Vitaly Bianki: biography of the writer of the revived forest

November 11, 2019
Art
Natalia Drong

The works of Vitaly Bianchi are familiar to many adults from childhood. And modern parents even today enjoy reading books by this wonderful Russian writer to their children. The figurative and easy language of his works is accessible to children. Stories about the funny adventures of talking forest dwellers immerse a child in the natural world and help him see the wonderful in the simple.

Biography of Bianchi: briefly about the most important things

Vitaly Valentinovich Bianki was born on January 30, 1894 in St. Petersburg in the family of an ornithologist. Valentin Lvovich, the father of the future writer, headed the ornithological department of the Zoological Museum of the Academy of Sciences. Bianchi's house was like a museum branch. The rooms were filled with numerous cages filled with chirping birds. Snakes, lizards, and turtles lived next to the cages in terrariums and aquariums.

In the summer, when moving to their dacha in the village of Lebyazhye, the family took all the living creatures with them. One day, the village rangers picked up a calf in the forest. The baby settled in the dacha until the fall, when he was transferred to the zoo.

All summer, the elder Bianki wandered through the forest with his sons, hunting, fishing, teaching them to observe nature and write down their observations.

Childhood and youth

“We all come from childhood” - this expression suits Vitaly Bianchi like no one else. The boy was born and raised in an amazing environment. Father Valentin Lvovich, head of the ornithological department of the zoological museum of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences, set up a real zoo at home.

Vitaly Bianchi in childhood (bottom left), his parents and brothers

The rooms were filled with cages with birds, adjacent to an aquarium and terrarium with lizards, snakes and turtles. The family, taking the animals, went to the village of Lebyazhye for the summer. Once, a moose calf, picked up by the rangers, even settled in the courtyard of Bianchi’s dacha, but in the fall the animal was placed in a zoo.

An even more fascinating world opened up in nature, which the father was in a hurry to introduce the children to. His sons wandered through the forests with him, recorded observations, learned to hunt and fish. Interest in nature and science determined the children's professions. The eldest son devoted his life to entomology, the middle one became a meteorologist. And the youngest, Vitaly, saw himself as an ornithologist, having been impressed by trips to Lebyazhye, where the great sea route of migratory birds lay.

Vitaly Bianchi in his youth

Love for animals is not Vitaly’s only childhood passion. The boy wrote poetry, respected music and sang well, and also played football well. After graduating from high school, the future writer entered St. Petersburg University, the department of natural sciences, but the First World War made adjustments - the young man was mobilized.

Vitaly Bianchi was interested in politics in his youth, joined the Social Revolutionaries, and walked under the banner of Kolchak. He later paid for the sins of his youth. The man was persecuted by the Soviet authorities, arrested on suspicion of counter-revolutionary activities, and once even deported to Uralsk (Kazakhstan).

Vitaly Bianchi in his youth

After the October Revolution, Vitaly Valentinovich lived for several years in Altai, in the city of Biysk. Here the writer gave lectures on ornithology, worked in the local history museum, introduced schoolchildren to the basics of biology, organized scientific expeditions and wrote stories for children.

At the turn of the era

In 1915, after graduating from high school, Vitaly became a student in the natural sciences department of St. Petersburg University. But the First World War began. The Bianchi mobilized. After an accelerated course at a military school, Vitaly is sent to an artillery brigade located in Tsarskoye Selo.

In February 1917, Vitaly was elected to the Council of Soldiers' and Workers' Deputies.

In 1918 he ended up in Samara and began working for the newspaper “People”.

After Samara, Vitaly changes his place of residence several times, moving from city to city, serving in different troops, getting into all sorts of troubles. Bianki is suspected of counter-revolutionary activities, arrested and deported to Uralsk, Kazakhstan.

Descendants of Vitaly Bianchi

Vitaly Valentinovich Bianki had four children from two marriages.

He first married in 1916 to the daughter of a titular councilor, Zinaida Aleksandrovna Zakharevich.

. That same year, young Vitaly Bianchi was drafted into the army and, after completing accelerated courses at the Vladimir Military School, was assigned to an artillery brigade with the rank of ensign.

