- He was an amazing man: an honored scientist, a wonderful translator, an outstanding specialist in Norwegian language and the author of the best dictionaries. He seemed to know everything and even more about Norway and Norwegian language. - recalls in her memory his former student Marina Melnikova.
Valery Berkov was a member of Russian, Norwegian and Frisian (The Netherlands) Academies of Sciences, also he was awarded with the Royal Norwegian Order of St.Olav and the Icelandic Order of the Falcon.
But first and foremost Valery Berkov is known for his Russian-Norwegian Dictionary (first published in 1987) and the new Norwegian-Russian Dictionary (2003). It took him several decades to accomplish the work.
A new, expanded edition of his Russian-Norwegian Dictionary, which he finalized while being seriously ill, will be published in Norway in 2011.
Berkov’s dictionaries are the most reliable and popular among those who study Norwegian. In Murmansk these books are always in high demand and are sold out within few days.
Berkov is one of the authors of Islandic-Russian Dictionary (1962), as well as monographs and textbooks on Norwegian language. He also translated a large number of Norwegian books.
“Norwegian language is my destiny”
Berkov was saying that Norwegian language was his destiny. He got his passion for Norwegian at the age of 12 when he read the book about Roald Amundsen.
After WW2 Berkov learned Norwegian and became a professor in Leningrad (Saint-Petersburg State University), there he worked for about 60 years. In 1978-1997 he was the Head of Scandinavian philology Department.
It is noteworthy that Berkov visited Norway for the first time only in 1966 - after 15 years of teaching Norwegian at the University. Even that time his foreign colleagues were impressed by his outstanding and brilliant language skills.
He also taught English, German and other languages.
Norway became his second motherland. Together with his wife they lived both in St.Petersburg and Oslo alternatively. In 1990s he became a professor at the University of Oslo.
He was a talented man indeed and will always be in our memories.
Read the interview with Valery Berkov (30 August 2009) on the radio web-site (‘Echo of Moscow’).
