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Vladimir Shatakishvili began to write books when his beloved wife got seriously ill. He had to do something just to stay in this world. The longing and bitterness overshadowed the whole world when the blue eyes of Lyudmila closed forever, but the fourteen-year-old Sandro (Alex), with a desperate hope, was looking at Vladimir with the same blue eyes. He had to live! So, he wrote dozens of notebooks with confessions of “resurrected” toastmaster, whose good friends never ceased to invite him to feasts, where he said lovely words wishing them eternal health, love, happiness and wealth… Having found out about his diaries, the son persuaded his father to publish these stories, and soon his books came out: “The Casket of Colourful Contemporaries” (2004), “Ball Wanted” (2005), “The Most Russian Person” (2007), “Companion at the Feast” (2012), “How Well We Lived Badly” (2014).

Word of the editor

For every person, the ability to control oneself and one’s emotions is the primary, necessary duty. This is more than once emphasized by the author of the book, Vladimir Shatakishvili. He writes about what he knows personally, what he himself has experienced. That’s why he is so interesting. Reading his stories, novels, memoirs, you fall in love with his heroes: Russians, Georgians, Armenians, Ukrainians, Greeks, French, Germans, Americans, Uzbeks, Turkmen, Ossetians, British, Jews, Spaniards… And I really want to be among them (decent people), make toasts, enjoy life, be beautiful spiritually and physically, as they are. And mistakes, and mistakes? And who does not have them? Everybody does. As well the betrayal of loved ones, indifference of colleagues, buddies, and you want to howl like a wolf when you are left alone with your problems. Communication cleans the soul, enriches the person. Ill-wishers promised him and his friends defeat in life.

After reading the book by Vladimir Shatakishvili, you understand, that the fate was generous to him, it presented tens, hundreds of friends around the world. Communicating with them is a priceless gift. Meeting everyone, he worries every time if others will be better after talking to him. Having read his stories about Shota Gabritchidze, Bitchiko Davlianidze, Ivan Medyanik, Andrey Gedikyants, Gennadiy Novakhov, Amiran Hurtsiya, Sergo Mgaloblishvili, Maysuradze, Vyacheslav Shulzhenko, Boris Arustamov, David Topuria, Gela Lobzhanidze, Boris Rosenfeld, there is a feeling that you are exchanging your thoughts and feelings with his characters.

In the first row, who Vladimir Shatakishvili describes, is the man of tremendous fate, a veteran of the nuclear industry, a strong-willed, demanding leader, Ivan Nikiforovich Medyanik. The author had frank conversations with him for several years, not trying to declassify a highly secret industry – the production of atomic weapons, which he was involved in, but offered his collocutor a sort of know-how: to talk only about feasts in his eventful life, when meeting iconic figures of the 20th century. If we apply the Lermontov formula “the hero of our time” to him, then in the twentieth century, of course, it will be Ivan Nikiforovich Medyanik. Without any misgivings (he gave a non-disclosure subscription) he spoke about the most prominent scientists: Kurchatov, Korolev, Marshals Budyonny, Zhukov, Voroshilov, Minister Slavsky, director of the “Mayak” plant Muzrukov. He remembered Beria, Kobulov, Shvernik… The man of legend is exactly about him! He did not live a year to his century.