Witness and Transformation
The Poetics of Gennady Aygi
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Academic Studies Press
Published:15th Sep '15
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
A first full-length critical study of Chuvash-born poet Gennady Aygi (1934-2006), who is considered the father of late-Soviet avant-garde Russian poetry, this book charts the development of Aygi’s poetics, which draws equally on Russian poetic and religious tradition, European literature and philosophy, and Chuvash literature, folk culture, and cosmology. Moving chronologically through Aygi’s life and work from the 1950s to his final work in the early 2000s, the book concludes with an interview with American poet Fanny Howe about the importance of Aygi’s work in translation. The volume places Aygi in the context of twentieth-century poetry of witness and reveals the global significance of his work.
“Of the most important Russian poets of the late Soviet period (Brodsky, Vsevolod Nekrasov, Aygi), only Aygi was not Russian, but Chuvash. However, with his mentor Boris Pasternak’s encouragement, Aygi began to compose primarily in Russian, thereby opening his work to a broad international audience. Sarah Valentine’s astute and rich monograph, the first on Aygi in English, establishes Aygi’s preeminence in contemporary world poetry and reveals the importance of Chuvash language and culture for his Russian works. Aygi’s special background has given him a whole new vision of the world in some of the greatest Russian poetry of the last century." -- Gerald Janecek, Professor Emeritus of Russian and Eastern Studies, University of Kentucky
ISBN: 9781618114433
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
216 pages