Alexander Pushkin

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Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin

Aleksandr Pushkin by Vasily Tropinin
Born June 6, 1799(1799-06-06)
Moscow, Russian Empire
Died February 10, 1837 (aged 37)
Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire
Occupation Poet, novelist, playwright
Influences
Influenced

Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin (Russian: Алекса́ндр Серге́евич Пу́шкин, pronounced [ɐlʲɪˈksandr sʲɪˈrgʲevʲɪtɕ ˈpuʂkʲɪn], listen (help·info)) (June 6 [O.S. May 26] 1799–February 10 [O.S. January 29] 1837) was a Russian Romantic author who is considered to be the greatest Russian poet[1][2][3][4] and the founder of modern Russian literature.[5][6] Pushkin pioneered the use of vernacular speech in his poems and plays, creating a style of storytelling—mixing drama, romance, and satire—associated with Russian literature ever since and greatly influencing later Russian writers.

Born in Moscow, Pushkin published his first poem at the age of fifteen, and was widely recognized by the literary establishment by the time of his graduation from the Imperial Lyceum in Tsarskoe Selo. Pushkin gradually became committed to social reform and emerged as a spokesman for literary radicals; in the early 1820s he clashed with the government, which sent him into exile in southern Russia. While under the strict surveillance of government censors and unable to travel or publish at will, he wrote his most famous play, the drama Boris Godunov, but could not publish it until years later. His novel in verse, Eugene Onegin, was published serially from 1825 to 1832.

Pushkin and his wife Natalya Goncharova, whom he married in 1831, later became regulars of court society. In 1837, while falling into greater and greater debt amidst rumors that his wife had started conducting a scandalous affair, Pushkin challenged her alleged lover, Georges d'Anthès, to a duel. Pushkin was mortally wounded and died two days later.

Because of his liberal political views and influence on generations of Russian rebels, Pushkin was portrayed by Bolsheviks as an opponent to bourgeois literature and culture and a predecessor of Soviet literature and poetry[6]. Tsarskoe Selo was renamed after him.

Contents

[edit] Life

The 16-year old Pushkin recites a poem before Gavrila Derzhavin. Painting by Ilya Repin (1911).
The 16-year old Pushkin recites a poem before Gavrila Derzhavin. Painting by Ilya Repin (1911).

Pushkin's father Sergei Lvovich Pushkin descended from a distinguished family of the Russian nobility which traced its ancestry back to the 12th century. Pushkin's mother Nadezhda Ossipovna Gannibal descended through her paternal grandmother from German and Scandinavian nobility.[7][8] Her paternal grandfather, i.e. Pushkin's great-grandfather, a page raised by Peter the Great, was Abram Petrovich Gannibal, who was born in Africa. One theory is that he came from an area in northern Ethiopia, (then was known as Abyssinia) and today part of the nation of Eritrea, on the banks of the Mareb River in a town called Logon. More recent research, however, indicates that he came from the Sultanate of Logone-Birni south of Lake Chad in Cameroon. After education in France as a military engineer, Gannibal became governor of Reval and eventually General-en-Chef for the building of sea forts and canals in Russia.

Born in Moscow, Pushkin published his first poem at the age of fourteen. By the time he finished as part of the first graduating class of the prestigious Imperial Lyceum in Tsarskoe Selo near Saint Petersburg, the Russian literary scene recognized his talent widely. After finishing school, Pushkin installed himself in the vibrant and raucous intellectual youth culture of the capital, Saint Petersburg. In 1820 he published his first long poem, Ruslan and Lyudmila, amidst much controversy about its subject and style.

