What is Acmeism in literature? Representatives of the direction. Artistic features of the creativity of Acmeists Principles of Acmeism in literature

Acmeism is one of the modernist movements in Russian poetry.

It occurred during the heyday of the Silver Age.

The ideological inspirers of Russian acmeism are considered to be the poets N. Gumilyov and S. Gorodetsky.

Aesthetic maturity of poetry

Throughout its existence, poetry has undergone many different movements and trends. In the first decade of the 20th century, in contrast to symbolism, a new modernist movement- Acmeism. Translated from Greek, this term means the highest degree, peak, maturity, blossoming.

Creative people, and especially poets, are most often far from such concepts as modesty. Almost everyone considers himself a genius or at least a great talent. Thus, a group of young poets, connected not only by creativity, but also by personal friendship, were outraged by the harsh criticism of one of them, Nikolai Gumilyov, and created their own association with the somewhat artisanal name “Poets Workshop.”

But already in the name itself there is a desire to look like more than just lovers of the lyrical poetic genre, but to be artisans, professionals. Acmeists published the magazines "Hyperborea" and "Apollo". Not only poetry was published there, but also polemics were conducted with poets of other movements in the prose genre.

Acmeist poets photo

The ideological inspirers of Acmeism, Nikolai Gumilyov and Sergei Gorodetsky, published in these magazines a kind of program manifesto of the new poetic movement.

Basic concepts of Acmeism

• Poetry must be expressed in a clear and understandable style;
• the reality and vitality of feelings and actions are much more important than emasculated, idealized, far-fetched and sensual concepts;
  
• frozen symbols should not dominate the human worldview;
• it is necessary to completely abandon the mystical creed;
• earthly life is full of diversity and color, which must be brought into poetry;
• the poetic word must sound precise and definite - every object, phenomenon or action must be voiced clearly and understandably;
• a person with his genuine, pristine, one might even say biological, emotions, and not fictitious, sleek and varnished feelings and experiences - this is a worthy hero of real poetry;
• Acmeists should not reject past literary eras, but take from them aesthetically valuable principles and have an inextricable connection with world culture.

The Acmeists considered the Word to be the foundation of their poetry. The backbone of the first composition of the “Workshop of Poets” was made up not just of poets close in their ideology, but also of people connected by ties of friendship. Subsequently, the names of these poets were included in the Golden Fund of Russian Literature.

Acmeist poets

• Sergei Gorodetsky - born in the 90s of the 19th century. He received an excellent education in a truly intelligent family, where morality, culture and education were considered the main values. At the time of the creation of Acmeism he was a famous poet.
• Nikolai Gumilyov is an extraordinary and talented personality, a romantic with a very courageous appearance and a subtle soul. WITH youth he tried to establish himself as a person and find his place in this difficult life. Very often this desire grew from position to position, which may have led to an early and tragic death from life.
• Anna Akhmatova - pride, glory, pain and tragedy of Russian poetry. The poetic soul of this courageous woman gave birth to piercing words about the great mystery of love, placing her poems among the beautiful creations of immortal Russian literature.
• Osip Mandelstam is a poetically gifted young man with a keen sense of art. Poems, in his own words, overwhelmed him and sounded like music in him. He considered his friendship with Nikolai Gumilyov and Anna Akhmatova to be the most important success of his life.
• Mikhail Zenkevich, poet and translator, the only one of the founders of Acmeism, lived until the 80s of the 20th century, successfully avoiding repression and persecution.
• Vladimir Narbut, a young poet, belonged to the circle of visitors to the Vsevolod Ivanov Tower and warmly embraced the idea of ​​Acmeism.

Bottom line

As a literary movement, Acmeism existed for just over two years. Despite all the controversial concepts of this movement, its value lies not only in the fact that it was an exclusively Russian movement, but in the fact that the work of remarkable Russian poets is associated with Acmeism, without whose work it is impossible to imagine Russian poetry of the 20th century.

