Вигель. Записки

Philip Philippovich Wigel came from Russified Swedes and was born into the family of a general. Since 1800, he served in various departments of the ministries of foreign affairs, internal affairs, and finance. Vice-governor of Bessarabia, mayor of Kerch, since 1829 - director of the Department of Spiritual Affairs of Foreign Faiths. In 1840 he retired with the rank of Privy Councilor and lived alternately in Moscow and St. Petersburg. From the mid-1810s, he acquired a reputation as an expert on literature and theater, and was one of the first to be accepted into the Arzamas literary society under the nickname Ivikov the Crane. He was friends with Zhukovsky, Pushkin, Zagoskin, Pogodin, Gogol and Khomyakov. He was not published during his lifetime; he entered literature as the author of “Notes” written after retirement.