Ostrovsky Estate and Museum

The Ostrovsky Estate and Museum, also part of the Bakhrushin Theater Museum, is dedicated mainly to the life and work of the Muscovite playwright who, is generally considered to be the greatest representative of the Russian Realist literary period. Born in 1823, Alexander Ostrovsky studied at the Legal Faculty of Moscow State University before becoming a court clerk and a minor civil servant.

He began his writing career later and in 1850 his second dramatic work "The Bankrupt" caused so much consternation amongst the Moscow merchant class, who disliked his exposure of bogus claims for bankruptcy, that they brought about his dismissal from the civil service. The majority of Ostrovsky's remaining dramatic works focus on the Russian merchant class and all of them premiered under the supervision of the playwright himself at Moscow's Maly Theater. Not only did Ostrovsky have very close ties with the Maly Theater, which honors his contribution with a seated statue of the playwright outside, but he was also very active in theatrical circles in the capital. He was the founder and first president of the Society of Russian Playwrights and later the artistic director of the Moscow Imperial Theaters. All in all Ostrovsky was the author of 47 plays, which are still today among the most widely read and frequently performed stage pieces in Russia. Moscow also boats a second smaller museum devoted to the Soviet writer; the Ostrovsky Humanitarian Center. The center is located at Ulitsa Tverskaya 14, not far from Pushkinskaya or Tverskaya Metros, and displays numerous sculptures and paintings pertaining to Ostrovsky and his works and functions as a meeting place for budding writers and actors and an occasional concert hall. Call (095) 229 8552 for further information.