Silver age of Russian culture. Silver Age. Main trends in poetry

The origins of neorealism
lay in another current of Italian literature - verismo, which originated at the end of the 19th century. Neorealism manifested itself in cinema, literature, theater and the visual arts.
The main character of neorealist works was a man from the people, possessing high spiritual qualities and fighting for a national cause and social justice. The main problem addressed by neorealist writers is whether an ordinary person can maintain dignity in this cruel and unjust world. In the fine arts, representatives of neorealism were R. Guttuso, G. Mucchi, E. Treccani, A. Fougeron, B. Taslitsky. In cinema - directors L. Visconti, V. De Sica, R. Rossellini, G. De Santis, P. Germi, C. Lizani, L. Zampa.
In literature, neorealism was opposed to various modernist movements, and especially to pro-fascist art. The main genre of neorealism was the so-called “lyrical document”. It was based on a real autobiography, embellished with elements of fiction. Examples of such works are “Magazzini Street” and “Family Chronicle”, “Metello” by V. Pratolini, “Christ Stopped at Eboli” by K. Ley, “Naples the Millionaire” by E. De Filippo.
In the mid-50s. 20th century neorealism is gradually fading away, and the preachers of neorealism themselves admit that they were unable to reveal the complex contradictions of the new reality. In the 70s works of art, paintings and films created in the spirit of neorealism began to be called political.

2) Acmeism
A new modernist movement, Acmeism, appeared in Russian poetry in the 1910s. as a contrast to extreme symbolism. Translated from Greek, the word “akme” means the highest degree of something, blossoming, maturity. The Acmeists advocated the return of images and words to their original meaning, for art for art's sake, for the poeticization of human feelings.
In 1912, poets S. Gorodetsky, N. Gumilev, O. Mandelstam, V. Narbut, A. Akhmatova, M. Zenkevich and some others united in the “Workshop of Poets” circle. The founders of Acmeism were N. Gumilyov and S. Gorodetsky. The Acmeists called their work the highest point of achieving artistic truth. They did not deny symbolism, but were against the fact that the symbolists paid so much attention to the world of the mysterious and unknown. The Acmeists pointed out that the unknowable, by the very meaning of the word, cannot be known. Hence the desire of the Acmeists to free literature from those obscurities that were cultivated by the symbolists, and to restore clarity and accessibility to it.
The Acmeists tried with all their might to return literature to life, to things, to man, to nature. Thus, Gumilev turned to the description of exotic animals and nature, Zenkevich - to the prehistoric life of the earth and man, Narbut - to everyday life, Anna Akhmatova - to in-depth love experiences. The desire for nature, for the “earth,” led the Acmeists to a naturalistic style, to concrete imagery, and objective realism, which determined a whole range of artistic techniques. In the poetry of the Acmeists, “heavy, weighty words” predominate; the number of nouns significantly exceeds the number of verbs.
Having carried out this reform, the Acmeists otherwise agreed with the Symbolists, declaring themselves their students. The other world for Acmeists remains the truth; only they do not make it the center of their poetry, although the latter is sometimes not alien to mystical elements. Gumilyov’s works “The Lost Tram” and “At the Gypsies” are completely permeated with mysticism, and in Akhmatova’s collections, like “The Rosary,” love-religious experiences predominate. The Acmeists were by no means revolutionaries in relation to symbolism, and never considered themselves as such; They set as their main task only the smoothing out of contradictions and the introduction of amendments.
In the part where the Acmeists rebelled against the mysticism of symbolism, they did not oppose the latter to real real life. Having rejected mysticism as the main leitmotif of creativity, Acmeists began to fetishize things as such, unable to approach reality synthetically and understand its dynamics. For Acmeists, things in reality have meaning in themselves, in a static state. They admire individual objects of existence, and perceive them as they are, without criticism, without attempts to understand them in relationship, but directly, in an animal way.
Basic principles of Acmeism:
rejection of symbolist appeals to the ideal, mystical nebula;
acceptance of the earthly world as it is, in all its color and diversity;
returning the word to its original meaning;
depiction of a person with his true feelings;
poeticization of the world;

inclusion in poetry of associations with previous eras.

3)Futurism
Futurism is one of the movements of modernism that originated in the 1910s. It is most clearly represented in the literature of Italy and Russia. On February 20, 1909, the article “Manifesto of Futurism” by T. F. Marinetti appeared in the Parisian newspaper Le Figaro. Marinetti in his manifesto called for abandoning the spiritual and cultural values ​​of the past and building a new art.
In Russia, Marinetti's article was published on March 8, 1909 and marked the beginning of the development of its own futurism. The founders of the new movement in Russian literature were the brothers D. and N. Burliuk, M. Larionov, N. Goncharova, A. Ekster, N. Kulbin. In 1910, one of the first futuristic poems by V. Khlebnikov, “The Spell of Laughter,” appeared in the collection “Impressionist Studio.” In the same year, a collection of futurist poets, “The Judges’ Tank,” was published. It contained poems by D. Burliuk, N. Burliuk, E. Guro, V. Khlebnikov, V. Kamensky. The futurists attached special significance to the seemingly meaningless title of the collection. For them, the fish tank symbolized the cage into which the poets were driven, and they called themselves the judges.
In 1910, the Cubo-Futurists united into a group. It included the Burliuk brothers, V. Khlebnikov, V. Mayakovsky, E. Guro, A. E. Kruchenykh. Cubo-futurists defended the word as such, “the word is higher than the meaning,” “the abstruse word.” Cubo-futurists destroyed Russian grammar, replacing phrases with combinations of sounds. They believed that the more disorder in a sentence, the better.
In 1911, I. Severyanin was one of the first in Russia to proclaim himself an ego-futurist. He added the word “ego” to the term “futurism.” Egofuturism can literally be translated as “I am the future.” A circle of followers of egofuturism rallied around I. Severyanin; in January 1912 they proclaimed themselves the “Academy of Ego Poetry.” Egofuturists have enriched their vocabulary with a large number of foreign words and new formations.
In 1912, the futurists united around the publishing house “Petersburg Herald”. The group included: D. Kryuchkov, I. Severyanin, K. Olimpov, P. Shirokov, R. Ivnev, V. Gnedov, V. Shershenevich.
In Russia, futurists called themselves “Budetlyans,” poets of the future. Futurists, captivated by dynamism, were no longer satisfied with the syntax and vocabulary of the previous era, when there were no cars, no telephones, no phonographs, no cinemas, no airplanes, no electric railways, no skyscrapers, no subways. The poet, filled with a new sense of the world, has a wireless imagination. The poet puts fleeting sensations into the accumulation of words. Words pile on top of each other, rushing to convey the author’s momentary feelings, so the work looks like a telegraph text. Futurists abandoned syntax and stanzas and came up with new words that, in their opinion, better and more fully reflected reality.

4)Symbolism
Symbolism as a literary movement originated in France in the 80s. 19th century The basis of the artistic method of French symbolism is sharply subjective sensualism (sensuality). The symbolists reproduced reality as a flow of sensations. Poetry avoids generalizations and seeks not the typical, but the individual, the one of a kind.
Poetry takes on the character of improvisation, recording “pure impressions.” The object loses its clear outlines, dissolves in a stream of disparate sensations and qualities; The dominant role is played by the epithet, a colorful spot. The emotion becomes pointless and “inexpressible.” Poetry strives to enhance sensory richness and emotional impact. A self-sufficient form is cultivated. Representatives of French symbolism are P. Verlaine, A. Rimbaud, J. Laforgue.
The dominant genre of symbolism was “pure” lyricism; the novel, short story, and drama became lyrical.
In Russia, symbolism arose in the 90s. 19th century and at its initial stage (K. D. Balmont, early V. Ya. Bryusov and A. Dobrolyubov, and later B. Zaitsev, I. F. Annensky, Remizov) developed a style of decadent impressionism, similar to French symbolism.
Russian symbolists of the 1900s. (V. Ivanov, A. Bely, A. A. Blok, as well as D. S. Merezhkovsky, S. Solovyov and others), trying to overcome pessimism and passivity, proclaimed the slogan of effective art, the predominance of creativity over knowledge.
The material world is depicted by symbolists as a mask through which the otherworldly shines through. Dualism finds expression in the two-plane composition of novels, dramas and “symphonies”. The world of real phenomena, everyday life or conventional fiction is depicted grotesquely, discredited in the light of “transcendental irony”. Situations, images, their movement receive a double meaning: in terms of what is depicted and in terms of what is commemorated.
Symbolism avoids the logical disclosure of the topic, turning to the symbolism of sensual forms, the elements of which receive a special semantic richness. Logically inexpressible “secret” meanings “shine through” the material world of art. By bringing forward sensual elements, symbolism withdraws at the same time O t of impressionistic contemplation of scattered and self-sufficient sensory impressions, into the motley stream of which symbolization introduces a certain integrity, unity and continuity.
The lyrics of symbolism are often dramatized or acquire epic features, revealing the structure of “generally significant” symbols, rethinking the images of ancient and Christian mythology. The genre of religious poem, symbolically interpreted legend is being created (S. Solovyov, D. S. Merezhkovsky). The poem loses its intimacy and becomes like a sermon, a prophecy (V. Ivanov, A. Bely).
German symbolism of the late 19th – early 20th centuries. (S. Gheorghe and his Group, R. Demel and other poets) was the ideological mouthpiece of the reactionary bloc of the Junkers and the big industrial bourgeoisie. In German Symbolism, aggressive and tonic aspirations, attempts to combat one’s own decadence, and a desire to disassociate ourselves from decadence and impressionism stand out in relief. German symbolism tries to resolve the consciousness of decadence, the end of culture, in a tragic affirmation of life, in a kind of “heroics” of decline. In the fight against materialism, resorting to symbolism and myth, German symbolism does not come to a sharply expressed metaphysical dualism, but retains the Nietzschean “loyalty to the earth” (Nietzsche, George, Demel).
German symbolism had a great influence on the formation of fascist ideology. In fascism, both lines of German symbolism are reproduced: the “pagan” individualism of the “blond beast”, open speech on the platform of the imperialist bourgeoisie, on the one hand, and the demagogic preaching of “supra-class”, “universally valid” values ​​as an attempt to expand the social base of the dictatorship of monopoly capital.

