Nobel Prize in Literature 2015 I am sure you are thrilled as i am about the new world's most popular author Svetlana Alexievich who won 2015 Nobel Prize in Literature! 8| She is from Belarus. No? Never heard of her? *awkward* Neither have i. nor my friend who prides himself to be somewhat of a connoisseur in Russian literature, he was noticeably irritated by the fact that he happen to completely miss the rising star of literature, now acclaimed writer, from his former homeland, and my friend is into it, the Russian literature that is, BIG time, even keeps traffic stats to the webpages of most popular authors and their books, i have managed to copy some from his compiled list, as an example to the popularity contest the new Nobel prize in literature is facing: 1. Topping the list is Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy*1 with 59,000 monthly visits. and his novel Anna Karenina -- 14,000. 2. Followed by the Soviet state official propagandist Maxim Gorky*2 -- 44,000 however that's because he is being pushed for by the state, even still, but if one looks at his popular novel Mother, it only has 1,600 visits a month. 3. Popular contemporary writer Victor Pelevin*3 with 30,000 holds strong in the third place, he wrote "Generation P" (P stand for Pepsi). 4. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, "was a Russian novelist, historian, and outspoken critic of the Soviet Union, especially its totalitarianism," and strangely one of very few who was be able to get away with it and do just fine. The sole authorship of some of his works was later questioned. He is faring with 27,000. 5. Mikhail Bulgakov*5, famous for his very popular novel The Master and Margarita, which has been called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century with respectable 26,000 monthly visits, the M&M books itself registers 25,000. 6. Vladimir Mayakovsky*6, great Russian poet with 22,000 showing interest. 7. Boris Leonidovich Pasternak*7, Doctor Zhivago (1957), totals healthy 22,000 visitors. 8. Now the eighth place is Mikhail Sholokhov*8, like Solzhenitsyn and Gorky, he was working for the State and was in many ways like the Russian version of Einstein in science or Shakespeare in literature, in a sense being the front man for the otherwise a group effort, anyway, he is famous for getting a 1965 Nobel Prize in Literature, primarily for the famous civil war novel "And Quiet Flows the Don" (Tihiy Don). Later, however, with the collapse of the Soviet Union the truth came out that he did not write it, but rather the manuscript was stolen from an old writer who was local to the Kazan region of the Don river during the Tsar time, and then when the Russian civil war broke out, he was arrested and consequently executed for being a "white spy," i.e. as in opposition to the Bolsheviks, whose colour of preference was red. Anyway, later, rummaging through his stuff the Bolsheviks found his manuscript and passed it to Sholokhov to publish as his own, which he did during the Stalin time, and even got a Nobel Prize for it later still, which is always nice. Oh ya, Sholokhov has about 21,500, while the infamous "And Quiet Flows the Don" novel attracts regular 10,000 visits a month. Sholokhov was an alcoholic and was often sent to the sanitariums to try to recover from it, so he heavily relied on Andrei Platonov**8, who was also an alcoholic, unfortunately he fell out of grace with Stalin and couldn't publish under his name, but to get by so he wrote for Sholokhov, who then published "his" yet another famous novel Podnyataya Tselina, 1932–1960, Platonov's The Foundation Pit (Котлован) gets regular 2,200 monthly visits, he died in 1951 at 51 years of age. 9. Sergei Alexandrovich Yesenin*8 is a Russian lyrical poet with 21,000. 10. Vladimir Nabokov*9, Lolita (1955) is his most famous novel, has 16,000. 11. Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy*10, son of Lev Tolstoy, with 12,000. 12. Leonid Nikolaievich Andreyev*11 (father) has 9,000. 13. Ilya Ilf, was a popular Jewish Soviet author of the 1920s and 1930s, wrote famous comedy titled 12 Chairs, he has 4,000 monthly visitors. 14. Aleksei Fedorovich Losev*14, was a Russian philosopher, philologist and culturologist, one of the most prominent figures in Russian philosophical and religious thought of the 20th century, he scores 3,400. In around 1997 I have translated a couple of pages from his 1930 book – The Dialectics of Myth, later translated by Vladimir Marchenkov, New York: Routledge, 2003, ISBN 0-415-28467-8, however mine is his first English translation.**14 15. Daniil Leonidovich Andreyev*12 (son) has 3,000. ~tired yet? i sure am, well, we are reaching soon, i hope, the lower bottom where we will find our new Nobel star of literature i am sure you have heard all about it, the world of literature is a buzz by now. So, moving on.~ 16. The obscure name of Eduard Bagritsky*11 wouldn't ring many bells thus far, he was an important Russian and Soviet poet of the Constructivist School, his score is 2,000 visits to show for. 17. Leonid Maximovich Leonov*17 was a Soviet novelist and playwright, he has 2,000 visitors a month. 18. And Last but not least, the world's most popular writer for 2015, although miraculously unknown, is declared the Nobel laureate in Literature -- Svetlana Alexievich*18 closes this list with 2,000 visits a month, averaging 60 a day, which is not very much considering Nobel et al. Congratulations Svetlana Alexievich with the Nobel Prize in Literature. *fireworks* ______________________________________ *1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Tolstoy *2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxim_Gorky *3 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Pelevin *4 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Solzhenitsyn *5.- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Bulgakov *6 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Mayakovsky *7 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Pasternak *8 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Sholokhov **8 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrei_Platonov *9 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Yesenin *10 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Nabokov *11 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksey_Nikolayevich_Tolstoy *12 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Andreyev *13 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilya_Ilf *14 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksei_Losev **14 - https://www.facebook.com/notes/alexander-braun/the-dialectic-of-myth-by-alexei-losev/445857010441 *15 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniil_Andreyev *16 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduard_Bagritsky *17 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonid_Leonov *18 - http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/09/books/svetlana-alexievich-nobel-prize-literature.html *18 - http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/08/svetlana-alexievich-wins-2015-nobel-prize-in-literature