Vladimir Mayakovsky

Vladimir Mayakovsky
Mayakovsky in 1920
Mayakovsky in 1920
BornVladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky
19 July [O.S. 7 July] 1893
Baghdati, Kutais, Russian Empire
Died14 April 1930(1930-04-14) (aged 36)
Moscow, Soviet Union
Alma materStroganov Moscow State University of Arts and Industry, Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture
GenrePoetry
SubjectNew Soviet man
Literary movementRussian Futurism
Cubo-Futurism
Years active1912–1930
Signature
Vladimir Mayakovsky's voice
Vladimir Mayakovsky reading his poem An Extraordinary Adventure, 1920

Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (Russian: Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский, IPA: [məjɪˈkofskʲɪj] (listenⓘ); 19 July [O.S. 7 July] 1893 – 14 April 1930) was a Soviet Russian poet, playwright, artist, and actor. Before the Russian Revolution until 1917, Mayakovsky became an important part of the Russian Futurist movement. He signed the Futurist manifesto, A Slap in the Face of Public Taste (1913). He wrote poems. His famous poems are "A Cloud in Trousers" (1915) and "Backbone Flute" (1916). Mayakovsky made many works in his career. He wrote many poems, wrote and directed plays, was in many movies, edited the art journal LEF, and made agitprop posters for the Communist Party during the Russian Civil War.

Mayakovsky's work showed that he supported the Bolsheviks and supported Vladimir Lenin. However, he often had issues with the Soviet state. Mayakovsky did not like their cultural censorship and Socialist realism. He made some works that satirized or attacked the Soviet Union. These included the poem "Talking With the Taxman About Poetry" (1926), and the plays The Bedbug (1929) and The Bathhouse (1929). The Soviet state did not like this.

In 1930, Mayakovsky killed himself. After his death, Joseph Stalin said that Mayakovsky was one of the most important poets in the Soviet Union.

Famous works

Poems

Poem cycles and collections

  • The Early Ones (Первое, 1912–1924, 22 poems)
  • I (Я, 1914, 4 poems)
  • Satires. 1913–1927 (23 poems, including "Take That!", 1914)
  • The War (Война, 1914–1916, 8 poems)
  • Lyrics (Лирика, 1916, Лирика, 1916, 3 poems)
  • Revolution (Революция, 1917–1928, 22 poems, including "Ode to Revolution", 1918; "The Left March", 1919)
  • Everyday Life (Быт, 1921–1924, 11 poems, including "On Rubbish", 1921, "Re Conferences", 1922)
  • The Art of the Commune (Искусство коммуны, 1918–1923, 11 poems, including "An Order to the Army of Arts", 1918)
  • Agitpoems (Агитпоэмы, 1923, 6 poems, including "The Mayakovsky Gallery")
  • The West (Запад, 1922–1925, 10 poems, including "How Does the Democratic Republic Work?", and the 8-poem Paris cycle)
  • The American Poems (Стихи об Америке, 1925–1926, 21 poems, including "The Brooklyn Bridge")
  • On Poetry (О поэзии, 1926, 7 poems, including "Talking with the Taxman About Poetry", "For Sergey Yesenin")
  • The Satires. 1926 (Сатира, 1926. 14 poems)
  • Lyrics. 1918–1924 (Лирика. 12 poems, including "I Love", 1922)
  • Publicism (Публицистика, 1926, 12 poems, including "To Comrade Nette, a Steamboat and a Man", 1926)
  • The Children's Room (Детская, 1925–1929. 9 poems for children, including "What Is Good and What Is Bad")
  • Poems. 1927–1928 (56 poems, including "Lenin With Us!")
  • Satires. 1928 (Сатира. 1928, 9 poems)
  • Cultural Revolution (Культурная революция, 1927–1928, 20 poems, including "Beer and Socialism")
  • Agit…(Агит…, 1928, 44 poems, including "'Yid'")
  • Roads (Дороги, 1928, 11 poems)
  • The First of Five (Первый из пяти, 1925, 26 poems)
  • Back and Forth (Туда и обратно, 1928–1930, 19 poems, including "The Poem of the Soviet Passport")
  • Formidable Laughter (Грозный смех, 1922–1930; more than 100 poems, published posthumously, 1932–1936)
  • Poems, 1924–1930 (Стихотворения. 1924–1930, including "A Letter to Comrade Kostrov on the Essence of Love", 1929)
  • Whom Shall I Become? (Кем Быть, Kem byt'?, published posthumously 1931, poem for children, illustrated by N. A. Shifrin)

Plays

Essays and sketches

  • My Discovery of America (Мое открытие Америки, 1926), in four parts
  • How to Make Verses (Как делать стихи, 1926)

