"A free person in a totalitarian country"

Semyon Reznik. This short life. Nikolai Vavilov and his time. - M.: Zakharov, 2017. - 1056 p.

Almost half a century ago, in the ZhZL series, the book of Semyon Reznik about Nikolai Vavilov was published. These days in the Sakharov Center, the writer presented his new - already fundamental - biographical book. Again - about the famous academician, genetics, botany and traveler. The book included materials that, for censorship reasons, could not be published in Soviet times in the first work of Reznik. And here is what the author says about the name of the new book - "This short life":

- When I wrote my first book about Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov, I was 25 years old. He finished it at the age of thirty. Then I did not understand how short his life was. But 50 years have passed since then. This is almost as much as Vavilov lived on Earth. Now I felt with my whole being the irresponsibility of his departure. Therefore, the book received the name "This short life."

This gene pool was estimated at 8 trillion dollars

In addition, the name echoes its main motto: life is short, you need to rush, you need to do great things. Nikolai Ivanovich did not spend a minute in vain. When he was forced to do this (and this happened, because Vavilov was a very charming person in communication), in his diary he wrote that "again these people came with the conversants." You see, he loved scientific conversations and did not like conversation. He was very cherished by time, and for a completely incredibly short time, over 23 years, that is, from the beginning of independent work in 1917 to arrest in 1940, Vavilov made a tremendous shift in the science of crop production.

In particular, Nikolai Vavilov collected the largest collection of plants. It still serves science:

10-15 years ago, this gene pool was estimated at 8 trillion dollars. Now the value of this collection is even higher. People continue to study and replenish it. They go to the places of Vavilov expeditions. I met with these scientists. More recently, they went through Vavilov routes in Abyssinia. However, "passed" is an inaccurate word. It was he who went there on his two, except that sometimes he sat on a mule. One! And here is a whole brigade on cars.

It is difficult to understand how it was possible to go alone to such a route to the European, who turned out to be among the savages. He bought sandals to them, but they did not know what it was. Shoes sold and went barefoot. And the robbers attacked the expedition, and there were many other difficulties. Nevertheless, Vavilov collected his gene pool. Most of these plants are no longer in nature. Civilization came there, and all these ancient genetic formations are now only in the collection of Vavilov and in other similar collections. At one time, the Vavilov collection was the largest in the world. Now she is in fourth place, and this is still a very significant position.

Nikolai Vavilov in a grain bazaar in Venezuela

I bring a quote from a letter from Nikolai Tulaikov in the book. He was the largest scientist agronom. In 1937, he was arrested and destroyed. And in the 20-30s, Vavilov tried to involve him in his expeditions. Either in Europe, then to other continents. Tulaikov always wanted to go, but somehow everything was breaking away. Again, Vavilov goes alone. And now, at a later time, Tulaikov writes that he only now begins to understand the meaning of what Vavilov is doing. What used to seem to him: a person loves adventures and collects plants simply as a collector. It turned out that this is not a collector’s love at all. It was the collection of the gene pool, which is the guarantor of the food security of the planet. At that time, about two billion people lived on Earth, and over the world all the time there was a feeling that humanity has propagated faster than food. Therefore, people are facing universal hunger. Now the population of the planet is seven and a half billion. They talk about an environmental disaster and a possible nuclear disaster. But no one talks about food catastrophe on the scale of the whole Earth. Now they make fuel from corn grain or other cereals to save oil products. Who would have thought at that time that they would spend food on this, and not vice versa. In many ways, the merit of the geneticist Vavilov.

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Semyon Reznik about Nikolai Vavilov

In addition to what he did as a scientist, people are especially attracted to the ethical side of his appearance. In general, Nikolai Vavilov was a very flexible and friendly person, not such a scientist who do not say a word against. No.

Lysenko, being an ignorant, but very smart person, deftly picked up such accusations

For example, in numerous discussions with Trofim Lysenko, he always took the same position: “If you prove the correctness of your ideas, I will accept them. Unfortunately, there is no evidence of your ovation , remaking heredity. I stand in the positions of world science. World science is moving, changing. What we say today is not what we said ten years ago.” And the Lysenkovites all the time pulled out the mistakes of the geneticists, which they expressed in 1900, and reproached them in 1939, when all this was a long time in science.

