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Alexey Ivanovich Panteleev

(L. Panteleev)

Lenka Panteleev

All this winter day the boys were very unlucky. Wandering around the city and already returning home, they wandered into the courtyard of a large, multi-story building on Stolyarny Lane. The courtyard was similar to all Petrograd courtyards of that time, not lit, covered with snow, littered with firewood... Electric light burned dimly in a few windows, pipes bent at the knee protruded from the vents here and there, a boring grayish smoke escaped from the pipes into the darkness, colored red sparks. It was quiet and empty.

“Let’s go to the stairs,” Lenka suggested, burbling at the letter “r.”

“Oh, come on,” Volkov winced angrily. - What, don’t you see? It’s as dark as a blackamoor’s bosom.

But still?..

Well, that's the way it is. Let's watch.

They climbed to the very top of the back stairs.

Volkov was not mistaken: there was nothing to profit from.

They descended slowly, looked for cold railings in the dark, came across walls covered with a thick layer of frost, and struck matches.

Devilishness! - Volkov grumbled. - Hamier! They live like... I don’t know, like some Samoyeds. At least hang one light bulb on the entire staircase.

Look! - Lenka interrupted him. - And for some reason it’s on fire!..

When they went upstairs, it was dark below, as well as on the entire staircase, but now there, dimly, like a swollen coal, a pot-bellied coal lamp was blinking.

Wait, wait! - Volkov whispered, grabbing Lenka by the hand and looking down over the railing.

Behind a simple single-leaf door, the kind that does not exist in residential apartments, the sound of water pouring from a tap could be heard. On the door latch hung, swaying slightly, a large shiny lock with a key stuck into the hole. The boys stood on the platform above and, leaning over the iron railing, looked down.

Leshka! By God! Five hundred lemons, no less! - Volkov whispered feverishly. And before Lenka had time to figure out what was the matter, his comrade, rushing from his seat, jumped over a dozen steps, tore off the lock with a roar as he went, and ran out into the yard. Lenka wanted to follow his example, but at that moment the single-leaf door swung open noisily and a fat, red-cheeked woman in a scarf tied in a triangle jumped out. Grabbing her hands to the place where a few seconds before the lock had hung, and seeing that there was no lock, the woman screamed in a wild, shrill voice:

Fathers! My dears! Guard!

Later Lenka berated himself mercilessly for the mistake he made. The woman ran into the yard, and he, instead of going upstairs and hiding on the stairs, rushed after her.

Jumping out into the yard and almost colliding with a woman, he put on a calm and indifferent face and asked in a kind voice:

It's my fault, madam. What's happened?

Lock? - Lenka was surprised. - Stolen? What are you saying? I saw... Honestly, I saw. Some boy took it off. I thought it was your boy. True, I thought it was yours. Let me catch him,” he offered helpfully, trying to push the woman away and dash to the gate. The woman was ready to let him through, but suddenly she caught herself, grabbed him by the sleeve and shouted:

No, brother, wait, wait! Who are you? A? Where are you from? They probably stole together!.. Eh? Speak! Together?!

And, throwing back her head, in the same strong, thick voice, like a fire pipe, she screamed:

Kar-raul!

Lenka tried to break free.

Let me! - he shouted. - How dare you? Let go!

But the windows and doors were already slamming around, people were already running from the street and from the yard. And someone’s jubilant voice was already shouting:

The thief was caught!

Lenka realized that he would not be able to escape. The crowd surrounded him.

Who? Where? - they were making noise around.

This?

The lock was broken.

I went into the laundry room...

Did you take a lot? A?

Which? Show.

Is this the net? Snub?

Ha ha! Here they are, please admire them, the children of the revolution!

Beat him!

Beat the thief!

Lenka buried his head in his shoulders and bent down. But no one hit him. The fat woman, the mistress of the castle, held the boy tightly by the collar of his fur coat and hummed right in his ear:

You know the one who took the castle away, right? You know, right? A? Is this your friend? Right?

What are you making up? Nothing like this! - Lenka shouted.

He's lying! - the crowd was noisy.

You can see it in his eyes - he’s lying!

Take him to the police!

To the station!

To the commandant's office!

Please please. Very good. “Let’s go to the police,” Lenka was delighted. - What are you doing? Please, let's go. There they will find out whether I am a Vog or not.

There was nothing else he could do. From bitter experience he knew that no matter how bad it was in the police, it was still better and more reliable there than in the hands of an angry crowd.

“You better indicate your accomplice,” said some woman. - Then we will let you go.

What more! - Lenka grinned. - An accomplice! Let's go, okay...

And although the fat woman was still holding him by the collar, he was the first to step towards the gate.

A crowd of about ten people led him to the police station.

Lenka walked calmly, his face did not give him away - a frown had frozen on his face since birth, and besides, at the age of fourteen he had experienced so many different things that he saw no reason to worry or worry.

“Okay. I don’t care. I’ll get out of it somehow,” he thought and, whistling, he casually thrust his hands into the pockets of his torn fur coat.

He felt something hard in his pocket.

“A knife,” he remembered.

It was a long and thin sausage knife, like a stiletto, which he and Volkov used instead of a screwdriver when they had to screw together chandeliers and caps on the main staircases of rich houses.

“We need to fuse it,” Lenka thought and began to carefully rip open the lining of his pocket, then stuck the knife into the hole that had formed and let it go. The knife fell silently into the thick snow. Lenka sighed with relief, but immediately realized that he was completely screwed. One of the guides said behind Lenka’s back:

Wonderful. Knife.

Everyone stopped.

What's happened? - asked the mistress of the castle.

“Knife,” repeated the same man, holding up the sausage knife like a trophy. - Have you seen it? You threw away the knife, you scoundrel! Evidence!.. The bastards were probably going for murder...

Alexey Panteleev is one of the heroes of the legendary “Republic of SHKID”. Every Soviet schoolchild read a book about street children. But few know about the fate of one of the authors. In his early years, L. Panteleev was left to his own devices. But the troubles of the prose writer were not limited to a homeless childhood.

Parents

Hundreds of thousands of children were left without parental care after the revolution. Most of them were destined for a criminal fate, and therefore poverty, illness, and early death. One of the orphaned Soviet children was Alexey Panteleev. Real name is Eremeev. The revolution first made the hero of this article an orphan, then forced him to hide his inconvenient biography.

Eremeev Alexey Ivanovich was born into a merchant family. My father was a Cossack officer, but became disillusioned with the service and, following the example of his relatives, began selling wood. The eldest son was only eight years old when Ivan Eremeev left the family. The mother was left with three young children. Alexey Panteleev did not remember the October events, since in the fall of 1917 he fell ill and lay in a fever for several weeks.

Both the mother and father of the future prose writer belonged to a merchant family. Ivan Andrianovich Eremeev was an officer, his image remained forever in the memory of his son. The father of the hero of the story “Lenka Panteleev” has many similarities with the writer’s parent, but unlike the fictional character, he was not a heavy drinker. Ivan Andrianovich did not leave his family of his own free will. In 1918, he met his eldest son for the last time and died soon after. According to some reports, Ivan Andrianovich spent several months in prison.

