economist publicist social activist
Ethnicity:
There is a version that Annensky’s grandmother was born in Hannibal, Missouri, United States.
Nikolai Fedorovich Annensky was born on March 12, 1843 in Saint Petersburg City, Russian Federation.
On the 5th year of life his family moved to Omsk where Nikolai Fedorovich graduated from cadet corps. When he was young, he lost both of his parents and had to care for his younger siblings, including the future Russian poet Innokenty Annensky.
In 1859 served in governance. Upon his return in Saint Petersburg he resigned the service and signed up in university as an external student. In 1865 he passed the exam for gymnasium certificate, in 1869 he graduated from the law department of Saint Petersburg University, in 1873 he graduated from the history and philology department of Kiev University.
After the marriage, Nikolai Fedoroviche had to take the post of proofreader in "Jurnal Minesterstva narodnogo prosvescheniya". In 1873 started to work as statistician in Ministry of Railways; was at International Statistics Congress in Budapest (1877) and in Rome (1878) as Russia representative.
Nikolai Fedorovich started his literature activity as an interpreter in 1868. Since the early 1870s he belonged to club of ’’Otechestvennye Zapiski’’ magazine’s employees. Formulas of that democratic trends, which opposed the liberal Slavophilic variant of populism since the late 1870s and focused in "Nedelia" newspaper, were shaped there. In the house of A.A. Ol’khin which was called "Ol’khinsky Klub", Nikolai Fedorovich got close to G.I. Uspensky, N.K. Mikhailovsky and others. Because of Mikhailovsky his works was printed in "Otechestvennye Zapiski". In the second half of 1870s his name had honorable fame in literature community.
In May 1880 Nikolai Fedorovich was exiled to Western Siberia to Tara of Tobolsk province (Omsk Oblast, Russia) till the end of February 1881. Then he lived in Sviyazhsk and Kazan and wrote some economy essays for "Otechestvennye Zapiski" and "Delo", including "German socialists of the chair" article. He wrote articles and memoirs about N.G. Chernyshevsky, N.K. Mikhailovsky, P.N. Tkachev. In 1887 he moved to Nizhny Novgorod. Worked as a head of Kazan and Nizhny Novgorod’s zemstvo statistical office where he gave it guidance which serves peasants’ interests.
In the end of 1894 Mikhailovsky invited him as an editor of "Russkoe Bogatstvo" magazine; soon Korolenko joined as well. "New Minin and Pojarsky from Nizhny Novgorod", as they were called on literature medium, used nickname O.B.A..
After the death of Mikhailovsky Nikolai Fedorovich led literature committee of "Russkoe Bogatstvo". He wrote "Short historical essay of edition partnership "Russkoe Bogatstvo""".
After he moved to Saint Petersburg in 1895 Nikolai Fedorovich was the part of many opposition communities such as Literature Fund committee, Free economic community council, Russian writers mutual support union committee. He was the chairman of the first All-Russian authors’ congress of 1905, where self-proclaimed authors’ union was established, which wasn’t acknowledged by government. At the beginning of 1907 literature community occurred in Saint Petersburg the head of which was Nikolai Fedorovich. At the beginning of 1906 he was the member of Shlisselburg committee and editorial office of "Gallery of Shlisselburg prisoners".
As a student, Nikolai Fedorovich became involved in the revolutionary populist movement. He was also strongly influenced by the writings of N.K. Mikhailovsky. Like Mikhailovsky, he rejected Marxism, which was just beginning to influence the Russian socialist movement, because it seemed to condemn the Russian peasantry to be sacrificed to the development of industrial capitalism. Instead, Nikolai Fedorovich desired an agrarian socialism based on the peasant commune.
Nikolai Fedorovich was a member of the populist (narodnik) movement and the Socialist-Revolutionary Party before becoming one of the founders of the Russian Popular Socialist Party (NSP) in 1906.
Nikolai Fedorovich mentioned 3 main factors which ideologically influenced on him the most: Emancipation reform, university science and journalism, particularly Nekrasov’s Sovremennik.
In 1869, he was arrested, but later released, when the police were investigating a murder committed by the revolutionary Sergey Nechayev, whose associates included Alexandra's brother, Pyotr Tkachev.
He was arrested again in 1879, after an attempt on the life of the Tsar Alexander II by the revolutionary Alexander Soloviev, but was released after he had proved his innocence. In 1880, he was arrested for the third time, on the grounds of 'political unreliability' and exiled to Tara, which at that time was in Tobolsk province, in Siberia. Released in 1883.
In 1901, Nikolai Fedorovich was arrested and exiled again for participating in an anti-government demonstration. After his release, he lived in Finland, where he was involved in founding the "Union of Liberation" in 1903 with former Marxists P.B. Struve, S.N. Prokopovich and others. This became the nucleus of the Constitutional-Democratic Party, tsarist Russia's main liberal party. However, Annensky also retained his connections with narodnik socialism and became involved in the Socialist-Revolutionary Party (PSR). He argued strenuously against the PSR's revival of political terrorism as a tactic and deplored the influence of Marxism on its leading theorists, such as V.M. Chernov.
According to Bunin’s memories, in Harkov’s intelligentsia medium Annensky had fame of renowned statistician with no lack of admiration. He was a natural leader - the spokesman of protest, wrath and joy as well. In the 4th of March 1901 during the demonstration near Kazan cathedral Nikolai Fedorovich stood between young people and Cossacks in order to protect them, and after all for him everything was as a joke, even being badly injured in such senile age.
Nikolai Fedorovich was the soul of so-called Culinary commission, which consisted of ex-members of suppressed by government Author’s union whose meetings were disguised as comrades’ dinners.
Nikolai Fedorovich married the teacher and later children's writer Alexandra Nikitichna Annenskaya in 1866. They had no children, but they adopted Tatiana Bogdanovich who was their niece and who too would be a writer.
