Name: Innokentiy Annenskiy
Age: 54 years old
Activity: poet, playwright, translator, critic
Family status: was married
Innokenty Annensky: biography
"In 45 minutes topic" silver Age“It’s almost impossible to tell, since it takes five years for a philology student to begin to understand it very roughly,” said publicist and literary critic Dmitry Bykov.
One cannot but agree with this statement, because at the turn late XIX- the beginning of the 20th century, so many undeniable talents appeared and literary movements that it is really difficult to tell about everyone. This is both a representative of Acmeism and an adherent of Cubo-Futurism, and it should also be noted that others famous personalities. But from this list we should highlight the symbolist Innokenty Annensky, who stood at the origins of the formation of trends in Russian poetry.
Childhood and youth
Innokenty Annensky was born on August 20 (September 1), 1855 in Omsk, which is rich in sights and cultural values(it’s not for nothing that Omsk is called “ theater city"). The future poet grew up in an average and exemplary family. Innocent's parents were not one iota close to creativity: his mother Natalia Petrovna led household, and father Fyodor Nikolaevich occupied a high position government post.
The main breadwinner in the house received the position of chairman of the Provincial Administration, so the parents and their son moved to the city of universities and scientists - Tomsk.
But Innokenty did not stay long in this place, about which he spoke impartially at one time: already in 1860, because of his father’s work, the Annenskys again packed their bags and left the harsh Siberia - the road lay to St. Petersburg. It is known that Fyodor Nikolaevich soon became interested in the scam, so he went broke, left with nothing.
As a child, Annensky was in poor health, but the boy did not stay homeschooling and went to a comprehensive private school, and later became a student at the 2nd St. Petersburg Progymnasium. Since 1869, Innocent was on the bench of the private gymnasium of V.I. Behrens, while simultaneously preparing to enter the university. In 1875, Annensky visited his older brother Nikolai Fedorovich, who was a journalist, economist and populist publicist.
Nikolai Fedorovich, educated and intelligent person, influenced Innocent and helped him in preparing for the exams. Thus, Annensky easily became a student at the Faculty of History and Philology St. Petersburg University, from which he graduated in 1879. It is noteworthy that the poet had solid “A” grades in all subjects, while in philosophy and theology the grades were a grade lower.
Further, before the ink had even dried on Annensky’s diploma, he began giving lectures on ancient languages and Russian literature at the Gurevich gymnasium and was known among the students as the strongest teacher. Among other things, Innokenty Fedorovich served as director of the Galagan College, the eighth St. Petersburg gymnasium and the gymnasium in Tsarskoe Selo, where he once studied.
Literature
Innokenty Fedorovich began writing since early age. But then the poet did not know what symbolism was, so he considered himself a mystic. By the way, symbolism is largest current in literature and art, characterized by mystery, enigma, and the use of allusions and metaphorical expressions. But, according to critics, the work of the literary genius does not fit into the framework of “symbolism”, but represents “pre-symbolism”.
Writer Innokenty Annensky In addition, Innokenty Fedorovich tried to follow the “religious genre” of the Spanish painter of the “golden age” Bartolome Esteban Murillo. True, the writer tried to convey the expression of virgin purity, meekness and prayerful tenderness with the help of words, and not with brushes and paints.
It is noteworthy that Innokenty Fedorovich did not seek to show his early creative efforts to eminent writers and magazine owners. The fact is that Nikolai Fedorovich advised younger brother start publishing in mature age, having established itself on life path and realizing my calling.
Therefore, the book “Quiet Songs” was published only in 1904, when Innokenty Annensky was known as a brilliant teacher and respected person. The symbolist also began to engage in drama, from his pen the following plays were published: “Melanippe the Philosopher” (1901), “King Ixion” (1902), “Laodamia” (1906) and “Famira the Kifared” (1913 - posthumously) in which the poet tried to imitate the favorite ancient Greek writers and geniuses of ancient mythology.
In his manuscripts, Annensky adhered to impressionism: he described things not as he knew them, for all phenomena and objects were inherent in the poet’s vision in this moment. The main motifs in the works of Innokenty Fedorovich are melancholy, melancholy, sadness and loneliness, which is why he so often describes cold, twilight and sunsets without excessive pretentiousness and exaltation. This trend can be seen in the poems “Snow”, “Bow and Strings”, “Two Loves”, “A Painful Sonnet” and other notable works.
