Kuprin in the early 1890s
Fyodor Shalyapin and Alexander Kuprin
Kuprin and his wife during World War I
Kuprin in the 1910s
Alexander Kuprin's grave
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Alexandr Kuprin was born on August 26 (September 7) 1870 in the provincial town Narovchatov (now the Penza region) to an official, hereditary nobleman Ivan Kuprin, who died a year after the birth of his son. His mother, Lyubov Alekseevna descended from Tatar princes. After her husband's death, she moved to Moscow, where the future writer spent his childhood and adolescence.
At the age of 6, he was sent to Moscow Razumovsky Orphan Boarding School, which he attended until 1880. In the same year, he entered the Second Moscow Military High School (known as Cadet Corps).
In 1887 Kuprin left the Cadet Corps to enter the Alexander Military Academy in Moscow. Later, he described his "military youth" in the story "At the Turning Point" and in the novel The Junkers.
Kuprin's first literary works were poems which stayed unpublished. The first work to see the light was the story "The Last Debut" (1889). In 1890, Kuprin was posted to the 46th Dnieper Infantry Regiment (in Proskurov). Military life he had for four years provided a rich material for his future works. In 1893-1894 saw the publication (in Russkoye Bogatstvo magazine) of his novel "In the dark" (1893) and the stories "On a Moonlit Night" and "The Enquiry". Kuprin wrote a few army stories: "A Place to Sleep" (1897), "The Night-shift" (1899).
In 1894, Lieutenant Kuprin retired from the military service and moved to Kiev, having no civilian profession. In the following years, he traveled across Russia, tried a lot of jobs, eagerly soaking up life's experiences, which became the basis of his future works.
In the 1890s, Kuprin published his short novel "Moloch", the story "The Backwoods", the novelettes "Olesya" and "Praporshchik", in 1901 - the horror story "Werewolf". During those years, Kuprin became acquainted with Ivan Bunin, Chekhov and Gorky. In 1901, he moved to St. Petersburg, began working as a secretary for The Journal for All. St. Petersburg's journals saw Kuprin's stories "The Swamp" (1902), "The Horse Thieves" (1903), "The White Poodle" (1903).
In 1905, his most significant work came out - "The Duel", which had great success. His other works of this period include the short stories "Junior Captain Rybnikov" (1906), "The River of Life" (1906), "Gambrinus" (1907), and the essay "Events in Sevastopol" (1905).
Kuprin's works in the years between the two revolutions opposed the spirit of pessimism in those years: the series of essays "Listrigony" (1907-1911), stories about animals, the stories "Sulamith" (1908) and "The Garnet Bracelet" (1911). His prose became a noticeable phenomenon in Russian literature. In 1915, Kuprin finished the story "The Pit" about Russian prostitutes in brothels. Critics condemned the novel for excessive naturalism.
After the Bolsheviks seized power, the writer didn't accept the policy of War Communism and its terror. In 1918, he had a meeting with Lenin and proposed to publish a newspaper for the village - "Zemlia". He worked in the publishing house "World Literature" (“Vsemirnaya literatura”), founded by Gorky. In June 1918, Kuprin was arrested for a short time for an article in the paper Molva (Rumor) critical of the regime. Lived in Gatchina. In the autumn of 1919, Gatchina was taken by the White Army. For a fortnight Kuprin was editing Prinevsky Krai (Neva Country), a paper published by Yudenich's army headquarters. After the defeat of the Army, Kuprin emigrated abroad. The writer spent seventeen years in Paris, and it was a fruitful period in his literary career.
In 1937, on the invitation of the USSR's government Kuprin returned to his homeland. January 1938 brought deterioration in Kuprin's health. He suffered from a kidney disorder and sclerosis and developed cancer of the oesophagus. Alexander Kuprin died on 25 August 1938, and was buried near his fellow writers at the Literaturskiye Mostki in the Volkovo Cemetery in Leningrad.
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In the mid-1900s relationships between Kuprin and his wife Maria deteriorated, Kuprin's alcohol abuse being the major reason. On one occasion, outraged by his behavior in the company of drunkards and prostitutes whom he brought to their dacha, Maria Karlovna crashed a decanter over his head. Another incident when, during an ugly row, he tried to set her dress on fire, proved to be their last: in 1907 the couple divorced. Maria Davydova later married the Soviet diplomat Nikolai Iordansky. In 1966 her book of memoirs Years of Youth (Годы молодости, 1966) came out.
Maria Karlovna Davydova (1881 - 1966) was the adopted daughter of Alexandra Davydova, the widow of the Saint Petersburg Conservatory's director who, after her husband's death in 1889, became editor of Mir Bozhy. When she died in 1902, Maria Karlovna took over it and soon Kuprin became the head the fiction section of his wife's journal. They had one daughter, Lydia (1903–1924).
Yelizaveta Geinrikh (1882–1942) was a daughter of the Hungarian revolutionary Morits Rotoni-Geinrich, brought up by the family of Dmitry Mamin-Sibiryak, her sister Maria's husband. In the early 1900s she was a sister of mercy, later Lydia's governess and Alexandra Davydova's good friend. In 1907 the couple married and settled in Gatchina. In 1908 their daughter Ksenia was born. Their second daughter Zinaida was born in 1909 and died of pneumonia in 1912. After the Kuprin's return to Russia Yelizaveta Kuprina-Geinrikh devoted herself to compiling and publishing her husband's literary legacy. She committed suicide in 1942, during the Siege of Leningrad.
(1903–1924)
Ksenia Kuprina (1908–1981) in the late 1920s became a Paul Poiret model and then actress who, as Kissa Kuprine, appeared in 11 films, starting with Le Diable au cœur (1927) by Marcel L'Herbier. After her return to the USSR in 1958, she worked as stage actress, translator, author and scriptwriter. Her book of memoirs My Father Kuprin (Мой отец – Куприн) came out in 1978.
