The following appeared in the January/February 2008 issue of Culture+Travel along with the article "Pushkin Is Our Everything."
St. Petersburg
St. Petersburg, Petrograd, Leningrad—and Piter to Russians—is the world’s ultimate literary stage set. Must-visit sites include the equestrian statue of Peter the Great on Decembrists’ Square, immortalized in Pushkin’s poem The Bronze Horseman; the Summer Garden, where Russian writers congregate to commune with Pushkin’s ghost; and the golden spire of the Admiralty, celebrated by pretty much every Russian who ever wrote. You can explore the city’s darker side at the Peter and Paul Fortress, where Dostoyevsky was imprisoned in 1849, and the infamous Soviet Kresty jail, described in Anna Akhmatova’s tragic Requiem.
See:
Anna Akhmatova Museum at the Fountain House
Entered through a somewhat hidden courtyard off Liteiny Prospekt, this communal apartment was Akhmatova’s home for three decades, beginning in the 1920s. Among the countless bone-chilling testaments to the horrors of totalitarianism is a letter she wrote to Stalin pleading for her son’s release from the gulag. The museum has informative English-language handouts and a nice small shop for souvenirs.
Sheremetyev Palace
Liteiny Prospekt, 53
78-12/579-7239
akhmatova.spb.ru
Fyodor Dostoyevsky Memorial Museum
Dostoyevsky’s final residence has been recreated according to memoirs and original plans, with memorabilia, manuscripts, and period objects on display. Do drop by the Kuznechny Market down the street to admire the homegrown edibles, and take a sample of sauerkraut offered by vendors. Also stroll along Fontanka River and Griboyedov Canal embankments, which figure prominently in Dostoyevsky’s novels.
Kuznechny
Pereulok, 5–2
78-12/117-4031
md.spb.ru
Pushkin Apartment Museum
The elegant 1830s interior of the poet’s last flat is filled with his personal effects, including a 4,000-book library. The adjacent 17-room literary annex (separate admission) perfectly illustrates Russia’s cultural golden age—with English audio.
Moika River
Naberezhnaya, 12
78-12/311-3531
museumpushkin.ru
Pushkin’s Lycée at Tsarskoye Selo
Often overlooked in favor of nearby Catherine Palace, this is the legendary progressive boarding school that Pushkin attended from 1811 to 1817. (His class reads like a who’s who of 19th-century Russian culture.) Especially memorable is Pushkin’s cell-like room and the examination hall where Gavriil Derzhavin, the father of Russian poetry, anointed the teenage poet as his successor. It’s all very moving, even to a non-Russian.
Pushkin,
Sadovaya Str., 2
78-12/476-6411
museumpushkin.ru
Vladimir Nabokov Museum
Nabokov lived in this ornate mansion near St. Isaac’s before emigrating in 1917. Fans will have a field day with his butterflies and his Scrabble set. English information is scant, but most items are self-explanatory.
Ul. Bolshaya
Morskaya, 47
78-12/315-4713
nabokovmuseum.org
Stay:
Angleterre
Olga Polizzi designed the guest rooms at the luxe Angleterre (and the Astoria, its sister and neighbor) in signature classic-contemporary style, here featuring acres of creamy Volga linen and splashes of Constructivist red. Prize rooms face the massive dome of St. Isaac’s, another landmark dear to Russian writers.
Ul. Malaya
Morskaya, 24
78-12/313-5787
RATES: $300–$500
angleterrehotel.com
Astoria
The 1912 grande dame, a Rocco Forte hotel, retains a faded, neoclassic elegance. Tea is served in the mint-green salon from fanciful blue-and-white china by the Lomonosov Imperial Factory. Vladimir Lenin, writer Mikhail Bulgakov, as well as H.G. Wells and John Reed, all slept here.
Bolshaya Morskaya
Ulitsa, 39
78-12/313-5757
RATES: $390–$640
thehotelastoria.com
Eat:
Chekhov
Anton Chekhov—the least Petersburgian of all Russian writers—lends his name to this rapturously delicious new spot. In a room that recreates the nostalgic feel of a 19th-century dacha, locals go loco for house-made pickles, potatoes fried with porcini mushrooms, and rich stews in adorable earthenware pots.
Petropavlovskaya
Ulitsa, 4
78-12/234-4511
July 4, 2008 
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