Devastation

After the coup d'etat, chaos reigned in the country. Products that were present in abundance on the table before 1917 suddenly turned into a delicacy. Searches and arrests were carried out everywhere. The mother of the future writer decided to leave Petrograd: it was necessary to save her children from hunger. The family moved to Yaroslavl province.

Alexey Eremeev, later known throughout the country as the prose writer L. Panteleev, read voraciously from childhood. In addition, from an early age he began to compose stories and poems. The author of the story "Lenka Panteleev", like his young hero, fell in love with literature from an early age. He read even when the country was mired in devastation, hunger, poverty, and poverty and illness reigned for a long time in the family of the future prose writer.

The family lived in the village for two years, then returned to their hometown. There wasn't enough money. He spent what his mother gave the boy on books. And the future author of the famous “Republic of SHKID” began to unscrew light bulbs for the purpose of further sale. For which he was arrested and sent to school, which he depicted in a work of art, co-authored with his friend Grigory Belykh.

Vikniksor

When we talk about such a figure in literature as Alexey Ivanovich Panteleev, it is impossible not to mention an outstanding teacher. N. Soroka-Rosinsky. His image is depicted in the book “Republic of SHKID”. G. Belykh and L. Panteleev created a character nicknamed by the students of the school named after. Dostoevsky Vikniksor.

Soroka-Rosinsky opposed the assertion that difficult children are morally and mentally defective. The teacher was sure that street children were ordinary children who found themselves in difficult life circumstances. If Alexey Eremeev had not ended up in the legendary orphanage, one of the best books in Russian literature about children and teenagers would not have been created. And in the literary world such names as Belykh and Panteleev would never have become known.

The story "Republic of SHKID"

In the twenties, Alexey Eremeev met Grigory Belykh. In those years, rumors circulated around Petrograd about the raider Lenka Panteleev. The hero of this article, although distinguished by his thirst for knowledge, was a complex teenager, and stood out even among street children for his extremely tough disposition. Eremeev received his nickname in honor of the bandit. The future writer at school was known as Grigory Chernykh. The nickname of Panteleev's friend is Yankel.

Three years after the students left school, an autobiographical story was written. The central characters of the book are Grigory Chernykh and Alexey Panteleev. However, the authors paid considerable attention to other characters in the story.

The school was located in an old three-story building on Peterhofsky Prospekt. It was not easy for teachers to curb the wild temper of their students. Each of them had a rich biography; before entering school, they led a free, nomadic and reckless life. Despite the difficulties, Soroka-Rosinsky later recalled that never before had Leningrad teachers worked with such enthusiasm and dedication. At the beginning of the story “The Republic of SHKID”, portraits of teachers and students predominate. In the second - stories from the life of the school. Alexey Panteleev subsequently gave preference to the theme of childhood.

Stories

The works, created in 1928, are dedicated to the psychology of adolescents. Such works include “Karlushkin Focus”, “The Clock”. Portrait characteristics already at an early stage of Panteleev’s work were created masterfully.

In the thirties, the writer paid special attention to the educational topic. The motives of homeless childhood fade into the background. The leading theme in Panteleev’s stories is children’s heroism, as exemplified by the work “Honest Word.” Panteleev also applied the pedagogical principles in raising his own daughter. A kind of father’s diary is the work “Our Masha”, in which the author’s position is distinguished by Spartan exactingness, moral maximalism and at the same time boundless love for the child.

Grigory Belykh

The life of the writer's friend L. Panteleev ended tragically. Grigory Belykh might have created many works if not for his death at the age of thirty-two. In 1935, the prose writer-journalist was repressed. The reason for the accusation of counter-revolutionary activity was a poem about Stalin. A denunciation against the writer was made by his relative. The husband of G. Belykh’s sister accidentally discovered poems of suspicious content on his desk, which he immediately reported to the appropriate authorities. The journalist was convicted under Article 58. He died in 1938 in a transit prison.

The Tale of Lenka Panteleev

One of the editors of the work of young authors was Samuil Marshak. The children's poet recommended rewriting one of the chapters, adding to it, and creating a full-fledged literary work from it. This is how the story “Lenka Panteleev” appeared.

The work begins with a description of the hero's early years. The author pays special attention to the portrait of his father, who is depicted as a complex, contradictory, but unusually honest man. Then the consequences of the October events and the beginning of Lenka’s thieving career are depicted. The boy miraculously managed to escape imprisonment. At the end of the story he ended up at the school named after. Dostoevsky. With this event, Lenka’s new life begins, like the other heroes of the book by Belykh and Panteleev.

"Our Masha"

After the war, the prose writer wrote a lot. They eagerly published it. In 1956, the writer had a daughter, to whom he dedicated the work “Our Masha”. The book is a collection of observation notes kept by many parents. But as a rule, mothers are the authors of such diaries. In this case, the father showed extraordinary scrupulousness and observation.

Masha was a late child. Her father was at one time deprived of attention and care and, perhaps, therefore paid excessive attention to his only daughter. Masha became an exceptionally well-read and developed girl, but she lacked live communication with her peers. In my youth, mental illness began to develop. Masha Panteleeva spent several years in hospitals. She died three years after the death of her father.

Criticism

In the thirties, when Belykh was arrested, Panteleev miraculously managed to avoid repression thanks to Chukovsky. The children's writer and poet highly appreciated the talent of this author. Chukovsky noted Panteleev’s expressive language, as well as the sincerity and truthfulness present in his books. A person who has survived so much adversity cannot but inspire the trust of readers. But it is worth saying that Makarenko had a different opinion about the book by Panteleev and Belykh. The creator of the “Pedagogical Poem” did not accept the “Republic of SHKID”, or rather, the method that the main character of the story, Viktor Nikolaevich Sorokin, used in working with students.

Features of the story

“Republic of SHKID” contains memoirs, essays, stories and portraits of heroes. The book by Panteleev and Belykh is often compared to Makarenko’s work. The main difference is that in the first the story is not told on behalf of the teacher. The events described in the book about street children who ended up at the school named after. Dostoevsky, told from the perspective of difficult teenagers.

The authors of the story were interested in a variety of people. Each of the characters could become the main character, regardless of whether he was a student or a teacher. There is some confusion in the structure of the work. It is explained by the abundance of memories of school graduates. In the epilogue, written in 1926, the authors talk about a meeting with the heroes of the story. One of the Shkidovites became another worked in a printing house, the third became an agronomist.

"I believe..."

L. Panteleev was a deeply religious man, as evidenced by his last book. “I Believe...” is a work published after the author’s death. The book has a confessional character. In it, the author conveyed his thoughts and experiences. The last essay has little in common with “The Republic of SHKID” and numerous stories aimed at young readers.

The writer died in 1987 in Leningrad. He is the author of four novellas and several dozen short stories. Three films and one animated film were created based on his works. But his name will always be associated with the book that he created in collaboration with Grigory Belykh - “The Republic of SHKID”.

