'Durrell in Russia' Published in Russian for the First Time

Gerald Durrell

Photo by V. Shirinya

Durrell in Russia, a book written by renowned writer and zoologist Gerald Durrell and his wife Lee after their 1984–1985 journey across the Soviet Union, has been published in Russian for the first time. The publication was initiated and coordinated by Asya Veksler, Associate Professor at the HSE School of Integrated Communications.

Asya Veksler, Associate Professor at the HSE School of Integrated Communications, member of the First Public Ecological Television Media Council, talked to the HSE News Service about the idea to translate and print the Durrells’ book, which has been unavailable to Russian-speaking audiences for over three decades.

The book Durrell in Russia was written by Gerald Durrell and his wife Lee, who was also a zoologist, after their journey with a film crew across the Soviet Union in 1984–1985. The Durrells studied the system for protecting rare animal species. They were among the first Western travellers to visit renowned and hard-to-reach Soviet nature reserves ranging from the Arctic tundra to Middle-Asian desert: Darwin Reserve, Barguzin Reserve, Taimyr Reserve, Astrakhan Reserve, and many others.

Asya Veksler, Associate Professor at the HSE School of Integrated Communications

An Accidental Discovery on Social Media

If someone asked me what book I would take to a desert island, I would say Gerald Durrell’s My Family and Other Animals. It is one of his earliest books, and he has a brilliant style and sense of humour—joyful, friendly and deeply touching. I first read this book in 1971 and have been part of the millions-strong community of Durrell’s fans in Russia and globally ever since.

Durrell dedicated his life to the preservation of wild animals. He was a pioneer of an idea that evolved in the 1950s: fostering rare and endangered animals in zoos and breeding grounds for later release back into nature, into a free life under human protection. At the time, the idea did not have a lot of support. Scientists believed it was too costly, and suggested breeding animals in reserves, while the public protested against collecting the last representatives of endangered species.

Thanks to Durrell’s practical and educational work, this idea became a widely accepted scientific concept aimed at preserving the biological diversity of our planet.

One example of the breeding of rare species was the Jersey Zoological Park on the island of Jersey in the English Channel. There, he founded a school where students from different countries can learn how animals live and how to care for them.

Durrell’s books reflect his love of animals and his admiration of the endless beauty of nature

He gave many people not only a new view on wildlife, but also a future profession: many of today’s zoologists started off by reading Durrell’s books before deciding to dedicate their lives to studying wildlife.

A year ago, on social media, I saw parts of a translation of Durrell’s book on Russian nature reserves, which I had never seen before. I was thrilled to learn about it and started investigating. I found that in 1984–1985, Gerald and Lee Durrell, together with a Canadian TV crew, visited the Soviet Union and travelled around nature reserves from the Arctic tundra to Central Asian deserts. The goal of the journey was to learn more about the system for protecting endangered animal species. The journey resulted in the 13-series film Durrell in Russia, and in 1986, Gerald and Lee wrote a book of the same name about their adventures. The book was never translated into Russian or published in Russia.

Since I am a member of the First Public Ecological Television Media Council, I immediately suggested joining forces with my TV colleagues to publish a Russian translation of the book. What’s more, 2021 marked the 35^th anniversary of the book’s first English publication. My colleagues supported the idea.

A Love of Durrell and Crowdfunding

The community of fans of Durrell’s books and life story turned out to be both interesting and large. I found several social media chat groups dedicated to Durrell, and wrote about my plans to publish the book. They were incredibly supportive. Lyuba, a woman from Moscow who lives in Germany and published the remarkable Durrells on Corfu guide, suggested publishing information on the project on Boomstarter. In two short months, about 100 people supported the future publication. All of them received the book afterwards by regular mail or from the EcoTV office in Moscow.

Sergey Yarokhovich, a geography teacher from Belarus, sent me the contacts of his friends— Pavel Smirnov and his colleagues, who are all ornithologists from the MSU Zoological Museum. As a result, a lot of people I didn’t know before helped me to publish the book. Zoologists edited the picture captions and the names of animals that were unclear to the translator.

Professionals say that the book includes no errors, despite containing a lot of special terms

As the project organiser, I had a lot of tasks to do. These included dealing with copyright: we negotiated with The Van Lear Agency, which represents the copyright owner (Lee Durrell) in Russia. I also worked with a team that included the translator, Anna Aizenstadt, as well as a literary editor, a proofreader etc.

But this publication project was special. In addition to the regular tasks, I also had to communicate with all the reserves that Durrell had visited.

As a result, we managed to find over 70 previously unknown photos from his journey that were stored in the personal archives of the reserves’ staff

We also collected seven memoir essays by people who met Durrell. We received beautiful stories from Astrakhan, Taimyr, Barguzin, the Darwin Reserve and others.

The book consists of three parts. The first is a translation of the Durrells’ book. The second is a collection of unique photos from the reserves’ archives and the personal collections of their staff. Many of the photos have never been published before. The third consists of seven memoir essays. The book includes lots of colour photos of the animals described by Durrell.

Support from Lee Durrell

I have talked to Lee Durrell a few times, and it was extremely pleasant. I informed her of our desire to translate and publish the book after 35 years—she was very enthusiastic about it!

She wrote an introduction to the book, in which she recalls the warm welcome she and Gerald received at the Soviet reserves, as well as their meetings with remarkable people.

I occasionally sent her pictures that she might never have seen before, and she was always happy to get them; she was grateful to be reminded of people she still remembers after so many years.

Life of the Book

The book was published in late November 2021. At the end of January, nature lovers and fans of Durrell met up for a presentation at the Zoological Museum. The presentation was attended by a lot of people who met Durrell during his visit.

We delivered some copies of the published book to the Zoological Museum. Everyone who supported the project on Boomstarter also received their books. Today, I get requests for the book from all over the country.

We even sent some books to France, Israel, and Latvia! But there are still copies of this unique book left for anyone who loves nature and is interested in Gerald Durrell’s works. If you want to get a copy, please contact us via email at vekpr@mail.ru.