Russians are a nation and an East Slavic ethnic group native to European Russia in Eastern Europe. Outside Russia, notable minorities exist in other former Soviet states such as Belarus, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Ukraine and the Baltic states. A large Russian diaspora also exists all over the world, with notable numbers in the United States, Germany, Brazil, and Canada.
Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia and its émigrés and to the Russian-language literature. The roots of Russian literature can be traced to the Middle Ages, when epics and chronicles in Old East Slavic were composed. By the Age of Enlightenment, literature had grown in importance, and from the early 1830s, Russian literature underwent an astounding golden age in poetry, prose and drama. Romanticism permitted a flowering of poetic talent: Vasily Zhukovsky and later his protégé Alexander Pushkin came to the fore. Prose was flourishing as well. The first great Russian novelist was Nikolai Gogol. Then came Ivan Turgenev, who mastered both short stories and novels. Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky soon became internationally renowned. In the second half of the century Anton Chekhov excelled in short stories and became a leading dramatist. The beginning of the 20th century ranks as the Silver Age of Russian poetry. The poets most often associated with the "Silver Age" are Konstantin Balmont, Valery Bryusov, Alexander Blok, Anna Akhmatova, Nikolay Gumilyov, Osip Mandelstam, Sergei Yesenin, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Marina Tsvetaeva and Boris Pasternak. This era produced some first-rate novelists and short-story writers, such as Aleksandr Kuprin, Nobel Prize winner Ivan Bunin, Leonid Andreyev, Fyodor Sologub, Aleksey Remizov, Yevgeny Zamyatin, Dmitry Merezhkovsky and Andrei Bely.
The USSR State Prize was the Soviet Union's state honor. It was established on September 9, 1966. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, the prize was followed up by the State Prize of the Russian Federation.
Vagankovo Cemetery, established in 1771, is located in the Presnya district of Moscow. It started in the aftermath of the Moscow plague riot of 1771 outside the city proper, so as to prevent the contagion from spreading.
Sergei Parajanov was a Soviet film director and artist of Armenian descent who made significant contributions to Soviet cinematography through Ukrainian, Georgian, and Armenian cinema. He invented his own cinematic style, which was totally out of step with the guiding principles of socialist realism. This, combined with his controversial lifestyle and behaviour, led Soviet authorities to repeatedly persecute and imprison him, and suppress his films.
The Order of the Red Banner of Labour was an order of the Soviet Union established to honour great deeds and services to the Soviet state and society in the fields of production, science, culture, literature, the arts, education, health, social and other spheres of labour activities. It is the labour counterpart of the military Order of the Red Banner. A few institutions and factories, being the pride of Soviet Union, also received the order. The Order of the Red Banner of Labour began solely as an award of the Russian SFSR on December 28, 1920. The all-Union equivalent was established by Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet on September 7, 1928 and approved by another decree on September 15, 1928. The Order's statute and regulations were modified by multiple successive decrees of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, on May 7, 1936, on June 19, 1943, on March 28, 1980, and on July 18, 1980.
Leonid Vyacheslavovich Kuravlyov is a Soviet and Russian film actor. He was named People's Artist of the RSFSR in 1976.
The Monarchy of Russia was abolished in 1917 following the February Revolution, which forced Emperor Nicholas II (1868–1918) to abdicate. Claims made on behalf of different persons to be the rightful current pretender continue to be debated.
Ukraine has had an influence on the history of the cinema. Prominent Ukrainian directors include Oleksandr Dovzhenko, Dziga Vertov and Serhiy Paradzhanov. Dovzhenko is often cited as one of the most important early Soviet filmmakers, as well as being a pioneer of Soviet montage theory and founding Dovzhenko Film Studios. In 1927 Dziga Vertov moved from Moscow to Ukraine. At the film studio VUFKU he made several avant-garde documentaries, among them «The Eleventh Year», «Man with a Movie Camera» and first Ukrainian documentary sound film «Enthusiasm ». Paradzhanov was an Armenian film director and artist who made significant contributions to Ukrainian, Armenian and Georgian cinema; he invented his own cinematic style, Ukrainian poetic cinema, which was totally out of step with the guiding principles of socialist realism.
The State Prize of the Russian Federation, officially translated in Russia as Russian Federation National Award, is a state honorary prize established in 1992 as the successor for the USSR State Prize following the breakup of the Soviet Union. In 2004 the rules for selection of laureates and the status of the award were significantly changed making them closer to such awards as the Nobel Prize or the Soviet Lenin Prize.
Roman Sergeevich Madyanov is a Soviet and Russian actor. Madyanov's career in cinema began as a child actor when he starred as Huckleberry Finn in Hopelessly Lost (1973). He is best known in the West for portraying the corrupt mayor Vadim in the 2014 film Leviathan.
Valentyn Oleksandrovych Nalyvaichenko is a Ukrainian diplomat and politician. On 24 February 2014, the Verkhovna Rada appointed Nalyvaichenko the Head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), on 18 June 2015 he was relieved of the office.
Yuri Anatoleyvich Bykov is a Russian filmmaker, screenwriter and actor. He is best known for directing the films The Major, The Fool and the TV series The Method.
The 2nd Grenadier Division was an infantry unit in the Imperial Russian Army as part of the Grenadier Corps. Notable engagements of the division include the French invasion of Russia.
Yuri Alexandrovich Merkulov was a Soviet artist, animation and film director, conservator-restorer, inventor, film theorist and actor. He is known as one of the founders of the Soviet school of traditional and stop motion animation.
