Zinoviev, Aleksandr, 1922-2006

Alexander Alexandrovich Zinoviev (Russian: Алекса́ндр Алекса́ндрович Зино́вьев; 29 October 1922 – 10 May 2006) was a Soviet philosopher, writer, sociologist and journalist. Coming from a poor peasant family, a participant in World War II, Alexander Zinoviev in the 1950s and 1960s was one of the symbols of the rebirth of philosophical thought in the Soviet Union. After the publication in the West of the screening book Yawning Heights, which brought Zinoviev world fame, in 1978 he was expelled from the country and deprived of Soviet citizenship. He returned to Russia in 1999. The creative heritage of Zinoviev includes about 40 books, covering a number of areas of knowledge: sociology, social philosophy, mathematical logic, ethics, political thought. Most of his work is difficult to attribute to any tendency or to put in any framework, including academic. Having gained fame in the 1960s as a researcher of non-classical logic, in exile, Zinoviev was forced to become a professional writer, considering himself primarily a sociologist. Works in the original genre of the 'sociological novel' brought international recognition to Zinoviev. Often he is characterized as an independent Russian thinker, one of the greatest, most original and controversial figures of Russian social thought of the second half of the 20th century. An anti-Stalinist in his youth, Zinoviev throughout his life held strong views on society, criticizing at first the Soviet system, then the Russian political system and the Western world, and at the end of his life, the processes of globalization. Zinoviev's worldview was distinguished by tragedy and pessimism. In the West, as in Russia, his non-conformist views were harshly criticized.