Masiej Siadnioŭ

Majsiej Laryvonavič Siadnioŭ was a Belarusian poet and novelist.

Early years

Siadnioŭ was born on 1 September 1915 into a poor farming family in the village of Mokraje, Mahilioŭ governorate of the Russian Empire.
One of his teachers at secondary school encouraged Siadnioŭ's interest in literature.
After school Siadnioŭ went on to study at the Mścislaŭ Pedagogical College and in 1933 entered the Minsk Higher Pedagogical Institute.

Gulag and escape

In the last year of his studies in October 1936, he was arrested on charges of participation in the "National Democratic" movement. According to the verdict, he was allegedly a member of an "anti-Soviet, counter-revolutionary organisation" while at the Mścislaŭ Institute. He was sent to a Gulag prison camp in the Kolyma region of the Russian Far East.
After 5 years in the Gulag, Siadnioŭ was brought to Minsk for retrial, however the invasion of Belarus by the Nazis allowed him to escape and he returned to farming in his native village.

Life in exile

Fearing re-arrest, he fled the advancing Soviet troops in 1943 and ultimately settled in the United States where he would spend the rest of his life, having taught Russian at Indiana University.
From 1967 to 1983, Siadnioŭ worked for Radio Liberty, heading its Belarusian edition.

Exoneration and death

Siadnioŭ was exonerated from all charges by the Supreme Court of Belarus in 1992.
He died in the United States on 5 February 2001 and was buried in the Belarusian cemetery of South River, New Jersey.