My teacher

We publish an article of the memory of Alexei Merkuryevich Gilyarov , prepared by Kand. Biol. sciences, translator Peter Petrov (Tubingen, Germany).

On Sunday, October 20, 2013, A.M. Gilyarov, professor at the Department of General Ecology of Moscow State University, one of many teachers who I had a chance to study, but one of the few whom I can call my teachers. In recent years, A.M. They became almost friends, despite 34 years of age difference. We united a lot. Last year, when A.M. Really serious health problems have not yet begun, he wrote to me: “I thought here that if I go into another world (no, I’m not going to, don’t worry!), Then you can write about me that you and I were very similar to many different things. And this applies not only to politics, church, science, but also of art. Both love Shostakovich, both bow to Richter (I am now before Yudina), both love I.S. Bach and much more ... "

I did not think then that I would have to fulfill this wish so soon. It seems to me that I still have not fully realized that I would never receive a letter from A.M., I would not hear his voices on the phone, I would not go to the concert or to the pizzeria with him. But I hasten to write about him, and it is precisely on the pages of the Trinity Option - newspapers like us, for people like us, in which A.M. Repeatedly published.

I will not dwell in detail on politics and church. But I will quote the record made by A.M. In the “Live Journal” (ghilarov.livejournal.com) last fall: “Actually, I went to rallies for a very long time, during the time of perestroika, and then there were two or three times, no more. Too an individualist and even snob, to be like everyone else and scream slogans with everyone. Not for a rally, but simply to express my indignation with monstrous injustice, I came to the Hamsuda building on August 17, when the verdict to the girls from Pussy Riot with references to some sources related to the Middle Ages read there. ” The involvement in politics was for A.M. (and was and remains for me) something like an unpleasant duty. To the church of A.M. He treated without respect, but respected worthy priests and had nothing against believers who did not suffer from fanatical creationism and intolerance. He himself was not believers, and this also united us with him. Our with A.M. The general religion was art, especially music, although we belonged to it to a little different faiths.

I met A.M. In 1996, being a third year student of the Faculty of Biology, Moscow State University, in the 557th audience, where he read the Zoological and Botanical Department for the Ecology course. We had many bright lectures, but the course of A.M. The feature was distinguished, rare (unfortunately) even among the courses of our best teachers - exceptional relevance. A.M. He tirelessly followed what was happening in science and constantly updated his lectures in accordance with the data of the latest research. In addition, he invariably set out the material cheerfully, with a shade of humor or sarcasm. I will not entrust all the listeners of his lectures, but my mood always came up to them. In general, cheerfulness was one of the main characteristics of the character of A.M.

Another rare feature of his lectures was the technique borrowed from the Polish colleague Matsu Glivich: at the end of almost every pair A.M. He gave students a small task related to the topic under discussion, and the next couple began with the analysis of the results. Those who especially successfully coped with such tasks, A.M. At the end of the course, he “excellent” automatically or took the exam in a light form. Subsequently, I did not carefully (as it seems to me) applied a similar method in the biological classes of the Moscow gymnasium in the southwest, where for three years (2004-2006) I was conducted by a special course on ecology, based, of course, on the knowledge that I have drawn from the course A.M.

It was thanks to the successes that for some reason I managed to achieve when solving such tasks (probably partly due to the fact that I was delighted with the lecturer and tried very hard to delve into everything that he told), A.M. And he paid attention to me. Subsequently, we always bowed with him, accidentally meeting on the biofac, and from time to time A.M. He recommended that I interested in the books, reported on scientific news, gave me to read new magazines, talked about changes in his course. But really closely I began to communicate with A.M. Only after one conversation, which was almost accidental.

This happened in 2003, when the course of Ecology A.M. My wife Anastasia Yeskova passed. By that time A.M. He introduced an unusual addition into his course: on the last pair, he gave students to listen to music, which, in his subordinating laws of diversity, seemed to him like the life of ecosystems. (Subsequently, A.M. began to accompany the playing such music with a show of reproductions of paintings, usually also having an indirect attitude to ecology.) And now my wife informed me that A.M. He said on the final pair of his course, as if nature is like Bach's music and is not like Shostakovich's music. At that time, I have not yet learned how to truly appreciate Bach (this happened later, largely under the influence of A.M.), and had already bowed before Shostakovich. I was offended that my favorite professor was unflattering (as I thought) speaks of my most beloved composer, and soon, having met A.M. On the biofac, I began to find out from him what exactly he had in mind. It turned out that A.M. She did not want to offend Shostakovich at all, whose music he also admires, but only wanted to note the similarity of the Bakho polyphonic variations with processes that are playing in living nature. After this conversation, A.M. They began to communicate regularly and from time to time to call each other to concerts.