By the way, Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov was very good at the scientific side of what Lysenko does. It doesn’t matter, Vavilov believed that his opponent was mistaken. So what? All scientists are mistaken. Any hypothesis can be confirmed, and may be refuted. That's why it is advanced to check it. But Lysenko demanded that what he offers was immediately carried out on millions of hectares. He destroyed the country's agriculture.

Moreover, the farther these discussions went, the more Vavilov was accused of all conceivable and unthinkable sins. He was called an idealist and a bourgeois scientist. Bourgeois specialists, according to Stalin, were enemies. Lysenko, being an ignorant, but very smart person, deftly picked up such accusations. And Nikolai Ivanovich put forward scientific arguments. He just acted according to conscience. We must understand: he was a free person in a totalitarian country, and therefore he could not survive in it.

The biography of his brother Nikolai Vavilov physicist Sergei Vavilov says Semyon Reznik, only on a superficial look turned out safely:

What they did with Nikolai, worse than death

- Even while working on the first book, I knew that Sergei Vavilov kept diaries. However, there was no access to these materials then. When such an opportunity appeared, it took many years to work with these diaries. The fact is that the brothers were very different. For example, Nikolai Ivanovich knew about twenty languages. However, he knew them, so to speak, consumerly. He studied languages as it was necessary for his work. Sergei Ivanovich knew only European languages, but he mastered them as relatives. So, many of his diary entries are made in different languages. On German, Italian and so on. Depending on different circumstances, for some reason he wanted so much. With all this, it was necessary to work, translate. A lot of work was applied. As a result, two volumes of his diaries are published.

When I looked at these diaries, I was convinced that I had previously suspected, but did not have documentary confirmation: the tragedy of Sergei Ivanovich Vavilov was no less terrible than his brother's hunger. This can be seen by the diaries - he executed himself. He was a man doomed to mental torment. This was partly due to the characteristics of his character. But the main thing is that this was due to what millstones he got into. His brother was arrested, declared an enemy of the people. Nothing is known about the verdict. He writes in diaries: what they did with Nikolai worse than death. After all, he gave himself all his life to science, gave himself to the country. Was this not visible?

Sergei tried to do something-nothing happened. He tried to attract other scientists whom he considered more influential than himself. He addressed both the President of the Academy of Sciences Komarov and the legendary polar explorer Schmidt. In vain. And then he is suddenly made as president of the USSR Academy of Sciences. For Sergei Ivanovich, this is a terrible tragedy, because from now on he must represent and will not be able to engage in his science. And this is the only thing that saved him and gave the meaning of life.

Another blow was the organized Lysenko and his followers of the Vaskhnil session of 1948, where the defeat of Soviet genetics was carried out. The President of the USSR Academy of Sciences learned about the preparing event from newspapers. He was not even warned that such a session would be. It was prepared secretly. Subsequently, Sergey Vavilov, who occupied the high post, was to be implemented at the Academy of the decisions that were made at this session.

There is no doubt, mental torment brought him to death. An autopsy showed that Sergei Vavilov suffered eight heart attacks on his feet. He was buried with all the honors. I remember these sheets with a child in mourning frames. At that time, it was nevertheless painted in the tables of ranks. The President of the Academy of Sciences was considered a scientist number one country of councils. And by diaries now we see what was happening in his soul behind this facade. So I had to increase the book by one hundred pages and make the last part. It is called "Brother Sergey".

For 35 years, Semyon Reznik has been living in the USA. He admits that he was not without a doubt to work on the book "This Short Life":

-Actually, it was a rather daring venture. Living in Washington, to write a book about a great Russian scientist, about which thousands of materials in Russia are scattered through various archives, a rather daring enterprise. But it turned out, I hope, successful. As soon as I began to make connections with modern "Vavilovites", I found the very atmosphere that I plunged 50 years before. It turned out that the people who are now engaged in crashes are also obsessed with the desire to help me, like those who had two generations before personally knew Vavilov and helped me with the first book.

