eisenstein prokofiev correspondence levaco
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University of Texas Press
Society for Cinema & Media Studies
The Eisenstein-Prokofiev CorrespondenceAuthor(s): Ronald LevacoSource: Cinema Journal, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Autumn, 1973), pp. 1-16Published by: University of Texas Press on behalf of the Society for Cinema & Media StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1225055 .
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h e
Eisenstein Prokofiev
orrespondence
Ronald
Levaco
The Eisenstein-Prokofiev
correspondence
assembled
and
translated here
begins in July of 1939 and ends in February, 1946. It remained unpublished
in Russia
until
1961,
the
period
of
"de-Stalinization,"
when
it
appeared
in
the fourth number
of
the
journal, Sovietskaya
muzika
(Soviet Music).
The
letters
were
written
against
a
backdrop
of
what
may
be
termed the
most
arduous
period
of
recent Soviet
history,
a
period
marked
by
the
indelible
consequences
of the
Stalinist
purges
and the
incalculable
human
loss
of Rus-
sia's
grimmest
and costliest
war.
During
the
war
years,
many
Soviet artists
were
evacuated
from the Mos-
cow
area
and
relocated
in
the
picturesque
and remote
resort cities of the
Caucasus
or,
as
in
Eisenstein's
case,
in
the exotic
capital
of
Kazakhstan,
Alma-Ata,1 situated in the mountains of Central Asia, quite near the Chi-
nese
border
and some three thousand
kilometers from
Moscow. The
Soviets
settled
on
Alma-Ata
as the
site of
wartime relocation for
virtually
their en-
tire
film
industry,
as well as
VGIK,
the
All-Union
State
Institute of
Cine-
matography,
to
be
headed,
Eisenstein
hoped, by
his
former
teacher,
col-
league,
and
friend,
Lev
Kuleshov.2
Thus,
it
was
principally
while
they
were
secluded
in
such
hideaways
and
attempting
to
go
on
with their
work,
at the
direction
of the
State,
that
Eisenstein and
Prokofiev
exchanged
these
let-
ters,
in
what
must have
been
a
bucolic and
surreal
asylum
from
the
ravages
of a war
of annihilation
that
spread apocalyptically
before
them,
across the
plains which lay to the North and West and separated them from Moscow.
In
a
large
sense,
this
correspondence plays
out
elliptically
the
scenario
of
both
artists' lives
in their last
years.
(Eisenstein
died in
1948;
Prokofiev
in
1953,
on the
day,
ironically,
of Stalin's
death.)
One
wishes,
perhaps,
that
the letters
had
dealt
with
more
substantive
matters,
but with the
mails un-
certain
as
they
must have
been
and
with
the threat of
internal
security
mani-
fest,
one can
also
imagine
that the
correspondents
exercised
a
measure
of
restraint.
Prokofiev's
reference to
Meierhold
in
his
letter of
July
30,
1939,
1
Jay Leyda,
Kino: A
History
of
the
Russian and Soviet Film
(London:
George
Allen
&Unwin, Ltd., 1960), p. 374.
2
Ibid.,
p.
374.
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CINEMA
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for
instance,
seems
cautiously vague. Clearly,
Meierhold's
tragic "disappear-
ance"
must
have
been
correctly interpreted by
most
who knew
him,
yet
Prokofiev could only permit
himself
the briefest
allusion
to
the
"catastro-
phe"
that had befallen
the
great
director.
There
is,
for
instance,
no reference
in
these
letters to
the
speech
that
the
sixty-eight-year-old
Meierhold
had
read
before
the First
National Convention of
Theatrical Directors
on
June
15,
1939,
a
month and
a half
before
Prokofiev's
letter
marks
Meierhold's
arrest. His
theatre
had
been
shut down since
January,
1937.
Expected
to di-
rect
Prokofiev's
new
opera,
Semyon
Kotko,
in
1939,
Meierhold
apparently
declined
the "second
chance" offered
him
by
Stalin when
he
openly
char-
acterized
the
Soviet theatre
as
colorless and
boring
and
defended
himself
against-rather
than
confessing
to-the
charges
of "formalism"3
hat
had
al-
ready been leveled against him by Stalinist critics. Meierhold's was a coura-
geous speech
but
one
which
at once
lost
Semyon
Kotko its
director and at
the
same time
placed
him
in the
gravest
jeopardy.
Thus,
these
letters
are
best
read
against
a
background
of
Soviet
life in
those
pre-war
and wartime
years
and best understood
in
light
of
what
was
left "unsaid"
as well
as
"said."This
necessarily
brief introduction
is intended
to
provide,
however
sketchily,
such
a
background.
In
addition,
one
might
find
interesting
and
informative
Israel
Nestyev's
massive
"official"
biogra-
phy,
Prokofiev,
expanded
and revised
in
1960;
Victor Seroff's
Sergei
Proko-
fiev;
Prokofiev's
own
Autobiography,
Articles,
Reminiscences;
Marie
Seton's
biography, Sergei M. Eisenstein; Jay Leyda's history of the Soviet cinema,
Kino;
and
S.
M. Eisenstein's
Notes
of
a Film
Director,
a
somewhat
mislead-
ingly
titled
Soviet collection
of
general
essays
and
reminiscences,
in
which
his famous
essay
on
Prokofiev,
entitled
"P-R-K-F-V,"
appeared.
The
combined
efforts of
Eisenstein
and
Prokofiev
were
exemplary
from
several
standpoints.
First,
their work
was
and
remains
a
paragon
of
an inno-
vative
mix
of
film and
music
in
the feature
length
motion
picture.