A.M. He carefully followed the musical life of Moscow and often invited his friends and students to concerts of those performers that he especially cherished: Alexei Lyubimov, Olga Martynova and their students and students, as well as some other musicians, “widely known in narrow circles”, but little -known outside of these circles. Thanks to A.M. I visited several concerts from the best in my life and learned to appreciate the two most expensive directions of music for him. The first was chamber (especially harpsichord) music by I.S. Bach, his sons K.F.E. Bach and I.Kh. Bach and their contemporaries and predecessors, the second - on the contrary, the newest music of the classical tradition: works of Cage, Schnita, Gubaidulina, Martynov. With Vladimir Ivanovich Martynov A.M. He was personally familiar, along with the students listened to his lectures at the Faculty of Philosophy of Moscow State University, rejoiced at the release of every new book and tried not to miss the concerts where his music was performed.

Here is an excerpt from the last letter that I (and far from me) received from A.M. Two and a half weeks before his death: “Dear friends, I apologize that there was no musical newsletter for so long. I was crazy in the hospital for a long time, and now I represent a person with very limited possibilities. I myself can not go anywhere, but I will try to inform you about interesting concerts. And such a concert will take place soon -8. An amazing thing - it seems that for the first time the Great Hall of the Conservatory was allowed into its walls the ensemble "Studio of New Music" and the Ensemble of Pokari strikes. "

Unfortunately, I only flew to Moscow from Chelyabinsk on the evening of October 8 and did not get to that concert. But I managed to visit the next concert of Pekarsky, held on October 17 in the Rachmaninovsky Hall. In the evening of the next day, I spoke with A.M. On the phone, but forgot to tell him about yesterday's concert. It was our last conversation.

A.M. He was not only a highly professional researcher and an outstanding lecturer, but also a wonderful popularizer of science. Even in recent months, despite a serious illness, he found time not only to work on a biosphere ecology textbook (almost completed and now prepared for publication), but also on one of his usual classes in these years-writing notes on the news of science for the excellent popular science site “Elements” ( http://elementy.ru/ ). In former times, A.M. He regularly wrote notes to the “News News” section of the magazine “Nature”, in the editorial board of which he entered for many years and where he also published expanded popular science articles and memories of scientists that he personally had known.

A.M. He loved to travel, especially in Europe, which also brought us closer to him. My European travels began in 2007, when A.M. I have long visited many of those cities that I still had to visit. His advice was an indispensable guide for me. I will quote a small excerpt from his letter, which I prudently printed before my first trip to Paris: “Of course, Saint-Whales are interesting from the cathedrals, but only if the sun! Otherwise, stained glass windows will not play. It’s good to walk through the Latin quarter, reach the Museum of Natural Resources. Stories and Jarden de Plant ... There, all sorts of great biologists wandered, and now they are sitting in the form of monuments ... ” This kind of landmarks A.M. He asked me before my visit to Marburg (where both of us had a chance to live for a while, albeit in different years), Barcelona, ​​Rome.

Last spring A.M. He carried out his long -standing plan, having made an almost two -week trip to the cities of Northern Italy. He returned from there very satisfied and this year was going to take another similar journey. It is unfortunate that the second trip A.M. He was forced to transfer, and then completely cancel due to illness. And yet it is a little comforted that at least his first trip to those blessed (as he called them) the edges took place and was successful. I think A.M. I looked at it the same.

A.M. For many years, he was associated with the Begor biostation of Moscow State University and spent a considerable part of almost every summer there. At the BBS, he arranged regular musical evenings for students and everyone for more than a year. These were joint auditions of the records of musical works (almost always undeveloped and in excellent performance), accompanied by explanations by A.M. He was not a musician, but thanks to him in the life of some people (my including) there was more music. In my opinion, this is far from the last of his achievements.

Love A.M. Both fiction, and without false modesty (which was not peculiar to him) wrote to me in one letter: “... As for the verses, I agree with Brodsky, who stated that in different countries only one percent of people are able to perceive poetry. Fortunately (for myself) I enter this percentage. " I'm not sure that this is an accurate assessment and that this value is really constant in different countries, but I have no doubt that A.M. Indeed, the few who really know how to value poetry were one.

The visual arts of A.M. He also really cherished, and besides, he himself was an almost professional level of a landscape painter and animalist. In recent years, he painted especially a lot on the White Sea. His drawings convey the spirit of the White Sea nature better than any photographs.

For some reason, I do not feel that A.M. No more with us. Probably, partly because with his death much of what connected me with him: dear to us by both music, his letters and articles, and the living nature itself, the love for which was inseparable for him from love for art. I learned a lot from A.M. And maybe I can learn from him further. Having written this text, I think: how would Alexey Merkuryevich appreciated it? I hope he would like it.