Vsevolod V. Krestovsky (1840–1895): Life, oeuvre, and Rusin themes in the writing of a Russian author and officer

Vsevolod Vladimirovich Krestovsky (February 11 (23), 1840 - January 18 (30), 1895) was a Russian writer, poet, literary critic, journalist, translator, military historian, politician, and editor. He attained the rank of Colonel in the Russian Imperial Army. Hailing from an ancient Malorossian (Little Russian) noble family, he graduated from the First Saint Petersburg Gymnasium and subsequently studied for two years at the Faculty of History and Philology of the Imperial Saint Petersburg University. He began writing poetry and short stories while still a gymnasium student. During his university years, he aligned himself with the liberal camp, and a number of his poems were adopted as revolutionary songs. After leaving the university, he contributed to several newspapers and journals. In 1863, influenced by the Polish uprising, his views shifted dramatically towards patriotism and support for the government, marking a renunciation of his former nihilist beliefs. In 1865-1866, he served on a commission established to investigate the dungeons of Warsaw, which had been used as hiding places by participants of the Polish insurrection. Krestovsky addressed the theme of the revolutionary movement in two novels published under the collective title Kovavyi Puf. Khronika o novom smutnom vremeni Gosudarstva Rossiiskogo (The Bloody Puff: A Chronicle of the New Time of Troubles in the Russian State; 4 vols., St. Petersburg, 1875). In 1858, he conceived the idea for his novel Peterburgskie trushchoby (The Slums of Petersburg), which was serialized in the journal Otechestvennye zapiskifrom 1864 to 1866 and published as a separate edition in 1867. The novel was a tremendous success. In 1868, Krestovsky enlisted as an unteroffizier (non-commissioned officer) in the 14th Ulansky Yamburg Regiment. During this period, he wrote a number of works on military-historical themes and saw action in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878. He is also known for his trilogy - Tma egipetskaya (Egyptian Darkness), Tamara Bendavid, and Torzhestvo Vaala(The Triumph of Baal) - which was published in Russkiy vestnik between 1881 and 1891. In the third, unfinished part, The Triumph of Baal, he issued a prophetic warning that the opponents of autocracy were changing their tactics: instead of “going to the people” (khozhdenie vnarod),they had begun to “infiltrate the government” (idti vpravitel’stvo). Krestovsky was promoted to the rank of Colonel on April 24, 1888. In 1892, he was appointed editor of the newspaper Varshavskiy dnevnik. He died in Warsaw on January 18, 1895, and was buried at the Nikolskoe Cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra in St. Petersburg.

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