In the Russian literary tradition Nikolai Vladimirovich Stankevich is regarded as an important figure; despite the fact that he wrote little, and nothing of significance, Stankevich was the central personality of the 1830s. As the leader of the famous Moscow University student circle that bore his name, he inspired and fascinated an entire generation of Russian poets, writers, and intellectuals. On Friday afternoons and evenings in Stankevich's rooms at the home of Professor Mikhail Grigor'evich Pavlov, many of the leading minds of the rising generation found an intellectual refuge from the ignorance and oppressiveness of Russian life under Tsar Nicholas I, and there they became acquainted with the literature and philosophy of Europe. Stankevich managed to hold future Westernizers, Slavophiles, patriots, radicals, conservatives, moderates, and apolitical aesthetes together in a community of interest that did not break up into factions until his untimely death.

Nikolai Vladimirovich Stankevich was...