For the first time, Sonya came from the pen of Andrei Usachev as a cartoon script. The cartoon was filmed in the early 90s, and then it was constantly shown on all channels (remember the screensaver of a tiny dog crawling out of a desk drawer?). This is because then the redistribution of property began, and Soyuzmultfilm was resolving issues with the rights to its products, their cartoons could not just be shown, and “Sonya”, it turned out, belonged to no one, and was exploited by everyone. That’s how she became a super popular character, and only then Usachev wrote a whole book about her. And away we go: the book turned out to be so successful that thirty years have passed, but today the next part of the adventures of this wonderful dog comes out again!
It’s worth talking about the illustrations separately, since the image invented by Evgeny Antonenkov was endorsed by Usachev as final and irrevocable: Sonya is like this and there will never be another! And before that, no matter how Sonya was portrayed: the breed, designated as a royal mongrel, left endless scope for creativity. She managed to be something resembling a spaniel with red bangs, and a fluffy spitz, and a dense pit bull, and everything else. The children pestered the author with questions about what kind of real Sonya she is, and it was decided to canonize the image. In 2016, Antonenkov came up with exactly the kind of Sonya we know her today.
It is interesting that “The Smart Dog Sonya” is the most commercially successful work of the writer, despite the fact that he does not position himself as a prose writer. I am a poet, he says, and prose is hard for me. I sit down to write and hover over the most basic sentences: “I went outside” or “I went outside”, or maybe better “I went into the yard”? And this is how these light and cheerful stories are born in the throes of creativity.
Well? Let's go to the dacha now?
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