5) Imagism
Imagism is a movement in literature and painting. Originated in England shortly before the war of 1914-1918. (founders Ezra Pound and Wyndham Lewis, who broke away from the futurists), developed on Russian soil in the first years of the revolution. Russian Imagists made their declaration at the beginning of 1919 in the magazines “Sirena” (Voronezh) and “Soviet Country” (Moscow). The core of the group was V. Shershenevich, A. Mariengof, S. Yesenin, A. Kusikov, R. Ivnev, I. Gruzinov and some others.
Organizationally, they united around the publishing house "Imaginists", "Chikhi-Pikhi", a bookstore and the well-known literary cafe "Pegasus Stall". Later, the Imagists published the magazine “Hotel for Travelers in Beauty,” which ceased in 1924 on its fourth issue. Shortly after this, the group disbanded.
The theory of imagism proclaims the predominance of the “image as such” as the main principle of poetry. Not a word-symbol with an infinite number of meanings (symbolism), not a word-sound (cubo-futurism), not a word-name of a thing (Acmeism), but a word-metaphor with one specific meaning is the basis of imagism. “The only law of art, the only and incomparable method is to reveal life through the image and rhythm of images” (“Declaration” of the Imagists). The theoretical justification of this principle comes down to the likening of poetic creativity to the process of language development through metaphor.
If in practical speech the “conceptuality” of a word displaces its “imagery,” then in poetry the image excludes meaning and content. In this regard, there is a breakdown of grammar, a call to agrammaticality: “the meaning of a word lies not only in the root of the word, but also in the grammatical form. The image of the word is only in the root. By breaking grammar, we destroy the potential power of the content, while maintaining the same power of the image” (Shershenevich ).
Focus on imagery led imagists to develop a wide variety of image-building techniques. “The image – in stages from analogy, parallelism, comparison, opposition, compressed and closed epithets, applications of polythematic, multi-story construction – these are the tools of production of the master of art” (“Declaration”). To this it should be added that the increase in imagery was achieved by the Imagists not only by the variety and complexity of all these schemes for constructing an image, but also by an unexpected comparison of distant ideas, according to the principle of “wireless imagination” (Marinetti), “churning together the pure and the impure” on the basis of the “law of magical attraction of bodies with negative and positive poles" (Marienhof), using previously obscene expressions.
Sophisticated in image-making, partly inspired by linguistic etymologies, partly created by random consonances of words, imagists are ready to fully accept reproaches of unnaturalness, artificiality, since “art is always conditional and artificial” (Shershenevich).
In 1923, the Imagists abandoned the extremes of their theory, recognizing that the “small image” (word-metaphor, comparison) should be subordinated to images of higher orders: the poem as a lyrical whole, the “image of a person,” the sum of lyrical experiences. This is already the beginning of the end of imagism, since with the abandonment of the principle of autonomy of the “small image”, imagism largely loses its basis for independent existence.
It is hardly possible to characterize the entire school as a whole in more detail: it included poets who were very heterogeneous both in their theoretical views and poetic practice, and in their social and literary connections. The poetry of V. G. Shershenevich and A. B. Mariengof is the product of that declassed urban intelligentsia who lost all soil, all living social connections and found their last refuge in bohemia. All their work shows a picture of extreme decline and desolation. Declarative appeals to joy are powerless: their poetry is full of decadent eroticism, saturating most works, usually loaded with themes of narrowly personal experiences, full of neurasthenic pessimism caused by rejection of the October Revolution.
The nature of the imagism of S. A. Yesenin, a representative of the declassing groups of the rural wealthy peasantry and kulaks, is completely different. True, here too the basis is a passive attitude towards the world. But this similarity is an abstraction from a completely different set of premises. Yesenin's imagism comes from the material concreteness of the natural economy on the soil of which he grew up, from the anthropomorphism and zoomorphism of primitive peasant psychology. The religiosity that colors many of his works is also close to the primitive concrete religiosity of the wealthy peasantry.
Thus, imagism does not represent a single whole, but is a reflection of the sentiments of several declassed groups of the bourgeoisie, in the world of “self-proclaimed words” seeking refuge from revolutionary storms.

6)Proletarian literature
Proletarian literature reflects reality from the perspective of the worldview of the proletariat as a class leading the struggle of workers for a socialist society. The defining feature of proletarian literature is not so much the social origin of its creators as the proletarian socialist ideological and artistic content of their work.
In its revolutionary practice, the proletariat creates and develops all aspects and forms of its ideology, including fiction. The decisive feature of proletarian literature is that this creatively free literature is revolutionary, anti-bourgeois, socialist both in character and in purpose.
The decisive feature of proletarian literature is its socialist aspiration. The higher the stage of development of the consistently revolutionary socialist struggle of the working class, the more fully and clearly the socialist aspirations of proletarian literature are expressed. If the work of the first proletarian poets of the 19th century is imbued with general democratic and at times even liberal dreams, and socialist tendencies are expressed vaguely, vaguely, then the works of the era of preparation for the revolution (poems by D. Bedny) sound with militant pathos and deep conviction in the victory of the working class.
Already in his early works, M. Gorky, depicting the world of capitalist relations as a vicious, unnatural world (“Foma Gordeev”, “The Orlov Spouses”), points out that the way out of this vicious reality is not the anarchic rebellion of tramps, not the individualistic passive protest of intellectuals, but the organized revolutionary activity of the proletariat, the only fully revolutionary class capable of eliminating the greatest injustices of the social system (“Mother”, “Enemies”). Confidence in the victory of the socialist proletariat marked the works of numerous worker-poets of the pre-October era.
After the October Revolution of 1917, the role of the Bolshevik party in proletarian literature was especially clearly revealed. Among the works devoted to the depiction of the civil war, such as “Chapaev” by D. Furmanov, “Iron Stream” by A. S. Serafimovich, and “Destruction” by A. Fadeev are still revered as examples. The strength of these works lies in the fact that their authors, depicting the era of the civil war, were able to artistically reveal the proletarian content of the revolution, the political growth of the masses participating in it, the role of the Bolshevik leadership, and proletarian consciousness.
Proletarian literature arises and is formed in the conditions of the revolutionary struggle of the proletariat and, in turn, serves as an indicator of both the social activity of the working class and its political maturity.
Literary significant works of proletarian creativity grow out of the revolutionary actions of the working class. During the period of 1848, the poets P. Dupont, G. Leroy showed themselves in France, in Germany - F. Freiligrath, comrade-in-arms and friend of Marx and Engels, Georg Weert and others. In 1871, the year of the Paris Commune, workers' songs were created by such poets as J. B. Clément, J. Jouy, E. Pothier, and the galaxy of worker-poets increased significantly.
It is very characteristic that proletarian literature achieves the greatest success in those countries where the proletariat has more experience of struggle and has high political maturity. Thus, during the years of “stabilization” of capitalism, after the revolution of 1918-1923, proletarian literature was formed in Germany. Proletarian writers I. Becher, A. Scharer, K. Neikrantz, G. Marchwitz, W. Bredel, E. Weinart and others in their works reflected episodes of the struggle of the German proletariat, exposed the methods of the fascist bourgeoisie, its attempts to start a war with the USSR. The experience of the dictatorship of the proletariat in Hungary determined the qualitative and quantitative growth of Hungarian proletarian literature. B. Illes, A. Gidash, A. Barta, A. Gabor, A. Komyat, A. Gergel, L. Kiss are writers of the Hungarian proletariat who deservedly received wide fame.
The artistic method of proletarian literature is socialist realism. Phenomena of reality are depicted by proletarian artists in a variety of ways, in development, taking into account the contradictions characteristic of these phenomena. Focused on depicting the main, significant trends in the development of objective reality, proletarian writers show how the negative phenomena of the past are overcome in people's practice. They show that the process of revolutionary breaking is complex, difficult, but at the same time objectively necessary, that only through this breaking and the eradication of all “birthmarks” of the past can the revival of humanity be achieved. The method of socialist realism in post-revolutionary proletarian literature includes a revealing attitude towards opponents of the revolution and a sharply critical attitude towards all remnants of the past, and also includes the writer’s ability to reveal the roots of these remnants and ways to overcome them.
Proletarian literature, depicting social processes of great historical significance, shows the struggle of the masses and the formation of a new man. “Mother” by M. Gorky is one of the first works that gave an example of the writer’s skill to show typical life circumstances, to give a full-fledged artistic generalization of the experience of the struggle for a new social order. And since the proletariat raises and carries away the entire mass of working people in its revolutionary practice, the positive hero in proletarian literature is no longer an exception. Both in life and in literature, a kind of rehabilitation of humanity is taking place, the human dignity of the majority of people, trampled on for centuries, is being restored.

