Alexey Surkov
Alexey Alexandrovich Surkov was a Russian Soviet poet, editor, literary critic and high-profile nomenklatura figure, the head of the Soviet Union of Writers in 1953–1959.
Surkov, a war correspondent during the Great Patriotic War, received numerous state awards, including the Orders of Red Banner and the Red Star, four Orders of Lenin and two Stalin Prizes.
The author of numerous poetry books, he is best remembered for his poems that were adapted into songs: "The March of the Defenders of Moscow", "The Song of the Brave Ones" and, most famously, "Zemlyanka".
