Research Catalog

Written in the dark : five poets in the siege of Leningrad / Gennady Gor, Dmitry Maksimov, Sergey Rudakov, Vladimir Sterligov, Pavel Zaltsman ; edited and with an introduction by Polina Barskova, with an afterword by Ilya Kukulin ; translated from the Russian by Anand Dibble, Ben Felker-Quinn, Ainsley Morse, Eugene Ostashevsky, Rebekah Smith, Charles Swank, Jason Wagner, and Matvei Yankelevich.

Title: Written in the dark : five poets in the siege of Leningrad / Gennady Gor, Dmitry Maksimov, Sergey Rudakov, Vladimir Sterligov, Pavel Zaltsman ; edited and with an introduction by Polina Barskova, with an afterword by Ilya Kukulin ; translated from the Russian by Anand Dibble, Ben Felker-Quinn, Ainsley Morse, Eugene Ostashevsky, Rebekah Smith, Charles Swank, Jason Wagner, and Matvei Yankelevich.
Publication: Brooklyn, New York : Ugly Duckling Presse, 2016.

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Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Request in advance	PG3237.E5 W75 2016	Off-site

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Description

159 pages : illustrations, portraits; 18 cm.

Summary

"This anthology presents a group of writers and a literary phenomenon that has been unknown even to Russian readers for 70 years, obfuscated by historical amnesia. Gennady Gor, Pavel Zaltsman, Dmitry Maksimov, Sergey Rudakov, and Vladimir Sterligov, wrote these works in 1942, during the most severe winter of the Nazi Siege of Leningrad (1941-1944). In striking contrast to state-sanctioned, heroic "Blockade" poetry in which the stoic body of the exemplary citizen triumphs over death, the poems gathered here show the Siege individual (blokadnik) as a weak and desperate incarnation of Job. These poets wrote in situ about the famine disease, madness, cannibalism, and prostitution around them—subjects so tabooed in those most-Soviet times that they would never think of publishing. Moreover, the formal ambition and macabre avant-gardism of this uncanny body of work match its horrific content, giving birth to a "poor" language which alone could reflect the depth of suffering and psychological destruction experienced by victims of that historical disaster. Polina Barskova, a Russian-language poet and scholar of the Siege, edited this volume from archival materials. The book includes an introduction by Barskova and an afterword by renowned literary critic Ilya Kukulin. The poems and supplementary materials were translated by Anand Dibble, Ben Felker-Quinn, Ainsley Morse, Eugene Ostashevsky, Rebekah Smith, Charles Swank, Jason Wagner, and Matvei Yankelevich."--Publisher's website (viewed 09/08/2016).

Series Statement

Eastern European poets series ; #38

Uniform Title

Eastern European poets series ; #38.
Woodberry Poetry Room Blue Star collection of books and manuscripts.

Subject

Genre/Form

Poetry

Note

Poems.

Bibliography (note)

"Gennady Gor (1907-1981), born in a tsarist prison, belonged to the avant-garde circles of Leningrad in the 1930s, but was ostracized for his “formalist” novel The Cow. After the Siege and his return from evacuation in Alma-Ata, he became a well-known scholar, collector of the art of Northern ethnicities, and science fiction writer. He was renowned in Leningrad as an art historian and young writers’ mentor."
"Dmitry Maksimov (1904-1987), was a renowned philologist and specialist of early twentieth-century Russian poetry. As a young poet, he discussed his works with Nikolay Zabolotsky and Konstantin Vaginov, writers close to the OBERIU circle. At the end of his life, he published in Switzerland his only book of poetry under the pseudonym Ignaty Karamov."
"Sergey Rudakov (1909-1944), was a philologist and poet and friend of Osip Mandelstam during his Voronezh exile. After spending the Siege winter in Leningrad, he died in action. He was a friend and relative of Konstantin Vaginov."
"Vladimir Sterligov (1904-1973), was an artist in the circle of Kazimir Malevich, one of the leaders of the Leningrad avant-garde. He was a close friend of the leaders of OBERIU, Daniil Kharms and Aleksandr Vvedensky, the latter whose son he baptized."
"Pavel Zaltsman (1912-1985), an artist, belonged to the circle of Pavel Filonov, one of the leaders of the Leningrad avant-garde. He spent most of his life working for film studios, first in Leningrad, then in Alma-Ata."
"Polina Barskova, associate professor of Russian literature at Hampshire College (MA), received her B.A. from St. Petersburg State University and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. Her scholarly publications include articles on Nabokov, the Bakhtin brothers, early Soviet film, and the aestheticization of historical trauma; namely, the Siege of Leningrad. She is the author of six books of poetry and one book of prose in Russian, and three books in English: This Lamentable City (Tupelo Press), The Zoo in Winter (Melville House), and Relocations (Zephyr Press)."

Language (note)

Poems in Russian with English translation on facing page; excerpt's from Pavel Zaltsman's diaries appear only in English translation.

Processing Action (note)

committed to retain

Contents

Written in the dark: an introduction / Polina Barskova -- Poems by Gennady Gor -- Poems by Dmitry Maksimov -- Poems by Sergey Rudakov -- Poems by Vladimir Sterligov -- Poems by Pavel Zaltsman -- Afterword / Ilya Kukulin -- Notes to the poems -- Appendix: Zaltsman's diaries.

ISBN

9781937027575

OCLC

953886985
SCSB-11168905

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library