The history of the Russian people. N.A. Poleva

Nikolai Alekseevich Poleva (1796-1846) - a noticeable figure in the galaxy of the stars of Russian literature of the first half of the 19th century. Many works came out of his pen, and a special place among them is occupied by the “History of the Russian People”, written in contrasting another well-known work: “History of the Russian state” by N. M. Karamzin. If Karamzin pays the main attention to the activities of rulers and other vivid personalities, whose will and charisma directly affect the course of events, then Field strove to identify first of all the “common principle” and the “folk spirit” of Russian history. Behind the Russian people, which combined the “imagination of the East with the West’s mind”, he saw the future. Initially, it was planned to write 12 volumes and complete the presentation by 1829, but in reality only 6 volumes came out, and the story breaks off at the conquests of Ivan IV.