Viktor Klyushnikov


Viktor Petrovich Klyushnikov was a Russian writer, editor and journalist, whose debut novel, Marevo, was considered by contemporary Russian critics to be one of the four 'great anti-nihilist' novels of the time, alongside Troubled Seas by Alexey Pisemsky, No Way Out by Nikolai Leskov and Demons by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Both Ivan Turgenev and Alexey K. Tolstoy reacted positively, hailing the arrival of the original, even if erratic literary talent, "who with his gift in acrobatic fashion," according to Tolstoy.
None of Klyushnikov's later works, among them Bolshiye korabli, Tsygane, Drugaya zhizn, Pri Petre, Semya volnodumtsev, Gosudar-otrok, have come even close to repeating the success of his debut.
According to the modern literary historian O. Mayorova, Klyushnikov was continuously dogged by financial troubles which might have accounted for the fact that most of his novels and novelets, bear the mark of utter haste, boasting stilted characters and improbable twists of plots. The critic lauded, though, his fine, lively language and occasionally brilliant observations of the real life. In retrospect, she argued, Klyushnikov's major achievement was his work as the editor-in-chief of the popular and influential Niva magazine, to which he devoted himself totally. He also published his own Krugozor magazine which proved to be financial disaster, and edited the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Science between 1877 and 1886.