We'll know how I survived. Analysis of the poem Wait for me, and I will return - Simonov
“Wait for me and I will return” Konstantin Simonov
Wait for me and I will come back.
Just wait a lot
Wait when they make you sad
Yellow rains,
Wait for the snow to blow
Wait for it to be hot
Wait when others are not waiting,
Forgetting yesterday.
Wait when from distant places
No letters will arrive
Wait until you get bored
To everyone who is waiting together.Wait for me and I will come back,
Don't wish well
To everyone who knows by heart,
It's time to forget.
Let the son and mother believe
In the fact that I am not there
Let friends get tired of waiting
They'll sit by the fire
Drink bitter wine
In honor of the soul...
Wait. And at the same time with them
Don't rush to drink.Wait for me and I will come back,
All deaths are out of spite.
Whoever didn't wait for me, let him
He will say: - Lucky.
They don’t understand, those who didn’t expect them,
Like in the middle of fire
By your expectation
You saved me.
We'll know how I survived
Just you and me, -
You just knew how to wait
Like no one else.
Analysis of Simonov's poem “Wait for me, and I will return”
The war for Konstantin Simonov began in 1939, when he was sent to Khalkhin Gol as a correspondent. Therefore, by the time Germany attacked the USSR, the poet already had an idea of everyday life at the front and knew firsthand that very soon thousands of families would begin to receive funerals.
Shortly before repeated demobilization, in the summer of 1941, Simonov came to Moscow for several days and stayed at the dacha of his friend, writer Lev Kassil, in Peredelkino. It was there that one of the poet’s most famous poems, “Wait for me, and I will return,” was written, which soon flew around the entire front line, becoming both an anthem and a prayer for the soldiers.
This work is dedicated to actress Valentina Serova, the widow of a military pilot, whom the poet met in 1940. A theater star and Stalin's favorite, she initially rejected Simonov's advances, believing that she had no right to betray the memory of her husband, who died during testing of a new aircraft. However, the war put everything in its place, changing the attitude not only towards death, but also towards life itself.
Going to the front, Konstantin Simonov was not sure of victory. Soviet army, nor that he will manage to escape alive. Nevertheless, he was warmed by the thought that somewhere far away, in sunny Fergana, where Valentina Serova’s theater had been evacuated, his beloved woman was waiting for him. And this is precisely what gave the poet strength and faith, instilled hope that sooner or later the war would end and he could be happy with his chosen one. Therefore, addressing Valentina Serova in the poem, he asks her only one thing: “Wait for me!”
The faith and love of this woman is a kind of talisman for the poet, that invisible protection that protects him at the front from stray bullets. Simonov knows firsthand that you can die completely by accident and even through stupidity. In the first days of the war, he happened to find himself in Belarus, where by that time there were fierce battles, and the poet almost died near Mogilev, falling into German encirclement. However, he is convinced that it is the love of a woman that can save him and many other soldiers from death. Love and faith that nothing will happen to him.
In the poem, he asks Valentina Serova, and with her thousands of other wives and mothers, not to despair and not to lose hope for the return of their loved ones, even when it seems that they will never be destined to meet again. “Wait until everyone who is waiting together gets tired of it,” the poet asks, noting that you should not succumb to despair and the persuasion of those who advise you to forget your loved one. Even best friends They are already drinking to the remembrance of his soul, realizing that miracles do not happen, and no one is destined to rise from the dead.
However, Simonov is convinced that he will definitely return to his chosen one, no matter what happens, since “in the midst of the fire, you saved me with your expectation.” The poet prefers to remain silent about what it will cost both of them. Although he knows very well that the unknown will certainly add new wrinkles and gray hairs to the hair of those women who are waiting for their loved ones. But it is the belief that they will someday return that gives them the strength to survive in the bloody meat grinder called war.
