Peter and Paul Nicholas Elpidiforovich

(1857 - 1892)
. He wrote under the pseudonym Karonin, was born in the spiritual family of the Samara province, was raised in a theological seminary, but the end of the course, he failed because he was embroiled in a political case for a long time in prison and then was exiled to Siberia
. Living in the province of Tobolsk, P. dealing with economic research of its southern districts, for which received an award from the West Siberian Division Geographical Society (napech. in the "Notes" department, book. VIII, No.. I, Omsk, 1886). His first fictional work - "voiceless" - appeared in 1879. in "Notes of the Fatherland", followed by a series of stories of people's life in "Notes of the Fatherland" ( "Scientist", "free man", "Last Dyoma Parish and others) and in" Word "(" hamstrung "," A bag of three pounds of "). Settling in Saratov, P. participated in local newspapers, then writing in Russian Thought "(short stories:" My World "," On the border of Rights "," Bor colony ")," Russian Gazette "and" Kazan Newssheet ". In his first stories P. draws a vivid picture of the village, with its desperate material need, without rights and intellectual helplessness. Against the background of the general savagery P. reveals the intimate life of a peasant, in which neither need, nor ignorance, can not erase the man (short stories "A few stakes," "Straw"). Common sense of their stories P. appeals to an active struggle against poverty and ignorance and to the work of intellectuals in favor of the village. However, P. ridicules the people who climb to the friends of the people, wanting to play this kind of role, to take their idleness at the expense of others ( "Bor Colony"). With a complete antipathy treated P. and to the Populists, who, under the banner of simplification, rejected science ( "Master of Life"). Major talent P. not possess, but his paintings are true, people's language is simple and true, never falling into a coarse or saccharine mannerisms. Stranger to sentimentality in its relations to the people, P. loved him and believed in his future, it makes his works particularly attractive. "Stories" Karonin published in three volumes (Moscow, 1890 - 1891). Wed. Pypin "The Village" ( "Vestnik Evropy, 1893,? 4); Protopopov," Literary-critical characteristics "(St. Petersburg, 1896); Skabichevsky" The history of modern Russian literature. "