Among other things, Innokenty Fedorovich replenished creative biography translation of manuscripts of their foreign colleagues. Thanks to him, Russian-speaking readers became acquainted with the famous tragedies of Euripides, as well as the poems of Hans Müller, Christian Heine and other literary geniuses.
Annensky made a huge contribution to the world of intricately woven lines. For example, his poem “Bells” can be correlated with the first works in the futuristic style. The second collection of poetry by Innokenty Fedorovich, “The Cypress Casket,” brought recognition and fame to the poet, albeit posthumously. It included the poems “Among the Worlds”, “Oreanda”, “Silver Noon”, “Ice Prison”, “ October myth"and other works.
Personal life
Contemporaries of Innokenty Fedorovich used to say that he was loyal and kind person. But sometimes excessive softness played a cruel joke. For example, he lost his position as director at a gymnasium in Tsarskoe Selo.
There is little information about the poet’s personal life, because even in his works the writer rarely shared his emotional experiences and what remained under the veil of secrecy. It is known that fate brought the second-year student Annensky together with the eccentric 36-year-old widow Nadezhda (Dina) Valentinovna, who came from a high-born class. The lovers immortalized their relationship by marriage, and soon their son Valentin was born.
Death
Innokenty Fedorovich died unexpectedly. Of course, he was in poor health, but on that fateful day, November 30 (December 13), 1909, there were no signs of trouble. Annensky died of a heart attack at the age of 54, right on the steps of the Tsarskoye Selo station (St. Petersburg).
- Once, when Innokenty Annensky was in bad mood and was burdened with thoughts, his wife came up to him and said: “Kenechka! Why are you sitting there sad? Open your mouth, I’ll give you an orange!” Dina also loved to have dinners with her friends, although Annensky avoided people and adhered to the outsider policy. What the poet thought about his marriage is not known for certain.
- Annensky began publishing at the age of 48, not striving for recognition and fame: the poet hid his true face, I publish under the pseudonym “Nik.-T-o”.
- During Annensky’s youth, his sisters discovered the little creator’s first efforts. But instead of praise, the boy received loud laughter, for the girls were amused by the line from the poem: “God sends her a sweet fig from heaven.” This gave rise to many jokes, so Innokenty Fedorovich hid his drafts in a secluded place, afraid to present them to the public.
- The poetry collection “Cypress Casket” was named so for a reason: Innocent had a cypress wood box where the poet kept notebooks and drafts.
Quotes
“... I love it when there are children in the house
And when they cry at night."
"Love is not peace, it must have moral result, first of all, for those who love.”
“But... there are such moments,
When your chest is scary and empty...
I am heavy - and dumb and bent...
I want to be alone... go away!
“Oh, give me eternity, and I will give eternity
For indifference to insults and years."
“There is love like smoke:
If she's cramped, she's stupefied,
Give her free rein - and she will be gone...
To be like smoke - but forever young."
Bibliography
Tragedies:
- 1901 – “Melanippe the Philosopher”
- 1902 – “King Ixion”
- 1906 – “Laodamia”
- 1906 – “Famira-kifared”
Collections of poems:
- 1904 – “Quiet Songs”
- 1910 – “Cypress Casket”
Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky as a poet has a truly unique destiny. The first collection of his poems (the only one during his lifetime) was published when the poet was already forty-nine years old, and the name “Nick” was on the cover. T-o” is the pseudonym that Annensky chose after some thought. Initially, he planned to call the collection “From the Cave of Polyphemus”, and as a pseudonym take the name “Utis” - “nobody” translated from Greek. This is exactly what Odysseus called himself to the Cyclops Polyphemus when he found himself in his lair. As a result, the collection was called “Quiet Songs”. The author's secrecy seemed unnecessary and hysterical to Blok - he wrote that he would like to know the poet who is hiding behind the mask.
Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky was born on August 20 (September 1), 1855 in Omsk, but soon his family moved to the then capital of Russia - St. Petersburg. In his autobiography, the poet wrote that he grew up in an environment that combined landowner and bureaucratic elements. From childhood, he fell in love with history and literature, and considered everything clear and elementary uninteresting and unpleasant.
