Vladimir Maiakovskii Research Articles

Caviar and Ashes: A Warsaw Generation's Life and Death in Marxism, 1918-1968 by Marci Shore (review)

144 SEER, 87, I, JANUARY 200g as Aleksandra Kollontai, who derided the units as a 'toy, show-off women's army' (p. 188), exploited by Russian militarism. Unfortunately, Stott does not really draw out the implications of the women's military movement and the units for the interests of the tottering Russian state. The result is that we are treated to a succession of sketches of individual women soldiers and the social profile and actions of thewomen's military units which, while not uninteresting, do not capture the dynamic of the relationship between women and the state at that critical moment in Russian history. For Stott, thewomen's units were part of a general drive by Russia's elites to elevate 'civic responsibility' (p. 208). But her own research demonstrates that, in Kerenskii's words, they were really part of a drive to 'restore the army's will to die [...] for the sake of the nation's life' (p. 60). Stott's narrative regains momentum in the latter of the part of the book when she moves on from wartime anecdotes to examining the images of Russia's women warriors from the perspectives of women, men and the military, Russian and allied, including the approving suffragette,Emmeline Pankhurst. Overall, Stott's book is a valuable contribution to the history of war and gender, casting new light on a phenomenon that captured world public attention, even if itwas driven by military reasons of state rather than the emancipation of women. School of Humanities and Social Science Roger D. Markwick The Universityof Newcastle, Australia Shore, Marci. Caviar andAshes: A Warsaw Generation's Life andDeath in Marxism, igi8-ig68. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT and London, 2006. xxii + 457 pp. Illustrations. Notes. Index. ?25.00. In her book, Marci Shore has addressed an interestingphenomenon inPolish cultural history, namely the cultural output and fate of the post-war genera tion of young writers. Their intellectual journey took them from Futurism, throughMarxism and engagement with Soviet art to Socialist realism of the post-Second World War period. The debate is so much more interesting because the present day historic discourse in Poland, and amongst those writing from theperspective of thepost-Communist period, tends to disregard the impactMarxism and left wing politics had on the cultural developments of the inter-war period. The starting point ofMarci Shore's analysis is the statement that a high proportion of avant-garde young writers were Jewish, which defined their position in a society increasingly preoccupied with national questions. The rise of totalitarian political ideas and focus on national leaders left themwith no obvious alternative to that of engagement with the people and cultural forms which presumed that thewriter/artist had to express thewill of the people. In a world where the profitmotive rules supreme, it is difficult to imagine a whole generation of culturally engaged people who trulybelieved that they were not to express theirown individual interestsbut those of thepeople. The REVIEWS 145 examples of the Soviet artists,most notably Vladimir Maiakovskii, inspired many. This cultural milieu, though narrow, was diverse in itsorigins. It included poets, writers and journalists. Julian Tuwim, Antoni Slonimski, Jan Lechon, Kazimierz Wierzyiiski, Jaroslaw Iwaszkiewicz, all associated with the Skaman der, were joined by Bruno Jasiehski, Anatol Stern, Aleksander Wat, Wiadyslaw Broniewski, Adam Wazyk, Stanislaw Ryszard Stande, Mieczeslaw Braun and Witold Wandurski representing the young post-war generation of poets. Although progressive in their thinking and in spite of their commitment to Marxism, membership of the Polish Communist Party did not attract them. Many travelled to the Soviet Union, but were repelled by Stalinist policies. On themargins of that group hovered the journalist Isaak Deutcher, who came to criticize theCommunist movement from a left wing position. Marci Shore is able to recreate the poets' preoccupation with their own place in society, their creative angst, loves and their search for means of expression. This unique work offersan insight into thismilieu because Shore is clearly aware of the historic and political forceswhich moulded their think ing. In this the author is a respectful and critical guide through their output. The military regime,which came to rule Poland after the 1926military coup, progressively restricted civil rights and...

