Georgi Mokeevich Markov (Russian: Георгий Мокеевич Марков; 19 April 1911 – 25 September 1991) was a Soviet novelist, playwright, screenwriter, journalist and public figure.

Biography

Georgi Markov was born in the family of a Siberian bear hunter. From 1927 to 1931 he worked at the

Komsomol The All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, usually known as Komsomol, was a political youth organization in the Soviet Union. It is sometimes described as the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), although it w ...

work in Tomsk. From 1930 to 1932 he studied at the evening department of

Tomsk State University The National Research Tomsk State University, TSU () is a public research university located in Tomsk, Russia. The university, which opened in 1888, was the first university in the Asian part of Russia and, in practice, the first Russian univ ...

, but did not graduate. From 1931 to 1941 he was the editor of multiple magazines and newspapers (editor of the children's magazine "Comrade" and the newspaper "Bolshevik Smena" in Novosibirsk, the newspaper "Young Bolshevik" in Omsk) and began publishing his own works from 1936. With the beginning of the

Great Patriotic War The Eastern Front, also known as the Great Patriotic War (term), Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union and its successor states, and the German–Soviet War in modern Germany and Ukraine, was a Theater (warfare), theatre of World War II ...

from June 1941, he was a war correspondent for the newspaper “At the Battle Post” of the Trans-Baikal Front, and participated in the defeat of the

Kwantung Army The Kwantung Army (Japanese language, Japanese: 関東軍, ''Kantō-gun'') was a Armies of the Imperial Japanese Army, general army of the Imperial Japanese Army from 1919 to 1945. The Kwantung Army was formed in 1906 as a security force for th ...

. He became a member of the

Union of Soviet Writers The Union of Soviet Writers, USSR Union of Writers, or Soviet Union of Writers () was a creative union of professional writers in the Soviet Union. It was founded in 1934 on the initiative of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (1932) a ...

in 1943. With the rank of major, he was demobilized from the army in December 1945. In 1956 he moved to Moscow. From 1956 to 1971 Markov was secretary of the board of the Union of Soviet Writers of and at the same time from 1959 to 1965 he was chairman of the board of the Moscow branch of the Union of Writers of the RSFSR. From July 2, 1971, to June 28, 1986, he served as first secretary of the board of the Union of Writers of the USSR. From June 28, 1986, to January 18, 1989, Markov Chairman of the Board of the Union of Writers of the USSR. Markov was a Communist Party official and was a member of its Central Committee from 1971 to 1990. In 1973, he signed a Letter from a group of Soviet writers condemning

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn. (11 December 1918 – 3 August 2008) was a Soviet and Russian author and Soviet dissidents, dissident who helped to raise global awareness of political repression in the Soviet Union, especially the Gulag pris ...

and

Andrei Sakharov Andrei Dmitrievich Sakharov (; 21 May 192114 December 1989) was a Soviet Physics, physicist and a List of Nobel Peace Prize laureates, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, which he was awarded in 1975 for emphasizing human rights around the world. Alt ...

. In 1978, he donated his

Lenin Prize The Lenin Prize (, ) was one of the most prestigious awards of the Soviet Union for accomplishments relating to science, literature, arts, architecture, and technology. It was originally created on June 23, 1925, and awarded until 1934. During ...

for the creation of a library in his native village of Novo-Kuskovo. He was Chairman of the Committee for Lenin and State Prizes of the USSR in the field of literature, art and architecture from 1979 as well as Chairman of the Literary Heritage Commission M. S. Shaginyan. Being a critic of

perestroika ''Perestroika'' ( ; rus, перестройка, r=perestrojka, p=pʲɪrʲɪˈstrojkə, a=ru-perestroika.ogg, links=no) was a political reform movement within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s, widely associ ...

Markov resigned from the post of chairman of the board of the Union of Writers in January 1989. He died after a serious long illness on September 25, 1991, in Moscow. He was buried at the Troekurovskoye Cemetery.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Markov, Georgi 1911 births 1991 deaths Soviet male writers Soviet novelists Soviet screenwriters Soviet male screenwriters Soviet dramatists and playwrights Soviet short story writers Soviet journalists Soviet war correspondents 20th-century Russian novelists 20th-century Russian dramatists and playwrights 20th-century Russian journalists Members of the Central Committee of the 24th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Members of the Central Committee of the 25th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Members of the Central Committee of the 26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Members of the Central Committee of the 27th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Seventh convocation members of the Soviet of the Union Eighth convocation members of the Soviet of the Union Ninth convocation members of the Soviet of the Union Tenth convocation members of the Soviet of the Union Eleventh convocation members of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union Members of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, 1963–1967 Socialist realism writers Recipients of the Vasilyev Brothers State Prize of the RSFSR Recipients of the Order of Lenin Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour Recipients of the Order of the October Revolution Recipients of the Lenin Komsomol Prize Recipients of the Lenin Prize Recipients of the USSR State Prize Heroes of Socialist Labour Tomsk State University alumni Burials in Troyekurovskoye Cemetery