Marina Tsvetaeva did not like the word “poetess” very much.She believed that the verse composer should only be called “poet” regardless of his gender.After returning to the USSR, she told her friends that she felt terrible loneliness.
One day she received from Arseny Aleksandrovich Tarkovsky, who admired her at a distance, a book of his translations of works by great Turkmen poet Kemine.The gift aroused a storm of emotions in Tsvetaeva, because Marina realized that at least someone else needed her.
More than 40 years after receiving an answer from Tsvetaeva, Tarkovsky quoted it from memory to the author of a book about him, Alexander Krivomazov: “Dear comrade Tarkovsky, your translation is lovely.
What can you do yourself?Well, you can do everything for the other.Soon I will invite you to visit me in the evening to listen to my poems from a future book.
I would insistently ask you not to show this letter of mine to anyone, since I am an isolated person, and I am writing to you, so why do you need other witnesses.
Any manuscript is defenseless, and I am a manuscript”.
Having received an invitation from Tsvetaeva, whom he considered the best poet of that time, Tarkovsky was ready to run to her immediately.
The meeting of the two talents was organized by translator Nina Yakovleva, who described Arseny as a tall handsome man with a noble face, brilliantly educated and immensely talented. But before meeting Tsvetaeva, who called him “a poet by God’s grace”, Tarkovsky was considered only a translator.
According to Tarkovsky, it was Marina who taught him to see in nature not chaos, but the harmonious architecture of heavenly and earthly in their majestic unity.
Later, Yakovleva compared the first meeting of the two talents with the meeting of Sergei Yesenin with Isadora Duncan. Here is what she wrote: “Their gazes met. They craved for each other. The poet saw the poet. People say: “Love at first sight…”.
Alas, constant worries about the fate of her son deprived Tsvetaeva of peace. Tarkovsky, who seriously intended to save Marina from loneliness, which Tsvetaeva considered the main fear of his life, told his wife that he fell in love with other woman. His spouse Antonina, although jealous, allowed Arseny to visit Tsvetaeva.
He read poetry to Marina every evening. She especially liked his new translations of Kemine’s works. However, seeing that Arseny puts an additional second meaning in them, Tsvetaeva begs Tarkovsky not to show these updated versions to anyone.
Their romance came to an end completely unexpectedly. Arseny agreed to Marina’s request to read his poem “The table is laid for six persons” in a circle of friends. The poem offended Tsvetaeva. It is known that she wrote an answer to it on the day of her death, which became her last work.
How could you at a table like this Forget the seventh man the seventh woman… Your guests are not happy, The crystal decanter is idle.They are sad, and you are sad, The uninvited all the saddest… You are nobody: not a brother, not a son, not a husband, Not a friend, and yet I reproach: You, who laid the table for six souls, And did not seat me on the edge…
Before Marina left for the evacuation, they saw each other again, but Tsvetaeva did not want to explain herself. Only after her death did Tarkovsky receive her last work. And he destroyed their correspondence, forever preserving the good memory of Tsvetaeva in his heart.
During the war, Tarkovsky was a war correspondent and was awarded the Order of the Red Star for his personal courage.Upon knowing that Arseny was seriously wounded in the leg, his wife, having obtained the necessary permissions, transported the poet to Moscow, where Professor Vishnevsky performed a complex operation.
Recovering from a wound took a lot of strength from Tarkovsky.
Creative activity helped to live on.Mark Tarlovsky recommended occupying the poet with translations of Georgian and Turkmen authors, and therefore in 1946-1947 Arseny lived in Ashgabat, translating works by classic of Turkmen literature Magtymguly.
Years later, in 1971, he was awarded the State Prize of the Turkmen SSR for these translations, which are considered the best in the world.
According to the poet’s recollections, living in Ashgabat, he literally absorbed the atmosphere of the eastern way of life, filled with the winds of the desert and the aromas of the bazaar, the scorching sun and the damp coolness of mountain shadows and waterfalls.
Friends said that Arseny literally merged with Magtymguly in time and space in order to convey the thoughts of the exponent of the national Turkmen spirit in an artistic word.
In addition to Kemine and Magtymguly, Tarkovsky translated into Russian the poems by Mollanepes and Aman Kekilov.
Arseny Alexandrovich passed away on May 27, 1989. The last collections of the poet were prepared for publication by his daughter Marina Arsenyevna Tarkovskaya.