Igor Akimushkin: biography, personal life, achievements

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Igor Akimushkin is a well-known domestic scientist, specialist in biology, popularizer of science, author of scientific and educational books about animal life, which were incredibly popular in Soviet times, and remain in demand today. We will tell about his biography and the most notable works in this article.

Writer's biography

Igor Akimushkin was born in 1929. He was born in Moscow. His father was an engineer who paid much attention to the development of his son. He developed an increased interest in biology, the environment and nature at an early age.

In 1937, the hero of our article entered the capital's school. A few years later, he began to attend a circle of naturalists at the Moscow Zoo. It was led by the Soviet teacher, naturalist and zoologist Pyotr Smolin, who brought up a whole generation of talented biologists and naturalists, among whom was Igor Akimushkin.

He graduated from school after the war in 1947. At that time he was already 18 years old. Immediately after school, Igor entered the Moscow StateUniversity, higher education at the Faculty of Biology and Soil.

Employment career

He graduated from high school in 1952. According to the distribution, he got into the Institute of Oceanology of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Here he began to conduct scientific activities, writing a dissertation on octopuses from the Pacific Ocean. After a successful defense, he received the degree of Candidate of Biological Sciences.

In 1963, Igor Akimushkin joined the Communist Party, which contributed to his career advancement. His work has been appreciated by the professional community. For example, in 1971 he was awarded the Knowledge Prize, established by the All-Union Knowledge Society.

In parallel with his scientific work, he began to engage in literature, wrote fascinating books about nature and animals. In 1979 he was admitted to the Union of Soviet Writers.

In 1993, Akimushkin died at the age of 63. His grave is located at the Nikolo-Arkhangelsk cemetery.

The hero of our article was such a prominent figure in Soviet biology that in 1968 a separate species of squid was even named after him.

Creative activity

During his literary career, Akimushkin wrote nearly a hundred science fiction, children's and popular science works dedicated to animals.

His literary debut took place in 1961, when he published several of his books at once - "The Path of Legends: Tales of Unicorns and Basilisks", as well as "Traces of Unseen Beasts". They included rumors andlegends about incredible and even fabulous animals, which as a result ended with discoveries in the scientific world of new animal species.

Igor Akimushkin's books were very popular among young readers, especially among schoolchildren, who not only had fun, but also gained new knowledge. Readers of his works were bribed by the simplest style of presentation, a fascinating manner of narration.

About cats

For example, in the book "These are all cats" Igor Akimushkin tells the story of these unique animals in an intelligible form.

He always actively used foreign sources, which were unfamiliar and inaccessible to most Soviet schoolchildren and students. Thanks to this, Soviet readers learned many facts about the animal world and the environment for the first time from the stories of Igor Akimushkin.

Entertaining Biology

In the early 60s, Akimushkin began to publish his books with enviable regularity. "Entertaining Biology" by Igor Akimushkin, "Where and How?", which tells about the ability of animals to navigate in space, "First Settlers of the Land", dedicated to arthropods, "The Tragedy of Wild Animals", which tells about species that are on the verge of extinction, and problems their total extermination, "Whims of nature", "Invisible threads of nature" about world ecology.

"Entertaining Biology" becomes one of histhe most notable works, which brings him fame and success. The author wonders how it turns out that completely different species of animals and plants appear on the planet, despite the fact that everyone lives under the same sky, eats the same food, breathes the same air.

He tries to tell in an accessible and interesting way how a person develops from one cell, when and under what circumstances life originated on Earth, where a person originated from. Many people often think about this and similar questions.

In his book, Akimushkin talks about it in an accessible and simple way in an entertaining way. Readers not only learn a lot of new things, but also make important and unexpected discoveries for themselves. A large number of drawings, original photographs make this book very easy to understand.

Animal book series

The six-volume series of books by Igor Akimushkin "The World of Animals" becomes the most famous. The first volume went through several reprints only from 1971 to 1975. Each book from this series was distinguished by a large number of photographs and an original design for that time, which made it popular and loved by many.

Igor Akimushkin himself worked on the unique design. "The World of Animals" differed from other publications of a similar nature in that there were thematic drawings by Zhutovsky and Bloch on specially left wide margins.

The text itself was printed in the largest possible font, and all additional information and quotes in font are muchsmaller size. In the early 80s, this series saw the light of day for the sixth volume in which the author combined all the available fascinating information on pets.

Already in 1998, a reissue of the "World of Animals" series was released in Russia. This time it was collected in four volumes, and was supplemented by parts about invertebrates. New color photographs appeared on the pages, while the hand-drawn illustrations that were present in the first edition were omitted in favor of brighter illustrations.

Films written by Akimushkin

In addition to scientific research and work with popular science books, Akimushkin participates in creating scripts for scientific documentaries, writes many books for the youngest children - these are "Who flies without wings?", "Once upon a time there was a beaver".

According to Akimushkin's script, more than five popular science films were released. In 1965, the painting "Lighthouses in the Sky" was released about the unique capabilities of birds in the field of navigation. Experiments with insects and birds in the natural environment and laboratory conditions are demonstrated. A year later, the picture "Visiting an octopus" with the sub title "In the land of cephalopods" was published.

After a short break in 1971, another picture appeared on the screens according to Akimushkin's script called "In the Askania-Novaya Reserve" about a unique biosphere reserve in the Kherson region on the territory of modern Ukraine. Here visitors and viewers of this film can see antelopes, bison, llamas, zebras, Przewalski's horses,flamingos, ostriches and many other exotic animals for these places.

In 1976, according to Akimushkin's script, the picture "Who hides how" was released. This is a fascinating film for children and teenagers, which introduces them to the peculiarities of the animal world, birds and marine life. In 1979, in the film "Why does Babirus need fangs?" the main characters are amazing mammals of the Babirus pig family, at the same time the authors talk about penguins and chimpanzees.

Feature film

In 1979, Akimushkin takes part in the creation of a real feature film. The adventure film by Vadim Derbenev "In the wake of the ruler" about the first post-war winter, which takes place in the Ussuri taiga, is released on Soviet screens. Beginner biologist Belov finds himself in a protected area, where unique tigers still remain. He seeks to win over the locals to his side in order to defeat the poachers.

The main roles were played by Yuri Belyaev, Vladimir Samoilov and Lyudmila Zaitseva.

The last picture according to the script of the hero of our article is the documentary film of 1988 "In the footsteps of Bigfoot …". It tells about the origin of our species, as well as hypotheses and theories related to the existence of Bigfoot.