Yanka Kupala during his studies in St. Petersburg.
Gallery of Yanka Kupala
1921
Kupala among the participants of the drama circle of the Bobruisk teacher training courses.
Gallery of Yanka Kupala
Miusskaya sq. 6, Moscow, 125993, Russia
In 1915 Yanka Kupala entered the Moscow City People's University named after A. L. Shanyavsky, but the general mobilization prevented him from continuing his studies.
In 1915 Yanka Kupala entered the Moscow City People's University named after A. L. Shanyavsky, but the general mobilization prevented him from continuing his studies.
Yanka Kupala was a Belarusian poet and writer. He was the People's Poet of the BSSR, Academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus and the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. His poem Mal'chik i Letchik (A Boy and a Pilot) inspired Yuri Gagarin to conquer space.
Background
Yanka Kupala was born on July 7, 1882 in the village of Vyazynka in the Belarusian Catholic family of Dominik Onufrievich Lutsevich and Benigna Ivanovna Lutsevich (Volosevich). His parents were impoverished Belarusian gentry, renting land in landlordly areas. The Lutsevich family was known since the beginning of the 17th century. The poet’s grandfather rented land from the Radziwills, but was expelled from the territory by them.
Education
Between 1888 and 1890 Yanka Kupala studied at the village school in Senno, then at the private primary school in Minsk. In 1898, he graduated from a public school in Belaruchi. From 1909 to 1913, the poet studied in St. Petersburg at the educational training courses of A. Chernyaev. In 1915 Yanka Kupala entered the Moscow City People's University named after A. L. Shanyavsky, but the general mobilization prevented him from continuing his studies.
Kupala began his career in 1902 working as a home teacher, a clerk and an estate manager. Later, he got a job as a laborer at a local distillery.
The first works of Kupala were several lyric poems in Polish, published in 1903-1904 in the journal Ziarno (The Grain). The first poem in Belarusian Maya Dolya (My Fate) dates back to July 15, 1904. The poem Muzhyk (A Man) was published in 1905 in the Minsk newspaper Severo-Zapadny Krai (The Northwestern Land).
In 1906-1907, the poems Zіmoyu (In Winter), Nіkomu (To Nobody), Adplata Kahannem (Payment by Love) were written. In 1907, Yanka Kupala began the first short-term cooperation with the newspaper The Nasha Niva (Our Field).
In the fall of 1908, Kupala moved to Vilno, where he continued to work in the editorial office of The Nasha Niva. During this period, many poems were written - Maladaya Belarus' (Young Belarus), Zaklyataya Kvetka (An Enchanted Flower), Adc'vіtan'ne (Fading) and others. In 1908, in St. Petersburg, the first collection of Kupala was published under the name Zhaleyka (The Little Flute). Zhaleyka was twice confiscated by the authorities. In order not to spoil the reputation of The Nasha Niva, Kupala stopped working at the editorial office. On December 18, 1908, the poem U Pіlіpaўku (To Pilipovka) was published. In the same year, the poems Advechnaya Pes'nya (The Eternal Song) and Za Shto (What for?) were created.
In 1908-1909 the poet’s most famous poem A kto tam idyot? (And Who Goes There?) was written.
At the end of 1909, Kupala went to Petersburg. On March 13, 1910, the collection Gus'lyar (A Gusli player) was published. In April 1910, Yanka created the poem Kurgan (A Barrow). On July 8, 1910, the poem Advechnaya Pes'nya (An Eternal Song) was published as a separate book, and in August of the same year, Yanka wrote the drama Son na Kurgane (A Dream on the Barrow).
In the years 1911-1913, Kupala lived with his mother and sisters in the Akopy estate. Here he wrote more than 80 poems.
On June 3, 1912, Kupala completed his first comedy play Paulinka, which was published in St. Petersburg the same year and then staged first in St. Petersburg, then in Vilna. In the spring of 1913 the third collection of Kupala’s Shlyakham Zhytsya (A Road of Life) was published. It included the dramatic poem Na Papase. In June 1913, the historical poem Bandarouna was completed in Akopy, followed by the poems Magіla L'va (The Tomb of the Lion), Yana і Ya (Her and I), as well as the comedy play Prymakі. At the same time, the drama Razoryonnoe Gnezdo (The Ruined Nest) was written. It was published in Vilna in 1919.
In the autumn of 1913, Kupala returned to Vilna, where he worked as a secretary at the Belarusian Publishing Partnership. Later Yanka again began to work for the Nasha Niva. On April 7, 1914 Kupala became editor of the newspaper. In 1915, the poem Bac'kaўshchyna (The Fatherland) was written.
At the beginning of 1916, the poet was drafted into the army and joined the road construction detachment, in which he worked until the events of the October Revolution. At this time, Yanka Kupala settled in Smolensk. In the period from 1916 to 1918 he did not create a single work, but later in 1919 he wrote Vremya (The Time), Dlya Otchizny (For the Fatherland), Nasledstvo (The Inheritance) and Svoemu Narodu (To My People).
Over the next two decades, the following lyric collections of the Belarusian poet were published - Nasledstvo (The Inheritance; 1922), Bezymyannoe (The Nameless; 1925), Pesnya Stroitel'stvu (The Song of Construction; 1936), Belorussii Ordenonosnoj (To Order-Bearing Belarus; 1937), Ot Serdca (With All My Heart; 1940), and poems Nad Rekoj Oressoj (Over the Oressa River; 1933), Tarasova Dolya (Tarasov's Fate; 1939) and some others.
With the Occupation of Belarus by Nazi Germany in 1941, because of being very ill Kupala moved to Moscow and then to Tatarstan. Even from there he wrote poems supporting the Belarusian partisans fighting against Nazi Germany. He died in Moscow in 1942, aged 59, having fallen down the stairwell in Hotel Moskva.
Yanka Kupala was baptized in the Catholic church of Radashkovichi.
Politics
Formally, Kupala never belonged to a single party, but from a young age he knew the members of the Belarusian Hromada well. In one of his letters, he recalled that in 1904-1905 he met Vladimir Samoilo and Alexander Burbis, and that they supplied him with illegal literature.
Kupala proved himself to the greatest extent as an ideologist of Belarusian independence in 1919-1920. In the article "The Case of Independence of Belarus Over the Last Year", written in 1920, he acted as a real political scientist. In it, Kupala outlined two opposing forces that appeared in the Russian revolution. These were adherents of the social revolution and the national revolution.
Views
The lyrics of Yanka Kupala organically merged lyricism and a romantic worldview with the traditions of folklore, images, motifs of Belarusian folk songs, legends, and fairy tales. In his dramaturgy, Kupala showed the difficult fate of a landless peasant and his search for ways to a better future.
Membership
Kupala was a full member of the National Academy of Sciences of BSSR (nowadays The National Academy of Sciences of Belarus) and The National Academy of Sciences of USSR (nowadays The National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine).
Personality
The elegance of Yanka Kupala has been repeatedly noted by his contemporaries. His sublimity, lightness, elegant attitude to life, and at the same time the depth of thoughts always attracted attention.
Interests
rock collecting
Connections
Yanka Kupala married Vladislava Stankevich in 1916 in the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul in Moscow. The couple lived together for 26 years and did not have children, although they wanted to adopt a girl. 18 years after the death of her husband, Vladislava lived with an eternal memory of her beloved. On May 25, 1944, Stankevich opened the State Literary Museum of Yanka Kupala in Minsk.