“A Man With Three Little ‘Buts’”: The Theater Critic Yurii Beliaev in the Writings of His Contemporaries

The literary and critical works of Yurii Dmitrievich Beliaev (1876–1917), the popular writer and influential theater critic of the Russian Silver Age, have already been studied by philologists and theater experts to some extent. The numerous assessments of Beliaev that were left by the people who knew him, who read his articles in the newspaper Novoe Vremia, and who saw performances of his plays, however, still await a detailed overview. Among these people, we can find famous writers, editors, directors, and actors, along with now forgotten journalists. The analysis of their opinions, which often are extremely contradictory, leads to the conclusion that not only the playwright’s work, but also his personality deserves attention.