M. A. Bakunin

Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin was a contemporary of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov. The same historical era gave the world both the most «European» among Russian poets and the most «European» among Russian political figures. They are separated by much in their personal qualities, but even more unites them the similarity of them as phenomena of their time. One could say that Bakunin is a living, exceptionally whole embodiment of the creative side of Lermontov’s gift—one that determines his creative power, revolutionary direction, and his ability, through destruction, to pave the way for something new.