Alexander Belyaev is one of those who laid the foundations of science fiction as a genre in the USSR. It was not for nothing that they called him “Soviet Jules Verne,” during his life he created more than seventy fantastic works (including seventeen novels). Among the most significant works - "The Head of Professor Dowell", "Ariel", "Air Seller", "Amphibian Man".
Life before the start of his science fiction career
Alexander Romanovich Belyaev was born in 1884 in provincial Smolensk, in the family of an ordinary priest. Since childhood, Alexander had many different hobbies, but it was fundamentally important for his father that his son continue his work. Therefore, in 1895, Sasha entered a theological school, from where, a few years later, he was transferred to a seminary. This education gave completely unexpected results: the young man became an ardent atheist.
Then, despite the objections of his father, the future science fiction writer went to study at the Demidov Lyceum as a lawyer. After graduation, he was able to work as a private attorney. This made it possible for Belyaev to rent a decent apartment, collect a wonderful personal library, and make a voyage to Europe.
But in 1914, Alexander left his job as a lawyer for the theater. This year he tried himself as a theater director, in addition, his first play, Grandma Moira, was published.
And in 1915, fate dealt him a terrible blow: Belyaev developed bone tuberculosis, which was also complicated by paralysis. This illness cut him off from active life for six long years and chained him to bed. The wife Vera Prytkova did not want to look after the writer and left him.
These six difficult years, Belyaev stubbornly struggled with the disease. As a result, he was able to restore his health. In 1922, Alexander (he was then in the Crimea) returned to work and married again. The name of the new lover is Margarita Magnushevskaya.
Key works and place of death
Then Belyaev, hoping to continue his career as a writer, went to Moscow. And already in 1924 the novel "The Head of Professor Dowell" was published on the pages of the newspaper "Gudok". In the same "Moscow" period, the brilliant novel "The Amphibian Man" was created. Thanks to the successful adaptation of this work in the early sixties, the name and surname of the science fiction writer became known to everyone.
In 1928, Alexander left Moscow and until 1932 he repeatedly changed his place of residence - Leningrad, Kiev, cold Murmansk, again Leningrad … And six years later, for a number of reasons, the writer and his family moved to the city of Pushkin.
In the thirties, the novels "The Star of the CEC" (about Tsiolkovsky), "The Wonderful Eye", "Leap into Nothing" were published from the pen of science fiction. And the last major creation of Belyaev - the novel "Ariel" - was published in 1941. This novel tells the story of a man with the gift of levitation.
In the summer of 1941, when the war began, Alexander Romanovich was already in a very bad condition - he got out of bed just to wash and eat. In September, the city was occupied by the Nazis, and a few months later (according to the most common version - in January 1942) the science fiction writer died of cold and exhaustion. There is virtually no information about how Alexander Belyaev lived in his last days and where he was buried.
Belyaev as a seer
Belyaev certainly left his mark on Russian science fiction. But Belyaev's novels and stories are also valuable in that they anticipate some inventions and phenomena. We are talking, for example, about farms under water and filming at sea depths, about space flights, large stations in near-earth orbit, landing on the lunar surface.
Also in his texts, ideas were expressed about growing organs by artificial means, about the emergence of the profession of a plastic surgeon, about the possibility of performing operations on the eye lens - now all this is embodied in reality.