MOSCOW STATE UNIVERSITY named after M.V. LOMONOSOV

FACULTY OF JOURNALISM

Performed:

Teacher:

Moscow, 2007

Introduction

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, a most interesting phenomenon arose in Russian literature, later called “poetry of the Silver Age.” It was a time of new ideas and new directions. If the 19th century nevertheless passed for the most part under the sign of the desire for realism, then a new surge of poetic creativity at the turn of the century followed a different path. This period was accompanied by the desire of contemporaries to renew the country, renew literature and with various modernist movements, as a consequence, that appeared at this time. They were very diverse both in form and content: symbolism, acmeism, futurism, imagism...

Thanks to such different directions and new names appeared for movements in Russian poetry, many of which happened to remain in it forever. The great poets of that era, starting in the depths of the modernist movement, very quickly grew out of it, amazing with their talent and versatility of creativity. This happened with Blok, Yesenin, Mayakovsky, Gumilev, Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Voloshin and many others.

Conventionally, the beginning of the “Silver Age” is considered to be 1892, when the ideologist and oldest participant in the Symbolist movement Dmitry Merezhkovsky read a report “On the causes of the decline and on new trends in modern Russian literature.” This is how the Symbolists made their presence known for the first time.

The beginning of the 1900s was the heyday of symbolism, but by the 1910s a crisis began in this literary movement. The attempt of the Symbolists to proclaim a literary movement and seize the artistic consciousness of the era failed. The question of the relationship of art to reality, the meaning and place of art in the development of Russian culture has been sharply raised again. national history and culture.

A new direction had to emerge, one that would pose the question of the relationship between poetry and reality in a different way. This is exactly what Acmeism became.

Acmeism as a literary movement

The emergence of Acmeism

In 1911, among poets who sought to create a new direction in literature, the “Workshop of Poets” circle emerged, headed by Nikolai Gumilyov and Sergei Gorodetsky. The members of the “Workshop” were mainly aspiring poets: A. Akhmatova, N. Burliuk, Vas. Gippius, M. Zenkevich, Georgy Ivanov, E. Kuzmina-Karavaeva, M. Lozinsky, O. Mandelstam, Vl. Narbut, P. Radimov. IN different time E. Kuzmina-Karavaeva, N. Nedobrovo, V. Komarovsky, V. Rozhdestvensky, S. Neldichen were close to the “Workshop of Poets” and acmeism. The most prominent of the “younger” Acmeists were Georgy Ivanov and Georgy Adamovich. In total, four almanacs “The Workshop of Poets” were published (1921 - 1923, the first was called “Dragon”, the last was published in Berlin by the emigrated part of the “Workshop of Poets”).

The creation of a literary movement called “Acmeism” was officially announced on February 11, 1912 at a meeting of the “Academy of Verse”, and in No. 1 of the magazine “Apollo” for 1913 articles by Gumilyov “The Legacy of Symbolism and Acmeism” and Gorodetsky “Some Currents in modern Russian poetry", which were considered manifestos of the new school.

Philosophical basis of aesthetics

In his famous article “The Legacy of Symbolism and Acmeism” N. Gumilyov wrote: “Symbolism is being replaced by a new direction, no matter what it is called, whether acmeism (from the word acmh (“acme”) the highest degree of something, color, blooming time ), or Adamism (a courageously firm and clear view of life), in any case, requiring a greater balance of forces and a more accurate knowledge of the relationship between subject and object than was the case in symbolism.”

The chosen name of this direction confirmed the desire of the Acmeists themselves to comprehend the heights of literary excellence. Symbolism was very closely connected with Acmeism, which its ideologists constantly emphasized, starting from symbolism in their ideas.

In the article “The Legacy of Symbolism and Acmeism,” Gumilyov, recognizing that “symbolism was a worthy father,” stated that it “has completed its circle of development and is now falling.” Having analyzed both domestic, French and German symbolism, he concluded: “We do not agree to sacrifice other methods of influence to it (the symbol) and are looking for their complete consistency,” “It is more difficult to be an Acmeist than a symbolist, just as it is more difficult to build a cathedral than tower. And one of the principles of the new direction is to always follow the line of greatest resistance.”

