Sergei Davydov

The playwright, author and poet Sergei Davydov was born in Togliatti, Russia, in 1992. He graduated from the State Aerospace University in Samara in 2014. In 2022, he also obtained a master’s degree in philology in Moscow. Davydov has written over 30 plays that have been staged all over Russia. He won several major theater competitions in Russia and participated in projects at the Sovremennik Theater in Moscow.

In 2020, his play »Respublika« (tr: Republic) was voted Play of the Year at the »Kulminaziya« competition, and »Tver-Tver« was included in the off program of the national award »Golden Mask«. A year later, the »Golden Mask« Expert Council singled out his play »Respublika« as one of the most important theater events of the year. In 2019, a collection of Davydov’s plays »Polnyj junajted« (tr: Fully United: Seven Plays About Youth) was published in Russia. He left Russia in 2023 because of political persecution due to his anti-war position.

His debut novel »Springfield« about queer people in Russia before the war in Ukraine was published in the same year by Freedom Letters, a publishing house that prints banned books in Russia and was the first to include this book in its program. The publisher’s owner Georgi Urushadze wrote: »this is a generational novel. The generation of thirty-somethings, crushed by Russian reality, destroying everything alive and unlike the mainstream. It is a must-read.« In the same year, Freedom Letters also published the anthology »Pjat’ p’es o swobode« (tr: Five Plays About Freedom).

Sergei Davydov’s text »Grenze« (tr: Border), which premiered in Berlin, is an autobiographical poetic text about life on the Russian-Ukrainian border and the relationship between the lyrical self and his mother.

Davydov’s plays have been shown in Moscow, St. Petersburg, San Francisco, London, Belgrade, Berlin, Tbilisi, and other cities. He is fellow of the Artist Protection Fund [Institute of International Education, New York, USA] and Gefangenes Wort Fund (Hessen, Germany).

He lives in Kassel.

Status: July 2024

Polnyj junajted
2019

Springfield
Freedom Letters
2023

Pjat‘ p’es o swobode
Freedom Letters
2023