Preporoditelj prirode: Život Mičurina

The book is a romantic-biographical novel (a story in narrative form) about the life and work of Ivan V. Michurin (1855–1935), a legendary Russian gardener, breeder, and transformer of nature. The author, Vyacheslav A. Lebedev, a Soviet writer who knew Michurin personally, portrays him as a genius self-taught who for decades in his modest garden in Kozlov (today's Michurinsk) crossed and created hundreds of new, more resistant, and more fruitful varieties of fruit trees adapted to the harsh Russian climate.

Lebedev vividly describes Michurin's difficult life: poverty, misunderstanding of the environment, persistent experiments, failures, and final successes. The book is written in a typical Soviet spirit – Michurin is portrayed as a heroic fighter for a better future, a man who does not wait for gifts from nature, but takes them from her. The work glorifies the idea that man can actively change and improve nature, which perfectly suited the official Soviet doctrine (especially Michurin-Lysenko biology) in the post-war period.

In Croatia (and Yugoslavia), the book was published in 1946, during the time of the strongest Soviet influence after World War II. It was part of the wider propaganda of "advanced Soviet science" and was intended for a wider audience – from youth to adults – in order to popularize the idea of ​​science in the service of the people and agriculture.

The style is lively, narrative and inspiring, with many descriptions of nature, gardening and Michurin's tireless perseverance. Today the book is also read as an interesting historical document of a time – a period when Michurin was the idol of Soviet agrobiology, and before his ideas (and especially Lysenko) experienced harsh scientific criticism.