Viktor Astafyev was born on May 1, 1924 in Ovsyanka village, not far from Krasnoyarsk. He was the third child in a family, but his two elder sisters died when they were young. After the death of the mother Viktor lived in the house of her parents - Ekaterina Petrovna and Ilya Evgrafovich Potylitsyn.

The life of the writer was complicated and rich for events. Astafyev lived in an orphanage, was a fisherman in the North, went through the Great civil war. After the war he changed many professions until he finally became a writer.

After demobilization in 1945 Astafyev moved to Ural and settled down in Chusovoy city, Permskaya oblast.

In 1945 he married Maria Semenovna Koryakina. They had three children: Lidiya, Irina and Andrey.

In 1951 the first story of Astafyev "A civil man" was published in "Chusovskoy workman" newspaper. After that Astafyev began to work for this newspaper, he wrote reports, articles and stories. His first book "Untill the next spring" appeared in 1953 in Perm.

In 1958 Astafyev was accepted into the USSR union of writers. In 1959-1961 he listened to the course of literature lectures in Moscow.

There are two main themes of the soviet literature in Astafyev's works - war and village. The theme of the village is brightly and fully reflected in the novel "Tsar Ryba" (1976). The impressions of the writer about his native Krasnoyarsk region became the base for "Tsar Ryba's" plot.

After long years of constant moving around the country Viktor Petrovich returned to his motherland - a village of Ovsyanka, distant from the city rush. This village has become "a cultural Mecca" of the Krasnoyarsk region. The writer was visited here by famous writers, cultural and political persons, and by grateful readers.