A love story that descendants are trying to rewrite.
People who lived in Russia at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries thought little about what their image would be in the eyes of distant descendants. Therefore, they lived simply - they loved, betrayed, committed meanness and selfless acts, not knowing that a hundred years later one of them would be put on a halo, while others would be posthumously denied the right to love.
Matilda Kschessinska got an amazing fate - fame, universal recognition, love of the powerful, emigration, life under German occupation, poverty. And decades after her death, people who consider themselves to be highly spiritual personalities will flap her name on every corner, inwardly cursing the fact that she ever lived in the world.
Kshesinskaya 2nd
She was born in Ligov, near St. Petersburg, on August 31, 1872. Ballet was her destiny from birth - her father, Pole Felix Kshesinsky, was a dancer and teacher, an unsurpassed mazurka performer.
Mother, Julia Dominskaya, was a unique woman: in her first marriage, she gave birth to five children, and after the death of her husband she married Felix Kshesinsky and gave birth to three more. Matilda was the youngest in this ballet family, and, following the example of her parents and older brothers and sisters, she decided to link her life with the stage.
At the beginning of her career, the name "Kshesinskaya 2nd" will be assigned to her. The first was her sister Julia, a brilliant artist of the Imperial Theaters. Brother Joseph, also a renowned dancer, will remain in Soviet Russia after the revolution, receive the title of Honored Artist of the Republic, stage performances and teach.
Promotional video:
Felix Kshesinsky and Julia Dominskaya.
Joseph Kshesinsky will be bypassed by repression, but his fate, nevertheless, will be tragic - he will become one of the hundreds of thousands of victims of the blockade of Leningrad.
Little Matilda dreamed of fame, and worked hard in class. The teachers of the Imperial Theater School said among themselves that the girl had a great future, if, of course, she found a wealthy patron.
Fateful dinner
The life of Russian ballet in the times of the Russian Empire was similar to the life of show business in post-Soviet Russia - talent was not enough. Careers were done through bed, and it was not very much hidden. Loyal married artists were destined to be the backdrop for the brilliant talented courtesans.
In 1890, 18-year-old graduate of the Imperial Theater School Matilda Kshesinskaya was given a high honor - Emperor Alexander III himself and his family attended the graduation performance.
“This exam decided my fate,” Kshesinskaya will write in her memoirs.
After the performance, the monarch and his retinue appeared in the rehearsal hall, where Alexander III showered Matilda with compliments. And then the emperor showed the young ballerina at a festive dinner a place next to the heir to the throne - Nicholas.
Alexander III, unlike other representatives of the imperial family, including his father, who lived in two families, is considered a faithful husband. The emperor preferred another pastime of Russian men to walking "to the left" - the consumption of a "little white woman" in the company of friends.
However, Alexander did not see anything shameful in the fact that a young man learns the basics of love before marriage. That is why he pushed his phlegmatic 22-year-old son into the arms of an 18-year-old beauty of Polish blood.
“I don't remember what we talked about, but I immediately fell in love with the heir. As I now see his blue eyes with such a kind expression. I stopped looking at him only as an heir, I forgot about it, everything was like a dream. When I said goodbye to the heir, who had spent the whole dinner next to me, we looked at each other differently than when we met, a feeling of attraction crept into his soul as well as into mine,”wrote Kshesinskaya about that evening.
Passion "hussar Volkov"
Their romance was not stormy. Matilda dreamed of meeting, but the heir, busy with state affairs, did not have time to meet.
In January 1892, a certain "hussar Volkov" arrived at Matilda's house. The surprised girl approached the door, and towards her was … Nikolai. They spent that night together for the first time.
The visits of the "hussar Volkov" became regular, and the whole Petersburg knew about them. It got to the point that one night a St. Petersburg mayor broke into a couple in love and received a strict order to deliver the heir to his father on an urgent matter.
This relationship had no future. Nikolai knew the rules of the game well: before his betrothal in 1894 to Princess Alisa of Hesse, the future Alexandra Fedorovna, he parted with Matilda.
In her memoirs, Kshesinskaya writes that she was inconsolable. Believe it or not, everyone's own business. An affair with the heir to the throne gave her such patronage that her rivals on the stage could not have.
We must pay tribute, getting the best games, she proved that she deserves them. Having become a prima ballerina, she continued to improve, taking private lessons from the famous Italian ballet master Enrico Cecchetti.
