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Biographies / Home / Table of Contents / Famous Namesakes / Joseph Brodsky Names / Patronymic names / First name and patronymic / Tests / Events Joseph Alexandrovich Brodsky biography
I seemed cheerful from the outside,
And inside he was already dead for a long time
Joseph Alexandrovich Brodsky is a Russian poet,novelist, essayist, translator, author of plays; he also wrote in English.
The zodiac sign is Gemini.
Joseph Alexandrovich Brodsky was born on May 24, 1940 in Leningrad.
In 1972, the poet emigrated to the United States.
In poems (collections "Stop in the desert", 1967, "The End of the Beautiful Era", "Part of Speech", both 1972, "Urania", 1987), the understanding of the world as a single metaphysical and cultural whole.
The distinctive features of the style are rigidity and hidden pathos, irony and fracture (early Brodsky), meditativeness, realized through an appeal to complicated associative images, cultural reminiscences (sometimes leading to the tightness of the poetic space).
Essays, short stories, plays, translations.
Nobel Prize (1987), Knight of the Legion of Honor (1987), winner of the Oxford Honori Causa Prize.
The significance of the work of Joseph Brodsky Striving for bilingualism, Joseph Brodsky also wrote essays, literary criticism, and poems in English.
Brodsky managed to expand the possibilities of the Russian poetic language.
The poet's artistic world is universal.
In his style, they see the influence of Baroque, neoclassicism, acmeism, English metaphysical poetry, underground, postmodernism.
The very existence of this person has become the embodiment of intellectual and moral opposition to lies, cultural degradation.
Initially, because of the process of "parasitism", Brodsky became a kind of a household name of an independent artist who resisted the generally accepted hypocrisy and violence both at home and outside it.
Until 1987, in the USSR, he was actually a poet for "initiates": keeping his poems at home was not only considered reprehensible, but was punishable, nevertheless, his poems were distributed in a way tested in Soviet times — with the help of Samizdat.
International fame came to the poet after the publication of his first collection in the West in 1965.
In the USSR, until 1987, Joseph Brodsky was practically not published.
Some of Brodsky's lines are well known as aphorisms of the formula: "Death is what happens to others" or " But until my mouth is filled with clay, only gratitude will come out of it."
The world of Brodsky's creations reflected the consciousness of a significant intellectual group of immigrants from Russia, and in general, people of the" exodus", living on the verge of two worlds, in the words of V. Uflyand, "Brodsky humanity": these new wanderers, as if continuing the fate of romantic wanderers, are like a kind of connective tissue of different cultures, languages, worldviews, perhaps on the way to a universal person of the future.
The early years of Joseph Brodsky Joseph Brodsky was born in an ordinary intelligent family.
His father, Alexander Ivanovich Brodsky, graduated from the geographical faculty of Leningrad University and the School of Red Journalists.
He spent the entire war as a photojournalist (from 1940 in Finland to 1948 in China).
In 1950, as part of the" purge " of the officer corps from persons of Jewish nationality, he was demobilized, interrupted by small notes and photographed for departmental multi runs.
Mother, Maria Moiseevna Volpert, worked as an accountant all her life.
As a teenager, Joseph Brodsky left school after the 8th grade; as later, he could not put up with state imposed hypocrisy, evil; not that he fought against them, but he was eliminated from participation ("I am not a soloist, but I am alien to the ensemble.
/ Taking the mouthpiece out of my pipe, I burn my uniform and break my saber").
At the age of 15, Brodsky joined the factory.
I have changed many professions: he worked both in the morgue and in geological parties.
He was engaged in self education, studied English and Polish.
Since 1957, he began to write poems, performed their reading in public.
Contemporaries remembered his innovative poems in terms of content and intonation of "singing" ("The Jewish cemetery near Leningrad...").
The first translation works of Brodsky belong to the early 1960s.
Anna Akhmatova highly appreciated the talent of the young poet, became one of his spiritual mentors.
Brodsky, rejected by official circles, becomes famous in literary circles, among the intellectual underground; but he never belongs to any group, is not associated with dissidence.
Large (poems "Guest", "Petersburg Novel", "Procession", "Zofia", "Hills", "Isaac and Abraham") and small forms equally attract the poet.
On huge poetic spaces, Joseph Brodsky works out a sophisticated mastery of the means of modern poetry (virtuosity in metrics, rhythm, rhyme) with the structural refinement, external restraint, and irony characteristic of the St. Petersburg style.
Brodsky wrote: "God is in each of us" and was proud that he actually re introduced the word soul into Russian poetry.
Independence, the then unheard of spirit of freedom and the appeal to biblical values, despite the absence of "anti Soviet" in his work, attract the negative attention of the authorities to him.
Several times, starting in 1959, Brodsky was interrogated by the KGB.
Court.
