Full Name: Merezhkovsky, Dmitry Sergeyevich
Other Names:
- Dmitry Sergeyevich Merejkowski
Gender: male
Date Born: 1865
Date Died: 1941
Home Country/ies: Russia
Subject Area(s): biography (general genre) and nineteenth century (dates CE)
Overview
Historian who wrote two popular works on artists in the 19th century. Merezhkovsky made special use of the translations of the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci by Jean Paul Richter. Richter had been the first to translate and publicize Leonardo’s writings. Merezhkovsky published his Romance of Leonardo da Vinci in 1902 and it soon appeared in many languages. It was the source for Sigmund Freud’s study of Leonardo. Although Merezhkovsky presented the book as a novel forming part of a world history, it is clear that Merezhkovsky based his book solidly on the data provided by Richter. The Modern Library of the World’s Best Books included it in their selection from the 1920s until the 1950s. The work won praise from Creighton E. Gilbert.
Selected Bibliography
Michael Angelo and other sketches. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1930; Voskresshīe bogi: Leonardo da Vinchi. Saint Peterburg: N. N. Klobukov, 1902, English, The Romance of Leonardo da Vinci. New York/London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1902.
Sources
Gilbert, Creighton E. “Introduction.” The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti: Based on Studies in the Archives of the Buonarroti Family at Florence. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002, p. xx.