Despite the late publication of poems, studying poetic creativity Annensky started early. In the 1870s. he did not yet know about symbolism, so he called himself a mystic, “raving about the religious genre” of the old master of Spanish painting B. E. Murillo, who worked in the 17th century. His elder brother N.F. Annensky advised him not to publish until he was thirty, and the young poet had no plans at all to present his poetic experiments to the public. He devoted all his energy to the study of antiquity and ancient languages, which he became interested in during his university years, and wrote nothing but dissertations. After this, Annensky plunged into teaching and administrative activities, which, according to his colleagues, distracted him from scientific research, and, in the opinion of close people who cared for creative success Annensky - interfered with poetry studies.
Annensky made his debut in print as a critic. In the 1880-1890s. he published a number of articles, the problems of which concerned the Russian literature of the 19th century century. In 1906 and 1909, respectively, he published two volumes of The Book of Reflections, a collection of his criticism, which was characterized by Wilde's subjectivism, associative imagery and impressionistic perception. Annensky has repeatedly emphasized that he considers himself, rather, not a critic, but a reader who shares his impressions.
Annensky the poet followed in the footsteps of the French symbolists, whom he translated (translations of their poems were included, along with the poet’s own works, in that first and only lifetime collection). He saw their merit not only in enriching the language, but also in increasing the aesthetic sensibility of the reader and introducing diversity into the artistic sensations of poetry lovers. Perhaps, among the Russian poets Annensky is closest to K. D. Balmont, whom he highly valued. He admired the musicality of Balmont's language.
Annensky drove quite quietly literary life, “secluded” and calm. He did not defend the right to life of new forms of art and did not participate in intra-symbolist “battles”. His first publications on the pages symbolist press appeared in 1906 in the magazine “Pereval”. Remaining in the shadows, Annensky became part of the Russian symbolist environment only in last year life. He gave several lectures at the Poetry Academy, became a member of the Society of Zealots artistic word”, and also published his article “On modern lyricism” on the pages of the St. Petersburg magazine “Apollo”.
Annensky died suddenly on November 30 (December 13), 1909, near the Tsarskoye Selo station. His death came as a shock to the Symbolists and caused a wide resonance in literary circles. The Symbolists began to be reproached for having “overlooked” Annensky, and the young Acmeist poets actually began a posthumous cult of Annensky the poet.
Four months after his death, the second collection of his poems was published - “The Cypress Casket”, so named because the poet’s manuscripts were kept in a cypress box. The poems were prepared for publication by Annensky’s son, V.I. Annensky-Krivich, his father’s biographer, his editor and commentator.
After the publication of " Cypress casket"Annensky received a wide posthumous fame. Blok wrote that the book struck him and penetrated deep into his heart; Bryusov noted and highly appreciated Annensky’s poetic gift, saying that his poems are unexpected and unpredictable, and their language is fresh.
In 1923, V.I. Annensky-Krivich published in the collection “Posthumous Poems of In. Annensky" and the rest of his father's manuscripts. There is an opinion that the son, by publishing his father’s works, one way or another, violated his will - after all, Annensky did not strive for fame as a poet, and the only collection of poems published by him during his lifetime under a deliberately mysterious pseudonym only confirms this.
The lyrical hero in Annensky's poetry is a person who solves the “hateful puzzle of existence.” Through his hero Annensky analyzes the internal content human personality, striving for unity with the whole world, but tormented by the awareness of her own loneliness. Each person feels the approach of an inevitable end and realizes the purposelessness of his existence; he is bent under the yoke of heredity and the impossibility of reuniting with the world in all its beauty and greatness.
S.K. Makovsky compared Annensky’s lyrics with the poems of the “younger” symbolists, and saw the origins of the poet’s tragic worldview and worldview in the fact that he did not believe in the “transcendental meaning of the Universe”, and denied the significance and meaning of a person’s personal existence. The originality of Annensky's poems lies in the light irony with which they are imbued. Bryusov considered this feature of Annensky’s poetic talent to be his second nature, an inseparable part of his personality as a poet and his spiritual appearance.
