Anna Halberstadt Guest Editor’s Note
Steve Luttrell had suggested to me to be a guest editor of the Russian Issue of the journal, dedicated to contemporary Russian poetry. Some Russian poems had appeared in The Café Review a few years ago.
My idea of the anthology was based of putting together a volume of poetry, in which more attention is being paid to the poets, who came to prominence in the last thirty years, after the perestroika.
Also, even though Joseph Brodsky came to stardom after the infamous court hearing and exile, his poetry is well known to Western readers. And the Akhmatova-Brodsky line of classical Russian poetry, starting with Alexander Pushkin, and going to Silver Age St. Petersburg poets, is still being continued by a number of prominent Russian poets, writing in meter and rhyme. Even though some of them, like masterful Sergey Gandlevsky and Alexey Tsvetkov and incredibly talented Vladimir Gandelsman, have been included in this issue, I tried to give more space to poets, like Arkady Dragomoshchenko, Alexey Parshchikov, Lev Rubinstein, Dmitry Prigov, and Victor Sosnora, that had followers before Perestroika, but gained notoriety or fame in the 1990s. These poets are more experimental, conceptual, writing in free verse and free-spirited. Dragomoshchenko, called ATD by friends, is often described as a Language School poet. But, as Aleksandr Skidan notes in his new book about ATD, his ground-breaking innovative poetry was much more than that. Arkady was quite original already in his early work. He was broadly educated in world poetry and philosophy, he knew English, he was acquainted with Robert Creeley, Charles Olson, and Lyn Hedginian, who corresponded with him and translated his work. Yet his early work already astonishes the reader with its originality, breadth, and beauty. ATD’s manner changes from more lyrical to more philosophical and, at times, becomes more obscure, in his late work. Victor Sosnora, who died this year, is incredibly original and free in his expression, his work is full of shocking metaphors and provocative, it is totally free of desire to please the reader, and his surreal images may cause visceral reactions, horror and disgust, among them.
Dmitry Prigov and Lev Rubinstein are representatives of so-called Conceptual poetry, a term, used predominantly by Russians, who had also embraced conceptual art. Some of Prigov’s poems are close to Sots Art, they are full ironic usage of Soviet-speak. Prigov was also an incredible performance artist, who made his audience howl with pleasure, while reading his piece, called “Obituaries,” among them, an obituary of Alexander Pushkin, written in the pompous style of official obituaries of Soviet dignitaries.
Then there are contemporary poets, writing in rhyme and meter, but still innovative, such as Maria Stepanova, whose poems remind me of an opera, with a complex libretto, polyphonic, with multiple voices, and connection to Russian folklore and the so-called urban romance.
And Polina Barskova, with her sensual, musical usage of language and rich imagery, also, her connection to her native St. Petersburg and its major trauma, the Siege.
The anthology includes other poets, writing in free verse, such as Elena Fanailova, with her interest in contemporary world and references to everything, including the Beatles, Maria Galina with her interest in cities and women’s lives and issues, Philip Nikolaev, who does incredible translations of Pushkin in meter and verse, and at he same time writes his own poetry in free verse in both English and Russian, and many others.
The first volume (The Café Review, Russian Issue, Spring 2019) includes poetry by 24 authors, who live in Russia, Ukraine, Germany, the U.S., and elsewhere, translated by 24 translators, including Michael Palmer and Eugene Ostashevsky.
The second volume (The Café Review, Russian Issue, Winter, 2021) includes poetry by Russian poets, living in Russia, as well as Global Russians, who live in the U.S., Australia, and European countries, poets of different generations, writing formal poetry and free verse, feminists and poets, involved in resistance such as Galyna Rymbu.
My profound gratitude goes to Steve Luttrell, publisher, Roger Dutton, editor, Danny Louten, art editor, to Alexey Vassiliev, Ronald Feldman gallery and the collectors Neil Rector and Julia Gelman, who had generously shared with us artwork by the unofficial artists of the Soviet era — Oleg Vassiliev and Vitaly Komar, as well as Russian artists, who emerged after the Perestroika in the 1990s.