What do you think?
Rate this book
賯氐丕卅丿 賲禺鬲丕乇丞
James McGavran鈥檚 new translation of Vladimir Maya颅kovsky鈥檚 poetry is the first to fully capture the Futurist and Soviet agitprop artist鈥檚 voice. Because of his work as a propagandist for the Soviet regime, and because of his posthumous enshrinement by Stalin as 鈥渢he best and most talented poet of our Soviet epoch,鈥� Mayakovsky has most often been interpreted鈥攁nd translated鈥攚ithin a political context. McGavran鈥檚 translations reveal a more nuanced poet who possessed a passion for word creation and lin颅guistic manipulation. Mayakovsky鈥檚 bombastic metaphors and formal 茅lan shine through in these translations, and McGavran鈥檚 commentary provides vital information on Mayakovsky, illuminating the poet鈥檚 many references to the Russian literary canon, his contemporaries in art and culture, and Soviet figures and policies.
156 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2013
6 people are currently reading
88 people want to read
About the author
Vladimir Mayakovsky
472听books601听followersVladimir Mayakovsky (袙谢邪写懈屑懈褉 袙谢邪写懈屑懈褉芯胁懈褔 袦邪褟泻芯胁褋泻懈泄) was born the last of three children in Baghdati, Russian Empire (now in Georgia) where his father worked as a forest ranger. His father was of Ukrainian Cossack descent and his mother was of Ukrainian descent. Although Mayakovsky spoke Georgian at school and with friends, his family spoke primarily Russian at home. At the age of 14 Mayakovsky took part in socialist demonstrations at the town of Kutaisi, where he attended the local grammar school. After the sudden and premature death of his father in 1906, the family 鈥� Mayakovsky, his mother, and his two sisters 鈥� moved to Moscow, where he attended School No. 5.
In Moscow, Mayakovsky developed a passion for Marxist literature and took part in numerous activities of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party; he was to later become an RSDLP (Bolshevik) member. In 1908, he was dismissed from the grammar school because his mother was no longer able to afford the tuition fees.
Around this time, Mayakovsky was imprisoned on three occasions for subversive political activities but, being underage, he avoided transportation. During a period of solitary confinement in Butyrka prison in 1909, he began to write poetry, but his poems were confiscated. On his release from prison, he continued working within the socialist movement, and in 1911 he joined the Moscow Art School where he became acquainted with members of the Russian Futurist movement. He became a leading spokesman for the group Gileas (袚懈谢械褟), and a close friend of David Burlyuk, whom he saw as his mentor.
The 1912 Futurist publication A Slap in the Face of Public Taste (袩芯褖褢褔懈薪邪 芯斜褖械褋褌胁械薪薪芯屑褍 胁泻褍褋褍) contained Mayakovsky's first published poems: Night (袧芯褔褜) and Morning (校褌褉芯). Because of their political activities, Burlyuk and Mayakovsky were expelled from the Moscow Art School in 1914.
His work continued in the Futurist vein until 1914. His artistic development then shifted increasingly in the direction of narrative and it was this work, published during the period immediately preceding the Russian Revolution, which was to establish his reputation as a poet in Russia and abroad.
Mayakovsky was rejected as a volunteer at the beginning of WWI, and during 1915-1917 worked at the Petrograd Military Automobile School as a draftsman. At the onset of the Russian Revolution, Mayakovsky was in Smolny, Petrograd. There he witnessed the October Revolution.
After moving back to Moscow, Mayakovsky worked for the Russian State Telegraph Agency (ROSTA) creating 鈥� both graphic and text 鈥� satirical Agitprop posters. In 1919, he published his first collection of poems Collected Works 1909-1919 (袙褋械 褋芯褔懈薪械薪薪芯械 袙谢邪写懈屑懈褉芯屑 袦邪褟泻芯胁褋泻懈屑). In the cultural climate of the early Soviet Union, his popularity grew rapidly. As one of the few Soviet writers who were allowed to travel freely, his voyages to Latvia, Britain, Germany, the United States, Mexico and Cuba influenced works like My Discovery of America (袦芯械 芯褌泻褉褘褌懈械 袗屑械褉懈泻懈, 1925). He also travelled extensively throughout the Soviet Union.
