List of Russian-language playwrights

Last updated July 07, 2025

Notable authors who have written dramatic works in the Russian language include:

Alphabetical list

A

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Alexander Ablesimov (1742–1783)	The Miller
Alexander Afinogenov (1904–1941)	Fear Crank A Far Place
Leonid Andreyev (1871–1919)	Anathema The Life of Man He Who Gets Slapped	Margalo Gillmore (Consuelo) & Richard Bennett (He) in He Who Gets Slapped, 1922.	Richard Bennett (He, left) & Louis Calvert (Baron Regnart, right) in He Who Gets Slapped, 1922.
Maria Arbatova (born 1957)	On the Road to Ourselves	Maria Arbatova in 2009
Aleksei Arbuzov (1908–1986)	Tanya A Long Road
Mikhail Artsybashev (1878–1927)	War	Artsybashev with the actress Yavorskaya, 1915	Drawing of Artsybashev
Arkady Averchenko (1881–1925)		Drawing of Averchenko	Averchenko, c. 1920

B

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Isaac Babel (1894–1940)	Maria Sunset
Andrei Bely (1880–1934)	Petersburg Moscow
Pyotr Boborykin (1836–1921)	The Scale	Vera Komissarzhevskaya in The Scale
Oleg Bogayev (born 1970)
Mikhail Bulgakov (1891–1940)	Flight Zoyka's Apartment Adam and Eve The Days of the Turbins	1926 production of The Days of the Turbins	2011 production of Zoyka's Apartment

C

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Catherine the Great (1729–1796)	Fevey	Portrait of Catherine, 1745	Portrait, 1794
Nikolai Chayev (1824—1914)	Svat Faddeyich
Anton Chekhov (1860–1904)	The Seagull Uncle Vanya Three Sisters The Cherry Orchard	Konstantin Stanislavski as Vershinin in Three Sisters	Chekhov's wife Olga Knipper, who played Madame Ranevskaya in The Cherry Orchard
Evgeny Chirikov (1864–1932)	The Peasant	At his desk, 1904	Portrait by Repin, 1906
Ada Chumachenko (1887 – 1954)	The Snow Queen A Man from the Moon
Grand Duke Constantine (1858–1915)	King of Judea	The Grand Duke in military dress, 1891	With his wife Elizaveta, 1894

D

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Grigoriy Demidovtsev (born 1960)		Certificate of membership in the Union of Russian Writers	Demidovtsev in 2007
	Victor Denisov (born 1944)	Six Specters of Lenin on a Piano		V. Denisov and a San Francisco director V.Zavarina, 1994

E

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Nikolai Erdman (1900–1970)	The Mandate The Suicide
	Nikolai Evreinov (1879–1953)	A Merry Death The Chief Thing The Presentation of Love The Storming of the Winter Palace	Drawing of Evreinov, 1921	Memorial plaque in Paris

F

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Denis Fonvizin (1744/45–1792)	The Minor	Statue of Fonvizin, part of the Millennium of Russia monument	The Fonvizin Family Coat of Arms
	Olga Forsh (1873–1961)	The Substitute Lecturer

G

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Alexander Galich (1918–1977)
Zinaida Gippius (1869–1945)	The Green Ring	Portrait of Gippius by Ilya Repin, 1894	Portrait by Léon Bakst, 1906
Nikolai Gogol (1809–1852)	Marriage The Government Inspector The Gamblers	Fyodor Paramonov as Anton Antonovich in The Government Inspector	Cover of the first edition of The Government Inspector, 1836
Dmitry Gorchakov (1758–1824)	King for a Day
Grigori Gorin (1940–2000)
Maxim Gorky (1868–1936)	The Philistines The Lower Depths Summerfolk Children of the Sun	Konstantin Stanislavski as Satin in The Lower Depths	1905 production of Children of the Sun by the Komissarzhevskaya Theatre
Aleksandr Griboyedov (1795–1829)	Woe from Wit	Stanislavski as Famusov in Woe from Wit	Title page of Griboyedov's manuscript of Woe from Wit, 1824
Isabella Grinevskaya (1864–1944)
Elena Guro (1887–1913)	The Hurdy-Gurdy	Guro's self-portrait	Elena and Mikhail Matyushin