At first, Konstantin Simonov refused to publish this poem, considering it deeply personal and not intended for a wide range of readers. After all, only a few close friends of the poet were privy to his heartfelt secret. However, it was they who insisted that the poem “Wait for me and I will return,” which thousands of soldiers so needed, became public knowledge. It was published in December 1941, after which neither Konstantin Simonov nor Valentina Serova considered it necessary to hide their relationship. And their vibrant romance became yet another proof that true love can work miracles.
The poem by the poet Konstantin Simonov “Wait for me, and I will return” - a text that has become one of the symbols terrible war, ending in 1945. In Russia, they know it almost by heart from childhood and repeat it from mouth to mouth, remembering the courage of Russian women who were expecting sons and husbands from the war, and the valor of the men who fought for their own homeland. Listening to these lines, it is impossible to imagine how the poet managed to combine death and the horrors of war, all-encompassing love and endless loyalty in several stanzas. Only real talent can do this.
About the poet
The name Konstantin Simonov is a pseudonym. From birth, the poet was called Kirill, but his diction did not allow him to pronounce his name without problems, so he chose a new one for himself, keeping the initial, but excluding the letters “r” and “l”. Konstantin Simonov is not only a poet, but also a prose writer; he has written novels and stories, memoirs and essays, plays and even scripts. But he is famous precisely for his poetry. Most of his works are created in military themes. This is not surprising, since the poet’s life has been connected with war since childhood. His father died during the First World War, his mother’s second husband was a military specialist and former colonel. Simonov himself served for some time, fought at the front and even had the rank of colonel. The poem “All his life he loved to draw war,” written in 1939, most likely has autobiographical features, since it clearly intersects with the life of the poet.
It is not surprising that Simonov is close to the feelings of a simple soldier who misses his loved ones during difficult battles. And if you analyze the poem “Wait for me, and I will return,” you will notice how alive and personal the lines are. What is important is how subtly and sensually Simonov manages to convey them in his works, to describe all the tragedy and horror of the military consequences, without resorting to excessive naturalism.
Most famous work
Of course, the best way to illustrate the work of Konstantin Simonov is his most famous poem. The analysis of the poem “Wait for me, and I will return” should begin with the question of why it became such. Why did it sink so deeply into the souls of the people, why is it now firmly associated with the name of the author? After all, initially the poet did not even plan to publish it. Simonov wrote it for himself and about himself, or rather about a specific person. But in a war, and especially in a war like the Great Patriotic War, it was impossible to exist alone, all people became brothers and shared their most intimate things with each other, knowing that perhaps these would be their last words.
So Simonov, wanting to support his comrades in difficult times, read his poems to them, and the soldiers listened to them with fascination, rewrote them, memorized them by heart and whispered them in the trenches, like a prayer or like a spell. Probably, Simonov managed to capture the most hidden and intimate experiences of not only an ordinary fighter, but also every person. “Wait, and I’ll come back, just wait very long” - the main idea of all literature, what the soldiers wanted to hear about more than anything else.
Military literature
During the war years there was an unprecedented rise in literary creativity. Many works on military subjects were published: short stories, novels, and, of course, poems. Poems were remembered faster, they could be set to music and performed in difficult times, passed from mouth to mouth, and repeated to oneself, like a prayer. Poems on military themes became not just folklore, they had a sacred meaning.
Lyrics and prose raised the already strong spirit of the Russian people. In a sense, the poems pushed the soldiers to exploits, inspired, gave strength and deprived them of fear. Poets and writers, many of whom themselves participated in hostilities or discovered their poetic talent in a dugout or the cockpit of a tank, understood how important universal support and glorification of the common goal was for fighters - saving the homeland from the enemy. That is why the works that appeared in large numbers at that time were classified as a separate branch of literature - military lyrics and military prose.
Analysis of the poem “Wait for me and I will return”
In the poem, the word “wait” is repeated many times - 11 times, and this is not just a request, it is a plea. Word forms are also used 7 times in the text: “waiting”, “waiting”, “waiting”, “waiting”, “waiting”, “waiting”. Wait, and I will return, just wait a lot - such a concentration of words is like a spell, the poem is imbued with desperate hope. It seems as if the soldier completely entrusted his life to the one who remained at home.
