- Person
- Osip Mandelstam
- Lived
- 1891–1938
- Field
- Poetry
- From
- Russian (Soviet)
The story
Osip Mandelstam was born in Warsaw in 1891 into a Jewish family with roots in the Lithuanian towns of Žagarė and Jurbarkas, and grew up in Saint Petersburg. Russian was not his native tongue. According to the Lithuanian Jewish Community, his highly cultured mother, who spoke excellent Russian, helped him overcome that barrier so completely that he became one of Russia's most famous poets, writing in perfect Russian. He began publishing poems in 1907 in the almanac of the Tenishev School and went on to study in Paris and Heidelberg.
At first the literary establishment did not know what to make of him, and the Symbolist poets who dominated the scene rejected his unusual style. His friendship with Nikolai Gumilyov gave him the push to publish a book, and in 1911 the two were among the young poets who formed the Poets' Guild, the core of the new Acmeist movement.
In 1913 Mandelstam published his first collection, Kamen, or Stone. The title expressed an Acmeist idea: that every stone thirsts to be built into something greater, like the arch of a Gothic cathedral. Some of his best early poems, including 'The Admiralty', 'Notre Dame' and 'Hagia Sophia', address great buildings. The book was reissued in 1916 with additional poems, and again in 1923, and it is considered the finest achievement of the Acmeist school.
His second book, Tristia, was published in Berlin in 1922. Critics identify a group of 'Jewish poems' in it. In the following years Mandelstam also wrote influential prose, including the autobiographical The Noise of Time (1925), the short novel The Egyptian Stamp (1928) and Journey to Armenia (1933).
These early books established Mandelstam as a leading Russian poet, a standing that the Soviet authorities could suppress but never erase. Stone and Tristia have since been translated many times. A full English version of Stone by Robert Tracy was published by Princeton University Press in 1981, and his poems remain widely read in many languages.
Why it matters
Mandelstam's early collections are counted among the treasures of Russian poetry and introduced the clarity and craftsmanship that shaped a generation of poets.
About Osip Mandelstam
Warsaw-born Jewish poet, one of the greatest in the Russian language, whose sixteen-line epigram on Stalin led to exile and death in a Gulag transit camp in 1938.
More about Osip Mandelstam
- Osip Mandelstam translated 19 books in six yearsIn the 1920s, while he had almost stopped writing poetry, Osip Mandelstam translated 19 books into Russian in six years.
- In exile, Osip Mandelstam wrote the Voronezh NotebooksDuring his 1934 to 1937 exile in Voronezh, Osip Mandelstam wrote the Voronezh Notebooks, including the cycle Verses on the Unknown Soldier.
- Osip Mandelstam wrote the manifesto of AcmeismOsip Mandelstam helped found the Acmeist movement in Russian poetry and wrote its manifesto, The Morning of Acmeism (1913).
- Osip Mandelstam dared to mock Stalin in a poemIn 1933 Osip Mandelstam composed a poem mocking Stalin and, when arrested, refused to disown it, believing a poet must never renounce his work.
- Osip Mandelstam's poems survived in his wife's memoryAfter the secret police seized Osip Mandelstam's manuscripts, his wife Nadezhda memorised his poems and later arranged for them to be published.
Sources
- Osip Mandelstam Wikipedia
- Remembering Osip Mandelstam, Litvak Poet, 125 Years after His Birth Lithuanian Jewish Community
- The Russian Joseph Jewish Review of Books
- Acmeism Wikipedia
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