Through its creative work and spreading of the arts, Evolve has formed close associations with leading Russian literary figures.

Immaculate Perception has been a great success and the poetry competition will continue to bring the two cultures closer.

The competition will be judged by Evolve in association with The Uriatin Literary Fund, and Vitaly Kalpidi, who will also translate the winning works. The Uriatan Literary fund is based in Perm in the Western Urals - the chain of mountains which separates Europe from Asia. Perm was the prototype town for Uriatin in Pasternak's novel Doctor Zhivago.

Kalpidi has won numerous literary awards including the Apollon Grigoriev Prize and Best Book of the Decade, he is considered a genius by his contemporaries. Kalpidi was born one month after a nuclear catastrophe in Chelyabinsk in the Urals, this perhaps explains the explosion of work by Kalpidi but moreover and central to his philosophy, the desire to create and spread culture from his birth place. Problems with the state for being 'subversive' led him to be thrown out of university, now his work is studied as part of the curriculum.
The British embassy was surprised that he declined to attend the prestigious Small Booker Prize award ceremony in Moscow because it coincided with a prearranged reading in a small provincial village.

Russian language has continued to expand since the influences of Pushkin and Dostoevsky, it is rich, flexible and musical. In the UK, knowledge of Russian poetry tends to stop after the early1900s, however there is a wealth of talent in modern Russian literature and we have plans for a reciprocal event and visions of cultural exchange visits.

The organisers are most likely to select poets whose writing displays a timeless quality.