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Article Draft for Innokenty Annensky

Corrected Annensky's death date. Add section or material about his work with classics.

Lead

Innokentiy Fyodorovich Annensky (Russian: Инноке́нтий Фёдорович А́нненский, IPA: [ɪnɐˈkʲenʲtʲɪj ˈfʲɵdərəvʲɪtɕ ˈanʲɪnskʲɪj] ; (1 September [O.S. 20 August] 1855, Omsk – 13 December [O.S. 30 November] 1909, Saint Petersburg) was a poet, critic, scholar, and translator, representative of the first wave of Russian Symbolism, although he was not well known for his poetry until after his death. In fact, Annensky never wrote professionally; he made little to no income from writing. Instead, he spent his career in academia as a full-time professor and administrator, translator of classic Greek works, and writer of essays and reviews. Despite this, Annensky is considered to be one of the most significant Russian poets from the early 20th century. Critics have cited Annensky's connection to French Symbolism and to the French poet Stéphane Mallarmé for their shared use of "associative symbolism". Annensky was considered to be an under-recognized or neglected poet, but he later gained most of his popularity, particularly in the west, because a number of later Russian Symbolists, such as Mandelstam, Akhmatova, Pasternak, and Mayakovsky, were inspired and influenced by his work.

Biography

In literary history, Annensky is remembered primarily as a poet. He started writing poetry in the 1870s but did not publish it. He decided not to publish any works until he was 35, advice that was given by his older brother Nikolay. His first collection of poems, entitled Quiet Songs, was published in 1904 under the pseudonym Nik. T.-o (i.e., Никто, "No one" in Russian). Because Annensky was a director of a public school at the time, publishing this avant garde work under his real name would have been controversial. The book gained moderate praise from leading Symbolists, some of whom didn't suspect that Annensky was the author. Annensky's second book, Тhe Cypress Chest (1910), is his best known collection of poetry. Annensky died just days before its projected publication. Many of his unpublished pieces were later edited and released in the 1920s by his son, Valentin Krivich.

Poetic Assessment

Annensky was interested in Symbolism, and he followed its growth in both Europe and Russia. This, combined with his knowledge of poetry, can be seen in his verses. Setchkarev, author of the first critical study of Annensky, claims that Annensky was likely the "most pessimistic of the Russian Symbolists". Annensky saw life as a "wicked enchantment" and an unhappy nightmare that he knew would end in death. The specificities and unknowns of death raise questions within symbolist poetry, and it has a particularly strong position in Annensky's poetry. He sensed that life was nothing without the inescapable concept of death and wrote often about symbols of life and time. Some of his common imagery, such as shadows, ice, dirt, et cetera, in his poems are not poetic, but he surrounds them with structure and sounds that create a "poetic aura". Some of these details and themes have roots in French Symbolism.

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Bibliography

• Kelly, Catriona (1986). Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky and the classical ideal (http://purl.org/dc/dcmitype/Text thesis). University of Oxford.
• Bedford, C. H. (1965). [Review of Studies in the Life and Work of Innokentij Annenskij., by V. Setchkarev]. Slavic Review, 24(1), 150–152. https://doi.org/10.2307/2493019
• Byrns, R., & Kotzamanidou, M. (1977). Mallarme and the Poetry of Innokenty Annensky: A Study of Surfaces and Textures. Comparative Literature Studies, 14(3), 223–232. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40245919
• Borker, D. (1979). Intrinsic and Extrinsic Aspects of Structure in Annenskij’s “Verbnaja Nedelja.” The Slavic and East European Journal, 23(4), 491–504. https://doi.org/10.2307/308054
• Annensky, Innokenty; The Cypress Chest, translated by R.H. Morrison, introduction by V. Setchkarev (1982), Ann Arbor, Michigan: Ardis.