Sergei
Yesenin, the son of Russian peasants,
was born in Kronstantinovo on 21st September, 1895. When he was seventeen
he moved to Moscow as a young man and worked as a proof-reader.
Yesenin
began writing poetry and was a great admirer of Alexander
Blok. Yesenin's first volume of poetry, Ritual
for the Dead, was published in 1916.
He supported
the October Revolution as he believed
it would provide a better life for the peasantry. This was reflected
in his volume of poems, Otherland
(1918). He soon became disillusioned and began to criticize
the Bolshevik government and wrote
poems such as The Stern October Has Deceived
Me.
In 1922
Yesenin married the dancer Isadora Duncan and accompanied
her on a tour of Europe. Often drunk, his smashing up of hotel rooms,
received a great deal of publicity in the world's press.
Yesenin
returned to his homeland in 1923 and published Tavern
Moscow (1924), Confessions of
a Hooligan (1924), Desolate and
Pale Moonlight (1925) and The
Black Man (1925).
Sergei
Yesenin suffered a mental breakdown and was hospitalized. Yesenin
was released and on 27th December, 1925, he cut his wrists, wrote
a farewell poem in his own blood, and then hanged himself. Although
one of Russia's most popular poets, much of his work was banned during
the rule of Joseph Stalin. His complete
works were republished in 1966.
(1)
Vladimir Mayakovsky later described
meeting Sergei Yesenin
for the first time.
The first
time I saw him he was dressed in a shirt embroidered with some crosses
and had bast moccasins on his feet. Knowing how eagerly a genuine
- as opposed to a theatrical - peasant changes his attire to town
jackets and shoes, I did not believe Yesenin. He seemed to me put-on
and showy. All the more so because he was already writing successful
poetry and could certainly afford shoes.
(2)
Sergei Yesenin,
letter to Alexander Shirayevets about the type of poetry he was trying
to write (June, 1917)
There is no question of trying to "please";
one must simply pull one's boots up as high as possible and wade into
the pond as deep as one can, and stir, stir, until the fishes pop
their noses up and notice you, notice that you are "you".
(3)
Victor Serge,
Memoirs of a Revolutionary (1945)
When I saw Yesenin for the first time, I disliked him.
Twenty-four years old, he mixed with the women, ruffians, and ragamuffins
from the dark corners of Moscow. A drinker, his voice was hoarse,
his eyes worn, his handsome young face puffed and polished, his golden-blond
hair flowing in waves around his temples.
Dressed
in a white silk smock, he would mount the stage and begin to declaim.
The affectation, the calculated elegance, the alcoholic's voice, the
puffy face, everything prejudiced me against him; and the atmosphere
of a decomposing Bohemianism, entangling its homosexuals and exotics
with our militants, all but disgusted me. Yet, like everyone else,
I yielded in a single instant to the positive sorcery of that ruined
voice, of a poetry which came from the inmost depths of the man and
the age.
(4)
Vladimir Mayakovsky met Sergei
Yesenin just before his death in 1925.
My last
meeting with him made a depressing but great impression on me. By
the Gosizdat cashier's office a man with a swollen face, twisted tie,
and cap only by a miracle holding onto his head, caught by a fair
lock of hair, threw himself at me. He and his two horrid (to me at
least) companions smelled from alcohol. With the greatest difficulty
I recognized Yesenin. With difficulty, too, I rejected the persistent
demands that we go for a drink, demands accompanied by the waving
of a fat bunch of banknotes. All day long I had his depressing image
before me, and in the evening, of course, I discussed with my colleagues
what could be done about Yesenin. Unfortunately, in such a situation
everyone always limits oneself to talk.
(5)
Ilya
Ehrenburg,
People, Years, Life (1961)
Yesenin was always surrounded by satellites. The saddest
thing of all was to see, next to Yesenin, a random group of men who
had nothing to do with literature, but simply liked (as they still
do) to drink somebody else's vodka, bask in someone else's fame, and
hide behind someone else's authority. It was not through this black
swarm, however, that he perished, he drew them to himself. He knew
what they were worth; but in his state he found it easier to be with
people he despised.
(6)
Victor Serge
entered Sergei Yesenin hotel room soon after he committed suicide.
They found him hanging with a suitcase-strap around his
neck, his forehead bruised by falling, as he died, against a heating-pipe.
Lying there washed and combed on his death-bed, his face was less
soft than in like, his hair brown rather than golden; he had an expression
of cold, distant harshness.
Thirty
years old, at his peak of glory, eight times married. He was our greatest
lyrical poet, the poet of the Russian campaigns, of the Moscow taverns,
of the Revolution's singing Bohemians. He spawned lines full of dazzling
images, yet simple as the language of the villages.
He plumbed
his own descent into the abyss: 'Where have you led me, you, my
reckless head?' and 'I have been loathsome, I have been wicked
- and all so that I could blaze more brilliantly.'
He had
tried to be in tune with the times, and with our official literature.
'I am a stranger in my own land'; 'My poems are no longer
needed now, and myself I am unwanted'.
(7)
Sergei Yesenin,
The Last Poem (1925)
Good-by, my dear, good-by.
Friend, you are sticking in my breast.
The promised destinies are weaving
the thread from parting to a meeting.
Good-by,
my dear, no hand or word,
Do not be sad, don't cloud your brow,
To die - in life is nothing new,
But nor is new, of course - to live.
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