In February 1917, on the initiative of the soldiers, Vitaly was elected to the Council of Soldiers' and Workers' Deputies and joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party. He worked on the commission for the protection of artistic monuments of Tsarskoye Selo, and in the summer of 1918 he became an employee of the Samara newspaper “People”.

Young Vitaly Bianchi

Here in 1918, Vitaly and Zinaida had a son, Mikhail.

. However, soon the advance of the Red Army forced the former warrant officer and Socialist Revolutionary Bianski to move to Ufa. He spent some time in Yekaterinburg, then lived in Tomsk. As a result, he settled in Biysk.

In order to avoid being mobilized into Kolchak’s army, Bianski issued documents under the surname Belyanin. According to legend, he was transformed into a student at Petrograd University, an ornithologist at the Zoological Museum of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Vitaly Valentinovich retained this “pseudonym” until the end of his life: in all documents he was listed under the double surname Bianki-Belyanin.

The writer's wife, Zinaida Aleksandrovna, trying to protect her son from persecution, filed for a divorce and transferred the boy to her last and patronymic names. So Mikhail Vitalievich Bianchi became Mikhail Alexandrovich Zakharevich

There is no information on the network about the life and professional path of Mikhail Alexandrovich. It is only known that he passed away in 1965 at the age of 46 and left two children, one of whom was his son Vladimir

His second wife, Vera Nikolaevna Klyuzheva

, Vitaly Valentinovich Bianski met in 1920 in Biysk. They both taught at a local school. In May 1921, the couple registered their marriage at the registry office and got married according to Orthodox traditions.

Vitaly Valentinovich Bianchi with his wife Vera Nikolaevna.
It was a difficult period in the life of Vitaly Bianchi. In 1921-1935 he was arrested more than once and sent into exile. The reason was either the Social Revolutionary past or the noble origin. From Biysk I had to move to Petrograd, then to Nizhny Novgorod. The intercession of famous writers Samuil Marshak and Boris Zakhoder and human rights activist, wife of Maxim Gorky Ekaterina Peshkova helped to avoid execution and many years of imprisonment.

Vera Nikolaevna heroically endured all the difficulties, supporting her beloved husband in everything and raising three children: their daughter Elena was born in 1922, their son Vitaly in 1926, and their son Valentin in 1932.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to find information about the life of the writer’s youngest son Valentin

failed. The only thing Wikipedia tells about him is his years of life: 1932-1970. Neither the brother, nor the sister, nor the grandson of the writer mention him in their interviews.

Elena Bianchi is the only daughter of the writer

Elena Vitalievna Bianki

became an illustrator. First of all, she created wonderful pictures for children's books about nature. Among her works are stunningly tender and accurate drawings for her father’s works, stories by Sokolov-Mikitov, Nikolai Sladkov, and other natural history writers.

Having lived 87 years, Elena Vitalievna Bianchi passed away in 2009.

Elena Vitalievna Bianki

For many years she was married to the son of a longtime friend and her father’s student, writer and chemist Alexei Alekseevich Liverovsky. Elena Bianchi and Alexei Liverovsky did not have any common children (the husband had a son, Alexey, and a daughter, Olga, from his first marriage).

Illustrations by Elena Bianchi for the story by Sokolov-Mikitov.

Even before the happy union with Liverovsky, in 1948 Elena Bianchi gave birth to a son, Sasha. Alexander

I was brought up in my grandfather’s family and adopted from him a love of nature and an interest in the world around me.

Archaeologist Alexander Mikhailovich Bianki is the only grandson of the writer.
Alexander Mikhailovich Bianki

became an archaeologist, studied the geological past of Russia. As an adult, he continued to live for many years in his grandfather's apartment in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, preserving his archives. Alexander Mikhailovich and Elena Vitalievna made a lot of efforts to create the Vitaly Bianchi Museum in his apartment, but they never managed to get the support of officials and open this museum.

Alexander Bianki studies the geological past of Russia.
In 1981, the son of Alexander Mikhailovich was born, who was named Valentin. Having chosen political psychology as his profession, Valentin Aleksandrovich Bianchi

Graduated from the University of St. Petersburg, defended his Ph.D. Currently, he is professionally involved in political technologies, advises clients, and conducts research within his own framework. According to the results of surveys conducted in the professional community, Valentin Bianchi has been repeatedly named one of the best political strategists in Russia.