Alexander Pushkin by Orest Kiprensky
Alexander Pushkin by Orest Kiprensky

Pushkin gradually became committed to social reform and emerged as a spokesman for literary radicals. This angered the government, and led to his transfer from the capital (1820). He went to the Caucasus and to the Crimea, then to Kamenka and Kishinev, where he became a Freemason. Here he joined the Filiki Eteria, a secret organization whose purpose was to overthrow the Ottoman rule over Greece and establish an independent Greek state. He was inspired by the Greek Revolution and when the war against the Ottoman Turks broke out he kept a diary with the events of the great national uprising. He stayed in Kishinev until 1823 and wrote there two Romantic poems which brought him wide acclaim, The Captive of the Caucasus and The Fountain of Bakhchisaray. In 1823 Pushkin moved to Odessa, where he again clashed with the government, which sent him into exile at his mother's rural estate in north Russia from 1824 to 1826. However, some of the authorities allowed him to visit Tsar Nicholas I to petition for his release, which he obtained. But some of the insurgents in the Decembrist Uprising (1825) in Saint Petersburg had kept some of his early political poems amongst their papers, and soon Pushkin found himself under the strict control of government censors and unable to travel or publish at will. He had written what became his most famous play, the drama Boris Godunov, while at his mother's estate but could not gain permission to publish it until five years later. The drama's original, uncensored version would not receive a premiere until 2007.

In 1831, highlighting the growth of Pushkin's talent and influence and the merging of two of Russia's greatest early writers, he met Nikolai Gogol. After reading Gogol's 1831-2 volume of short stories Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka, Pushkin would support him critically and later in 1836 after starting his magazine, The Contemporary, would feature some of Gogol's most famous short stories. Later, Pushkin and his wife Natalya Goncharova, whom he married in 1831, became regulars of court society. When the Tsar gave Pushkin the lowest court title, the poet became enraged: He felt this occurred not only so that his wife, who had many admirers—including the Tsar himself—could properly attend court balls, but also to humiliate him. In 1837, falling into greater and greater debt amidst rumors that his wife had started conducting a scandalous affair, Pushkin challenged her alleged lover (correction: man who insulted his wife), Georges d'Anthès, to a duel which left both men injured, Pushkin mortally. He died two days later.

The government feared a political demonstration at his funeral, which it moved to a smaller location and made open only to close relatives and friends. His body was spirited away secretly at midnight and buried on his mother's estate.

Pushkin had four children from his marriage to Natalya: Alexander, Grigory, Maria, and Natalia (the last of whom married, morganatically, into the royal house of Nassau and become the Countess of Merenberg).

[edit] Literary legacy

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Memorial to Pushkin in Shanghai, China
Memorial to Pushkin in Shanghai, China

Critics consider many of his works masterpieces, such as the poem The Bronze Horseman and the drama The Stone Guest, a tale of the fall of Don Juan. His poetic short drama "Mozart and Salieri" was the inspiration for Peter Shaffer's Amadeus. Pushkin himself preferred his verse novel Eugene Onegin, which he wrote over the course of his life and which, starting a tradition of great Russian novels, follows a few central characters but varies widely in tone and focus. "Onegin" is a work of such complexity that, while only about a hundred pages long, translator Vladimir Nabokov needed two full volumes of material to fully render its meaning in English. Because of this difficulty in translation, Pushkin's verse remains largely unknown to English readers. Even so, Pushkin has profoundly influenced western writers like Henry James.[9]

Pushkin's works also provided fertile ground for Russian composers. Glinka's Ruslan and Lyudmila is the earliest important Pushkin-inspired opera, and a landmark in the tradition of Russian music. Tchaikovsky's operas Eugene Onegin (1879) and The Queen of Spades (1890) became perhaps better known outside of Russia than Pushkin's own works of the same name, while Mussorgsky's monumental Boris Godunov (two versions, 1868-9 and 1871-2) ranks as one of the very finest and most original of Russian operas. Other Russian operas based on Pushkin include Dargomyzhsky's Rusalka and The Stone Guest; Rimsky-Korsakov's Mozart and Salieri, Tale of Tsar Saltan, and The Golden Cockerel; Cui's Prisoner of the Caucasus, Feast in Time of Plague, and The Captain's Daughter; Tchaikovsky's Mazeppa; and Nápravník's Dubrovsky. This is not to mention ballets and cantatas, as well as innumerable songs set to Pushkin's verse.

