M. Gorky’s Unfulfilled Literary and Publishing Project “The History of the Gorky Region”

The article attempts to reconstruct M. Gorky’s unfulfilled plan of the 1930s on the basis of archival sources: to create a book series “The History of Cities as the history of Russian life&8j1; and within its framework, with the help of a team of modern authors, to write a book about the past and present of Nizhny Novgorod (Gorky). Based on the material of the writer’s correspondence with the party curator of this project, L.Yu. Schmidt and his other participants, as well as with the help of archival and printed sources, the origin of the idea of the book “The History of the Gorky Region&8j1; and the beginning of the work of the team of authors on its implementation are shown. The reasons that prevented the implementation of this project have been identified. The conclusion is made about the special importance that Gorky attached to it, and about the role that the work on the book played in the creative fate of the project participants.

M. Gorky, “The history of cities as the history of Russian lifeˮ, “The History of the Gorky Regionˮ, A.N. Tikhonov, L.Y. Schmidt, L.N. Seifullina, V.N. Zhakova