Poets of the Silver Age

The names of the poets who formed the spiritual core of the Silver Age are known to everyone: Valery Bryusov, Fyodor Sologub, Innokenty Annensky, Alexander Blok, Maximilian Voloshin, Andrei Bely, Konstantin Balmont, Anna Akhmatova, Nikolai Gumilyov, Marina Tsvetaeva, Vyacheslav Ivanov, Igor Severyanin, Boris Pasternak, Georgy Ivanov and many others.

The poets of the Silver Age also sought to overcome the attempts of the second half of the 19th century to explain human behavior by social conditions, environment and continued the traditions of Russian poetry, for which a person was important in himself, his thoughts and feelings, his attitude to eternity, to God, to Love were important and Death in a philosophical, metaphysical sense. Poets of the Silver Age, both in their artistic work and in theoretical articles and statements, questioned the idea of ​​progress for literature. For example, one of the brightest creators of the Silver Age, Osip Mandelstam, wrote that the idea of ​​progress is “the most disgusting type of school ignorance.” And Alexander Blok in 1910 argued: “The sun of naive realism has set; it is impossible to comprehend anything outside of symbolism.” The poets of the Silver Age believed in art, in the power of words. Therefore, immersion in the element of words and the search for new means of expression are indicative of their creativity. They cared not only about meaning, but also about style - sound, the music of words and complete immersion in the elements were important to them. This immersion led to the cult of life-creativity (the inseparability of the personality of the creator and his art). And almost always, because of this, the poets of the Silver Age were unhappy in their personal lives, and many of them ended badly...

Symbolism (from Greek simbolon - sign, symbol) - a movement in European art of the 1870s - 1910s; one of the modernist movements in Russian poetry at the turn of the 19th – 20th centuries. Focuses primarily on expression through symbol intuitively comprehended entities and ideas, vague, often sophisticated feelings and visions.

The word itself "symbol" in traditional poetics it means “multi-valued allegory,” that is, a poetic image that expresses the essence of a phenomenon; in the poetry of symbolism, he conveys the individual, often momentary ideas of the poet.

The poetics of symbolism is characterized by:

• transmission of the subtlest movements of the soul;
• maximum use of sound and rhythmic means of poetry;
• exquisite imagery, musicality and lightness of style;
• poetics of allusion and allegory;
• symbolic content of everyday words;
• attitude to the word as a cipher of some spiritual secret writing;
• understatement, concealment of meaning;
• the desire to create a picture of an ideal world;
• aestheticization of death as an existential principle;
• elitism, focus on the reader-co-author, creator.

The beginning of Russian symbolism is considered to be the moment when Merezhkovsky published his article “On the causes of decline and new trends in modern Russian literature,” which he read in St. Petersburg in December 1892. The flourishing of Russian symbolism is associated with the advent of A. Blok, A. Bely, Vyach. Ivanova, I. Annensky, J. Baltrushaitis and others, who performed in the early 1900s. A significant role in the development and spread of symbolism in Russia was played by the publishing houses "Scorpion", "Grif", "Ory", "Musaget", and the magazines "Libra".

Nikolay Minsky

Oh, this delirium of the heart and evenings,
And the endless evening that was yesterday.

And the roar of a distant ride, like a distant splash,
And the candles have a lonely sad shine.

And the appearance of my own body is alien to me,
And bitterness without limit of past grievances.

And a sultry reflection of passion from previous years,
And the pendulum is calm, repeating: no.

And a whisper of reproach after someone,
And the dream of life, and the delirium of life.

1901

"The Golden Fleece".

Vladimir Solovyov

A wingless spirit, filled with earth,
A self-forgotten and forgotten god...
Just one dream - and again, inspired,
You are rushing upward from vain worries.

A vague ray of familiar sparkle,
A barely audible echo of an unearthly song, -
And the old world in unfading radiance
He stands again before a sensitive soul.

Just one dream - and in a difficult awakening
You will wait with agonizing melancholy
Again the reflection of an unearthly vision,
Once again the echo of holy harmony.

1883

Innokenty Annensky

Among the worlds

Among the worlds, in the twinkling of the luminaries
One Star and I repeat the name...
Not because I loved her.
But because I languish with others.

And if it’s hard for me to doubt,
I pray to Her alone for an answer,
Not because there is light from Her,
But because there is no need for light with Her.

1909

Fedor Sologub

I am the god of the mysterious world,
The whole world is in my dreams.
I will not make myself an idol
Neither on earth nor in heaven.

Of my divine nature
I won't reveal it to anyone.
I work like a slave, but for freedom
I call night, peace and darkness.

Dmitry Merezhkovsky

Houses and ghosts of people -
Everything merged into a smooth haze,
And even the flames of lanterns
It was suffocating in the dead fog.
And past the stone masses
Somewhere people are hurrying
Like pale shadows they slide,
And I myself walk silently,
I don’t know where, like in a dream,
I walk, I walk, and it seems to me,
That now I’m tired,
I will die like the flame of lanterns,
Like a pale ghost born
The fog of northern nights.

1889

Vyacheslav Ivanov

in autumn
Al.N.Chebotarevskaya*

The groves of the hills, speckled with crimson,
Blue, gloomy mountains in the distance...
In the yellow wilderness there are sophisticated thorns
Hops are flying wildly.

The nomadic silver ray lights up...
As if in a coffin, cooling down, the Earth
The magnificent sorrow of the suns is removed...
The poplars tremble harmoniously.

Wind gusts... Sounding silences...
The river rolls into white oblivion...
You threw thin dodders
Into the sensitive dreams of the reed.

1903

Konstantin Balmont

Reeds

Midnight in the swamp wilderness
The reeds rustle barely audibly, silently.

What are they whispering about? What are they talking about?
Why are the lights burning between them?

They flicker, blink - and again they are gone.
And again the wandering light began to appear.

At midnight the reeds rustle.
Toads nest in them, snakes whistle in them.

A dying face trembles in the swamp.
That crimson month sadly drooped.

And it smelled like mud. And the dampness creeps in.
The quagmire will lure you, squeeze you, suck you in.

“Who? For what?” the reeds say.
Why are the lights burning between us?"

But the sad month silently drooped.
Does not know. He bows his face lower and lower.

And, repeating the sigh of the lost soul,
The reeds rustle sadly and silently.

1895

Zinaida Gippius

She

In his shameless and pathetic baseness,
She is like dust, gray, like the dust of the earth.
And I'm dying from this closeness,
From her inseparability with me.

She's rough, she's prickly,
She's cold, she's a snake.
I was wounded by a disgustingly burning
Her cranked scales.

Oh, if only I could feel the sharp sting!
Clumsy, stupid, quiet.
So heavy, so lethargic,
And there is no access to her - she is deaf.

With her rings she, stubborn,
The soul caresses me.
And this one is dead, and this one is black,
And this terrible one is my soul!

1905

Valery Bryusov

We met her by chance,
And I timidly dreamed about her,
But a long cherished secret
Hidden in my sadness.

But once in a golden moment
I expressed my secret;
I saw the blush of embarrassment
The answer I heard was “I love you.”

And the eyes flashed tremblingly,
And the lips merged into one.
Here's an old tale that
You are always destined to be young.

Andrey Bely

Motherland

V.P. Sventitsky *

The same dew, slopes, fogs,
A red sunrise above the weeds,
The cooling rustle of the clearing,
Starving, poor people;

And in freedom, in freedom - bondage;
And our harsh leaden land
Throws to us from a cold field -
Sends us a cry: "Die -

Like everyone else they die"... You can't breathe,
You don’t hear deadly threats: –
You hear hopeless cries
And sobs, and complaints, and tears.

The wind carries the same exclamations;
The same flocks of unsatiated deaths
They mow with scythes over the slopes,
People are being mowed down over the slopes.

Doomland, icy,
Cursed by iron fate -
Mother Russia, oh evil homeland,
Who made fun of you like that?

1908

Alexander Blok

***
And the heavy sleep of everyday consciousness
You will shake it off, yearning and loving.
Vl. Solovyov

I have a feeling about you. Years pass by -
All in one form I foresee You.

The whole horizon is on fire - and unbearably clear,
And I wait silently, yearning and loving.

The whole horizon is on fire, and the appearance is near,
But I’m scared: you’ll change your appearance,

And you will arouse impudent suspicion,
Changing the usual features at the end.

Oh, how I will fall - both sadly and low,
Without overcoming deadly dreams!

How clear is the horizon! And radiance is close.
But I’m scared: You will change your appearance.

