Published on: 2026-08-31
Source: Moscow Government – Правительства Москвы –
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Summer has come to an end, but the dacha season is still ongoing: warm September days and Indian summer lie ahead. On the last weekend of August, we recall how famous poets and prose writers wrote about the dacha, how they spent time there, and what they found in the countryside solitude.
Alexander Pushkin in the “rural backwoods”
In the winter of 1831, Alexander Pushkin found family happiness — he married his beloved Natalya Goncharova, whose hand he had long sought. “I am married — and happy; my only wish is that nothing in my life changes — I will not hope for anything better,” he wrote to his friend, literary critic and poet Pyotr Pletnev.
At first, the young couple settled in a cozy apartment on Arbat, but then they had to move to Saint Petersburg—to get away from the annoying mother-in-law. They spent that summer in Tsarskoye Selo, which was associated with Pushkin’s warmest memories of youth. The small one-story house, rented to him by Anna Kitaeva, the widow of the court valet of Nicholas I, seemed to the poet the best place in the world.
“We live here quietly and happily, as if in a remote village; news hardly reaches us,” — such lines were received in June 1831 by the patron, collector, and close friend Pavel Nashchokin from him.
After the revelry of bachelor life, Alexander Sergeyevich enjoyed family idyll: while his wife was busy with embroidery or other pleasant activities, he wrote — for example, it was here that the poet worked on the “Little Tragedies” and other works. In the evenings, the spouses loved to walk together and drink tea while conversing.
You can learn more about the poet’s and his family’s daily life in To the Memorial Apartment of A.S. Pushkin on Arbat. Here are items that tell about Pushkin’s Moscow, the friends and close ones of Alexander Sergeyevich, his life and work.
Relaxation and the “quiet reflection” of Andrey Bely
From spring 1925 to April 1931, one of the most important representatives of Russian symbolism, philosopher, prose writer, and poet Andrey Bely (real name — Boris Bugayev) rented a dacha house in the Moscow suburb of Kuchino. He affectionately called it “the place of my complete recovery”: after returning from Germany, he could no longer live in his apartment on the Arbat: he lost his rights to it after his parents’ death, and other people had settled there.
The quiet picturesque village of Kuchino, surrounded by forests, became a real blessing after noisy Moscow. At first, the poet and his friend Klavdiya Vasilyeva (who later became his wife) settled in the former estate of the Ryabushinsky merchants, and in April 1925 they moved to the Levandovsky summer cottage. Life flowed leisurely: walks, nature, small household chores. But most importantly, the author was working on the novel “Moscow” about the customs of the pre-revolutionary and post-October city.
“Kuchino. Here — rest: and quiet reflection; here I begin the work on ‘Moscow’ interrupted for almost three months,” he wrote.
Leo Tolstoy did not like the cuckoo. How famous writers listened to birds
In the Memorial Apartment Andrei Bely, in the world’s only museum dedicated to the writer, one can immerse themselves in the atmosphere of the Silver Age.
The Tsvetaevs — in a “nest among poplars and birches”
The Tsvetaev family rented a dacha in Tarusa for many years — a small town in the Kaluga region located on the banks of the Oka River. Dachas appeared here at the end of the 19th century; the Tarusa zemstvo built them to rent out.
It was here that little Marina absorbed the atmosphere of freedom and love for nature. Years later, she fondly recalled that carefree time. One of her poems begins like this:
We are at the dacha: beyond the meadow, the Oka is shimmering,
It gleams like a new blade.
Our mother is a queen today,
Mom has a wreath on her head.
Anastasia Tsvetaeva, the poet’s sister, also wrote about the dacha in her memoirs — with the same warmth and love:
“May, June, July, August, part of September—how many days, how many mornings in our nest among poplars, birches, willows, elderberry and bird cherry bushes—a thicket so dense with trees that we had to cut it through to see the Oka River from the balcony, flowing under the hill to the left toward Serpukhov, Bekhovo, and to the right from Velegovo, Aleksin. I don’t know and cannot imagine a childhood more complete, happier than ours in Tarusa.”