Discussing the relationship between the world and human consciousness, Gumilyov demanded to “always remember the unknowable,” but at the same time “not to offend your thoughts about it with more or less probable guesses.” Having a negative attitude towards the aspiration of symbolism to know the secret meaning of existence (it remained secret for Acmeism as well), Gumilyov declared the “unchastity” of knowledge of the “unknowable”, the “childishly wise, painfully sweet feeling of one’s own ignorance”, the intrinsic value of the “wise and clear” reality surrounding the poet. Thus, the Acmeists in the field of theory remained on the basis of philosophical idealism. The program of acmeistic acceptance of the world was also expressed in the article by Sergei Gorodetsky “Some trends in modern Russian poetry”: “After all sorts of “rejections”, the world was irrevocably accepted by acmeism, in all its beauties and ugliness.”

Sorry, captivating moisture

And primordial fog!

There is more good in the transparent wind

For countries created for life.

The world is spacious and loud,

And he is more colorful than rainbows,

And so Adam was entrusted with it,

Inventor of names.

Name, find out, tear off the covers

And idle secrets and ancient darkness.

Here is the first feat. New feat

Sing praises to the living earth.

Genre-compositional and stylistic features

The main attention of the Acmeists was focused on poetry. Of course, they also had prose, but it was poetry that formed this direction. As a rule, these were small works, sometimes in the genre of sonnet or elegy.

The most important criterion was attention to the word, to the beauty of the sounding verse. There was a certain general orientation towards traditions of Russian and world art that were different from those of the Symbolists. Speaking about this, V.M. Zhirmunsky wrote in 1916: “Attention to the artistic structure of words now emphasizes not so much the importance of the melodiousness of lyrical lines, their musical effectiveness, but rather the picturesque, graphic clarity of images; the poetry of hints and moods is replaced by the art of precisely measured and balanced words... there is a possibility of rapprochement between young poetry not with the musical lyricism of the romantics, but with the clear and conscious art of French classicism and with the French 18th century, emotionally poor, always rationally in control of itself, but graphic rich variety and sophistication of visual impressions, lines, colors and shapes."

It is quite difficult to talk about general themes and stylistic features, since each outstanding poet, whose, as a rule, early poems can be attributed to Acmeism, had his own characteristic features.

In the poetry of N. Gumilyov, Acmeism is realized in the desire to discover new worlds, exotic images and subjects. The path of the poet in Gumilyov’s lyrics is the path of a warrior, a conquistador, a discoverer. The muse that inspires the poet is the Muse of Distant Journeys. The renewal of poetic imagery, respect for the “phenomenon as such” was carried out in Gumilyov’s work through travel to the unknown, but quite real lands. Travels in N. Gumilyov's poems carried impressions of the poet's specific expeditions to Africa and, at the same time, echoed symbolic wanderings in “other worlds.” Gumilev contrasted the transcendental worlds of the Symbolists with the continents they first discovered for Russian poetry.

A. Akhmatova’s acmeism had a different character, devoid of any attraction to exotic subjects and colorful imagery. The originality of Akhmatova’s creative style as a poet of the Acmeistic movement is the imprinting of spiritualized objectivity. Through the amazing accuracy of the material world, Akhmatova displays an entire spiritual structure. In elegantly depicted details, Akhmatova, as Mandelstam noted, gave “all the enormous complexity and psychological richness of the Russian novel of the 19th century.”

The local world of O. Mandelstam was marked by a feeling of mortal fragility before a faceless eternity. Mandelstam's Acmeism is “the complicity of beings in a conspiracy against emptiness and non-existence.” The overcoming of emptiness and non-existence takes place in culture, in the eternal creations of art: the arrow of the Gothic bell tower reproaches the sky for being empty. Among the Acmeists, Mandelstam was distinguished by an unusually keenly developed sense of historicism. The thing is inscribed in his poetry in a cultural context, in a world warmed by “secret teleological warmth”: a person was surrounded not by impersonal objects, but by “utensils”; all mentioned objects acquired biblical overtones. At the same time, Mandelstam was disgusted by the abuse of sacred vocabulary, the “inflation of sacred words” among the Symbolists.

