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[SOVIET CLASSICS] Neobyknovennoye predstavleniye o priklyucheniyakh Travki, o yego pape, mame, o Solnechke, uborshchitse Mar'ye Petrovne i o mnogikh drugikh lyudyakh, veshchakh, sobytiyakh [i.e. An Extraordinary Play about the Adventures of Travka, about his Dad, Mom, about Sunny, the Cleaning Lady Marya Petrovna and about Many Other People, Things, Events]

Rozanov, S.

Item #2539

Moscow; Leningrad: Detizdat TSK VLKSM, 1936. 86, [2] pp.: ill. 22,6x17,7 cm. In original publisher’s illustrated cardboards. Very good. Boards rubbed and stained. Soviet bookshop stamp on the rear board.

Scarce. First edition. Text in Russian.
The first dramatic adaptation of Sergei Rozanov’s well-known children’s tale An Extraordinary Play about the Adventures of Travka, His Father, Mother, Solnyshko, the Janitor Maria Petrovna, and Many Other People, Things, and Events.
According to a note on the verso of the title page, the staging plan for this amateur theater production, as well as its musical accompaniment, were prepared by Alexandra Grossman. The note also indicates that “The right of the first professional staging of the play belongs to the Moscow Children’s Theater under the direction of Natalia Sats.”
Natalia Sats (1903–1993) was a pioneering Russian stage director who founded and directed theaters for children, including the Moscow Musical Theater for Children, now named in her honor. In 1937 she was arrested during Stalin’s purges, reportedly due to her relationship with Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, one of the most prominent Soviet commanders, who was executed that same year. Sats herself was imprisoned until after Stalin’s death and was fully rehabilitated in 1953, returning to Moscow in 1958.
The book opens with a short address to the reader (most likely written by Grossman), offering practical advice for staging the play, such as avoiding elaborate decorations and selecting calm children for the roles. The play itself follows the adventures of young Travka, who becomes lost on his way to see an airship with his father. Structured in three acts with corresponding scenes, the text is accompanied by fourteen pieces of Mozart’s sheet music, designated for scenes marked with an asterisk.
The edition is richly illustrated, featuring four full-page color plates and numerous black-and-white drawings by Andrei Andreevich Brei (1899–1965), a Soviet graphic artist and illustrator. A student of Konstantin Yuon, Sergey Malyutin, and Vladimir Favorsky at VKhUTEMAS and other Moscow schools, Brei became a prolific book and magazine illustrator. He collaborated with major Soviet publishers such as Molodaya gvardiya, Detgiz, and Detsky mir, and contributed to leading children’s magazines including Pioner, Murzilka, and Vesyolye kartinki. A pioneer of Soviet diafilm illustration, he was praised for integrating text seamlessly into his drawings.
Worldcat shows 2 copies of the edition at Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and New York Public Library.

Price: $1,250.00