A Poet with a Charisma and a pop-star status

Yevgeny Yevtushenko

Born Yevgeni Aleksandrovich Gangnus (later he took his mother's last name, Yevtushenko) in the Irkutsk region of Siberia in a small town called Zima Junction on 18 July, 1933 to a peasant family of mixed Russian, Ukrainian and Tatar heritage.. "His great-grandfather, Joseph Yevtushenko, a suspected subversive, was exiled to Siberia after the 1881 assassination of Czar Alexander II. But he died on the way. Both of Mr. Yevtushenko's grandfathers were arrested under Stalin's purges as "enemies of the people" in 1937."

His maternal grandfather, named Ermolai Naumovich Evtushenko, had been a Red Army officer during the Russian Revolution and the Civil War. Yevtushenko's father, named Aleksandr Rudolfovich Gangnus, was a geologist, as was his mother, named Zinaida Ermolaevna Evtushenko, who later became a singer. The boy accompanied his father on geological expeditions to Kazakhstan in 1948, and to Altai, Siberia, in 1950. Young Yevtushenko wrote his first verses and humorous songs "chastushki" while living in Zima, Siberia. "His parents were divorced when [he] was 7 and he was raised by his mother."

"By age 10 he had cranked out his first poem. Six years later a sports journal was the first periodical to publish his poetry. At 19, he published his first book of poems, The Prospects of the Future."

After the Second World War, Yevtushenko moved to Moscow. From 1951-1954 he studied at the Gorky Institute of Literature in Moscow, from which he dropped out. He published his first poem in 1949 and his first book three years later. In 1952 he joined the Union of Soviet Writers after publication of his first collection of poetry. His early poem So mnoyu chto-to proiskhodit (Something is happening to me) became a very popular song, performed by actor-songwriter Aleksandr Dolsky

In 1955 Yevtushenko wrote a poem about the Soviet borders being an obstacle in his life. His first important publication was the poem Stantsiya Zima (Zima Junction 1956). In 1957, he was expelled from the Literary Institute for "individualism". He was banned from traveling, but gained wide popularity with the Russian public. His early work also drew praise from the likes of Boris Pasternak, Carl Samdberg and Robert Frost..

During the Khrushchev Thaw

Yevtushenko was one of the authors politically active during the Khruschev Thaw (Khrushchev declared a cultural "Thaw" that allowed some freedom of expression). In1961 he wrote what would become perhaps his most famous poem,Babi Yar, in which he denounced the Soviet distortion of historical fact regarding the Nazii massacre of theJewish population of Kiev in September 1941, as well as the antisemitism still widespread in the Soviet Union. The usual Soviet policy in relation to the Holocaust in Russia was to describe it as atrocities against Soviet citizens, and to avoid mentioning that it was a genocide specifically of the Jews.

Therefore, Yevtushenko's work Babi Yar was quite controversial and politically incorrect, "for it spoke not only of the Nazi atrocities, but the Soviet government's own persecution of Jewish people." Following a centuries-old Russian tradition, Yevtushenko became a public poet. The poem achieved widespread circulation in the underground samizdat press, and later was set to music, together with four other Yevtushenko poems, by Dmitri Shostakovich in his Thirteenth Symphony, subtitled Babi Yar. Publication of the poem in the state-controlled Soviet press was delayed until 1984.

Reportedly, the poem "was published abroad and appeared in clandestine fashion in the Soviet Union." Alternatively, some note that the poem was published in a major newspaper" Liteaturnaya Gazeta" and achieved widespread circulation in numerous copies. Of Yevtushenko’s work, Shostakovich has said, “Morality is a sister of conscience. And perhaps God is with Yevtushenko when he speaks of conscience. Every morning, in place of prayers, I reread or repeat by memory two poems by Yevtushenko: ‘Career’ or ‘Boots.’”

In 1961 , Yevtushenko also published Nasledniki Stalina (The Heirs of Stalin), in which he stated that although Stalin was dead, Stalinism and its legacy still dominated the country; in the poem he also directly addressed the Soviet government, imploring them to make sure that Stalin would "never rise again". Published originally in Pravda , the poem was not republished until a quarter of a century later, in the times of the comparatively liberal party leaderMikhail Gorbachev.

Yevtushenko became one of the best known poets of the 1950s and 1960s in the Soviet Union. He was part of the 1960s generation, which included such writers as Vasili Akyonov, Andrei Voznesensk, Bella Akhmadulina, Robert Rozhdestvensky, and many others. During the time, Anna Akhmatova, a number of whose family members suffered under the communist rule, criticised Yevtushenko's aesthetic ideals and his poetics.

