Involved in the revolutionary movement from a young age, he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1905 while being a student at the Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology.
Initially settling in Vienna, he then traveled to Capri where he lived with Maxim Gorky who published his poetry.
He showed journalistic and organizational skills, which then gave rise to the appointment of him as a commissioner of a news agency.
In March 1918 Stark and other leaders of the Petrograd Telegraph Agency moved to Moscow and the PTA was merged with the Press Bureau of the All-Russian Central Executive, creating the Russian Telegraph Agency (ROSTA) which Stark became the director of.
Some Soviet sources claim that Stark died of pneumonia in 1942 while he was in prison captivity, however it is most likely he was shot in November 1937.