The house itself was very simple. Anastasia Tsvetaeva described it as follows:
“A simple gray wooden house under a rusty iron roof. The ladder from the lower balcony descends right into the lilac. Swing posts; an old bench under a huge willow is barely visible — it’s so dense around. In the tall woven fence — a gate to the road. If you stand facing the Oka River, to the left are garden beds, beyond them — raspberries, currants, and gooseberries, behind the house a croquet lawn. In front of the terraces — a space among four poplars; between two of them — my childhood swings with a chair and barriers. And the real swings are among four hazel bushes bearing our four names: Lera, Andryusha, Musya, and Asya.”
She also wrote about the manners observed at the summer house: for example, her mother, Maria Alexandrovna, dressed very simply, teaching the same to her daughters. There was no place for luxury in the house — its only decoration remained the grand piano.
“Attic Palace,” love, poetry, and addresses of inspiration. Marina Tsvetaeva’s Moscow
In Moscow, you can get acquainted with the life and work of Marina Tsvetaeva in her house-museum. In the coming days, researchers will conduct themed tours — for example, about Moscow’s role in the fate poet, about family stories Tsvetaevs and about what Marina Ivanovna recorded in notebooks.
“Semiznakomaya” system of Vladimir Mayakovsky
Vladimir Mayakovsky loved spending time at country houses, but he did not have his own summer house, so he also had to rent a house for the summer.
In the 1920s, he rented a summer house from the Rumyantsev peasants on Akulova Hill — a place considered one of the most picturesque in suburban Pushkino. The view from the house, situated on a rise, was stunning: below, a meadow stretched out green, a bit further a field ripened, and in the distance stood a forest. It was there that the poet created his famous fantasy poem about how the sun came down to visit him. It is titled “An Extraordinary Adventure That Happened to Vladimir Mayakovsky One Summer at the Dacha:”
I shouted to the sun:
“Wait!”
listen, golden-forehead,
than so,
to come in without a reason,
to me
would stop by for tea!”
There were also humorous incidents related to the summer cottage vacation. Once the poet won 65 rubles in a lottery — a considerable sum at that time. He decided to spend this money on a holiday and went to a resort place called Kuokkala (now the village of Repino) near Leningrad, where he was able to rent a room. In the summer, it attracted many people who could afford an expensive rest, and the poet quickly solved his problem of lack of funds.
“The seven-acquaintance system (seven-file). Established seven dining acquaintances. On Sunday I ‘eat’ Chukovsky, Monday — Evreinov, and so on. Thursday was worse — I ‘eat’ Repin’s herbs. For a futurist a sazhen tall — that’s no good,” he wrote.
Most likely, here he means visits to the artist Ilya Repin — who was a well-known vegetarian and did not consume meat.
In Moscow, guests are awaited at State Museum of V.V. Mayakovsky: in memorial apartments at Krasnaya Presnya and in Studenetsky Lane you can learn more about the poet himself, as well as about his mother, sisters, muses, and only daughter.
Two apartments, five women, one fate: going to the Mayakovsky Museum with a “Mosbilet”
“Anton Chekhov’s ‘A Whole Bay'”
In 1898, Anton Chekhov was forced to change his climate and move to Crimea due to his health condition. In Gurzuf, he bought a dacha for a fabulous three thousand rubles and did not regret it at all. He wrote to his relatives:
“I bought a piece of the shore with a bathing area and Pushkin Rock near the pier and park in Gurzuf. Now we own a whole little bay where a boat or a motorboat can be docked. The house is shabby, but covered with tiles, four rooms, large hallways. One big tree — a mulberry.”
Almost none of the writer’s friends and acquaintances knew about the existence of the house, so that the writer could live in blissful solitude. Here he breathed fresh air, took long walks, and worked — in particular, it was here that he began writing his “Three Sisters.”
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