Acmeism (from Greek Akme- the highest degree of something, blossoming, maturity, peak, edge) - one of the modernist movements in Russian poetry of the 1910s, formed as a reaction to the extremes of symbolism. Acmeists united in the group "Workshop of Poets" in 1912-1913. published the magazine "Hyperborea". The main ideas of Acmeism were set out in the programmatic articles by N. Gumilyov “The Heritage of Symbolism and Acmeism” and S. Gorodetsky “Some Currents in Modern Russian Poetry”, published in 1913 in No. 1 of the Apollo magazine (the literary organ of the group during its heyday) , published under the editorship of S. Makovsky Basic principles of Acmeism: liberation of poetry from symbolist appeals to the ideal, returning it to clarity; rejection of mystical nebula, acceptance of the earthly world in its diversity, visible concreteness, sonority, colorfulness; the desire to give a word a certain, precise meaning; objectivity and clarity of images, precision of details; appeal to a person, to the “authenticity” of his feelings; poeticization of the world of primordial emotions, primitive biological natural principles; echoes of past literary eras, broad aesthetic associations, “longing for world culture”

Symbolism - a literary and artistic movement that considered the goal of art to be an intuitive comprehension of world unity through symbols. Art was seen as the unifying principle of such unity. The key artistic means of symbolism is symbol- ambiguous allegory (as opposed to allegories- unambiguous allegory). The symbol contains the prospect of limitless development of meanings. In addition, a symbol is also a full-fledged image; it can be perceived without the potential meanings it contains. The symbol in a compressed form reflects the comprehension of the unity of life, its true, hidden essence.

Symbolism is the poetry of allusions and allegories. This direction is represented by the names of V. Bryusov, D. Merezhkovsky, K. Balmont, I. Annensky, A. Bely, A. Blok.

It was the Symbolists who contributed to the establishment of the perception of Pushkin as a national poet and discovered the significance of Dostoevsky for Russian culture. At the same time, for the first time in Russian literature, they proclaimed the human personality as the subject of history, taught them to perceive poetry more voluminously, more deeply, refreshed and updated the poetic language, enriching the forms of verse, its rhythm, vocabulary, metaphor and musicality of speech.

Examples:
Don't you sometimes imagine

When dusk moves through the house,

Right there, next to a different environment,

Where do we live completely differently?
The shadow merged there so softly with the shadow,

There is such a moment there,

What rays of invisible eyes

We seem to disappear into each other.
And move to scare away this moment

We are afraid to break with a word,

It’s like someone’s ear close to you,

Forcing the distant to listen.
But as soon as the candle burns,

The sensitive world gives in without a fight,

Only from the eyes by the angles of the beam

The blue shadows will run into the flames.

(I. Annensky)
Evening. Seaside. Sighs of the wind.

A majestic cry of will.

A storm is coming. It hits the shore

A black boat alien to enchantment.

Alien to the pure charms of happiness,

A boat of languor, a boat of anxiety,

Abandoned the shore, fights the storm,

The palace is looking for bright dreams.

(K. Balmont)
Acmeism (from the Greek “akme” - the highest degree of something) arose from the denial of the mystical, full of humane hints of the art of the Symbolists. Acmeists proclaimed the high intrinsic value of the earthly, real world. They wanted to glorify the earthly world in all its diversity. Freed from symbolism, the Acmeists became fascinated by colorful, sometimes exotic, details, filigree decoration of verse, and the search for bright epithets. Acmeist poets: N. Gumilyov, S. Gorodetsky, A. Akhmatova, O. Mandelstam.
I will find a different soul,

Everything that was teased, caught.

I will bless the golden one

The road to the sun from the worm.

(N. Gumilev)
And the cuckoo clock is happy too,

Their clear conversation can be heard more and more.

I look through the crack: horse thieves

A fire is lit over the hill.

(A. Akhmatova)
But I love the casino on the dunes,

Wide view through a foggy window

And a thin ray on the crumpled tablecloth.

(O. Mandelstam)
I fell in love with you on an amber day

When, luminous azure

Born, laziness oozed

From every branch grateful.

(S. Gorodetsky)
Futurism (from Latin futurum - future) - an avant-garde movement in European and Russian art of the early twentieth century, which denied the artistic and moral heritage, preached the destruction of the forms and conventions of art for the sake of merging it with the accelerated life process.

Symbolism became its aesthetic prerequisite. Based on the principles of this literary movement, the futurists placed man at the center of the world, sang “benefits” rather than “secrets,” and rejected the understatement, vagueness, veil, and mysticism inherent in symbolism. The futurists opposed the whole society with their radical views, the thesis “Art for art’s sake” - the slogan “Art for the masses”.

Assessing the classics and all previous literature as something that had lived and did not correspond to modern times, the futurists put forward the idea of ​​art that could actually transform the world with words. They sought to update the poetic language (word-innovation, “authentic” word), searched for new rhythms, rhymes, genre forms of poetry, and relied on the slogan-like nature of creativity.

The most prominent representatives of the futurists: V. Mayakovsky, V. Khlebnikov, I. Severyanin (egofugurist), etc.

Let’s read and comment on V. Khlebnikov’s poem “Where the Waxwings Lived.”
Where the waxwings lived,

Where the ate swayed quietly,

Flew by, flew away

Flocks of easy times,

Where they ate quietly,

Where the youths sang a cry,

Flew by, flew away

Became an easy time.

In the chaos of wild shadows,

Where, like the darkness of old days,

Spun and rang

A pack of light timers

It's time for easier times!

You are poyunna and vabna,

You intoxicate the soul like strings,

You enter the heart like a wave!

Come on, sonorous sons,

Glory to easy times!
Let us note the neologisms: vremiri (time and bullfinches?), poyun (singing and young?), poyunna (from singing), vabna (according to V. Dahl’s dictionary, “delicious, tempting”).

The mood of the Silver Age of Russian culture was deeply, soulfully reflected in the work of musicians and artists. For the Symbolists, the first of the arts to express the true feelings of man was music. Many Acmeists praised architects and their creations as the highest achievements of the human spirit. Futurists considered painting to be the highest art; almost all of them were artists. But all of them, representatives of different poetic movements, felt an irresistible attraction to the rich world of art.

The time frame of the Silver Age can be designated only conditionally, but in general it is a period covering the years from the beginning of the 1890s, when the poems of V. S. Solovyov and the first poetic experiments of V. Ya. Bryusov appeared in print, and mystical realism was established in painting. . M. Vasnetsov and M.V. Vrubel, and before the outbreak of the First World War, which led to the collapse of the Russian Empire and the establishment of the Bolshevik dictatorship in 1917, although the agony of the Silver Age continued until the early 1920s.

The fate of Silver Age literature is tragic: the blood, chaos and lawlessness of the revolutionary years and civil war destroyed the spiritual basis of its existence. The post-revolutionary biography of most writers also turned out to be difficult. Merezhkovsky, Gippius, Balmont, and Vyach left their homeland. Ivanov, Baltrushaitis, Bunin, Kuprin (until 1936), Shmelev, Zaitsev, Andreev, Zamyatin, Remizov, A. N. Tolstoy (from 1918 to 1923), Amphitheaters, G. Ivanov, Adamovich, Burliuk, Igor Severyanin , Sasha Cherny, Averchenko, Teffi, Khodasevich, Tsvetaeva (until 1939). During the years of the “Red Terror” and Stalinism, Gumilev, Mandelstam, Klyuev, Livshits, Klychkov, Narbut were killed or exiled to camps. S. Yesenin, V. Mayakovsky, M. Tsvetaeva committed suicide. Almost all of these names were forgotten for many decades.

After October 1917, many philosophers, poets, musicians, and artists who created the culture of the Silver Age still lived and worked, but the characteristic atmosphere of that era ended. However, the Silver Age was not “cut off” in 1917, but lived after it in hidden forms in the poetry of A. Akhmatova, M. Tsvetaeva, in the work of B. Pasternak, in the literature of the Russian emigration.

The 19th century, which became a period of extraordinary growth of national culture and grandiose achievements in all spheres of art, was replaced by a complex 20th century, full of dramatic events and turning points. The golden age of social and artistic life gave way to the so-called silver age, which gave rise to the rapid development of Russian literature, poetry and prose in new bright trends, and subsequently became the starting point of its fall.

In this article we will focus on the poetry of the Silver Age, consider it and talk about the main directions, such as symbolism, acmeism and futurism, each of which was distinguished by its special verse music and a vivid expression of the experiences and feelings of the lyrical hero.

Poetry of the Silver Age. A turning point in Russian culture and art

It is believed that the beginning of the Silver Age of Russian literature falls on the 80-90s. XIX century At this time, the works of many wonderful poets appeared: V. Bryusov, K. Ryleev, K. Balmont, I. Annensky - and writers: L. N. Tolstoy, F. M. Dostoevsky, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. The country is going through difficult times. During the reign of Alexander I, first there was a strong patriotic upsurge during the War of 1812, and then, due to a sharp change in the previously liberal policy of the tsar, society experienced a painful loss of illusions and severe moral losses.

The poetry of the Silver Age reached its peak by 1915. Social life and the political situation are characterized by a deep crisis, a turbulent, seething atmosphere. Mass protests are growing, life is becoming politicized, and at the same time personal self-awareness is strengthening. Society is making intense attempts to find a new ideal of power and social order. And poets and writers keep up with the times, mastering new artistic forms and offering bold ideas. The human personality begins to be perceived as a unity of many principles: natural and social, biological and moral. During the years of the February and October revolutions and the Civil War, the poetry of the Silver Age was in crisis.

