The Presidential Library marking the birthday of Nikolai Chernyshevsky

A publicist and writer, materialist philosopher and scientist, revolutionary democrat and theorist of utopian socialism, “enemy of the Russian Empire number one” according to gendarme documents, Nikolai Chernyshevsky was born in Saratov on July 24 (12 old style) 1828.

The Presidential Library dedicated a special section Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky (1828-1889)  in the Russian People collection to the difficult fate of this selfless ideological fighter, his literary and social activities. The institution’s portal provides access to individual documentary and research materials about Chernyshevsky; detailed information about him is also available in On This Day section.

Historian and publicist Yuri Steklov tells about the family of Nikolai Chernyshevsky in his monumental work “Nikolai Chernyshevsky: his Life and Career: 1828-1889" (1928).

Nikolai began his education at home, under the guidance of his father. Yuri Steklov writes that “in his Autobiography, Chernyshevsky himself talks about his passion for books. "I" he says, "became a bibliophile, a book eater, very early" <...> Chernyshevsky was primarily a bookish person (in the good sense of the word). His love of reading really turned into a real passion for him".

In 1843, Chernyshevsky entered the Saratov Theological Seminary. Three years later, without completing the course of study, he perfectly passed the entrance exams to St. Petersburg University. “By this time, according to the testimony of contemporaries, Chernyshevsky already possessed an amazing erudition and intellectual development. He knew languages: Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, German, Polish and English. He even took up the study of the Persian language...", - notes Steklov.

“In 1850, Chernyshevsky graduated from the course at St. Petersburg University as an 11th candidate in the Faculty of Philosophy, later transformed into the Faculty of History and Philology, and remained with him for studies. At the university, he acquired almost encyclopedic knowledge, by the way, he knew medicine so well that he gave advice to patients and pointed out to them the medicines... <...> Chernyshevsky did not stay in St. Petersburg at the university for studies: on February 4, 1851 he was appointed senior teacher of literature in the Saratov gymnasium... ", - says the article by the historian and archaeologist Flegont Dukhovnikov "Nikolai Gavrilovich Chernyshevsky (1850–52)" (1910), published in the December issue of the monthly historical publication Russkaya Starina.

During the years of study at the university, in addition to knowledge, Chernyshevsky acquired his revolutionary democratic convictions.

In 1853, after marrying the daughter of a Saratov doctor, Olga Vasilyeva, Chernyshevsky returned to St. Petersburg and for some time worked as a teacher in the Second Cadet Corps. Then his literary activity begins. At first, these were small articles and notes in the St. Petersburg Vedomosti newspaper and the Otechestvennye zapiski magazine, reviews and critical articles. In 1854 he began to collaborate with Sovremennik and soon became the head of the critical-bibliographic department, and then, along with Nikolai Nekrasov and Nikolai Dobrolyubov, the entire magazine. Chernyshevsky's dissertation "Aesthetic relations of art to reality", based on the ideas of materialism of Ludwig Feuerbach, became the manifesto of a whole trend.

Chernyshevsky's literary-critical articles and reviews published in Sovremennik were devoted to the works of Pushkin, Zhukovsky, Nekrasov, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Lev Tolstoy and others. He assigned a subordinate role to fiction in society, emphasizing primarily its social and moral significance. A citizen writer, according to Chernyshevsky, must first of all be a publicist - educate, carry scientific knowledge, awaken curiosity and striving for the highest public interests.

Soon Nikolai Chernyshevsky became a recognized and influential leader of the democratic and socialist representatives of society. According to historian Mikhail Lemke his work The political processes of M. I. Mikhailov, D. I. Pisarev and N. G. Chernyshevsky: (according to unpublished documents)  (1907), “it was not such a mind and not such a person who would sit idly by and do nothing but wrote in Sovremennik. It was first of all a prophet and a leader".

"On July 7, 1862, at about 2 ½ o'clock in the afternoon, in his apartment in St. Petersburg, on Bolshaya Moskovskaya Street, 4, N. G. Chernyshevsky was arrested", - says Soviet historian Anna Pankratova in her introductory article to the collection N. G. Chernyshevsky: archival documents (1939). Mikhail Lemke explains the essence of the charges: “What crime was charged to him by the government of Alexander II? First of all, not one, but two. The first is the composition of the proclamation "To the lordly peasants", the second is preparation for indignation. There was also a third one - "illegal relations with the exiled Herzen", but it was considered unproven".

Nikolai Chernyshevsky spent almost two years in a solitary confinement cell at the Alekseevsky ravelin of the Peter and Paul Fortress, continuing to work. Here the writer created his most famous literary work - the novel What Is To Be Done?, published in Sovremennik in 1863. At first, the censorship did not see its ideological content behind the love story of the novel, and later, after the publication was banned, the novel, which caused a huge public response in the country, was distributed in handwritten copies.

The investigation into the Chernyshevsky case lasted a year and a half. In February 1864, he was sentenced to 14 years of hard labor and subsequent life in Siberia. Emperor Alexander II partially pardoned the convicted person and cut the term of hard labor by half. Chernyshevsky spent more than two decades in prison and hard labor. In Siberia, at a settlement in Vilyuisk, he wrote the novel "Prologue" as well as several stories and plays.

In 1883, Chernyshevsky was allowed to settle in Astrakhan, and then, thanks to the efforts of his son Mikhail, he returned to his native Saratov, but a few months later he fell ill with malaria.

Nikolai Chernyshevsky died on October 29 (17 according to the old style) October 1889 and was buried in Saratov at the Resurrection cemetery.