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Andrey Voznesensky Quotes

Andrei Andreyevich Voznesensky was a Soviet and Russian poet and writer who had been referred to by Robert Lowell as "one of the greatest living poets in any language." He was one of the "Children of the '60s," a new wave of iconic Russian intellectuals led by the Khrushchev Thaw.Voznesensky was considered "one of the most daring writers of the Soviet era" but his style often led to regular criticism from his contemporaries and he was once threatened with expulsion by Nikita Khrushchev. He performed poetry readings in front of sold-out stadiums around the world, and was much admired for his skilled delivery. Some of his poetry was translated into English by W. H. Auden. Voznesenky's long-serving mentor and muse was Boris Pasternak, the Nobel Laureate and the author of Doctor Zhivago.

Before his death, he was both critically and popularly proclaimed "a living classic", and "an icon of Soviet intellectuals". Wikipedia  

✵ 12. May 1933 – 1. June 2010
Andrey Voznesensky photo
Andrey Voznesensky: 8 quotes1 like

Famous Andrey Voznesensky Quotes

“With good reason, Voznesensky is a hero to all those in the Soviet Union who want their poets to tell them the truth. But at the risk of his career, freedom, and perhaps even his life, he has never been able to do much more than drop hints.”

Andrey Voznesensky

Clive James From the Land of Shadows (London: Picador, 1983) p. 222.
Criticism

“It's shameful to spot a lie and not to name it,
shameful to name it and then to shut your eyes,
shameful to call a funeral a wedding
and play the fool at funerals besides.”

Andrey Voznesensky

Stanley Kunitz (trans.) Story Under Full Sail (New York: Doubleday, 1974) p. 20.

“Along a parabola life like a rocket flies,
Mainly in darkness, now and then on a rainbow.”

Andrey Voznesensky

"Parabolic Ballad"; translated by W. H. Auden, p. 113.
Antiworlds, and the Fifth Ace

“I have hurled westward the ashes of the uninvited guest!
and hammered stars into the unforgetting sky – like nails
I am Goya.”

Andrey Voznesensky

"I am Goya"; translated by Stanley Kunitz, p. 3.
Antiworlds, and the Fifth Ace

“Everything's sliding apart.
Yet, "Long live everything!"
For the art of creation
Is older than the art of killing.”

Andrey Voznesensky

"Lines to Robert Lowell"; translation by Louis Simpson and Vera Dunham, from Vera Dunham and Max Hayward (eds.) Nostalgia for the Present (New York: Doubleday, 1978) p. 111.

“Akhmatova's seeming successor as the best living Russian poet is Voznesensky. His talent is dazzling. He has the gift of fresh, witty perception, works with unusual images and modern rhythms. His poetry is marvelously dynamic.”

Andrey Voznesensky

Olga Carlisle in The New York Times, September 11, 1966.
Criticism

“I am Goya
of the bare field, by the enemy's beak gouged
till the craters of my eyes gape
I am grief
I am the tongue
of war, the embers of cities
on the snows of the year 1941
I am hunger.”

Andrey Voznesensky

"I am Goya"; translated by Stanley Kunitz, p. 3.
Antiworlds, and the Fifth Ace

“The urge to kill, like the urge to beget,
Is blind and sinister. Its craving is set
Today on the flesh of a hare: tomorrow it can
Howl the same way for the flesh of a man.”

Andrey Voznesensky

"Hunting a Hare"; translated by W.H. Auden, p. 13.
Antiworlds, and the Fifth Ace

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