her that he devoted many of his poems and poems.
After the death of Mayakovsky, Lily Brik officially received part of the rights to his legacy. She participated in the preparation of a complete works, opened the first Mayakovsky Museum in the capital, which was later liquidated.
In 1933, a son, Victor, was born into the Warsaw family, who became a well-known cybernetist who developed artificial intelligence in the USSR.
The creative path of Warsaw
The hero of our article published his first fantastic story in 1962 in the journal Science and Life, it was called Roby. In 1964, his debut book, Molecular Cafe, was published.
In total, five books of Ilya Varshavsky were published during his lifetime. Creativity was very diverse. There were enough parodies and stylizations (short stories “New about Sherlock Holmes”, “Secrets of the genre”), social pamphlets (“There are no disturbing symptoms”, “Violet”), psychological problematic short stories (“The plot for the novel”, “Make up your mind, pilot!”, "A Tale Without a Hero").
Writer Story Reviews
Critics almost immediately praised the writer's talent. They noted that the stories are distinguished by ingenuity, sharp stories, obvious literary skill.
Boris Strugatsky, who liked the stories of Warsaw, said that he once gave them read to the Czech classic Stanislav Lem. He returned the next day with the words that he could not imagine that in several works all Western fantasy literature could be collected.
Modern scholars believe his stories about the Donomagh inspired cyberpunk style writers.
"There are no disturbing symptoms."
One of Warsawski’s most famous science fiction stories is “There are no alarming symptoms.” It was published in 1964, gave the name to the eponymous collection.
This is a science fiction piece in which a 100-year-old mathematics professor named Olaf Clarence decides to undergo a complete rejuvenation procedure. This is his gift to his wife on her 75th birthday. At the same time, he decides to invert, that is, agrees to erase from memory everything that is unnecessary for work.
The computer analyzes the scientist's memories, keeping only the positive. When Clarence returns to university, he smashes his colleague Levy, when he makes a report, it turns out at home that he forgot about the wedding anniversary and the death of his son. She is in shock; at night she drinks a lethal dose of morphine.
The professor is not aware of what happened, continuing to draw up new equations. The doctors who performed the operation note that it was successful, there are no alarming symptoms.
Warsaw, as in most stories, raises the theme of human birthright, the true value of each individual. Critics noted that after such an inversion of the hero, there is practically nothing left of the person, he turns into a robot. By the way, Warsaw openly scoffed at the claims of robots in many of his other stories. There is no ironic component here. Lowering a person to the level of a robot does not cause a smile, but horror.
In 1984, based on the story, the television play "This Fantastic World" was shot.
"Around the world without a ticket"
The first literary work of Warsaw, co-authored with his brother and Slepnev, is a book of essays "Around the World Without a Ticket." It includes travel stories about the voyages of ships departing from Leningrad to the Black Sea. On the way, they call at all kinds of ports around the world - Liverpool, Hamburg, Algeria, Rotterdam, Constantinople, Alexandria, because Warsaw served on the merchant fleet, so these notes are his personal impressions and experiences.
True, after the first experiment, he abandoned attempts to become a writer for a long time, returning to literature only in the status of a science fiction writer.