Shostakovich, Dmitri

in Russian, confiding his love for his girlfriend, Tatyana Glivenko, the long walks and discussions he has had with her in the Crimea, and his fear of her imminent departure for Moscow; he also gives his opinions about the conductor Vladimir Dranishnikov, and Vasily Kalinnikov, Kvadri ("...I like his quartet more than Tyulin's music..."), and asks after V.V. Shcherbachev, Morzluk, T.N. Petrov, Volynsky and Leonid Vladimirovich [Nikolayev]

 2 pages, 4to (27.8 x 21.4cm), [Gaspra, Crimea], 25 August 1923, overall staining, splitting at folds



"...I once expounded to you my view of marriage and love...I would have been altogether depressed here if it were not for the presence of one girl...the most beautiful girl I have ever met.  Her name is Tatyana Ivanova Glivenko... I am very much in love with her...But soon she is leaving...I do not know how I am going to live without her...You write that you heard Tchaikovsky's 6th [the "Pathetique Symphony"] conducted by Dranishnikov.  I have always liked his conducting and I think he's very talented...I am glad you liked the First Symphony of Kalinnikov,  It's a wonderfully refreshing and talented piece..." [translations]



This is the earliest letter by Shostakovich that we have traced at auction.  The composer contracted tuberculosis in 1923 and was sent to recuperate in the spa town of Gaspra in the Crimea.  There he met his first girlfriend, Tatyana Glivenko, the daughter of a professor of philology in Moscow.  Tatyana returned home in September and the two lovers conducted a long correspondence during the years 1923 to 1931 (mainly 1923-1926), comprising over 150 letters, amounting to some 516 pages (see the sale in our rooms on 6 December 1991, lot 184).  See also E. Wilson, Shostakovich Remembered (2006), pp.94-99.  Valerian Bogdanov-Berezovsky was a fellow student of Shostakovich and his closest friend at this time.   The conductor Dranishnikov conducted the first performance of Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov in 1928, an opera that Shostakovich later edited.

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"...I once expounded to you my view of marriage and love...I would have been altogether depressed here if it were not for the presence of one girl...the most beautiful girl I have ever met.  Her name is Tatyana Ivanova Glivenko... I am very much in love with her...I do not know how I am going to live without her...I am glad you liked the First Symphony of Kalinnikov,  It's a wonderfully refreshing and talented piece..." [translations]

This is the earliest letter by Shostakovich that we have traced at auction.  Tatyana Glivenko, the daughter of a professor of philology in Moscow, was Shostakovich's first girl-friend and their correspondence during the years 1923 to 1931, covered over 500 pages (see the sale in our rooms on 6 December 1991, lot 184).  See also E. Wilson, Shostakovich Remembered (2006), pp.94-99.