The return of Mayakovsky. Biography of the poet without labels and falsifications

MOSCOW. A novelty from Corpus is a book by the Swedish writer Bengt Jangfeldt about Mayakovsky and his inner circle.

Yangfeldt’s serious passion for the Russian language and literature at a young age began with the French edition of the correspondence of Mayakovsky and Brik. Sincere interest has grown into a vocation. The result - a professorship at the Department of Slavic Studies, books on iconic figures of Russian literature, friendship and cooperation with Brodsky. Acquaintance with Lily Brik, her stories about Mayakovsky, about his inner circle, which included herself, and prompted him to write a true biography of the poet, not distorted by myths.

Almost 40 years have passed from the idea to the implementation. The first edition of Med livet som insats: Berättelsen om Vladimir Majakovskij och hans krets was released in 2007. The Russian version of Bet - Life: Vladimir Mayakovsky and his circle, which the author himself took part in, was released 2 years later. Yangfeldt’s book from Corpus was published in early February. Previously unknown information obtained in the British archives, many rare photographs will allow a different look at many pages of the poet’s biography. It was the turn of a calm and balanced conversation about a talented person, now becoming the main poet of the Bolshevik state, then sent into oblivion. The tragedy of the individual, whose sincere belief in the possibility of building a society of a new formation was gradually breaking into obvious facts about the trouble in the “Kingdom of Denmark”.

In his work, Yangfeldt cites facts that testify to Mayakovsky’s initial rejection of the revolution, about political addictions of a completely different kind. The book is full of details, evidence, genuine memories. Yangfeldt quotes the words of the famous linguist and researcher of the Russian avant-garde Roman Osipovich Jacobson that the collected works published in Soviet times turned out to be falsification. The absence of some inconvenient works, necessary references and explanations in it turned out to be a “worthy contribution” to the distortion of the poet’s very ambiguous and tragic figure.

Elena Tanakova © Gallerix.ru