Dubbed by his fellow Futurists the "King of Time," Velimir
Khlebnikov (1885-1922) spent his entire brief life searching for a
new poetic language to express his convictions about the rhythm of
history, the correspondence between human behavior and the
"language of the stars." The result was a vast body of poetry and
prose that has been called hermetic, incomprehensible, even
deranged. Of all this tragic generation of Russian poets (including
Blok, Esenin, and Mayakovsky), Khlebnikov has been perhaps the most
praised and the more censured.
This first volume of the Collected Works, an edition sponsored
by the Dia Art Foundation, will do much to establish the
counterimage of Khlebnikov as an honest, serious writer. The 117
letters published here for the first time in English reveal an
ebullient, humane, impractical, but deliberate working artist. We
read of the continuing involvement with his family throughout his
vagabond life (pleas to his smartest sister, Vera, to break out of
the mold, pleas to his scholarly father not to condemn and to send
a warm overcoat); the naive pleasure he took in being applauded by
other artists; his insistence that a young girl's simple verses be
included in one of the typically outrageous Futurist publications
of the time; his jealous fury at the appearance in Moscow of the
Italian Futurist Marinetti; a first draft of his famous zoo poem
("O Garden of Animals "); his seriocomic but ultimately shattering
efforts to be released from army service; his inexhaustibly
courageous confrontation with his own disease and excruciating
poverty; and always his deadly earnest attempt to make sense of
numbers, language, suffering, politics, and the exigencies of
publication.
The theoretical writings presented here are even more important
than the letters to an understanding of Khlebnikov's creative
output. In the scientific articles written before 1910, we discern
foreshadowings of major patterns of later poetic work. In the
pan-Slavic proclamations of 1908-1914, we find explicit connections
between cultural roots and linguistic ramifications. In the
semantic excursuses beginning in 1915, we can see Khlebnikov's
experiments with consonants, nouns, and definitions spelled out in
accessible, if arid, form. The essays of 1916-1922 take us into the
future of Planet Earth, visions of universal order and
accomplishment that no longer seem so farfetched but indeed
resonate for modern readers.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!