Paustovsky began writing while still in Gymnasium. His first works were imitative poetry but he restricted his writing to prose after
Ivan Bunin wrote in a letter to him: "I think that your sphere, your real poetry, is prose. It is here, if you are determined enough, that I am sure you can achieve something significant." His first stories to be published were “Na vode” (“On The Water”) and “Chetvero” (“The Four”) in 1911 and 1912. During
World War I, he wrote sketches of life at the front, one of which was published. His first book,
Morskiye Nabroski (“Sea Sketches”), was published in 1925, but received little attention. This was followed by
Minetoza in 1927, and the romantic novel
Blistaiushie Oblaka (“Shining Clouds”) in 1929. His work of this period was influenced by
Alexander Grin as well as the writers of the "Odessa school", (
Isaac Babel,
Valentin Kataev, and
Yury Olesha). In the 1930s, Paustovsky visited various constructions sites and wrote in praise of the industrial transformation of the country. To that period belong the novels
Kara-Bugaz (1932) and
Kolkhida (1934).
Kara-Bugaz won particular praise. It is essentially a tale of adventure and exploration in the region around Kara-Bugaz Bay, where the air is mysteriously heavy. It begins in 1847 and moves to the
Russian Civil War period when a group of
Red Guards is abandoned to near-certain death on a desolate island. Some of them, though do survive and are rescued by an explorer and stay on to help in the exploration, development and study of the natural wealth of the region. Paustovsky continued to explore historical themes in
Severnaya Povest ("Tale of the North", 1938). In this tale, after the anti-Tsarist
Decembrist uprising in
Saint Petersburg, a wounded officer who had taken part in the uprising and a sailor try to make it by foot across the ice to Sweden but are captured in a sequence of dramatic events. Years later, in
Leningrad in the 1930s, the great-grandsons of the participants unexpectedly meet. In the late 1930s, Russian nature emerged as a central theme for Paustovsky, for example, in
Letniye Dni ("Summer Days", 1937) and
Meshcherskaya Storona (1939) in which he treats nature was a many-faceted splendor in which man can free himself from daily cares and regain his spiritual equilibrium. This focus on nature drew comparisons with
Mikhail Prishvin. Prishvin himself wrote in his diary, "If I were not Prishvin, I would like to write like Paustovsky." During
World War II Paustovsky served as a
war correspondent on the southern front. In 1943 he produced a screenplay for the Gorky Film Studio production of
Lermontov, directed by
Albert Gendelshtein. Another work of note is
Tale of the Woods (1948). This story opens in a remote forest in the 1890s, where
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is composing a symphony. The young daughter of a local forester often brings Tchaikovsky berries. Half a century later, the daughter of this girl is a
laboratory technician working in the local forest station. From 1948 until 1955, Paustovsky taught at the
Maxim Gorky Literature Institute. He also edited literary collections including
Literary Moscow (1956) and
Pages from Tarusa, in which he sought to bring new writers to the public's attention and to publish writers suppressed during the
Joseph Stalin years. Other major works include
Snow,
Crossing Ships (1928);
The Black Sea (1936); and
The Rainy Dawn (1946). Paustovsky was also the author of several plays and fairy tales, including "Steel Ring" and of Zolotaya Rosa "The Golden Rose" (1955), in which he discusses the process of literary creation. ==Autobiography==