How Nikolai Karamzin transformed himself from a noted poet into Russia's premier historian.

When two cosmonauts - Valentina Tereshkova and Andriyan Nikolayev - wed in late 1963, it was the event of the year. We print an extract from the diary of its stage manager.

When Grand Prince Vasily III died in late 1533, his second wife, Yelena Glinskaya made her move, ruthlessly so. In so doing, she paved the way for her son to take power. Ivan the Terrible would rule for 37 years...

The 1913 staging of Dostoyevsky's Demons (as the play Nikolai Stavrogin caused a vehement argument between Russia's leading artistic theater and one of its leading writers.

Catherine II's desire for legitimacy and her gratitude for the healing of her heir (the future Paul I), led to the founding of Moscow's Pavlov Hospital for the poor.

A look back at the spat between the USSR and China over liberalization and reform, with a poetic interlude offered by Vladimir Vysotsky.

In September 1863, Fyodor Dostoyevsky was desperate for money. The result was one of his finest works, the novel The Gambler. It would change the writer's fate in many ways.

A look back at the first person ever to perform an aerial loop in an airplane, Pyotr Nesterov.

In 1903, unnoticed by few, a little group of radicals had a meeting in London that was to alter the face of the 20th century.

In July 2003, the Krylya (Wings) Rock Festival was held for the fourth time at the Tushino Airfield outside Moscow.

A short piece on the young Alexander Pushkin, when he was just finding his poetic legs in the Lyceum.

Sergei Diaghilev’s fifth “Russian Season” began in Paris in May 1913.