David Samoilov was born on June 1, 1920 in Moscow. My mother was Cecilia Izrailevna. Father Samuil Abramovich Kaufman worked as the chief venereologist of the Moscow region, participated in the First World War and the Civil War; in World War II he worked in the rear hospital.
Childhood memories
The images of the parents of the future poet will be vividly described in the poems “My childhood yard” and “Departure”, and the author truly captured childhood memories in the autobiographical works “Home”, “Dreams about the father”, “Apartment”, “From the eighth grade diary”.
The biography of David Samoilov - a talented poet - is quite ordinary. He was born … Studied … Composed … David became friends with poetry since childhood, a great novelist and part-time family friend Vasily Yan had a great influence on his formation as a creative person.
Biography of David Samoilov
The future poet graduated from school in 1938 and became a student at the Moscow Institute of Philosophy, History and Literature, where the best scientists of that time taught: L. I. Timofeev, N. K. Gudziy, D. N. Ushakov, Yu. M. Sokolov, S. I. Radzig, D. D. Blagoy.
During his studies, David Samoilov (photo of the war period) made friends with poets, later called representatives of the poetry of the military generation of the 40s: Sergey Narovchatov, Boris Slutsky, Mikhail Kulchitsky, Pavel Kogan. They were dedicated to the prophetic poem "Five", and the author himself was the fifth.
The death of some of them, as if prophesied in a work, became a great grief for Samoilov. The author was also creatively close with N. Glazkov, M. Lukonin, colleagues in the unofficial creative seminar of the poet I. Selvinsky, who achieved publication of the works of his students in the journal Oktyabr. It happened in 1941; Samoilov’s poem, published in a general compilation, describing a picture of human progress and signed by the pseudonym David Kaufman (in honor of his father), was called “Hunting for a Mammoth”.
Years of war
In the Finnish War, Samoilov David Samuilovich, whose biography was always associated with poetry, wanted to get to the front as a volunteer, but did not pass due to health reasons. In the Great Patriotic War, he did not pass into the ranks of the defenders of the Motherland by age: he was sent to dig trenches near Vyazma. In the first war months, the poet wrote in an notebook unpublished and important for himself works (about thirty poems, three poetic translations and one comedy). In those days, David fell ill and was evacuated to Ashgabat, where he began his studies at the evening pedagogical institute. After that there was the Gomel Military Infantry School, in which David, after spending a couple of months, was sent under Tikhvin to the Volkhov Front. Subsequently, the author wrote that the war revealed to him the main thing - the feeling of the people.
Reached Berlin
The biography of David Samoilov has the fact of a wound received in 1943. The writer owes his life saving to his friend, the Altai peasant S. A. Kosov, to whom the poem “Semyon Andreich” was subsequently dedicated. After discharge from the hospital, he returned to the front. As a scout, as part of the First Belorussian Front he liberated Germany, Poland, and reached Berlin. The most important stages of the biography of the generation of the war years, David Samoilov emphasized in the poem “Nearby Countries. Notes in verses.
During the war, David Samoilovich Samoilov, whose biography is of genuine interest to fans of his work, did not compose poetic lines, not counting poems about Foma Smyslov, a successful soldier, and poetic satire on Hitler, published in a garrison newspaper under the pseudonym Semyon Shilo. The first work published in the journal “Banner” after the war (in 1948) was “Poems about a new city”. The regular publication of his works in periodicals began to appear in the press since 1955. Prior to this period, Samoilov worked as a professional translator and screenwriter on the radio.
The work of Samoilov
The biography of David Samoilov has always been associated with creativity. In 1958, the debut poetic book “Near Countries” was published, the key characters of which were a front-line soldier in the works “I feel sorry for those who die at home …”, “Semyon Andreich” and a child in the works “Cinderella”, “Fairy Tale”, “Circus”, "Poems about Tsar Ivan." In this poetic cycle, the poet’s life experience and the historical experience of Russia harmoniously combined with his traditions of Pushkin's historicism.
The theme of history and the role of man in it continued in the dramatic scenes Dry Flame (1963) and the poem Pestel, Poet and Anna, written in 1965. Historical epochs resonate in the poem Last Holidays, published in 1972, which tells about the protagonist’s journey together with the 16th-century sculptor Squash Wit across Poland and Germany from different historical periods.
The fame of David Samoilov
The name of Samoilov became known to a wide circle of readers after the publication of the poetry collection Days in 1970, the best poems of the author were combined in the book The Equinox. David Samoilov, a biography whose verses are interesting to the current generation, did not take part in the official writing life, which in no way isolated him from public life, because both the circle of communication and the range of Samoilov’s occupations were quite wide.
In 1967, the writer settled near Moscow, in the village of Opaliha. The biography of David Samoilov is associated with many famous names: Julius Kim, Yuri Levitansky, Zinovy Gerdt, Bulat Okudzhava, Fazil Iskander, with whom the poet maintained close friendship.
The versatility of David Samoilov
Eye disease did not interfere with his work in the historical archive, writing a work about 1917. In 1973, Samoilov published the “Book of Russian Rhyme”, in 1974 the book “Wave and Stone”, called by critics of the Pushkin’s book itself, was published, based on the poetic attitude and frequency of references to the great poet.
David Samuilovich actively and in large volumes translated poetry from Bulgarian, Spanish, Armenian, German, Lithuanian, Polish, Turkish, French, Serbian, Estonian poets, took part in the creation of a number of performances in the Taganka Theater, Yermolova Theater, "Contemporary", wrote for theater and movie songs. In 1988 he became a laureate of the State Prize of the Soviet Union.
Estonian writer life
The poet David Samoilov, whose biography is associated with wartime, was a light and sociable person in life.
In 1976, he settled on Tooming Street, in an Estonian coastal town called Pärnu, which he loved very much. The beauty of the seaside park, the intricate old streets, the incredibly beautiful bay inspired the poet to work. It was in Estonia, a country where the author felt easy and calm, that six of his poetry collections were published, one of which was published in Estonian. The poet often visited the local gymnasium and neighboring schools, liked to talk with teachers and students about Russian literature, and read aloud his works. Communication was informal and always left a deep impression in the hearts of the younger generation.
Samoilov never set dates for his poems. In 1962 he began to keep a diary; the notes from it served as the basis for prose published in a separate book, Memorials after his death, in 1995. The poet's sparkling brilliant humor gave rise to numerous epigrams, parodies, a playful epistolary novel.
