Борис Полевой

Борис Полевой - pseudonym of Boris Nikolayevich Kampov (1908-1981) - Russian Soviet journalist and prose writer. Born in Moscow in 1908, he received technical education in Tver and began his journalism career in 1928 under the patronage of Maxim Gorky. His first book of essays "Memoirs of a Lousy Man" (1927) about the lives of society's outcasts was noted by Gorky himself. Polevoy worked for several newspapers including "Terskaya Pravda" and "Smena". During World War II, he served as a correspondent for Pravda on the Kalinin Front and wrote about the feat of 83-year-old peasant Matvey Kuzmich Kuzmyn. His fame and Stalin Prize came from "The Story of a Real Man" (1946) - a novella written in just 19 days, dedicated to pilot Alexei Maresyev's heroic feat.