Moreover,
each
one's
interest
in the
form and
technique
of
the other's
art
was
deep
and
unpretentious;
and while
it
is
not known
how
thoroughly
Prokofiev
might
have delved
into
Eisenstein's
theory
of
montage,
it
is
known,
for
instance,
that Prokofiev was both exploratory and ingenious enough to discover that
certain
technical difficulties
in
recording
sound for film
could
be orches-
trated and
exploited.
Despondent
after
a
discouraging
mixing
session with
Boris
Volsky,
the recordist
for
Alexander
Nevsky,
Prokofiev
discovered that
part
of
the
recording
made for
Nevsky
had
been
improperly
modulated
and
had
"spilled
over."
Apparently,
however,
Prokofiev had
already
learned
enough
of
working
in
the cinema
to
convert
errors
into
advantages,
for it
was
this
very
harsh
quality
of sound which he
incorporated
into the
rasp-
ing,
dissonant,
and
fright-filled
brass
motifs
for
the
Teutonic
knight
se-
quences
in
Alexander
Nevsky.4
3
Victor
Seroff,
Sergei
Prokofiev:
A
Soviet
Tragedy
(New
York:
Funk
&
Wagnalls,
1968),
pp.
230-32.
4
Israel
V.
Nestyev,
Prokofiev
(trans.
Florence
Jonas),
(Stanford,
California: Stan-
ford
University
Press,
1960),
p.
294.
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3
It
was Eisenstein
who later
described
the
general
method that Prokofiev
and he had
evolved
in
working
on
Nevsky. Projecting
the
rushes
for Proko-
fiev,
often
in
rough-cut,
Eisenstein would
explain
in
words, sounds,
and
ges-
tures what he
sought.
On
one
occasion,
for
example,
not
being
able
to im-
press
on
Prokofiev what he wanted for
the memorable
sequence
in
Nevsky
when
pipes
and
drums
are
played
for the
victorious
Russian
soldiers,
Eisen-
stein ordered
some
prop
instruments
constructed,
shot
these
being played,
and
projected
the
results for
the
composer. According
to Eisenstein's ac-
count,
Prokofiev
almost
immediately
handed
him
"an
exact musical
equiva-
lent to that
visual
image."5
"He
is
the
perfect composer
for
the
screen,"6
Eisenstein
often said of Pro-
kofiev,
characterizing
Prokofiev's
music
as
"amazingly plastic"7;
but
indeed,
if Prokofiev's music were termed "plastic," so could Eisenstein's films be
termed
"symphonic"-conceived
in
structure
around
a
central
theme
which
pulsated recurrently
through
a film and served
as
its
unifying
leitmotif.
In
the case of his
painfully
irreclaimable
Que
Viva Mexico
(on
which the
di-
rector worked
on location in
Mexico
from
December, 1930,
until
March,
1932),
Eisenstein had
virtually
generated
a
symphonic
structure with four
movements,
framed
by
a
prologue
and
epilogue,
and unified
by
the recur-
rent
visual
motif
of the
serape,
the
simple,
cloak-like
blanket
worn
by
the
Mexican Indian.
In
Fergana
Canal,
the next
film Eisenstein
was to
begin
in
1939
but
not
to
finish,
the visual motif
was to
be
water,
as
a
life-source
for
man.
The two
abortive
films-with
the successful
Alexander
Nevsky
(1938)
coming
between-bear
comparison
in a
number of
ways.
Both dealt with
the
transmigration
of
great
civilizations,
as
symbolized
by
the
image
of bur-
ial. In
Que
Viva
Mexico the
burial
exemplified by
the
prologue
was
of one
man;
in
Fergana
Canal
it was
to
be
the
burial
of
thousands. Both films ex-
plored
a tension
between
the
physical
plasticity
and
historical
autonomy
of
man,
on the one
hand,
and the static
immobility
of
stone and
horrifying
in-
anition of
sand,
on
the other.
Both
films
adumbrated the
haunting question
before
Eisenstein,
as
any
Soviet artist-the
choice
between
relativism,
on the
one hand, and absolutism, on the other. Both films dealt with the protean
struggle
of
humanity
against petrifaction
and
death. Both films
were to re-
veal
a
rather
bleak
vision of
history
as
decadence and
blight-a pessimism
of
which Eisenstein
had
spoken
prior
to
leaving
Hollywood
for Mexico
in
early
December
of 1930. And
both
films
remained
unfinished.
Fergana
Canal,
the
subject
which
begins
this
heretofore untranslated cor-
respondence
between
Eisenstein and
Prokofiev,
was to have
been an
epic
film which dealt with
a
region long
fascinating
to Eisenstein-Central Asia.
In
a
letter
to
Jay
Leyda,
the
film scholar and
Eisenstein's
translator,
written
in
1939,
Eisenstein
described the
project
as a
"big
film .
. .
starting
with
5
Leyda,
Kino,
p.
351.
6
Seroff,
Sergei
Prokofiev,
p.
217.
7
Sergei
Eisenstein,
Notes
of
a Film
Director
(trans.
X.
Danko),
(London:
Lawrence
&
Wishart,
1959),
p.
163.
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Tamarlaine
the Great
(Timur)
on
the
background
of
the
architectural mar-
vels
of
Samarkand,
Bukhara,
etc."8
Coming
shortly
after
the
release,
on
November 23, 1938, of Alexander Nevsky, Fergana Canal should be con-
sidered in
the
political
ethos in
which Eisenstein
conceived
it.
The late
1930's
in
the Soviet Union
were
years
of terror
for the
members
of
the
film
industry,
as,
indeed,
for
millions of
Soviet citizens.
