Russkii Vestnik
Russkii Vestnik
(Russian Herald), a literary and political journal founded in Moscow in 1856 by M. N. Katkov with the assistance of P. M. Leont’ev. Initially it was issued twice a month, and beginning in 1861 monthly.
The first period of the journal’s publication (1856–61) was characterized by a moderately liberal program and the expectation of “reforms from above.” During these years, the journal published M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin’s Provincial Sketches, I. S. Turgenev’s On the Eve and Fathers and Sons, L. N. Tolstoy’s War and Peace, and F. M. Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. In its second period (1862–67) the journal became a mouthpiece for the forces of reaction. Katkov turned from “enlightened liberalism” to “nationalism, chauvinism, and rabid Black-Hun-dredism” (V. I. Lenin, Poln. sobr. soch, 5th ed., vol. 22, p. 44).
Russkii vestnik cultivated the “antinihilistic novel” (A Troubled Sea by A. F. Pisemskii, At Daggers Drawn by N. S. Leskov, The Mirage by V. P. Kliushnikov, and Panurge’s Flock by V. V. Krestovskii) and demanded “repression from above.” After Katkov’s death in 1887, the journal was published by various individuals in Moscow and St. Petersburg until 1906.
REFERENCES
Lenin, V. I. “Kar’era.” Poln. sobr. sock, 5th ed., vol. 22.Zaionchkovskii, P. A. Rossiiskoe samoderzhavie v kontse XIX stoletiia. Moscow, 1970.
Kantor, V. “M. N. Katkov i krushenie estetiki liberalizma.” Voprosy literatury, 1973, no. 5.
Istoriia russkoi zhurnalistiki XVIII-XIX vv, 3rd ed. Moscow, 1973.
E. G. BABAEV