The exile of Joseph Brodsky, the poet was interrupted by casual earnings; he was also supported by friends.
Until 1972, only 11 of his poems were published in his homeland in the third issue of the Moscow Samizdat hectographed magazine "Syntax" and local Leningrad newspapers, as well as translation works under the surname of Brodsky or under a pseudonym.
Joseph Brodsky traveled a lot around the country with geologists and friends, saw the former USSR.
The free "extra legal" existence was overshadowed by three short term arrests (one in the case of Shakhmatov Ukhtomsky about the hijacking of an airplane).
In the 1960s, there was a tense struggle between the authorities and the intelligentsia, and Brodsky, unwittingly, found himself in the center of this confrontation.
At the end of 1963, he took refuge in Moscow; he tried to "hide" in a psychiatric hospital, but escaped from there.
Brodsky was arrested in Leningrad on February 12, 1964.
The poet was "chosen" as the central figure for the demonstration trial on charges of parasitism.
Symptomatic articles appeared in the press: "A near literary drone", "A parasite is paid tribute to".
Brodsky was found sane after being forcibly placed in a hospital for a forensic psychiatric examination.
On March 13, 1964, the trial of the poet took place, the course of which was recorded by Frida Vigdorova(thanks to her recordings, the trial of Brodsky became the property of the world community).
Akhmatova, Marshak, Shostakovich, Sartre stood up for the poet.
Akhmatova's words about the trial: "What a biography is being made for our redhead!" turned out to be prophetic.
The trial of Brodsky made his name universally famous and even a household name.
The simple and courageous words uttered by him were picked up and retold like a legend.
Brodsky was sentenced to a five year exile in the Arkhangelsk region ("with mandatory involvement in physical labor").
He stayed in the village of Norenskaya from the spring of 1964 to the fall of 1965.
Thanks to the protests of the world community, the poet was released early.
His talent and spirit are in exile ("the main thing is not to change...
I have accelerated too far, and I will never stop until I die").we got stronger and reached a new level.
Joseph Brodsky studied world literature, English poetry in the originals, wrote a lot.
In addition to a large body of scattered poems, the cycle "Songs of a Happy Winter", poems and "big poems" (the main ones, according to the poet's definition), such as "Farewell Ode", "Winter has come and everyone who could fly...", "A letter in a bottle", "New stanzas for August", "Two hours in a tank", are mainly created here.
However, all this was published later, abroad.
First publications.
After the exile, Brodsky, who returned from exile to Leningrad, was not re registered in the "one and a half rooms" that his parents occupied in a communal apartment.
Only after repeated petitions (Dmitry Shostakovich also worked for him) was Brodsky allowed to settle in his hometown legally.
The poet continued to work, but still his poems could not appear in official publications.
Funds for life were provided only by transfers, supported by friends and acquaintances.
A growing sense of alienation, humiliation and despair "lack of demand", of course, was reflected in the works: in verse "It's about spilled milk", "Goodbye, miss Veronica" (1967), Stanza (1968), "the End of a great era" (1969), "Autumn is kicking me out of the Park" (1970), "Letter to General Z." in the poem about the life and death of the best parts of the soul in the madhouse of reality "Gorbunov and Gorchakov" (1968).
With the publication of poems abroad (collections of "Poems".
Washington New York, 1965; "A Stop in the Desert".
New York, 1970) the situation of Joseph Brodsky in the USSR is complicated.
The theme of loss becomes end to end: the first poem in the Collection of his works in 1957 is called " Goodbye..."; numerous poems "on the death of the poet", starting with "In memory of Baratynsky" (1961), "On the death of Robert Frost" (1963), "...T. S. Eliot" (1965); philosophical elegies epitaphs — "In Memory of T. V.", poems about separation, like "Singing without music", "Bobo's Funeral", "I visited the ashes", "1972".
Endowed with the gift of seeing life in everything, he was acutely aware of the tragic "finiteness" of existence.
It is not by chance that the collection of 1964-1971 was named after the poem "The End of the Beautiful Era" (Ardis, 1977).
Mostly from the works of this time, Brodsky himself compiled a unique book of lyrics addressed to one addressee, " New Stanzas for August.
Lyrics to M. B.".
The main body of Brodsky's poems, written before his departure, was published abroad (1965).
The efforts of friends and researchers (primarily V. Marasino and M. Meylaha) in Russia was made before 1972, admitted into the official seal of the four volume collection of his writings (the fifth volume not finished) with a review of the texts and variants.
During this period, the defining features of Brodsky's style were formed: highly concentrated content in a perfect poetic form; a tragic method of cognition and artistic reflection; innovative metaphorics; intellectualism of poetry, philosophy, references to literature and related arts (cinema, architecture, painting, music).
Brodsky can be considered a classic of Russian verse.