Also, if you analyze the poem “Wait for me and I will return,” you will notice that it is dedicated to a woman. But not a mother or daughter, but a beloved wife or bride. The soldier asks not to forget him under any circumstances, even when children and mothers no longer have hope, even when they drink bitter wine for the remembrance of his soul, he asks not to remember him with them, but to continue to believe and wait. Waiting is equally important for those who remained in the rear, and first of all for the soldier himself. Faith in endless devotion inspires him, gives him confidence, makes him cling to life and pushes the fear of death into the background: “They cannot understand, those who did not wait, how in the midst of the fire you saved me with your expectation.” The reason the soldiers were alive in battle was because they realized that they were waiting for them at home, that they could not die, they needed to return.
The Great Patriotic War lasted 1418 days, or about 4 years, and the seasons changed 4 times: yellow rains, snow and heat. During this time, not losing faith and waiting for the fighter after so much time is a real feat. Konstantin Simonov understood this, which is why the poem is addressed not only to the soldiers, but also to everyone who kept hope in their souls until the last, believed and waited, no matter what, “in spite of all deaths.”
War poems and poems by Simonov
- "The General" (1937).
- "Fellow Soldiers" (1938).
- "Cricket" (1939).
- "Hours of Friendship" (1939).
- "Doll" (1939).
- "The Artilleryman's Son" (1941).
- “You told me “I love you”” (1941).
- "From the Diary" (1941).
- "The North Star" (1941).
- “When on a scorched plateau” (1942).
- "Motherland" (1942).
- "Mistress of the House" (1942).
- "Death of a Friend" (1942).
- "Wives" (1943).
- "Open Letter" (1943).
Today Simonov would have turned one hundred years old. He died several epochs ago, in August 1979. He did not become a long-liver: the overstrain of the war years affected him, which he endured in subsequent years. Undoubtedly, he was not only one of the most beloved Russian Soviet writers among the people, but perhaps the most prolific.
Simonov's literary heritage is enormous. Poems, fiction, drama, journalism, several volumes of diaries, without which it is impossible to get an idea of the Great Patriotic War. But among Simonov’s many volumes, one poem will never get lost. Same thing. It brought a special shade of meaning and feeling into our lives.
Simonov wrote it at the beginning of the war, when he was deafened by the first battles, the first defeats, the tragic encirclements, and retreats. The son and stepson of an officer, he did not separate himself from the army. Simonov was often asked: how did these lines appear to him? He once responded in a letter to a reader: “The poem “Wait for Me” has no special history. I just went to war, and the woman I loved was behind the lines. And I wrote her a letter in verse..." The woman is Valentina Serova, the famous actress, widow of the pilot, Hero Soviet Union, future wife of Simonov. The poem really appeared as a cure for separation, but Simonov did not write it in the active army.
In July 1941, having briefly returned from the front, the poet spent the night at the Peredelkino dacha of the writer Lev Kassil. He was burned by the first battles in Belarus. All his life he dreamed of these battles. The darkest days of the war were passing, and it was difficult to tame despair. The poem was written in one sitting.
Simonov had no intention of publishing “Wait for Me”: it seemed too intimate. Sometimes I read these poems to friends, the poem went around, rewritten, sometimes on tissue paper, with mistakes... The poem was heard on the radio. It first became legendary, and then published. The publication took place not just anywhere, but in main newspaper the entire USSR - in Pravda, January 14, 1942, and after Pravda it was reprinted by dozens of newspapers. Millions of people knew him by heart - an unprecedented case.
War is not only battles and campaigns, not only the music of hatred, not only the death of friends and cramped hospitals. This is also parting with one’s home, separation from loved ones. Poems and songs about love were valued at the front above patriotic appeals. “Wait for Me” is one of the most famous Russian poems of the twentieth century. How many tears were shed over him... And how many did it save from despondency, from dark thoughts? Simonov’s poems convincingly suggested that love and loyalty are stronger than war:
Wait for me and I will come back.
