Kalinin was born on February 14, 1882 (or 1883, according to some sources) in the village of Shiklovo in the industrial region of Vladimir province.

He started working at the age of 12, variously as a carpenter, typesetter, and a weaver, like his father, at a factory in Strunino.

The members of the circle were preparing an assassination attempt on the Yaroslavl governor, but the police uncovered the plot.

He studied at the Capri Party School, where he met Alexander Bogdanov and Anatoly Lunacharsky, and together with them he created the Vpered'.

[1]: 176 Kalinin was secretary to the "Circle of Proletarian Literature" established by the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in Paris in 1913.

9), in which he criticized G. V. Plekhanov's article "On the Psychology of the Labor Movement" (1907), pointing out that the "idea of workers' solidarity", so admired by the critics, is nothing more than a manifestation of the "fanatical mysticism" and "sectarian-type solidarity" characteristic of closed, controlled communities which has nothing to do with the true moral orientation of the proletarians.