Kazimir Barantsevich

Kazimir Stanislavovich Barantsevich (; – 26 July 1927) was a Russian writer and poet, who also used the pseudonym Sarmat.

Biography Barantsevich was born in Saint Petersburg to Stanislav Martynovich Barantsevich, a descendant of the Polish aristocratic family belonging to the order of Leliwa, and his French wife, Julia Ivanovna ( Lemann).

He debuted in 1873 with the drama in verse Oprichnina, a poetic remake of A.K. Tolstoy's Prince Serebryanny which was produced in October that year in Alexandrinsky Theatre.

His first short story collection Pod gnyotom ('Oppressed') which the writer Nikolai Leykin had been instrumental in the publication of, came out in 1883 to considerable critical acclaim. It was followed by several more, including Porvannye struny ('Broken Strings', 1886), 80 Stories by Sarmat (1891) and Kartinki zhizni ('Life's Sketches', 1892), as well as three novels: Raba ('Woman Slave', 1887), Semeyny ochag ('Family Hearth', 1893), Bortsy ('Wrestlers', 1896).

Legacy Barantsevich's novels, highlighting the life of people from Russian lower middle classes, leading unspeakably dreary, aimless and lonesome existence on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg, earned him the reputation of the leading purveyor of 'social pessimism' in the Russian literature of the late 19th century. Nikolai Mikhaylovsky, though, praised Barantsevich as a true master for depicting human loneliness, quite able to "rise to the peaks of true art." Anton Chekhov considered his worldview 'limited' but still, in 1900 suggested him as a candidate for the Honourable Academics.