Valery Marakou

Valery Marakou (Belarusian: Валеры Маракоў, Russian: Валерий Моряков, March 14(27), 1909 - October 29, 1937) — was a Belarusian poet and translator.

Short biography

First verses of poetry by Marakou were printed in 1925. Bright and lyrical young talent, Marakou had attracted attention, fatherly support and sympathy of Yanka Kupala, the national poet of Belarus. During his short lifetime, four books — collections of his poetry had been published. In March of 1935, he was arrested by agents of the State Security for the first time. Arrested again on November 6th, 1936. In October of 1937, after a year of torturing, the badly maimed poet was charged for being "a member of a counter-revolutionary national-fascist organisation", by a session of NKVD's "troika". He was executed by a fire squad on the [http://www.marakou.by/by/davedniki/adna_noch.html infamous for the country's history night] of October 29th, together with other 22 Belarusian literary men, in the internal prison of NKVD in Minsk. Rehabilitated on April 23rd, 1957, by a military board of the Supreme Court of the USSR.

The works of Valery Marakou were re-discovered for the Belarusian reader and the facts of his tragic fate were investigated due to the diligent labour of his nephew, Leanid Marakou, a renowned Belarusian historian-encyclopedist and writer. L. Marakou had published [http://www.marakou.by/by/davedniki/valery-marakou.html a monograph] dedicated to the life and works of the poet, and placed the uncle's books in electronic format on his web-site, re-opening thus access to once lost oeuvre of a great poetic talent of Belarus for the masses.

Bibliography and selected works

* [http://www.marakou.org/en/v-marakou.html A web-page dedicated to Valery Marakou on the web-site of Leanid Markou]