Yevtushenko, Yevgeny Aleksandrovich
Yevtushenko, Yevgeny Aleksandrovich
yĕv˝to͞oshĕng´kō, Rus. yĭvgā´nyē əlyĭksän´drəvĭch yĭvtəshĕn´kō [key], 1933–2017, Russian poet, b. Zima Junction, Siberia. Along with AndreiVoznesenskyand several others he helped revive the tradition of Russian lyric poetry. Yevtushenko's first book of poems was published in 1952. He soon became the most popular spokesman of the young generation of poets who refused to adhere to the doctrine ofsocialist realism; he inspired young Russians to resist Stalinism during the cold war and to cope in the years following Stalin's death.Yevtushenko: Selected Poems(1962) contains four of his most famous poems:
Zima Junction,an autobiographical work originally published in 1956, which first brought him to public attention;
Talk,an indictment of Soviet hypocrisy;
Babi Yar,a description of the 1941 German massacre of thousands of Jews in Kiev, Ukraine and a protest against Soviet anti-Semitism, which brought him international acclaim; and
The Heirs of Stalin,a denunciation of the Soviet system. His long poems includeBratsk Station(1964–65) and喀山大学(1970). The publication in Paris of Yevtushenko'sPrecocious Autobiography(1963) brought him severe official censure, and he was frequently criticized by the Russian government for his nonconformist attitude. Despite this, Yevtushenko, a charismatic public speaker, declaimed his poetry in hundreds of highly popular readings throughout Russia, and made numerous, nearly as popular reading tours abroad during and after the Soviet era. He also wrote novels, notablyWild Berries(tr. 1984), essays, and the semiautobiographical, post-Soviet workDon't Die Before You're Dead(tr。1995),一个帐户的1991 Bori的胜利sYeltsin(Yevtushenko served in the Soviet parliament from 1988 to 1991), and was an actor, director, and photographer. In later years, Yevtushenko taught at several American universities, notably at the Univ. of Tulsa, a city where he maintained a home. His name is sometimes transliterated Evtushenko.
See his collected poems (tr. 1991).
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