''The Sealed Angel'' (russian: Запечатленный ангел) is a story by

Nikolai Leskov Nikolai Semyonovich Leskov (russian: Никола́й Семёнович Леско́в; – ) was a Russian novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and journalist, who also wrote under the pseudonym M. Stebnitsky. Praised for his unique w ...

, written in 1872 and first published in the No.1, January

1873 Events January–March * January 1 ** Japan adopts the Gregorian calendar. ** The California Penal Code goes into effect. * January 17 – American Indian Wars: Modoc War: First Battle of the Stronghold – Modoc Indians defeat ...

issue of ''

The Russian Messenger The ''Russian Messenger'' or ''Russian Herald'' (russian: Ру́сский ве́стник ''Russkiy Vestnik'', Pre-reform Russian: Русскій Вѣстникъ ''Russkiy Vestnik'') has been the title of three notable magazines published in ...

''. The story concerns a group of

Old Believers Old Believers or Old Ritualists, ''starovery'' or ''staroobryadtsy'' are Eastern Orthodox Christians who maintain the liturgical and ritual practices of the Russian Orthodox Church as they were before the reforms of Patriarch Nikon of Moscow bet ...

whose revered

icon An icon () is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, in the cultures of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Catholic churches. They are not simply artworks; "an icon is a sacred image used in religious devotion". The most ...

of an angel is confiscated by officials and sealed with wax.

Background

Nikolai Leskov developed a great interest in the

Raskol The Schism of the Russian Church, also known as Raskol (russian: раскол, , meaning "split" or " schism"), was the splitting of the Russian Orthodox Church into an official church and the Old Believers movement in the mid-17th century. It ...

history and movement in the early 1860s. His attitude towards it changed over time from very cautious to openly appreciative, as he came to see the

as keepers of old Russian artistic traditions which otherwise would have disappeared without a trace, lacking governmental support. Leskov got interested in the art of

-painting after having met the iconographer Nikita Racheiskov (d. 1886) whom he commemorated later by the posthumous essay "Of the Artist Man Nikita and Those Brought up by Him".(''Novoye vremya'', 1886, December 25).Serman, I. Commentaries. The Works by N. S. Leskov in 6 volumes. Pravda Publishers, Moscow, 1973. Vol. 3. Pр. 399-400. It was in Racheiskov's studio that Leskov, while studying ''Ikonopisny podlinnik'' (a hand-written manual of icon-painting), wrote ''The Sealed Angel''. The story which came out at the time when the academic studies of icon-painting began, influenced and contributed to the process, according to scholar I. Serman. Leskov remarked later that ''The Sealed Angel'' was his only work that avoided any editorial cuts, explaining this by

Mikhail Katkov Mikhail Nikiforovich Katkov (russian: Михаи́л Ники́форович Катко́в; 13 February 1818 – 1 August 1887) was a conservative Russian journalist influential during the reign of tsar Alexander III. He was a proponent of Rus ...

's men being "too busy to pay much notice". Apparently, there was another reason. ''The Sealed Angel'', being close to a Christmas story in style and form, was warmly received at the Russian Court. Empress consort Maria Alexandrovna and

Tsar Alexander II Alexander II ( rus, Алекса́ндр II Никола́евич, Aleksándr II Nikoláyevich, p=ɐlʲɪˈksandr ftɐˈroj nʲɪkɐˈlajɪvʲɪtɕ; 29 April 181813 March 1881) was Emperor of Russia, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Fin ...

reportedly liked it, which must have kept both editors and censors off.

Finale

The story's finale, where the Old Believers' community all of a sudden return to mainstream

Orthodoxy Orthodoxy (from Greek: ) is adherence to correct or accepted creeds, especially in religion. Orthodoxy within Christianity refers to acceptance of the doctrines defined by various creeds and ecumenical councils in Antiquity, but different Churc ...

, was criticized as being unnatural. Ten years later Leskov conceded that, while the story itself was mostly based on real facts, the end of it was made up. What happened in reality he revealed in Chapter 41 of ''The Pechersk Antics'' set of memoir sketches.

English translations

The Sealed Angel
from ''Russian Sketches, Chiefly of Peasant Life''. Translated by Beatrix Tollemache. *K. A. Lantz (1984) *David McDuff (1988) * Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2013) *

Donald Rayfield Patrick Donald Rayfield OBE (born 12 February 1942, Oxford) is an English academic and Emeritus Professor of Russian and Georgian at Queen Mary University of London. He is an author of books about Russian and Georgian literature, and about Josep ...

(2020)

Music

The story became the basis for the 1988 Russian-language choral work '' The Sealed Angel'', by

Rodion Shchedrin Rodion Konstantinovich Shchedrin ( rus, Родион Константинович Щедрин, , rədʲɪˈon kənstɐnʲˈtʲinəvʲɪtɕ ɕːɪˈdrʲin; born 16 December 1932) is a Soviet and Russian composer and pianist, winner of USSR State ...

. ''Encyclopedia of Contemporary Russian Culture'' 1136787852 Smorodinskaya, - 2013- Page 556 "16 December 1932, Moscow Composer Shchedrin graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1955 and taught ... Zapechatlennyi angel (The Sealed Angel, 1988, from text by Nikolai Leskov) for mixed choir and reed pipe...

References

External links

''Запечатленный ангел''
The original Russian text. {{DEFAULTSORT:Sealed Angel, The 1873 books Works by Nikolai Leskov Works originally published in The Russian Messenger