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Le Soir
Une voix sonore et fragileEn 1912, la poétesse russe Anna Akhmatova va sur ses 23 ans. L’année semble pleine de promesses : en mars paraît Le Soir, son premier cycle de poèmes.Ce premier recueil, paru la même année que Pierre d’Ossip Mandelstam, constitue l’une des œuvres fondatrices de l’acméisme, mouvement littéraire dont la naissance est proclamée par Nikolaï Goumiliov. L’esthétique acméiste s’oppose radicalement au lyrisme musical des symbolistes qui dominent alors la poésie russe. Les acméistes revendiquent l’utilisation d’un langage simple et concret, censé porter à son apogée la dimension poétique du quotidien. Le Soir d’Akhmatova frappe justement par l’absence de tout arrière-plan mystique. Le recueil est composé de brefs tableaux précis et sobres où l’état d’âme n’est souvent que suggéré. Les détails ou objets concrets jouent un rôle essentiel; ils deviennent les vecteurs des sentiments ou des idées.
128 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1912
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About the author
Anna Akhmatova
431 books964 followersalso known as: Анна Ахматова
Personal themes characterize lyrical beauty of noted work of Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, pseudonym of Anna Andreevna Gorenko; the Soviet government banned her books between 1946 and 1958.
People credit this modernist of the most acclaimed writers in the canon.
Her writing ranges from short lyrics to universalized, ingeniously structured cycles, such as Requiem (1935-40), her tragic masterpiece about the Stalinist terror. Her work addresses a variety of themes including time and memory, the fate of creative women, and the difficulties of living and writing in the shadow of Stalinism. She has been widely translated into many languages, and is one of the best-known Russian poets of 20th century.
In 1910, she married the poet, Nikolay Gumilyov, who very soon left her for lion hunting in Africa, the battlefields of World War I, and the society of Parisian grisettes. Her husband did not take her poems seriously, and was shocked when Alexander Blok declared to him that he preferred her poems to his. Their son, Lev, born in 1912, was to become a famous Neo-Eurasianist historian.
Nikolay Gumilyov was executed in 1921 for activities considered anti-Soviet; Akhmatova then married a prominent Assyriologist Vladimir Shilejko, and then an art scholar, Nikolay Punin, who died in the Stalinist Gulag camps. After that, she spurned several proposals from the married poet, Boris Pasternak.
After 1922, Akhmatova was condemned as a bourgeois element, and from 1925 to 1940, her poetry was banned from publication. She earned her living by translating Leopardi and publishing essays, including some brilliant essays on Pushkin, in scholarly periodicals. All of her friends either emigrated or were repressed.
Her son spent his youth in Stalinist gulags, and she even resorted to publishing several poems in praise of Stalin to secure his release. Their relations remained strained, however. Akhmatova died at the age of 76 in St. Peterburg. She was interred at Komarovo Cemetery.
There is a museum devoted to Akhmatova at the apartment where she lived with Nikolai Punin at the garden wing of the Fountain House (more properly known as the Sheremetev Palace) on the Fontanka Embankment, where Akhmatova lived from the mid 1920s until 1952.
Personal themes characterize lyrical beauty of noted work of Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, pseudonym of Anna Andreevna Gorenko; the Soviet government banned her books between 1946 and 1958.
People credit this modernist of the most acclaimed writers in the canon.
Her writing ranges from short lyrics to universalized, ingeniously structured cycles, such as Requiem (1935-40), her tragic masterpiece about the Stalinist terror. Her work addresses a variety of themes including time and memory, the fate of creative women, and the difficulties of living and writing in the shadow of Stalinism. She has been widely translated into many languages, and is one of the best-known Russian poets of 20th century.
In 1910, she married the poet, Nikolay Gumilyov, who very soon left her for lion hunting in Africa, the battlefields of World War I, and the society of Parisian grisettes. Her husband did not take her poems seriously, and was shocked when Alexander Blok declared to him that he preferred her poems to his. Their son, Lev, born in 1912, was to become a famous Neo-Eurasianist historian.
Nikolay Gumilyov was executed in 1921 for activities considered anti-Soviet; Akhmatova then married a prominent Assyriologist Vladimir Shilejko, and then an art scholar, Nikolay Punin, who died in the Stalinist Gulag camps. After that, she spurned several proposals from the married poet, Boris Pasternak.
After 1922, Akhmatova was condemned as a bourgeois element, and from 1925 to 1940, her poetry was banned from publication. She earned her living by translating Leopardi and publishing essays, including some brilliant essays on Pushkin, in scholarly periodicals. All of her friends either emigrated or were repressed.
Her son spent his youth in Stalinist gulags, and she even resorted to publishing several poems in praise of Stalin to secure his release. Their relations remained strained, however. Akhmatova died at the age of 76 in St. Peterburg. She was interred at Komarovo Cemetery.
