Deaths on February 4

Ilya Kormiltsev, Russian-English poet and translator (b. 1959)

Ilya Valeryevich Kormiltsev (Russian: Илья́ Вале́рьевич Корми́льцев, b. September 26, 1959, Sverdlovsk, USSR (now Yekaterinburg, Russia) - d. February 4, 2007, London, UK) was a Russian poet, translator, and publisher.

Kormiltsev is most famous for working as songwriter and producer in Nautilus Pompilius, one of the most popular rock bands in the Soviet Union and, later, Russia. Kormiltsev worked with Nautilus Pompilius during the 1980s and the 1990s.He understood the English and French languages to a near-native level and translated books from these languages into his native Russian.

Later, Kormiltsev founded Ultra.Kultura publishing house and managed it as the editor-in-chief since 2003 until his death in 2007. The publishing house became notorious in 2004, when Russian authorities accused it with propaganda of drug use and terrorism.In late 2006 all copies of the combined Ultra.Kultura edition of Adam Parfrey's Apocalypse Culture and Apocalypse Culture II were sought by authorities, and most were seized and submitted to flames, owing to the book's inclusion of an essay by David Woodard that was alleged to promote recreational ketamine use. On a visit to London in January 2007, Kormiltsev fell down and injured his spine. On January 22, 2007 he was diagnosed with incurable spinal cancer and died on February 4, 2007, aged 47.The funeral service was held at Troyekurovskoye Cemetery in Moscow. Alexander Korotich designed the monument to a Russian poet Ilya Kormiltsev that was placed in Moscow in 2009.

Geydar Dzhemal, chairman of the Islamic Committee of Russia, announced that Kormiltsev embraced Islam before his death. Although initially Kormiltsev's friends and relatives denied this had taken place, after the funeral, they announced that Kormiltsev had been buried in a savan, facing Mecca.A commemorative bench for Kormiltsev was installed at Lincoln's Inn Fields in London.A literary award was named after him.