Leonid Panteleev

"Lyonka Panteleev"

Introduction

That day, Volkov again dragged Lyonka to steal light bulbs in the front doors. In one of them they stole a brand new padlock. The accomplices did not have time to run out of the entrance when the mistress of the castle made a noise. Volkov managed to escape, but Lyonka failed to get out. The boy was taken to the police station and put in an empty, cold cell. Having cried, Lyonka began to remember how he came to such a life.

Chapter I

In the family Lyonka was called Alyosha. His father Ivan Adrianovich had a difficult character. Ivan Adrianovich also had a tendency to long drinking bouts. Despite this, Lyonka loved his father for his honesty, directness and generosity. The boy only knew about his past that he served as a Cossack officer and participated in the Russian-Japanese War.

Ivan Adrianovich was born into an Old Believer St. Petersburg family that sold bricks and panel tiles. Against the will of his parents, he graduated from the Elisavetgrad Military School, served in a dragoon regiment, managed to fight, but became disillusioned with officer life; after being wounded, he did not return to the regiment and began selling timber. He married Alexandra Sergeevna from an Orthodox trading family. She was never able to find a common language with her husband, whom she was very afraid of.

Mother and father argued, lived apart, then got back together, and the boy’s life went on as usual. Having learned to read early, Lyonka read everything that came into his hands. He was never a good boy, and always got into trouble. It became especially difficult for Alexandra Sergeevna to cope with her son’s paternal disposition when Ivan Adrianovich finally left the family.

Chapter II

Lyonka’s father died “in a foreign land,” there was no funeral or wake, and the boy always thought that his father was about to return. It was the third year of the First World War. In the fall, Lenka entered the second grade of a preparatory school and tried to write poetry. Alexandra Sergeevna gave music lessons, and that’s what the family lived for.

The boy heard about the Bolsheviks from his housekeeper Stesha - she was going to vote for them. The whooping cough suffered in the summer prevented Lyonka from properly preparing for the exams, but he entered a real school without difficulty. The students of the school were not so much interested in their studies as in politics and hostility with schoolchildren.

Taking an active part in the life of the school, Lyonka managed to read. He was drawn to serious books. On this basis, he met the realist Vladimir Volkov, a serious and slightly arrogant boy from a wealthy family. He gave Lenka books and one day picked him up in his own carriage. During lunch with the Volkovs, Lyonka learned that the Bolsheviks were “Teutonic spies” sent to Russia to sow confusion among the workers. From that day on, the boy thought only about Stesha, who could turn out to be a spy. Volkov began to shun Lyonka, having learned that his father was a simple cornet.

Lenka began to follow Stesha and even opened the chest where the girl kept her things. He considered the pamphlet of the German economist Karl Marx found there as evidence of Steshina’s espionage activities. Soon everything opened up. Alexandra Sergeevna considered her son a thief, but he told his mother about the “spy” Stesha and lost consciousness.

Chapter III

Lenka was ill for 48 days. The October Socialist Revolution occurred while the boy was lying in feverish delirium. Returning to school before the Christmas holidays, Lyonka discovered that his class had thinned out greatly. Volkov also disappeared. High school students walked the corridors in greatcoats, and classes were often cancelled. Having visited a friend, Lenka learned that the Volkovs had left for their estate.

The winter turned out to be hungry. Stesha went to work at the Triangle plant, and helped Alexandra Sergeevna as much as she could. Lenka read a lot and tried to write poetry. In the spring, when the boy entered second grade, a letter arrived from his former nanny. She invited the whole family to her place for the summer, in a village in the Yaroslavl province. Stesha refused to leave St. Petersburg - she stayed to take care of her property.

Chapter IV

At the station, the red-bearded godfather of the nanny, Sekletei Fedorovna, was waiting for Alexandra Sergeevna and the children. Along the road through the forest, their cart was attacked by robbers, but the red-bearded man managed to negotiate with them. These were soldiers of the Green Army, which now occupied the village. Upon arrival, the nanny said that the sons of the red-bearded Fyodor Glebov were in this army fighting the Bolsheviks.

After revolutionary Petrograd, village life seemed calm and well-fed to Lenka. Vasya and Lyalya quickly became friends with the village children, and shy Lyonka watched them from the sidelines for a long time. However, he soon joined the company of village children, where he met Glebov’s youngest son, Ignat.

Soon Lyonka met with the chairman of the committee of the poor, Vasily Fedorovich Krivtsov. He told the boy that Nekrasov had described the places around Cheltsov, and showed him his garden, where he tried to grow tomatoes. The plants lacked Bordeaux mixture, which was very expensive.

In mid-June, Ataman Khokhryakov appeared in the district, and soon appeared in Cheltsov. Lenka rushed to warn Krivtsov, but he was not at home. The boy ran to the road and saw that Ignashka Glebov, sent by his father, was already guarding Krivtsov. Fortunately for the chairman, the Khokhryakovites soon left the village. Returning home, Lyonka drank ice water and fell ill with diphtheria. Alexandra Sergeevna decided to take her ten-year-old son to the doctor in Yaroslavl.

Chapter V

Staying at the Europe Hotel, Alexandra Sergeevna called a pediatrician. He gave Lyonka an injection and stated that the boy should be hospitalized. However, Lyonka never ended up in the hospital: the White Guards burst into Yaroslavl. The guests of the Europa had to hide in the hotel basement. In her haste, Alexandra Sergeevna did not have time to grab things and food. Soon it became known that the Bolshevik power had been overthrown, and a joyful revival reigned in the basement. Alexandra Sergeevna ventured to go get her things. When the woman returned, she reported that everything had been stolen from them.

Having gone to the toilet, Lyonka could not resist the temptation and went to the upper floors of the “Europe”. On the way back, Lyonka got lost, went out onto the main staircase and came across the hotel owner Poyarkov and his son, a White Guard officer. Mistaking the boy for a thief, they took him to the basement to check whether he really lived here. Convinced that his mother had been looking for him for a long time, Poyarkov convinced people to leave the basement and promised treats at the expense of the hotel. In the morning, when Alexandra Sergeevna and Lyonka were having breakfast at the Europe restaurant, shooting began again - the communists fired cannons at Yaroslavl.

Chapter VI

One of the targets of the shelling was the Europe Hotel. Only those who had nowhere to run remained in her basement, including Alexandra Sergeevna and Lyonka. On the fourth day, candles and food ran out, and the woman decided to look for something to eat. Lenka tagged along with her. Having risen, they discovered that people were living in the long hotel corridor, and they settled down next to an overweight, stern woman, the village teacher Nonna Ieronimovna Tirosidonskaya.

Tirosidonskaya's meager reserves did not save them from famine. Soon there was no water in Yaroslavl. One day, having made their way into the city, the women got a lot of sugar and coffee. The son of a hotel doorman was selling drinking water, and Alexandra Sergeevna sent Lyonka to him. Not finding a water carrier, the boy decided to go to the Volga for water himself.

