A Note on Pasternak's poem ‘Definition of Poetry’

Abstract

Pasternak's many “definitions” of art typically dwell on its “boundless” origin in inspiration. This origin is particularly strongly – if enigmatically – represented in the third stanza of the Sestra moia – zhizn' poem ‘Definition of Poetry’ where, although there are no actual statements, there are subtle dislocations of syntax which suggest a nameless awareness of “that which is called inspiration”.