born Jan. 10, 1883, Nikolayevsk, Russia
died Feb. 23, 1945, Moscow
Russian writer.
Distantly related to the great novelist Leo Tolstoy , he supported the anti-Bolshevik White Army in the Russian Civil War, then emigrated to western Europe, where he wrote one of his finest works, the nostalgic, partly autobiographical Nikita's Childhood (1921). In 1923 he returned to Russia as a supporter of the Soviet regime. He wrote many works that are purely entertaining and, in wartime, patriotic articles. He won three Stalin Prizes, for the novel trilogy The Road to Calvary (192041), the novel Peter the First (192945), and the play Ivan the Terrible (1943).