Movies

Translations

  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir. The Bedbug and selected poetry. Ed. with introd. by Patricia Blake. Trans. by Max Hayward and George Reavey. New York: Meridian Books, 1960. Reprint: Indiana University Press, 1975.
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir. Mayakovsky: Plays. Trans. Guy Daniels. (Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Il, 1995). ISBN 0-8101-1339-2.
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir. For the voice (The British Library, London, 2000).
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir (ed. Bengt Jangfeldt, trans. Julian Graffy). Love is the heart of everything : correspondence between Vladimir Mayakovsky and Lili Brik 1915–1930 (Polygon Books, Edinburgh, 1986).
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir (comp. and trans. Herbert Marshall). Mayakovsky and his poetry (Current Book House, Bombay, 1955).
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir. Selected works in three volumes (Raduga, Moscow, 1985).
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir. Selected poetry. (Foreign Languages, Moscow, 1975).
  • Mayakovsky, Vladimir (ed. Bengt Jangfeldt and Nils Ake Nilsson). Vladimir Majakovsky: Memoirs and essays (Almqvist & Wiksell Int., Stockholm 1975).

Books

  • Aizlewood, Robin. Verse form and meaning in the poetry of Vladimir Maiakovsky: Tragediia, Oblako v shtanakh, Fleita-pozvonochnik, Chelovek, Liubliu, Pro eto (Modern Humanities Research Association, London, 1989).
  • Brown, E. J. Mayakovsky: a poet in the revolution (Princeton Univ. Press, 1973).
  • Charters, Ann & Samuel. I love : the story of Vladimir Mayakovsky and Lili Brik (Farrar Straus Giroux, NY, 1979).
  • Humesky, Assya. Majakovskiy and his neologisms (Rausen Publishers, NY, 1964).
  • Jangfeldt, Bengt. Majakovsky and futurism 1917–1921 (Almqvist & Wiksell International, Stockholm, 1976).
  • Lavrin, Janko. From Pushkin to Mayakovsky, a study in the evolution of a literature. (Sylvan Press, London, 1948).
  • Novatorskoe iskusstvo Vladimira Maiakovskogo (trans. Alex Miller). Vladimir Mayakovsky: Innovator (Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1976).
  • Noyes, George Rapall (ed.). Masterpieces of the Russian drama. Vol. 2 (Dover Pub., NY, 1961 [1933]).
  • Nyka-Niliūnas, Alfonsas. Keturi vėjai ir keturvėjinikai (The Four Winds literary movement and its members), Aidai, 1949, No. 24. (in Lithuanian)
  • Rougle, Charles. Three Russians consider America : America in the works of Maksim Gorkij, Aleksandr Blok, and Vladimir Majakovsky (Almqvist & Wiksell International, Stockholm, 1976).
  • Shklovskii, Viktor Borisovich. (ed. and trans. Lily Feiler). Mayakovsky and his circle (Dodd, Mead, NY, 1972).
  • Stapanian, Juliette. Mayakovsky's cubo-futurist vision (Rice University Press, 1986).
  • Terras, Victor. Vladimir Mayakovsky (Twayne, Boston, 1983).
  • Vallejo, César (trans. Richard Schaaf) The Mayakovsky case (Curbstone Press, Willimantic, CT, 1982).
  • Volk, Craig, "Mayakovsky Takes The Stage" (full-length stage drama), 2006 and "At The Top Of My Voice" (feature-length screenplay), 2002.
  • Wachtel, Michael. The development of Russian verse : meter and its meanings (Cambridge University Press, 1998).

References

  1. ↑ Mayakovsky, Vladimir (1985). "Conversation with Comrade Lenin". Selected Works in Three Volumes. Vol. 1 (Selected Verse). English poem trans. Irina Zheleznova. USSR: Raduga Publishers. pp. 238. ISBN 5-05-00001 7-3. On snow-covered lands / and stubbly fields, / in smoky plants / and on factory sites, / with you in our hearts, / Comrade Lenin, / we think, / we breathe, / we live, / we build, / and we fight!
  2. ↑ Mayakovsky, Vladimir (1960). "At the Top of My Voice". The Bedbug and Selected Poetry. trans. Max Hayward and George Reavey. New York: Meridian Books. pp. 231–235. ISBN 978-0253201898. When I appear / before the CCC / of the coming / bright years, / by way of my Bolshevik party card, / I'll raise / above the heads / of a gang of self-seeking / poets and rogues, / all the hundred volumes / of my / communist-committed books. {{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
  3. ↑ Sundaram, Chantal (2000). Manufacturing Culture: The Soviet State and the Mayakovsky Legend 1930–1993. Ottawa, Canada: National Library of Canada: Acquisitions and Bibliographical Services. pp. 71, 85. ISBN 0-612-50061-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)

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