Vadim Viktorovich Rudnev (1874 – November 19, 1940) was a Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n politician and editor.

In Russia

Vadim Rudnev studied medicine at Moscow University, but in 1902 was exiled to Siberia for his revolutionary activities. Amnestied in 1905

Russian Revolution of 1905

The 1905 Russian Revolution was a wave of mass political and social unrest that spread through vast areas of the Russian Empire. Some of it was directed against the government, while some was undirected. It included worker strikes, peasant unrest, and military mutinies...

 with other political prisoners, he became a member of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party

Socialist-Revolutionary Party

thumb|right|200px|Socialist-Revolutionary election poster, 1917. The caption in red reads "партия соц-рев" , short for Party of the Socialist Revolutionaries...

. In 1907 he was arrested again; after four years in Siberia he moved to Switzerland to complete his medical education. At the outbreak of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, the SRs (like other revolutionary parties) split into 'Defencist

Internationalist/Defencist Schism

The terms 'Internationalist' and 'Defencist' were commonly used to describe the broad opposing camps in the international socialist movement during and shortly after the First World War. Prior to 1914, anti-militarism had been an article of faith among most European socialist parties...

' and 'Internationalist' antiwar groups; Rudnev, like his colleagues AA Argunov

Andrei Argunov

Andrei Argunov -Biographical Information:Andrei Aleksandrovich Argunov was a Russian revolutionary. He became involved in the populist movement and joined 'The People's Will' in the 1880s. In 1896 he founded the 'Union of Socialist-Revolutionaries' in Saratov, later transferring its headquarters...

 and ND Avksentiev

Nikolai Avksentiev

Nikolai Dimitrovich Avksentiev was a leading member of the Russian Socialist-Revolutionary Party . He was one of the 'Heidelberg SRs' , like V.M. Zenzinov...

, took the former position, in opposition to the party's leaders, Victor Chernov and Mark Natanson

Mark Natanson

Mark Andreyevich Natanson was a Russian revolutionary and one of the founders of the Circle of Tchaikovsky, Land and Liberty, and the Socialist-Revolutionary Party...

, and worked as a doctor on a hospital ship. During the February Revolution

February Revolution

The February Revolution of 1917 was the first of two revolutions in Russia in 1917. Centered around the then capital Petrograd in March . Its immediate result was the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, the end of the Romanov dynasty, and the end of the Russian Empire...

 he was a leader of the Moscow branch of the party and edited its newspaper Trud, and in July he was chosen mayor of Moscow; he supported the policies of Alexander Kerensky

Alexander Kerensky

Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky was a major political leader before and during the Russian Revolutions of 1917.Kerensky served as the second Prime Minister of the Russian Provisional Government until Vladimir Lenin was elected by the All-Russian Congress of Soviets following the October Revolution...

. He opposed the October Revolution

October Revolution

The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...

, and after the dispersal of the Constituent Assembly

Russian Constituent Assembly

The All Russian Constituent Assembly was a constitutional body convened in Russia after the October Revolution of 1917. It is generally reckoned as the first democratically elected legislative body of any kind in Russian history. It met for 13 hours, from 4 p.m...

 (of which he was a member) he fled south, first to Kiev, then the Caucasus, and finally Odessa. In April 1919 he left Russia.

In emigration

Rudnev, like many Russian émigrés, moved to Paris, where along with his fellow SR Ilya Fondaminsky

Ilya Fondaminsky

Ilya Isidorovich Fondaminsky was a Jewish Russian author and political activist, in 1910s one of the leaders of the ultra left SR party, in 1917 a senior member of the Alexander Kerensky’s Provisional government.In 1918 Fondaminsky took part...

 he founded Sovremennye zapiski [Contemporary Notes], which became the main literary journal of the Russian emigration (publishing, for instance, most of Nabokov

Vladimir Nabokov

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...

's Russian-language work). Nina Berberova

Nina Berberova

Nina Nikolayevna Berberova was a Russian writer who chronicled the lives of Russian exiles in Paris in her short stories and novels. She visited post-Soviet Russia and died in Philadelphia.-Biographical Sketch:...

, in her memoirs, calls Rudnev "a very dear man" who did not understand literature. When the Germans captured Paris in World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, he moved to the south of France, where he died of cancer in Pau.

External links

• Russian biography page