The range of topics of his work is wide, and in the variety of genre directions and angles, it seems that only the engagement and conformism of "Soviet poetry"are absent.
With the end of the political "thaw", the poet's position in the Brezhnev era became more hopeless, more dangerous; he was increasingly pushed to emigrate.
Just before leaving, summarizing the results, Joseph Brodsky creates several top works of his philosophical lyrics: "Candlemas", "Letters to a Roman friend","Butterfly".
He did not want to leave Russia; however, he had no other choice.
In a letter to Brezhnev, imbued with confidence in returning to his homeland, he writes: "in the flesh or on paper:...even if my people do not need my body, my soul will still be useful to them... "
Emigration.
1972-1979 On June 4, 1972, the emigrant period of the poet's life and work began, which gave new incentives to poetic creativity.
Joseph Brodsky first landed in Vienna.
He was met by an old friend, publisher Karl Proffer, who for many years headed the publishing house "Ardis".
Brodsky's meeting with W. H. Auden became a milestone for the Russian poet.
In the same year, Brodsky settled in the United States, got a job for the first time — taught at various universities (such as the University of Michigan, South Hadley Mount Holyoke College, Ann Arbor, etc.).
New collections of the poet are published, containing not only what has already been created, but the first translations of his poems into English (Selected Poems.
New York, 1973) and new essays (Part of Speech.
Poems 1972-76.
Ardis, 1977; A Part of Speech, N. Y. Farror, Straus Giroux, 1980, New Stanzas for August.
Poems to M. B. 1962-82.
Ardis, 1983).
The role of the publishing house "Ardis"is undoubtedly great in the fact that these poems were published.
In 1978, Joseph Brodsky underwent his first heart operation, after which new poems did not appear for a whole year.
The periods of youthful, absorbing everything valuable from the poetic treasury, "romanticism", and the verbose poetic flow "baroque in the context of neoclassicism" are left behind.
For a poet, life outside the elements of his native language (even if outwardly much more prosperous) is always a tragedy.
New qualities corrode and at the same time enrich Brodsky's manner: this is a concentrated figurative emblematics, a complex metaphor, manifested primarily in the cycle "Part of speech": "From nowhere with love, nadtsaty Mart... facial features, frankly speaking , I canot remember already, not yours, but / and no one's best friend...".
Since the late 1970s, Joseph Brodsky has been mastering new genres for himself: essay studies and literary criticism, he begins to write in English — the first collection of his prose was the American critics ' award winning Less Than One: Selected Essays (1986).
In such essays as "Less than One" (which gave the name to the entire collection), "In one and a half rooms", the poet, starting from his autobiography, creates a portrait of a generation.
It is printed in The New Yorker, "New York Review of Books", and participates in conferences, symposia, has traveled the world, what is reflected in the expansion of the "geography" of his work, imbued with the joy of exploration of new horizons, bitterness, nostalgia, looking for the meaning of existence, on the brink of nothingness and freedom: "the Rotterdam diary", "the Lithuanian Nocturne", "Laguna" (1973), "Twenty sonnets to Mary Stuart," "the Thames in Chelsea" (1974), "lullaby of Cape cod", "Mexican Divertissement" (1975), "December in Florence" (1976), "Fifth anniversary", "San Pietro", "In England" (1977).
The path to world fame the fortieth anniversary of the poet feels like an important milestone; the outcome "I walked instead of a wild animal in a cage..." he confirms stoic, courageous acceptance of the whole experience of life lived, with its loss of blows.
In 1980, Joseph Brodsky received American citizenship.
Since the early 1980s, he has become not only a significant figure of the Russian poetic abroad, but increasingly, thanks to English language prose, a world famous writer.
Convinced of the great purifying, creative power of poetry, Brodsky fights for " collections of poems to lie by the bed next to aspirin and the Bible."
With the moral and artistic power of his work, Joseph Brodsky opposes the world's Evil (according to some researchers, "Language", "Time" and "Evil" are the main themes of the poet).
The invasions of Soviet troops in Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan become reasons for allegorical and there are no violent poetic protests, full of shame and rage poems of 1968 and epic "Poems about the Winter Campaign of 1980".
But Brodsky still attracts philosophical lyrics: "Roman elegies" (1981), "Venetian stanzas" (1982), "Sitting in the shadows" (1983), "In the mountains", "the exhibition Karl Malinka" (1984), "the Fly" (1985), "a Warning", "Aria", "To a chair" (1987), "a New life", "the Centaurs" (1988).
Vocabulary Joseph Brodsky constantly enriched, this period is characterized by a peculiar amalgam spoken, bureaucratic, "thieves", "high" styles coming together in a new level of linguistic layers: archaic, dialect, slang camp, special scientific terms.
This polyphony reflects the content ambivalence, paradoxicity, semantic richness ("Representation", 1986).