Vitaly Vitalievich Bianchi

The son of the writer-naturalist Vitaly Vitalievich Bianki from the very beginning dreamed of becoming a scientist, like his grandfather and uncles. However, the war intervened in these plans: in 1943, a 17-year-old boy volunteered to go to the front. To begin with, he was sent to a military school. While studying was going on, the war ended in victory. And Vitaly Bianchi Jr. remained in the army. Only in 1950, after demobilization, he entered the biology department of Leningrad University, choosing the specialty of ornithologist.

In 1955, by assignment, Vitaly Vitalievich came to the Kandalaksha Nature Reserve in the Murmansk region and remained in these parts for the rest of his life.

Over the years of work, Vitaly Vitalievich Bianki published more than 200 scientific papers, over 400 popular science articles, 3 books. He has repeatedly acted as a consultant for documentaries about the nature of the Russian North. He defended his doctoral dissertation in the field of biological sciences, became an honorary citizen of Kandalaksha and an honored ecologist of the Russian Federation.

Vitaly Vitalievich Bianki at work (the process of ringing birds).
The main topic of his research is the birds of the White Sea. For many years, Vitaly Vitalievich headed the Northern Ornithological Station of the reserve. Together with fellow scientists and students who came to practice at the reserve, he studied bird migrations in the North-West of Russia.

We present to your attention a 20-minute documentary filmed in 2014. This is a rare video in the public domain. Vitaly Vitalievich talks about his work in it.

Now Vitaly Bianchi Jr. is 93 years old. Without looking back at his age, he continues to work enthusiastically, going on field expeditions as much as he can.

To the surprised questions of journalists, he simply answers: “To work hard and successfully, the work must be loved. So that a person treats it like a holiday. I live the way I want and am generally satisfied with my work. I make a living doing what I like, working with people I feel comfortable with. That's the whole secret."

Vitaly Vitalievich’s wife worked with him in the reserve and died several years ago. The couple had no children. They were replaced by students with whom he worked on field expeditions year after year. He happily passed on his experience and love for his native nature, inherited from his father, to these enthusiastic guys.

Vitaly Vitalievich Bianchi is passionate about work, forgetting about age.

Biysk period in the biography of Bianchi

After a series of misadventures, Vitaly settles in Altai, in Biysk, where Soviet power has already been established. Bianchi changes his last name (becomes Belyanin). Vitaly Valentinovich teaches at a local school, heads a museum, gives lectures on ornithology, engages in scientific research and writes stories. The Biysk period can be considered the beginning of Bianchi’s creative biography.

In 1921, in Biysk, Vitaly Valentinovich married for the second time. His chosen one is Vera Nikolaevna Klyuzheva, a French teacher who later bore her husband four children.

Personal life

Vitaly Bianki met his future wife in the Altai region when they worked together at the gymnasium. Vera Klyuzheva, the daughter of a doctor and a French teacher, gave birth to the writer four children - a daughter and three sons. The heirs, thanks to their father, also absorbed an interest in the surrounding nature.

Vitaly Bianchi and his wife Vera

Today, only one son of Bianka is alive and well - Vitaly, an ornithologist, Doctor of Science, working in the Kandalaksha Nature Reserve in the Murmansk Region. The man celebrated his 90th birthday last year, but despite his age, he is still absorbed in scientific work and traveling on field expeditions.

Family of Vitaly Bianchi

In one of his interviews, Vitaly Vitalievich says that his father, following the example of his parent, took his children to the village every summer. At home, in a city apartment, there lived canaries, dogs, and once a bat settled in.

Son of Vitaly Bianchi

The author of children's books had a positive attitude towards life and knew how to enjoy little things - the sunrise, spring streams and the burning gold of autumn. Traditions have taken root in the Bianchi family, which are still supported by their grandchildren whenever possible - they created New Year's toys exclusively with their own hands, and on the day of the spring equinox they baked larks from dough.

Vitaly Valentinovich loved to play with children, his daughter and sons were the first critics of his new works, and he happily whiled away the hours playing board games.