There is a museum devoted to Akhmatova at the apartment where she lived with Nikolai Punin at the garden wing of the Fountain House (more properly known as the Sheremetev Palace) on the Fontanka Embankment, where Akhmatova lived from the mid 1920s until 1952.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews
March 4, 2025
Evening is an early collection of poems by the Russian modernist poet Anna Akhmatova. It is translated by Andrey Kneller, who has described her as "a great Russian poet of the Silver Age" and again, "one of Russia's most beloved poets." She was born in the Ukraine, her parents both being descended from the Russian nobility. Akhmatova chose to adopt her grandmother's surname "Akhmatova" as a pen name, as her father did not want to see any verses printed under his "respectable" name.
Published in 1912, this is the first collection of five in nine years. Akhmatova was prolific. She had been writing poetry since she was eleven, and had already been published in her late teens, although none of this work survives. This collection includes just 35 of the 200 poems she had written by the end of 1911. It was very well received by the critics, who remarked that she was a "new and striking young writer." With these poems she became famous.
These poems are not typical of her later work, however. That was inevitably heavily influenced by the tumultuous events both in her life and the country she lived in. These are the beautiful yearning poems of a young woman, full of details and captured impressions. They are intimate, colloquial poems on topics of love and relationships. In the main they centre on the relationship between a man and woman during its most significant and sensitive moments. She said of them later,
"These naïve poems by a frivolous girl for some reason were reprinted thirteen times [...] And they came out in several translations. The girl herself (as far as I recall) did not foresee such a fate for them and used to hide the issues of the journals in which they were first published under the sofa cushions."
They are very personal descriptions, where images have a particular and special meaning for the poet. Such images have been called "sentimental souvenirs". They seem to add significance to everyday objects by virtue of the moment in time they were encapsulated. At moments of crisis or joy, we may remember a particular object or location with a high degree of intensity, despite the fact that it is, in itself, irrelevant to the experience. This feature of her work is described by M. Kuzmin in the Preface to the first edition thus,
"Anna Akhmatova possesses an ability to understand and love things exactly in their incomprehensible connection to the experienced minutes."
All poets have a heightened sensibility, by virtue of their craft. These poems are simple and direct, and highly evocative in their detail. The Acmeist movement in Russian poetry had just begun to emerge in 1910, and its "Guild of Poets", which she had participated in since 1907, published this collection. The ideals of Acmeism were "compactness of form and clarity of expression." They valued "direct expression through images" rather than use of symbols. The form is classical; the poet's voice lyrical and romantic.
As Kuzmin again observes,
"She does not belong to the poets who are particularly merry, but to those who are always singing."
In 1903 she had met the young poet Gumilev, and he pursued her, constantly proposing marriage. In 1907 she wrote, "He has loved me for three years now, and I believe that it is my fate to be his wife. Whether or not I love him, I do not know, but it seems to me that I do." They married in 1910, honeymooning in Paris where Akhmatova met the artist Modigliani, who was to become a great friend. He made drawings of her both in 1911 and later. By the end of the first year, Gumilev began to tire of their marriage. Akhmatova wrote that he had "lost his passion" for her and by the end of that year he left on a six-month trip to Africa. In 1912 Akhmatova gave birth - both to her son Lev and to the poetry collection "Evening".
These events in her life are reflected in her poetry, and the poems in "Evening" become darker and more poignant as the collection progresses. The first lines of the poem "Song of the Final Meeting" (1911) have become to many, Akhmatova's signature,
"How helplessly chilled was my chest, yet
My footsteps were nimble and light.
The glove that belonged on my left hand
I unconsciously put on my right."
But the final word should go to Andrey Kneller,
"She was a master of conveying raw emotion in her portrayals of everyday situations."
Published in 1912, this is the first collection of five in nine years. Akhmatova was prolific. She had been writing poetry since she was eleven, and had already been published in her late teens, although none of this work survives. This collection includes just 35 of the 200 poems she had written by the end of 1911. It was very well received by the critics, who remarked that she was a "new and striking young writer." With these poems she became famous.
These poems are not typical of her later work, however. That was inevitably heavily influenced by the tumultuous events both in her life and the country she lived in. These are the beautiful yearning poems of a young woman, full of details and captured impressions. They are intimate, colloquial poems on topics of love and relationships. In the main they centre on the relationship between a man and woman during its most significant and sensitive moments. She said of them later,
"These naïve poems by a frivolous girl for some reason were reprinted thirteen times [...] And they came out in several translations. The girl herself (as far as I recall) did not foresee such a fate for them and used to hide the issues of the journals in which they were first published under the sofa cushions."
They are very personal descriptions, where images have a particular and special meaning for the poet. Such images have been called "sentimental souvenirs". They seem to add significance to everyday objects by virtue of the moment in time they were encapsulated. At moments of crisis or joy, we may remember a particular object or location with a high degree of intensity, despite the fact that it is, in itself, irrelevant to the experience. This feature of her work is described by M. Kuzmin in the Preface to the first edition thus,
"Anna Akhmatova possesses an ability to understand and love things exactly in their incomprehensible connection to the experienced minutes."
All poets have a heightened sensibility, by virtue of their craft. These poems are simple and direct, and highly evocative in their detail. The Acmeist movement in Russian poetry had just begun to emerge in 1910, and its "Guild of Poets", which she had participated in since 1907, published this collection. The ideals of Acmeism were "compactness of form and clarity of expression." They valued "direct expression through images" rather than use of symbols. The form is classical; the poet's voice lyrical and romantic.