Once on the street, Lyonka realized that he did not know how to get to the river, and began to wander around the city. On the way, he was almost detained by a sentry, then he escaped from a White Guard officer. Fleeing from the bullets, Lyonka dropped into a farm store, from where he brought out a jar of Bordeaux mixture and several handfuls of hemp seeds. Having difficulty finding a hotel, the boy returned to his mother, who was already going crazy. Tirosidorskaya, who appeared in the evening, reported that the Reds had promised to release the civilian population from the city.

The next day they crossed the Volga on a small steamer. Lyonka noticed that several white officers also escaped from the besieged city on the same boat. After parting with Tirosidonskaya, Alexandra Sergeevna and Lyonka decided to spend the night in the village of Bykovka. In the morning, the Khokhryakovites attacked the village. The bandits wanted to shoot Lyonka and her mother, but one of the bandits did not allow the child to be killed and allowed them to escape. Outside the village outskirts, the boy remembered the Bordeaux mixture and returned for it, almost falling into the clutches of the Khokhryakovites again. Lyonka didn’t think to grab his mother’s bag, and they were left without money. An angry old man ferried them across the Volga without taking a penny. Having reached Cheltsov, Lyonka learned that the chairman, severely beaten by the Khokhryakovites, was taken to the hospital.

Chapter VII

Two weeks later, Alexandra Sergeevna again took Lyonka to Yaroslavl to see a doctor. Leaving her son in the hospital garden, the mother went in search of a doctor. Suddenly, “brass music began to sound around the corner of the building” - they were burying the Red Army soldiers who died during the mutiny. In the crowd, the boy saw Krivtsova and learned that the chairman had survived, having received eighteen wounds. The woman took the boy to her husband, who was in the same hospital. The doctor suddenly approached recognized Lyonka, examined him and declared that he was “healthy as a bull.”

Returning to Cheltsovo by boat, Lyonka noticed in the crowd a young Poyarkov, dressed in rags. In August, Alexandra Sergeevna went to Petrograd several times to buy things, which she later exchanged for food. Lenka no longer played with Glebov Jr. - he again became addicted to reading. At the end of summer, Lyonka’s aunt and her daughter Ira moved from Petrograd to Cheltsovo. Soon the village was occupied by the Red Army. Glebov Sr. was killed, and a few days later the captured Khokhryakovites led by the ataman were led through the village.

Alexandra Sergeevna brought news from St. Petersburg about the assassination attempt on Lenin and that Stesha had gone to the front. Famine was coming to the village, and the woman decided to go in search of a “place of bread,” leaving the children in the care of a nanny and aunt. In the fall, Chairman Krivtsov returned to Cheltsovo, and Lyonka gave him the Bordeaux mixture he had saved with such difficulty.

Alexandra Sergeevna found a job “in a small Tatar town on the Kama River.” She was offered to head a children's music school. She took both the children and her aunt and daughter.

Chapter VIII

Soon, Alexandra Sergeevna “was already in charge of children’s art education throughout the city.” The family was given two large furnished rooms, and Vasya entered an agricultural school and lived outside the city in a boarding school. At the beginning of March, Alexandra Sergeevna left for Petrograd on a business trip. At that time Lyonka was in the hospital with typhus. The boy’s aunt did not visit him, and in recent days Lyalya also stopped going. Returning home, Lyonka discovered that everyone was sick, and his mother had not returned. He took up running the household. For two weeks he treated his aunt and Ira, ran to the hospital to see Lyalya and cooked dinners. Soon the aunt recovered, and Lyonka became a burden to her. At this time, a letter arrived from Vasya, very pleased with his studies and work, and the boy decided to go to his brother’s “farm”.

In the city zemstvo department he learned that there were no free places at the agricultural school. Alexandra Sergeevna did not respond to letters or telegrams, her aunt became increasingly angrier, and Lenka decided to go to the farm without accompanying papers, hoping for his brother’s help.

Vasya didn’t care much about household chores, but he didn’t drive his brother away. The school director, Nikolai Mikhailovich, did not accept the boy, and he remained “as a bird.” Everyone stole here. The director, who seemed vaguely familiar to the boy, and the teachers robbed the students, and the students, in order to survive, slaughtered livestock in the surrounding villages. Lenka also quickly learned this craft. Agricultural work was not given to the boy, and he often paid for his mistakes.

One day, while grazing pigs, Lyonka lost a purebred hog, and he had to run away from school. Only now did the boy realize that the school was run by the former White Guard Poyarkov Jr. Lyonka returned to his aunt, but she was not happy with him - they lived on Ira’s salary and rations. The boy went to the orphanage, where Lyalya already lived. The orphanage was located in a former convent. One day, the guys found things hidden by the nuns in the bell tower and tried to sell them at the market. So Lyonka ended up in the police, and then in another orphanage. At night he ran away from there, taking the women's shoes hidden from the boys, and went to St. Petersburg to look for his mother.

The money didn't last long. Lyonka was starving and lived on alms. In an abandoned estate, he found boxes of books. Having settled in a boarded-up kiosk, the boy sold all the books. His last buyer was a German who owned a shoe shop. Having learned that Lyonka was an orphan, he took him on as an apprentice. If it weren’t for the hostess, who immediately took a dislike to the boy, he would have stayed in Kazan forever.

After living with a shoemaker for two months, the boy boarded the first ship he came across, ended up in the town of Piany Bor and settled on the pier in the company of street children. Meanwhile, winter has arrived. Lenka was cold and starving until a cheerful guy picked him up on the street. So the boy ended up in the city committee of the RKSM, where he remained for the whole winter. Soon the guy, whose name was Yurka, invited Lyonka to enroll in a vocational school. The boy was immediately enrolled in the third grade, but he was not given any specialties, and he had never even heard of algebra. Having learned about the underachievement of his mentee, Yurka began to “pull him up”. A few months later Lyonka was already receiving good grades.

Lyonka’s life began to improve when a kulak uprising broke out in the province, and all the Komsomol members left to fight. Yurka died, and Lyonka again felt like an orphan. In early spring he again tried to get to St. Petersburg.

Chapter IX

Lyonka did not make it to Petrograd again. The boy moved like a hare, clinging to the sleigh until his foot fell under the runner. Having lost his warm boots, he barely made it to the nearest village and knocked on the first hut. There he lay in a fever until late spring. A middle-aged peasant woman, Marya Petrovna Kuvshinnikova, came out to Lenka. The boy lived with the Kuvshinnikovs for some time, but then he was again drawn to travel.

Now Lyonka traveled by train. In Belgorod, he was caught by the duty officer, a Chek agent. After interrogating the boy, the security officer took pity on him, wrote out a document according to which Lyonka could get to St. Petersburg without a ticket, and gave him money. Lyonka spent the night in the barracks where he was robbed. The boy discovered the loss only on the train. He was disembarked from the carriage at an unknown station. Lenka spent the entire autumn, winter and summer in Ukraine. He couldn't find a job and stole to survive. At the end of summer the boy reached Petrograd.

