-
Destruction of the Spirit: War in Voloshin's "Drugu" and Pushkin's "Arion"
- Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature
- Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association
- Volume 49, Number 2, 1995
- pp. 119-137
- 10.1353/rmr.1995.a459618
- Article
- Additional Information
- Purchase/rental options available:
Destruction of the Spirit: War in Voloshin's "Drugu" and Pushkin's "Arion" Ann Marie Basom University ofNorthern Iowa According to one of Maksimilian Aleksandrovich Voloshin's unfinished autobiographies, Pushkin's "Poltava" (interestingly, a narrative poem named for a battle) was among the works Voloshin could recite from memory even before he could read (Kupchenko 777). Voloshin's generation of poets was raised on Pushkin's verse, and Voloshin consistently lists Pushkin as among his earliest influences ("Avtobiografiia" 29). Indeed, Voloshin's first public performance in 1893 was a reading of Pushkin's "Klevetnikam Rossii" 'To the Slanderers of Russia.' Although Voloshin never devoted an article to Pushkin's verse, his writings on contemporary authors and artists are peppered with references to Russia's greatest poet.1 The work of Pushkin can be seen as forming part of a national myth, which Voloshin believed was needed as a basis for the development of Russian tragedy.2 Therefore it is not surprising that when responding to the participation of a friend in war, Voloshin should recall Pushkin's verse on this subject. "Drugu" 'To my Friend' (August 1915), one of Voloshin's early poems on the theme of war, is Voloshin's poetic response to Pushkin's "Arion" (1827). Voloshin uses a well known Russian rendition of a classic myth to launch his own ideas, challenging his reader to compare and contrast the two poems, as well as the two historical events to which they refer. There is a political context for each poem: World War I provides the background in the case of Voloshin's poem, and the Decembrist uprising in Pushkin's. Both poems thus concern the poet's reaction to armed conflict. As well as juxtaposing his own ideas to those found in the earlier work, Voloshin offers a new reading of "Arion," focusing on the horror of violence implicit in the work. More importantly, however, Voloshin gives the story a new twist, praying not only for the physical, but also for the spiritual survival of his friend. This focus on the spiritual ravages of war becomes the single most important theme in Voloshin's poetry on war and revolution, forming the basis for views expressed in Voloshin's later works.3 As the story of Arion is an important subtext for both of the poems, it is useful to briefly summarize the contents of the tale. Arion seems to have been a real person, a poet who lived about 700 119 120Rocky Mountain Review BC, none of whose poems have come down to us. All that is actually known of him is the story of his escape from death. Arion's mastery of the lyre and song won him the prize at a music contest in Sicily. On the voyage home to Corinth the sailors in whose vessel he was traveling coveted the prize and planned to kill him. Apollo told him in a dream of his danger and how to save his life, so that when the sailors attacked him he begged them as a last favor to let him play and sing before he died. At the end ofhis song he flung himself into the sea, where dolphins, who had been drawn to the ship by the enchanting music, bore him up as he sank and carried him to land (Hamilton 289). Both poems are written in iambic tetrameter. "Drugu" consists of fifty-one lines, which when first published in Anno mundi ardentis. 1915 were not divided into stanzas. Later versions, however, present the poem as containing twelve stanzas offour or five lines each (see, for example, Neopalimaia Kupina 'The Burning Bush' in Stikhotvoreniia [1982]). Pushkin's poem, by contrast, is limited to fifteen lines. One reason for this difference in length is that Voloshin's poet informs the reader of the relationship of the poet to his shipmate and of the contents of the poet's "song," all of which Pushkin's reader must infer from the text. We learn little directly about the poet's ideas in "Arion," and thus the content of the songs he sings (whose words we never hear) at the end of the poem have been a subject ofmuch...