Annensky believed that the task of poetry is not to bring him closer to the reader, not to depict something inaccessible to expression and incomprehensible, but to hint at this “something”, to give a person the opportunity to feel the “unspeakable.”
Please note that the biography of Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky presents the most important moments from his life. This biography may omit some minor life events.
Annensky is generally full of mysteries and paradoxes. From his autobiography you can find out that he was born in 1855 in the city of Omsk, but modern researchers found out that this actually happened in the city of Tomsk in 1856. If Innokenty Annensky did not consider it necessary to remember the exact place and date of his own birth, one might think that this fact itself was unimportant to him. When he was five he became seriously ill and the result of the illness was a heart defect that changed his entire life. later life. Physically very weak, he could not play with his peers and grew up in the world of adults, which is why the inherent desire for loneliness, isolation, and contemplation inherent in him from birth developed strongly in his character.
His illness coincided with the family's move to St. Petersburg, where his father, Fyodor Nikolaevich Annensky, who held a high post in Siberia, hoped to receive a good place. The location turned out to be not very good. There were six children in the family: four sisters and two brothers; Innokenty was the youngest of the children. To support his family with dignity, the father took up speculation, but went broke. The case was accompanied by loud scandals with creditors because of which the authorities, deciding that such commercial activity doesn't go well with public service, fired Fedor Nikolaevich without severance pay. And only the intercession and efforts of his eldest son helped him receive a small pension. To top off all the troubles, Fyodor Nikolaevich suffered from paralysis.
The denouement of family misfortunes came in 1874, when Innokenty Annensky had to take the matriculation exams, it is not surprising that he failed: he did not pass a written exam in mathematics and was not admitted to the next one. In general, he studied at several different gymnasiums in St. Petersburg, but completed his education at home. Innokenty Annensky did not like to remember his childhood. In his youth he wrote poems that have not survived because he destroyed them one day, considering them nonsense.
The following year, 1875, Innocent lived with his older brother, under whose guidance he prepared for the exams much better and received the following grades: the law of God and French - “excellent”, Russian language and mathematics - “good”, and “satisfactory” in all other subjects . He entered St. Petersburg University at the Department of History and Philology. Knowing German since childhood and French languages at the university he mastered fourteen ancient languages, among which, in addition to Greek and Latin, were Hebrew, Sanskrit, and also a number of Slavic languages. At the university, Innokenty Annensky studied comparative philology and completely abandoned writing poetry. Final exams he passed brilliantly, receiving “excellent” in all subjects, except philosophy and theology, in which he received “good”.
Date of Birth: |
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Place of Birth: |
Omsk, Russian empire |
Date of death: |
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A place of death: |
St. Petersburg, Russian Empire |
Citizenship: |
Russian empire |
Occupation: |
Poet, playwright, translator |
Years of creativity: |
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Direction: |
Symbolism |
Nicknames: |
A-ii, I.; An-ii, I.; A-sky, I.; Nobody; Uh-oh, Nick. (Nobody); Nobody |
Dramaturgy
Translations
Literary influence
(August 20 (September 1), 1855, Omsk, Russian Empire - November 30 (December 13), 1909, St. Petersburg, Russian Empire) - Russian poet, playwright, translator. Brother of N.F. Annensky.
Biography
Innokenty Fedorovich Annensky was born on August 20 (September 1), 1855 in Omsk in the family of government official Fyodor Nikolaevich Annensky (died March 27, 1880) and Natalia Petrovna Annenskaya (died October 25, 1889). His father was the head of the Main Directorate Western Siberia. When Innocent was about five years old, his father received a position as an official special assignments in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the family from Siberia returned to St. Petersburg, which they had previously left in 1849.
In poor health, Annensky studied at private school, then - in the 2nd St. Petersburg gymnasium (1865-1868). Since 1869, he studied for two and a half years at the private gymnasium of V. I. Behrens. Before entering the university, in 1875, he lived with his older brother Nikolai, encyclopedic educated person, an economist, a populist, who helped his younger brother prepare for the exam and had a great influence on Innocent.
