acommonreader.st
Windmill in Mikhailovskoe, Russia (where Pushkin was exiled 1824 – 1826) Picture source With womankind, the less we love them, the easier they become to charm, the tighter we can stretch above them enticing nets to do them harm. – 4, vii ‘I’ve dreams and years past resurrection; a soul that nothing can renew… I […]
For AE with highest admiration and esteem, always Merrill Moore October, 1929Last week I was thumbing through the books at a used bookstore and something drew me to The Noise that Time Makes by Merrill Moore. Upon opening the cover, I was surprised to see the above inscription (I’m not sure why the photos turned […]
Half hero and half ignoramous, What’s more, half scoundrel, don’t forget. But on this score, the man gives promise That he will make a whole one yet. (More on Vorontsov’s monument can be found here)
Your cause of sorrowMust not be measured by his worth, for thenIt hath no end. (Macbeth Act V, Scene 8) Things that could not be known on that wedding day: Franklin Delano Roosevelt would complain of a headache the next day, passing away in nearby Warm Springs, Georgia Victory in Europe was less than a […]
Feodor Chaliapin as Salieri (1898) Picture source Thou shalt not, poet, prize the people’s love. The noise of their applause will quickly die; Then shalt thou hear the judgment of the fool And chilling laughter from the multitude. But stand thou firm, untroubled and austere; Thou art a king and kings must live alone. Thine […]
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage by J.M.W. TurnerPicture source I had written a long post on Lord Byron’s influence on Pushkin, as well as Pushkin creating something beyond Byron. As I was re-reading it, I realized only people working on graduate degrees related to this would care. Hell, even I didn’t care by the time I reached […]
Ilya Repin’s painting “Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin recites his poem before Gavrila Derzhavin during the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum exam on January 8th, 1815” Picture sourceAlexander Pushkin was a member of the first Imperial Lyceum founded by Alexander I. (Several of his classmates would lead the Decembrist uprising.) The painting above is by Ilya Efimovich Repin. A […]
I’m not really sure. But here’s an article I enjoyed: Steeped in Shakespeare “Shakespeare’s plays were ubiquitous in antebellum America. They inhabited the schoolbooks, including Scott’s Lessons in Elocution, which Lincoln read as a boy. Dozens of editions circulated through the states and territories. The plays visited rural and urban stages in scenes and declamatory […]
Never one to do things in a consistent order (or even an order that even makes sense), I wanted to write about this movie before discussing the book. So I apologize in advance for referring to the work without directly addressing it first. For those unfamiliar with Eugene Onegin, here is a brief synopsis shamelessly […]
Alexander Pushkin by Vasily Tropinin (1827) Picture sourceI only know a little bit about Alexander Pushkin but find him a fascinating character. My limited introduction to him so far has been the movie Amadeus, which took his play “Mozart and Salieri” as a starting point. Eugene Onegin will obviously suffer since I am dealing with […]