Поклониться тени

by Joseph Brodsky, Иосиф Бродский

348 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Joseph Brodsky (Russian: Иосиф Бродский] was a Russian-American poet and essayist. Born in Leningrad in 1940, Brodsky ran afoul of Soviet authorities and was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972, settling in America with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters. He taught thereafter at several universities, including Yale, Columbia, and Mount Holyoke. Brodsky was awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature "for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity." A journalist asked him: "You are an American citizen who is receiving the Prize for Russian-language poetry. Who are you, an American or a Russian?" Brodsky replied: "I'm Jewish; a Russian poet, an English essayist – and, of course, an American citizen." He was appointed United States Poet Laureate in 1991.

Reviews

[Anastasiia Bereza · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Среди преступлений против литературы наиболее тяжким является не преследование авторов, не цензурные ограничения и т. п., не предание книг костру. Существует преступление более тяжкое - пренебрежение книгами, их не-чтение. За преступление это человек расплачивается всей своей жизнью; если же преступление это совершает нация - она платит за это своей историей".

Подходящая, я считаю, цитата из интуитивно выбранной для новогодней ночи книги.
И для того, чтобы начать мой первый год на Goodreads - my year of magical reading.

[Sam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Joseph Brodsky was a Nobel Laureate who was born in Russia and emigrated to US. He wrote in Russian and English and is one of the foremost writers of our time. He is not well known but his writing is remarkable. This book is part travel writing, part personal essays that shows his genius and his understanding of humanity. I think this book was in someways an opening to how people can write to get their feelings and also showed me how a writer looks at other writers.