Boris Pil'niak

Michael George Falchikov (University of Edinburgh)
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Boris Pil'niak was born Boris Andreevich Vogau, in Mozhaisk, to the west of Moscow on 11th October 1894. His father, Andrei, a veterinarian, was of Volga German descent and his mother was the sister of the landscape painter Alexander Savinov. Boris thus grew up in a typical provincial intelligentsia family and spent his early years in a number of provincial towns in central Russia, including Nizhnii Novgorod, though he is particularly associated with Kolomna, where he lived until the mid-1920s. He studied at the Moscow Commercial Institute, but began his writing career in his teens. Exempt from war service because of poor eyesight, he began publishing in provincial journals from 1915 onwards, under the name “Pil'niak”. This pseudonym, prompted by the need to conceal a German surname…

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Citation: Falchikov, Michael George. "Boris Pil'niak". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 January 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=11676, accessed 19 March 2024.]

11676 Boris Pil'niak 1 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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