Lidin, Vladimir

Born Feb. 3 (15), 1894, in Moscow. Russian Soviet writer.

Lidin graduated from the law faculty of Moscow University (1916) and fought in the Civil War of 1918–20. He made his debut as a writer in 1915 with the collection of short stories Nothing Matters (1916). In the 1920’s, Lidin published the story collection North (1925), the essays Roads and Mileage (1927), and a novel devoted to the NEP period, The Recreant (1927). In the 1930’s, Lidin traveled throughout Russia and published Fishing Time (1930), About the Far East (1932), and the novel The Great, or the Pacific (1933)—all devoted to building of a new life in the Far East.

During the Great Patriotic War (1941–45), Lidin was an Izvestiia war correspondent. In the 1950’s and 1960’s, moral and ethical themes predominated in his works—for instance, the novel Two Lives (1950), and the collection The Birds Came: Stories of 1954–1961 (1970). Several of Lidin’s works were translated into both foreign languages and the languages of USSR nationalities. Lidin has been awarded two orders and various medals.