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Who are some icons for the Russian people?

Question by Yashibu Wolf: Who are some Russian icons Russian people look up to?
Like the Russian equivilant of Wayne Gretsky or Martin Luther King or George Washington or Michael Jackson.

Answers and Views:

Answer by Mob Rules
Stalin has made a “cultural comeback” of sorts over the past decade-plus // there are many in athletics, but one iconic figure is weightlifter Vasiliy Ivanovich (“The Mighty”) Alekseyev

Answer by polynesian
It’s an interesting question. I tried to figure out the equivalents, but failed to find strong parallels…
There are basically no ‘icons’ of the strength that you describe – all the current ‘icons’ are mainly fashion and will be forgotten in 10-20-30 years. But let’s try –

Wayne Gretzky? – Andrey Arshavin
Martin Luther King? – ? no equivalent
George Washington? – I’d say V.V.Putin (sad enough)
Michael Jackson? – Dima Bilan (also sad enough)

Hope this helps

@Wave2012 – formally you are right, but ask the younger ones if they at all KNOW who Sakharov was…

upd. yeah, Victor Tsoi is an icon, so forget about Dima Bilan

Answer by Wave2012
More than 1000 of years of Russian history brought hundreds and thousands icons in different fields every Russian knows. Some of them:

Martin Luther King: Andrei Sakharov, Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

George Washington: Yaroslav the Wisdom, Peter the Great, Peter Stolypin.

Michael Jackson: Alla Pugacheva, Iosif Kobzon.

Wayne Gretsky: Vyacheslav Fetisov, Irina Rodnina, Vladislav Tretyak, Lev Yashin, Elena Isinbaeva.

———
Yes, I agree, that nowadays young Russian people (as well as everywhere in the world, I think) are oriented on global tendencies and pay less attention to local events. Exclusion is USA because they create most part of these trends.

Answer by Slava T
Just following your examples:
Wayne Gretsky – Valery Kharlamov http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valeri_Kharlamov; Vladislav Tretiak http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladislav_Tretiak;

Martin Luther King: Lev Tolstoy (he was not only a great author but a moralist as well) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Tolstoy; the same applies to Fedor Dostoyevsky http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedor_Dostoevsky

Michael Jackson: oops, pop icons come and go, every generation has their own icons but I think Alla Pugacheva perfectly fits the definition of an icon. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alla_Pugacheva

George Washington (great state leader): Peter the Great http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_the_Great; Alexander II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_II_of_Russia; Sergei Witte http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Witte

Answer by Street Spirit
Yury Gagarin, Victor Tsoy
Not just ‘icons’ but heroes for many generations.

Answer by K2010
Those are Richest ones

http://www.therichest.com

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