“I am devoted to her against her will”: on the decipherment of the stenographic diary of Anna Dostoevskaya by Сeciliya Poshemanskaya

In 2018 the Decree of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection of the Russian Federation abolished the profession of a stenographer due to the absence of demand. Researchers of the creative work of Fyodor Dostoevsky cherish the memory of two female stenographers - the writer’s collaborator Anna Dostoevskaya and Ceciliya Poshemanskaya, a modest stenographer from Leningrad that managed to find the key to the shorthand system of the former. In the 1950s-1970s Poshemanskaya disclosed to the public the diary of Anna Dostoevskaya of 1867, the rough copies of “A Writer’s Diary” and “The Brothers Karamazov” and some more pages written shorthand by the writer’s assistant. The information on Poshemanskaya and her long-term, broad scale work in the memory of Dostoevsky is scarce. This article gives a brief description of the main stages of her creative career of the stenographer from Leningrad. Some additional details on life and work of Poshemanskaya are available in the documents kept in the fund of historian - registrar Sarra V...