Arrests and the beginning of literary activity

In 1922, the threat of another arrest looms over Bianchi. With Vera and his six-month-old daughter, Vitaly returns to his hometown, now called Petrograd.

The literary gift of the young writer is rapidly developing in the circle of children's writers, led by Samuil Yakovlevich Marshak. The Petrograd period is a formative stage in Bianchi’s creative biography. Vitaly immerses himself in literature with enthusiasm. His stories about animals and plants are supported by knowledge from the fields of ornithology, biology, and natural history.

In 1923, readers become acquainted with Bianchi's first publications in print. The story “The Journey of the Red-Headed Sparrow” in the magazine “Sparrow”, and then the book “Whose Nose is Better?” receive approval from adult readers and children. Bianca's popularity is growing.

For participation in an underground organization (not proven) in 1925, Vitaly Valentinovich was sentenced to three years of exile.

From 1925 to 1935, the writer’s life was full of arrests, exiles, and suspicions of collaboration with underground organizations that undermined Soviet power.

The last exile to the Aktobe region (in 1935) was canceled thanks to the petition of Maxim Gorky’s wife E. Peshkova.

War years

Before the start of the war, a “literary school” was opened in Vitaly Valentinovich’s house, whose students became future famous writers. Bianchi, as a wise mentor, taught novice authors how to structure a work, talked about the forms and development of the plot, read the works of the circle members and made corrections to them.

A bad heart did not allow the writer to go to the front.

Having evacuated from besieged Leningrad to the Urals, Vitaly Valentinovich works a lot. He is absorbed in literary creativity.

In the post-war years, a large number of works came out from Bianchi’s pen: stories, cartoon scripts, feature films and filmstrips. The writer receives letters every day from young admirers of his literary talent.

Literary creativity

The home libraries of families where children are growing up are not complete if there are no books by Vitaly Valentinovich on the shelves.

Works for children occupy a special place in Bianchi’s creative biography. The writer's short stories are unique. Talking insects and plants not only help children learn about the wonderful world around them. By reading Bianca's fairy tales, a child learns to make friends, help loved ones out of trouble, and observe nature. In the writer’s works, children find answers to numerous questions: for example, how ice appears on rivers where birds fly for the winter.

More than a hundred books are in the bibliography of Bianchi’s creative biography. For children, the writer created a unique “Forest Newspaper”, which had no literary analogues. “Forest Newspaper” is news about the life of forest inhabitants presented in different genres (notes, advertisements, chronicles).

And how the “Sinichkin Calendar” helps parents, easily explaining the change of seasons to kids!

“Like an ant hurried home”, “Where crayfish spend the winter”, “First hunt”, “There were forest tales”, “Bear-head”, “Teremok” - these names are familiar to thousands of children from childhood.

Bianchi is the author of more than three hundred stories, fairy tales, novellas, and notes.

Vitaly Valentinovich also earned recognition from young radio listeners with the program “News from the Forest,” which aired monthly in the 50s of the last century.

He sought to awaken the ability to enjoy simple things - sunrise, birdsong, rain - and love for his native nature in his young readers.

In a short biography of Bianchi, one cannot fail to mention the book “Bird Identifier in the Wild,” which the writer did not have time to finish.

Literature

Vitaly wrote down his observations of the life of animals - these notes became the basis of his works about nature. The author's bibliography contains more than 300 fairy tales, stories, articles and stories, and 120 books were published. The writer once admitted in an address to readers:

“I tried to write in such a way that fairy tales would be interesting to adults as well. But now I realized that I was creating for adults who kept a child in their souls.”

Vitaly Bianchi's literary talent blossomed after returning from Altai to his hometown in 1922. In Leningrad, he joined the circle of children's writers Samuil Marshak and plunged headlong into creating a world woven from the chirping of birds, the greenery of grass and the adventures of animals.

Vitaly Bianki watches birds

The first fairy tale, “The Journey of the Red-Headed Sparrow,” was appreciated by young readers, and in gratitude they received a number of separate books: “Forest Houses,” “Mouse Peak,” “Whose Nose is Better?”

