Nikolai Zabolotsky: play for mortal stakes

Abstract

Darra Goldstein. Nikolai Zabolotsky: for Mortal Stakes. Cambridge Studies in Russian Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. xiii, 306 pp. Photographs. Select Bibliography. Index. $64.95, cloth. After more than thirty years of western interest in enigmatic Russian poet Nikolai Zabolotsky, first book-length study of his oeuvre has finally appeared in English. With this critical biography Darra Goldstein has become not just another contributor to cyclically developing, and still occasional, western research on Zabolotsky, but has attempted to fulfill difficult task of pioneer-monographer. She put forward an unexpected interpretation of Zabolotsky primarily as visionary poet, which is different from traditional eastern and western treatments. If latter used to praise rebellious Scrolls of young modernist and blame his later retreat into realm of classicism, former, until recently, took an opposite viewpoint and preferred to deal with decent aged Zabolotsky. Thus, opening book with challenging subtitle Play for Mortal Stakes, expects either an all-clarifying response to Soviet criticism or, at least, new convincing arguments in defense of Zabolotsky as fighter and victim of regime. In fact, Goldstein places at core of her approach to Zabolotsky as philosopher of nature and an extraordinary visionary-a concept which cardinally changes treatment of poet as an opponent of Stalinist regime in his youth and defeated man in last ten years of his life. Her Zabolotsky is preoccupied with his lifelong of harmony, with search for secret of immortality which can be found in man's amalgamation with nature through endless posthumous transformations at an atomic level. The whole tonality of book leads to only possible conclusion in Goldstein's understanding-an optimistic one-according to which Zabolotsky has found harmony even earlier, before death. Goldstein's concept is result of her own long pursuit of this original understanding of poet based on her dissertation, extensive archival research, and her broad contacts with Zabolotsky's family. Philosophic harmony-Goldstein's metaphor for understanding Zabolotsky-allows her to treat his poetry, previously divided into at least two drastically different periods, as single whole, a natural progression, result of internal experience rather than external pressure (p. 4). The postulate that there exists not two Zabolotskys, but one (p. 4), put forward in Introduction, runs through entire book as an indisputable refrain. However illogical this treatment may seem at first glance, Goldstein's rejection of traditional division can be accepted at contemporary stage of studies on Zabolotsky. She is not alone in these arguments, since certain critics (Purin, 1995, and Mikushevich, 1993) trace and excavate hidden message of Scrolls running through Zabolotsky's late poetry. In fact, such critics pronounce what was suspected by official criticism in 1940s-1950s, and what Zabolotsky was implicitly hated for despite official full recognition in late fifties. In first two chapters, contradictory to her own conclusion about prevalence of Zabolotsky's internal experience, Goldstein gives detailed information about some external influences on poet: OBERIU-the Association for Real Art-the last Russian modernistic group of poets, analytical art of painter Filonov, Futurist poet Khlebnikov, the father of Russian cosmonautics Tsiolkovsky, and philosopher of common cause Fedorov. Details of Zabolotsky's biography and brief analysis of Scrolls shed additional light on our general understanding of poet. A student of Russian literature may find short but useful references to literary influences of Derzhavin, Pushkin, Tiutchev, and Baratynsky, and few parallels with Pasternak and Mandelstam in Notes at end of book. …