Brodsky's poetic speech is characterized by allegory, metaphorical richness, genre diversity: from poems "in case", miniatures, to giant epic canvases, various forms of the novel in verse and poems,"big poems".
The collection of poems to one addressee — "New Stanzas for August" - expanded the scale of lyrical poetry.
He becomes a true master of stylizations, literary translation (works of English metaphysical poets, K. Cavafy, U. Saba, C. Milos ).
The poet Joseph Brodsky remains true to his world and his leading themes.
"The autumn cry of a hawk", rising above the ordinary to the upper valleys and paying for it with glaciation and death, "answers" the early "Great Elegy to John Donne".
The theme of constant separation continues "On the death of a friend";
"In memory of Gennady Shmakov", "In Memory of my father", the Christmas cycle, stretching through the years, continues in "Lagoon", "Flight to Egypt"; features of Baroque poetry are also evident in the later poems, philosophical, eschatological intonation sounds in "Notes of a fern", "Clouds", "Fin de siecle", "View from a hill", "Portrait of a tragedy" (1988-1992); philosophical dualism and fantastic irony of the play "Marble" develops the problems of "Gorchakov and Gorbunov".
Brodsky's mother and father, who for many years had been trying to get permission to travel abroad without receiving it, die in Leningrad without seeing their son.
The death of the parents for the poet is a blow to childhood and the basics of life, a blow to the main tool of the poet, his native speech, the Russian language.
The tragic image of a language distorted by reality — as a metaphor for a damaged mirror becomes one of the most important in the poet's late work.
1987 became a" turning point "for the poet, when widespread recognition and world fame came (L. Losev called it a "holiday of justice"), and even the poet's "literary return" to his homeland began, with the first publication of his poems in the "New World".
In the same year, 1987, Joseph Brodsky was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
At the award ceremony, he delivered his brilliant "Nobel Lecture", in which, in particular, he honed the concept of language priority: "Perhaps the most sacred thing we have is our language...".
Since the mid 1980s, the Brodsky becomes the subject of fascinating study: go work on his poetics.
T. Venclova comes to the conclusion that it Brodsky has a way to overcome inferiority and ruggedness of the world, opening the space up: "this is a genuine cross the border, out of the absurdity of the fallen world, the entry into a meaningful time"; he identifies as "the main components of Miro text" Brodsky "it's time, the void" and makes the assumption that the main theme of the poet is "being and nothingness".
In the same years, Joseph Brodsky collects a plentiful harvest of numerous awards, but, first of all, as an English language author.
He was awarded the title of "Poet Laureate of the USA" 1991-1992.
The last years of Brodsky's life In the early 1990s, Joseph Brodsky underwent a second heart operation, a third was coming.
However, he continued to teach, wrote poetry and prose ("As long as there is such a language as Russian, poetry is inevitable").
The last years of his short life are marked by a rise in the intensity of creativity.
Collections of Brodsky's works begin to be published in Russia: the first of them are "Edification" (1990)," Autumn Cry of a Hawk "(1990)," Poems " (1990).
Following the growing popularity, the awareness of the meaning and influence of Brodsky's poetics is growing.
He brought to Russian poetry the expressive qualities of English, classical Latin poetry.
In art criticism, analysis of fine literature, Brodsky is interesting as a researcher of poetics, psychology, aesthetics of creativity (works about Tsvetaeva, Platonov, Mandelstam, Auden, Frost, Akhmatova, Cavafy, Montal and others).
Along with lyrics, "travel notes", ancient, biblical themes, elegies, "dialogues" with great writers of the past and present, a penchant for philosophy, irony and sarcasm, for Brodsky, according to the observations of researchers, the problems of "Time", "Language", "Death"are end to end.
The last works are filled with the sad moods of the Stoic poet about the "results" of being.
Creativity appears as the main goal of the universe, overcoming dumbness, silence and emptiness.
Poetry as the highest expression of language is the opposition of "nothing".
The will Brodsky, his latest poetry book, "landscape with the flood" ends the poem with the lines: "I was accused of everything, except the weather...
Overall, maybe oblivion armor appreciates the attempts of turning it into a sieve and the hole will thank me." (E. M. Petrushansky) the Transcript of the trial of Brodsky the court of Dzerzhinsky district of the city of Leningrad Street Uprising, 36.
The judge is Savelyeva.
February 18, 1964.
The first trial of Joseph Brodsky.
Judge: What do you do?
Brodsky: I write poetry.
I'm translating it.
I believe...
Judge: No "I believe".
Stand still properly!
Donot lean against the walls!
Look at the court!
Answer the court properly!
(to Me).
Stop recording now!
Otherwise, I'll take you out of the hall. (To Brodsky)
: Do you have a permanent job?
Brodsky: I thought it was a permanent job.
Judge: Answer exactly!
Brodsky: I wrote poetry.
I thought they would be printed.
