Vladimir Krupin

Vladimir Nikolayevich Krupin (Владимир Николаевич Крупин, September 7, 1941, village Kilhmez, Kirovskaya Oblast, USSR) is a Soviet Russian writer, editor, religious author and tutor. The major proponent of the Village prose movement, noted for his eccentric, folklore-rooted style of writing, Krupin was propelled to nation-wide fame by his 1980 Novy Mir-published satirical novel Zhivaya Voda (Aqua Vita). ^[1]

Biography

Vladimir Krupin was born in Kirovskaya Oblast, in the family of a local forester. In 1957, after finishing school, he came to work at a local newspaper. In 1961, having served 3 years in the Soviet Army, he joined the CPSU. In 1967 he graduated from N.K.Krupskaya Moscovskaya Oblast Pedagogical Institute and spent several years teaching Russian language at school. Krupin joined the Sovremennik Publishers as an editor and at one point became its partorg, only to be fired from this post after the publication of Georgy Vladimov's Three Minutes of Silence.^[1]

In 1974 Vladimir Krupin published his first book, the collection of short stories "Zyorna" (Seeds). That year also saw the publication of his short novels Varvara and The Yamshchik Tale. In 1980 the satirical short novel Aqua Vitae, dealing with the degradation of the Soviet rural community, steeped in mass alcoholism, made Krupin famous. The publication of another novel, The 40th Day in Nash Sovremennik entailed the deputy editor Yuri Seleznyov being fired. ^[1]

In 1980-1982 Krupin edited the literary Moskva magazine. His 1980s works, - Bokovoy veter (The Side Wind, 1982), Povest o vom, kak... (The Tale of How..., 1985) - examined hardships of life in the Soviet village, praised the ‘small man’s courage and spiritual strength, deploring the demise of Russia’s traditional values in the modern times.

Disgusted by Perestroika, Krupin came up with politicized novels The Saving of the Perished (1988) and Good-Bye Russia, Meet You in Paradise (1991), the latter showing the agony of the Russian village, destroyed by the new leadership who turned the country into a psychiatric ward, as the author saw it. Outraged by the destruction of the Russian Parliament in October 1983, he reacted by the series of articles ("The Cross and the Void", "The Bitter Grief", and others) published by the self-styled 'spiritual opposition' magazines Nash Sovremennik and Moskva. By this time Krupin, now a controversial figure, has been ignored by the mainstream Russian media and lambasted by liberal-minded critics for what they saw as obscurantism and the tendency to blame detrimental Western influences for all the Russian ailments.

In 1994 Krupin started to lecture in the Moscow Religious Academy. Since 1998 he is the editor-in-chief of the Orthodox Christian magazine Blagodatny Ogon (The Benevolent Fire). For many years he’s been the Chairman of the Orthodox Christian film festoval Radonezh. ^[1]

Selected bibliography

• Zyorna (Seeds, 1974, short stories collection)
• Do Vecherney Zvezdy (Up Until the Evening Star, 1977, short stories collection)
• Zhivaya Voda (Aqua Vita, 1980)
• Verbnoye Voscresenye (Pussy-willow Sunday, 1981)
• Sorokovoy Denh (The 40th Day, 1981)
• Vo Vsyu Ivanovskuyu (Full Throttle, 1985)
• Doroga Domoy (The Way Home, 1985)
• Vyatskaya Tetradh (The Vyatka Notebook, 1987, short stories collection)
• Prosti, proshchay (Forgive Me and Let Go, 1988)
• Kak Tolko, Tak Srazu (At Once, 1992)
• Krestny Khod (Crucession, 1993)
• Povesti Poslednego Vremeni (Tales of the Later Times, 2003)
• Duymka (The Haze, 2007, collection)

References