 | Diary, 1901-1969 Subjects: Chukovskii Kornei 1882–1969 -- Diaries; Chukovskii Kornei 1882–1969 -- Friends and associates; Authors Russian -- 20th century -- Diaries; A perceptive literary critic, a world-famous writer of witty and playful verses for children, a leading authority on children's linguistic creativity, and a highly skilled translator, Kornei Chukovsky was a complete man of letters. As benefactor to many writers including Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Joseph Brodsky, he stood for several decades at the center of the Russian literary milieu. It is no exaggeration to claim that Chukovsky knew everyone involved in shaping the course of twentieth-century Russian literature. His voluminous diary, here translated into English for the first time, begins in prerevolutionary Russia and spans nearly the entire Soviet era. It is the candid commentary of a brilliant observer who documents fifty years of Soviet literary activity and the personal predicament of the writer under a totalitarian regime. Kornei Chukovsky was an extraordinary figure: a critic and memoirist of the Silver Age, a literary scholar and editor, a celebrated children's poet, and a noted translator and theoretician of translation. Especially fine were his translations from English, including renderings of Walt Whitman, Mark Twain, and G. K. Chesterton. From Two to Five, first published in 1928 and reissued many times, presents witty, thoughtful observations of children's psychology and verbal creativity, and has been frequently used by linguists. Chukovsky's own verses for children, which are enormously popular, are among the classics of this genre in Russia. (Bowker Author Biography) |