Some attention has also been given to Pushkin's apparent anti-Semitism in his writings, as well as those of his contemporaries, Fyodor Dostoevsky and Nikolai Gogol.[10][11][12][13][14][15]

[edit] Influence on the Russian language

Alexander Pushkin is usually credited with developing literary Russian. Not only is he seen as having originated the highly nuanced level of language which characterizes Russian literature after him, but he is also credited with substantially augmenting the Russian lexicon. Where he found gaps in the Russian vocabulary, he devised calques. His rich vocabulary and highly sensitive style are the foundation for modern literary Russian. Alexander Pushkin played an absolutely unique role in the Russian literature. Russian literature virtually begins with Alexander Pushkin. His talent set up new records for development of the Russian language and culture. He became the father of Russian literature in 19th century, marking the highest achievements of 18th century and the beginning of literary process of 19th century. Alexander Pushkin introduced Russia to all the European literary genres as well as a great number of West European writers. He brought natural speech and foreign influences to create modern poetic Russian. Though his life was brief, he left examples of nearly every literary genre of his day: lyric poetry, narrative poetry, the novel, the short story, the drama, the critical essay, and even the personal letter. From him derive the folk tales and genre pieces of other authors: Esenin, Leskov and Gorky. His use of Russian language formed the basis of the style of novelists Ivan Turgenev, Ivan Goncharov, and Leo Tolstoy. Pushkin was recognized by Nikolay Vasilyevich Gogol, his successor and pupil, the great Russian critic Vissarion Grigoryevich Belinsky, who produced the fullest and deepest critical study of Pushkin's work, which still retains much of its relevance. Alexander Pushkin became an inseparable part of the literary world of the Russian people. He also exerted a profound influence on other aspects of Russian culture, most notably in opera. Translated into all the major languages, his works are regarded both as expressing most completely Russian national consciousness and as transcending national barriers. Pushkin’s intelligence, sharpness of his opinion, his devotion to poetry, realistic thinking and incredible historical and political intuition make him one of the greatest Russian national geniuses.

[edit] Works

The famous Pushkin Monument in Moscow, opened in 1880 by Turgenev and Dostoyevsky.
The famous Pushkin Monument in Moscow, opened in 1880 by Turgenev and Dostoyevsky.
Six winged Seraph (after Pushkin's poem Prophet), 1905. By Mikhail Vrubel.
Six winged Seraph (after Pushkin's poem Prophet), 1905. By Mikhail Vrubel.

[edit] Poems

  • 1820–Ruslan i Lyudmila (Руслан и Людмила); English translation: Ruslan and Ludmila
  • 1820-21–Kavkazsky plennik (Кавказский пленник); English translation: The Prisoner of the Caucasus
  • 1821 Gavriiliada (Гавриилиада) ; English translation: The Gabrieliad
  • 1821–22–Bratya razboyniki (Братья разбойники); English translation: The Robber Brothers
  • 1823–Bakhchisaraysky fontan (Бахчисарайский фонтан); English translation: The Fountain of Bakhchisaray
  • 1824–Tsygany (Цыганы); English translation: The Gypsies
  • 1825–Graf Nulin (Граф Нулин); English translation: Count Nulin
  • 1829–Poltava (Полтава); English translation: Poltava
  • 1830–Domik v Kolomne (Домик в Коломне); English translation: The Little House in Kolomna
  • 1833-Andjelo (Анджело); English translation: Angelo
  • 1833–Medny vsadnik (Медный всадник); English translation: The Bronze Horseman

