Dear Reader,

Clearing the bookshelves and finding new homes for the books there can be interesting and more time consuming than anticipated. These poets, from Russia's recent past, had troubled lives in a world torn by war and oppressive government. What strikes me most in this most recent reading is that each maintains a strong focus on erotic relationships. It's as if each woman's heart has become a microcosm of erotic and cultural betrayal. Of the three, Akhmatova is most familiar to me. I have enjoyed other translations of her poems more. The Akhmatova poems presented make me wonder about translator Maddock's ear. Still, this is an interesting introduction for those not aware of these poets. At one point, the Russian writer Joseph Brodsky named Akhmadulina the most important living Russian poet. As of this journal entry, she is still alive. Akhmatova died after much hardship, a worshipped figure of the Russian culture of her day. Tsvetayeva was a suicide, persecuted and without hope at the end of her life. Perhaps because Akmadulina is least familiar to me I enjoyed her poetry here most.

Laughing, exulting and rebellious

Laughing, exulting and rebellious
in her exitless melancholy
in a Georgian city near Batumi
she stood on the sand.

She was proud,
Imagining herself a river,
she flowed naked into the sea
and the sea fondled her with its hand.

Free of unnecessary clothing,
she walked at an angle to the shore.
She undid her bra
and threw it on the sand.

The exposure of her dim forearm,
teased and irritated me.
Her tan against her white skin,
Showed where her clothes had been.

She smiled, exhilarated,
plaiting her palms in the water
while a rainbow arched between her head
and shoulder.

Bella Akhmadulina

I responded most strongly to Akhmadulina's brilliant reading of the historic French St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, the poem Bartholomew's Night. She creates parallels between this scene of the slaughter of the Hugenots and Russian politics. I'm too lazy to copy the poem out here but it's on the internet and worth looking up. The poems Goodbye, Muteness and To Sleep also appealed deeply to me.

Tonight this book begins its journey to a bookshelf in New Mexico. I hope it will be enjoyed there.

Arrived in the mail. Cordelia-anne, this one is probably going to be my favorite...I may hang on to it for a while. I've studied Russian and continue to muddle along with it on my own, and I have an Akhmatova collection that has sort of evaded all of my efforts - I'm going to use this volume as a side-by-side to help in my readings. I've read some Akhmadulina, but Tsvetayeva is new to me - I'm really looking forward to this one!

9/2008 - Well, this was kind of an iffy collection. I don't think the translator has a very poetic ear; I've hunted down other translations of some of the poems in this collection & found versions by other people that I like MUCH better, and I've gone back to some of the Akhmatova poems that are in the collection I have....the translations aren't outright wrong, but they are not true, somehow. I have a wonderful Yevtushenko translation collection that he actually did in collaboration with English-language poets, and they talk about the difficulties of getting the poems right in translation, but also how important it is to the poet and the reader.

Thanks for sharing, though - and it has given me more of an impetus to get books by these other authors in Russian and try for my own interaction with them.

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

on BC shelf - Jare says poetry usually goes quickly, here.

Shelf