As Kuzmin again observes,
"She does not belong to the poets who are particularly merry, but to those who are always singing."
In 1903 she had met the young poet Gumilev, and he pursued her, constantly proposing marriage. In 1907 she wrote, "He has loved me for three years now, and I believe that it is my fate to be his wife. Whether or not I love him, I do not know, but it seems to me that I do." They married in 1910, honeymooning in Paris where Akhmatova met the artist Modigliani, who was to become a great friend. He made drawings of her both in 1911 and later. By the end of the first year, Gumilev began to tire of their marriage. Akhmatova wrote that he had "lost his passion" for her and by the end of that year he left on a six-month trip to Africa. In 1912 Akhmatova gave birth - both to her son Lev and to the poetry collection "Evening".
These events in her life are reflected in her poetry, and the poems in "Evening" become darker and more poignant as the collection progresses. The first lines of the poem "Song of the Final Meeting" (1911) have become to many, Akhmatova's signature,
"How helplessly chilled was my chest, yet
My footsteps were nimble and light.
The glove that belonged on my left hand
I unconsciously put on my right."
But the final word should go to Andrey Kneller,
"She was a master of conveying raw emotion in her portrayals of everyday situations."
January 14, 2018
Neither one of us understood
How small the earth was for two
Evening is Akhmatova's first book, published in 1912. This collection includes some beautifully crafted poems that brought her critical acclaim. Through the art of simplicity, she managed to convey many aspects of our complex behavior.
A decision, a depart, different stages of a relationship, a failed marriage, a brief existence, the desire of returning to what is essential. An eerie atmosphere covers the entire book, unveiling the intrinsic bond between opposite elements that necessarily complement each other. There is simply too much love and too much loss on every page Akhmatova wrote.
And your sorrow, hidden from others,
Drew me close and opened forthright
And you say just how much I was smothered
By the poisonous yearning inside.
Her verses portray fragments of emotions that can be seen in the beginning of a relationship. Emotions that either evolve or degenerate, until there is nothing but distance and pride.
Everything seems to have been written by someone that was able to feel everything. Until there was nothing left.
The ice has covered up the garden,
It sparkles and it cracks.
The one who left me is disheartened
But there's no coming back.
There are few poems filled with effusive impressions that made me feel a bit uncomfortable, since I honestly can't connect with that kind of strong sentiment. So the lines that describe someone's lament as a response to the aching absence of love usually leave me confused, when such lament involves an absurd desire of wanting to merge with the earth because someone doesn't share the same feelings. But I did enjoy the poems written with a much balanced tone, and the ones that illustrate other sides that together constitute what we know as human nature. Luckily, those were the majority.
In the heart, the memory of the sun fades,
Yellower turns the grass.
The wind disperses the early flakes
Barely, with each pass.
In narrow channels, water won't flow -
Cooling, stands still.
Here nothing will ever happen, I know, -
It never will!
...
I will keep exploring Akhmatova's poetry so as to witness what I believe must be a fascinating journey through the years, as she reached a more mature style. Even though this first collection of hers was an impressive start. Her writing is deeply lyrical and, fortunately, lacks of all superfluous attempt of embellishment. Her poetry echoes every raw emotion that many are unwilling to acknowledge. Or worse, unable to explain.
Here years can pass without a word.
Jan 17, 16
* A nice translation by Kneller. This is the second time I read his work and I'm very much pleased with what I found.
** Also on my blog.
May 26, 2017
The collection contains poems when Akhamotava was still young and from before first world war left its dark influence on her poetry - and so most of the poetry is about love of all forms - requited, unrequited and no-longer-requited, failed relationships etc.
Funeral
"I am seeking a gravesite that’s bright.
Can you help, I am tired and weary?
Open fields get so cold in the night.
Heaps of stones by the sea are so dreary.
She’s so used to the peace she knew prior
And she loves the rays of the sun,
I will build a small hermitage by her,
As our home for the ages to come.
With two windows, a door in-between,
And an icon lamp always alight,
Like a dark heart the icon will gleam
With a scarlet-red fire inside.
She was raving, you know, sick in bed,
Of some heavenly place in the blue,
But a monk, reproaching her, said:
“It was not made for sinners like you.”
It was then that she whispered to me,
Turning pale from pain: “Let us go.”
Now alone we are wandering free,With our feet in the blue surf below. "
Funeral
"I am seeking a gravesite that’s bright.
Can you help, I am tired and weary?
Open fields get so cold in the night.
Heaps of stones by the sea are so dreary.
She’s so used to the peace she knew prior
And she loves the rays of the sun,
I will build a small hermitage by her,
As our home for the ages to come.
With two windows, a door in-between,
And an icon lamp always alight,
Like a dark heart the icon will gleam
With a scarlet-red fire inside.
She was raving, you know, sick in bed,
Of some heavenly place in the blue,
But a monk, reproaching her, said:
“It was not made for sinners like you.”
It was then that she whispered to me,
Turning pale from pain: “Let us go.”