Just wait a lot
Wait when they make you sad
Yellow rains,
Wait for the snow to blow
Wait for it to be hot
Wait when others are not waiting,
Forgetting yesterday.
Wait when from distant places
No letters will arrive
Wait until you get bored
To everyone who is waiting together.
The poem shook the country and became an anthem of anticipation. It has the power of healing. The wounded whispered the lines of this poem like a prayer - and it helped! The actresses read “Wait for me” to the fighters. Wives and brides copied each other's prayer lines. From then on, wherever Simonov performed - until last days, he was invariably asked to read “Wait for Me.” Such a melody, such cohesion of words and feelings - this is strength.
But one can also understand the poet’s mother, Alexandra Leonidovna Obolenskaya. She was offended by her son's main poem. In 1942, his mother’s letter found him: “Without waiting for an answer to my letters, I am sending a response to the poem “Wait” published on 19/1-42 in Pravda, in particular to the line that especially hits me in the heart with your stubborn silence:
Let the son and mother forget...
Of course you can slander
For son and mother,
Teach others how to wait
And how to save you.
You didn’t ask me to wait,
And I didn’t teach you how to wait,
But I waited with all my might,
As soon as a mother can,
And in the depths of my soul
You must be aware:
They, my friend, are not good,
Your words about your mother.”
Of course, this is an unfair line - “Let the son and mother forget...” This is what happens with poets: along with autobiographical motives, introduced ones also appear that have nothing to do with his personal family. Simonov needed to thicken the colors, emphasize the invisible connection between two lovers - and maternal love had to be sacrificed. To sharpen the image! And Alexandra Leonidovna forgave her son - soon they were already discussing Simonov’s new poems and plays in letters in a friendly manner.
Simonov reads poetry to soldiers and officers. Photo: godliteratury.ru
...Prayer for love and fidelity. There is probably no poem in the history of Russian poetry that has been repeated so often in difficult times. It helped millions of people who knew by heart the lines that Simonov initially considered too personal and not suitable for publication...
It is impossible to forget how he read “Wait for Me” from the stage in the late seventies, shortly before his death. An aged, haggard “knight of the Soviet image,” he did not resort to theatrical intonations or raise his voice. And the huge hall listened to every word... The war brought us so many losses, so many separations, so much expectation that such a poem could not help but appear. Simonov managed to recreate in verse and government dimension wars, both military, and human, personal.
And the poems influenced the fate of the war, the fate of people. Simonov wrote many years later: “I remember the camp of our prisoners of war near Leipzig. What happened! Furious screams: ours, ours! Minutes later, and we were surrounded by a crowd of thousands. It is impossible to forget these faces of suffering, exhausted people. I climbed up the porch steps. I had to say in this camp the first words that came from my homeland... I feel my throat is dry. I can't say a word. I slowly look around at the vast sea of people standing around. And finally I say. I can’t remember what I said now. Then I read “Wait for Me.” I burst into tears myself. And everyone around is also standing and crying... That’s how it happened.”
That's exactly how it was. It’s fitting to remember this on the day of the poet’s centenary.
This poem is known to everyone. It is unlikely that there was another work in Soviet poetry that would have received such a massive response. During the Great Patriotic War this poem was cut out from newspapers, copied, memorized, carried with them and shared with others. The project includes the most popular and recognizable poem of the wartime “Wait for me” by Konstantin Simonov.
Wait for me
Wait for me and I will come back.
Just wait a lot
Wait when they make you sad
Yellow rains,
Wait for the snow to blow
Wait for it to be hot
Wait when others are not waiting,
Forgetting yesterday.
Wait when from distant places
No letters will arrive
Wait until you get bored
To everyone who is waiting together.
Wait for me and I will come back,
Don't wish well
To everyone who knows by heart,
It's time to forget.
Let the son and mother believe
In the fact that I am not there
Let friends get tired of waiting
They'll sit by the fire
Drink bitter wine
In honor of the soul...
