Letters of a Russian Traveler

After returning from a year-long journey through Europe, Nikolai Mikhailovich Karamzin founded the "Moscow Journal," in which, starting from the first issue and for two years of its existence in 1791-1792, he published the "Letters of a Russian Traveler" - his extremely elegant in form and simultaneously monumental in idea work of the epistolary genre, which was destined to become one of the most significant phenomena of Russian literary sentimentality. The history of "Letters..." continued even after the story of the "Moscow Journal" ended: Karamzin continued to work on them in the following years.

The first complete edition of "Letters...", due to the close scrutiny of the censors regarding the fragments dedicated to the French Revolution, became possible only after the death of Paul I in 1801... Over time, in addition to the undeniable literary merits of "Letters...", the unique historical value of the image of Europe captured by Karamzin, seen through the eyes of a traveler from Russia, as well as the reflected image of the enlightened Russian traveler of the eighteenth century, became increasingly evident.