Beginning
with
the
assassination
of
Sergei
Kirov in
Leningrad
in
1934,
a
period
of
xenophobia
and
repression
had settled
over the
Soviet
film
industry
and all
the
arts.9
Kirov
had
been the
party
head
of
the
Leningrad
district
(Fried-
rich
Ermler
later
based
his film
A
Great
Citizen,
released
on
February
13,
1938,
on Kirov's
life),10
and
Stalin seemed to have chosen
the incident
of
Kirov's
assassination as
grounds
for the
expulsion
of
"undesirable"
foreign-
ers and the arrest of numbers of suspected Trotskyist conspirators. It was
during
this
period,
for
instance,
that
Jay Leyda,
an
American,
left Russia.11
During
1936-37, Eisenstein,
who was
recovering
from
smallpox,12
had
continued
sporadically
to revise
his
ideologically
"unripe"
Bezhin
Meadow,
with the
help
of the
writer,
Isaac
Babel,
one of
the
Soviet
Union's most
extraordinary
talents,
himself
shortly
to
be
arrested
and
imprisoned.l3
On
March
17,
1937,
Eisenstein's
nemesis,
Boris
Shumyatsky,
the
then head of
the
Soviet film
industry,
halted the
production
of
Bezhin
Meadow
and
is-
sued
a
vicious attack on its director. It was
this
denunciation
which
precipi-
tated
Eisenstein's
humiliating
confession,
"The
Mistakes of Bezhin
Mea-
dow." Later, in the disquieting atmosphere of Stalinist intimidation, Shum-
yatsky
himself
was dismissed
on
January
9,
1938,
and
demoted to
an
ig-
nominious
post
in
charge
of
a
small
film studio.14
In
the
autumn
of 1937 Eisenstein was
permitted
to
resume work and
be-
gan
collaborating
on the
scenario
of Alexander
Nevsky
with
Piotr
Pavlen-
ko.15 For
Eisenstein
Nevsky
might
well
be termed
a
project
of
ideological
accommodation,
as
well
as an
attempt
at
the reclamation of his
eroded ar-
tistic
pre-eminence.
In
a
period
of
great political
turmoil and
uncertainty,
Eisenstein seemed
keenly
aware that he
needed
a
major
triumph
to coun-
tervail the slanderous
charges
of formalism
consistently
leveled
against
him
by such formidable adversaries as a Shumyatsky and Khersonsky, a party
film critic.
As a
grim
affirmation
of the
peril
to
any
dissident
artists,
Vladi-
mir Nilsen
(a
former student
of Eisenstein and author of
The
Cinema as
a
Graphic
Art),
Isaac
Babel,
Sergei
Tretyakov,
and Vsevolod
Meierhold
were
8Marie
Seton,
Sergei
M.
Eisenstein
(New
York: A.A.
Wyn,
Inc.,
1952),
p.
392.
9
Leyda,
Kino,
p.
338.
10
Ibid.,
p.
290.
11
Ibid.,
p.
338.
12
Ibid.,
p.
334.
13
Ibid.,
p.
338.
14 Ibid., pp. 339-40. It is crucial to note, Jay Leyda reports, on reading this manu-
script,
that
contrary
to
official
accounts,
Bezhin
Meadow was
completed
before its
con-
demnation and
should
be
regarded
as a lost
finished
film
rather
than as a halted
produc-
tion.
15
Seton,
Sergei
M.
Eisenstein,
p.
379.
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5
all
arrested
during
these
years,
1938-39,
and,
as
far as can
be
deduced,
ex-
ecuted
soon after.16 All
had been
fairly
close associates
of Eisenstein.
For an imperiled Eisenstein, the war against the fascists called for the
patriotically
galvanizing
theme of
Nevsky,
which
could
protect
him
against
further
ideological
harassment and
permit
him to return to
work
unencum-
bered.
It is in view
of
this
political
climate that
Fergana
Canal
might
also
appropriately
be
appraised,
for
it
is
likely
that Eisenstein chose
the
Fergana
Valley
as
his location
not
only
because
it
represented
a
historical,
epic
metaphor
of the
struggle
of
humanity against
nature and the
struggle
of
Asian Russia
against conquerers
like
Tamerlaine
but
also
because
he could
culminate
the film with a
paean
to the
construction of the
170-mile-long
Fergana
Canal
in
Uzbekistan
(the
Uzbek
S.S.R.)
in
1939. The Canal had
been constructed in the name of Stalin in the incredible duration of six
weeks,
using
a
compulsory
labor force
of
Uzbeks.
It seems
likely
that this
futile
struggle
of
humanity against
the
intransigent
stone
and
sand
suggested
to
Eisenstein the mental
images
of the last
nightmarish
years
of his
life and
his
own
struggle against
the
retrograde,
intransigent
elements
in
Soviet
so-
ciety.
Each
of Eisenstein's last
three
films
reflects the
glint
of a
two-edged
sword,
at once an
appeasement
to Stalin and
his
troglodytes
and
a
veiled
attack.
Thus,
in
the wake of the acclaim of
Alexander
Nevsky,
which
finally
se-
cured for Eisenstein his Order
of
Lenin,17
he
again
sought
the
collaboration
of Prokofiev for Fergana Canal.l8 There seems little question that Eisen-
stein's
deep
esteem and affection
for
Prokofiev
were
reciprocated.
Yet,
as
the
exchange
of letters
just
before
the
last
indicates,
Eisenstein's
determina-
tion
to
press
toward
completion
of the second
part
of Ivan
superseded
even
considerations
of Prokofiev's
failing
health.
By
then,
Eisenstein
and
Proko-
fiev were
immersed
in
Ivan.
A
few
days
after
conducting
his
great
Fifth
Symphony
on
January
13, 1944,
Prokofiev
apparently
fell while
visiting
friends and
suffered
a
brain concussion.19
Nowhere
in
Nestyev's
lengthy
"official"
biography
is the
diagnosis
described,
except
as
simply
"a
grave
illness."