After graduating from the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University in 1879, he served as a teacher of ancient languages and Russian literature. He was the director of the Galagan College in Kyiv, then the VIII Gymnasium in St. Petersburg and the Gymnasium in Tsarskoe Selo. The excessive softness he showed, in the opinion of his superiors, during the troubled times of 1905-1906 was the reason for his removal from this position. In 1906 he was transferred to St. Petersburg as a district inspector and remained in this position until 1909, when he retired shortly before his death. Gave lectures on ancient Greek literature at the Highest women's courses. He appeared in print since the early 1880s with scientific reviews, critical articles and articles on pedagogical issues. From the beginning of the 1890s, he began studying Greek tragedians; Over the course of a number of years, he completed a huge amount of work translating into Russian and commenting on the entire theater of Euripides. At the same time, he wrote several original tragedies based on Euripidean plots and the “Bacchanalian drama” “Famira-kifared” (run in the 1916-1917 season on the stage of the Chamber Theater). He translated French symbolist poets (Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Mallarmé, Corbières, A. de Regnier, F. Jamme, etc.).
On November 30 (December 13), 1909, Annensky died suddenly on the steps of the Tsarskoye Selo station in St. Petersburg.
Annensky's son, philologist and poet Valentin Annensky-Krivich, published his “Posthumous Poems” (1923).
Poetry
Annensky is most significant as a poet. He began writing poetry since childhood, but published them for the first time in 1904. By his “intelligent being,” Annensky, in his opinion in my own words, was entirely obliged to the influence of his older brother, the famous publicist-populist N.F. Annensky, and his wife, the sister of the revolutionary Tkachev. In his poetry, Annensky, as he himself says, sought to express the “urban, partly stony, museum soul” that was “tortured by Dostoevsky,” the “sick and sensitive soul of our days.” The world of the “sick soul” is the main element of Annensky’s creativity. According to fair criticism, “nothing succeeded in Annensky’s poems so vividly, so convincingly, as the description of nightmares and insomnia”; “He found thousands of shades to express the painful decline of spirit. He exhausted the curves of his neurasthenia in every possible way.” The hopeless melancholy of life and the horror of “liberating” death, the simultaneous “desire to be destroyed and the fear of dying,” rejection of reality, the desire to escape from it into the “sweet hashish” of delirium, into the “binge” of labor, into the “poison” of poetry and at the same time “ a mysterious" attachment to "everyday life", to everyday life, to the "hopeless devastation of one's vulgar world" - such is the complex and contradictory "worldview and understanding of the world" that Annensky seeks to "instill" in his poems.
Approaching this “worldview” of all his contemporaries most of all to Fyodor Sologub, in the forms of verse Annensky is closest to the young Bryusov of the period of “Russian Symbolists”. However, the exaggerated “decadence” of Bryusov’s first poems, in which there was a lot of deliberate, invented with the special purpose of attracting attention and “shocking” the reader, is of a deeply organic nature for Annensky, who did not publish his poems. Bryusov soon moved away from his early student experiences. Annensky remained faithful to “decadence” throughout his life, “frozen in his modernism at a certain point in the early 90s,” but he brought it to perfect artistic expression. Annensky's style is brightly impressionistic, often distinguished by sophistication, standing on the verge of pretentiousness and lush rhetoric of décadence.
Like the young Bryusov, Annensky’s poetic teachers were French poets second half of the 19th century centuries - Parnassians and the “damned”: Baudelaire, Verlaine, Mallarmé. From the Parnassians Annensky inherited their cult poetic form, love for the word as such; Verlaine was followed in his desire for musicality, for the transformation of poetry into a “melodic rain of symbols”; following Baudelaire, he intricately intertwined in his dictionary “lofty”, “poetic” sayings with scientific terms, with ordinary, emphatically “everyday” words borrowed from the vernacular; finally, following Mallarmé, he built the main effect of his rebus poems on a deliberate obfuscation of meaning. Annensky is distinguished from the “passionate” French Parnassians by a special piercing note of pity, sounding through all his poetry. This pity is directed not at the social suffering of humanity, not even at man in general, but at nature, at the inanimate world of those suffering and languishing with “evil insults” of offended things (a watch, a doll, a barrel organ, etc.), with the images of which the poet masks his own pain and flour. And the smaller, the more insignificant, the more insignificant the “suffering” thing, the more hysterical, aching self-pity it evokes in him.