Introduction

Among the topics in Slavic literary scholarship that have emerged in the second half of the twentieth century, the study of Russian modernism, also known as the Silver Age, has been one of the indisputable leaders. The groundwork for the canonization of the Silver Age was laid in the postwar Soviet Union, where young poets like Andrei Voznesenskii and Joseph Brodsky made pilgrimages to Boris Pasternak and Anna Akhmatova. The allure of the Silver Age was increasingly felt in official Soviet culture as well. Just as Vladimir Maiakovskii's canonical status had earlier sanctioned the limited study of other futurists, the official recognition of Aleksandr Blok and Valerii Briusov as the bards of the October revolution provided the cover for scholars in the 1970s and 1980s to undertake a massive excavation of symbolist culture. After the beginning of perestroika, survivors from the Silver Age, from philosopher Aleksei Losev to émigré poet Irina Odoevtseva, came to be revered as emissaries from a lost, better world.

The Russian Avant-Garde, Maiakovskii, and the Maiakovskii Museum

My visit to Moscow's Maiakovskii Museum serves as starting point for an exploration, informed by Peter Bürger's Theory of the Avant-Garde, of the influence of the Russian avant-garde and poet Vladimir Maiakovskii's role within this movement. It also queries the essentialism and functionality of the museum dedicated to him, as well as the personal experience of my visit.

The Russian Avant-Garde, Maiakovskii, and the Maiakovskii Museum

My visit to Moscow's Maiakovskii Museum serves as starting point for an exploration, informed by Peter Bürger's Theory of the Avant-Garde, of the influence of the Russian avant-garde and poet Vladimir Maiakovskii's role within this movement. It also queries the essentialism and functionality of the museum dedicated to him, as well as the personal experience of my visit.

My Petersburg/Myself: Mental Architecture and Imaginative Space in Modern Russian Letters by Anna Lisa s> Crone Jennifer Day (review)