However,
according
to Seroff's
well-written,
but
largely
undocu-
mented biography, doctors diagnosed Prokofiev's illness as an extreme case
of
hypertension
which
led to
an
excessive flow of
blood to the
brain and
caused
his fall.20 After a
long
confinement at a
sanitorium
near
Moscow,
Prokofiev
spent
the
summer of 1945 at the
government-maintained
Com-
poser's
Home
in
Ivanovo,
from which
he
had
previously
written
Eisenstein
on
July
31,
1944.
As Eisenstein
must
have
known,
Prokofiev's
life
had
be-
come a constant
struggle
against
severe headaches and endless
convales-
16
Steven
P.
Hill,
"Inquisition
in the Other
Eden,"
Film
Comment,
Vol.
5,
No.
1,
Fall, 1968,
p.
22.
17
Leyda, Kino,p. 351.
18
Ibid.,
p.
349.
Khersonsky,
however,
had
already
attacked the
scenario in the
March, 1938,
issue
of the
leading
Soviet
film
journal,
Iskusstvo Kino.
19
Seroff,
Sergei
Prokofiev,
p.
265.
20
Ibid., p.
267.
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cences,
during
which there
were
long periods
when Prokofiev was not
per-
mitted
by
his
doctors to
work
more than two hours a
day.21
Nevertheless,
Eisenstein seems to have withheld his solicitude long enough to urge again
Prokofiev's
completion
of
the
score
for Ivan.
It
was this letter from
Eisenstein
which
occasioned
the rather
terse
reply
from
Prokofiev's
long-time
companion,
Mira
Mendelsohn,
inseparable
from
the
composer
from 1941
until his
death
in
1953. Little is
known
for
certain
about
Mira Mendelsohn
and
Prokofiev,
except
that
they
lived
together
as
married,
although
Prokofiev's
estranged
wife,
Lina
Llubera-Prokofieva,
a
woman of mixed
Spanish-Russian
ancestry,
was
still
apparently living
in
Russia at the time.
Prokofiev's
biographers
take contentious
views on
the
issue. The
Soviet
biographer, Nestyev,
scarcely
mentions the
matter,
while
the emigre biographer, Seroff, uses the issue to dramatize his obvious repug-
nance for what
he
feels to
be
the
expediency
of
man's
acts
when
living
under totalitarianism.
Seroff,
however,
weakens
his
case for desertion
by
resorting
to innuendos rather than
documented conclusions.
In
short,
Seroff
seems to
imply
that
Prokofiev's motive for
deserting
his
wife,
who man-
aged
at
grave
risk to maintain contact
with her
aging
mother
in
Nazi-occu-
pied
Paris,
was
simply
the
fear
that
Beria
might
wreak
reprisal against
them
both.
What
is
known
is
that Mira Mendelsohn
was,
in
fact,
the niece
of
Lazar
Kaganovich,
the
then
Minister
of
Heavy
Industry
and a
close confi-
dant
of Stalin.
Thus,
Seroff
implies
purely
through
innuendo
and
conjec-
ture that Stalin, who was then
openly
living
with
Kaganovich's
sister,
might
have
looked with favor on Prokofiev's
intimate
relationship
with
Mira
Men-
delsohn-favor,
in
other
words,
particularly
invaluable
during
a
period
of
the
severest
persecution
of artists and
shortly
after
Prokofiev's latest
effort,
Semyon
Kotko,
had
been
mercilessly
attacked
by
the
official
press
for
its
lack
of
understanding
of
the Soviet
people.22
And
finally,
of
course,
what
Seroff
hints is
that Prokofiev was
privy
to this
information and calculated
his
relationships-a
cruel
implication
for
which he offers
no
basis
in fact.
Moreover,
according
to
Seroff,
Prokofiev's desertion of
his first
wife
is
further vitiated
by
her arrest
in
1948
during
the
post-war
purges
by
Stalin.
Based on
fairly
reliable
sources,
Lina Llubera-Prokofieva
probably spent
some
fifteen
years
in
confinement
in
Siberia,
after
which she
was tried
for
high
treason, convicted,
sentenced
to
death,
and
finally
had
her
sentence com-
muted
to
life
imprisonment.23
Her
arrest had
been
precipitated by
her
per-
sistent
attempts
to
apply
for
permission
to leave Russia
with her two sons.
Ultimately,
the matter of
Prokofiev's
estrangement
from Lina
remains
moot
and
mysterious, although
admittedly
it
may
reflect
a
side of the
composer's
character
that these
letters
to Eisenstein
cannot reveal.
There
are,
of
course,
untold
dimensions
of
personality
and
collaboration
which
this brief
correspondence
between
Eisenstein
and
Prokofiev-though
21
Ibid.,
p.
268.
22
Ibid.,
p.
249.
23
Ibid.,
pp.
292-296.
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7
all
we
have-does
not
reveal. These
fragments
of the
writings
of both
artists
provide only cursory insights
into
the character of their
relationship
and
do
not reveal, for instance, the state of their
being.
Their artistic
compatibility
can
only
be
inferred from
the
correspondence-and
only
with
hindsight.
However,
the hardened
ego-drive
of each man for
artistic
as well
as
physi-
cal
perseverence
and
survival flashes
occasionally, arcing
between
the
lines.
But
what reveals
itself
most
remarkably-despite
their
endured
hardships
and,
perhaps,
the
expedient
decisions each
might
have made-is each
man's
almost
unswerving
indomitability.
Under
the kind of
unrelenting
pressure
from
above which
ultimately
suffocates
any
artist
encysted
in
the
machina-
tions of
a
sclerotic,
diseased
social
organism
such
as
Stalin's
Russia,
the
health,
first,
of
Eisenstein, then,
of
Prokofiev,
had
begun
to
fail.