Judge: We are not interested in "I believe".
Answer me, why didnot you work?
Brodsky: I was working.
I wrote poetry.
Judge: We are not interested in this.
We are interested in which institution you were associated with.
Brodsky: I had contracts with the publishing house.
Judge: Do you have enough contracts to feed yourself?
List: which ones, from what date, for what amount?
Brodsky: I donot remember exactly.
All contracts are with my lawyer.
Judge: I'm asking you.
Brodsky: Two books with my translations were published in Moscow... (lists).
Judge: What is your work experience?
Brodsky: Approximately... the judge: We are not interested in "approximately"!
Brodsky: Five years.
Judge: Where did you work?
Brodsky: At the factory.
Judge: How long have you worked at the plant?
Brodsky: A year.
Judge: By whom?
Brodsky: A milling machine operator.
Judge: And in general, what is your specialty?
Brodsky: The poet.
The poet is a translator.
Judge: And who admitted that you are a poet?
Who ranked you among the poets?
Brodsky: Nobody.
(Without calling).
And who ranked me among the human race?
Judge: Did you study this?
Brodsky: To what?
Judge: To be a poet?
Did not try to graduate from a university where they prepare...
Brodsky: I didnot think that this was given by education.
Judge: And what about?
Brodsky: I think it's... (confused)... from God...
Judge: Do you have any petitions to the court?
Brodsky: I would like to know why I was arrested.
Judge: This is a question, not a petition.
Brodsky: Then I have no petition.
Judge: Do the defense have any questions?
Defender: Yes.
Citizen Brodsky, do you contribute your earnings to the family?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: Do your parents also earn money?
Brodsky: They are pensioners.
Defender: Do you live as a family?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: Therefore, your funds were contributed to the family budget?
Judge: You are not asking questions, but generalizing.
You help him answer.
Do not generalize, but ask.
Defender: Are you registered in a psychiatric clinic?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: Have you received inpatient treatment?
Brodsky: Yes, from the end of December of the 63rd year to January 5 of this year at the Kashchenko Hospital in Moscow.
Defender: Do you think that your illness prevented you from working in one place for a long time?
Brodsky: Maybe.
Probably.
I donot know, though.
No, I donot know.
Defender: Have you translated poems for a collection of Cuban poets?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: Have you translated Spanish romanceros?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: Were you connected with the translation section of the Writers ' Union?
Brodsky: Yes.
Defender: I ask the court to attach to the case a description of the bureau of the translators ' section... a list of published poems...
Copies of contracts... a telegram: "We ask you to speed up the signing of the contract."
(Lists).
And I ask you to send Citizen Brodsky for a medical examination to conclude on the state of health and whether it interfered with regular work.
In addition, I ask you to immediately release Citizen Brodsky from custody.
I believe that he has not committed any crimes and that his detention is illegal.
He has a permanent place of residence and can appear at any time on a court summons.
The court leaves for a meeting.
And then he returns, and the judge reads out the decision: To send him to a forensic psychiatric examination, before which to raise the question whether Brodsky suffers from some kind of mental illness and whether this disease prevents Brodsky from being sent to remote areas for forced labor.
Considering that it is clear from the medical history that Brodsky evaded hospitalization, to offer the police department No. 18 to deliver him for a forensic psychiatric examination.
Judge: Do you have any questions?
Brodsky: I have a request to give me a paper and a pen in my cell.
Judge: This is what you are asking from the police chief.
Brodsky: I asked, he refused.
I ask for paper and a pen.
The judge (softening): All right, I'll pass it on.
Brodsky: Thank you.
When everyone left the courtroom, they saw a huge number of people in the corridors and on the stairs, especially young people.
Judge: How many people!
I didnot think that so many people would gather!
From the crowd: It's not every day that a poet is judged!
Judge: And we donot care — a poet or not a poet!
According to the defender Toporova 3.
N., the judge Savelieva had to release Brodsky from custody so that he would go to the specified psychiatric hospital for examination the next day, but Savelieva left him under arrest, since he was sent to the hospital under escort.
The second trial of I. Brodsky Fontanka, 22, hall of the Builders ' Club.
March 13, 1964.
The expert opinion says: There are psychopathic character traits, but he is able to work.
Therefore, administrative measures may be applied.
Those going to court are met by an announcement: The trial of the parasite Brodsky.
The big hall of the Builders ' Club is full of people.
- Get up!
The trial is coming!
Judge Savelieva asks Brodsky what petitions he has to the court.
It turns out that neither before the first nor before the second, he was not acquainted with the case.
The judge calls a break.
Brodsky is taken away so that he can get acquainted with the case.
After a while, he is brought in, and he says that the poems on the pages 141, 143, 155, 200, 234 (lists) they donot belong to him.
In addition, he asks not to attach to the case a diary that he kept in 1956, that is, when he was 16 years old.
