Mikhail Lermontov | Poetry Foundation

On July 27, 1841, Mikhail Lermontov, Russian poet and writer, died at the age of 26. An excerpt from the article:

"Lermontov is the author of the narrative poems The Corsair (1828), The Angel (1831), Tambov Treasurer’s Wife (1838), The Fugitive (1846), and the much-revised Romantic masterpiece Demon (1839) and the first Russian psychological novel A Hero of Our Time (1840). Lord Byron greatly influenced Lermontov, and his early poems often featured a Byronic hero. Lermontov’s interest in the Russian Middle Ages drove the creation of historical poems and his love of the Russian countryside came out in colorful imagery and characters. Lermontov’s poetry is marked by Romantic intensity, and his lyricism was greatly admired by Anton Chekhov who said, 'I know no better language than that of Lermontov.'”