Now alone we are wandering free,With our feet in the blue surf below. "
July 16, 2025
I am, beginning on Christmas, 2020, to read the complete poems, book by book, of the great Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, whom I knew as a poet when I was young but really delved into when I went to Russia in 1991 with a group of high school students for a kind of writing/cultural exchange. We took the train from Moscow to Leningrad for a couple days, visited many of the key tourist attractions, but one thing I did to prepare for this was to read the poetry of Akhmatova, paying particular attention to her war poetry, specifically her poetry of WWII, focused on the siege of Leningrad.
The trip included a visit to the Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery and two or three Russian Orthodox Cathedrals, all of which was very memorable and moving for me., in part I suppose because we visited there on Easter. Of her poetry, Akhmatova said, “I never stopped writing poems. In them is the link with time, with the new life of my people. When I wrote them, I believed in the resounding rhythms reflected in the heroic history of my country.”
Evening is the first book the young Akhmatova published, in 1911, at the age of 22, but it was both critically and popularly received. The focus in these poems is love, though other subjects are included, of course, such as nature, but it is tempting to see the work as emerging out of her tempestuous, tumultuous relationship with her first husband, Nikolay Gumilyov. It’s a book about what she called “meetings,” by which she meant emotional encounters, and a range of emotions we associate with love. The critic Korney Chukovsky said that a couple generations of Russians grew up and fell in love to the accompaniment of her poetry.
“I’m carrying a bouquet of white gillyflowers.
In them there’s a secret, latent flame for the one
Who, taking the blossoms from my timid hands,
Will touch my warm palm.”
“The blood beats ever stronger
In a body wounded by desire.”
“First as a serpent, it’ll cast its spell
Next to your heart, curled up.
Then it’ll come as a dove as well,
Cooing for days nonstop.”
And of jealousy?
“I keep the candle burning in my window til dawn
And I don’t long for anyone
But I don’t want, don’t want, don’t want
To know how they kiss.”
“He loved three things in life:
Evensong, white peacocks
And old maps of America.
He hated it when children cried
He hated tea with raspberry jam
And women’s hysterics
. . . And I was his wife.”
The Complete Poems was translated by Judith Hemschemeyer, who devoted seventeen years of her life to the unenviable task of taking her rich lyrical Russian language and conveying it into the more prosaic English. But this is now the definitive Russian to English edition. I can't read the original (though I have two record albums of her reading her own work that were given to me as gifts when I was there that are priceless, amazing), but the poetry is terrific.
Of these early poems Akhmatova was to write: “These naïve poems by a frivolous girl for some reason were reprinted thirteen times [...] And they came out in several translations. The girl herself (as far as I recall) did not foresee such a fate for them and used to hide the issues of the journals in which they were first published under the sofa cushions."
The trip included a visit to the Piskaryovskoye Memorial Cemetery and two or three Russian Orthodox Cathedrals, all of which was very memorable and moving for me., in part I suppose because we visited there on Easter. Of her poetry, Akhmatova said, “I never stopped writing poems. In them is the link with time, with the new life of my people. When I wrote them, I believed in the resounding rhythms reflected in the heroic history of my country.”
Evening is the first book the young Akhmatova published, in 1911, at the age of 22, but it was both critically and popularly received. The focus in these poems is love, though other subjects are included, of course, such as nature, but it is tempting to see the work as emerging out of her tempestuous, tumultuous relationship with her first husband, Nikolay Gumilyov. It’s a book about what she called “meetings,” by which she meant emotional encounters, and a range of emotions we associate with love. The critic Korney Chukovsky said that a couple generations of Russians grew up and fell in love to the accompaniment of her poetry.
“I’m carrying a bouquet of white gillyflowers.
In them there’s a secret, latent flame for the one
Who, taking the blossoms from my timid hands,
Will touch my warm palm.”
“The blood beats ever stronger
In a body wounded by desire.”
“First as a serpent, it’ll cast its spell
Next to your heart, curled up.
Then it’ll come as a dove as well,
Cooing for days nonstop.”
And of jealousy?
“I keep the candle burning in my window til dawn
And I don’t long for anyone
But I don’t want, don’t want, don’t want
To know how they kiss.”
“He loved three things in life:
Evensong, white peacocks
And old maps of America.
He hated it when children cried
He hated tea with raspberry jam
And women’s hysterics
. . . And I was his wife.”
The Complete Poems was translated by Judith Hemschemeyer, who devoted seventeen years of her life to the unenviable task of taking her rich lyrical Russian language and conveying it into the more prosaic English. But this is now the definitive Russian to English edition. I can't read the original (though I have two record albums of her reading her own work that were given to me as gifts when I was there that are priceless, amazing), but the poetry is terrific.
Of these early poems Akhmatova was to write: “These naïve poems by a frivolous girl for some reason were reprinted thirteen times [...] And they came out in several translations. The girl herself (as far as I recall) did not foresee such a fate for them and used to hide the issues of the journals in which they were first published under the sofa cushions."
February 8, 2016
A wonderful little book. Very accessible for a non poetry reader like me.
The poems are brief, direct and simple, with none of the highfalutin references and allusions that can disfigure poetry (in my view at least, simpleton that I am). The themes of the poems are eternal - love, loss, yearning, nature, friends
I found it poignant that this book was written by a young Russian on the eve of the First World War, totally oblivious to the horrors to follow - war, revolution, the great terror, war and famine again. And yet these vignettes of a lost world still resonate today.
