Russian poetry and Rembrandt

[Alexandra Smith]

Dear Otto,

In addition to Olga Meerson's suggestion to look at Mandelshtam's poem
"Kak svetoteni muchenik Rembrandt" (1937) (see Nadezhda Mandelshtam's
comment on its autobiographical and prophetic qualities), I would like
to add to your list of texts Akhmatova's poem "I prekrasnei mrakov
Rembrandta/Prosto plesen' v chernom uglu..." (1954); Kushner's
collection of poems "Nochnoi dozor" (inspired by Rembrandt as Kushner
revealed in several interviews); and Aleksander Kochetkov's one-act
play about Rembrandt -- "Golova gomera"; Dmitrii Kedrin's play  
(written in verse) "Rembrandt" (1940)... Vladimir Narbut was very much  
inspired by Rembrandt's paintings, too, but I don't remeber any  
specific references at this point; Nikolai Otsup wrote in his long  
narrative poem about his  meeting with Annensky in a study compared to  
Rembrandt's paintings (na sumrak Rembrandta pokhozhii...)(Otsup, 1993:  
it's the edition that was prepared by Roman Timenchik)... Pavel  
Antokol'skii was often compared to Rembrandt but I don't remember  
whether his collection of poems "Nochnoi smotr" (1974, I think) has  
any specific references to Rembrandt, it contains allusions to  
Zhukovsky, of course, but there might be something  that evokes  
Rembrandt's works ... and, of course, Nikolai Zabolotsky was always  
very sensitive to paintings. You might wish to have a look at his poem  
"Gomborskii les" (1957) which includes the lines: "Zdes' osen' sumela  
takie passazhi/ Naliapat' iz okhry, ognia i belil, /Chtob dub  
busheval, kak Rembrandt v Ermitazhe, /A klen, akak Muril'o, na  
kryl'iakh paril"."
Good luck with your fascinating project!

All best,
Sasha Smith


=====================================
Alexandra Smith (PhD, University of London)
Lecturer in Russian
School of European Languages and Cultures
The University of Edinburgh
David Hume Tower
George Square
Edinburgh EX8 9JX
UK

tel. +44-(0)131-6511381
fax: +44- (0)131- 650-3604
e-mail: Alexandra.Smith at ed.ac.uk

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