Academic Studies Press Pushkin: A Writer's Biography

Yuri Lotman’s biography of Pushkin is a classic work of Soviet literary scholarship, presenting an image of Russia’s national poet as a complex figure caught up in the trials and contradictions of his age, who, during his own lifetime, took a pioneering approach to the shaping of his own public biography, much as he did with regards to his works. This volume presents a chronological biography of Alexander Pushkin, often held to be Russia’s national poet and writer. Lotman pays special attention to the development of Pushkin’s social and political thought throughout the poet’s life, painting a picture of the poet as having been deeply in tune with and even involved in the most pressing socio-political challenges of his age, such as the issue of constitutional monarchy and revolution through his association with various members of the Decembrist movement, the issue of serfdom, and his struggle for personal, creative, and financial freedom as a writer who was under constant public scrutiny and state surveillance. Lotman also fascinatingly describes the deliberate measures Pushkin undertook in his own life to shape the public’s perception of him, essentially treating his life and personal mythology as a work of art in itself. Autorid: Yuri Lotman, Ilya Nemirovsky, David M. Bethea