Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
achievement,
The Brothers Karamazov
(1880).
These were all written at a time of great personal
turmoil, increasingly poor health, and poverty.
Through other literary vehicles, such as the
magazine
Time and Epoch
(1861-65), the weekly
The Citizen
(1873-74), and his
The Diary of a
Writer,
which was published in separate volumes
between 1876 and 1881, Dostoevsky publicized
a unique blend of nationalist, Russian messianic,
democratic, and Christian views that also show
an appreciation for European civilization. By the
time of his death in February 1881, he was rec-
ognized as one of the Russian literary giants of
the day. He was buried in the Alexander Nevsky
monastery in St. Petersburg. In the decades that
ensued, his literary reputation grew worldwide,
in great part because of the efforts of his second
wife, Anna Grigorievna. In the 20th century his
work came to be seen as anticipating that of
Nietzsche and Freud, albeit with unique Russian
spiritual themes that later found an echo in the
work of Aleksandr
SOLZHENITSYN
.
of over 20 cameramen distributed along the bat-
tlefront. He turned to color for
Michurin
(1949), a
botanist who had been elevated to cult status by
Soviet officialdom. At the time of his death he
was working on
Poem of the Sea,
which was dis-
tributed posthumously in 1958.
Dukhobor
A term that translates as “spirit wrestlers,”
Dukhobor is the colloquial name of a religious
sect whose members were active in 18- and
19th-century Russia before emigrating to Canada
after 1898. The Dukhobors were disciples of one
of the many nonconformist religious movements
that developed in resistance to the Orthodox
Church reforms introduced by Patriarch
NIKON
in
1652 that resulted in the church schism of
1666-67. While some of these nonconformist
groups were
OLD BELIEVERS
who defended the
traditional ways of Russian Orthodoxy, a minor-
ity adopted more extreme forms of worship, with
mystical and often orgiastic overtones. Among
these were the Dukhobors, who in addition to
rejecting the authority of the state and the
church also distinguished themselves by rejecting
the authority of the Bible. Pacifist by conviction,
they also rejected military service. A small minor-
ity practiced collective nudism. The Dukhobors
centered their religious activities around a
Book of
Life,
a collection of hymns and proverbs, which
were read and sung at gatherings that featured
simple peasant food. Like other religious sectari-
ans, especially those who did not recognize the
authority of the state or refused to perform mili-
tary service, the Dukhobors were persecuted by
the czarist government. Already in 1840-41, a
group that had previously settled near the Sea of
Azov had been deported to the Caucasus. In
1898, with the assistance of British Quakers and
the vocal support of Leo
TOLSTOY
, about 7,500
Dukhobors emigrated to Canada, first settling in
the province of Saskatchewan, which welcomed
them with land and exemption from military ser-
vice. In 1907 most of the Dukhobors moved on
to British Columbia when the Saskatchewan
government insisted on individual, rather than
Dovzhenko, Aleksandr Petrovich
(1894-1956)
film director
One of the leading representatives of the Soviet
avant-garde in cinema, Dovzhenko was born to
a
COSSACK
family. After early stints as a school-
master, a painter, and a diplomat in Berlin, he
entered the world of the cinema. Two of his early
films deserve the label classic of both Soviet and
world cinema,
Arsenal
(1929) and
Earth
(1930).
They used a variety of cutting-edge techniques of
the day but are infused with Dovzhenko's distinc-
tive lyricism, full of poetic imagery and surreal-
istic symbols. In the changing context of Soviet
politics of the time, official critics denounced
them as “counterrevolutionary” and, in the case
of
Earth,
as “too realistic” in its portrayal of a
peasantry on the verge of collectivization. He
partially redeemed himself with
Shchors
(1939),
the story of a Ukrainian Red Army hero of the
civil war, presented in a way that conformed to
official accounts. During World War II, he shot
Battle of Ukraine
(1943), distinguished by its use
Search WWH ::
Custom Search