The Adamism of S. Gorodetsky, M. Zenkevich, V. Narbut, who formed the naturalistic wing of the movement, differed significantly from the Acmeism of Gumilev, Akhmatova and Mandelstam. The dissimilarity between the Adamists and the Gumilyov-Akhmatova-Mandelshtam triad has been repeatedly noted in criticism. In 1913, Narbut suggested that Zenkevich found an independent group or move “from Gumilyov” to the Cubo-Futurists. The Adamistic worldview was most fully expressed in the works of S. Gorodetsky. Gorodetsky's novel Adam described the life of a hero and heroine - “two smart animals” - in earthly paradise. Gorodetsky tried to restore in poetry the pagan, semi-animal worldview of our ancestors: many of his poems took the form of spells, lamentations, and contained bursts of emotional imagery drawn from the distant past of everyday life. Gorodetsky’s naive Adamism, his attempts to return man to the shaggy embrace of nature could not but evoke irony among sophisticated modernists who had studied the soul of his contemporary well. Blok, in the preface to the poem Retribution, noted that the slogan of Gorodetsky and the Adamists “was a man, but some kind of different man, without humanity at all, some kind of primordial Adam.”

And yet, you can try to analyze the main features of Acmeism using the example of individual works. An example of this is Théophile Gautier’s poem “Art,” translated by Gumilyov. Théophile Gautier was generally a symbolic figure in the formation of Russian Acmeism. “Apparently, in Gautier’s aesthetic program,” writes I.A. Pankeev, - Gumilyov was most impressed by the declarations that were close to himself: “Life is the most important quality in art; everything can be forgiven for him"; "... less meditation, idle talk, synthetic judgments; All you need is a thing, a thing and another thing."

So, let's turn to the poem.

Creation is all the more beautiful What material was taken from? More dispassionate - Poem, marble or metal. Oh bright friend, Drive away the embarrassment, Tighten the buskins. Away with easy tricks Shoe on all feet, Familiar Both beggars and gods. Sculptor, don’t pretend to be humble And a lump of limp clay, Dreaming of something else. With Parian or Carrara Fight with a piece of debris, As with the royal one Home of beauty. Wonderful dungeon! Through the Bronze of Syracuse looks The arrogant appearance of the muses. By the hand of a gentle brother Outline the slope And Apollo will come out.

Artist! Watercolors You won't be sorry! Melt your enamel. Create green sirens With a smile on your lips, Bowed Monsters on coats of arms. In a three-tiered radiance Madonna and Christ, Latin cross. Everything is dust. - One, rejoicing, Art will not die. The people will survive. And on a simple medal, Open among the stones, Unknown kings. And the gods themselves are perishable, But the verse will not stop singing, Haughty, More powerful than copper. Mint, bend, fight, - And the unsteady dream of a dream Will pour in Into immortal features.

In general, we have before us a classic verse: rhyme, rhythm and poetic meter are observed everywhere. Sentences are usually simple, without complex multi-stage turns. The vocabulary is mostly neutral; it was practically not used in Acmeism outdated words, high vocabulary. However, colloquial vocabulary is also absent. There are no examples of “word creation”, neologisms, or original phraseological units. The verse is clear and understandable, but at the same time extremely beautiful.

If you look at the parts of speech, nouns and verbs predominate. There are practically no personal pronouns, since Acmeism is largely addressed to the external world, and not to the internal experiences of a person.

Various means of expression are present, but do not play a decisive role. Of all the tropes, comparison predominates.

Thus, the Acmeists created their poems not through multi-stage structures and complex images - their images are clear, and their sentences are quite simple. But they are distinguished by the desire for beauty, the sublimity of this very simplicity. And it was the Acmeists who were able to make ordinary words play in a completely new way.

Conclusion

Despite numerous manifestos, Acmeism still remained weakly expressed as a holistic movement. His main merit is that he was able to unite many talented poets. Over time, all of them, starting with the founder of the school, Nikolai Gumilyov, “outgrew” Acmeism and created their own special, unique style. However, this literary direction somehow helped their talent develop. And for this reason alone, Acmeism can be given an honorable place in the history of Russian literature of the early 20th century.

But nevertheless, it is possible to identify the main features of the poetry of Acmeism. Firstly, attention to the beauty of the surrounding world, to the smallest details, to distant and unknown places. At the same time, Acmeism does not strive to understand the irrational. He remembers it, but prefers to leave it untouched. As for the stylistic features directly, this desire for simple sentences, neutral vocabulary, absence of complex phrases and a clutter of metaphors. However, at the same time, the poetry of Acmeism remains unusually bright, sonorous and beautiful.