Thus,
clear-
ly,
the circumstances for Prokofiev's motives and actions
during
these last
years
of
his
life
were,
at
best,
extenuating.
His
biographer,
Seroff,
however,
portrays
a
compromised
Prokofiev
who,
already seriously
ill,
declined to
write a
ballet
based
on
Othello
with
the words: "It
would
mean
to live
in
an
atmosphere
of
ill
feeling,
and
I
don't want to have
anything
to
do with
Iago."24
Thus,
Seroff
portrays
a
culpable,
capitulated figure
in
Prokofiev,
seeking only
those
themes in
which he said he found
"depths
of
ideas,
hu-
manitarian
attitudes,
keen
humor,
and clear
images
of man
and
his
striving
for
good
and
justice."25
In
the
end,
Seroff
portrays
a
once-spirited, explora-
tive
Prokofiev,
who had
always sought
new
forms,
seeking palliatives
in
what sounded like a
predictable description
of
soporific,
socialist realist
art.
In all
Prokofiev wrote
some
twenty-nine
musical
numbers
for
the cinema.
Yet,
such had
been
the nature of his association
with
Eisenstein that
when
he
was asked
by
Boris
Volsky
in
1948 to
write the
music for
another
film,
Prokofiev shook
his head: "Since the
death
of
Sergei
Eisenstein,
I
consider
my
motion
picture
activities
terminated."26
24
Ibid.,
p.
277.
25
Ibid.,
p.
277.
26Ibid.,p. 304.
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9
2)
The
victory
of the
sands
(the
finale of Part
1).
3)
The
advance of the sand
(through
the
second
part
and
in
particular
in
the finale:
by
the
death of the
girl, N.B.-Through
her
dance-
through
the
background
too.).
The
third
group-this
is
Tokhtasyn's
song (ephemeral),
and
apparently,
somehow
coming through
her
(the
song)
the theme of
labor
in
Part 3.
In
general,
we shall
have to make
the
third
part
like our battle3-2-3
musical
knots and
the rest is
up
to
Volsky4,
who
is
of
course
with us
again.
Here
very
cursorily
are mes
decirs a
ce
sujet.
I
beg you
to
write
me
your
thoughts
about
everything
at
once,
as
in the
beginning
of
August,
around the
tenth,
I
am
flying
out to the construction
site
of
the
Fergana
Canal.
I
embrace you and anxiously await your letter.
Yours,
Sergei
Eisenstein
Moscow,
Potylikha,
54-6
Apt.
7,
Bldg.
I.T.R. Mosfilm
Write
special delivery.
2.
Prokofiev
to
Eisenstein
Kislovadsk 30
July
(19)39
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
I
was
awfully happy
when I
saw a
first-class American
envelope
with
Sergei
M.
Eisenstein on
it,
but
after
reading
the contents I
became
very
upset,
since it
appears
that
the
pleasure
of
working
with
you
this
time is
not to be fated for me. I am presently up to my ears in an opera which
they
have
just begun
to learn.5 As
soon
as
that is
finished,
rehearsals
will
begin,
while
concurrently
there is-the
production
of Romeo
and
Juliet
in
Leningrad
with the eventual
coming
of the
Leningrad
company
to
Moscow. To
take
up
such a
large
theme
as
yours
is
impossible:
it is
difficult to
split
into
two;
one's
thoughts
wouldn't
be
there.
Don't
be
surprised
that
I've switched to
opera.
I
continue
to consider
cinema
the most
contemporary
of the
arts,
but
specifically
because of its
novelty
in
our
country
we
haven't
yet
learned
to value
integral
parts
and
consider
music
to
be
some
sort of
appendage,
not
deserving
of
any
particular attention. And meanwhile, in order to write such a thing as
"sands and
water,"
one
must
invest
a
great
deal in
it. That
is
why
I
have,
in
the old
style,
taken
up
with
opera,
where
music
already
holds its
established
place:
the
work
is surer.
By
the
way,
after the
catastrophe
with
M[eierhold]
who was
to have
staged
my opera, my
first
thought
was to
throw
myself
at
your
feet
and
ask
you
to take over its
staging
yourself.
The theater
was
very receptive
to
my
idea,
but
you
were
in Asia with the
prospect
of a
long project-and
the
idea
had to be abandoned.6
I
hope
that
in
answer to this
letter
you
won't curse me
or
if
you
do curse
3
Reference to
Nevsky
battle
sequence.
4
Sound
mixer for
both
Nevsky
and Ivan.
5
Semyon
Kotko.
6
The
opera
Semyon
Kotko was
eventually staged
by
S.G.
Birman.
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me,
that
it
won't be for
long,
and we'll
meet
in the
very
near
future,
be it in
film
or
in
opera-I
somehow
a
priori
believe
in
Eisenstein-as an
opera
regisseur
I
embrace
you
tenderly
and
wish
you
a
tremendous
success,
Yours,
S. Prokofiev
3. S. M.
Eisenstein
to S.
S.
Prokofiev
23
December
41
My
dear friend
Sergei Sergeevich
I
am
writing hurriedly;
the
director Petrov7
is
leaving today
to
see
you
in
Tibilisi
(Tiflis)
and
is
taking
this
message.
I
have not written
by
post-not
counting
on
it
getting
to
you.
Facts: Terrible8is
to
be
shot.
I
shall
begin,
it
appears,
at
the end of
the
winter.
Currently,
I
am
completing
the scenario
and will send it to you on the next occasion. At the beginning of next year,
it
will
already
be
possible
to
come
to
agreements-to
get together,
etc.
