Like most of people, I like reading. Among my favorite writers are Jules Verne, Herbert Wells, Mayne Reid, and many others (if you are interested, take a look at Top 20 my favorite writers). But my most favorite author is Ivan Efremov, a brilliant Russian scientist and science fiction writer.

He was a prominent paleontologist, who was interested in ancient vertebrates, living on the Earth hundreds of million years ago. He discovered and described many new species of ancient reptiles. The main Efremov's achievement in science were formalizing and developing of a new branch of Paleontology, which is called Taphonomy.

As for literature, his creative work gave a powerful stimulus to the Soviet science fiction of the 1950-1960s. Efremov's literary skill is amazing. Exciting worlds, created by him, have been impressing some generations of readers. People, living on the Earth of future, have radically changed the face of their home planet and established contacts with other space civilizations. In the Efremov's works the beings from different parts of our Galaxy have reached an understanding despite the considerable differences in the ways of living. Unlike the nations, inhabited the today's Earth, they do not fight endless wars with each other, but have created a tremendous organization on the Galaxy scale, which is called the "Great Circle". The goal of the "Great Circle" is storing knowledge, accumulated by different civilizations, sharing the experience, and assisting to the planets that suffer a disaster.

The main Efremov's achievement in literature, in my opinion, is that the people, vividly described by the author in his tales and novels, are not only very intelligent and noble, but also incredibly beautiful. According to the writer, the physical perfection of the people of future is in no way pure luck, but a direct consequence of evolutionary process. Efremov's heroes truly believe that beauty is the happiness and the meaning of life.

The goal of this division of my site is to provide more information about this great figure.