“I’m Doing Well in the Center of Siberian World under Strict Police Supervision…”: F.I. Knauer’s Letters from his Tomsk Exile in 1915–1917 Part 2 (letters 8–21)
The article introduces the letters of the Professor of the Kiev University, Sanskrit scholar Fyodor Ivanovich (Friedrich) Knauer (18491917) sent by him to his colleague, philologist Vladimir Nikolaevich Peretz. They are now housed at the Personal Fund of V.N.Peretz in the Russian State Archive of Literature and Art (RGALI. Fond 1277. Inv.1. F.35). This set of letters is undoubtedly of great importance because, among other things, we have no other surviving epistolary heritage of the scholar. Revealing the authors personality, the letters (there are only 21 of them) acquaint us to some extent with his inner world. Until recently, F.I.Knauers biography, especially the years of his exile, was full of blank spots which we can finally fill. The entire sequence of events relating to Knauers arrest, up to his arrival in Tomsk and life in Siberia, is presented by him as an uninterrupted narrative. The letters give us an idea of relations between the scholar, when he was out of favor, and his colleagues, friends, common people, local and higher authorities. They provide reliable documentary evidence of the terrible misfortune of a sincere person, who fell victim to a complicated political period.