It
has
two
parts-entertaining
at
the
highest
level.
Comrade
Composer
is
offered
great
freedom in
any
direction.
How
are
you
both
living?
We have
situated ourselves
quite
comfortably.
Whatever
concerns
the
shooting,
we'll
be
shooting,
it
seems,
in
various
locations-not
excluding
Moscow
Am
impatiently
awaiting
some
news from
you.
Write to:
Alma-Ata,
Ob'edinennaya
Kinostudio.
Petrov will tell
you
in
colorful
detail
about the
difficulties
of our move
and of our life here.
I
embrace
you
most
sincerely.
Heartfelt
regards
to
your
life's
companion.
Yours
always,
Sergei
Eisenstein
4. S. M.
Eisenstein
to
S. S.
Prokofiev
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich
Nikolai
Mironovich,9
who has
promised
to
see
you
and to
show
you
the
scenarios,
is on his
way
to
Tibilisi.
I
hope you
will
like
him
The
work on
the
music can start
whenever
you
wish.
I'll
begin shooting
toward
the end
of
the
summer. You can
begin
either in
the
Spring,
in
the
Summer,
or in
the
Fall,
or
even
in
the
Winter-whenever
most
convenient
for you.
You can come to an
arrangement
about
everything
with
Nikolai Mirono-
vich. If
money
is
needed,
we
can draw
up
a
contract.
Please write us
about how
you're
getting
on. I've
heard
that
you
have
completed
War and
Peace-am
very
curious.10
7
Vladimir
Mikhailovich
etrov,
ilm
director.
8
Russians
frequently
use
grozny
(literally,
stem)
alone
to refer
to Ivan
IV. Eisen-
stein's Ivan
Grozny
was
conceived
in three
parts,
only
two of
which
had
been
completed,
the first
in
1944;
the
second,
while
completed
in
1945,
was
not released
until 1958.
Prokofievwrote scores
to both
parts
of
Ivan
Grozny.
Eduard
Tisse and
Andrei N.
Moskvin
served as cameramen-Tisse for exteriors,Moskvinfor interiors.Eisenstein was working
on
the third
part
when he died
of heart
failure on
February
10,
1948.
9
Nikolai
Mironovich
Sliozberg-Head
Editor
for
Ivan
the
Terrible.
10
Prokofiev's
opera
with
a
libretto
by
Prokofiev and
Mira
Mendelsohn-Prokofieva,
appeared
in
its first
version in
1943
and
its
second
in
1952.
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11
A
heartfelt
embrace,
Yours
always, Sergei
Eisenstein
Best
regards
to
the
family
Alma-Ata
3
March
42
5. S.
S.
Prokofiev
to
S. M. Eisenstein
Tibilisi
House of Communications
Poste
Restante
29 March 1942
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
Nikolai
Mironovich
brought
your
letter
just
at
the
right
time: I
am
completing the last bars of War and Peace and therefore, in the very near
future,
I'll
be
ready
to
bend to
your yoke.
In
view of the fact
that
Sliozberg
is
about
to
return
in
the end of
April,
Mira and I
are
planning
to
leave
with
him. He
promises
to
deliver
the
scenario
to
me
any day-I'm
waiting
for
it
with
aroused interest.
I
am
affectionately "looking
forward"
[sic]
to
our
work
together
and
embrace
you.
Yours,
S.
Prokofiev
Petrov
carried
your
letter,
written
in
December,
exactly
three
months
and delivered
it after
the letter written
in
March.
6. S. S.
Prokofiev
to S. M. Eisenstein
Semipalatinsk,
4
December
1942
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
I
am
sending
you
a
list
of
the first
seven scenes of War and Peace.
I'll
send the
rest off
tomorrow. Tomorrow we're
planning
to
push
off
for
Moscow,
since I've
finished the work
on the film.
I
embrace
you.
Heartfelt
regards
from Mirochka.
Yours,
S.P.
Be
kind
enough
to
find out from
Sveshnikov"l
whether
he's
returned
the
books
I
left
behind
to the
library.
7.
S.
M.
Eisenstein to
S.
S.
Prokofiev
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich
I am
sending
you my
warmest
regards
on the faintest rose-tinted
paper
to
be
found
in
all Alma-Ata
in addition to an article
about
you.12 Anything
that
might
not
please you-strike
out
mercilessly.
With
heartfelt
regards
a
madame,
Toujours
a
vous,
Sergei
Eisenstein
7 December
1942
11
Boris
Aleksandrovich
Sveshnikov,
assistant director on
Ivan
the
Terrible.
12
The
reference is
to the
article
P-R-K-F-V
originally published
as an introduction
to
the
biography
Sergei
Prokofiev,
His Musical
Life
by
Israel
Nestyev, published
in the
U.S.A.
by
Alfred
A.
Knopf,
1946.
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8.
Telegram:
S. M.
Eisenstein to S.
S.
Prokofiev
[4
January
1943]
Heartiest
congratulations.
I
embrace
you.
Confirm
receipt
article.
Await
your
arrival.
Eisenstein.
9.
Telegram:
S.
S.
Prokofiev
to
S.
A.
Eisenstein
[20
January
1943]
Splendid
article
received. Thanks
for
the
telegram.
Samosudl3
supposes
he
will
do the
opera
in
the
Spring.
We're
preparing
to
leave for
Alma-Ata
on
the 19th.
We
embrace
you.
Prokofiev.
10.
S. M.
Eisenstein to
S. S.
Prokofiev
[9
July
1943]
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich
I
beg
you
very,
very
much not to leave this
place
until the
recording
of
the
Chorus
of the
Oprichniksl4-without
you
the chorus and the
recording
will
be
hopelessly
botched
(if
you
know
what
I
mean ).