REVIEWS 337 This is a very detailed study of demonological references in Dostoevskii's works, but the focus is soft:just as Bakhtin sees thresholds everywhere and Freudianssee phallic symbols, so Leatherbarrowtends to see the demonic in everydayobjectsand acts. Given all this devilryit is a reliefat the end to learn of Dostoevskii'sown scepticism, when he writes: 'My whole problem is that there is no way I can bring myself to believe in devils myself' (p. I79). The opening chapter examines the role of the demonic in Dostoevskii's early writing, and each of the following chapters is devoted to one of the major novels in turn. In Crime andPunishment, Leatherbarrownotes that, in explainingthe murder to Sonia, Raskol'nikovsubstituteschert for d'iavolperhaps to show his unwillingness to allow conventional religiousovertones into discussionof his crime. Moreover, it is perhapsNapoleon as beshe has in mind, not Sonia's Orthodox d'iavol. In The Idiot the question of apocalypse looms large, and here Leatherbarrowhas some interestingobservationson names the symbolism of horses and birds,and he arguesthat the surnameof NastasiaFiippovna Barashkova(suggesting'lamb'),castsher both as whore (ofBabylon)and lamb (of Christ). The novel TheDevilsyieldsthe most obviousmaterialfor the theme, placing it in a political context. The demonic characteristicsof the arch 'devil' Petr Verkhovenskiiare likened to a puppet bearing the diminutiveof his name the Petrushkaof street theatre. In ne Brothers Karamazov the somewhat heretical ideas of Zosima are discussed and there is a fine analysis of how three sections of the monk's teaching have relevance for each of the brothers in turn, but it comes as a surprisethat after such exegesis Leatherbarrowshould assertthat this section 'The Russian Monk' 'never really belongs. It remains a cuckoo in the nest, a piece of artisticsleightof hand' (p. I76).Even more surprisingis his concluding statement:'In his attempts [...] to use the demonic form of the novel in the service of the Lord, it is perhaps Dostoevsky himselfwho emerges as the true "fatherof the lie" in the Brothers Karamazov' (p. I77).'The devil is in the detail'is an adage that could well be appliedto this study:it is a crowdedbook in a crowded field. Nevertheless, it does offer some real insights. Department ofRussianStudies RicHARD PEACE University ofBristol Crone, Anna Lisa and Day, Jennifer. My Petersburg/Mysel: MentalArchitecture andImaginative Spacein ModemRussianLetters. Slavica, Bloomington, IN, 2004. 385 pp. Notes. Indexes. $29.95 (paperback). IN his book, ThePracticeof Evegyday Life (Berkeley, CA, I984), Michel de Certeau demonstrateshow the tactical use of cultural forms enables individuals to elude and resist the power of social determination. The creation of various counter-hegemonic rituals and stylistic practices makes possible the articulationof a playful element in the deterministicsocial space. In My 338 SEER, 85, 2, 2007 Petersburg/Myself Anna Lisa Crone andJennifer Day explore, in terms similar to de Certeau, Petersburgwriters'identificationof their selfwith urban spaces and their poetic dialogueswith the Petersburgtradition.They discussRussian twentieth-centurypoets and writers,includingAndrey Belyi, Vassili Rozanov, Vladimir Nabokov, Anna Akhmatova, Osip Mandel'shtam and Joseph Brodsky,who were 'otheredinto or unto urban space' (p. 2). The book investigates the metapoetic function that 'entails the equation by poets of their artisticworks(poems)with Petersburgbuildingsand statues'(p. I7). Crone ancl Day's discussionof Mandel'shtam'svision of the Admiralty,BenedictLifshits's image of the Kazan' cathedral, and Alexander Blok's elegiac identifications with Petersburglandscapesare especiallyrewarding.It is surprisingnot to see any analysis of Andrei Bitov's short stories which stand close to the urban writing of Alexander Kushner and Brodsky. Crone and Day also do not engage with Maria Rubins's excellent comparative study Crossroad of Arts, Crossroad of Cultures: Ekphrasis InRussian andFrench Poet?y (New York, 2000) that discusses numerous examples of ekphrasis in Russian poetry. Both books explore the construction of self and the interplay between the Russian and European culturaltraditions. Crone's and Day's study comprises four chapters. The first chapter 'Towards a Theory of Identificationwith PetersburgSpace' brings together Fedor Dostoevskii, Akhmatova, Mandel'shtam, Vladimir Maiakovskii and Lifshits.Crone and Day offer close reading of various texts. They provocatively say that 'to present the besieged Petersburgand the Petersburgwriter as stable and indestructible,writers take the unexpected tack of resortingto urban Petersburgidyll and the closely related urban elegy...

“Uncle Lighthouse”: The Authorial Presence in Vladimir Maiakovskii's Books for Children

“Uncle Lighthouse”: The Authorial Presence in Vladimir Maiakovskii's Books for Children

Genrikh Sapgir: Klassik avangarda by M. D. Shrayer D. Shrayer-Petrov (review)