I am glad I strayed out of my comfort zone and took a (small) risk on this book. Officially this was number 49 on my to read list, but I dipped in for a quick preview and was hooked.
Well worth a read.
The poems are brief, direct and simple, with none of the highfalutin references and allusions that can disfigure poetry (in my view at least, simpleton that I am). The themes of the poems are eternal - love, loss, yearning, nature, friends
I found it poignant that this book was written by a young Russian on the eve of the First World War, totally oblivious to the horrors to follow - war, revolution, the great terror, war and famine again. And yet these vignettes of a lost world still resonate today.
I am glad I strayed out of my comfort zone and took a (small) risk on this book. Officially this was number 49 on my to read list, but I dipped in for a quick preview and was hooked.
Well worth a read.
October 30, 2017
These love poems are unexpectedly intense, raw and captivating.
September 1, 2016
Bury me, bury me, wind!
None of my kin had arrived,
The evening above me dimmed
And the earth indistinctly sighed.
Like you, I was free and of course,
I couldn’t resist life’s charms
And now, wind, you see my corpse
With no one to fold my arms.
Let this black wound recede
As the shroud of darkness spreads,
And command azure mist to read
Psalms up above my head.
To ease me, alone, on the brink
Of sleep for the final time,
Make the sedges rustle of spring,
Of the spring that used to be mine.
None of my kin had arrived,
The evening above me dimmed
And the earth indistinctly sighed.
Like you, I was free and of course,
I couldn’t resist life’s charms
And now, wind, you see my corpse
With no one to fold my arms.
Let this black wound recede
As the shroud of darkness spreads,
And command azure mist to read
Psalms up above my head.
To ease me, alone, on the brink
Of sleep for the final time,
Make the sedges rustle of spring,
Of the spring that used to be mine.
May 3, 2023
je mets 3 étoiles et non 2 car je continue de stan Anna Akhmatova plus que tout mais force est d'admettre que son premier recueil de poèmes m'a laissée un petit peu sur le côté je veux pas dire y a quelques petits vers très chouettes qui m'ont fait dire "moow" ou "han" mais dans l'ensemble c'était beaucoup
La clarté verte de l'arbre
Sinue sous mon chagrin
Il est parti
L'eau aussi sèchera un jour
Brille brille le ciel
En plein coeur de la nuit
Il était mon étoile
Partout le soleil meurt
et genre
bon
les vers qui sont littéralement "Il est parti/Je ne comprends pas pourquoi" ça peine à marquer mon âme élégiaque
nonobstant
je pense profondément et sincèrement que la traduction est juste pas ouf (désolée Sylvie je suis sûre que tu as fait de ton mieux et que j'aurais été incapable de traduire ces poèmes moi-même, bravo déjà de nous les avoir rendus accessibles), que ça rend mieux en russe et aussi qu'Akhmatova a bcp évolué dans son style par la suite, mais voilà, en toute honnêteté, not really worth the ride
La clarté verte de l'arbre
Sinue sous mon chagrin
Il est parti
L'eau aussi sèchera un jour
Brille brille le ciel
En plein coeur de la nuit
Il était mon étoile
Partout le soleil meurt
et genre
bon
les vers qui sont littéralement "Il est parti/Je ne comprends pas pourquoi" ça peine à marquer mon âme élégiaque
nonobstant
je pense profondément et sincèrement que la traduction est juste pas ouf (désolée Sylvie je suis sûre que tu as fait de ton mieux et que j'aurais été incapable de traduire ces poèmes moi-même, bravo déjà de nous les avoir rendus accessibles), que ça rend mieux en russe et aussi qu'Akhmatova a bcp évolué dans son style par la suite, mais voilà, en toute honnêteté, not really worth the ride
February 4, 2026
j’ai adoré le moment où je lisais dans le métro le matin et quand je suis sortie du métro il y avait exactement la même lumière bleu foncé que dans les poèmes
April 3, 2020
" I wrote the words that lately
I wouldn’t dare to speak.
My head is dully aching,
My body’s numb and weak.
The distant horn’s subsided,
Heart’s mysteries – unknown.
First autumn snow fell lightly
Upon the croquet lawn.
Last aching thoughts will linger!
Last leaves will come undone!
I never wished to hinder
The one who's used to fun.
Dear lips - absolved at last
For jokes that hurt me so…
You’ll come to visit us
Tomorrow, through the snow.
The candles, in the day,
Burn tenderly, more ardent.
They’ll bring a whole bouquet
Of roses from the garden."
I wouldn’t dare to speak.
My head is dully aching,
My body’s numb and weak.
The distant horn’s subsided,
Heart’s mysteries – unknown.
First autumn snow fell lightly
Upon the croquet lawn.
Last aching thoughts will linger!
Last leaves will come undone!
I never wished to hinder
The one who's used to fun.
Dear lips - absolved at last
For jokes that hurt me so…
You’ll come to visit us
Tomorrow, through the snow.
The candles, in the day,
Burn tenderly, more ardent.
They’ll bring a whole bouquet
Of roses from the garden."
