TLW's Russian Poet Historyscope |
By T.L. Winslow (TLW), the Historyscoper™ |
© Copyright by T.L. Winslow. All Rights Reserved. |
Original Pub. Date: Aug. 28, 2015. Last Update: Aug. 28, 2015. |
Westerners are not only known as history ignoramuses, but double dumbass history ignoramuses when it comes to Russian poet history. Since I'm the one-and-only Historyscoper (tm), let me quickly bring you up to speed before you dive into my Master Historyscope.
In 1820 Moscow-born #1 Romantic poet-playwright-novelist ("Founder of Modern Russian Literature") ("the Russian Shakespeare") Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin (1799-1837), great-great-grandson of black Russian Gen. Abram Petrovich Gannibal (1695-1781) pub. his first novel Ruslan and Ludmila; a fairy tale about Ludmila, daughter of Prince Vladimir of Kiev by an evil wizard and the attempt by brave knight Ruslan to rescue her; opening lines are inspired by an oak tree in Taganrog near Rostov on Don. In 1820-1 he pub. The Prisoner of the Caucasus. In 1821 he anon. pub. The Gabrieliad, which lampoons the New Testament incl. Mary, Joseph, Jesus and the Virgin Birth. In 1821-2 he pub. The Robber Brothers. In 1823 he pub. The Fountain of Bakhchisarai; turned into an opera in 1911 by Alexander Ilyinsky, and a ballet in 1934 by Boris Asafyev. In 1825 he pub. Count Nulin. In 1827 he pub. The Gypsies; written in 1824. In 1829 he pub. Poltava; about Cossack leader Ivan Mazepa and the 1709 Battle of Poltava. In 1830 he pub. The Little House in Kolomna. In 1833 he pub. Angelo. In 1833 he pub. Eugene Onegin, a verse novel, pioneering the Pushkin Sonnet; bored St. Petersburg dandy Eugene Onegin inherits a landed estate from his uncle and moves to the country, befriending his neighbor, starry-eyed poet Vladimir Lensky, who is enaged to Olga Larina, whose sister Tatyana gets a crush on Onegin and writes him a letter, then meets him to tell him, causing him to deliver Onegin's Sermon rejecting her condescendingly but politely, after which Lensky tries to get them to hook up at a ball, causing him to get even by going after Olga, pissing him off and causing him to challenge Onegin to a duel, only to be killed; after returning to St. Petersburg, he encounters Tatyana married to an old fart general, and falls in love with her, but she rejects him. In 1837 he pub. The Bronze Horseman: A Petersburg Tale; written in 1833; his most popular poem?; about the equestrian statue of Peter the Great in St. Petersburg. On Feb. 10, 1837 Pushkin is killed in St. Petersburg in his 29th duel by George-Charles de Heeckeren d'Anthes) .