Sobranie Stikhotvorenii by Solomon Bart Lazar Fleishman (review)

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REVIEWS 95 the crucial notion that one perspective alone cannot reveal the truth(p. 137). Sperrle effectively ties together the form and content of Leskov's works according to her criteria for organicity. She highlights Leskov's love of wordplay and lexical richness, presenting a persuasive argument for her choice of translationfor 'Zaiachii remiz'. Her analysis explains the place in Leskov'sworldview of what has often been called excess in his style, and she underlinesthe subtletyand philosophicaldepth of Leskov'snarrative. It mightbe expected thatin a studyof a nineteenth-centuryRussianorganic worldview,more mention might be made of the earlySlavophiles.Certainlyit is clear that in terms of a distrust of dogmatism and fixed theory, some parallelscouldbe drawnwithIvanKireevskii'scritiqueof abstractintellectualism and Western Christianity,and there are other ideas in common such as an affinitywith the apophatic tradition. Given that Sperrle concedes that at differenttimes in his life Leskovseemed to expressthe views of Slavophilesas well as Populistsand Westernizers(p. 9), she perhaps misses the opportunity to pursue, as she does in the case of Tolstoi, any instancesof Leskovengaging with and 'digesting' Slavophile ideas. Apart from one reference to the story 'The Kolyvan Husband' as an attack on dogmatic thinking in Slavophilism (p. ioi), thereis little discussionof the movement, and it seems to me thatthis is one aspect that might have furtherenriched Sperrle'sstudy. This aside, however, the work is powerfullyargued, and Sperrlecombines convincing evidence with obvious infectious enthusiasm. In particular, her emphasison Leskov'sconcept of heresyas a constantquestioningof authority to guard against the 'calcification of the Christian belief' (p. 133) is very appealing in this day and age. Her studywill surelyprovoke freshthinkingin Leskovscholarship. Department ofRussian andSlavonic Studies S. F. HUDSPITH U'niversity ofLeeds Bart, Solomon. Sobranie Stikhotvorenii. Edited by Lazar Fleishman. Stanford Slavic Studies, 24. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 2002. 222 pp. Notes. Price unknown. THE name of Solomon Bart is little known both in the literary circles and among the specialists in Russian poetry of the first half of the twentieth century. His biographicaldates were lost, many of his poems vanished in the flames of the Revolution and World War II, but in the words of Lazar Fleishman, the editor of Bart'scollected works,the readercannot help but be taken aback by the enormous creative potential of this remarkable and unappreciatedauthor. Solomon Bart (Solomon Veniiaminovich Kopel'man) emerged as a poet during one of the most dynamic periods of Russian culture,when most of the traditionalvalueswere questioned and transformed.His firstpoems appeared in the Almanakhistikhov,vykhodiaschie v Petrograde alongside the works of Akhmatova, Gumilev and Ivanov. In 1917 Bart published his own book of poems called Floridei; but following that he abruptly disappeared from the literary scene. In the 1930S his name surfaced again in connection with 96 SEER, 82, I, 2004 the work of the 'Literaturnoesodruzhestvo',the Russian emigration circle in Poland. Soon Bart became one of its central figures:he wrote articles and criticalreviews,gave talkson variousoccasions.During theseyearshiswriting matured tremendously, reaching remarkablevivacity of imagery and power of expression. His literary success, however, did not last long. Due to his awkward personality and inability to compromise Bart became burdened by work in the 'Sodruzhestvo'. By I936 he had severed his contacts with almost all its members and published three new collections of poems entirely on his own. Judging by the reviews, his poetry was highly acclaimed by the Parisian emigre press:at that time few could compete with the depth of his insightand the expressiveness of his lyrical experiment. The Eastern congregation, nevertheless, still silently shunned his work. Remaining in literary isolation, Bart continued to work up to the last few days of his life, when he sent his friendsa notebook of poems writtenin theJewish ghetto in Warsaw. The main, and perhaps the sole theme of Bart'swork was death. Neither nature, norjoy of life could inspire the poet; his approach to love was that of twisted sarcasm. Only death was his true passion, only its image was worthy of splendour.The predilection for death and glorificationof evil were among the main themes of Russian symbolistwriters. However Bart did not follow the Gnostic trend that inspired the works of Merezhkovskii, Sologub and Gumilev. The traditionalambivalenceof life and death in hispoetrymanifests...