A. Blok’s speech “On the appointment of a poet” (February 11, 1921), delivered by him at a meeting on the occasion of the 84th anniversary of the death of A. Pushkin, becomes the final chord of the Silver Age.

Characteristics of literature of the 19th - early 20th centuries.

Let's look at the features of the poetry of the Silver Age. Firstly, one of the main features of the literature of that time was a huge interest in eternal themes: the search for the meaning of the life of an individual and all of humanity as a whole, the mystery of national character, the history of the country, the mutual influence of the worldly and spiritual, human interaction and nature. Literature at the end of the 19th century. becomes more and more philosophical: the authors reveal themes of war, revolution, personal tragedy of a person who, due to circumstances, has lost peace and inner harmony. In the works of writers and poets, a new, brave, extraordinary, decisive and often unpredictable hero is born, stubbornly overcoming all adversities and hardships. In most works, close attention is paid to how the subject perceives tragic social events through the prism of his consciousness. Secondly, a feature of poetry and prose has become an intensive search for original artistic forms, as well as means of expressing feelings and emotions. Poetic form and rhyme played a particularly important role. Many authors abandoned the classical presentation of the text and invented new techniques, for example, V. Mayakovsky created his famous “ladder”. Often, to achieve a special effect, authors used speech and language anomalies, fragmentation, alogisms, and even allowed

Thirdly, the poets of the Silver Age of Russian poetry freely experimented with the artistic possibilities of the word. In an effort to express complex, often contradictory, “volatile” emotional impulses, writers began to take a new approach to words, trying to convey the subtlest shades of meaning in their poems. Standard, formulaic definitions of clear objective objects: love, evil, family values, morality - began to be replaced by abstract psychological descriptions. Precise concepts gave way to hints and understatements. Such instability and fluidity of verbal meaning was achieved through the most vivid metaphors, which often began to be built not on the obvious similarity of objects or phenomena, but on non-obvious signs.

Fourthly, the poetry of the Silver Age is characterized by new ways of conveying the thoughts and feelings of the lyrical hero. Poems by many authors began to be created using images, motifs from various cultures, as well as hidden and explicit quotes. For example, many word artists included scenes from Greek, Roman and, a little later, Slavic myths and legends in their creations. In the works of M. Tsvetaeva and V. Bryusov, mythology is used to build universal psychological models that allow us to comprehend the human personality, in particular its spiritual component. Each poet of the Silver Age is brightly individual. You can easily understand which of them belongs to which verses. But they all tried to make their works more tangible, alive, full of colors, so that any reader could feel every word and line.

The main directions of poetry of the Silver Age. Symbolism

Writers and poets who opposed realism announced the creation of a new, modern art - modernism. There are three main poetry of the Silver Age: symbolism, acmeism, futurism. Each of them had its own striking features. Symbolism originally arose in France as a protest against the everyday reflection of reality and dissatisfaction with bourgeois life. The founders of this trend, including J. Morsas, believed that only with the help of a special hint - a symbol - can one comprehend the secrets of the universe. In Russia, symbolism appeared in the early 1890s. The founder of this movement was D.S. Merezhkovsky, who proclaimed in his book three main postulates of the new art: symbolization, mystical content and “expansion of artistic impressionability.”

Senior and Junior Symbolists

The first symbolists, later called the elders, were V. Ya. Bryusov, K. D. Balmont, F. K. Sologub, Z. N. Gippius, N. M. Minsky and other poets. Their work was often characterized by a sharp denial of the surrounding reality. They portrayed real life as boring, ugly and meaningless, trying to convey the subtlest shades of their feelings.

Period from 1901 to 1904 marks the advent of a new milestone in Russian poetry. The poems of the Symbolists are imbued with a revolutionary spirit and a premonition of future changes. Younger symbolists: A. Blok, V. Ivanov, A. Bely - do not deny the world, but utopianly await its transformation, chanting divine beauty, love and femininity, which will certainly change reality. It was with the appearance of younger symbolists in the literary arena that the concept of symbol entered literature. Poets understand it as a multidimensional word that reflects the world of “heaven,” the spiritual essence and at the same time the “earthly kingdom.”

Symbolism during the Revolution

Poetry of the Russian Silver Age in 1905-1907. is undergoing changes. Most symbolists, focusing on the socio-political events taking place in the country, reconsider their views on the world and beauty. The latter is now understood as the chaos of struggle. Poets create images of a new world that replaces the dying one. V. Ya. Bryusov creates the poem “The Coming Huns”, A. Blok - “The Barge of Life”, “Rising from the Darkness of the Cellars...”, etc.

The symbolism also changes. Now she turns not to the ancient heritage, but to Russian folklore, as well as Slavic mythology. After the revolution, the Symbolists split into those who wanted to protect art from the revolutionary elements and, on the contrary, those who were actively interested in the social struggle. After 1907, the Symbolist debate exhausted itself and was replaced by imitation of the art of the past. And since 1910, Russian symbolism has been going through a crisis, clearly displaying its internal inconsistency.

Acmeism in Russian poetry

In 1911, N. S. Gumilyov organized a literary group - the “Workshop of Poets”. It included the poets O. Mandelstam, G. Ivanov and G. Adamovich. This new direction did not reject the surrounding reality, but accepted reality as it is, affirming its value. The "Workshop of Poets" began to publish its own magazine "Hyperborea", as well as publish works in "Apollo". Acmeism, which originated as a literary school to find a way out of the crisis of symbolism, united poets who were very different in their ideological and artistic attitudes.

Features of Russian futurism

The Silver Age in Russian poetry gave birth to another interesting trend called “futurism” (from the Latin futurum, that is, “future”). The search for new artistic forms in the works of the brothers N. and D. Burlyuk, N. S. Goncharova, N. Kulbin, M. V. Matyushin became a prerequisite for the emergence of this trend in Russia.

In 1910, the futuristic collection “The Fishing Tank of Judges” was published, which collected the works of such outstanding poets as V.V. Kamensky, V.V. Khlebnikov, the Burliuk brothers, E. Guro. These authors formed the core of the so-called Cubo-Futurists. Later V. Mayakovsky joined them. In December 1912, the almanac “A Slap in the Face of Public Taste” was published. The cubo-futurists' poems "Lesiny Bukh", "Dead Moon", "Roaring Parnassus", "Gag" became the subject of numerous disputes. At first they were perceived as a way to tease the reader's habits, but a closer reading revealed a keen desire to show a new vision of the world and a special social involvement. Anti-aestheticism turned into a rejection of soulless, fake beauty, the rudeness of expressions was transformed into the voice of the crowd.

Egofuturists

In addition to cubo-futurism, several other movements arose, including ego-futurism, led by I. Severyanin. He was joined by such poets as V. I. Gnezdov, I. V. Ignatiev, K. Olimpov and others. They created the publishing house “Petersburg Herald”, published magazines and almanacs with original titles: “Sky Diggers”, “Eagles over the Abyss” , “Zakhara Kry”, etc. Their poems were extravagant and were often composed of words they themselves created. In addition to the ego-futurists, there were two more groups: “Centrifuge” (B. L. Pasternak, N. N. Aseev, S. P. Bobrov) and “Mezzanine of Poetry” (R. Ivnev, S. M. Tretyakov, V. G. Sherenevich).

Instead of a conclusion

The Silver Age of Russian poetry was short-lived, but it united a galaxy of the brightest, talented poets. Many of them had tragic biographies, because by the will of fate they had to live and work in such a fatal time for the country, a turning point of revolutions and chaos of the post-revolutionary years, civil war, collapse of hopes and revival. Many poets died after tragic events (V. Khlebnikov, A. Blok), many emigrated (K. Balmont, Z. Gippius, I. Severyanin, M. Tsvetaeva), some committed suicide, were shot or perished in Stalin’s camps. But they all managed to make a huge contribution to Russian culture and enrich it with their expressive, colorful, original works.

Literature of the 20th century

“Our time is a bit difficult for the pen...”

V.V. Mayakovsky

“Not a single world literature of the 20th century, except Russian, knew such an extensive list of cultural masters who passed away untimely and early...”

V.A. Chalmaev

“The 20th century broke us all...”

M.I. Tsvetaeva

Historical situation in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century

The last years of the 19th century were turning points for Russian and Western cultures.. Since the 1890s. and until the October Revolution of 1917 literally every aspect of Russian life has changed, ranging from economics, politics and science, to technology, culture and art.

The new stage of historical and cultural development was incredibly dynamic and, at the same time, extremely dramatic. It can be said that At a turning point for Russia, Russia was ahead of other countries in the pace and depth of changes, as well as in the enormity of internal conflicts.

Revolutions

• Historical shocks in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century (in addition to global ones)

• First Russian Revolution

• February bourgeois-democratic revolution

• October Socialist Revolution

Nikolay Berdyaev (Russian religious and political philosopher)

“This was the era of the awakening of independent philosophical thought in Russia, the flowering of poetry and the intensification of aesthetic sensitivity, religious anxiety and quest, interest in mysticism and the occult.”

Nineteenth century

The fragments of superstitions fell into the dust,

Science has turned a dream into reality:

To steam, to telegraph, to phonograph, to telephone,

Understanding the composition of stars and the life of bacteria.

