Boris Ryzhy

He was born in Chelyabinsk, but had lived in Sverdlovsk (renamed Yekaterinburg after the dissolution of the Soviet Union) since 1980.

Boris Ryzhy studied at Ural State Mining University, Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences and Ural State University. The recorded working language is Russian. The field of work recorded is geophysics and poetry. Employment is recorded with Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences and Ural (magazine). Distinctions recorded are Anti-Booker prize and Palmyra North.

• Name — Boris Ryzhy • Native Name — Борис Рыжий • Born — 8 September 1974 • Birthplace — Chelyabinsk, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union • Died — 7 May 2001 • Place of death — Yekaterinburg, Russia • Education — Ural State Mining University (Geology) • Known for — Poetry, Geology • Notable Works — Opravdaniye zhizni ("A Reason to Live")

At the time of his death, Ryzhy's reputation had burgeoned and he was starting to receive recognition as one of the premier poets of his generation. He was awarded the Anti-Booker Prize and accepted an invitation to the Rotterdam Poetry Festival. Ryzhy took his own life by hanging on 7 May 2001, at the age of 26. His suicide, seen by some skeptics as an act to gain recognition and fame (the kind of which had occurred in Russia since Sergei Esenin's suicide in a St. Petersburg hotel in 1925), may have been a consequence of his bipolar disorder and substance abuse. Shortly afterwards, he was posthumously awarded the Northern Palmyra, one of the most highly sought-after prizes in Russian poetry, for his collection Opravdaniye zhizni ("A Reason to Live"). He had at least one prior suicide attempt in 1999. His only son, Artem (born 19 January 1993) died of a cardiac arrest in September 2020, at the age of 27.

Boris Ryzhy worked in geophysics and poetry. He was employed by Ural Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences and Ural (magazine).