The relevance of Mayakovsky's influence cannot be limited to Soviet poetry. While for years he was considered the Soviet poet par excellence, he also changed the perceptions of poetry in wider 20th century culture. His political activism as a propagandistic agitator was rarely understood and often looked upon unfavourably by contemporaries, even close friends like Boris Pasternak. Near the end of the 1920s, Mayakovsky became increasingly disillusioned with the course the Soviet Union was taking under Joseph Stalin: his satirical plays The Bedbug (袣谢芯锌, 1929) and The Bathhouse (袘邪薪褟, 1930), which deal with the Soviet philistinism and bureaucracy, illustrate this development.
On the evening of April 14, 1930, Mayakovsky shot himself.
In Moscow, Mayakovsky developed a passion for Marxist literature and took part in numerous activities of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party; he was to later become an RSDLP (Bolshevik) member. In 1908, he was dismissed from the grammar school because his mother was no longer able to afford the tuition fees.
Around this time, Mayakovsky was imprisoned on three occasions for subversive political activities but, being underage, he avoided transportation. During a period of solitary confinement in Butyrka prison in 1909, he began to write poetry, but his poems were confiscated. On his release from prison, he continued working within the socialist movement, and in 1911 he joined the Moscow Art School where he became acquainted with members of the Russian Futurist movement. He became a leading spokesman for the group Gileas (袚懈谢械褟), and a close friend of David Burlyuk, whom he saw as his mentor.
The 1912 Futurist publication A Slap in the Face of Public Taste (袩芯褖褢褔懈薪邪 芯斜褖械褋褌胁械薪薪芯屑褍 胁泻褍褋褍) contained Mayakovsky's first published poems: Night (袧芯褔褜) and Morning (校褌褉芯). Because of their political activities, Burlyuk and Mayakovsky were expelled from the Moscow Art School in 1914.
His work continued in the Futurist vein until 1914. His artistic development then shifted increasingly in the direction of narrative and it was this work, published during the period immediately preceding the Russian Revolution, which was to establish his reputation as a poet in Russia and abroad.
Mayakovsky was rejected as a volunteer at the beginning of WWI, and during 1915-1917 worked at the Petrograd Military Automobile School as a draftsman. At the onset of the Russian Revolution, Mayakovsky was in Smolny, Petrograd. There he witnessed the October Revolution.
After moving back to Moscow, Mayakovsky worked for the Russian State Telegraph Agency (ROSTA) creating 鈥� both graphic and text 鈥� satirical Agitprop posters. In 1919, he published his first collection of poems Collected Works 1909-1919 (袙褋械 褋芯褔懈薪械薪薪芯械 袙谢邪写懈屑懈褉芯屑 袦邪褟泻芯胁褋泻懈屑). In the cultural climate of the early Soviet Union, his popularity grew rapidly. As one of the few Soviet writers who were allowed to travel freely, his voyages to Latvia, Britain, Germany, the United States, Mexico and Cuba influenced works like My Discovery of America (袦芯械 芯褌泻褉褘褌懈械 袗屑械褉懈泻懈, 1925). He also travelled extensively throughout the Soviet Union.
The relevance of Mayakovsky's influence cannot be limited to Soviet poetry. While for years he was considered the Soviet poet par excellence, he also changed the perceptions of poetry in wider 20th century culture. His political activism as a propagandistic agitator was rarely understood and often looked upon unfavourably by contemporaries, even close friends like Boris Pasternak. Near the end of the 1920s, Mayakovsky became increasingly disillusioned with the course the Soviet Union was taking under Joseph Stalin: his satirical plays The Bedbug (袣谢芯锌, 1929) and The Bathhouse (袘邪薪褟, 1930), which deal with the Soviet philistinism and bureaucracy, illustrate this development.
On the evening of April 14, 1930, Mayakovsky shot himself.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
February 14, 2021
perhaps it's Jesus Christ stopping to sniff
the forget-me-nots of my soul.
I read (and then reread) these incendiary pieces in two seismic sessions. Separated by aching winter days, informed by masterful contexts courtesy of Shklovsky and Jakobson--and perhaps refracted by Nabokov? The weather and work have ground me down. I returned home yesterday but blank and little else. I reread Cloud in Trousers, while listening to Brahms and then collapsed.
