Benedikt Livshits

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Portrait of Benedikt Livshits by David Burliuk

Benedikt Konstantinovich Livshits (Russian: Бенедикт Константинович Лившиц) (December 24, 1886 — May 15, 1939) was a poet and writer of the Silver Age of Russian Poetry.

Benedikt was born to a Jewish family in Odessa. He studied Law at the Novorossia University there, then transferred to Kiev University where he graduated in 1912. He was then conscripted to the Russian Ground Forces and served in the 88th Infantry Regiment. In 1914 he was conscripted again and served in infantry during World War I; he was awarded Cross of St. George.

His first poetry was published in the Anthology of the Modern Poetry (Kiev) in 1909. In 1910 he works for the Sergei Makovsky's symbolist art magazine Apollon.

Together with Wladimir Burliuk, David Burliuk, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Vasily Kamensky, Alexandra Exter he was a member of futurist group Gilea.

In 1933 he published a book of memoirs The One and half-eyed Strelets that consider one of the best histories of Russian Futurism. In 1934 he published a large book of translations from the French poetry From Romantics to Surrealism.

In 1939 during the Great Purge he was arrested and executed as a people's enemy.

[edit] Literary works

Marsia Fleute (1911, print was destroyed by the Government censorship).
Sun of wolves (Volch'e solntse), 1914
The One and a Half-eyed Archer (Polutoraglazyj strelec), 1933 ([1]) - memoirs about the Futurist movement.