Каталог «Хлебниковской коллекции» Дома-музея Велимира Хлебникова

КАТАЛОГ «ХЛЕБНИКОВСКОЙ КОЛЛЕКЦИИ» ДОМА-МУЗЕЯ ВЕЛИМИРА ХЛЕБНИКОВА

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надлежавшие ранее Хлебниковым и Митури-

чам, теперь систематизированы и описаны,

а главное – нашли своё место в экспозиции

музея.

Каталог – это, на первый взгляд, сухой спи-

сок вещей, артефактов, экспонатов, книг и до-

кументов. Он кажется бездушным справочни-

ком и своеобразным скелетом, но за ним стоит

жизнь и творческая судьба Хлебникова. Ката-

лог – это прелюдия к теме, это начало начал,

очередные «подступы» к творчеству, быть

может, самого сложного поэта ХХ века. Ката-

лог – это введение в науку о Хлебникове и,

можно сказать, верный ключ к прочтению гер-

метических текстов великого поэта.

Мы, исследователи и почитатели Хлебни-

кова, должны быть очень благодарны Алексан-

дру Мамаеву за его кропотливую и трудную ра-

боту, за его многолетний подвижнический труд

по собиранию и изучению материалов Хлебни-

кова. Музей, возглавляемый А.А. Мамаевым,

не только опровергает и разрушает многие

легенды о Хлебникове своей пропагандист-

ской и научной деятельностью, но прежде

всего является важным научным центром по

изучению жизни и творчества поэта. Здесь на-

ходятся не только личные вещи и книги поэта,

здесь собрана уникальная библиотека научных

трудов, посвящённых его творчеству и издан-

ных на многих языках мира. Сюда ведут пути

многих ученых, начинающих молодых поэтов

и простых любителей поэзии.

Поздравляю тебя с юбилеем музея, дорогой

Саша Мамаев, и многая лета тебе!

А.Е. Парнис

There are many legends around Velimir

Khlebnikov. The life of a wandering poet and his

tragic fate became the blessing grounds for crea-

ting a myth of Khlebnikov. In one of the post-revo-

lutionary declarations he wrote that “poets must

wander and sing”. And this became his lifestyle, his

modus vivendi and his view of the world.

Not that long ago, one could hardly imagine

that homeless Khlebnikov with unsuitable living

conditions had once had a house, where he lived

with his family and even had his own desk… Such

a mythopoetic image of Khlebnikov, a wanderer

and a dervish, arises from the memories and testi-

monies of the poet’s friends, associates and acqua-

intances.

Mayakovskiy wrote in the obituary: “…with

Khlebnikov, who had rarely worn his own pants

(not to speak of the academic allowances), the self-

neglect became a real self-sacrifice, a martyrdom

for the poetic idea”.

M. Gasparov had once said that “there are wri-

ters ‘with the biography’ and ‘without it’. Velimir

Khlebnikov was not only the one ‘with the bio-

graphy’, but also ‘with some legend’”.

Twenty years ago, in October 1993, in As-

trakhan, on former 53 Boljshaya Demidovskaya

Street (now Sverdlova St.), in the house where the

poet had lived from 1914 to March 1919 (his pa-

rents had lived there up to 1931), the Khlebnikov

Museum was created. Now, the poet, who had cal-

led himself the First Chairman of the Earth, has

not only the house museum, but also (and at last)

the Catalogue being published, made by Alek-

sandr Mamayev. Now, many legends accompanied

Khlebnikov all his life are denied with artifacts, do-

cuments and various materials collected in the

Museum and included in the Catalogue.

I was a witness of the first Mamayev’s steps on

a Khlebnikov scholar’s thorny path. I can remem-

ber how it all began. As far back as in the late 60s,

I wrote a letter to an Astrakhan local ethnographer

S. Koteljnikov, asking him for help in finding Veli-

mir Khlebnikov’s traces. He responded that there

were about 150 people named Khlebnikov in As-

trakhan and asked me whom out of those 150 I was

looking for. Since then, I have arrived in As-

trakhan many times, being engaged in searching

for those who knew the poet and collecting the

materials about him. So, I succeeded in identify-

ing the authentic place of Khlebnikov’s birth –

Winter Headquarters of the Malyje Derbety Ulus

of the Astrakhan Government (now the village of

Malyje Derbety).

In 1970, I got acquainted with Sasha Mamayev

when he was engaged in translating the French ‘ac-

cursed’ poets. So, I swept himwith Khlebnikov. To-

gether, we looked for the poet’s relatives, identi-

fied the places where he had lived, together visi-

ted the apartment in the ‘parents’ house’ on 53

Sverdlova St. (a guy named Merkulov was living

there), went to the officials on culture… I wrote se-

veral articles about Khlebnikov for “The Volga”