The defender joins this request.
Judge: We will take into account the part of his so called poems, and in the part of his personal notebook, there is no need to withdraw it.
Citizen Brodsky, since 1956 you have changed 13 places of work.
You worked at the factory for a year, and then you didnot work for six months.
In the summer we were in the geological party, and then we did not work for 4 months... (lists the places of work and the breaks that followed).
Explain to the court why you did not work during breaks and led a parasitic lifestyle?
Brodsky: I worked during breaks.
I was doing what I am doing now: I was writing poetry.
Judge: So you wrote your so called poems?
And what is useful in the fact that you often changed your place of work?
Brodsky: I started working at the age of 15.
Everything was interesting to me.
I changed jobs because I wanted to know as much as possible about life and people.
Judge: And what have you done useful for the motherland?
Brodsky: I wrote poetry.
This is my job.
I am convinced...
I believe that what I have written will serve people, not only now, but also for future generations.
A voice from the audience: Big deal!
Imagines it!
Another voice: He is a poet.
He must think so.
Judge: So you think that your so called poems benefit people?
Judge: We call your poems "so called" because we have no other concept about them.
Sorokin: You say that you have a highly developed curiosity.
Why didnot you want to serve in the Soviet army?
Brodsky: I will not answer such questions.
Judge: Answer me!
Brodsky: I was released from military service.
Not "didnot want to", but was released.
These are different things.
I was released twice.
The first time because my father was ill, the second time because of my illness.
Sorokin: Is it possible to live on the amounts that you earn?
Brodsky: You can.
While in prison, I signed every time that 40 kopecks were spent on me per day.
And I earned more than 40 kopecks a day.
Sorokin: But you have to put on shoes, dress up.
Brodsky: I have one suit — an old one,but it's what it is.
And I donot need anything else.
Lawyer: Have experts evaluated your poems?
Brodsky: Yes.
Chukovsky and Marshak spoke very well about my translations.
Better than I deserve.
Lawyer: Did you have any contact with the translation section of the Writers ' Union?
Brodsky: Yes.
I spoke in an almanac called "For the first time in Russian", and read translations from Polish.
The judge (to the defender): You should ask him about useful work, and you ask about performances.
Lawyer: His translations are his useful work.
Judge: Better, Brodsky, explain to the court why you didnot work in between jobs?
Brodsky: I was working.
I wrote poetry.
Judge: But that didnot stop you from working.
Brodsky: And I worked hard.
I wrote poetry.
Judge: But there are people who work at the factory and write poetry.
What prevented you from doing this?
Brodsky: But people are not like each other.
Even the color of the hair, the expression of the face.
Judge: This is not your discovery.
Everyone knows this.
But rather, explain how to evaluate your participation in our great progressive movement towards communism?
Brodsky: The construction of communism is not only standing at the machine and plowing the land.
This is also an intelligent work, which ...
Judge: Leave high phrases!
It is better to answer how you think to build your work activity for the future.
Brodsky: I wanted to write poetry and translate.
But if this contradicts some generally accepted according to the norms, I will take a permanent job and still write poetry.
Assessor Tyagly: Every person works for us.
How did you do nothing for so long?
Brodsky: You donot consider my work as work.
I wrote poetry, I consider it a work.
Judge: Have you drawn conclusions for yourself from the press performance?
Brodsky: Lerner's article was false.
That's the only conclusion I made.
Judge: So you havenot made any other conclusions?
Brodsky: I didnot.
I do not consider myself a person leading a parasitic lifestyle.
Lawyer: You said that the article "Near literary drone " published in the newspaper" Evening Leningrad " is incorrect.
With what?
Brodsky: Only the first and last name are correct there.
Even the age is wrong.
Even the poems are not mine.
There, people I barely know or donot know at all are called my friends.
How can I consider this article correct and draw conclusions from it?
Lawyer: You consider your work useful.
Will the witnesses I have called be able to confirm this?
The judge (to the lawyer, ironically): Is that the only reason you called the witnesses?
Sorokin (public prosecutor, Brodsky): How could you independently, without using someone else's work, make a translation from Serbian?
Brodsky: You ask the question ignorantly.
The contract sometimes involves a substring.
I know Polish, I know less Serbian, but these are related languages, and with the help of a substring I was able to make my own translation.
Judge: Witness Grudnina!
Grudnina: I have been directing the work of aspiring poets for more than 11 years.
For seven years, she was a member of the commission for work with young authors.
Now I lead the poets of high school students in the palace of pioneers and the circle of young writers of the Svetlana plant.
At the request of publishers, she compiled and edited 4 collective collections of young poets, which included more than 200 new names.
Thus, I practically know the work of almost all the young poets of the city.
The work of Brodsky, as an aspiring poet, is known to me from his poems of 1959 and 1960.
