Aleksandr Ivanovich Ertel
Aleksandr Ivanovich Ertel was a Russian writer born on July 7, 1855, in Ksizovo, a small town in central Russia, where he grew up working on a vast estate. Largely self-educated, he was influenced by the Bible and the novels of Leo Tolstoy, which shaped his literary voice. After marrying in 1875, Ertel focused on writing, particularly inspired by his experiences with the peasant class and rural life. His early work, "Zapiski stepniaka," reflects his intimate connection to the land and the hardships of peasant existence, often marked by a sense of pessimism regarding their cyclical struggles.
Ertel's life took a significant turn when he was jailed in 1884 due to his political associations, an experience that led him to a spiritual awakening. This newfound perspective guided his writing, culminating in his major work, "Gardeniny, ikh dvornia, priverzhentsy i vragi," published in 1889, which explored themes of love, compassion, and the spiritual divide in society. Over the following decade, he continued to delve into psychological and philosophical investigations through his novels. In 1896, Ertel shifted his focus from writing to farming, eventually relocating to Moscow due to health issues, where he passed away on February 7, 1908. His works, alongside those of Tolstoy and Chekhov, are celebrated for their emotional depth and contribute to the rich cultural landscape of late nineteenth-century Russia.
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Aleksandr Ivanovich Ertel
Writer
- Born: July 7, 1855
- Birthplace: Ksizovo (near Voronezh), Russia
- Died: February 7, 1908
- Place of death: Moscow, Russia
Biography
Aleksandr Ivanovich Ertel was born July 7, 1855, in the small town of Ksizovo in the rich farmlands of central Russia. His father was in charge of a vast estate, and young Ertel worked the farm alongside the peasants; this experience would greatly affect the fiction he would come to write. Never formally schooled, Ertel nevertheless read widely and was particularly influenced by the Bible and later by the panoramic novels of Leo Tolstoy. After marrying in 1875, Ertel turned to writing, drawing on his close ties to the land and to the peasant class. Determined to establish more intimate ties with the Russian literary community, he relocated to St. Petersburg and, while working in a library, wrote a series of sketches that recalled his rural experiences, eventually published as Zapiski stepniaka (notes of a steppe-dweller). A pulmonary hemorrhage compelled Ertel to return to his family farm, where he continued to write. Not surprisingly, the writings often reflect a deep pessimism: His sketches of the peasant life indicate a sense of their lives as unrewarding and locked in endless cycles of anticipation and disappointment.
In 1884, Ertel was jailed because of his association with political insurgents in St. Petersburg. He became sick and also fretted over the health of his only daughter, whose delicate constitution had been ravaged by scarlet fever (she would die before he was released). In jail, tormented by such concerns, Ertel underwent what he later described as a religious awakening, a spiritual conviction that turned his heart toward a generous sense of forgiveness and compassion. Released because of his health four months later but invigorated by the intensity of his spiritual awakening, Ertel sought an audience with Tolstoy himself. Ertel was interested furthering Tolstoy’s vision, described in his parable-like stories, of a universal family centered on simple rugged virtues of the rural class.
In 1888, Ertel began working on what would become his defining work, the sweeping family saga Gardeniny, ikh dvornia, priverzhentsy i vragi (1889), which examined the divide between the established social and religious order and the newer radical spirituality. The young central hero comes to affirm the value of love, the reward of compassion, and the necessary gesture of forgiveness. For the next ten years, Ertel continued to explore man’s spiritual dimension in novels that, if they do not always succeed as narratives, stand as intense psychological investigations into character. They are probing philosophical investigations that test Ertel’s willingness to affirm confidence in the heroic reclamation of the soul against his lingering pessimism. By 1896, Ertel had turned from writing to farming, and he worked as a farmer until 1906, when his progressively deteriorating health compelled him to move to Moscow, where he died of a heart attack on February 7, 1908. Along with Tolstoy’s epics and Anton Chekhov’s tales, Ertel’s novels and sketches capture the rich emotional range of the cultural and spiritual renaissance that shook Russia in the late nineteenth century.