January 26, 2024
Contente de pouvoir lire en langue originale car c’est quoi cette dinguerie de traduction ? J’en ai parlé dans un mini-mémoire tellement c’est trop, dans « хочешь знать » (« tu veux vraiment savoir » — sans commentaire sur l’ajout de l’adverbe), le dernier vers « Да?! » (littéralement « oui ») a été traduit par « Ah ! Ouiche ! »❓❓❓❓❓❓ ❓❓monsieur c’est le mcdonalds ici
January 28, 2014
Very glad I read this. Her poetry is raw but beautiful
February 18, 2015
It's hard for me to rate poetry collections as I usually find them uneven (perhaps I'm not a good enough poetry reader). But there are several poems here I've returned to a couple of times and read out loud to no one, and I might have found one to stand among my very favourites ("Grey-Eyed King").
I've read several versions of some of the poems and I've decided that in the future I will only read the translations by Andrey Kneller.
I've read several versions of some of the poems and I've decided that in the future I will only read the translations by Andrey Kneller.
Read
April 10, 2017Stilted and unoriginal
Speaking only of this translation since I cannot read the original Russian, this collection of poems gives a stilted and unoriginal voice to an abandoned lover.
Speaking only of this translation since I cannot read the original Russian, this collection of poems gives a stilted and unoriginal voice to an abandoned lover.
May 25, 2016
Нямам нищо против скръбта, меланхолията и мрачните нотки, на които често се натъквам в руската поезия. Точно обратното- дори ми допадат.
Това, което винаги искрено ме е дразнело (в поезията in general) обаче, са нелепи рими от сорта на:
С кожения бич ядосано
бие ме мъжът ми лош.
Зад прозорчето белосано
аз те чакам цяла нощ.
или:
Песничка любовна пея в утринния час
и се каня да полея лободата аз.
Цялата "Вечер" е в този дух и съм доста разочарована от първия си прочит на Ахматова. Искрено се надявам проблемът да е в неумел превод и следващите ми срещи с поетесата да са по- приятни.
И все пак, имаше няколко попадения:
Ту змийка, преплетена зло,
сега ми предрича сполука,
ту гълъбка с бяло крило
отвън на прозореца гука,
привиди се в скрежа ли мек,
в съня ли дълбок на шибоя.
Но с нея забравя човек
утеха и радост какво е.
Тя шепне с молитвен копнеж,
ридае в звънтеж на соната.
И страшно е, щом я съзреш
в усмивка съвсем непозната.
("Любов")
***
Спомен за слънце в сърцето слабее.
Вехне трева.
Сняг подранил е и вятър го вее
едва-едва.
В тесни канали водата зловещо
стине без звук.
Всичко е свършено, чакаш ли нещо
някога тук?
Стеле се в празно небе разпростряна
ива една.
Все пак добре е, че няма да стана
ваша жена.
Спомен за слънце в сърцето слабее.
Сън? Или мрак?
Тази нощ сигурно вън ще навее
първия сняг.
***
Не познахме съпричастие,
дето искаш, там иди.
Който е свободен, щастие
го очаква от преди.
Но сълза не съм изплакала,
моя дял е крут и твърд.
И от теб целувки чакала,
нека ме целуне смърт.
Мъката на много зими е
преживяна, не тежи.
Но защо, сравнен с любимия,
ти си по-добър, кажи?
***
Глъхне в самотата
от боязън смътна…
Четох, че душата
уж била безсмъртна.
("Тъмната тераса")
***
То дори не ги усеща
и не ги лови по път.
Бие само кръв гореща
в наранената му гръд.
("Рибар")
Това, което винаги искрено ме е дразнело (в поезията in general) обаче, са нелепи рими от сорта на:
С кожения бич ядосано
бие ме мъжът ми лош.
Зад прозорчето белосано
аз те чакам цяла нощ.
или:
Песничка любовна пея в утринния час
и се каня да полея лободата аз.
Цялата "Вечер" е в този дух и съм доста разочарована от първия си прочит на Ахматова. Искрено се надявам проблемът да е в неумел превод и следващите ми срещи с поетесата да са по- приятни.
И все пак, имаше няколко попадения:
Ту змийка, преплетена зло,
сега ми предрича сполука,
ту гълъбка с бяло крило
отвън на прозореца гука,
привиди се в скрежа ли мек,
в съня ли дълбок на шибоя.
Но с нея забравя човек
утеха и радост какво е.
Тя шепне с молитвен копнеж,
ридае в звънтеж на соната.
И страшно е, щом я съзреш
в усмивка съвсем непозната.
("Любов")
***
Спомен за слънце в сърцето слабее.
Вехне трева.
Сняг подранил е и вятър го вее
едва-едва.
В тесни канали водата зловещо
стине без звук.
Всичко е свършено, чакаш ли нещо
някога тук?
Стеле се в празно небе разпростряна
ива една.
Все пак добре е, че няма да стана
ваша жена.
Спомен за слънце в сърцето слабее.
Сън? Или мрак?
Тази нощ сигурно вън ще навее
първия сняг.
***
Не познахме съпричастие,
дето искаш, там иди.
Който е свободен, щастие
го очаква от преди.
