The International Center for Dostoevsky Studies Has Won a Grant to Study the Scholarly Biography of A.G. Dostoevskaya
The Russian Science Foundation has announced the results of its grant competition for the "Fundamental and Exploratory Research by Individual Research Groups" program for 2026–2028. Of the 454 supported projects, one was from Petrozavodsk State University: "New Archival and Printed Sources of A.G. Dostoevskaya's Scientific Biography" (RSF, No. 26-18-00186; supervised by I.S. Andrianova, Director of the International Center for Dostoevsky Studies).
Researchers from the International Center for Dostoevsky Studies at PetrSU, the Dostoevsky Literary Memorial Museum, Yaroslavl State University, Crimean Federal University, the Institute of Russian Literature, and the State University of Education have begun work on this project. The project is dedicated to the 180th anniversary of the birth of the wife of the great writer F. M. Dostoevsky – Anna Grigoryevna Dostoevskaya (1846–1918).
She rightfully ranks first among the wives of literary figures, inspiring their husbands' creativity, contributing to the success of their professional activities, and spreading their ideas. Stenographer, copyist, co-author, leading reader and critic, personal secretary and accountant, archivist, museum worker, biographer, editor, textual scholar, bibliographer, publisher, bookseller, commentator, school organizer and trustee, collector, memoirist, and humorist—this is the list of professional fields and skills she mastered.
Scientific interest in her biography and heritage is expressed not only by Russian but also by international scientists. However, to date, there is no stone monument to this extraordinary woman, nor even a printed "memorial" to her—a complete scientific biography based on archival documents describing her life with Dostoevsky and her fate after his death has not been written.
Project goals:
· to continue the preparation of a scientific biography of A.G. Dostoevsky;
· encourage young researchers to conduct archival research (in-person, remote, and using neural networks) of the writer's wife's documents and correspondence;
· publish a scientific description of her manuscripts in the public domain (this will help not only researchers but also archives in systematizing the materials);
· publish for the first time a selected collection of the writer's wife's correspondence, based on autographs and of historical and literary value;
· publish the complete corpus of correspondence between F.M. Dostoevsky and A.G. Dostoevsky with updated commentary.
The scope of the project also includes organizing an international scientific conference, "Wives as Assistants to Writers and Poets: On the 180th Anniversary of A.G. Dostoevsky," with the publication of materials to popularize the work of Dostoevsky's wife and traditional family values. In addition, two projects supported by the Russian Science Foundation will involve postgraduate students from the Institute of Philology and the Institute of History, Political and Social Sciences at PetrSU—Daniil Iyudin, Arseniy Liskov, and Danil Speller. These projects are:
• "Dostoevsky's Moscow: New Sources and Research" (RSF, No. 26-18-00190; Supervisor: V.V. Borisova, Moscow State Linguistic University);
• "The Sonnet as a National Treasure: Preserving the Creative Heritage of Poets from the Russian Provinces" (RSF, No. 6-18-00128; Supervisor: O.I. Fedotov, Moscow State Pedagogical University).
Staff from the International Center for Dostoevsky Studies will also participate in the project "Dostoevsky's Moscow: New Sources and Research," which entails a full-scale reconstruction of Dostoevsky's "Moscow Text" based on archival sources.
