Sasha Krasny (russian: Саша Красный, literally ''Alexander the Red'') was the pen-name of Aleksandr Davydovich Bryansky (russian: Александр Давыдович Брянский; – 2 March 1995), a

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

n poet and songwriter. His first book was published in Odessa in 1912 and the last in 1993. His son Boris Bryansky (1928–1972) was also a poet and songwriter.

Biography

Bryansky said he was born in 1882 in

Sevastopol Sevastopol (; uk, Севасто́поль, Sevastópolʹ, ; gkm, Σεβαστούπολις, Sevastoúpolis, ; crh, Акъя́р, Aqyár, ), sometimes written Sebastopol, is the largest city in Crimea, and a major port on the Black Sea ...

, into a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family. After graduating from

Grekov Odessa Art school The Grekov Odesa Art School ( ua, Одеське художнє училище імені Митрофана Грекова; abbreviated ОХУ) is a secondary education institution in Odesa, Ukraine. It is the oldest arts school in the country. ...

which he entered in 1908, Bryansky performed on stage under the pseudonym of Sasha Krasny. In 1914 he was drafted into Russian Army and fought in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. According to his own account, he was wounded and awarded with a St. George's Cross, 4th Degree. After the

October Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key mome ...

he joined the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army ( Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, afte ...

and became one of

Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1 ...

's bodyguards. Along with fellow Odesite writers such as

Ilya Ilf Ilya Arnoldovich Ilf (born Iehiel-Leyb Aryevich Faynzilberg, russian: Иехи́ел-Лейб Арьевич Фа́йнзильберг) ( in Odessa – 13 April 1937, Moscow), was a popular Soviet journalist and writer of Jewish origin who us ...

and Yevgeni Petrov he published his poems in the ''Gudok'' newspaper, a mouthpiece for the Soviet Ministry of Transport. He helped initiate the

agitprop Agitprop (; from rus, агитпроп, r=agitpróp, portmanteau of ''agitatsiya'', "agitation" and ''propaganda'', " propaganda") refers to an intentional, vigorous promulgation of ideas. The term originated in Soviet Russia where it referred ...

movement of "Blue shirts" which took its name from his 1923 collection of poetry, "The Blue Blouse" (Russian: Синяя блуза). In the mid-1920s Krasny led a circle of amateur performers who sought to popularize Bolshevik ideology by touring the country with skits, songs, and recitations of poems. The show was called the Sasha Krasny Theatre and continued well into the 1930s. He also found time to publish several collections of songs. Krasny was not active as a poet from that time until the 1980s. When he joined the

USSR Union of Writers The Union of Soviet Writers, USSR Union of Writers, or Soviet Union of Writers (russian: Союз писателей СССР, translit=Soyuz Sovetstikh Pisatelei) was a creative union of professional writers in the Soviet Union. It was founded ...

in 1984, he was already 102 years old. In his old age he concentrated on love themes. His collection "The Contrasts" appeared in 1990 and "Only About Love" three years later. This last collection of verse was published when he was 111.

Death

Krasny died in 1995 at the claimed age of 112Помним, скорбим/Брянский, Александр Давыдович
/ref> in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...

and was buried at the New

Donskoy Cemetery The New Donskoy Cemetery (Новое Донское кладбище) is a 20th-century necropolis sprawling to the south from the Donskoy Monastery in the south-west of Central Moscow. It has been closed for new burials since the 1980s. Histo ...

there. His supercentenarian age was never independently confirmed. His final publication was a memoir about Sergei Yesenin.

References

External links

''This article is based on a translation of the equivalent article of the Russian Wikipedia on 2 October 2007''.
Bryansky's tomb
{{DEFAULTSORT:Krasny, Sasha 1882 births 1995 deaths 20th-century pseudonymous writers 20th-century Russian male writers Jewish Russian writers Men supercentenarians People from Sevastopol Recipients of the Cross of St. George Russian Jews Russian male poets Russian people of World War I Soviet male writers Soviet poets