[edit] Verse novel

  • 1825-32–Yevgeny Onegin (Евгений Онегин); English translation: Eugene Onegin

[edit] Drama

  • 1825–Boris Godunov (Борис Годунов); English translation: Boris Godunov
  • 1830–Malenkie tragedii (Маленькие трагедии); English translation: The Little Tragedies
    • Kamenny gost (Каменный гость); English translation: The Stone Guest
    • Motsart i Salyeri (Моцарт и Сальери); English translation: Mozart and Salieri
    • Skupoy rytsar (Скупой рыцарь); English translations: The Miserly Knight, The Covetous Knight
    • Pir vo vremya chumy (Пир во время чумы); English translation: A Feast During the Plague

[edit] Prose

  • 1827–Arap Petra Velikogo (Арап Петра Великого); English translations: The Negro of Peter the Great, The Moor of Peter the Great
  • 1831–Povesti pokoynogo Ivana Petrovicha Belkina (Повести покойного Ивана Петровича Белкина); English translation: The Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich Belkin
    • Vystrel (Выстрел); English translation: The Shot
    • Metel (Метель); English translation: The Blizzard
    • Grobovschik (Гробовщик); English translation: The Undertaker
    • Stanzionny smotritel (Станционный смотритель); English translation: The Station Master
    • Baryshnya-krestyanka (Барышня-крестьянка); English translation: The Squire's Daughter
  • 1833 Пиковая дама (The Queen of Spades)
  • 1834 Istoriya Pugacheva (История Пугачева); English translation: A History of Pugachev, a historical study of the Pugachev's Rebellion
  • 1834 Кирджали (Kırcali) short story
  • 1835 Египетские ночи (Egyptian Nights) unfinished
  • 1836 Kapitanskaya dochka (Капитанская дочка) (The Captain's Daughter)
  • 1837 История села Горюхина (The Story of the Village of Goryukhino) unfinished
  • 1837 Сцены из рыцарских времен (Scenes from the Age of Chivalry)
  • 1841 Дубровский (Dubrovsky) unfinished novel

[edit] Tales in verse

[edit] Honors

A minor planet, 2208 Pushkin, discovered in 1977 by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh is named after him.[16] A crater, Pushkin, on Mercury is also named in his honor.

There is a bust [2]of Pushkin by the pond Valkeinen, in Kuopio, Finland.

[edit] Hoaxes and other attributed works

In the late 1980s, a book entitled Secret Journal 1836–1837 was published by a Minneapolis publishing house (M.I.P. Company), claiming to be the decoded content of an encrypted private journal kept by Pushkin. Promoted with little details about its contents, and touted for many years as being 'banned in Russia', it was an erotic novel narrated from Pushkin's perspective. Some mail-order publishers still carry the work under its fictional description. In 2006 a bilingual Russian-English edition was published in Russia by Retro Publishing House.

[edit] See also

Pushkin's self-portrait on a one ruble coin, 1999
Pushkin's self-portrait on a one ruble coin, 1999