Chapter X

Strangers lived in Lyonka’s apartment, and the boy moved to the Catherine Canal, where his mother’s sister lived. There he found his family. Lyonka did not recognize the grown ten-year-old Lyalya. Vasya's agricultural school was closed - all the teachers turned out to be former White Guards. The boy moved to St. Petersburg and went to work in a confectionery shop. He told how he searched for Lyonka in the forest for two days and decided that he had been killed by wolves.

Alexandra Sergeevna also spoke about her misadventures. She was already returning to the children when the train was attacked by a deserter detachment. The woman hid, buried herself in coal chips, and then, half-dressed, made her way to the nearest station. On the way, she caught a cold and was taken to the hospital, where she contracted typhus and was ill for several months. Lyonka also told about himself. Alexandra Sergeevna took an oath from her son that he would never steal again.

Now Lyonka dreamed of working at some factory, but finding such a place was not easy. Finally, the boy got a job at the Express factory, which produces artificial mineral waters. Lyonka was appointed assistant to the elderly Zakhar Ivanovich. The two of them spent the whole day delivering bottles around the city in a heavy cart, receiving almost nothing for it.

Chapter XI

During one of the flights, Lyonka met Volkov, who became a street thief. In amazement, the boy released the handle of the cart and broke several dozen bottles. The owner fined people for broken bottles. Lyonka didn’t have that kind of money, and he had to get away urgently. Volkov helped the boy hide in the crowd and offered to go with him on the case. Lenka agreed only to get rid of his friend, who was simultaneously attracting and repelling him. The boy did not want to steal.

An unexpected guest was waiting for Lyonka at home - Stesha, who became Stepanida Timofeevna. She arranged for Alexandra Sergeevna to become the leader of a music group at the Triangle plant club. The woman told Stesha about Lyonka’s adventures, and she decided to take the boy seriously.

Chapter XII

Soon, at the insistence of his aunt, Lyonka entered the Unified Labor School, which was once a gymnasium, where the old teaching staff, gymnasium rules were preserved, and the children of rich Nepmen studied. Soon rumors about Lyonka's past spread around the school. The boy began to be called a thief. Despite this, Lyonka decided to stay at school. One day he saw some boy scouts turning a portrait of Karl Marx upside down and rushed into the fray. Taking advantage of this, the headmistress kicked the boy out. That same day Lyonka came across the owner of the Express. He demanded to pay for the losses caused to him. The boy had no choice but to tell his mother everything.

Alexandra Sergeevna gave Lyonka money. On the way to Express, he saw street roulette, and, tempted by easy money, lost everything he had. Not daring to return home, Lyonka went to wander around St. Petersburg, and soon met Volkov again. This time the boy did not refuse his offer.

Lyonka firmly connected with Volkov. After an unsuccessful theft of the castle and a night in a cold cell, Lyonka was released on Stesha’s guarantee. The boy told everything without concealment, he did not reveal only the name of his accomplice. Thanks to Stesha, the case did not go to trial. She also got the boy a ticket to a special school for troubled teenagers, headed by Viktor Nikolaevich Sorokin. The boy was in good hands and many years later he wrote a story about the Dostoevsky school.

The story begins with a short introduction. Lyonka’s acquaintance, Volkov, again drags him along to steal light bulbs in the front doors. In one of them, the guy was captured and taken to the police station, where Lyonka begins to remember how he came to such a life.

Alyosha grew up in the family of a former Cossack officer who was prone to long drinking bouts. But the boy loved his father for his honesty, justice and generosity. Father and mother often argued. They then diverged, then came together again, and the boy’s life went on as usual. Having started reading early, the boy studied everything that came into his hands. Soon the father finally left the family.

In the third year of the First World War, the boy entered second grade and tried to write poems. Lyonka's mother worked as a tutor. She gave music lessons to earn money to support her family.

The boy took an active part in the life of the school, but did not forget to read. He liked serious books. At the school he met Vladimir Volkov, who gave Lyonka books. However, having learned that Alyosha was the son of a simple cornet, he begins to shun him. At this time, talk about the Bolsheviks was heard everywhere. Many called them spies of the West, and Lyonka, having learned that his housekeeper Stesha was going to vote for the Bolsheviks, began to follow her. Soon he discovered a volume of Karl Marx in the girl’s possession and considered this proof of Steshina’s espionage activities. The mother considered the boy a thief, but he told her about his suspicions and fell unconscious. Lenka was ill for a long time. At that moment, when Alyosha was delirious, a revolution occurred.

Returning to the school, the boy noticed that many students were missing from the school. Volkov also disappeared. He left with his family to an estate outside the city. Stesha went to work at the factory and helped the boy’s family as best she could.

In the spring, Lyonka’s family moved to the Yaroslavl province, where they were invited by the boy’s former nanny. Here he learned about clashes between the People's Army and the White Guards. After some time, Lenya fell ill with diphtheria, and his mother decided to take him to Yaroslavl. Fighting began in Yaroslavl, and the mother and boy were forced to hide in the basement.

Having difficulty getting out of the city, they safely reached their village, where Lyonka’s aunt and her daughter Ira moved. Famine began in the country. The mother, in search of a place to earn money, began to look for work. She was offered to become a music teacher in a Tatar town, where she took her son and her aunt and daughter.

Soon the boy's mother disappeared, and he was sent to an orphanage. He decides to escape from the orphanage and goes in search of his mother. After wandering around the country, he reached his native St. Petersburg, where he learned that strangers were living in his apartment. He remembered his mother’s sister and went to her, where he met his family. Then the boy got a job at a small factory producing mineral water. He began delivering water in a heavy cart, receiving pennies for it.

During one of his flights he met Volkov, who became a street thief. Volkov invited the boy to go with him on business. Lenka agreed, but he didn’t want to steal. At home, the boy met Stesha, who helped his mother get a job as a music teacher in the circle of the Triangle plant and decided to start raising Alyosha. Now Stesha was called by his first name and patronymic.

The boy was sent to a labor school, where many, having learned about his past, began to call Lyonka a thief. Taking advantage of the boy's accidental mistake, he was expelled from school, and the boy contacted Volkov again. After an unsuccessful theft at the front door, Lenka told the police everything without revealing the name of his accomplice.

After that, he was sent to a school for difficult teenagers. And a few years later, he wrote a story about the Dostoevsky school.

"I'll plant the whole alley with flowers,
But I don’t have it... a rose in a white glass..."
Favorite criminal song of Lenka Panteleev

E His real name was Pantelkin. He was the coolest St. Petersburg bandit of the mid-20s.
In the long history of the criminal world of St. Petersburg - Petrograd - Leningrad - St. Petersburg, there is no more famous character than Lenka Panteleev. We can safely say that the bandit Lenka has become a kind of St. Petersburg legend. He was so elusive and successful that he was even credited with mysticism.

Lenka was born in 1902 in the city of Tikhvin, now the Leningrad region. He graduated from primary school and vocational courses, during which he received the prestigious profession of a printer and typesetter at that time, then worked in the printing house of the Kopeyka newspaper.

In 1919, Panteleev, who had not yet reached conscription age, voluntarily joined the Red Army and was sent to the Narva Front. It is reliably known that he took direct part in the battles with Yudenich’s army and the White Estonians, rose to the position of commander of a machine gun platoon.