I

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Vsevolod Ivanov (1895–1963)	Armoured Train 14-69	1927 production of Armoured Train 14-69

K

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Vasily Kapnist (1758–1823)	Chicane	Postcard featuring Kapnist
Valentin Kataev (1897–1986)	Quadrature of the Circle	Kataev's brother, the writer Yevgeni Petrov
Pavel Katenin (1792–1853)	Andromache
Yevgeny Kharitonov (1941–1981)	Under House Arrest
Daniil Kharms (1905–1942)	Elizaveta Bam		Caricature of Kharms by Antonovsky
Mikhail Kheraskov (1733–1807)
Vladimir Kirshon (1902–1938)	Bread The Miraculous Alloy	Layout of scenery for the play based on the play by V. Kirshon The Court
Fyodor Kokoshkin (1775–1838)	Little Demon on Vacation	Kokoshkin's grave at the Donskoy Monastery's necropolis in Moscow
Nikolay Kolyada (born 1957)	A Tale About the Dead Tsarina Oginski Polonaise Persian Lilac Playing Forfeits Slingshot	in the Sverdlovsk Regional Universal Scientific Library Vissarion Belinsky	Kolyada Theater in Yekaterinburg
Yakov Knyazhnin (1740/42–1791)	Olga The Cranks The Braggart Vadim the Bold
Eugene Kozlovsky (born 1946)
Valentin Krasnogorov (born 1934)	Let's Have Sex! Pelicans of the Wilderness The Delights of Adultery The Dog The Fall of Don Juan
Ivan Krylov (1769–1844)	Philomela The Cat and the Сook The Fox and the Crane The Quartet The Wolf and the Lamb	Monument to Krylov in St Petersburg	Illustration The Cat and the Сook by Sergei Gribkov
Nestor Kukolnik (1809–1868)	A Life for the Tsar	Title page from one of Kukolnik's dramas, 1834	Plaque for Kukolnik in Taganrog

L

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Ivan Lazhechnikov (1792–1869)	Oprichnik
	Leonid Leonov (1899–1994)	Untilovsk
	Dmitri Lipskerov (born 1964)
	Lev Lunts (1901–1924)	Native Land

M

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Anatoly Marienhof (1897–1962)		With the poet Sergei Yesenin, 1915
Samuil Marshak (1887–1964)	Smart Things The Twelve Months	Soviet stamp featuring Marshak
Mikhail Matinsky (1760–c. 1820)	Regeneration Saint-Petersburg's Trade Stalls
Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893–1930)	The Bedbug The Bathhouse Mystery-Bouffe	A young Mayakovsky	Soviet stamp featuring Mayakovsky
Sergey Mikhalkov (1913–2009)	Three Plus Two	Mikhailov receiving an award from Vladimir Putin in 2003	Talking with Vladimir Putin in 2003

N

Person	Notable works	Illustration
Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)	The Waltz Invention	Nabokov's first published work
Löb Nevakhovich (1776/78–1831)
Alexander Neverov (1886–1923)	Baba Hunger	Drawing of Neverov
Nikolai Nikolev (1758–1815)
Osip Notovich (1849–1914)	Shady Business

O

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Alexander Ostrovsky (1823–1886)	The Storm The Poor Bride Poverty is No Vice Enough Stupidity in Every Wise Man The Snow Maiden	Stanislavski (left) and Vasily Kachalov in Enough Stupidity in Every Wise Man	Monument to Osrovsky at the Maly Theatre in Moscow
Valentin Ovechkin (1904–1968)	A Time to Reap
Vladislav Ozerov (1769–1816)	Dmitry Donskoy