Matilda Kshesinskaya became the first Russian dancer to perform 32 fouettés in a row, which today are considered the trademark of Russian ballet, having adopted this trick from the Italians.
Grand Ducal Love Triangle
Her heart was not free for long. The new chosen one was again a representative of the Romanovs' house, Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, grandson of Nicholas I and cousin of Nicholas II. The unmarried Sergei Mikhailovich, who was known as a closed man, felt incredible affection for Matilda. He took care of her for many years, thanks to which her career in the theater was completely cloudless.
Feelings of Sergei Mikhailovich passed cruel tests. In 1901, Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich, the uncle of Nicholas II, began to look after Kshensinskaya. But this was only an episode before the appearance of a real rival. The rival was his son - Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, cousin of Nicholas II. He was ten years younger than his relative and seven years younger than Matilda.
“It was no longer an empty flirtation … From the day of my first meeting with the Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, we began to meet more and more often, and our feelings for each other soon turned into a strong mutual attraction,” writes Kshesinskaya.
Men of the Romanov family flew to Matilda like butterflies on fire. Why? Now none of them will explain. And the ballerina skillfully manipulated them - having struck up a relationship with Andrei, she never parted with Sergei.
Having set off on a trip in the fall of 1901, Matilda felt unwell in Paris, and when she turned to a doctor, she found out that she was in a "position." But she didn't know whose child it was. Moreover, both lovers were ready to recognize the child as their own.
The son was born on June 18, 1902. Matilda wanted to call him Nicholas, but did not dare - such a step would be a violation of the rules that they once established with the now Emperor Nicholas II. As a result, the boy was named Vladimir, in honor of the father of the Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich.
The son of Matilda Kshesinskaya will have an interesting biography - before the revolution he will be “Sergeevich” because he is recognized by the “senior lover”, and in emigration he will become “Andreevich” because the “younger lover” marries his mother and recognizes him as his son.
Kshesinskaya, in the end, will consider that the son was conceived after all from Andrey. So be it.
Matilda Kshesinskaya, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich and their son Vladimir. Around 1906
Mistress of the Russian ballet
In the theater, Matilda was openly afraid. After leaving the troupe in 1904, she continued one-time performances, receiving mind-boggling royalties. All the parties that she liked were assigned to her and only to her. To go against Kshesinskaya at the beginning of the 20th century in Russian ballet meant ending her career and ruining my life.
The director of the Imperial Theaters, Prince Sergei Mikhailovich Volkonsky, once dared to insist that Kshesinskaya go on stage in a costume that she did not like. The ballerina did not obey and was fined. A couple of days later, Volkonsky resigned, as Emperor Nicholas II himself explained to him that he was wrong.
The new director of the Imperial Theaters, Vladimir Telyakovsky, did not argue with Matilda over the word “absolutely”.
“It would seem that a ballerina serving in the directorate should belong to the repertoire, but here it turned out that the repertoire belongs to M. Kshesinskaya, and both out of fifty performances 40 belong to balletomanes, and in the repertoire - of all ballets, more than half of the best belong to the ballerina Kshesinskaya, - Telyakovsky wrote in his memoirs. - She considered them her property and could give or not let others dance. There were cases when a ballerina was discharged from abroad. In her contract ballets were stipulated for the tour. So it was with the ballerina Grimaldi, who was invited in 1900. But when she decided to rehearse one ballet, indicated in the contract (this ballet was "A Vain Precaution"), Kshesinskaya said: "I won't give it, this is my ballet." Began - telephones, conversations, telegrams. The poor director rushed here and there. Finally he sends the minister an encrypted telegram to Denmark, where he was at that time with the sovereign. The case was secret, of special state importance. And what? Receives the following answer: "Since this ballet is Kshesinskaya, then leave him for her."
Matilda Kshesinskaya with her son Vladimir, 1916
Shot off nose
In 1906, Kshesinskaya became the owner of a luxurious mansion in St. Petersburg, where everything, from start to finish, was done according to her own ideas. In the mansion there was a wine cellar for men visiting the ballerina; in the courtyard, horse-drawn carriages and cars were waiting for the hostess. There was even a barn, because the ballerina loved fresh milk.
Where did all this splendor come from? Contemporaries said that even Matilda's space fees would not be enough for all this luxury. It was claimed that the Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, a member of the Council of State Defense, “pinched off” for his beloved little by little from the country's military budget.
Kshesinskaya had everything she dreamed of, and, like many women in her position, she got bored.