It was not known exactly what Panteleev did after demobilization. And only recently a sensation broke out! He served in the Cheka! Personal file No. 119135 for Leonid Ivanovich Pantelkin was found in the FSB archives.
It is clear for what reasons these facts were kept secret. A security officer turned bandit is ideal ground for various speculations. Moreover, the reason for Panteleev’s dismissal from the Cheka is still unclear.

Leonid Panteleev is a current employee of the Cheka (standing fourth from the right).

However, at the beginning of 1922, Panteleev found himself in Petrograd, put together a small gang and began robbing. The composition of the gang was varied. It included Panteleev’s colleague in the Pskov Cheka Varshulevich, Gavrikov, who was a battalion commissar and member of the RCP(b) during the Civil War, as well as professional criminals such as Alexander Reintop (nickname Sashka-Pan) and Mikhail Lisenkov (nickname Mishka-Clumsy).

In the 20s there was not a person in Petrograd who had not heard of Lenka Panteleev, nicknamed Fartovy. The whole of Petrograd was talking about Panteleev’s gang. When carrying out raids, Lenka first shot in the air, and then always called out his name. This was a psychological move - the bandits created authority for themselves, and at the same time suppressed the will of their victims, their ability to resist. Moreover, the raiders took only rich Nepmen to the “gop-stop”, without touching ordinary people. Moreover, Panteleev personally allocated small amounts of money to some nice ragamuffins and street children.

The security officers did not yet shine with professionalism, so Lenka became more and more impudent with each successful case...

At first, Panteleev maintained a certain romantic aura around his person, even avoided murders, dressed well and was emphatically polite to the ladies. They talked about him as a “noble robber” who robbed only the rich, but then Fartovy became brutal, and his gang began not only to rob, but also to kill.

The gang acted with humor, audacity and ingenuity. In one of the robberies, Panteleev purchased a leather jacket and cap at a flea market and passed himself off as a GPU employee. Using forged warrants, the gang searched and requisitioned valuables from Nepmen Anikeev and Ishchens.
The next time, when robbing Dr. Levin's apartment, the raiders were dressed in the uniform of Baltic sailors.

After each raid, Lenka Panteleev used to leave his business card in the hallway of the robbed apartment, elegantly printed on chalk cardboard, with a laconic inscription: “Leonid Panteleev is a free artist-robber.” On the back of his business card, he often gave various parting words to the security officers; for example, on one he wrote: “
To the employees of the criminal investigation department with friendly greetings. Leonid ".

After particularly successful raids, Lenka liked to transfer small amounts of money by mail to the university, the Technological Institute and other universities. " Enclosing one hundred chervonets, I ask you to distribute them among the most needy students. With respect to science, Leonid Panteleev".
According to one of the legends he had several doubles. When the GPU arrested one of them, he raided the department and, having killed everyone, freed his double.

During one of the raids on the Kozhtrest store, he was ambushed and arrested. He was stunned and therefore taken alive.

Nevsky Prospekt, house 20. It was here in September 1922 that the Kozhtrest store was located, where the police detained Panteleev. The lower corner room on the first floor is on the right. (now the House of Military Books).

Under heavy security, the raiders were taken to the 1st correctional home - now the Kresty pre-trial detention center.
The GPU was afraid of an attack even on the Crosses! The guards were strengthened, the sentries on the towers were armed with Colt or Lewis light machine guns.

Once in the dock, Panteleev behaved confidently and even brazenly. He recited the poems of Sergei Yesenin by heart and even managed to have a “platonic” affair with his lawyer’s fiancée, who regularly attended the trial. In general, he made the most favorable impression on the public.

Lenka answered the prosecutor’s questions boldly and finally said: “Citizens judges, why all this farce? I’ll run away soon anyway.”

And indeed, on the night of November 10-11, Leonid Panteleev and three accomplices escaped from the strictly guarded Kresta prison. An officer from the Cheka helped him escape. He pointed out to the arrested a weak spot on the outer wall, which was not far from the bathhouse adjacent to Komsomol Street. There was firewood piled against the wall. Winter was approaching, and the prison was still heated in the old fashioned way - with stoves. The stack made it easy to climb onto the wall.

According to some reports, Panteleev actually planned to raise an armed uprising in “Kresty” on November 7. He intended to open the fireproof cabinet of the Ispravdom office, seize several rifles, a light machine gun, kill the guards and organize a mass escape. But the criminals refused to get involved “in politics.” Then the disappointed Panteleev turned back and decided to flee only with his gang.

The werewolf released Lenka and his accomplices from the cells, and then cut off the power to the building. The prisoners strangled the guard, Lenka changed into the uniform overcoat of the murdered warden, put on his cap, put the revolver in his holster, and began to pose as a guard. The entire group managed to calmly get out of the building, run across the narrow prison yard, and climbing onto the stack of firewood and descending to freedom using the prepared ropes was already a matter of technique.

A car was waiting for the fugitives in a nearby alley. The guards on the tower did not notice anything, it was raining heavily with snow, and the spotlight (randomly) was shining in the other direction.
Mikhail Lisenkov and Alexander Reintop (right) - gang members who escaped from prison along with Panteleev.

In the entire more than hundred-year history of the prison, only Panteleev’s gang managed to make a successful group escape from Kresty. The head of the prison and his deputy were removed from office after the escape, and in 1937 they were shot for negligence.

In the famous television series "Born of the Revolution" it is stated that Panteleev was shot dead in the hall of the Donon restaurant. But this is the creative invention of the director and screenwriter. In fact, events unfolded differently and Lenka’s criminal path was much longer.

Panteleev actually celebrated his escape from Kresty at the Donon restaurant. on the Fontanka embankment.

There he quarreled with the Nepmen. The metro d'hotel quietly called the GPU. In the shootout that ensued with the security officers, several gang members were killed, but Lenka, wounded in the arm, was still able to escape. And this despite the fact that they followed the trail with dogs and mounted police were brought in.

After being wounded, Lenka became more careful. He feared betrayal and put together a new gang, even stronger than the old one. He had more than thirty new safe shelters in different areas of the city. And the police lost the trail. And the gang committed new daring crimes. In the last month of his freedom alone, the gang committed 10 murders, 15 raids, and 20 street robberies. But these are approximate figures; no one knows the exact statistics.

The raid on the apartment of engineer Romanchenko also turned out to be bloody. Having burst into the hallway, the bandits killed the owner and his wife with knives, shot the dog that rushed at them with a point-blank shot, and took away everything valuable.

One day Panteleev felt he was being followed. The young sailor followed him for two blocks without turning. Lenka turned the corner, took out his Mauser, and when the “tail” appeared, he shot him. But I was mistaken - the sailor did not serve in the criminal investigation department, but was simply going home on leave.

Panteleev was elusive, there were strong suspicions that he had his own people in the Cheka who helped him escape from ambushes. But constant tension turned Panteleev into a neurasthenic, shooting without warning at anyone who aroused the slightest suspicion in him; even his closest accomplices began to fear him.

