Ufa Writer Published First Soviet Utopian Novel and Was Executed

Many consider the first science fiction novels in the USSR to be Alexei Tolstoy«s »Aelita« (1923), Vladimir Obruchev»s «The Land of Sannikov» (1924), and Alexander Belyaev«s »Professor Dowell«s Head» (1925). But few know that even before them, a writer from Ufa presented «The Land of Gonguri,» which did not gain great fame but was noted by contemporaries, including Maxim Gorky himself.

In «The Land of Gonguri,» the author created his version of a utopia, and the main character is a revolutionary who, finding himself captured, discovers the ability to travel through time and sees what the world was like and what it could become. Awaiting execution, he learns more and more but comes to disappointing conclusions about humanity. The author«s fate turned out to be no less sad. Why he was executed and why the book almost fell into oblivion—in the material from UFA1.RU.

«The Land of Gonguri» was written by Vivian Itin, who was born in 1894 into the family of a lawyer famous in Ufa at the time. At various times, Azary Itin was a member of the City Duma, chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Commercial School, and a member of the audit commission of the local Red Cross society.

His son was also destined for a great future. After finishing school, Vivian went to St. Petersburg, where he received higher education, but his main occupation became writing poetry. There he met the poetess and one of the heroines of the 1917 revolution, Larisa Reisner.

Reisner passed Itin«s story, later reworked into »The Land of Gonguri,« to Gorky, who was already an influential writer. However, Gorky liked the original version, and for the final one, he criticized Itin. At the same time, he noted that Vivian had obvious talent and abilities.

With Larisa Reisner, Itin had to part ways because the people«s commissariat where he was listed was transferred to Moscow. Vivian had to travel a lot around the country and fight as part of partisan units. When he ended up in Kansk, Krasnoyarsk Krai, where he worked as an editor of a local newspaper, he was sent the manuscript of that very story.

He reworked it into a novel and published it several months earlier than «Aelita.» For the sake of fairness, it should be noted that the dystopian novel «We» by Yevgeny Zamyatin is considered to have been written in 1920 (fully, although three years later than the first version of Itin«s story), but it was not published in the USSR almost until its collapse, as the authorities considered it hostile. It was first published in Russian only in 1927 in Prague, and without the author»s knowledge.

Subsequently, «The Land of Gonguri» was republished several times. Itin also created a collection of poems «The Sun of the Heart,» an anti-war story «Urambo,» and a story about aviators «Kaan-Kerede.» Itin was one of those who publicly condemned the execution of Nikolai Gumilyov, calling what happened a deep tragedy for the entire country.

In 1938, Vivian himself was arrested. He was then working as an editor of a magazine in Novosibirsk, which at that time was still called Novo-Nikolaevsk. By the way, the modern name of the city, according to one version, was proposed by Itin himself. But the charge was very serious—espionage for Japan.

Itin was sentenced to death and executed. Only 18 years later was the writer rehabilitated «for lack of evidence of a crime.» His burial place remains unknown. Another sad fact: the name Gonguri in his novel was borne by one of the heroines. In her honor, one of the writer«s daughters was named, but she died soon after birth.

Natives of Bashkiria turned out to be pioneers in other areas. Read also the story of an engineer who, despite falling out of favor due to his surname, became the creator of one of the first computers in the USSR.