Very different from Annensky’s other poems is his poem “Old Estonians” (From the Poems of a Nightmarish Conscience) - a response to the shooting of a demonstration in Revel (Tallinn) on October 16, 1905. It differs in its poetic power and from many poems written by other poets, poems that were inspired by the events of the first Russian revolution.
Peculiar literary fate Annensky is reminiscent of the fate of Tyutchev. Like the latter, Annensky is a typical “poet for poets.” He published his only lifetime book of poetry under the characteristic pseudonym “Nick. That". And indeed, throughout almost his entire life, Annensky remained a “nobody” in literature. Only shortly before his death, his poetry gained fame in the circle of St. Petersburg poets grouped around the Apollo magazine. Annensky's death was noted by a number of articles and obituaries, but after that his name again disappeared from the printed columns for a long time. In the 4th book of poems by Nikolai Gumilyov “Quiver” the poem “In Memory of Annensky” was published.
Dramaturgy
Annensky wrote four plays - "Melanippe the Philosopher", "King Ixion", "Laodamia" and "Thamira the Cyfared" - in the ancient Greek spirit, based on the plots of the lost plays of Euripides and in imitation of his manner.
Translations
Annensky translated into Russian full meeting plays by the great Greek playwright Euripides. Also completed poetic translations works by Horace, Goethe, Muller, Heine, Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Rainier.
Literary influence
Annensky's literary influence on the movements of Russian poetry that emerged after symbolism (Acmeism, Futurism) is very great. Annensky's poem "Bells" can rightfully be called the first Russian futuristic poem in time of writing. Annensky's influence greatly affects Pasternak and his school and many others. In his literary critical articles, partially collected in two “Books of Reflections,” Annensky provides brilliant examples of Russian impressionistic criticism, striving for interpretation work of art through the conscious continuation of the author’s creativity within oneself. It should be noted that already in his critical and pedagogical articles of the 1880s, Annensky, long before the formalists, called for a systematic study of the form of works of art in school.
Biography
Personality Inkenty Fedorovich Annensky remained largely a mystery to contemporaries. Born on August 20 (September 1), 1855 in Omsk in the family of a government official. His father was the head of the Omsk department railways. When Innocent was about five years old, his father received a position as an official on special assignments in the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the family returned from Siberia to St. Petersburg, which they had previously left in 1849.
Poor health, Annensky studied at a private school, then at the 2nd St. Petersburg gymnasium (1865-1868). Since 1869, he studied for two and a half years at the private gymnasium of V. I. Behrens. Having lost his parents early, he often lives with his older brother Nikolai, an encyclopedic educated man, economist, populist, who had a great influence on Innocent.
After graduating (1879) from the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University, he served as a teacher of ancient languages and Russian literature, and subsequently as director of a gymnasium in Kyiv, St. Petersburg, and Tsarskoe Selo. Since 1906, inspector of the St. Petersburg educational district. He lectured on ancient Greek literature at the Higher Women's Courses. Since the early 1880s, he has appeared in print with scientific reviews, critical articles and articles on pedagogical issues. From the beginning of the 1890s, he began studying Greek tragedians; Over the course of a number of years, he completed a huge amount of work translating into Russian and commenting on the entire theater of Euripides. At the same time, he wrote several original tragedies based on Euripidean plots and the “Bacchanalian drama” “Famira-kifared” (run in the 1916-1917 season on the stage of the Chamber Theater). He translated French symbolist poets (Baudelaire, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Mallarmé, Corbières, A. de Regnier, F. Jamme, etc.).
November 30 (December 11) 1909 Annensky died suddenly on the steps of the Tsarskoye Selo (Vitebsk) station in St. Petersburg.
Annensky's son, a philologist and poet, published his “Posthumous Poems” (1923).