At the same time, Lenka continued to terrorize the Nepmen. He decided to "take over" the night! He wanted even the police to be afraid to go out into the streets at night and unleashed terror against the security officers, forcing other city gangs to take up this idea. Bandits of Lenka's gang attacked policemen from ambushes and several times entered into a shootout even with large patrols of mounted police. Residents could not help but hear gunfire at night and the city was on the verge of panic.
Mocking inscriptions appeared on the streets of Petrograd: “Before 10 pm the fur coat is yours, and after 10 it’s ours!”, the author of which was considered Pateleyev.

The police were on their ears. The boosts didn't help. One night, twenty ambushes were set up in places where he might appear, but in vain! They pressed mercilessly from above! They demanded that the gang be liquidated immediately and by any means necessary!

The photo shows documents being checked by Cheka officers.

Finally, luck smiled on the security officers. Through intelligence channels they received information that a “gangway” would take place on Ligovka, at which Panteleev was supposed to be present. The operation to capture him was carefully planned. At the last moment, one of the security officers found out that Panteleev’s friend had a mistress living on Mozhaiskaya Street, and just in case, an ambush was sent to her. But since Panteleev was expected at Ligovka, Mozhaiskaya was sent to the youngest employee, just a boy, Ivan Brusko with two Red Army soldiers.

The lucky Panteleev ignored the gangway and showed up at Mozhaiskaya, but then his luck suddenly changed.

Mozhaiskaya street, house 38. It was here, on the second floor, that there was an apartment in which (on the night of March 12 to 13, 1923) an ambush was organized on Lenka Panteleev.

Panteleev did not expect an ambush, and the police did not expect his appearance either. The more experienced Lenka Panteleev was the first to come to his senses. He stepped forward sharply and said in a stern but calm voice:

What's the matter, comrades, who are you waiting for here?

The security officers could not clearly see the faces of those who entered. And they should have been killed, but fate again brought a surprise - Fortune turned away from Lenka. While pulling out a pistol from his pocket, Panteleev accidentally caught the trigger in his pocket... an involuntary shot rang out. And then the operatives came to their senses and opened fire. They shot almost point blank. Panteleev, shot through the head, collapsed dead on the floor. Lisenkov, wounded in the neck, tried to escape, but was detained.

Already in the morning, the Petrograd newspapers wrote: “On the night of February 12-13, a strike group for the fight against banditry at the provincial department of the GPU with the participation of the criminal investigation department, after a long search, caught a famous bandit, who has recently become famous for his brutal murders and raids, Leonid Pantelkin, according to nickname “Lenka Panteleev.” During his arrest, Lenka offered desperate armed resistance, during which he was KILLED.”

Strangely, the newspaper headline did not write about the liquidation, but about the detention of Panteleev. The fact that he was killed was only stated in the text.

The city did not believe that Lenka Panteleev was killed. Perhaps the police themselves did not believe much, especially since robberies and murders continued under his name. And then the authorities had to take an unprecedented step - to put his corpse on public display. The corpse (like Lenin) was displayed in the morgue of the Obukhov hospital.

Thousands of Petrograd residents came to see the legendary raider. But those who knew him personally were sure that this was not his corpse.

The arrested 17 people from Panteleev’s gang were hastily shot on March 6, 1923, virtually without trial or investigation. The case of Lenka Panteleev’s gang was closed. But the rush made people whisper that the authorities were trying to quickly close the “case” and were carefully hiding something.

The corpse on display indirectly testified to his death. Like, if Lenka had been alive, he would have even recaptured his own corpse. But many still did not believe in his death. There were rumors that Lenka went to Estonia (where he was going), and his double was shot, but it is no longer possible to verify this.

The looted treasures of Lenka Panteleev (the common fund of his gang) have not yet been found. They say that Lenka also appeared in the entrance to the Rotunda on Gorokhovaya.

He had one of the apartments on the 1st floor in the entrance to the Rotunda, where he hid from the Cheka. They say Lenka used the basement of the building as a portal and could miraculously move to another place in Petrograd. Allegedly, there were even numerous witnesses to such transfers. So he escaped surveillance and the Cheka. In Soviet times, people searched for his jewelry and gold coins on Gorokhovaya (he did not recognize paper money). It was assumed that he hid his treasures in this very place (now the entrance to the basement from the entrance is walled up). Of course, they looked for them carefully, but alas... Lenka Panteleev hid everything securely, and a very serious amount was stolen, even by today's standards. However, perhaps Lenka himself took the money and jewelry... and far from THAT world.

It was after the destruction of Lenka Panteleev that Petrograd was renamed Leningrad))) an era passed... albeit a coincidence, but significant.

The fate of the young security officer Ivan Busko also developed in a strange way., who shot Lenka in an ambush on Mozhaiskaya Street (on the left in the photo).

Instead of receiving a well-deserved reward and promotion, Busko was demoted to Sakhalin Island (!) and appointed assistant chief of the border outpost. There he remained until June 1941. During the Great Patriotic War, Busko served in SMERSH, retired from the police with the modest rank of lieutenant colonel, and returned to Leningrad only in 1956. He lived very modestly, categorically refusing to communicate with journalists and any public appearances. Busko died in 1994, in complete obscurity.

They treated S. Kondratiev in much the same way- head of the special operational group of the Petrograd GPU, which was hunting for Panteleev’s gang. By the way, it was his biography that served as the basis for the script of the film “Born of the Revolution”, with only one significant amendment - after the Panteleev “case” they also began to persecute him in his career.

S. Kondratyev was transferred from Leningrad to Petrozavodsk (and not at all to Moscow), where he headed the local criminal investigation department for a long time and lived after retirement.

Subsequently he the wife claimed that Lenka Panteleev came to their home several times in the spring and summer of 1922(!), and had some conversations with her husband. The security officer who led his search!

S. Kondratyev, head of the GPU operational group, who led the search for L. Panteleev

Another mystery is the fate of the other four security officers who were part of the special group: Sushenkov, Shershevsky, Davydov and Dmitriev. They, in fact, caught the legendary raider; their signatures appear on the protocol for examining the body of the murdered L. Panteleev. All of them were soon dismissed from the “authorities” under various pretexts, and their names are not mentioned even in serious historical and scientific literature. Including in such a reputable publication as “Chekists of Petrograd” (1987 edition).

Another interesting fact is that in the early 20s there were many gangs operating in Petrograd. But the most popular then, of all those published in the city, "Red Newspaper" from issue to issue depicted the adventures of only one gang of Panteleev. The party newspaper could do this only on instructions from above - in other words, The St. Petersburg city leadership intensively “promoted” Lenka, for some reason making him a criminal “star”.

St. Petersburg was then led by Zinoviev, who really wanted to prove to Lenin that the NEP was wrong and predicted great popular unrest. Perhaps it was beneficial for him to plunge the city into fear of crime and thereby cause popular unrest. He almost succeeded.

