Faddey Bulgarin

Faddei Venediktovich Bulgarin (; – ), born Jan Tadeusz Krzysztof Bułharyn, was a Russian writer, journalist and publisher of Polish ancestry. In addition to his newspaper work, he rejuvenated the Russian novel, and published the first theatrical almanac in Russian. During his life, his novels were translated and published in English, French, German, Swedish, Polish, and Czech. He served as a soldier under Napoleon, and in later life as an agent of the Czar's secret police.

Origins Bulgarin was born in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, then part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, to a noble family in the Pereszewo manor, Minsk Voivodeship (near the modern village of , Belarus), as a son of Benedykt and Aniela née Buczyńska. He came from a noble family with Lithuanian Tatar roots of the Bułat coat of arms. In turn, Bulgarin intensively criticized Pushkin in his works. Bulgarin retorted with epigrams, in which Pushkin's name was rendered as Chushkin (from the Russian word for "nonsense").

Books Inspired by Sir Walter Scott, Bulgarin wrote the Vejeeghen (Vyzhigin) series of historical novels, which used to be popular in Russia and abroad. He followed these with two sententious novels Dmitry the Pretender (1830), about the False Dmitry I, and Mazepa (1834) about Ivan Mazepa. In 1837 he published under his own name a lengthy description of Imperial Russia, although much of the work was actually by Nikolai Alexeyevich Ivanov, then a Ph.D. student at Dorpat University.

Some of Bulgarin's stories are science fiction: Plausible Fantasies is a far future novel about the 29th century Improbable Fables is a fantastic voyage into hollow Earth (The Adventures of Mitrofanushka in the Moon) (1837), a satirical fantasy novel.

Quotes and criticism Bulgarin's biography always was subject of discussion among Russian society and especially among poets as he served in the Third Department under the rule of the Nicholas I. His friend and colleague Nikolay Gretsch wrote about him: "During his lifetime, some praised him, others tolerated him, some hated him, many argued and quarreled with him, but undoubtedly, no one ever slandered him—except in unpublished epigrams. It seems they feared his sharp, relentless pen. But after his death, he became the subject of universal malice and ridicule. People who wouldn't be fit to work as his janitors now curse and vilify him in the most merciless, shameless way."

Death After Nicholas I's death, Bulgarin retired from the department of stud farms, in which he had been serving for many years, and withdrew to his manor in Karlova (Karlowa in German) a suburb of Tartu at the time, but now incorporated within the city.

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