The late Russian poet Victor Krivulin quotes her saying that "Yevtushenko doesn't rise about an average newspaper satirist's level. Yevtushenko and Andrei Voznesensky's works just don't do it for me, therefore neither of them exists for me as a poet." Alternatively, Yevtushenko was much respected by others at the time both for his poetry and his political stance toward the Soviet government. "Dissident Pavel Litvinov had said that '[Yevtushenko] expressed what my generation felt. Then we left him behind.'"

In 1963 until 1965, for example, Yevtushenko, already an internationally recognised literateur, was banned from travelling outside the Soviet Union. Generally, however, Yevtushenko was still the most extensively travelled Soviet poet, possessing an amazing capability to balance between moderate criticism of Soviet regime, which gained him popularity in the West, and, as noted by some, a strong Marxist-Leninist ideological stance, which allegedly proved his loyalty to Soviet authorities.

At that time the KGB Chairman Vladimir Semichastny and the next KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov reported to the Communist Politburo on the "Anti-Soviet activity of poet Yevtushenko." Nevertheless, some Soviet dissidents in the 1960s nicknamed Yevtushenko "Zhenya Gapon," comparing him to Father George Gapon, a Russian priest who at the time of the Revolution of 1905 was both a leader of rebellious workers and a secret police agent .

Yevtushenko Controversy

In 1965, Yevtushenko joined Anna Akhmatova, Kornei Chukovsky, Jean-Paul Sartre and others and co-signed the letter of protest against the unfair trial of Joseph Brodsky (a fellow poet influenced by Anna Akhmatova) as a result of the court case against him initiated by the Soviet authorities. He subsequently co-signed a letter against the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Nevertheless, "when, in 1987, Yevtushenko was made an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Brodsky himself led a flurry of protest, accusing Yevtushenko of duplicity and claiming that Yevtushenko's criticism of the Soviet Union was launched only in the directions approved by the Party and that he criticised what was acceptable to the Kremlin, when it was acceptable to the Kremlin, while soaking up adulation and honours as a fearless voice of dissent."

Further, of note is "Yevtushenko's protest of the trial of Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel, , an event now credited with inaugurating the modern dissident movement and readying the national pulse for perestroika. Both writers had toiled under pseudonyms and stood accused, in 1966, of "anti-Soviet activity" for the views espoused by their fictional characters. But Yevtushenko's actual position was that the writers were guilty, only punished too severely."
"Yevtushenko was not among the authors of the "Letter of the 63" who protested [their convictions]."

Moreover, "when Yevtushenko was nominated for the poetry chair at Oxford in 1968, Amis, Bernard Levin, and the Russian-Hungarian historian Tibor Szamuely led the campaign against him, arguing that he had made life difficult for his fellow Soviet writers."

Films

He was filmed as himself during the 1950s as a performing poet-actor. Yevtushenko contributed lyrics to several Soviet films and contributed to the script of Soy Cuba (1964), a Soviet propaganda film. His acting career began with the leading role in Vzlyot (1979) by director Savva Kulish , where he played the leading role as Russian rocket scientist Tsiolkovsky . Yevtyshenko also made two films as a writer/director. His film 'Detsky Sad' ('Kindergarten', 1983) and his last film, 'Pokhorony Stalina' ('Stalin's Funerals', 1990) deal with life in the Soviet Union.

Post-Soviet period

In 1989 Yevtushenko was elected as a representative in the Soviet Parliament (Congress of Peoples Deputies), where he was a member of the pro-democratic group supporting Mikhail Gorbachev and "represent[ed] the little-known Ukrainian city of Kharkov." In 1991, he supported Boris Yeltsin , as the latter's defended the parliament of the Russian Federation during the hardline coup that sought to oust Gorbachev and reverse "perestroika"., Later, however, when Yeltsin sent tanks into restive Chechnya , Yevtushenko reportedly "denounced his old ally and refused to accept an award from him."

In the post-Soviet era Yevtushenko actively discussed environmental issues, confronted Russian Nationalist writers from the alternative Union of the Writers of Russia, and campaigned for the preservation of the memory of victims of Stalin's Gulag . In 1995 he published his huge anthology of contemporary Russian poetry entitled Verses of the Century. Reviewing this anthology, Russian poet Alexey Purin referred to it as "a huge book, a huge flop. Really, a collection of names rather than a collection of good poetry." Purin (himself a traditionalist) that Yevtushenko included only mainstream poetry written according to "good old canons" and totally ignored nearly all of the avant-garde authors, notably Gennady Aigi, Vladimir Earle and Rea Nikonova. More recently, Yevtushenko has been criticised for refusing to speak out against Russian President Vladimir Putin's liberties during his presidency. Yevtushenko responded by saying that "Putin, like Russia, is struggling to find his way in a time when ideals have been shattered and expedience reigns."

