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Obruchev, Vladimir A

(1863-1956) Russian geologist, academician and author. Two of his novels, both early classics of Russian sf, have been translated: Plutoniia (1915; 1924; trans B Pearce as Plutonia 1957) and Zemlya Sannikova (1926; trans David Skvirsky as Sannikov Land 1955). Both are adventures after the style of Jules Verne, aimed at younger readers, and informatively crammed with geological and palaeontological data. The first is a Hollow-Earth story in which a party of Russian explorers enters the Earth via an unknown landmass north of the Bering Strait and finds a Lost World full of prehistoric reptiles (see Dinosaurs) and complete, following John Cleves Symmes, with an internal sun. The second is similar; a volcanic Island thrusting through the Arctic icecap to the far north of Siberia contains a fertile lost world, populated by a stone-age people, inside its huge crater. Other, untranslated, works by Obruchev were travel novels set in Central Asia. [PN]

see also: Russia.

Vladimir Afanasevich Obruchev

born Klepenino, Russia: 10 October 1863

died Zvenigorod, USSR: 19 June 1956

works

• Plutoniia (Moscow: ONTI, 1924) [written 1915: binding unknown/]
  • Plutonia (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1956) [trans by Fainna Solasko of the above: hb/G V Nikol'skii]
  • Plutonia: An Adventure Through Prehistory (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1957) [new trans by Brian Pearce of the above: hb/]
• Zemlya Sannikova ili Poslednie Onkilony (Moscow: ONTI, 1926) [binding unknown/]
  • Sannikov Land (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1955) [trans by David Skvirsky of the above: illus/hb/Y Krasny]
    • Sannikov's Land (London: Harrap, 1968) [vt of the above trans: hb/]

links

• Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Picture Gallery

Entry from The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (2011-current) edited by John Clute and David Langford.
Accessed 02:47 am on 27 July 2024.
<https://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/obruchev_vladimir_a>