About

Ivan Bunin (1870, Voronezh, Russian Empire – 1953, Paris, France) – Russian poet and prose writer, translator, and first Russian writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature (1933). After the October Revolution, he fled Russia in 1918 and emigrated to France in 1920, dividing his life between Paris and Grasse. He felt like a stranger in his new country. Reputedly a misanthrope, he nevertheless hid Jews during the Occupation. His works were banned in the Soviet Union until after Stalin’s death. When the Second World War ended, he was proposed to return to his homeland, but this did not happen. Bunin, who lived on an emigrant’s passport, remained stateless for the rest of his life.

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