And Quiet Flows the Don

Author Bio: Mikhail Sholokhov

Mikhail Sholokov (1905–1984), a Soviet/Russian author best known for writing about the Cossacks during the Russian Revolution, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1965. He was born in a village in the region of the Don river of a family that had been living there for many generations. Despite poverty, he was able to attend school in Moscow. At the age of fifteen, he returned to his native village to become a schoolteacher, then a statistician, and a food inspector, among various other jobs. He began writing when he was eighteen years old. His best-known book, And Quiet Flows the Don, was published in 1928 in the Soviet Union and in the United States in 1934. Its sequel, The Don Flows Home to the Sea, was finished in 1939 and appeared in America in 1940. Although each is complete in itself, the two books are often referred to under the title The Silent Don. Others of his books that have been translated into English include Harvest on the Don, Seeds of Tomorrow, and Tales of the Don.