Biriukov, Nikolai Zotovich

Biriukov, Nikolai Zotovich 

Born Feb. 1 (14), 1912, in Orekhovo-Zuevo; died Jan. 31, 1966, in Simferopol’. Soviet Russian writer. Member of the CPSU since 1951.

As a result of an accident on a construction site, Biriukov became seriously ill in 1930. Confined to his bed, he devoted himself to literary work. He took correspondence courses from the Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages and the Gorky Literary Institute. His work first appeared in print with the novella On the Farmsteads (1938). His novel The Seagull (1945; State Prize of the USSR, 1951) relates the life and heroic death of the partisan girl Liza Chaikina. (This work has been translated into many foreign languages.) In the novel The Waters of Naryn (1949) the construction of the Fergansk Canal is described. Biriukov is also the author of a book of sketches entitled On the Peaceful Land (1952) and the historical revolutionary novel Through Hostile Whirlwinds (1959). He was awarded two orders as well as medals.

WORKS

Na krutykh perevalakh: Povestvovanie o vekovom puti bor’by i svershenii nashego naroda, vols. 1–4. Simferopol’, 1965–67.

REFERENCES

Viadro, Sh. “Zhizn’—podvig.” Sovetskaia Ukraina, 1959. no. 5.
Matveeva, N. “ O zhizni i tvorchestve N. Biriukova.” Istorikokraevedcheskii sbornik, issue 2. Moscow, 1959. (Orekhovo Zuevskii kraevedcheskii Museum.)
Zharikov, L., G. Ershov, and M. Kotov. Nash sovremennik—Nikolai Biriukov. Moscow, 1967.