A city written from memory. Chizhova E.S.

prose writer Elena Chizhova - Petersburger in the fourth generation; The author of the ten novels, including “The Time of Women” (Russian Bucher Award), “Lord of things”, “Orest and son”, “Terracotta old woman”. Petersburg, “the most beautiful, mysterious, mystical city of Russia”, one way or another (the place of action or one of the heroes) is present in every book of the writer. Petersburg becomes the city of memory - personal, family, historical. Elena Chizhova by bit restores the exciting story of her family. Grafa maid, a stove master, a brilliant dressmaker, a soldier, chief engineer, owner of a manufactory and a half-brood girl who “poisoned” courty friends in the attic, are four generations that keep the memory of the events of the twentieth century that fell to the share of Leningraders: Civil War, The repressions of the 1930s, blockade, evacuation, difficult post-war period.

“Miklometers thirty before the final station, my mother left the train... She got to Leningrad on a passing truck. One. At home, on the 1st Krasnoarmeyskaya, an empty room was waiting for it: an iron bed remained from pre-war furniture. However, the lack of furniture was not upset by the mother: the main thing is Leningrad. From the joys of the first days: everyone speaks Leningrad. This sense of language - pure, newly found after a long separation - remains for life. "