These were still imperfect poems, but with vivid finds and images.
I did not include them in the collections, however, I considered the author capable.
Until the fall of 1963, I did not meet Brodsky personally.
After the publication of the article "Near literary drone" in "Evening Leningrad", I called Brodsky to me for a conversation, as the young people besieged me with requests to intervene in the case of the slandered person.
Brodsky to my question — what is he doing now?
- he replied that he has been studying languages and working on literary translations for about a year and a half.
I took the translation manuscripts from him for review.
As a professional poet and literary critic by education, I claim that Brodsky's translations are made at a high professional level.
Brodsky has a specific, not often encountered talent for literary translation of poems.
He presented me with a work of 368 lines of poetry, in addition, I read 120 lines of his translated poems published in Moscow publications.
From my personal experience of literary translation, I know that such a volume of work requires at least six months of condensed working time from the author, not counting the hassle of publishing poems and consulting specialists.
The time required for such troubles, as you know, does not lend itself to accounting.
If we evaluate even at the lowest publishing prices those translations that I have seen with my own eyes, then Brodsky has already earned 350 rubles with new money, and the only question is when everything that has been done will be printed in full.
In addition to the contracts for translations, Brodsky presented me with contracts for work on radio and television, the work on which has already been completed, but also has not yet been fully paid.
From a conversation with Brodsky and people who know him, I know that Brodsky lives very modestly, denies himself clothes and entertainment, spends most of his time at his desk.
The money received for his work contributes to the family.
Lawyer: Is it necessary to know the author's creativity in general for the literary translation of poems?
Grudnina: Yes, for good translations, like Brodsky's translations, it is necessary to know the author's creativity and understand his voice.
Lawyer: Does the payment for translations decrease if I translated using subscripts?
Grudnina: Yes, it decreases.
Translating Hungarian poets by the substrings, I received less per line for a ruble (with old money).
Lawyer: Do translators practice working on substrings ?
Grudnina: Yes, everywhere.
One of the largest Leningrad translators, Alexander Ilyich Gitovich, translates from ancient Chinese by subscripts.
Assessor Lebedeva: Is it possible to learn a foreign language by self teaching?
Grudnina: I learned two languages as a self taught student in addition to those that I studied at the university.
Lawyer: If Brodsky does not know the Serbian language, can he, despite this, make a highly artistic translation?
Grudnina: Yes, of course.
Lawyer: And donot you consider the substring a reprehensible use of someone else's labor?
Grudnina: God forbid.
Assessor Lebedeva: Here I am looking at a book.
Here Brodsky has only two small poems.
Grudnina: I would like to give some explanations concerning the specifics of literary work.
The thing is... the judge: No, donot.
So, what is your opinion about Brodsky's poems?
Grudnina: My opinion is that as a poet he is very talented and is head and shoulders above many who are considered a professional translator.
Judge: And why does he work alone and does not attend any litobedineniye?
Grudnina: In 1958, he asked to be accepted into my litobedinenie.
But I heard about him as a hysterical young man and did not accept him, pushing him away with my own hands.
It was a mistake, I regret it very much.
Now I will willingly take him into my association and will work with him if he wants it.
Tax assessor: Have you ever personally seen him personally working on poems, or did he use someone else's work?
Grudnina: I didnot see Brodsky sitting and writing.
But I did not see Mikhail Alexandrovich Sholokhov sitting at his desk and writing.
However, this does not mean that...
Judge: It is inconvenient to compare Sholokhov and Brodsky.
Didnot you explain to the young people that the state requires young people to study?
After all, Brodsky has only seven classes.
Grudnina: He has a very large amount of knowledge.
I was convinced of this by reading his translations.
Sorokin: Have you read his bad pornographic poems?
Grudnina: No, never.
Lawyer: That's what I want to ask you, witness.
Brodsky's products for 1963 are as follows: poems in the book "Dawn over Cuba", translations of poems by the Polish poet Constanta Ildefons Galchinsky (although not yet published), poems in the book "Yugoslav Poets", Gaucho songs and publications in"Bonfire".
Can this be considered a serious job?
Grudnina: Yes, undoubtedly.
It's a busy year.
And this work can bring money not today, but several years later.
It is wrong to determine the work of a young author by the amount of royalties received at the moment.
A young author may fail, a new long term work may be required.
There is a joke: the difference between a parasite and a young poet is that a parasite does not work and eats, and a young poet works, but does not always eat.
Judge: We didnot like your statement.
In our country, every person receives according to his work, and therefore it cannot be that he works a lot and receives little.
In our country, where so much attention is paid to young poets, you say that they are starving.
Why did you say that young poets donot eat?
Grudnina: I didnot say that.
I warned you that this is a joke, which has some truth in it.
Young poets have very uneven earnings.
Judge: Well, it depends on them.