Yevtushenko in the West

Yevtushenko, who now (October, 2007) divides his time between Russia and the United States, teaches Russian and European poetry and the history of world cinema at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma and at Queens College of the City University of New York . In the West he is best known for his criticism of the Soviet bureaucracy and appeals for getting rid of the legacy of Stalin. He is now working on a three-volume collection of Russian poetry from the 11th-20th century, and plans a novel based on his time in Havana during the Cuban Missile Crisis (he was, reportedly, good friends with Che , Salvador Allende and Pablo Neruda .

In October 2007 he was an artist-in-residence with the School of Arts and Humanities at the University of Maryland , College Park, and recited his poem Babi Yar before a performance of Dmitri Shostakovich's Symphony No.13, which sets five of his poems, by the University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra and the men of the UM Choirs, with David Brundage as the bass soloist. A similar performance with Yevtushenko present took place at the University of Houston's Moore's School of Music in 1997. In addition to the Babi Yar symphony, Shostakovich's Execution of Stephan Razin (another text setting by Yevtushenko) was also performed.

Personal life

Yevtushenko is allegedly known for his many liaisons.Yevtushenko has been married four times: in 1954 he married Bella Akhmadulina , who published her first collection of lyrics in 1962. After divorce he married Galina Semenova. Yevtushenko's third wife was Jan Butler (married in 1978) (an English translator of his poetry with whom he visited Ireland several times), and fourth Maria Novika (married in 1986) He has five children, all boys.His current wife teaches Russian at Thomas Edison Preparatory Academy in the United States, near the University of Tulsa where Yevtushenko himself spends half the year, lecturing on poetry and European cinema.

Honors

In 1961, Yevtushenko was featured on the cover of Time magazine. In 1993, Yevtushenko received a medal as 'Defender of Free Russia,' which was given to those who took part in resisting the hard-line Communist coup in August 1991. In July 2000 the Russian Academy of Sciences named a star in his honor. In 2001, his childhood home in Zima Junction, Siberia, was restored and opened as a permanent museum of poetry. Yevtushenko received in 1991 the American Liberties Medallion, the highest honor conferred by the American Jewish Committee.

Criticism

"Yevtushenko's politics have always been a complicated mixture of bravery, populism, and vulgar accommodation with dictatorship." Reportedly, "'The writers who had briefly flourished [under Khrushchev's thaw] went two different ways,' the great Sovietologist and literary critic Robert Conquest put it in a 1974 profile. 'Solzhenitsyn and his like into silenced opposition; Yevtushenko and his like, sometimes reluctantly, sometimes in the hope of still influencing matters a little, into well-rewarded collaboration.'" Some argue that before the appearance of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Andrei Sakharov and the dissident movement in Russia, Yevtushenko, through his poetry, was the first voice to speak out against Stalinism(although Boris Pasternak is often considered "to have helped give birth to the dissident movement with the publication of his 'Doctor Zhivago'").^[1"Sovietologist Stephen Cohen of Princeton University contends that Yevtushenko was among those Soviets who didn't become dissidents but in their own way tried to improve conditions and prepare the way for reform, [saying that] 'They exhibited a kind of civic courage that many Americans didn't recognize.'"

Brodsky repeatedly criticised Yevtushenko for what he perceived as his "conformism", especially after the latter was made member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.Commenting on this controversy in A Night in the Nabokov Hotel, an anthology of Russian poetry in English translation Anatoly Kudryavitsky wrote the following: "A few Russian poets enjoyed the virtual pop-star status, unthinkable if transposed to other parts of Europe. In reality, they were far from any sort of protest against Soviet totalitarianism and therefore could not be regarded as anything else but naughty children of the regime."

Furthermore, some criticized Yevtushenko regarding Pasternak's widow, given that "when Pasternak's widow, Olga Ivinskaya, was imprisoned on trumped-up charges of illegally dealing in foreign currency, Yevtushenko publicly maligned her [and added] that 'Doctor Zhivago' was not worth publishing in the Soviet Union."

Moreover, "the poet Irina Ratushinskaya , upon her release from prison and arrival in the West, dismissed Yevtushenko as an official poet and Vasily Aksionov , the novelist who now lives in Washington, has also refused contact [with Yevtushenko]."

Responding to the criticism, Yevtushenko reportedly said"Who could sanction me to write Babi Yar, or my protests against the (1968 Soviet) invasion of Czechoslovakia? Only I criticised Khrushchev to his face; not even Solzhenitsyn did that. It is only the envy of people who couldn't stand against the propaganda machine, and they invented things about my generation, the artists of the '60s. Our generation was breaking the Iron Curtain. It was a generation crippled by history, and most of our dreams were doomed to be unfulfilled - but the fight for freedom was not in vain."

