Aleksander Griboyedov

Aleksander Sergeyevich Griboyedov (Russian: Алекса́ндр Серге́евич Грибое́дов, alternative transliteration: Griboedov) (January 15, 1795 – February 11, 1829) was a Russian diplomat, playwright, poet, and composer. He is recognized as homo unius libri, a writer of one book, whose fame rests on the verse comedy Woe from Wit (or The Woes of Wit). He was Russia's ambassador to Qajar Persia, where he and all the embassy staff were massacred by an angry mob. Born in Moscow, Griboyedov studied at Moscow University from 1810 to 1812. He then obtained a commission in a hussar regiment, which he resigned in 1816. The next year, he entered the civil service. In 1818 he was appointed secretary of the Russian legation in Persia, and transferred to Georgia. His verse comedy The Young Spouses (Молодые супруги), which he staged in St.Petersburg in 1816, was followed by other similar works. Neither these nor his essays and poetry would have been long remembered but for the success of his verse comedy Woe from Wit (Горе от ума, or Gore ot uma), a satire on Russian aristocratic society. As a high official in the play puts it, this work is "a pasquinade on Moscow". The play depicts certain social and official stereotypes in the characters of Famusov, who hates reform; his secretary, Molchalin, who fawns over officials; and the aristocratic young liberal and Anglomaniac, Repetilov. By contrast the hero of the piece, Chatsky, an ironic satirist just returned from western Europe, exposes and ridicules the weaknesses of the rest. His words echo the outcry of the young generation in the lead-up to the armed insurrection of 1825. In Russia for the summer of 1823, Griboyedov completed the play and took it to St.Petersburg. It was rejected by the censors. Many copies were made and privately circulated, but Griboyedov never saw it published. The first edition was printed in 1833, four years after his death. Only once did he see it on the stage, when it was performed by the officers of the garrison at Yerevan. Soured by disappointment, he returned to Georgia. He put his linguistic expertise at the service of general Ivan Paskevich, a relative, during the Russo-Persian War of 1826-1828, after which he was sent to St. Petersburg at the time of the Treaty of Turkmenchay. There, thinking to devote himself to literature, he started work on a romantic drama, A Georgian Night (Грузинская ночь, or Gruzinskaya noch').