More than one generation of children read the miniature humorous stories “How the Ant Hurried Home,” “The First Hunt,” “Bear-Bashka,” “Teremok,” “Owl,” etc. In 1932, the writer’s first large collection, “Forest,” appeared in bookstores. There were also fables.”

Vitaly Bianki with pets

Young parents are sure to replenish their home library with the fairy tale “Titmouse’s Calendar,” which in a playful way introduces kids to the changing seasons and months. It’s a pleasure to explore the world together with Zinka the titmouse. On the pages of the book are answers to questions about why rivers freeze, when birds fly in and out, and many other interesting facts about animals and nature.

An extraordinary work that had no analogues in literature was the book “Forest Newspaper”. Vitaly Bianchi began this work in 1924; until 1958, 10 editions were published, which were constantly supplemented and changed in appearance.

Books by Vitaly Bianchi

An encyclopedia, a calendar, a game - this is all about the “Forest Newspaper”, consisting of 12 chapters, each dedicated to a month of the year. The writer put the material into newspaper genres: telegrams, advertisements, chronicles and even feuilletons containing news about the life of the forest appeared on the book’s page. "Lesnaya Gazeta" was warmly received by children in other countries - the book was translated into several languages.

Vitaly Valentinovich received additional recognition from the radio program “News of the Forest,” which was loved by young listeners in the 50s. Bianchi explained that the educational program was conceived as a gift to post-war children - “so that the children would not be bored, but would be happy.” “News from the Forest” was broadcast once a month; the program was also a kind of calendar.

Writer Vitaly Bianchi

The unfinished book “Bird Identifier in the Wild” put an end to the writer’s creative biography. In his diary Vitaly Bianchi wrote:

“There is a certain cheerful force living inside me. I see: everything that I had and still have that is good and bright in life... comes from this power. She is blessed both in me and in others - in people, birds, flowers and trees, in earth and in water.”

Last years

In the last years of his life, Vitaly Valentinovich was greatly hampered by numerous illnesses. He suffered two strokes, a heart attack, and his legs hurt a lot due to diabetes. And the writer so wanted to walk through his favorite forest.

Vitaly Valentinovich Bianchi died on June 10, 1959, at the age of 65. The writer is buried at the Bogoslovskoye cemetery.

The memory of Bianchi lives on in his books. Teachers still read the works of Vitaly Valentinovich to pupils and students of children's educational institutions. Streets and children's libraries in several large cities are named after Vitaly Valentinovich. And in the village of Lebyazhye there is a natural park “Polyana Bianki”.

Family history of Vitaly Bianchi, his real name

The Russian language was native to Vitaly Valentinovich Bianchi, and he himself considered himself a Russian person and a Russian writer. Meanwhile, the Bianchi family came to Russia only at the beginning of the 19th century. The future writer’s great-grandfather on his mother’s side was Swiss (from birth, Vitaly Valentinovich’s mother was Clara Emma Mathilde Blank). The paternal surname of the family was German - Weiss (translated as “white”).

Bianchi family: Valentin Lvovich, Klara Andreevna, Lev, Anatoly, Vitaly.

There is a family legend about how Weiss became Bianchi. The writer's great-grandfather on his father's side was a famous opera singer. In preparation for a tour of Italy, his agent convinced him to change his German surname to its Italian version - Bianko. This stage name, fixed in documents, was passed down to descendants.

Valentin Lvovich Bianchi, the father of the naturalist writer, was a famous zoologist. On the basis of the entomological and ornithological departments of the Zoological Museum of the Academy of Sciences, he was actively involved in scientific activities. Bianchi conducted not only theoretical but also practical work, studying insects and birds. In 1900 he was elected scientific secretary of the Russian Polar Expedition. In 1908 he worked as part of the zoological department of F.P.’s expedition. Ryabushinsky in Kamchatka.

Valentin Lvovich fully passed on his love for nature to his sons:

the eldest son Lev combined the work of a philologist and an entomologist;
the middle one, Anatoly, became a meteorologist, worked for many years at the Main Geophysical Laboratory;
Jr., Vitaly - naturalist, writer, the most famous of the Bianchi family, whose books were published in the USSR in millions of copies and continue to be published today.