Essays on Mandelstam

London: Harvard University Press, 1990. Binding: Hardcover
Pages: 192

Harvard Slavic Studies (Cambridge, Mass.), V. 6.

From the preface:
"My first serious encounter with Mandelstam's poetry took place over forty years ago in Prague, where I was spending the summer of 1931, having just completed my sophomore year at the Law School of Belgrade University. There, in the famous Slavic bookstore in Wenceslaus Square, I happened upon the first edition of "Tristia" (1922)-which, strange though it may seem today, had not yet sold out, despite the fact that only three thousand copies had been printed. Until then, I was familiar with only a few of Mandelstam's poems, published in various anthologies; reading "Tristia" prompted me to search out the other two books of his poetry. Thus, I discovered his unique poetic world, whose fascination was to remain strong for the rest of my life.

Though taken with the "music" of his verse and his exquisite imagery, I was annoyed with my inability to understand the cryptic messages of certain of his poems, to grasp their "deep meaning." Even at that time, I believed that there must be one since the majority of his poems did not present problems in this respect. Later, during my philological studies at Belgrade University (1933-36) and at Charles University in Prague (1938-39), I became aware of the many "poetic reminiscences" in Mandelstam's poetry; it was not difficult to recognize at least those from Lermontov and Tyutchev. Subsequently, I came to believe that to understand his poetic world, one had to acquire Mandelstam's culture, as far as possible. However, neither in the thirties nor in the next two decades did I think of undertaking such a task.

My second major encounter with Mandelstam occurred after I came to this country (in 1958) and bought the New York edition of Mandelstam's "Sobranie sochineni" (1955). At this time, I became primarily interested in his versification, especially when I noticed that his iambic hexameter after 1915 has a most original rhythmic structure, unprecedented in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Russian poetry."

Very good condition.