Remember Belyaev? The Head of Professor Dowell, Ariel, Amphibian Man? I was surprised to read about his life today. And he was born at an unfortunate time, living on the edge. “Born, suffered, and died” — that’s his brief biography. It seems to me that if there is any spiritual bond in Russia, it is suffering.
Very briefly: His brother and sister died — Nina from sarcoma, Vasily drowned as a student. Young Alexander was involved in music, dreamed of the sky. He jumped off the roof of a shed, having tied brooms to his arms: he survived. Then he jumped with an umbrella: he survived. Then he made a parachute from a sheet and hurt his back, gradually developing tuberculosis of the spine, causing leg paralysis. Then he fell from a tree and had lifelong vision problems. Soon after, his mother dies of starvation. The story “The Head of Professor Dowell” (later turned into the novel “Resurrected from the Dead,” which, after Belyaev’s death, was renamed “The Head…”) was written by Belyaev based on personal experience: while paralyzed in Yalta, he imagined himself as a living head, devoid of a body. Upon returning, the writer became seriously ill. In 1931, his six-year-old daughter Lyuda died of meningitis. A few days later, his older daughter Sveta became seriously ill with rickets. Alexander faced World War II in Leningrad, the siege and famine began. On January 6, 1942, paralyzed Alexander died of starvation in Nazi-occupied Pushkin. Three years later, his wife and daughter were deported to Siberia. They spent 11 years in exile. The writer is buried in a mass grave, the location unknown.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 