We donot need to explain this.
Okay, you've made it clear that your words are a joke.
Let's accept this explanation.
A new witness is called Etkind Yefim Grigorievich.
Judge: Give me your passport, because your last name is somehow not pronounced clearly. (Takes the passport)
Etkind ...
Efim Gershevich... we are listening to you.
Etkind (he is a member of the Writers ' Union, a teacher at the Herzen Institute): By the nature of my social and literary work related to the education of novice translators, I often have to read and listen to translations of young writers.
About a year ago, I had a chance to get acquainted with the works of I. Brodsky.
These were translations of poems by the wonderful Polish poet Galczynski, whose poems have not been translated much yet.
I was very impressed by the clarity of poetic turns, musicality, passion and energy of the verse.
I was also struck by the fact that Brodsky independently, without any outside help, learned the Polish language.
He read Galchinsky's poems in Polish with the same enthusiasm with which he read his Russian translations.
I realized that I was dealing with a person of rare talent and — no less important — ability to work and perseverance.
The translations that I had the opportunity to read later strengthened me in this opinion.
These are, for example, translations from the Cuban poet Fernandez, published in the book" Dawn over Cuba", and from modern Yugoslav poets, published in the collection of Goslitizdat.
I had a lot of conversations with Brodsky and was surprised by his knowledge of American, English and Polish literature.
Translating poems is a very difficult job that requires diligence, knowledge, and talent.
On this path, the writer can expect countless failures, and material income is a matter of the distant future.
You can translate poems for several years and not earn a single ruble.
Such work requires a selfless love for poetry and for the work itself.
The study of languages, history, and culture of the working people all this is not given immediately.
Everything I know about Brodsky's work convinces me that before him as there is a great future as a poet and translator.
This is not just my opinion.
The bureau of the translators ' section, having learned that the publishing house had terminated the contracts concluded with Brodsky, made a unanimous decision to petition the director of the publishing house to attract Brodsky to work, to restore contractual relations with him.
I know for certain that the same opinion is held by major authorities in the field of poetic translation: Marshak and Chukovsky, who ...
Judge: Talk only about yourself!
Etkind: Brodsky should be given the opportunity to work as a poet translator.
Far from a big city, where there are no necessary books or a literary environment, it is very difficult, almost impossible: on this path, in my deep conviction, a great future awaits him.
I must say that I was very surprised to see the ad: "The trial of the parasite Brodsky".
Judge: You knew this combination.
Etkind: I knew.
But I never thought that such a combination would be accepted by the court.
With his poetic technique, nothing would prevent him from messing around, he could translate hundreds of lines if he worked easily, with ease.
The fact that he earned little money does not mean that he is not hardworking.
Judge: And why is he not a member of any collective?
Etkind: He has been to our translation seminars ...
The Judge: Well, seminars...
Etkind: He is included in this seminar in the sense...
The Judge: And if there is no sense?
(Laughter in the audience).
That is, I want to ask: why was he not a member of any association?
Etkind: We donot have a membership, so I canot say "entered".
But he came to us, read his translations.
Judge (Etkind): Have you had any misunderstandings in your work, in your personal life?
Etkind (surprised): No.
However, I havenot been to the Institute for two days.
Maybe something happened there.
(The question of the audience and, apparently, the witness remained incomprehensible).
Judge: Why did you, speaking about Brodsky's knowledge, press on foreign literature?
And why donot you talk about our, domestic literature?
Etkind: I spoke to him as a translator and therefore I was interested in his knowledge of American, English, and Polish literature.
They are large, diverse and not superficial.
Smirnov (prosecution witness, head of the House of Defense): I am not personally acquainted with Brodsky, but I want to say that if all citizens treated the accumulation of material values like Brodsky, we would not have built communism for a long time.
The mind is a dangerous weapon for its owner.
Everyone said that he was smart and almost brilliant.
But no one has said what kind of person he is.
Having grown up in an intelligent family, he has only a seven year education.
Here, let those present say, would they like a son who has only a seven year old?
He did not join the army, because he was the only breadwinner of the family.
And what kind of breadwinner is he?
They say here — a talented translator, and why does no one say that he has a lot of confusion in his head?
And anti Soviet lines?
Brodsky: This is not true.
Smirnov: He needs to change many of his thoughts.
I question the certificate that was given to Brodsky in the nervous dispensary about a nervous illness.
These illustrious friends began to ring all the bells and demand oh, save the young man!
And he must be treated with forced labor, and no one will help him, no illustrious friends.
I donot know him personally.
I know about him from the press.
And I am familiar with the certificates.
I question the medical certificate that released him from military service.
I'm not a doctor, but I question it.
Brodsky: When I was released, as the only breadwinner, my father was ill, he was lying after a heart attack, and I worked and earned money.
And then I was sick.
How do you know about me, so that t