Yevtushenko further notes that "in several cases [he] personally rose to the defense of these writers, interceding privately for Ratushinskaya's release from a prison, defending Mr. Aksionov and others who were expelled from the Writers Union."

Critics differ on the statutue of Yevtushenko in the literature world, with "most Western intellectuals and many Russian scholars extol[ing] him as the greatest writer of his generation, the voice of Soviet life." They "acknowledge that his speaking tours have won him converts among audiences impressed with his dramatic readings and charismatic personality. Tina Tupikina Glaessner (1967) refers to him as “one of the greatest poets of the modern age.” She states that “Bratsk Station” offers the greatest insight into Soviet life of any other work in modern Russian literature. Two decades later, in his 1988 article, Michael Pursglove echoes her sentiments referring to Stantisiya Zima as “one of the landmarks of Soviet literature."

Others, however, notably Russian critics like "Patricia Pollock Brodsky (1992) takes issue with the interpretation that Yevtushenko has been persecuted by the Russian government." "And most scathing, Tomas Venclova asserts, in his 1991 essay, that few in the Russian literary community “consider his work worthy of serious study." Furthermore, when in 1972, Yevtushekno criticized U.S.'s government, " Allen Tale called him a 'ham actor, not a poet,' and others not unsympathetic to criticisms of Washington found his frequent condemnations of American 'imperialism,' and comparatively footling criticisms of the Russian police state, thoroughly repulsive."

Some of his poems
Waiting

My love will come
will fling open her arms and fold me in them,
will understand my fears, observe my changes.
In from the pouring dark, from the pitch night
without stopping to bang the taxi door
she’ll run upstairs through the decaying porch
burning with love and love’s happiness,
she’ll run dripping upstairs, she won’t knock,
will take my head in her hands,
and when she drops her overcoat on a chair,
it will slide to the floor in a blue heap.

Don't Disappear

Don't disappear. . . . By disappearing from me,
you will disappear from yourself,
betraying your own self forever,
and that will be the basest dishonesty.

Don't disappear. . . . To disappear is so easy.
It's impossible to resurrect one another.
Death drags down too deep.
Death even for a moment is too long.

Don't disappear. . . . Forget the third shadow.
In love there are only two. There are no thirds.
We both will be pure on Judgment Day,
when the trumpets call us to account.

Don't disappear. . . . We have redeemed sin.
We both are free of the law, we are sinless.
We are worthy together of the forgiveness of those
whom we have unintentionally wounded.

Don't disappear. . . . One can disappear in an instant,
but how could we meet later in the centuries ahead?
Is your double possible in the world,
and my double? Only barely in our children.

Don't disappear. . . . Give me your palm.
I am written on it--this I believe.
What makes one's last love terrible
is that it is not love, but fear of loss.


Wounds
To D.G.
I have been wounded so often and so painfully,
dragging my way home at the merest crawl,
impaled not only by malicious tongues--
one can be wounded even by a petal.

And I myself have wounded--quite unwittingly--
with casual tenderness while passing by,
and later someone felt the pain,
it was like walking barefoot over the ice.

So why do I step upon the ruins
of those most near and dear to me,
I, who can be so simply and so sharply wounded
and can wound others with such deadly ease?

"Once people..."
Once people
get under
my skin,
they never find the exit.
They romp around,
fill my insides with their song and dance,
make lots of noise, using my dumbness as their cover-up.
I’m full to bursting
with wise men
and fools--
they’ve utterly exhausted me!
So much so that my skin’s
quite worn through
by their heels, rubbing from inside!
Give me a chance to breathe!
It’s all impossible!
I’m stuffed to the gills
with those who’ve brought me so much joy
as well as those who’ve given most offence.
What has come over me?
What can I do with this great throng
stuck in my own small heart--
police are needed to keep order there!
I’ve gone a little cracked,
for there, in that secluded shade,
I’ve dropped none of the women
and none of them’s dropped me!
It’s awkward to revive dead friendships
however much you tire yourself with trying.
The only friends I’ve lost
were on the outside,
but of those inside I’ve lost nobody.
All the people in my life I’ve quarreled with,
or made friends with,
or only shaken hands with,
have merged in a new life under the old one’s skin--
a secret conflagration without flame.
The repossession of the unpossessable
is like a waterfall that rushes upward.
Those who have died
have been born again in me,
those who have not been born as yet
cry out.
My population is too large,
beyond the strength of just one man--
but then, a person would be incomplete
if he contained no others.