They
are
literally
flogging
themselves
to
death in
rehearsal
so
far,
and
therefore
it
would be
highly, highly
desirable to
plan your
departure
not for
Monday
but
for
the
next
day
on which
transportation
is
available.
For
my part,
I shall
apply
pressure
with all
available means.
I
await
your reply.
Yours
sincerely,
Sergei
Eisenstein
11.
Telegram:
S. M. Eisenstein to S. S.
Prokofiev
[7
October
1943]
Have
wired to Perm'
a
request
to
come
to
Alma-Ata at
end
October.
Waiting.
Embrace
you
both.
Sergei
Eisenstein.
12.
S.
S.
Prokofiev
to
S.
M.
Eisenstein
Moscow,
Postal
Department
No.
25,
General
Delivery
17
November 1943
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich:
I want to hope that you are not too angry with me for not coming to
Alma-Ata.
I
wasn't
able
to.
And at
present, preparation
for
two
symphonic
concerts
has
begun:
one
being
War and Peace
with artists from the
Bolshoi
Theater under
the
direction of
Samosud,
the
second selected
from others
of
my
new
composi-
tions.
Both
will
be
given
in
December.
I
am
sending you
"Peschnoe
Deistvo"15
and
heartily
request
that
you
1)
send
me
detailed
dispositions
of
those
pieces
that
I
can do
prior
to
your
arrival,
2)
wire me
precisely
what
part
of
January
it
will be that
you
will
need
me.
The fact
is that the
Kirovskii
Theater
will be
starting
rehearsals
13
Conductor
of orchestra
for
premiere
performance
of War and
Peace at Bolshoi
Theater,
Moscow,
on
7
June
1945.
14
The
"Pledge
of the
Oprichniks"-fragment
from
the
first reel of Ivan.
15
A
fragment
from the
first
part
of
Ivan.
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13
on
Zolushka
and Duen'al6 and
I'll
need to
go
to
Perm'.
I'll
arrange
my
time
depending
on
your
telegram.
We're both very anxious to see you, await your arrival, are planning
to
see
Ivan-and
embrace
you
to
our hearts.
Yours,
S.
Prokofiev
13.
Telegram:
S. M.
Eisenstein
to
S. S.
Prokofiev
16
January
1944
Sound
recording put
off till last
part
of
March.
Regards,
Eisenstein
14. S. S.
Prokofiev
to
S. M. Eisenstein
(handwritten
in
pencil)
To:
Eisenstein,
Alma-Ata
7 March 1944
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
A
long
time without
news from
you.
How do
your
labors
progress?
Will
it
be
long
before
you
and the whole
grand
outfit will
be
coming
to
Moscow?
Little
reaches
me
regarding your
work,
but
what does
is
good.
The
change
of the
artistic direction
of the
Bolshoi
Theater has
been
expressed
in
War
and Peace
being
delayed
somewhat,
as Pazovskii
has
to
revive the
classical
repertoire
with
the
performance
of a
couple
of classical
operas.
For
my
placation they
are
staging
Zolushka,
with rehearsals to
begin
this
month,
the intention to
prepare
it
for
the
start of the fall season.
Drop
me a
line,
not to the
9th
postal
zone
but
the
159th;
the former is
located
in the Hotel
Moscow where
I'm
staying;
I
prefer
to
receive
my
by general
delivery,
rather than
having
it sent to the hotel
room,
which,
one not-so-fine
day,
we
may
be
asked to
vacate.
Mirochka and I
often
think of
you
and we are
missing
those
pleasant evenings
which we
spent
with
you
at
Alma-Ata.
I
embrace
you,
S.
Prokofiev
15.
Telegram:
S. M. Eisenstein
to
S.
S.
Prokofiev
30
July
1944
Categorically
beg
you
to
come at once. Based
[on]
your
agreeing
to
come
by my arrival, time limits have been fixed. A fortnight's delay will upset
all
my plans
for
the
release of
both
parts.17
I ask it
very
much.
Sergei
Eisenstein
16. S. S.
Prokofiev
to
S.
M. Eisenstein
Ivanovo,
31
July
[19]44
To: Eisenstein
Moscow
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
I
joyfully
greet
your
return
to
Moscow.
I
anticipated
that
you
would
call
16Referenceto Zolushka,a ballet of Prokofiev's,with librettoby N.D. Volkova,and
Duen'a-Betrothal
in
a
Monastery-a
comico-lyric opera
with
libretto
by
S.S.
Prokofiev
and
M.A.
Mendelsohn-Prokofieva.
The
premiere
performances
were
held
in
Leningrad
in
1946.
17
Reference
to
Ivan the
Terrible.
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me out
at the
beginning
of
July
and was
waiting
for the
promised
materials
from
Indenboml8
at
the
end of
June.
At
present,
I'm
busily
at
work on
the
Fifth Symphony, the composing of which has gained momentum which I
cannot
interrupt
under
any
circumstances
and switch to
Ivan
the Terrible.
I
am
certain
that
you
will understand
my
position.
On
the
15th of
August
I'll
be
in
Moscow
and will devote
all
my
energies
to our
film-I
shall
work
quickly
and
exactly.
At
the
same
time,
I
am
writing
to
Indenbom
that the contract
expired
in
1943,
and
I'm
asking
that he formalize our
collaboration
anew.
Support
me
in
this
regard.
I
embrace
you
vigorously.
Heartfelt
regards
from
M[ira]
A[lexsandrovna].
Yours,
S.
Prokofiev
17. S. M. Eisenstein to S. S. Prokofiev
[22
September
1944]
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich,
I
am
sending
you
"Kazan"19
with the
timing
and
markings
to
help
you
remember
what is
going
on
and what is needed in
terms of
its
character.