The ancient world led to eternal secrets;

The new world gave the mind power over nature;

Centuries of struggle crowned everyone with freedom.

All that remains is to combine knowledge with mystery.

We are nearing the end and a new era

Do not drown out the aspirations for a higher sphere .

(V.Bryusov)

Russian literature at the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries is called Silver Age .

(1895 – 1920)

"Beginning" of the Silver Age

• The beginning of the “Silver Age” of Russian poetry is considered article by D. Merezhkovsky “Symbols”.
• The father of the “term” is the Russian philosopher Nikolay Berdyaev, called the "Silver Age" reflection, revival of the “golden age” ».
• One of the most likely reasons is crisis of the era, tense historical situation.

Modernism is the general name for various movements in art of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which proclaimed a break with realism, a rejection of old forms and a search for new aesthetic principles.

At this time, the realistic era of Russian culture is replaced by modernist .

Modernism - the general name of different movements in art of the late 19th - early 20th centuries, which proclaimed a break with realism, a rejection of old forms and a search for new aesthetic principles.

All modernist movements are very different, have different ideals, pursue different goals, but they agree on one thing : work on the rhythm, on the word, to bring the play of sounds to perfection.

Literature of the early 20th century

modernism

imagism

symbolism

futurism

acmeism

Table "Silver Age"

Name + year

Representatives

Characteristics, traits

Symbolism

from gr. symbolon - “sign, symbol”.

1870-1920s

Symbolism as a movement arose in France in the 60-70s. 19th century .

The origins of Russian symbolism

France 1860-70s.

Charles Baudelaire

Arthur Rimbaud

Paul Verlaine

Stefan Mallarmé

Founder of Symbolism - Charles Baudelaire

Representatives

France 1860-70s.

F. Sologub

Z. Gippius

D. Merezhkovsky

K. Balmont

V. Bryusov

V. Ivanov

A. Bely

A. Blok

Features of symbolism

• Symbol - an image that has an unlimited number of meanings; it conveys not the objective essence of a phenomenon, but the poet’s individual idea of ​​the world; an image that demands from the reader co-creation .
• Art– this is not a depiction of reality, but “ understanding the world other, non-rational ways" (V.Ya. Bryusov) – through spiritual experience man and the creative intuition of the artist.
• The world is unknowable. Only lower forms of life can be rationally comprehended, and not “higher reality” (the area “ absolute ideas", "world soul")
• Antithesis of two worlds– real and ideal*
• Sound recording .
• Poetry gravitates to music . Musicality– the highest form of manifestation of sound.
• Color significance. Every color has a meaning.
• Questions about the fate of Russia.
• Ideal Eternal Femininity(philosophy of V. Solovyov).
• Love is an “unearthly” feeling, it cannot be experienced physically.
• Genres: sonnet, rondo

Acmeism

( from Greek аkme – “highest degree”,

“top”, “blooming”, “blooming time”)

Acmeism arose in Russia in the 1910s

Representatives of Acmeism

N. Gumilev

A. Akhmatova

O. Mandelstam

S. Gorodetsky

Features of Acmeism

• Acmeism stood out from symbolism and was his " opposition »
• Criticism of the vagueness of the symbolist language. Return to the material the world, the subject, the exact meaning of the word.
• Refusal of mystery, nebula, polysemy.
• The world is material, is objective, you need to look for values ​​in the world and capture them using accurate and understandable images .
• Cult " beautiful clarity »: poetry must be understandable, the images are clear.
• The precision of the details that create specific picture words " with more stable content »
• Main genre – madrigal- a short musical and poetic work, usually love-lyrical content .
• Love is an earthly feeling, and not “insight into other worlds.”

Futurism

(from Latin futurum - future)

1912-1916

Futurism was born in Italy

in the 1910-1915s.

Representatives of futurism

V. Mayakovsky

V. Kamensky

V. Khlebnikov

D. Burliuk

I. Severyanin

Features of futurism

• Refusal from traditional literature (" Abandon Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, etc. from the Steamship of Modernity").
• Denial of the past in the name of the present and the present - in the name of the future.
• Motive – aspiration to the future, destruction of the “old shackles” and standards, poetic cliches.
• Chanting technological progress, y urbanization
• Rebel poet, creator new reality. Courage, audacity.
• "Impatience" with the existing language, word creation, creating your own language. Sound has its meaning. The word turns into a sign.
• Sharp rejection of everyday life, as well as the “ordinary ancestry” of other poets.
• Literary experiments with genres, forms, poetic meters, etc.
• Metaphorization of reality. Shocking as a form of creativity.

Futurists' worldview

• Future world(“Budetlyans”) is the goal of life today.
• Chanting technological progress, industrial city
• Adoration before action, movement, speed, strength and aggression
• Poet - creator of the world, language .

K. Malevich. Grinder

From the manifesto:

We gave an example of a different sound and phrase: Hole, bul, schyl, Ubeshchur skoom you and boo r l ez(By the way, there is more Russian nationality in this five-line poem than in all of Pushkin’s poetry).

A. Kruchenykh’s poem is the first example of new poetry

Imagism

from English and fr. image - “image”

Image change arose in England, in the USA

(i.e. English-speaking countries).

* Image inism – in Russia .

Representatives of imagism

V. Shershenevich

S. Yesenin

A. Mariengof

Features of imagism

• The main goal of this movement was image of the world exactly like that what he really looked like .
• Proclaimed the intrinsic value of the poetic image as such
• Skill comes first create images correctly and beautifully, and not just words.

• Each the word is an image.
• « Eating" with an image of meaning, image is more important than meaning which he can carry. Creation - " catalog of images ».

• The main thing - metaphor .
• Performances against the politicization of art .
• Frequent genre - free verse, “free” from meter, rhythm, etc.

Beyond literary styles and directions

Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva

September 26 (October 8), 1892, Moscow, Russian Empire - August 31, 1941, Elabuga, USSR) - Russian poet, prose writer, translator, one of the largest Russian poets of the 20th century.

“Silver Age” of Russian poetry - this name has become stable to designate Russian poetry of the late 19th - early 20th centuries. It was given by analogy with the Golden Age - that’s what the beginning of the 19th century, Pushkin’s time, was called. There is an extensive literature about Russian poetry of the “Silver Age” - both domestic and foreign researchers have written a lot about it, including such prominent scientists as V. M. Zhirmunsky, V. Orlov, L. K. Dolgopolov, M. L . Gasparov, R. D. Timenchik, N. A. Bogomolov and many others. Numerous memoirs have been published about this era, for example, V. Mayakovsky (“On Parnassus of the Silver Age”), I. Odoevtseva (“On the Banks of the Neva”), three-volume memoirs of A. Bely; The book “Memories of the Silver Age” was published.

Russian poetry of the “Silver Age” was created in an atmosphere of general cultural upsurge. It is characteristic that at the same time such bright talents as A. Blok and V. Mayakovsky, A. Bely and V. Khodasevich could create in one country. This phenomenon was unique in the history of world literature.

Late XIX – early XX centuries. in Russia, this is a time of change, uncertainty and gloomy omens, this is a time of disappointment and a feeling of the approaching death of the existing socio-political system. All this could not but affect Russian poetry. The emergence of symbolism is connected with this.

Symbolism was a heterogeneous phenomenon, uniting in its ranks poets who held the most contradictory views. Some of the symbolists, such as N. Minsky, D. Merezhkovsky, began their creative career as representatives of civil poetry, and then began to focus on the ideas of “god-building” and the “religious community.” The “senior symbolists” sharply denied the surrounding reality and said “no” to the world:

I don't see our reality

I don't know our century...

(V. Ya. Bryusov)

Earthly life is only a “dream”, a “shadow”. The world of dreams and creativity is opposed to reality - a world where the individual gains complete freedom:

There is only one eternal commandment - to live.

In beauty, in beauty no matter what.

(D. Merezhkovsky)

Real life is portrayed as ugly, evil, boring and meaningless. The symbolists paid special attention to artistic innovation - the transformation of the meanings of the poetic word, the development of rhythm, rhyme, etc. “senior symbolists” have not yet created a system of symbols; they are impressionists who strive to convey the subtlest shades of moods and impressions. The word as such has lost its value for the Symbolists. It became valuable only as a sound, a musical note, as a link in the overall melodic structure of the poem.

A new period in the history of Russian symbolism (1901 – 1904) coincided with the beginning of a new revolutionary upsurge in Russia. Pessimistic sentiments inspired by the era of reaction of the 1980s - early 1890s. and the philosophy of A. Schopenhauer, give way to premonitions of “unheard-of changes.” “Younger Symbolists” - followers of the idealist philosopher and poet Vl. - are entering the literary arena. Solovyov, who imagined that the old world is on the verge of complete destruction, that divine Beauty (Eternal Femininity, the Soul of the World) is entering the world, which must “save the world”, connecting the heavenly (divine) beginning of life with the earthly, material, creating the “kingdom of God on earth":

Know this: Eternal Femininity is now

In an incorruptible body he goes to earth.

In the unfading light of the new goddess

The sky merged with the abyss of water.

