The Most Dangerous Art: Poetry, Politics, and Autobiography after the Russian Revolution
At a time in Russia's history when poets could be (and sometimes were) killed for a poem, the autobiographies of three prominent poets, Osip Mandelstam, Marina Tsvetaeva, and Boris Pasternak, became a courageous defense of poetry. The Most Dangerous Art shows how these autobiographies trace an emotional trajectory that corresponds to the intensity of the social and state pressures that threatened Russian poets from the early 1920s to the late 1950s. During a period when literature became intensely political, and creative freedom became intensely risky, these autobiographies proclaim poetry's immortality and defend the poet's right to individual creativity against an increasingly threatening Soviet literary hierarchy. Donald Loewen provides detailed close readings of these biographies and juxtaposes these readings with historical context. The Most Dangerous Art is an illuminating contribution to the study of Russian literature. The volume is of special interest to researchers of 20th century Russian literature and autobiography.
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The Most Dangerous Art: Poetry, Politics, and Autobiography after the Russian Revolution
At a time in Russia's history when poets could be (and sometimes were) killed for a poem, the autobiographies of three prominent poets, Osip Mandelstam, Marina Tsvetaeva, and Boris Pasternak, became a courageous defense of poetry. The Most Dangerous Art shows how these autobiographies trace an emotional trajectory that corresponds to the intensity of the social and state pressures that threatened Russian poets from the early 1920s to the late 1950s. During a period when literature became intensely political, and creative freedom became intensely risky, these autobiographies proclaim poetry's immortality and defend the poet's right to individual creativity against an increasingly threatening Soviet literary hierarchy. Donald Loewen provides detailed close readings of these biographies and juxtaposes these readings with historical context. The Most Dangerous Art is an illuminating contribution to the study of Russian literature. The volume is of special interest to researchers of 20th century Russian literature and autobiography.
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The Most Dangerous Art: Poetry, Politics, and Autobiography after the Russian Revolution
At a time in Russia's history when poets could be (and sometimes were) killed for a poem, the autobiographies of three prominent poets, Osip Mandelstam, Marina Tsvetaeva, and Boris Pasternak, became a courageous defense of poetry. The Most Dangerous Art shows how these autobiographies trace an emotional trajectory that corresponds to the intensity of the social and state pressures that threatened Russian poets from the early 1920s to the late 1950s. During a period when literature became intensely political, and creative freedom became intensely risky, these autobiographies proclaim poetry's immortality and defend the poet's right to individual creativity against an increasingly threatening Soviet literary hierarchy. Donald Loewen provides detailed close readings of these biographies and juxtaposes these readings with historical context. The Most Dangerous Art is an illuminating contribution to the study of Russian literature. The volume is of special interest to researchers of 20th century Russian literature and autobiography.
Donald Loewen is associate professor of Russian at Binghamton University (SUNY).
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 Endangered Genre, Endangered Artist Chapter 2 Early Warning Signs Chapter 3 The Search for Safe Passage Chapter 4 Fighting for Breath Chapter 5 The Poet's Birthright Chapter 6 A Survivor's Story
What People are Saying About This
David M. Bethea
The Most Dangerous Art provides a subtle and far-reaching analysis of how poetic culture engaged with political reality in the Soviet era. By focusing on the autobiographical prose of Pasternak, Mandelstam, and Tsvetaeva and by showing how the 'orientation toward authenticity' (Lydia Ginzburg) in such writing places these works and their authors at the center of a force field involving the individual, the state, and the larger human community, Donald Loewen shows once again why 'the Poet' has been such an indispensable figure, indeed perhaps the indispensable figure, in the history of Russian self-consciousness. A beautifully written and powerfully argued study.
Sibelan Forrester
After introducing their broader context, Donald Loewen studies autobiographical prose by three of the greatest Russian poets: Mandelshtam, Pasternak, and Tsvetaeva. Loewen brings out the complexity of these documents of informed resistance. The Most Dangerous Art offers important insights for readers who care about the relationship of poetry and prose, literature and politics, creativity and oppression in an era when poetry was a matter of life and death—dangerous stuff indeed.