Но сълза не съм изплакала,
моя дял е крут и твърд.
И от теб целувки чакала,
нека ме целуне смърт.
Мъката на много зими е
преживяна, не тежи.
Но защо, сравнен с любимия,
ти си по-добър, кажи?
***
Глъхне в самотата
от боязън смътна…
Четох, че душата
уж била безсмъртна.
("Тъмната тераса")
***
То дори не ги усеща
и не ги лови по път.
Бие само кръв гореща
в наранената му гръд.
("Рибар")
March 1, 2024
Some of her poems are among my favorites and they have left a real impression on me and I find myself keeping coming back to them. Here we have a solid version of poems, some of which are among my favorites and others less so. I find it interesting to read different translations of her poems but this version is not my favorite.
Update:- I do find that my love of AA is fickle and can depend a lot on the translation. This one is overly inclined to twist the words in English to some fairly basic rhymes which I think is not the best.
This collection does read like a first collection and whilst there is much here to love I have preferred reading fuller omnibuses of her works where I can hop from Early to Late and get more variety. Still great collection and well worth reading if you havent yet.
Update:- I do find that my love of AA is fickle and can depend a lot on the translation. This one is overly inclined to twist the words in English to some fairly basic rhymes which I think is not the best.
This collection does read like a first collection and whilst there is much here to love I have preferred reading fuller omnibuses of her works where I can hop from Early to Late and get more variety. Still great collection and well worth reading if you havent yet.
July 17, 2019
First as a serpent, it’ll cast its spell
Next to your heart, curled up.
Then it’ll come as a dove as well,
Cooing for days nonstop.
In the frost it’ll show itself curtly
Or in the drowsing field of carnations…
To escort you covertly and firmly
Away from all rest and elation.
In the prayer of a violin yearning,
So sweetly it’ll sob for a while,
And how frightening it is to discern it
In a yet unfamiliar smile.
// Love
Next to your heart, curled up.
Then it’ll come as a dove as well,
Cooing for days nonstop.
In the frost it’ll show itself curtly
Or in the drowsing field of carnations…
To escort you covertly and firmly
Away from all rest and elation.
In the prayer of a violin yearning,
So sweetly it’ll sob for a while,
And how frightening it is to discern it
In a yet unfamiliar smile.
// Love
December 3, 2014
Very good translation and book. The author has many more translations of Russian Poetry that are excellent. Check him out on amazon and here on goodreads.com
March 24, 2021
Beautiful, dark, gothic at times.
January 9, 2018
Голубовато-оранжевая атмосфера, фрагменты незаконченных историй и нежные чувства...
January 31, 2024
"This is the song of the final meeting.
I looked up at your house, all dark inside.
Just the bedroom candles burned with a fleeting,
Indifferent and yellowish light."
I looked up at your house, all dark inside.
Just the bedroom candles burned with a fleeting,
Indifferent and yellowish light."
April 17, 2020
Nice poems
March 6, 2024
« Le soir est bleu. »
Je connaissais le nom d’Anna Akhmatova depuis longtemps, aux côtés d’Ossip Mandelstam, mais je n’avais encore jamais lu sa poésie, jusqu’à ce que j’ouvre l’anthologie personnelle de Diglee, Je serai le feu. Le soir est mon premier recueil de poésie par Anna Akhmatova, et ce ne sera pas le dernier.
J’aime énormément cette simplicité dans les poèmes, ces petites vignettes, fragments de moments doux et simples et gris. Et puis cette édition est très belle également.
/Mercredi 6 mars 2024/
Repioché au hasard et c’est si beau
Un matin de printemps fou de soleil,
L’odeur des roses jusque sur la terrasse,
Et comme une faïence bleue - le ciel.
Le cahier recouvert de basane
Où je lis élégies et stances
Toutes dédiées à ma grand-mère.
Je vois l’allée jusqu’au portail, les bornes
Blanches dans l’émeraude de l’herbe sauvage.
Que l’amour est aveugle, qu’il est doux !
Et si joyeux les parterres constellés,
Et le cri aigre d’un corbeau noir dans le ciel,
L’arc de la crypte au fond de l’allée.
Je connaissais le nom d’Anna Akhmatova depuis longtemps, aux côtés d’Ossip Mandelstam, mais je n’avais encore jamais lu sa poésie, jusqu’à ce que j’ouvre l’anthologie personnelle de Diglee, Je serai le feu. Le soir est mon premier recueil de poésie par Anna Akhmatova, et ce ne sera pas le dernier.
J’aime énormément cette simplicité dans les poèmes, ces petites vignettes, fragments de moments doux et simples et gris. Et puis cette édition est très belle également.
/Mercredi 6 mars 2024/
Repioché au hasard et c’est si beau
Un matin de printemps fou de soleil,
L’odeur des roses jusque sur la terrasse,
Et comme une faïence bleue - le ciel.
Le cahier recouvert de basane
Où je lis élégies et stances
Toutes dédiées à ma grand-mère.
Je vois l’allée jusqu’au portail, les bornes
Blanches dans l’émeraude de l’herbe sauvage.
Que l’amour est aveugle, qu’il est doux !
