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Neizvestny, Ernst Iosifovich
(1925-
)
Nekrasov was born into the noble family of a
retired officer and serf-owner and spent his child-
hood on the family estate in Yaroslav province.
In 1832 Nekrasov entered the Yaroslavl Gymna-
sium but did not complete his studies. In 1838 his
father sent Nekrasov to St. Petersburg to enroll in
the training academy for noble officers, but he
instead joined the Faculty of History and Philol-
ogy at St. Petersburg University. In punishment,
his father ceased to provide Nekrasov with finan-
cial support, forcing him into a student life of
hunger and deprivation far removed from the
privileged circumstances of his childhood. His
early attempts at literature were unsuccessful,
but Nekrasov eventually found success as a poet,
with the encouragement of the influential critic
Vissarion
BELINSKY
, whom he met in 1845. By
1847 Nekrasov had become the editor and pub-
lisher of
Sovremennik,
the literary journal that
published Belinsky, Aleksandr
HERZEN
, Lev
TOL
-
STOY
, Feudor
DOSTOEVSKY
, Ivan
TURGENEV
, and
other leading authors of the Russian world of let-
ters. Under Nekrasov's direction,
Sovremennik
also
became the leading voice of Russia's emerging
revolutionary movement. In 1866 the auhorities
closed the journal, but two years later Nekrasov
was publishing a new journal,
Otechestvennye
zapiski,
which he edited until his death. Although
Nekrasov's influence through his editorial work
and publishing was immense, he is best remem-
bered by Russians through poems such as “The
Railway,” “Peasant Children,” “Russian Women,”
and “Who Lives Well in Russia?,” the latter a his-
torical epic written from 1864 to 1876. Several of
his poems were also put to music by leading
composers of his day, such as Peter
TCHAIKOVSKY
and Modest
MUSSORGSKY
.
artist and sculptor
An influential figure among unorthodox Soviet
artists, Neizvestny will be most readily remem-
bered for the testy but ultimately respectful rela-
tionship he developed with Nikita
KHRUSHCHEV
.
Born in Sverdlovsk (Ekaterinburg), he studied at
the Surikov State Institute for the Arts. He
served in the Red Army during World War II
(1942-45) and was severely wounded. After the
war he worked as a sculptor at the studios of the
USSR Agricultural Exhibition in Moscow. Over
the years he developed a monumental cubist
style, which was neither that of “official” social-
ist realism, nor a reflection of the fashionably
abstract work then being produced in the West,
and thus he was criticized by proponents of both
traditions. Neizvestny became known to the
world following his public confrontation with
General Secretary Khrushchev when the latter
launched a violent verbal attack against modern
art while visiting the Manezh exhibit in Moscow
in November 1962. Yet Khrushchev eventually
changed his evaluation of Neizvestny's art,
because at the time of Khrushchev's death, he
was commissioned to sculpt the memorial to
Khrushchev in Novodeviche Cemetery in Mos-
cow. An active supporter of human rights and
dissident causes, Neizvestny was expelled several
times from the Artists' Union between the 1950s
and 1970s. He emigrated in 1976, first to Switzer-
land then the United States, where he has lived
since. In 1991, the Soviet citizenship that had
been revoked when he emigrated was restored.
Nekrasov, Nikolai Alekseevich
(1821-1877)
poet and publisher
A poet recognized for his passionate denuncia-
tions of
SERFDOM
and the misery of the lower
classes, Nekrasov enjoyed great popularity
among the intelligentsia of the mid-19th century.
He was the owner and editor of the influential
journals
Sovremennik
(The contemporary) and
Otechestvennye zapiski
(Notes of the fatherland).
Nemirovich-Danchenko, Vladimir
Ivanovich
(1859-1943)
theater director and producer
Born in Georgia, Nemirovich-Danchenko was
one of two brothers who played an active part in
the culture of the late imperial and early Soviet
periods of Russian history. While his older
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