Vasiliy Lvovich Pushkin was a minor Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 best known as an uncle of the much more famous Alexander Pushkin.

Vasiliy Pushkin was born in Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

, Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

. During his early years, he has served in Russia's Leib Guard Izmailovo Regiment, retiring at the rank of poruchik

Poruchik

Poruchik was a military rank in several Slavic countries, such as the Russian Empire and the Republic of Poland, equivalent to Lieutenant. "Poruchik" means "messenger", "officer for orders". This is a Slavic copy of the term "Lieutenant" .In Russia this rank was first introduced in Strelets New...

. Between 1803 and 1804 Pushkin lived abroad, mainly in Paris.

Pushkin was a neoclassical

Neoclassicism

Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...

 poet and was indifferent to the then-popular romantic

Romantic poetry

Romanticism, a philosophical, literary, artistic and cultural era which began in the mid/late-1700s as a reaction against the prevailing Enlightenment ideals of the day , also influenced poetry...

 movement. In his poem "Captain Khrabrov", Pushkin mocked romanticism. He was a follower of light poetry

Light poetry

Light poetry, or light verse, is poetry that attempts to be humorous. Poems considered "light" are usually brief, and can be on a frivolous or serious subject, and often feature word play, including puns, adventurous rhyme and heavy alliteration...

, and wrote numerous songs, epistles, and epigram

Epigram

An epigram is a brief, interesting, usually memorable and sometimes surprising statement. Derived from the epigramma "inscription" from ἐπιγράφειν epigraphein "to write on inscribe", this literary device has been employed for over two millennia....

s in the manner of Horace

Horace

Quintus Horatius Flaccus , known in the English-speaking world as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus.-Life:...

, Tibullus

Tibullus

Albius Tibullus was a Latin poet and writer of elegies.Little is known about his life. His first and second books of poetry are extant; many other texts attributed to Tibullus are of questionable origins. There are only a few references to him in later writers and a short Life of doubtful authority...

, or Catullus

Catullus

Gaius Valerius Catullus was a Latin poet of the Republican period. His surviving works are still read widely, and continue to influence poetry and other forms of art.-Biography:...

. He also translated several poems of La Fontaine

Jean de La Fontaine

Jean de La Fontaine was the most famous French fabulist and one of the most widely read French poets of the 17th century. He is known above all for his Fables, which provided a model for subsequent fabulists across Europe and numerous alternative versions in France, and in French regional...

 and other French poets.
Vasily Lvovich had a sudden burst of creativity in 1810 and 1811, when he wrote his best polemical verse, including a humorous masterpiece, A Dangerous Neighbour (1811), set in a bowdyhouse. Buyanov, the main character of the poem, became a household name; Alexander Pushkin mentioned him in Eugene Onegin

Eugene Onegin

Eugene Onegin is a novel in verse written by Alexander Pushkin.It is a classic of Russian literature, and its eponymous protagonist has served as the model for a number of Russian literary heroes . It was published in serial form between 1825 and 1832...

. Pushkin the younger did not take his uncle's poetry seriously; at the age of 22 he apprehended that the posterity will ascribe A Dangerous Neighbour to his own juvenilia:

All his works are not worth his Buyanov; and what will happen to him in posterity? I'm extremely afraid that my cousin [i.e., Buyanov] will be taken for my son... [Pushkin's letter to Peter Vyazemsky, January 2, 1822].

Due to interest in his nephew, Vasily Pushkin's works were re-published numerous times; the last and most complete collection is "V. L. Pushkin. Poems", M. Hyperion, 2005. ISBN 5-89332-104-9.

Rerefence