Sign up
You have successfully registered, a confirmation email has been sent to the email address you provided.
Gleb Ivanovich Uspensky
About museum
Gleb Ivanovich Uspensky was a Russian writer and publicist associated with the Narodnik movement. He was born in Tula on October 13, 1843, into the family of a civil servant. He studied at the gymnasiums of Tula and Chernigov, then entered the Faculty of History and Philology at Saint Petersburg University. He later transferred to Moscow University, but his father's death forced him to abandon his studies due to financial difficulties.
Uspensky began his literary career in 1862, publishing pieces in Leo Tolstoy's magazine "Yasnaya Polyana" under the pseudonym G. Bryzgin. He then contributed to the Moscow magazine "Zritel" ("The Spectator"), and later moved to Petersburg, where he was published in periodicals such as "Biblioteka dlya chteniya" ("Library for Reading") and "Russkoye Slovo" ("The Russian Word"). From 1868 Uspensky collaborated with the journal "Otechestvennye Zapiski" ("Notes of the Fatherland") and became one of the leading democratic authors. He traveled abroad, had contacts with members of "Narodnaya Volya" (the People's Will) and was under police surveillance. After returning to Russia, Uspensky worked on the railway and went to Serbia as a correspondent, which was reflected in his cycle of essays "New Times, New Concerns".
Uspensky spent long periods in Russian villages studying peasant life. This work formed the basis of his writings on the peasant commune and the rise of the kulaks ("Vlast' zemli" ["The Power of the Land"], "Iz derevenskogo dnevnika" ["From a Village Diary"], "Koy-pro-chto" ["About One Thing or Another"]). He also produced works devoted to the spiritual quests of the Russian intelligentsia ("Bez opredelennykh zanyatiy" ["Of No Fixed Occupation"], "Voley-nevoley" ["Whether One Likes It or Not"]) and to art ("Vypryamila").
From 1889 the writer developed a nervous disorder that progressed to paralysis. Three years later Gleb Ivanovich was placed in a psychiatric hospital in Novgorod, where he remained for almost ten years. On March 24, 1902, at the age of fifty-eight, Uspensky died of heart paralysis. The writer is buried in the Volkovo Cemetery in Saint Petersburg.
Date of birth
25 October 1843
Date of death
06 April 1902
Occupation
Writer