There were even rumors that Lenka, having completed a special task from the authorities to destroy some Nemans, returned to serve in the authorities. They said that he was seen several times in the corridors of the Big House, in the uniform of a GPU employee.

And for a long time there was a legend around St. Petersburg that Panteleev’s head preserved in alcohol is kept in the museum on Liteiny, 4. And this turned out to be true, although it is no longer possible to recognize Lenka in it.

Not long ago, this “exhibit” was accidentally discovered at the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg State University...

Info and photos (C) different places on the Internet. Some material is published for the first time.

L. Panteleev

Collected works in four volumes

Volume 1. Lenka Panteleev

Korney Chukovsky. Panteleev

In one of Panteleev’s stories, Ataman Khokhryakov appears - for a minute, no longer. This raucous drunkard, a bandit, passes through the village at the head of his band of robbers. Noticing a pretty city woman near a hut, he addresses her with obsequious courtesy:

Sorry. I am very sorry. May I ask your kindness to give me a ladle of cold water?

And when she gives him a drink, she thanks her just as gallantly:

Oh, enormous mercy!

A bandit who shows himself to be a ladies' man is a creepy and at the same time comic image. He is characterized in the story by this single phrase. He doesn't say another word. But this phrase is all about him, this former Rostov clerk. Here is his whole ugly appearance and tiny nose, and vulgar mustache, and pretentious buffoon clothes. The very style of his phrase, where the original Russian word “enormous” is combined with the French “mercy,” caustically characterizes the vulgarity of the bourgeois milieu from which this haberdashery robber emerged.

Panteleev’s language is so expressive. A man flashed on the page for a minute, said two words in passing, and we see him from head to toe.

Let us recall the speech of the young Budenovite in Panteleev’s story “The Package,” so expressive that the whole person again stands before us. This is the authentic speech of an ordinary fighter of that era, who emerged from the deepest lowlands of the people.

You believe in Panteleev’s heroes; they are tangible and visible precisely because each of them speaks in his own voice, in his own language. Speech characteristics of faces are where Panteleev is strongest. Wherever you open his books, everywhere you will hear a newly captured, freshly reproduced speech in all the diversity of its intonations: the speech of a collective farmer, a policeman, a doctor, a soldier, a village girl, a sailor, a worker.

Panteleev does not flaunt his skills, he uses them modestly and with restraint. His theme is so dear to him that the form in which he puts it on never seduces him in itself.

What is Panteleev's theme?

It seems to me that it is best expressed by the following instructive parable, which once, about thirty years ago, he told for children.

Two frogs fell into a pot of sour cream. One of them was weak-willed and timid. She swam a little in the sour cream, floundered and said to herself:

“I still can’t get out of here. Well, I’ll flounder in vain!.. It’s better that I drown right away!”

She thought so, stopped floundering - and drowned.

“No, brothers,” said another, “I will always have time to drown. This won't get away from me. But I’d rather flounder some more.”

And this frog floundered for so long that in the end the liquid sour cream under its fast paws turned into dense, solid butter. The frog churned the butter, sat down on it and was saved.

Hence, of course, the moral:

Don't die before you die! Flounder until the last minute! Remember that “the will and labor of man create marvelous wonders.” Eliminate all frailty and flabbiness from your soul.

This is what Panteleev teaches. Teaches you to admire people of the greatest perseverance and courage.

Here is Lesha Mikhailov, who built several anti-aircraft batteries from snow and ice to lure fascist “vultures” (“Chief Engineer”).

And a barefoot girl who, at the risk of her life, saves her city from an enemy raid (“Night”).

And her peer, twelve years old. Matyusha, a Leningrad boy working on the Neva as a carrier in the rain of shells and anti-aircraft fragments (“On a Skiff”).

And many others - right up to the fearless rural teacher, who, disregarding danger, protects herself from enemy bullets with an old umbrella, “and even then when they start to shoot really hard” (“Lenka Panteleev”).

In the story “The First Feat” Panteleev again appears as a preacher of persistent will. To a boy eager to become famous for a heroic deed, one of the famous heroes advises:

If you really want to accomplish a feat, please quit smoking. This will be a good start.

Moral stories are not in our favor. Readers, like children, do not like notations. The very word didactics is considered almost a dirty word. It is common to think that only the lack of talent, only the poverty of visual means prompts a writer to resort to didactics.

But Panteleev is such a strong artist that didactics is not a hindrance to him. Against. Instructive phrases, which in another writer would sound unforgivably false, here, in the atmosphere of his novels and stories, which no one would call thin, are perceived as legitimate phenomena of style. His moral message would never have reached the hearts of children if he had not been an artist.

The strength and effectiveness of his teachings lies precisely in the artistic authenticity of his language. If his characters did not have such typical, expressive speech, which truly reflects their life, their profession, their individual qualities, these people would become abstract schemes, without a heartbeat, without flesh and blood.

The biography of Alexey Ivanovich Panteleev is very bright and impressive. As a child, he was a street child and stole light bulbs, watermelons, and felt boots. If he was caught, he was beaten. Then he was sent to a school for juvenile offenders.

After which, as a seventeen-year-old youth, he wrote, together with his peer Grigory Belykh, a talented and very loud book, which was met with stormy praise and controversy. It soon appeared abroad in translations into French, Dutch, Japanese and several other languages.

The book was called "The Republic of Shkid". It was perceived as a kind of literary miracle: yesterday’s “Shpargonians” and “Kkety” created a genuine work of art, in which you can feel not only talent, but also skill, culture, and taste!

Panteleev himself later, recalling his youth, spoke about the “Republic of Shkid”:

“The book was written by two boys who had just left the walls of an orphanage...”, “the main, and perhaps the only, merit of the story is its spontaneity, liveliness, authenticity of life.”

I just can’t agree with this. Really, “Republic Shkid” has many other advantages.

What strikes me most in this first book by two inexperienced “boys” is their literary experience, their meticulous knowledge of writing technique.

The story is written very skillfully, the whole plot is played out like clockwork. Every scene is spectacular, every situation is developed in the most advantageous way, brought to the brightest shine. Each character is outlined in the book with such strong and precise strokes that only mature artists can achieve it.

No, “The Shkid Republic” was not written by apprentices, but by masters, craftsmen. The period of their apprenticeship was far behind them when they took up the pen to depict this dear republic.

Where do “boys who have just left the walls of the orphanage” have such a strong literary grip, as if “Republic of Shkid” is not their first attempt at writing, but at least their tenth or, say, fifteenth?

Now from the story “Lenka Panteleev” we know that this was the case in reality. What did this extraordinary boy write: articles for homemade magazines, poems, dramas, pamphlets, ditties, satires, and stories. I tried all styles and genres. He was, it seems, not twelve years old when he created the longest poem “Black Raven” and a polyphonic opera about the life of the Don Cossacks. Not long before this, he had written an extensive series of adventurous stories and an entire novel about robbers, gypsies, and pirates under the enticing title “The Dagger of Salvation.”

So, when these “boys”, who had just left the orphanage, began to compose “The Shkid Republic”, they already had considerable writing experience behind them, especially “Lenka” by Panteleev.