Product Description

From the artistic passion of the St Petersburg poets and bohemians, to the collective suffering of a nation through this turbulent century, Akhmatova spoke to, and for, the soul of her people. Born in 1889, Anna survived upheavals, refusing to abandon either Russia or her craft despite vicious attacks on her name and censorship of her work. When committing poems to paper threatened to cause her arrest, a few close friends faithfully memorized her lines. By the time she died in 1966, Anna was recognized as one of the world's great poets. This book contains 800 of her poems, an extensive photo-essay, a preface by the translator, an introduction Anatoly Naiman (Akhmatova's literary agent during the 1960s), and a reprint of Isaiah Berlin's memoir of Anna from his book "Personal Impressions".

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #360629 in Books
• Published on: 2000-08-08
• Original language: Russian
• Binding: Paperback
• 988 pages

Customer Reviews

Best of Poetesses
Anna Akhmatova's views on life through windows of an everchanging feminine spirit comes in a strow of poems in this collection. I found this version fully corresponding with the Russian version...

Her works are literary monuments of world literature and have a special place in the hearts of the Russians who albeit the socialist way of life and years of censorship, have nembraced her writings as detrimental in defining the woman's role in Soviet and post-Soviet societies. She's a true role model that brings a feminine mindset out as a human component of passion and intelligence, capable of mixing the two Maries in one - a dilemma still subject of a great debate in the West. Her life from childhood to adulthood go through introvert and extrovert changes, she almost physically exceeds emotions on the shifting political influences in her country and yet stays loyal to the very feminine core of her existence - her confused lovelife, her allowing herself to be exposed to the intellectual influence of someone as dubious yet powerful as Gumilev...

Anna Akhmatova is a true Eurasian, a composure of a woman of two distinct worlds in search of a singular truth and thus her narrative takes the reader once into a rational state of mind and at other times to a heartfully engaged mistress who's at the same time a mother and a public intellectual, fearlessly changing and opinionating masses of other confused souls as herself...A definite read, indeed.

A fine love poet
A large book, with everything one could wish for. A section of pictures and paintings of the poet are a welcome addition to a vast collection of poems.

It blew my mind!
You got to read this if you like poetry. Enjoy!