NEKRASOV, NIKOLAI ALEKSEEVICH. 1821-1878.
Autograph Letter Signed, 1 p, 8vo, St. Petersburg, October 16, 1875, pin holes.
Nekrasov was a famous Russian "civic poet" whose admirers have included everyone from Dostoyevsky to Lenin. His sympathetic depiction of the peasants and outrage at social injustice particularly endeared him to the Bolsheviks. He also edited the important literary magazine Sovremennik (The Contemporary) and was a popular children's poet. Here he writes (in translation): "I pass my voting right at the assembly of Dramatic Writers Society on October 21, 1875 to Aleksandr Nikolaevich Ostrovskii." Ostrovsky was a Russian playwright, noted for his realism, whom Nekrasov championed. Perhaps his most famous play, however, was the fairy tale Snegurochka (1873) that was later turned into operas by both Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov; Nekrasov hated it. The correspondence between Nekrasov and Ostrovsky is now lost.