746 SEER, 83, 4, 2005 attempt to move beyond an assessment of Vampilov's prose as preparatory worksforhis drama,and raisesthe question as to whetherhis proseworkscan ever be entirelyisolated from his playwriting.In addition, Farberincludes an appendix listing the stories in chronological order, a detailed notes section, bibliographyand index, aswell as suggestionsforfurtherreading. Overall, Farber'sstudy serves as an introduction to the prose works of a significant figure in twentieth-century Russian drama, largely neglected in Western scholarship, and for this reason is important. Her argument that Vampilov deserves attention for his prose works, as well as for his drama, is persuasive,but a more extensive and penetratinganalysiswould have helped to reinforce this. That said, the quotations alone should serve to stimulate furtherinterest in Vampilov as a prose writer, and it is to be hoped that this studywillprompt a more detailedconsiderationof hiswork. School ofSlavonic andEastEuropean Studies K. SEALEY RAHMAN University College London Shrayer,M. D. and Shrayer-Petrov,D. Genrikh Sapgir: Kiassik avangarda. Dmitrii Bulanin, St Petersburg,2004. 26I pp. Notes. Bibliography.Appendices Illustrations.Indexes. Priceunknown. GENRIKH SAPGIR (I 928-98) is well known among specialists of Russian contemporary poetry as one of the most exciting innovative poets of tlhe I960S-70S. Only since the I99oS have his writings been available to the generalpublic. His highlywhimsicalpoetry and minimalistfictiondevelop the experiments of the most prominent Russian avant-garde authors, including Velimir Khlebnikov, Vladimir Maiakovskii, Nikolai Zabolotskii, Nikolai Oleinikov and Daniil Kharms. During the late Soviet period Sapgir worked as a children's writer, penning poems and scripts for animated films and various plays for marionette theatres. Although his experimental poetry subverted the socialist realist mould, and was appreciated by only a few intellectualsin Russia and abroad, Sapgir in the I96os-8os published about fortybooks of poetry for children (p. 48). The present studymight be seen as the firstcriticalbiography of Sapgir'slife and work. The authorsare Maksim Shrayer, a specialist on Russian literature and a poet from Boston, and his fatherDavid Shrayer,a close friendof Sapgirof almostthirtyyearsand whose poetry standsclose to the worksof EvgeniiRein andJoseph Brodsky. The book includes a lively description of Sapgir'spersonality and literary activities, occasional analysis of the themes and metrical patterns found in Sapgir'spoetry; a substantialbibliography of Sapgir'sworks and secondary sources; David Shrayer's memoirs about his friendship with Sapgir; and correspondencebetween David Shrayerand Sapgir, accompanied by Shrayer 's explanations and photographs. The book portrays Sapgir as a Jewish Russian poet related to Marc Chagall and well versed in Jewish folk culture and religious practices. Hence the book will be of great interest to students and researchers interested in the origins of Russian postmodernism and Russian undergroundculture, to specialistson RussianJewish tradition,and to generalreaders.It willprovide excellent readingfor all admirersof Russian REVIEWS 747 contemporarypoetry, especially because of the authors' intimate knowledge of Sapgir's life and surroundings.The flow of the narration is such that the chronologically organized material is occasionally interrupted by detailed explanations and lyrical digressions.It also could be used as a solid stepping stone for further investigations into Moscow's underground culture of the I960s-80s because of the first-handaccount of some culturalevents,including unofficialartexhibitionsand poetry readings. The firstpart of the book contains twelve shortchaptersand a Conclusion. The firstchapter, titled 'Rannie gody' (EarlyYears),describesin great detail Sapgir'syouth. It highlights the influence on the aestheticsof Sapgir and his friends of Evgenii Leonidovich Kropivnitskii (I893-I978), a talented postSymbolist poet, artist and composer, whose gatheringsin Liazanovo village gave the name to the whole group of artists and poets advocating hyperrealism and primitivismas their main modes of expression. Maksim Shrayer compares Sapgir's 1995 book Smeiantsy to the experiments of Khlebnikov, Kharms and Lewis Carroll (pp. 52-54) and argues that it parodies famous worksof many Soviet poets, includingthe poems and fablespenned by Sergei Mikhalkov,one of the most establishedSoviet poets. Chapter six is one of the most interestingin the book, offeringsome usefulinsightsinto Sapgir'sartistic worldview relating to Russian Jewish tradition and the Bible. According to Shrayer, Sapgir translated into Russian many writings produced by the RussianJewish authorOvsei Ovseevich Driz (i 908-7 I). Shrayersees Sapgir's Psalms(i 965-66) as a radicalappropriationof the classicalJewish themes and images, and deciphers numerous hidden...

Unbearable Burdens: Aleksandr Blok and the Modernist Resistance to Progeny and Domesticity

Drawing on contemporary critical theory, as well as on the works of a wide variety of Russian modernists, Jenifer Presto discusses the ways in which the symbolist poet Aleksandr Blok responded to what Edward Said has termed the modernist “crisis of filiation.” This essay contends that despite the fact that Blok was consecrated as one of the poetic sons of Russian modernism, he envisioned modern poetic history as a violent family romance that involved murderous impulses not just, as Harold Bloom would suggest, toward his literary forefathers, but also toward his imagined children. Although Blok's complicated reaction to the appearance of a new generation of children has received far less critical attention than that of the futurist Vladimir Maiakovskii, it is Blok—not Maiakovskii—who can be credited with inaugurating a filicidal model of poetic creativity that would come to dominate the more radical flank of Russian modernism, the avant-garde. By examining Blok's resistance to progeny within the larger context of Russian modernism, this article reveals the existence of an antigenerative male poetic tradition that extends from Blok to the futurists, reflecting the writers' growing sense of rupture with the past in the period leading up to and immediately following the revolution.

