Russian 0325: Russian Short Story in Context Fall 2010 (2111)

Russian Literary History Timeline

(A work in progress)

© 2010 by Gerald McCausland

Date Event
1762 Catherine the Great becomes Empress—will reign until 1796
1792 "Poor Liza" published 
   
1801 Alexander I becomes Emperor upon assassination of his father, Paul I
1812 War with Napoleon. French invade 24 June, are driven out 14 December
   
1825 Nicholas I becomes Emperor upon death of his brother. Will rule until 1855.
1830 Aleksandr Pushkin, "Tales of Belkin" written. Published the following year.
1833 Nikolai Gogol finished "The Nose" but no publisher will touch the scandalous text.
1834 Aleksandr Pushkin, "The Queen of Spades" published
1836 Nikolai Gogol's "The Nose" is finally published by Pushkin in his journal The Contemporary
1837 Pushkin killed in a duel in St. Petersburg
1839 Mikhail Lermontov, "The Fatalist" published.
1840 Mikhail Lermontov, "Taman" published. The entire Hero of Our Time appears later this same year.
1842 Nikolai Gogol's Petersburg Tales, including "The Overcoat," is published.
1852 Gogol dies in Moscow, having burned the second volume of Dead Souls
1852 Turgenev's Sportsman's Sketches, including "Bezhin Meadow," published.
1855 Alexander II becomes Emperor upon death of his father Nicholas.
1872 Tolstoy's "Prisoner of the Caucasus" and "God Sees the Truth But Waits" are published
1873 Dostoevsky's "Bobok" is published in The Citizen
1874  Turgenev's "The Knocking" added to new editions of Sportsman's Sketches
1877 Tolstoy's spiritual crisis, which will lead to his "Confession" (written 1880 but suppressed by censorship)
1881  Nikolai Leskov, "The Steal Flea" is published.
1881 Alexander III becomes Emperor upon assassination of his father, Alexander II
   
   
1894 Nicholas II becomes Emperor upon assassination of his father, Alexander III
1905  Bloody Sunday, Revolution of 1905, introduction of limited constitutionalism. 
1910  Tolstoy dies. 
1917 Year of Revolutions. Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik Party seizes power in Novmeber. War Communism and Civil War
 
 
1921 NEP begins.
1923–24  Babel's Red Calvary stories published
1924 Lenin dies. Stalin quickly dominates the party and government
1925 Nabokov's "Return of Chorb" published in Berlin
1925 CC Resolution on literature
1926 Bulgakov's "The Embroidered Towel" published
1928 First Five-Year Plan begins
1932 All literary associations disbanded. Socialist Realism defined as mandatory unitary style for all Soviet literature.
1934 First Congress of Union of Soviet Writers
1935  Zamyatin's "The Lion" published in France
1936 Kirov assassinated. The Great Terror Begins
1939 Nazi-Soviet pact. World War II begins.
1940 Babel arrested fof treason and executed.
1941 Operation Barbarossa. Germany invades the USSR. The Great Patriotic War begins.
1947 Zhdanov denounces Zoshchenko and Akhmatova. Begin of Zhdanovshchina.
1953 Stalin dies.