I finished the other longer poems this morning. I was struck by Mayakovsky's speculative vision: how the antithesis of Global Revolution could be found in Chicago and the conductor of such was Woodrow Wilson.
Armageddon occurs in the skies, an airborne Agincourt.
All of which clears the way for four hour work days, the untimely triumph of kitsch and a failsafe recipe for every sane poet to finally find absolution --by shooting themselves in the heart.
the forget-me-nots of my soul.
I read (and then reread) these incendiary pieces in two seismic sessions. Separated by aching winter days, informed by masterful contexts courtesy of Shklovsky and Jakobson--and perhaps refracted by Nabokov? The weather and work have ground me down. I returned home yesterday but blank and little else. I reread Cloud in Trousers, while listening to Brahms and then collapsed.
I finished the other longer poems this morning. I was struck by Mayakovsky's speculative vision: how the antithesis of Global Revolution could be found in Chicago and the conductor of such was Woodrow Wilson.
Armageddon occurs in the skies, an airborne Agincourt.
All of which clears the way for four hour work days, the untimely triumph of kitsch and a failsafe recipe for every sane poet to finally find absolution --by shooting themselves in the heart.
November 29, 2024
What a guy. Delighted by the poems that were abstractly absurd AND the poems that were simply absurd. The book divided those into pre Soviet lyric poems and post revolution propaganda. Mayakovsky is a strange propagandist bc he wears his dark, petty, in love w street grime, hopelessly pining heart on his sleeve
I loved how earnestly he defends poetry as a tool for the revolution even while writing propaganda so ridiculous that it pissed off Lenin, and also fights for it to live:
鈥淚 can鈥檛 stand anything that鈥檚 dead and rank! I adore everything that鈥檚 full of life!鈥�
I literally LOLed at the wrestling match between woodrow Wilson and a giant Trojan horse named Ivan made up of 鈥�150 million鈥� Soviets
From the lyric era, he will color the way I look at smoggy streetlamps and the flabby moon
I loved how earnestly he defends poetry as a tool for the revolution even while writing propaganda so ridiculous that it pissed off Lenin, and also fights for it to live:
鈥淚 can鈥檛 stand anything that鈥檚 dead and rank! I adore everything that鈥檚 full of life!鈥�
I literally LOLed at the wrestling match between woodrow Wilson and a giant Trojan horse named Ivan made up of 鈥�150 million鈥� Soviets
From the lyric era, he will color the way I look at smoggy streetlamps and the flabby moon
October 25, 2021
Mayakovsky has many of the elements that I find interesting in a writer: anguished as a man, challenging and controversial as a poet, and having lived in an era of turmoil. His short career spanned the Russian revolution, of which he was a staunch supporter, before he committed suicide at the age of 37.
Like Whitman, Mayakovsky wrote grandiosely, magnifying himself, e.g. 鈥淚 am everywhere there is pain鈥�, and comes across as messianic at times. As Whitman felt a connection to the common man and to the American ideal, Mayakovsky champions the proletarian and the Bolshevik revolution. Both men also challenged existing poetical forms and developed new ones.
Unfortunately for Mayakovsky, he was adored neither by the working man, who found his 鈥渇uturism鈥� odd and his braggadocio rude, nor Soviet leaders, at least until after his death. However, when Stalin decreed 鈥淢ayakovsky was and remains the best and most talented poet of our Soviet epoch. Indifference to his memory and his works is a crime鈥�, public places were named after him (including one of the most beautiful subway stations in the world in Moscow), and schoolchildren were forced to memorize some of his more nationalistic poems, also earning a degree of hatred for him in the future. When perestroika arrived, he was quickly denounced.
And there are certainly things to dislike. In the aftermath of the revolution, Mayakovsky鈥檚 poetry often reads like propaganda; though that itself is of interest to me, it鈥檚 unfortunate he ended up on the wrong side of history. Worse yet, in promoting the future, he felt a need to tear down all aspects of the past, including other artists, and his scorn and derision extended to those around him. It seems fitting to me that Whitman died content in old age, revered by Americans, while the tortured Mayakovsky committed suicide after arguing with a lover.
