Petr Semenovich Kirillov

(Petr Er’ke). Born July 8 (21), 1910, in Malyi Tolkai, in present-day Podbel’skii Raion, Kuibyshev Oblast; died Nov. 24, 1955, in Moscow. Soviet Mordovian writer. Member of the CPSU (1942). Participant in the Great Patriotic War (1941–45).

Kirillov was first published in 1929. His works include the collections of lyric verse Without Bounds (1932) and Along the Roads of War (1945), the novellas In Spasskii Monastery (1935) and The First Lesson (1940), the historical drama Litova (1940), and the plays Light in a God-forsaken Place (1950) and The Teacher (1953; Russian translation, 1956). Kirillov was awarded four orders and several medals.