Merezhkovskii, Dmitrii Sergeevich (1865--1941) | University of Illinois Archives

Dmitrii Sergeevich Merezhkovskii (1865--1941) was a prominent Russian writer and religious philosopher. His literary corpus includes poetry, novels, dramas, critical essays, and translations from several languages. Merezhkovskii's European fame, however, rests primarily on his historical novels, first of all, on his trilogy Christ and Antichrist (1896 --1905).

Merezhkovskii came from an aristocratic family and was educated at the HistoricalPhilological Faculty of the University of St. Petersburg. In 1989 he married Zinaida Hippius and they settled in St. Petersburg.

Merezhkovskii's second book of verse Symbols (1892) and his treatise "On the Reasons for the Decline of, and on New Trends in, Contemporary Russian Literature" (1893) made him a leader of the new movement called "decadent" or "symbolist." In the late 1890's Merezhkovskii, by then more a novelist and critic than a poet, turned from Nietzschianism to Christianity. Merezhkovskii, Hippius, and Dmitrii Filosofov developed the concept of a "church of the Holy Flesh and the Holy Spirit," in which they sought to integrate the life-affirming traits of Greek paganism into Christian spirituality. In 1901 Merezhkovskii, Hippius, and D. Filosofov founded the Religious-Philosophical society of St. Petersburg.

Two editions of Merezhkovskii's Collected Works appeared in 1911-13 and 1914, and many of these works were translated into various European languages.

The Merezhkovskiis were among first Russian writers who actively opposed the Bolshevik regime. In 1919 they (along with their secretary V. Zlobin and D. Filosofov) left Soviet Russia via Poland. Together with Boris Savinkov they tried to organize military opposition to Bolshevism in Poland, but their attempts failed. In 1920 the Merezhkovskiis left Warsaw and settled in Paris, where they continued to play an important role in the intellectual and literary life of Russian emigration. Merezhkovskii remained an extremely prolific author for the rest of his life. Works written in emigration include Napoleon (1929) Messia (1928) Taina Zapada. Atlantida -Evropa (The Secret of the West. Atlantis-Europe, 1930), Iisus Neizvestnyi (Jesus, the Unknown, 1932-34), and books about Dante, Francis from Assisi, Jeanne d' Arc, St. Augustin, and St. Paul.