There is no material evidence

An incredible number of materials have been discovered to our days. When Nikolai Ivanovich was arrested, searches were carried out in him in a Leningrad apartment, in a Moscow apartment and at his institute. As they say, two trucks were taken out. I think that this is still exaggerated, but at least two bags of materials-manuscripts, documents, photographs, some clippers from newspapers. Since the investigator was stupid, he did not manage to draw a single page from these materials in order to introduce him to business. In his indictment, it is written - "there is no material evidence." Not knowing what to do with these bags of documents, he gave himself the order itself (all this is also documented) to burn them. It was all burned! It would seem, where to come from the legacy of Nikolai Ivanovich? But no! Thousands and thousands of documents related to Vavilov continue to open, and they will still be discovered. They are scattered all over the world. The fact is that Vavilov was constantly in work. People who participated with him on some trips say: "We go to bed-Nikolai Ivanovich is still sitting at the table. We get up in the morning-he is already sitting at the table." He slept 3-4 hours a day. He was enough for him. He could write letters at any time of the day and night and in any position - standing, sitting, lying, on a bus, in a car.

His wife lived literally three quarters from prison, but did not know that he was there

He was reproached for traveling a lot. That, being the director of the institute, he does not manage the team well. And when he resigned such reproaches in response to such reproaches, he went to the authorities that Nikolai Ivanovich directed us even when he is not. Because we all receive instructions, letters, documents and so on from him. These immense materials continue to open, open and open.

Fortunately, then a search was not searched in the apartment of his first wife, where she lived with his son. Thanks to her grandchildren, I got the opportunity to have this archive in work. The book began to grow.

One of the most tragic moments: Elena Ivanovna Barulina, his wife, was evacuated to Saratov during the war. And she lived literally three quarters from the prison, but did not know that he was there. She sent parcels to Moscow. And someone, some bastards stuck these products, and Nikolai Ivanovich died of hunger in a Saratov prison in three quarters from her. In 1985, the premiere of the film "Star of Vavilov" took place. For the first time, some hints appeared that he died not his death. There was a discussion at the Polytechnic Museum. Everything went well, everyone praised the film. Then a frantic person suddenly jumped to the rostrum - the geneticist Vladimir Pavlovich Efroimson and said: "I came here to tell you the truth! Vavilov did not die! He died like a dog, from hunger! From Pellagra! I am an old man, I have already stopped being afraid! Let them do what they want with me, but I came to tell you the truth." These words later parted widely, because perestroika began. I give this statement in the book.

We must look in the eye - half the country was sitting, half of the country planted. Both that half and that half have heirs. There are people who understand that their grandfathers and great -grandfathers were people of their time. If they did bad things, then maybe at that time they believed that they were doing a righteous work. There is another position. For example, the grandchildren of some Goering accept Judaism and leave for Israel to silence the sins of their great-grandfathers. But such cases are rare. More often people like whose descendants they are. I saw how the portraits of those killed in the war were worn during the Immortal Regiment campaign. There was the grandson of Molotov, and he carried a portrait of Molotov as a man who suffered in the war! Listen, this is the person who unleashed the war! And his grandson does not want to recognize this. He is proud of his grandfather.

I did not blame Nikolai Ivanovich in espionage

I don’t know if the investigator Alexander Khota has descendants who mocked Vavilov for 11 months, forcing him to admit that Nikolai Ivanovich did not admit. The famous journalist Yevgeny Albats once interviewed him. In my book, I am comparing the materials of the case, which are now published, with what the grip Evgenia Albats said at a time when these documents have not yet been published. She herself could not conduct such a comparison, but now I am doing it and show how he led the investigation. In an interview, he said: "Well, no, of course, I did not blame Nikolai Ivanovich of espionage. There were no grounds for this." And in the indictment signed by this very grip, Vavilov was called a spy. He has a daughter. Perhaps there are grandchildren, great -grandchildren. If so, I sympathize with them. I hope they understand that they had such a bad share. But many do not want to recognize this. The split in Russian society is very large, partly, I think, this is the result of the heritage of Stalinism. This legacy remains. It does not evaporate from the fact that I wrote a book about Vavilov. No! Plato once said that "ideas are primary and eternal." And this applies not only to the great, humane, bright and brilliant ideas, but this applies to vile ideas. They are also eternal. If you stop the struggle with them, they again begin to bloom and be fruit, ”says Semyon Reznik .