(Vl. Soloviev)

They are especially attracted to love - starting with voluptuousness and ending with romantic longing for the Beautiful Lady, Mistress, Eternal Femininity, Stranger... Symbolist poets also love landscape, but not as such, but as a means to reveal their mood. That is why so often in their poems there is a Russian, languidly sad autumn, when there is no sun, and if there is, then with sad faded rays, falling leaves quietly rustle, everything is shrouded in the haze of a slightly swaying fog. The favorite motif of the “younger symbolists” is the city. A city is a living creature with a special form, a special character, often it is a “Vampire City”, “Octopus”, a satanic obsession, a place of madness, horror; the city is a symbol of soullessness and vice (Blok, Sologub, Bely, S. Solovyov, to a large extent Bryusov).

The years of the first Russian revolution (1905 - 1907) again significantly changed the face of Russian symbolism. Most poets respond to revolutionary events. Blok creates images of people of the new, popular world. V. Ya. Bryusov writes the famous poem “The Coming Huns,” where he glorifies the inevitable end of the old world, to which, however, he includes himself and all the people of the old, dying culture. During the years of the revolution, F. K. Sologub created a book of poems “To the Motherland” (1906), K. D. Balmont created a collection “Songs of the Avenger” (1907), published in Paris and banned in Russia, etc.

Even more important is that the years of revolution restructured the symbolic artistic understanding of the world. If earlier Beauty was understood as harmony, now it is associated with the chaos of struggle, with the elements of the people. Individualism is replaced by the search for a new personality, in which the flourishing of the “I” is associated with the life of the people. The symbolism is also changing: previously associated mainly with the Christian, ancient, medieval and romantic traditions, now it turns to the heritage of the ancient “national” myth (V. I. Ivanov), to Russian folklore and Slavic mythology (A. Blok, M. M . Gorodetsky) The mood of the symbol also becomes different. Its earthly meanings play an increasingly important role in it: social, political, historical.

By the end of the first decade of the twentieth century, symbolism as a school was in decline. Individual works of Symbolist poets appear, but his influence as a school has been lost. Everything young, viable, vigorous is already outside of him. Symbolism no longer gives new names.

Symbolism has outlived itself, and this obsolescence has gone in two directions. On the one hand, the requirement of mandatory “mysticism”, “revelation of secrets”, “comprehension” of the infinite in the finite led to the loss of the authenticity of poetry; The “religious and mystical pathos” of the luminaries of symbolism turned out to be replaced by a kind of mystical stencil, template. On the other hand, the fascination with the “musical basis” of verse led to the creation of poetry devoid of any logical meaning, in which the word was reduced to the role of no longer a musical sound, but a tin, ringing trinket.

Accordingly, the reaction against symbolism, and subsequently the fight against it, followed the same two main lines.

On the one hand, the “Acmeists” opposed the ideology of symbolism. On the other hand, “futurists” who were also ideologically hostile to symbolism came out in defense of the word as such.

I will find a different soul,

Everything that was teased, caught.

I will bless the golden one

The road to the sun from the worm.

(N.S. Gumilev).

And the cuckoo clock of the night is happy,

Their clear conversation can be heard more and more.

I look through the crack: horse thieves

They light a fire under the hill.

(A. A. Akhmatova).

But I love the casino on the dunes,

Wide view through a foggy window

And a thin ray on the crumpled tablecloth.

(O. E. Mandelstam).

These three poets, as well as S. M. Gorodetsky, M. A. Zenkevich, V. I. Naburt, in the same year called themselves acmeists (from the Greek akme - the highest degree of something, a blooming time). Acceptance of the earthly world in its visible concreteness, a keen look at the details of existence, a living and immediate sense of nature, culture, the universe and the material world, the thought of the equality of all things - this is what united all six at that time. Almost all of them had previously been trained by the masters of symbolism, but at some point they decided to reject the typical symbolists’ aspiration to “other worlds” and disdain for earthly, objective reality.

A distinctive feature of the poetry of Acmeism is its material reality, objectivity. Acmeism loved things with the same passionate, selfless love as symbolism loved “correspondences,” mysticism, mystery. Everything in life was clear to him. To a large extent, it was the same aestheticism as symbolism, and in this respect it is undoubtedly in continuity with it, but the aestheticism of Acmeism is of a different order than the aestheticism of symbolism.

The Acmeists liked to derive their genealogy from the symbolist In. Annensky, and in this they are undoubtedly right. In. Annensky stood apart among the Symbolists. Having paid tribute to early decadence and its moods, he almost did not reflect in his work the ideology of late Moscow symbolism, while Balmont, and after him many other symbolist poets, got lost in the “verbal balancing act,” as A. Bely aptly put it , choked in the stream of formlessness and “spirit of music” that flooded symbolic poetry, he found the strength to take a different path. Poetry In. Annensky marked a revolution from the spirit of music and aesthetic mysticism to simplicity, conciseness and clarity of verse, to the earthly reality of themes.

The clarity and simplicity of the construction of the verse of John. Annensky was well adopted by the Acmeists. Their verse acquired clarity of outline, logical force and material weight. Acmeism was a sharp and definite turn of Russian poetry of the twentieth century towards classicism. But it is only a turn, and not a completion - this must be kept in mind all the time, since Acmeism still carried in itself many features of romantic symbolism that had not yet been completely eliminated.

The skill of the Acmeists, in contrast to the ardor and expression of the best achievements of symbolism, bore a touch of some kind of self-contained, sophisticated aristocracy, most often (with the exception of the poetry of Akhmatova, Narbut and Gorodetsky) cold, calm and dispassionate.

Among the Acmeists, the cult of Théophile Gautier was especially developed, and his poem “Art,” which begins with the words “Art is the more beautiful the more dispassionate the material taken,” sounded like a kind of poetic program for the older generation of the “Workshop of Poets.”

Just like symbolism, acmeism has absorbed many different influences, and various groups have emerged among it.

What united all the Acmeists was their love for the objective, real world - not for life and its manifestations, but for objects, for things.

First of all, we see among the Acmeists poets, whose attitude towards the objects around them and admiring them bears the stamp of the same romanticism. This romanticism, however, is not mystical, but objective, and this is its fundamental difference from symbolism. Such is Gumilev’s exotic position with Africa, Niger, the Suez Canal, marble grottoes, giraffes and elephants, Persian miniatures and the Parthenon, bathed in the rays of the setting sun... Gumilev is in love with these exotic objects of the surrounding world, but this love is thoroughly romantic. Objectivity took the place of the mysticism of symbolism in his work. It is characteristic that in the last period of his work, in such things as “The Lost Tram”, “Drunken Dervish”, “The Sixth Sense” he again becomes close to symbolism.

In the external fate of Russian futurism there is something reminiscent of the fate of Russian symbolism. The same furious non-recognition at the first steps, the noise at birth (for the futurists only much stronger, turning into a scandal). The rapid recognition of the advanced layers of literary criticism following this, a triumph, enormous hopes. A sudden breakdown and fall into the abyss at a moment when there seemed to be unprecedented possibilities and horizons in Russian poetry.

There is undoubtedly a significant external influence of futurism (in particular Mayakovsky) on the form of proletarian poetry in the first years of its existence. But there is also no doubt that futurism could not bear the weight of the tasks assigned to it and completely collapsed under the blows of the revolution. The fact that the work of several futurists - Mayakovsky, Aseev and Tretyakov - in recent years has been imbued with revolutionary ideology speaks only of the revolutionary nature of these individual poets: having become singers of the revolution, these poets have lost their futuristic essence to a significant extent, and futurism as a whole is not affected by this became closer to the revolution, just as symbolism and acmeism did not become revolutionary because Bryusov, Sergei Gorodetsky and Vladimir Narbut became members of the RCP and singers of the revolution, or because almost every symbolist poet wrote one or more revolutionary poems.

At its core, Russian futurism was a poetic movement. In this sense, he is a logical link in the chain of those movements of poetry of the twentieth century that placed aesthetic problems at the forefront of their theory and poetic creativity. Futurism had a strong rebellious formal-revolutionary element, which caused a storm of indignation and “shocked the bourgeoisie.” But this “shocking” was a phenomenon of the same order as the “shocking” that the decadents caused in their time. In the “rebellion” itself, in the “shocking of the bourgeoisie”, in the scandalous cries of the futurists there were more aesthetic emotions than revolutionary emotions.

The starting point of the technical quest of the futurists is the dynamics of modern life, its rapid pace, the desire for maximum cost savings, “an aversion to a curved line, to a spiral, to a turnstile, a penchant for a straight line. Aversion to slowness, to trifles, to long-winded analyzes and explanations. Love of speed, of abbreviation, of summarizing and of synthesis: “Tell me quickly in a nutshell!” Hence the destruction of generally accepted syntax, the introduction of “wireless imagination,” that is, “absolute freedom of images or analogies expressed in liberated words, without the wires of syntax and without any punctuation marks,” “condensed metaphors,” “telegraphic images,” “movements in two, three , four and five tempos”, the destruction of qualitative adjectives, the use of verbs in the indefinite mood and so on - in a word, everything aimed at brevity and increasing the “speed of style”.