Wait. And at the same time with them
Don't rush to drink.
Wait for me and I will come back,
All deaths are out of spite.
Whoever didn't wait for me, let him
He will say: - Lucky.
Those who were not waiting for them cannot understand,
Like in the middle of fire
By your expectation
You saved me.
We'll know how I survived
Just you and me, -
You just knew how to wait
Like no one else.
Historical context
During the Great Patriotic War literary works were published by the front and central press, poems were heard on the radio simultaneously with reports about the current military and political events, were read from improvised scenes. Favorite poems were copied into front-line notebooks and learned by heart.
Konstantin Simonov. Wartime photography
The poem “Vasily Terkin” gained enormous popularity, bringing fame to Alexander Tvardovsky. For many writers, their creative takeoff occurred precisely during the war years (Mikhail Isakovsky, Alexey Surkov, Ilya Erenburg, Viktor Nekrasov, Olga Berggolts, etc.). One of the authors, without whom literature about the war turned out to be unthinkable, was Konstantin Mikhailovich Simonov.
Author
Konstantin Simonov (1915–1979) belonged to the family of Russian princes Obolensky. His mother is Princess Alexandra Obolenskaya, his father is a general in the tsarist army who died in the First World War. The stepfather, who raised Simonov and had a great influence on him, was also a serviceman, a hero of two wars. Since the attitude towards the nobility and the officers at that time was extremely negative, Simonov had to hide his origin.
Having a passion for literature and writing, Simonov entered the Literary Institute. Gorky, after graduating from which he was soon called up to serve as a war correspondent. From the very first days of the war until May 1945, he did not leave this position. Shortly before leaving for the front, Simonov decides to change his native name Kirill to Konstantin. The reason was that to pronounce given name It was difficult for him: he could not pronounce “r” and “l”. Very soon, Konstantin Simonov gained all-Union fame as a writer. From the very first day of the war, he realized its grandiose historical meaning. It is no coincidence that Simonov kept diaries almost throughout the war. He painted the year 1941 almost every day. Everyone knew that he was not sitting in the rear, that the materials he brought from the front were an eyewitness account of the events. For many military people, the writer immediately became his own man, a real front-line comrade. Everyone knew that if the text was written by Simonov, then there were no lies in it.
Simonov's literary heritage is great. He is the author of the novel trilogy "The Living and the Dead", screenplays, essays and numerous poems. However, the most important poem that brought Simonov fame is “Wait for Me,” which became a real poetic prayer and anthem of waiting during the war years.
Work
Konstantin Simonov wrote his famous poem in the summer of 1941. It was dedicated to theater and film actress Valentina Serova. The poet did not want to publish this text, since he considered it very personal and read it only to his closest acquaintances, who admired it, calling it a cure for melancholy. However, in the fall, the poet decides to publish the poem at all costs. Simonov wrote about the reason for this: “Several months later, when I had to be in the far north and when snowstorms and bad weather sometimes forced me to sit for days somewhere in a dugout<…>I had to read poetry to a variety of people. And a variety of people dozens of times, in the light of a smokehouse or a hand-held flashlight, copied on a piece of paper the poem “Wait for Me,” which, as it previously seemed to me, I wrote only for one person.” He realized that thousands of people needed these lines, which sounded a call for saving expectation.
Valentina Serova is the poet’s muse, to whom he initially dedicated “Wait for Me”
At first, the poet wanted to publish “Wait for Me” in the newspaper “Red Star”, where he worked. However, the editor hesitated and returned the text to the author, saying, “that these poems, perhaps, are not for a military newspaper, they say, there is no point in poisoning the soul of a soldier - separation is already bitter!” As a result, the poems were published in the country's main newspaper, Pravda. However, even before publication, the poem became known to front-line soldiers, as it was copied and learned by heart.
Issue of the newspaper “Pravda” for 1942, where “Wait for Me” was first published
The poem became a real poetic prayer. In war conditions, in those terrible years of 1941–1942, when nothing was clear about the outcome of the war, when the hope of return was vanishingly small, this faith in saving love, in the power of love, was necessary for people.