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Short biography from University of Virginia, retrieved on 24 November 2006.
  2. ^ Allan Reid, "Russia's Greatest Poet/Scoundrel", retrieved on 2 September 2006.
  3. ^ BBC News, 5 June 1999, "Pushkin fever sweeps Russia", retrieved 1 September 2006.
  4. ^ BBC News, 10 June 2003, "Biographer wins rich book price", retrieved 1 September 2006.
  5. ^ Biography of Pushkin at the Russian Literary Institute "Pushkin House", retrieved 1 September 2006.
  6. ^ a b Maxim Gorky, "Pushkin, An Appraisal", retrieved 1 September 2006
  7. ^ Лихауг [Lihaug], Э. Г. [E. G.] (November 2006). "Предки А. С. Пушкина в Германии и Скандинавии: происхождение Христины Регины Шёберг (Ганнибал) от Клауса фон Грабо из Грабо [Ancestors of A. S. Pushkin in Germany and Scandinavia: Descent of Christina Regina Siöberg (Hannibal) from Claus von Grabow zu Grabow]". Генеалогический вестник [Genealogical Herald].–Санкт-Петербург [Saint Petersburg] 27: 31–38. 
  8. ^ Lihaug, Elin Galtung (2007). "Aus Brandenburg nach Skandinavien, dem Baltikum und Rußland. Eine Abstammungslinie von Claus von Grabow bis Alexander Sergejewitsch Puschkin 1581–1837". Archiv für Familiengeschichtsforschung 11: 32–46. 
  9. ^ Joseph S. O'Leary, Pushkin in 'The Aspern Papers' , the Henry James E-Journal Number 2, March 2000, retrieved on 24 November 2006.
  10. ^ Russian Urges Quotas on Jews; Communists Begin to Split Over Comrade's Antisemitism. David Hoffman. The Washington Post, A Section; Pg. A28. November 12, 1998.
  11. ^ Taking Penguins to the Movies: Ethnic Humor in Russia By Emil Draitser. P. 112. Google Book Citation
  12. ^ Negative Images of Jews in Recent Russian Literature. Pereira, N G O. [1]
  13. ^ The Development of Russian Verse: Meter and Its Meanings By Michael Wachtel. p. 26. Google Book Citation
  14. ^ Puskin's "Black Shawl" poem. Fullbooks.com
  15. ^ One Less Hope: Essays on Twentieth-century Russian Poets By Constantin V. Ponomareff."The Avarious Knight" poem. p. 161. Google Book Citation
  16. ^ Schmadel, Lutz D. (2003). Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, 5th, New York: Springer Verlag, p. 179. ISBN 3540002383. 

[edit] References

  • Elaine Feinstein (ed.): After Pushkin: versions of the poems of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin by contemporary poets. Manchester: Carcanet Press; London: Folio Society, 1999 ISBN 1-85754-444-7
  • Serena Vitale: Pushkin's button; transl. from the Italian by Ann Goldstein. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1998 ISBN 1-85702-937-2
  • Markus Wolf: Freemasonry in life and literature. With an introduction to the history of Russian Freemasonry (in German). Munich: Otto Sagner publishers, 1998 ISBN 3-87690-692-X
  • (Russian)Yuri Lotman: Пушкин. Биография писателя. Статьи и заметки. Available online: [3]
  1. ^ Troyat, Henri (1957). "Pushkin's Ethiopian Ancestry". Ethiopia Observer 6.
  2. ^ Black Russian - A Review by Andrew Kahn of Hugh Barnes' Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg.
  3. ^ Barnes, Hugh. Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg, London 2005, p. 4.
  4. ^ Gnammankou, Dieudonné. Abraham Hanibal - l’aïeul noir de Pouchkine, Paris 1996, p. 129.
  5. ^ Barnes, Hugh. Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg, London 2005, p. 219.

[edit] Further reading

  • T. J. Binyon has written an English biography: Pushkin: A Biography (London: HarperCollins, 2002) (ISBN 0-00-215084-0; US edition: New York: Knopf, 2003; ISBN 1-4000-4110-4).
  • Yuri Druzhnikov, Prisoner of Russia: Alexander Pushkin and the Political Uses of Nationalism, Transaction Publishers, 1998, ISBN 1-56000-390-1
  • Н. К. Телетова [N. K. Teletova], Забытые родственные связи А.С. Пушкина [The forgotten family connections of A. S. Pushkin], Спб.: Дорн [Saint Petersburg: Dorn], 2007. ISBN 5-86197-070-0

[edit] External links

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Persondata
NAME Pushkin, Aleksandr Sergeyevich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Алекса́ндр Серге́евич Пу́шкин (Russian)
SHORT DESCRIPTION Russian Poet, novelist, playwright
DATE OF BIRTH June 6, 1799
PLACE OF BIRTH Moscow, Russia
DATE OF DEATH February 10, 1837
PLACE OF DEATH Saint Petersburg, Russia