However, with all that said, Mayakovsky held my interest. He was a revolutionary from an early age, and got sent to prison at the age of 14 for seditious activities. He was in unhappy love affairs, most notably with Lily Brik, a married woman, who returned his love briefly but then retreated, reducing Mayakovsky to a 鈥榝amily friend鈥�, a relationship reminiscent of Turgenv and the Viardots that similarly raised eyebrows. He was a so-called 鈥楩uturist鈥� who sought to advance the world in all ways. He was truly idealistic, and in a na茂ve way, imagining a time when life would be much easier because of technology (his long poem The Flying Proletarian reminds one of the cartoon The Jetsons), and because wealth would be shared, the communist dream. While he glorified Russia and the Revolution, he traveled to America and was impressed with the technological achievements he found there, and he had fantastical and creative visions in his works, of riding comets, walking skyscrapers, and talking violins among other things.
Lastly, this edition is very well put together, both in the selection of material and in the 52 pages of very helpful notes on the poems and their references in the back. McGavran does an excellent job of helping the English reader understand portions of Mayakovsky鈥檚 inventive word play which are impossible to translate, including at times the original Russian to show unique rhyming patterns, palindromic soundplay, his inclusion of challenging proper names and English words and then finding rhymes in Russian, and in one case a staccato pattern that emphasized agitation and a martial drumbeat.
My favorites:
Lilichka! In Place of a Letter (1916)
The Brooklyn Bridge (1925)
The Cloud in Pants (1914-15)
The Backbone Flute (1915)
I Love (1922)
As for quotes, just this excerpt from The Backbone Flute, on love:
鈥測ou and I will be all
that remains,
and I
will chase you from city to city.
You鈥檒l be given away in marriage across the sea,
trying to hide in night鈥檚 burrow 鈥�
I鈥檒l kiss into you through the London fog
with the fiery lips of streetlamps.
In the heat of the desert you鈥檒l stretch out your caravans,
with lions standing guard 鈥�
beneath you
under the windblown sand,
I鈥檒l place my burning Sahara cheek.
You鈥檒l deposit a smile in your lips
as you watch 鈥�
the toreador is so handsome!
And suddenly I鈥檒l
fling my jealousy into the stands
through the dying eye of the bull.
If you should point your absentminded steps to a bridge
and think
how nice it would be to jump down 鈥�
It is I,
the Seine poured out underneath,
who will call to you,
baring my rotten teeth.
If, with another, you light up with horse-hoof fire
the Strelka or the Sokolniki,
then I, clambering way up above,
patient and naked, will torment you with moonlight.
I鈥檓 strong,
and soon they鈥檒l need me 鈥�
they鈥檒l command:
kill yourself in the war!
My last word will be
your name,
clotted on my shrapnel-shredded lips.
Will they give me a crown?
Or send me to Saint Helena?
I who have saddled the cloudbanks of life鈥檚 storm
am an equal candidate
for tsar of the universe
and
the shackles.
If it鈥檚 determined that I should be tsar,
then your dear little face
on the sunny gold of my coins
I鈥檒l order my people
to stamp!
But if I wind up
where the world fades into tundra,
where the river trades with the north wind,
then I鈥檒l scratch the name Lily onto my chains
and kiss them blind in the dark of my prison camp.鈥�
Like Whitman, Mayakovsky wrote grandiosely, magnifying himself, e.g. 鈥淚 am everywhere there is pain鈥�, and comes across as messianic at times. As Whitman felt a connection to the common man and to the American ideal, Mayakovsky champions the proletarian and the Bolshevik revolution. Both men also challenged existing poetical forms and developed new ones.
Unfortunately for Mayakovsky, he was adored neither by the working man, who found his 鈥渇uturism鈥� odd and his braggadocio rude, nor Soviet leaders, at least until after his death. However, when Stalin decreed 鈥淢ayakovsky was and remains the best and most talented poet of our Soviet epoch. Indifference to his memory and his works is a crime鈥�, public places were named after him (including one of the most beautiful subway stations in the world in Moscow), and schoolchildren were forced to memorize some of his more nationalistic poems, also earning a degree of hatred for him in the future. When perestroika arrived, he was quickly denounced.