P

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Vera Panova (1905–1973)	Ivan Kosogor In Old Moscow	Plaque for Panova in St. Petersburg
Lyudmila Petrushevskaya (born 1938)		Petrushevskaya in 2009	At a booksigning in New York with Keith Gessen, 2009
Aleksey Pisemsky (1821–1881)	A Bitter Fate The Hypochondriac Lieutenant Gladkov The Financial Genius	A Bitter Fate. Lizaveta. Picture by Ilya Repin.	Engraving of Pisemsky
Andrei Platonov (1899–1951)	The Hurdy Gurdy Fourteen Little Red Huts
Pyotr Polevoy (1839–1902)	Princess Sophia
Nikolai Pogodin (1900–1962)	Aristocrats
Mikhail Popov (1742–1790)	Anyuta
Alexander Preys (1905–1942)
Iosif Prut (1900–1996)
Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837)	Boris Godunov The Stone Guest Mozart and Salieri The Covetous Knight	The Stone Guest. Don Juan and Doña Ana. Picture by Ilya Repin.

R

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Edvard Radzinsky (born 1936)
	Vyacheslav Rybakov (born 1954)

S

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Mikhail Saltykov-Schedrin (1826–1889)	The Death of Pazukhin
Natalya Sats (1903–1993)
Alexander Shakhovskoy (1777–1846)	Ladies' Joke The New Stern
Shchepkina-Kupernik (1874–1952)	Summer Picture
Evgeny Shvarts (1896–1958)	The Dragon
Vassily Sigarev (born 1977)	Plasticine Black Milk
Fyodor Sologub (1863–1927)	The Triumph of Death	Portrait by Konstantin Somov
Ksenya Stepanycheva (born 1978)	Pink Bow	Stepanycheva in 2009
Aleksandr Sukhovo-Kobylin (1817–1903)	Pictures of the Past	Prov Sadovsky as Rasplyuyev in Krechinsky's Wedding (first part of Pictures of the Past).	Cover of the first edition of Pictures of the Past.
Alexander Sumarokov (1717–1777)	Khorev	Portrait of Sumarokov by Fedor Rokotov.

T

Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
Yelizaveta Tarakhovskaya (1891–1968)	By the Pike's Wish	Tarakhovskaya's birth house in Taganrog
Modest Tchaikovsky (1850–1916)		Tchaikovsky's brother, the composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky
Nadezhda Teffi (1872–1952)	The Woman Question
Viktoriya Tokareva (born 1937)
Aleksey K. Tolstoy (1817–1875)	The Death of Ivan the Terrible Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich Tsar Boris Don Juan	Ivan the Terrible. Picture by Viktor Vasnetsov.	Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich
Aleksey N. Tolstoy (1883–1945)		Stamp featuring Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910)	The Power of Darkness The Fruits of Enlightenment The Living Corpse	Stanislavski as Zvezdintsev in The Fruits of Enlightenment, 1891	Stanislavski as Prince Abrezhov in The Living Corpse, 1911
Sergei Tretyakov (1892–1937)	I Want a Baby
Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883)	A Provincial Lady A Month in the Country	Stanislavski and Knipper in A Month in the Country, 1909	A scene from A Month in the Country

U

Portrait	Person	Notable works	Illustration	Illustration
	Eduard Uspensky (1937–2018)

V

Person	Notable works	Illustration
Alexander Vampilov (1937–1972)	Elder Son
Alexander Vvedensky (1904–1941)	Christmas at the Ivanovs	Vvedensky after arrest in 1941
Anastasiya Verbitskaya (1861–1928)	Mirages	Verbitskaya in 1898
Vsevolod Vishnevsky (1900–1951)	Optimistic Tragedy

Z

Person	Notable works	Illustration
Mark Zakharov (1933–2019)		Zakharov with Dmitry Medvedev in 2008
Boris Zaytsev (1881–1972)
Yevgeny Zamyatin (1884–1937)
Aleksey Zhemchuzhnikov (1821–1908)
Lydia Zinovieva-Annibal (1866–1907)
Rafail Zotov (1795–1871)	Jealous Wife

List of Russian-language playwrights

Contents

Alphabetical list

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

I

K

L

M

N

O

P

R

S

T

U

V

Z

See also