Et si joyeux les parterres constellés,
Et le cri aigre d’un corbeau noir dans le ciel,
L’arc de la crypte au fond de l’allée.
March 16, 2017
Good
Good, but not great. Anna Akhmatova was young when she wrote these poems and I think that shows. Excellent translation.
Good, but not great. Anna Akhmatova was young when she wrote these poems and I think that shows. Excellent translation.
April 6, 2020
"In narrow channels water won't flow -
Cooling, stands still.
Here nothing will ever happen, I know -
It never will!"
Cooling, stands still.
Here nothing will ever happen, I know -
It never will!"
Read
April 9, 2023'With a candle, I keep waiting
On the windowsill for you.'
This collection circles around Anna's younger days where she is hunted down by her husband and then left high and dry. One of the greatest Russian poets of the Silver Age beaten by her husband with a belt he bent in two.
It speaks of love, fate and longing. But it also speaks of how a woman in the early 1900s would willingly lay down mind, body, soul and every last drop of her blood for a man who would leave her in a time of crisis for a six-month trip to Africa.
A 'good woman' would justify him by saying he must've had his 'reasons'. Men were (still are) shunned for having any emotions, save anger. Divorced from their emotional side, they either seek refuge in drinks or escapism of any other form. In this case, it was a six-month trip to Africa.
Methinks, emotional expression should come as easy as breathing, and that is the remedy to all this nonsensical suffering we have created for ourselves.
On the windowsill for you.'
This collection circles around Anna's younger days where she is hunted down by her husband and then left high and dry. One of the greatest Russian poets of the Silver Age beaten by her husband with a belt he bent in two.
It speaks of love, fate and longing. But it also speaks of how a woman in the early 1900s would willingly lay down mind, body, soul and every last drop of her blood for a man who would leave her in a time of crisis for a six-month trip to Africa.
A 'good woman' would justify him by saying he must've had his 'reasons'. Men were (still are) shunned for having any emotions, save anger. Divorced from their emotional side, they either seek refuge in drinks or escapism of any other form. In this case, it was a six-month trip to Africa.
Methinks, emotional expression should come as easy as breathing, and that is the remedy to all this nonsensical suffering we have created for ourselves.
October 29, 2020
yeah. so. this reads like a series of vignettes, snapshots into different lenses of love, different lives. anna has this really cool thing that she does where she takes something utterly ordinary and positions it so that the gleam shines through. so that the light catches the right emotional angle.
i could totally be basic and quote the glove on the left hand blah blah blah quote but here have this instead
ah, i didn't lock the door,
i didn't light the candles.
you don't know that, exhausted,
i decided not to go to bed.
to watch how the streaks of sunset died away in the gloom of the firs,
getting drunk on the sound of a voice that resembles yours.
i could totally be basic and quote the glove on the left hand blah blah blah quote but here have this instead
ah, i didn't lock the door,
i didn't light the candles.
you don't know that, exhausted,
i decided not to go to bed.
to watch how the streaks of sunset died away in the gloom of the firs,
getting drunk on the sound of a voice that resembles yours.
September 18, 2023
Высоко в небе облачко серело,
Как беличья расстеленная шкурка.
Он мне сказал: «Не жаль, что ваше тело
Растает в марте, хрупкая Снегурка!»
...
О, как вернуть вас, быстрые недели
Его любви, воздушной и минутной!
***
Отчего ушел ты?
Я не понимаю...
Радостно и ясно
Завтра будет утро.
Эта жизнь прекрасна,
Сердце, будь же мудро.
Ты совсем устало,
Бьешься тише, глуше...
Знаешь, я читала,
Что бессмертны души.
***
Песня последней встречи
Между кленов шепот осенний
Попросил: «Со мною умри!
...
Умру с тобой...»
Эта песня последней встречи.
Я взглянула на темный дом.
Только в спальне горели свечи
Равнодушно-желтым огнем.
Как беличья расстеленная шкурка.
Он мне сказал: «Не жаль, что ваше тело
Растает в марте, хрупкая Снегурка!»
...
О, как вернуть вас, быстрые недели
Его любви, воздушной и минутной!
***
Отчего ушел ты?
Я не понимаю...
Радостно и ясно
Завтра будет утро.
Эта жизнь прекрасна,
Сердце, будь же мудро.
Ты совсем устало,
Бьешься тише, глуше...
Знаешь, я читала,
Что бессмертны души.
***
Песня последней встречи
Между кленов шепот осенний
Попросил: «Со мною умри!
...
Умру с тобой...»
Эта песня последней встречи.
Я взглянула на темный дом.
Только в спальне горели свечи
Равнодушно-желтым огнем.
January 1, 2023
Segundo que eu leio dela, muito consistente com o outro, esquema de rimas marcados, pelo menos na tradução americana, que li. Pode ser por conta da idade dela quando escreveu, mas tudo parece bem romântico, na temática mesmo. O próximo vai ser de uma fase mais madura, espero, pra comparação.
Read
January 3, 2026Frequently beautiful poetry about love, unrequited, unfulfilled, passionate, heartbreaking, and full.
This is good stuff, though not always to my taste, and the more mature works I've read far surpass it.
This is good stuff, though not always to my taste, and the more mature works I've read far surpass it.
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