Bibliography

1. Acmeism // Literary manifestos from symbolism to the present day. Comp.S. Jimbinov. – M.: Consent, 2000.

2. Acmeism, or Adamism // Literary encyclopedia: In 11 volumes - [M.], 1929-1939. T.1

3. Gumilyov N. Heritage of symbolism and acmeism // Gumilyov N. Favorites. – M.: Veche, 2001. – 512 p. – P.367-370.

4. Zhirmunsky V.M. Overcoming symbolism: article [ Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http: // gumilev. ru/main. phtml? aid=5000895

5. Pankeev I.A. In the middle of the earthly journey (lit.-biographical chronicle) // Gumilyov N., Selected. – M.: Education, 1991.

6. Scriabina T. Acmeism // Encyclopedia “Around the World”: encyclopedia [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http: // www. krugosvet. ru/articles/102/1010275/1010275a1. htm

Quote by Acmeism // Literary manifestos from symbolism to the present day. Comp. S. Dzhimbinov. – M.: Consent, 2000.

Zhirmunsky V.M. Overcoming symbolism: article [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http://gumilev.ru/main.phtml?aid=5000895

Pankeyev I. A. In the middle of the earthly journey (lit.-biographical chronicle) // Gumilyov N., Selected. – M.: Education, 1991. - P. 11.

Acmeism (from the Greek akme - the highest degree of something, blossoming, maturity, peak, edge) is one of the modernist movements in Russian poetry of the 1910s, formed as a reaction to the extremes of symbolism.

Overcoming the Symbolists’ predilection for the “superreal,” polysemy and fluidity of images, and complicated metaphors, the Acmeists strove for sensual plastic-material clarity of the image and accuracy, precision of the poetic word. Their “earthly” poetry is prone to intimacy, aestheticism and poeticization of the feelings of primordial man. Acmeism was characterized by extreme apoliticality, complete indifference to the pressing problems of our time.

The Acmeists, who replaced the Symbolists, did not have a detailed philosophical and aesthetic program. But if in the poetry of symbolism the determining factor was transience, the immediacy of being, a certain mystery covered with an aura of mysticism, then as cornerstone Acmeism poetry was based on a realistic view of things. The vague instability and vagueness of symbols was replaced by precise verbal images. The word, according to Acmeists, should have acquired its original meaning.

The highest point in the hierarchy of values ​​for them was culture, identical to universal human memory. That is why Acmeists often turn to mythological subjects and images. If the Symbolists focused their work on music, then the Acmeists focused on the spatial arts: architecture, sculpture, painting. The attraction to the three-dimensional world was expressed in the Acmeists' passion for objectivity: a colorful, sometimes exotic detail could be used for purely pictorial purposes. That is, the “overcoming” of symbolism occurred not so much in the sphere of general ideas, but in the field of poetic stylistics. In this sense, Acmeism was as conceptual as symbolism, and in this respect they are undoubtedly in continuity.

A distinctive feature of the Acmeist circle of poets was their “organizational cohesion.” Essentially, the Acmeists were not so much an organized movement with a common theoretical platform, but rather a group of talented and very different poets who were united by personal friendship. The Symbolists had nothing of the kind: Bryusov’s attempts to reunite his brothers were in vain. The same thing was observed among the futurists - despite the abundance of collective manifestos that they released. The Acmeists, or - as they were also called - "Hyperboreans" (after the name of the printed mouthpiece of Acmeism, the magazine and publishing house "Hyperboreas"), immediately acted as a single group. They gave their union the significant name “Workshop of Poets.” And the beginning of a new trend (which later became almost “ prerequisite"the emergence of new poetic groups in Russia) was caused by a scandal.

