Yevtushenko's Reader

 

Some time ago...when I was reading Stalingrad by Vasily Semyonovich Grossman / Васи́лий Семёнович Гро́ссман...I decided to have a look at a book I'd bought some time before, Bratsk Station and Other New Poems by Yevgeny Yevtushenko. I'm not completely sure why I picked this book up from the wire-stand spinner rack at Half-Price Books...although it's easy for me to guess that the idea of poems about a power station alone would have been enough for me. I had never heard of Yevtushenko before. I have had a bit of a crush on Russia for some time, and I'm sure that that also played into it. At any rate, I had not done more than glance at the book for years until Stalingrad excited my hunger for more Russian things. 

When I read it, I found it interesting, but also found it to be more than a little bit clumsy. There were many times when I thought, "This is not very good poetry." Now, of course, that could be the fault of the translator, I'd have no way of knowing anything about that. But I guessed that that was not the case, because there were other times...sometimes just a line or two in a poem, sometimes a whole poem... wherein I was really touched or blown away by what Yevtushenko had written. I finished the book, and did not do what I normally do when I finish reading something which has affected me deeply: I did not seek out any more works by Yevtushenko. Which suggests to me that my Yevtushenko stomach was full, and that I was moving on, moving on. (Yes, thinking of Yoko Ono there.)

But then a few weeks ago as I was going through that self-same wire spinner rack at Half-Price Books...and I will confess that it is my favorite part of the bookstore, because you never know what you're going to find there, and the books are never very expensive...I spotted something called Yevtushenko's Reader. I fondled it for a bit, not even sure that this was the same guy I'd read before (that's how dim my memory of the poet was)...got out my phone and Googled, affirming that this was, indeed, the guy who had written Bratsk Station...and then I ended up putting the book back on the rack. However...as often happens...after I got home I started thinking that I should have bought that book. So the next day...maybe a couple of days later...I went back, and lo and behold, the book was still there. (It usually doesn't work out that way when I pass on a book.) So I took that as a sign and bought it. And much to my surprise, I began to read it almost immediately.

And it only took a page or two before the second piece, "A Precocious Autobiography," caught me up. (I don't know why I'd skipped the first piece, which was only a half-dozen pages long, but this second piece formed the majority of the book--142 of the 180 text pages, almost 80%, so maybe I was just anxious to get to the main course.)

But the short version is that I read this book in just a few days, deeply loved it, and am now seeking out more Yevtushenko, beginning with The Collected Poems, 1952-1990,  which should be arriving at my branch of the library pretty much any minute now. To be honest, there aren't that many books of poetry that I've read cover to cover...and most of the ones that I did were written by Charles Bukowski...but I am hoping that after experiencing the wonders of Yevtushenko's prose, his poetry may sing a different tune for me now.

Details as they happen. 

Here are just two things from "A Precocious Autobiography" which I found particularly striking:

"Poetry, if it is genuine, is not a racing car rushing senselessly around and around a closed track; it is an ambulance rushing to save someone." (Semyon Isaakovich Kirsanov / Семён Исаакович Кирсанов to Yevgeny Aleksándrovich Yevtushenko / Евге́ний Алекса́ндрович Евтуше́нко).

"...the wicked usually hang together even when they hate each other. This is their strength. Good people, however, are more scattered and this is their weakness."

And doesn't that pretty much sum up the current state of politics in the U.S. of A.?

Oh, P.S. The contents of this book: 

The Spirit of Elbe (To My American Readers) 

A Precocious Autobiography                                

Epilogue                                                       

Poems 
New York Elegy                                                                                              
Gentleness                                                                
Babii Yar

Fears

Talk

Birthday

Colors

Zima Junction

Bombs for Balalaikas

Dwarf Birches

Belly Dance

Waiting

Thanks

Some of the poems were discussed at some length in "A Precocious Autobiography," so it's cool that they're included here. Other poems that were discussed in the text...such as Yevtushenko's first published poem...are not included, which is a bit frustrating. And other poems which were not mentioned in the text are included, which is puzzling. It seems like there was an idea here which wasn't allowed to come to fruition, but hey, what do I know. I enjoyed the book immensely, and recommend it to you unreservedly.