Poetry
Annensky is most significant as a poet. He began writing poetry since childhood, but published them for the first time in 1904. Annensky, in his own words, was entirely indebted for his “intelligent being” to the influence of his older brother, the famous publicist-populist N.F. Annensky, and his wife, the sister of the revolutionary Tkachev. In his poetry, Annensky, as he himself says, sought to express the “urban, partly stony, museum soul” that was “tortured by Dostoevsky,” the “sick and sensitive soul of our days.” The world of the “sick soul” is the main element of Annensky’s creativity. According to fair criticism, “nothing succeeded in Annensky’s poems so vividly, so convincingly, as the description of nightmares and insomnia”; “He found thousands of shades to express the painful decline of spirit. He exhausted the curves of his neurasthenia in every possible way.” The hopeless melancholy of life and the horror of “liberating” death, the simultaneous “desire to be destroyed and the fear of dying,” rejection of reality, the desire to escape from it into the “sweet hashish” of delirium, into the “binge” of labor, into the “poison” of poetry and at the same time “ a mysterious" attachment to "everyday life", to everyday life, to the "hopeless devastation of one's vulgar world" - such is the complex and contradictory "worldview and worldview" that Annensky seeks to "instill" in his poems.
Approaching this “worldview” of all his contemporaries most of all, Annensky’s forms of verse are closest to the young period of the “Russian Symbolists”. However, the exaggerated “decadence” of the former, in which there was a lot of deliberate, invented with the special purpose of attracting attention and “shocking” the reader, is of a deeply organic nature for Annensky, who did not publish his poems. Bryusov soon moved away from his early student experiences. Annensky remained faithful to “decadence” throughout his life, “frozen in his modernism at a certain point in the early 90s,” but he brought it to perfect artistic expression. Annensky's style is brightly impressionistic, often distinguished by sophistication, standing on the verge of pretentiousness, the lush rhetoric of decadence.
Like the young Bryusov, Annensky’s poetic teachers were French poets of the second half of the 19th century - the Parnassians and the “damned”: Baudelaire, Verlaine, Mallarmé. From the Parnassians, Annensky inherited their cult of poetic form, love of the word as such; Verlaine was followed in his desire for musicality, for the transformation of poetry into a “melodic rain of symbols”; following Baudelaire, he intricately intertwined in his dictionary “lofty,” “poetic” sayings with scientific terms, with ordinary, emphatically “everyday” words borrowed from the vernacular; finally, following Mallarmé, he built the main effect of his rebus poems on a deliberate obfuscation of meaning. Annensky is distinguished from the “passionate” French Parnassians by a special piercing note of pity, sounding through all his poetry. This pity is directed not at the social suffering of humanity, not even at man in general, but at nature, at the inanimate world of those suffering and languishing with “evil insults” of offended things (a watch, a doll, a barrel organ, etc.), with the images of which the poet masks his own pain and flour. And the smaller, the more insignificant, the more insignificant the “suffering” thing, the more hysterical, aching self-pity it evokes in him.
A peculiar literary destiny Annensky reminds me of fate. Like the latter, Annensky is a typical “poet for poets.” He published his only lifetime book of poetry under the characteristic pseudonym “Nick. That". And indeed, throughout almost his entire life, Annensky remained a “nobody” in literature. Only shortly before his death, his poetry gained fame in the circle of St. Petersburg poets grouped around the Apollo magazine. The death of Annensky was noted by a number of articles and obituaries, but after that his name again disappeared from the printed columns for a long time. A poem was published in the 4th book of poems by Nikolai Gumilyov “Quiver”.
Dramaturgy
Annensky wrote four plays - "Melanippe the Philosopher", "King Ixion", "Laodamia" and "Thamira the Cyfared" - in the ancient Greek spirit, based on the plots of the lost plays of Euripides and in imitation of his manner.
Translations
Annensky translated into Russian the complete collection of plays by the great Greek playwright Euripides.
Literary influence
Annensky's literary influence on the movements of Russian poetry that emerged after symbolism (Acmeism, Futurism) is very great. Annensky's poem can rightfully be called the first Russian futuristic poem written in time. Annensky's influence greatly affects Pasternak and his school and many others. In his literary critical articles, partially collected in two “Books of Reflections,” Annensky provides brilliant examples of Russian impressionistic criticism, striving to interpret a work of art through the conscious continuation of the author’s creativity. It should be noted that already in his critical-pedagogical articles of the 1880s Annensky long before the formalists, he called for a systematic study of the form of works of art in schools.