The main aspiration of Russian “Cubo-Futurism” is a reaction against the “music of verse” of symbolism in the name of the intrinsic value of the word, but the word not as a weapon for expressing a certain logical thought, as was the case with the classical poets and the Acmeists, but the word as such, as an end in itself. Combined with the recognition of the absolute individualism of the poet (the futurists attached great importance even to the poet’s handwriting and published handwritten lithographic books, and with the recognition of the role of the “creator of myth” in the word, this aspiration gave rise to unprecedented word creation, which ultimately led to the theory of “absentient language.” For example serves as the sensational poem by Kruchenykh: “Dyr, bul, schyl, ubeschur skum vy so bu, r l ez”).

Word creation was the greatest achievement of Russian futurism, its central point. In contrast to Marinetti’s futurism, Russian “Cubo-Futurism”, represented by its most prominent representatives, had little connection with the city and modernity. The same romantic element was very strong in him.

It was reflected in the sweet, half-childish, gentle cooing of Elena Guro, for whom the “terrible” word “cubo-futurist” suits so little, and in the early works of N. Aseev, and in the rollicking Volga prowess and ringing sunshine of V. Kamensky, and the gloomy “spring after death” by Churilin, but especially strongly by V. Khlebnikov. It is even difficult to connect Khlebnikov with Western futurism. He himself persistently replaced the word “futurism” with the word “Budetlyans”. Like the Russian symbolists, he (like Kamensky, Churilin and Bozhidar) absorbed the influence of previous Russian poetry, but not the mystical poetry of Tyutchev and Vl. Solovyov, and the poetry of “The Tale of Igor’s Campaign” and the Russian epic. Even the events of the most immediate, close modern times - the war and the New Economic Policy - are reflected in Khlebnikov’s work not in futuristic poems, as in “1915.” Aseev, and in the wonderful “Combat” and “Oh, fellows, merchants,” romantically stylized in the ancient Russian spirit.

However, Russian futurism was not limited to “word creation” alone. Along with the current created by Khlebnikov, there were other elements in it. More suitable for the concept of “futurism”, making Russian futurism related to its Western counterpart.

Before talking about this movement, it is necessary to single out another type of Russian futurism into a special group - the “Ego-Futurists”, who performed in St. Petersburg somewhat earlier than the Moscow “Cubo-Futurists”. At the head of this movement were I. Severyanin, V. Gnedov, I. Ignatieva, K. Olimpov, G. Ivanov (later an Acmeist) and the future founder of “imagism” V. Shershenevich.

“Egofuturism” essentially had very little in common with futurism. This trend was some kind of mixture of the epigonism of early St. Petersburg decadence, bringing to limitless limits the “songability” and “musicality” of Balmont’s verse (as you know, Severyanin did not recite, but sang his poems at “poetry concerts”), some kind of salon-perfumery eroticism , turning into slight cynicism, and the assertion of extreme egocentrism (“Egoism is individualization, awareness, admiration and praise of the “I” ... “Egofuturism is the constant striving of every egoist to achieve the future in the present.”). This was combined with the glorification of the modern city, electricity, railways, airplanes, factories, cars borrowed from Marinetti (from Severyanin and especially from Shershenevich). “Egofuturism, therefore, had everything: echoes of modernity, and new, albeit timid, word creation (“poetry”, “overwhelm”, “mediocrity”, “olilien” and so on), and successfully found new rhythms for conveying the measured sway of car springs (“Elegant Stroller” by Severyanin), and a strange admiration for a futurist for the salon poems of M. Lokhvitskaya and K. Fofanov, but most of all, a love for restaurants, boudoirs, cafes, which became Severyanin’s native element. Apart from Igor Severyanin (who soon, however, abandoned ego-futurism), this movement did not produce a single poet of any brilliance.

Much closer to the West than the futurism of Khlebnikov and the “ego-futurism” of Severyanin was the bias of Russian futurism, revealed in the work of Mayakovsky, the last period of Aseev and Sergei Tretyakov. Adopting in the field of technology the free form of verse, new syntax and bold assonances instead of the strict rhymes of Khlebnikov, paying a well-known, sometimes significant tribute to word creation, this group of poets gave in their work some elements of a truly new ideology. Their work reflected the dynamics, enormous scope and titanic power of the modern industrial city with its noise, noise, noise, glowing lights of factories, street bustle, restaurants, crowds of moving masses.

In recent years, Mayakovsky and some other futurists have been freed from hysteria and stress. Mayakovsky writes his “orders”, in which everything is cheerfulness, strength, calls to fight, reaching the point of aggressiveness. This mood resulted in 1923 in the declaration of the newly organized group “LEF” (“Left Front of Art”).

Not only ideologically, but also technically, all of Mayakovsky’s work (with the exception of his first years), as well as the last period of the work of Aseev and Tretyakov, is already a way out of futurism, an entry into the path of a kind of neorealism. Mayakovsky, who began under the undoubted influence of Whitman, in the last period developed very special techniques, creating a unique poster-hyperbolic style, restless, shouting short verse, sloppy, “torn lines”, very successfully found to convey the rhythm and huge scope of the modern city, war, movements of millions of revolutionary masses. This is a great achievement of Mayakovsky, who has outgrown futurism, and it is quite natural that Mayakovsky’s technical techniques had a significant influence on the proletarian poetry of the first years of its existence, that is, precisely the period when proletarian poets fixed their attention on the motives of the revolutionary struggle.

The last school of any noticeable sensation in Russian poetry of the twentieth century was imagism. This movement was created in 1919 (the first “Declaration” of Imagism was dated January 30), therefore, two years after the revolution, but in its ideology this movement had nothing in common with the revolution.

The head of the “imaginists” was Vadim Shershenevich, a poet who began with symbolism, with poems imitating Balmont, Kuzmin and Blok, in 1912 who acted as one of the leaders of ego-futurism and wrote “poets” in the spirit of Severyanin and only in the post-revolutionary years created his own “ imagist poetry.

Just like symbolism and futurism, imagism originated in the West and only from there was transplanted to Russian soil by Shershenevich. And just like symbolism and futurism, it differed significantly from the imagism of Western poets.

Imagism was a reaction both against the musicality of the poetry of symbolism and against the materiality of acmeism and the word-creation of futurism. He rejected all content and ideology in poetry, putting the image at the forefront. He was proud that he “had no philosophy” and “no logic of thought.”

The Imagists connected their apology for the image with the fast pace of modern life. In their opinion, the image is the clearest, most concise, most appropriate to the age of cars, radio telegraphs, and airplanes. “What is an image? - the shortest distance at the highest speed.” In the name of “speed” of conveying artistic emotions, imagists, following the futurists, break syntax, throw out epithets, definitions, prepositions, and predicates.

Essentially, there was nothing particularly new in the techniques. “Imagism” as one of the techniques of artistic creativity was widely used not only by futurism, but also by symbolism (for example, in Innokenty Annensky: “Spring has not yet ruled, but the snow cup has been drunk by the sun” or in Mayakovsky: “The bald lantern voluptuously removed a black stocking from the street "). What was new was only the tenacity with which the Imagists brought the image to the fore and reduced everything in poetry to it - both content and form.

Along with poets associated with certain schools, Russian poetry of the twentieth century produced a significant number of poets who were not affiliated with them or who were affiliated for some time, but did not merge with them and ultimately went their own way.

The fascination of Russian symbolism with the past - the 18th century - and the love of stylization were reflected in the work of M. Kuzmin, the fascination with the romantic 20s and 30s - in the sweet intimacy and coziness of samovars and ancient corners of Boris Sadovsky. The same passion for “stylization” underlies the oriental poetry of Konstantin Lipskerov, Marieta Shaginyan and in the biblical sonnets of Georgy Shengeli, in the sapphic stanzas of Sofia Parnok and the subtle stylized sonnets from the “Pleiades” cycle by Leonid Grossman.

Passion for Slavicisms and the Old Russian song style, craving for “artistic folklore” noted above as a characteristic moment of Russian symbolism, reflected in the sectarian motifs of A. Dobrolyubov and Balmont, in the popular prints of Sologub and in the ditties of V. Bryusov, in the Old Slavic stylizations of V. Ivanov and throughout the entire first period of S. Gorodetsky’s work, - the poetry of Love of the Capital, Marina Tsvetaeva and Pimen Karpov fills the poetry. It is also easy to catch the echo of Symbolist poetry in the hysterically expressive, nervous and sloppy, but powerfully written lines of Ilya Ehrenburg, a poet who in the first period of his work was also a member of the Symbolists.

The poetry of I. Bunin occupies a special place in Russian lyricism of the twentieth century. Starting with lyrical poems written under the influence of Fet, which are unique examples of a realistic representation of the Russian village and a poor landowner's estate, in the later period of his work Bunin became a great master of verse and created poems that were beautiful in form, classically clear, but somewhat cold, reminiscent of , - as he himself characterizes his work, - a sonnet carved on a snowy peak with a steel blade. V. Komarovsky, who died early, is close to Bunin in restraint, clarity and some coldness.

Around 1910, when the bankruptcy of the Symbolist school was discovered, a reaction against Symbolism began. Above, two lines were outlined along which the main forces of this reaction were directed - Acmeism and Futurism. However, the protest against symbolism did not stop there. It found its expression in the work of poets who were not affiliated with either Acmeism or Futurism, but who through their creativity defended the clarity, simplicity and strength of the poetic style.

Despite the conflicting views of many critics, each of the listed movements has produced many excellent poems that will forever remain in the treasury of Russian poetry and will find their admirers among subsequent generations.