I
embrace
you,
Sergei
Eisenstein
18. S. M. Eisenstein to S.
S.
Prokofiev
My
dear
and
beloved
Sergei
Sergeevich,
I
have
learned to
my great
concern that
you
are not
feeling better yet.
I
am familiar with
and share
your "Molieresque" response
to
doctors,
but
I
think
that
you
still
ought
to
have
yourself
examined.
I
am
already
here a
week-it's
very
pleasant
now
in
Barvikha:
everything
is
re-built
as in
pre-
war
days.
Why
don't
you
and Mira Aleksandrovna
arrange
to come
here-
Khrapchenko
can
arrange
it
(Okhlopkov
and
Ruben Simonov
are here
already);
Bol'shakov,
so
far
as I
know,
is
ill,
otherwise it could
be
arranged
through
him.
All
week
I've
been
ill
with
the
grippe
and for this
reason do
not
go
for walks and do
not
enjoy
life
as much as it
is
possible
to
do
here.
I
anxiously
await
news from
you
and
hope
that it will
be
good
news.
I embrace you vigorously. Heartfelt regards to M[ira] A[leksandrovna].
With
love,
Sergei
Eisenstein
Barvikha
8/11/[19]45
19. S.
M. Eisenstein
to S. S.
Prokofiev
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich,
I
am
writing
in a
great
hurry,
so
please
forgive
my writing
in
pencil.
Besides
the
hurry-I
write
in
great
concern-both
for
your
health
and our
mutual work.
Apparently
you
are in
poor
health
once
again,
since
I
cannot
conceive
a
single
reason for
postponement
from
the
beginning
of
August
to
October:
I have
gotten
so accustomed to
trusting
your
promises.
This
post-
ponement
puts
my work in a catastrophic position. Based on your promise
18
Lev
Aronovich
Indenbom,
assistantdirector of
Ivan
the Terrible.
19
Fragment
of
scenario
from
part
one
of
Ivan.
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CINEMA
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15
of the
music
for the
dance20 we
have constructed
corresponding
sets
and
have
hastened
all our
plans
and deadlines
for arrival
of
actors
for
this shoot-
ing. Now everything is going to come apart at the seams, so that you'll
never
pick
up
the
pieces
again.
I am
asking
you
very,
very seriously
if there
is
the
slightest
possibility
to
pursue
the
composition
of the
dance now-it will
take not
more than one or
two
days,
while
a
postponement
until
October
might
kill the release
of the
film
this
year
and
is
destroying
all the work to
come.
Let
me
know,
and
I'll rush to
see
you
immediately.
In the
meanwhile
I
kiss
and
embrace
you
in the
hope
that
your
health
will
improve.
Yours,
Sergei
Eisenstein
Heartfelt regards to Mira Aleksandrovna.
Moscow
1
August
1945
20. M. A.
Mendelsohn-Prokofieva
to
S. M. Eisenstein
3
August
1945
Dear
Sergei
Sergeevich,
I
am
extremely
saddened
to
have
to
reiterate to
you
the fact that
Sergei
Sergeevich
will,
under
no
circumstances,
be
able
to
compose
the
music for
the second
part.21
He
has tried to
work,
but
recently
he has
suffered from
several nosebleeds so that the Moscow professor named N. A. Popova,
who
is
treating
him and with
whom we have
spoken
on the
telephone,
became
alarmed.
She
strictly
forbade
any
activities
for the
present.
Sergei
Sergeevich
sincerely
wants
to
write
the
promised
dance
for
you
but will
hardly
be
able
to
undertake it
soon,
especially
since
this dance
demands,
by
its
very
character,
intense concentration.
Sergei
Sergeevich
embraces
you
fondly;
he
himself
yearns
for work and
keenly
suffers
his
imposed
inactivity.
I
send
you
my
most
heartfelt
greetings.
Mira
Mendelsohn
21. S.
S.
Prokofiev
to
S.
M. Eisenstein
20
February
1946
Dear
Sergei
Mikhailovich,
How
is it
you've
let
yourself go
like that?
I
frequently
pass
by
the
hospital
(electrification,
teethfication22)
and want
to visit
you very
much,
but,
apparently,
it is not
up
to
you
to
permit
yourself
visitors.
I
heartily
embrace
you.
Get well. Ivan
is
acclaimed
by
all.
Yours,
S.P.
20
Reference to "Dance of the Oprichniks" rom part two of Ivan the Terrible.
21
Prokofiev
recommended
that G.N.
Popov
be
invited to
complete
the
music
for
the
second
part
of
Ivan.
However,
on
recovering,
S.S. Prokofiev
himself
completed
the
work.
22
Intentional
malapropism
by
Prokofiev.
7/21/2019 Eisenstein Prokofiev Correspondence Levaco
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22. S. M. Eisenstein
o
S. S.
Prokofiev
[22
February
1946]
MydearSergeiSergeevich
I
was
delighted by your
note.
I
want
to see
you
very
much,
but
due
to
the
grippe epidemic
n the
city,
no one
is
permitted
o
see
us.
As soon
as
the
quarantine
s
lifted,
I
promise
o
get
in
touch
with
you by
telephone
and
will
be
delighted
to see
you.
It
appears
shall
have
to lie
in
bed for
a
long
time.
Funny
to
say
it-but
the attackof
February
2nd
nearly
killed
me,
and
actually
I
survived
t
totally accidentally
and
unexpectedly.
I
include
a
present;
t was amidst
the
magazines
which
some kind
people
have sentme, so thatI wouldn'tget lonely.
Regards
o
MiraAleksandrovna.
I
heartily
embrace
you,
Yours,
Sergei
Eisenstein