The essence of Simon's prayer is concentrated in eternal Christian values - faith, love and hope. “Wait for me” was sent from the front to the rear and from the rear to the front. According to the testimonies of war participants, it instilled hope in those who believed that they were expected, and in those who waited.
Poem manuscript
For many years after the end of the war, Simonov received letters from people who were helped by his poems in difficult times. For women who were waiting for their men from the war, “Wait for Me” became a real anthem of fidelity. Thus, one woman told the author of the poem about how every day she hoped to receive news from her husband from the front: “I looked into the mailbox many times every day and whispered, like a prayer, “wait for me, and I will return in spite of all deaths ...” and added: “Yes, dear, I will wait, I know how.”
Correspondent Konstantin Simonov talks with nurses at a military hospital
Simonov wrote: “I remember the camp of our prisoners of war near Leipzig. What happened! Furious screams: ours, ours! Minutes later, and we were surrounded by a crowd of thousands. It is impossible to forget these faces of suffering, exhausted people. I climbed up the porch steps. I had to say in this camp the first words that came from my homeland... I feel my throat is dry. I can't say a word. I slowly look around at the vast sea of people standing around. And finally I say. I can’t remember what I said now. Then I read “Wait for Me.” I burst into tears myself. And everyone around is also standing and crying... That’s how it happened.”
Simonov read his poem to the public hundreds of times after the war. And today “Wait for me” does not lose its power.
WAIT FOR ME
Music by Matvey Blanter
Words by Konstantin Simonov
Wait for me and I will come back,
Just wait a lot.
Wait when they make you sad
Yellow rains.
Wait for the snow to blow
Wait for it to be hot.
Wait when others are not waiting,
Forgetting yesterday.
Wait when from distant places
No letters will arrive.
Wait until you get bored
To everyone who is waiting together.
Wait for me and I will come back,
Don't wish well
To everyone who knows by heart,
It's time to forget.
Let the son and mother believe
That there is no me.
Let friends get tired of waiting
They'll sit by the fire
Drink bitter wine
In honor of the soul...
Wait, and with them at the same time
Don't rush to drink.
Wait for me and I will come back
All deaths are out of spite.
Whoever didn't wait for me, let him
He will say: “Lucky.”
They don’t understand, they didn’t expect it,
Like in the middle of fire
By your expectation
You saved me.
How I survived - we will know
Just you and me.
You just knew how to wait
Like no one else.
words - July 1941
Russian Soviet songs (1917-1977). Comp. N. Kryukov and Y. Shvedov.
The poem is dedicated to the movie star Valentina Vasilyevna Serova, the beloved woman of Konstantin Simonov. Written in July 1941 at the front, where Simonov served as a war correspondent. None of my friends believed that anyone would agree to publish such a poem before the end of the war. Nevertheless, Simonov read it on the radio, and it appeared in Pravda in February 1942, then spread across all newspapers and was included in the author’s collection of poems “With You and Without You,” dedicated to Serova. Simonov and Serova became a symbol of fidelity, and “Wait for me” became a spontaneous song, and they sang it to an arbitrary motive. Then Matvey Blanter wrote the music (he also wrote the music for “The Correspondent’s Table”).
In 1943, the play “Wait for Me” was released based on Simonov’s play of the same name, and directors Alexander Stolper and Boris Ivanov made a film with the same name. Serova played the main role in both the play and the film; in 1944 she and Simonov got married.
“Wait for me” was also heard in the film “The Guy from Our City” (1942) by the same directors, based on Simonov’s play “The Guy from Our City.” Both films were filmed in evacuation in Almaty.
Part of Vadim Kozin's repertoire. Leonid Utesov performed a song to the melody of Nikolai Gorbenko. At the front, many folklore “Responses” to the poem were composed. See, for example, “Waiting for you, my dear...” (1915-1979)
Konstantin Simonov
