Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy

Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy

Aleksey Tolstoy (Russian: Алексей Константинович Толстой) born September 5, 1817 (Julian calendar: August 24) – October 10, 1875 (Julian calendar: September 28) was a Russian poet, novelist and dramatist.

Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy was born in Saint Petersburg to the famed family of counts Tolstoy. He graduated from the University of Moscow in 1836. Aleksey spent most of his life at court, serving first as the Master of Ceremonies, later as Grand Master of Royal Hunting. He retired from service in 1861 to dedicate more time to writing poetry.

He wrote admirable ballads, a historical novel, some licentious verse, and satires published under the penname of Kozma Prutkov. But his lasting contribution to the Russian literature was a trilogy of historical dramas, modelled after Pushkin's Boris Godunov.

External links

*Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy. Poems (in Russian)
* Love's Ebb and Flow - a poem by Tolstoy translated into English by Alice Stone Blackwell.