And there are certainly things to dislike. In the aftermath of the revolution, Mayakovsky鈥檚 poetry often reads like propaganda; though that itself is of interest to me, it鈥檚 unfortunate he ended up on the wrong side of history. Worse yet, in promoting the future, he felt a need to tear down all aspects of the past, including other artists, and his scorn and derision extended to those around him. It seems fitting to me that Whitman died content in old age, revered by Americans, while the tortured Mayakovsky committed suicide after arguing with a lover.
However, with all that said, Mayakovsky held my interest. He was a revolutionary from an early age, and got sent to prison at the age of 14 for seditious activities. He was in unhappy love affairs, most notably with Lily Brik, a married woman, who returned his love briefly but then retreated, reducing Mayakovsky to a 鈥榝amily friend鈥�, a relationship reminiscent of Turgenv and the Viardots that similarly raised eyebrows. He was a so-called 鈥楩uturist鈥� who sought to advance the world in all ways. He was truly idealistic, and in a na茂ve way, imagining a time when life would be much easier because of technology (his long poem The Flying Proletarian reminds one of the cartoon The Jetsons), and because wealth would be shared, the communist dream. While he glorified Russia and the Revolution, he traveled to America and was impressed with the technological achievements he found there, and he had fantastical and creative visions in his works, of riding comets, walking skyscrapers, and talking violins among other things.
Lastly, this edition is very well put together, both in the selection of material and in the 52 pages of very helpful notes on the poems and their references in the back. McGavran does an excellent job of helping the English reader understand portions of Mayakovsky鈥檚 inventive word play which are impossible to translate, including at times the original Russian to show unique rhyming patterns, palindromic soundplay, his inclusion of challenging proper names and English words and then finding rhymes in Russian, and in one case a staccato pattern that emphasized agitation and a martial drumbeat.
My favorites:
Lilichka! In Place of a Letter (1916)
The Brooklyn Bridge (1925)
The Cloud in Pants (1914-15)
The Backbone Flute (1915)
I Love (1922)
As for quotes, just this excerpt from The Backbone Flute, on love:
鈥測ou and I will be all
that remains,
and I
will chase you from city to city.
You鈥檒l be given away in marriage across the sea,
trying to hide in night鈥檚 burrow 鈥�
I鈥檒l kiss into you through the London fog
with the fiery lips of streetlamps.
In the heat of the desert you鈥檒l stretch out your caravans,
with lions standing guard 鈥�
beneath you
under the windblown sand,
I鈥檒l place my burning Sahara cheek.
You鈥檒l deposit a smile in your lips
as you watch 鈥�
the toreador is so handsome!
And suddenly I鈥檒l
fling my jealousy into the stands
through the dying eye of the bull.
If you should point your absentminded steps to a bridge
and think
how nice it would be to jump down 鈥�
It is I,
the Seine poured out underneath,
who will call to you,
baring my rotten teeth.
If, with another, you light up with horse-hoof fire
the Strelka or the Sokolniki,
then I, clambering way up above,
patient and naked, will torment you with moonlight.
I鈥檓 strong,
and soon they鈥檒l need me 鈥�
they鈥檒l command:
kill yourself in the war!
My last word will be
your name,
clotted on my shrapnel-shredded lips.
Will they give me a crown?
Or send me to Saint Helena?
I who have saddled the cloudbanks of life鈥檚 storm
am an equal candidate
for tsar of the universe
and
the shackles.
If it鈥檚 determined that I should be tsar,
then your dear little face
on the sunny gold of my coins
I鈥檒l order my people
to stamp!
But if I wind up
where the world fades into tundra,
where the river trades with the north wind,
then I鈥檒l scratch the name Lily onto my chains
and kiss them blind in the dark of my prison camp.鈥�
November 18, 2019
The best translation of Mayakovsky available in the English language. Selection of his poetry highlight his greatest works, build a clear trajectory of how the great poet's mind and ideologies evolve, and is spread evenly across his lifetime.
December 13, 2024
Truly one of the best poets. Love love loved this!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
Can't find what you're looking for?
Get help and learn more about the design.