The result of boredom was the 44-year-old ballerina's romance with a new stage partner, Peter Vladimirov, who was 21 years younger than Matilda.
Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, ready to share his mistress with an equal, was furious. During Kshesinskaya's tour in Paris, the prince challenged the dancer to a duel. The offended representative of the Romanov family shot the unfortunate Vladimirov's nose. The doctors had to collect it piece by piece.
But, surprisingly, the Grand Duke this time also forgave the windy beloved.
The end of the fairy tale
The tale ended in 1917. With the fall of the empire, Kshesinskaya's former life also collapsed. She also tried to sue the Bolsheviks for the mansion, from the balcony of which Lenin spoke. The understanding of how serious everything is came later.
Together with her son, Kshesinskaya wandered around the south of Russia, where the government changed, as if in a kaleidoscope. Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich fell into the hands of the Bolsheviks in Pyatigorsk, but they, still undecided what he was to blame, let him go on all four sides. Son Vladimir was ill with the Spanish flu, which mowed millions of people in Europe. Miraculously escaping typhus, in February 1920, Matilda Kshesinskaya on the steamer "Semiramis" left Russia forever.
By this time, two of her lovers from the Romanov family were no longer alive. Nikolai's life was interrupted in the Ipatiev house, Sergei was shot in Alapaevsk. When his body was raised from the mine where it had been dumped, a small gold medallion with a portrait of Matilda Kshesinskaya and the inscription "Malia" was found in the grand duke's hand.
Juncker in the former mansion of the ballerina Matilda Kshesinskaya after the Central Committee and the Petrograd Committee of the RSDLP (b) moved from it. June 6, 1917. Photo: RIA Novosti.
The Most Serene Princess at a reception at Muller's
In 1921, in Cannes, 49-year-old Matilda Kschessinska became a legal wife for the first time in her life. Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, despite the sidelong glances of his relatives, formalized the marriage and adopted a child, whom he always considered his own.
In 1929, Kshesinskaya opened her ballet school in Paris. This step was rather forced - the former comfortable life was left behind, it was necessary to earn a living. Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, who in 1924 declared himself the head of the Romanovs' house in exile, in 1926 assigned Kshesinskaya and her offspring the title and surname of princes Krasinskiy, and in 1935 the title began to sound like "the most lofty princes Romanovskiy-Krasinskiy".
During the Second World War, when the Germans occupied France, Matilda's son was arrested by the Gestapo. According to legend, the ballerina, in order to achieve release, achieved a personal audience with the chief of the Gestapo Müller. Kshesinskaya herself never confirmed this. Vladimir spent 144 days in a concentration camp, unlike many other emigrants, he refused to cooperate with the Germans, and nevertheless was released.
There were many long-livers in the Kshesinsky family. Matilda's grandfather lived 106 years, sister Julia died at the age of 103, and Kshesinskaya 2 herself passed away just a few months before her 100th birthday.
The building of the Museum of the October Revolution - also known as the mansion of Matilda Kshesinskaya. 1972 Architect A. Gauguin, R. Melzer. Photo: RIA Novosti / B. Manushin.
I cried with happiness
In the 1950s, she wrote a memoir of her life, which was first published in French in 1960.
“In 1958, the Bolshoi Ballet Company arrived in Paris. Although I don't go anywhere else, dividing my time between the house and the dance studio where I earn to live, I made an exception and went to the Opera to see the Russians. I cried with happiness. It was the same ballet that I saw more than forty years ago, the owner of the same spirit and the same traditions …”, wrote Matilda. Probably, ballet remained her main love for all her life.
The cemetery of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois became the resting place of Matilda Feliksovna Kshesinskaya. She was buried with her husband, whom she survived for 15 years, and her son, who passed away three years after her mother.
The inscription on the monument reads: "The Most Serene Princess Maria Feliksovna Romanovskaya-Krasinskaya, Honored Artist of the Imperial Theaters Kshesinskaya."
No one will be able to take away from Matilda Kshesinskaya the life he has lived, just as no one will be able to remake the history of the last decades of the Russian Empire to their liking, turning living people into disembodied beings. And those who are trying to do this do not know even a tenth of the colors of life that little Matilda learned.
The grave of the ballerina Matilda Kshesinskaya and Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich Romanov at the Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois cemetery in the city of Sainte-Genevieve-des-Bois in the Paris region. Photo: RIA Novosti / Valery Melnikov.
Andrey Sidorchik