In the Laboratory of Constructivism: Karl Ioganson's Cold Structures

In her memoirs, the celebrated Russian translator Rita Rait-Kovaleva reminisces about her friendship in the 1920s with the poet Vladimir Maiakovskii. One recollection concerns the advent, in the wake of socialist revolution in Russia, of a radical new form of three-dimensional work that could not be encapsulated within the terms of the traditional category of sculpture-the so-called spatial construction. Rait-Kovaleva attributes to Maiakovskii great insight apropos the urgency and future significance of this new Constructivist form:

Reading Suicide: Tsvetaeva on Esenin and Maiakovskii

Мне кажется, смерть художника не следует выключать из цепи еґо творческих достижений, а рассматривать как последнее заключительное звено.Osip Mandel’ shtamThe death of a poet is a theme Marina Tsvetaeva addressed frequently both in poetry and in prose. The list of poets whose deaths underwent Tsvetaeva’s artistic scrutiny is varied and includes Aleksandr Pushkin, Aleksandr Blok, Sergei Esenin, Rainer Maria Rilke, Vladimir Maiakovskii, Maksimilian Voloshin, Andrei Belyi, and Nikolai Gronskii. A number of notable lyric cycles and some of Tsvetaeva’s finest prose essays emerged as homage to deceased poets. The function of these works extends beyond commemoration and entails the elaboration of Tsvetaeva’s definition of lyric poetry and her exploration of poetic responsibility.

Aleksei Kruchenykh's "Razboinik Van'ka-Kain" and the Literary Politics of LEF

Aleksei Kruchenykh's "Razboinik Van'ka-Kain i Son'ka-manikiurshchitsa" is the first in a cycle of four "crime novels" in verse published by the poet during the heyday of his involvement in postrevolutionary futurist politics. Unlike much of the ephemera he wrote during the 1910s, this particular poem was produced and promoted with unusual care. It first appeared in the sixth, penultimate, issue of Vladimir Maiakovskii's LEF.

Verse Form and Meaning in the Poetry of Vladimir Maiakovskii

Verse Form and Meaning in the Poetry of Vladimir Maiakovskii

Verse Form and Meaning in the Poetry of Vladimir Maiakovskii

Verse Form and Meaning in the Poetry of Vladimir Maiakovskii

Vladimir Maiakovskii's “From Street into Street” as Cubo-Futurist Canvas: A View through the Art of Kazimir Malevich

The artist Kazimir Malevich once called Vladimir Maiakovskii's lyric “Iz ulitsy v ulitsu” the best example of “versified cubism.“ Although Maiakovskii's early poetry has often been linked to developments in the pictorial arts, the precise nature of this connection requires more detailed examination. Investigation of the role of the visual arts in a literary interpretation appears exceptionally intriguing considering that Malevich, both a contemporary of Maiakovskii and a painter of high caliber, paid special tribute to this poem in painterly terms.

Surrealism in Twentieth-Century Russian Poetry: Churilin, Zabolotskii, Poplavskii

All her life Zinaida Gippius remembered how startled she was when as a young girl she was told that the Russian word predmet was devised and introduced into the language by Karamzin at the very end of the eighteenth century. The discovery left her wondering how the Russians who lived before that time could discuss all sorts of basic things without a word denoting “object” in the language. We may well be startled in a similar way when we stop to realize that the handy adjective “surrealistic” was coined only in the late 1920s. Furthermore, the word did not initially mean what it came to mean later. When Vladimir Maiakovskii encountered the French Surrealists during his trip to Paris in 1927, he was not sure just what their movement was about but from their behavior concluded that they must be the French equivalent of his own LEF group.