In the fall of 1911, a “riot” broke out in the poetry salon of Vyacheslav Ivanov, the famous “Tower”, where the poetry society gathered and poetry was read and discussed. Several talented young poets defiantly left the next meeting of the Academy of Verse, outraged by the derogatory criticism of the “masters” of symbolism. Nadezhda Mandelstam describes this incident as follows: “Gumilyov’s “Prodigal Son” was read at the “Academy of Verse,” where Vyacheslav Ivanov reigned, surrounded by respectful students. He subjected the “Prodigal Son” to real destruction. The speech was so rude and harsh that Gumilyov’s friends left the “Academy” and organized the “Workshop of Poets” - in opposition to it.”

And a year later, in the fall of 1912, the six main members of the “Workshop” decided not only formally, but also ideologically to separate from the Symbolists. They organized a new commonwealth, calling themselves “Acmeists,” i.e., the pinnacle. At the same time, the “Workshop of Poets” as organizational structure preserved - the Acmeists remained in it as an internal poetic association.

The main ideas of Acmeism were set out in the programmatic articles by N. Gumilyov “The Heritage of Symbolism and Acmeism” and S. Gorodetsky “Some Currents in Modern Russian Poetry”, published in the magazine “Apollo” (1913, No. 1), published under the editorship of S. Makovsky. The first of them said: “Symbolism is being replaced by a new direction, no matter what it is called, whether Acmeism (from the word akme - the highest degree of something, a blooming time) or Adamism (a courageously firm and clear view of life), in any case, requiring a greater balance of power and a more accurate knowledge of the relationship between subject and object than was the case in symbolism. However, in order for this movement to establish itself in its entirety and become a worthy successor to the previous one, it is necessary that it accept its inheritance and answer all the questions it poses. The glory of the ancestors obliges, and symbolism was a worthy father.”

S. Gorodetsky believed that “symbolism... having filled the world with “correspondences”, turned it into a phantom, important only insofar as it... shines through with other worlds, and belittled its high intrinsic value. Among the Acmeists, the rose again became good in itself, with its petals, scent and color, and not with its conceivable likenesses with mystical love or anything else.”

In 1913, Mandelstam’s article “The Morning of Acmeism” was also written, which was published only six years later. The delay in publication was not accidental: Mandelstam’s acmeistic views significantly diverged from the declarations of Gumilyov and Gorodetsky and did not make it onto the pages of Apollo.

However, as T. Skryabina notes, “the idea of ​​a new direction was first expressed on the pages of Apollo much earlier: in 1910, M. Kuzmin appeared in the magazine with an article “On Beautiful Clarity,” which anticipated the appearance of declarations of Acmeism. By the time this article was written, Kuzmin was already a mature man and had experience of collaborating in symbolist periodicals. Kuzmin contrasted the otherworldly and foggy revelations of the Symbolists, the “incomprehensible and dark in art,” with “beautiful clarity,” “clarism” (from the Greek clarus - clarity). An artist, according to Kuzmin, must bring clarity to the world, not obscure, but clarify the meaning of things, seek harmony with the environment. The philosophical and religious quest of the Symbolists did not captivate Kuzmin: the artist’s job is to focus on the aesthetic side of creativity, artistic skill. “The symbol, dark in its deepest depths,” gives way to clear structures and admiration of “lovely little things.” Kuzmin’s ideas could not help but influence the Acmeists: “beautiful clarity” turned out to be in demand by the majority of participants in the “Workshop of Poets.”

Another “harbinger” of Acmeism can be considered In. Annensky, who, formally being a symbolist, actually paid tribute to him only in the early period of his work. Subsequently, Annensky took a different path: the ideas of late symbolism had practically no impact on his poetry. But the simplicity and clarity of his poems were well understood by the Acmeists.

Three years after the publication of Kuzmin’s article in Apollo, the manifestos of Gumilyov and Gorodetsky appeared - from this moment it is customary to count the existence of Acmeism as an established literary movement.

Acmeism has six of the most active participants in the movement: N. Gumilyov, A. Akhmatova, O. Mandelstam, S. Gorodetsky, M. Zenkevich, V. Narbut. G. Ivanov claimed the role of the “seventh Acmeist,” but such a point of view was protested by A. Akhmatova, who stated that “there were six Acmeists, and there never was a seventh.” O. Mandelstam agreed with her, who, however, believed that six was too much: “There are only six Acmeists, and among them there was one extra...” Mandelstam explained that Gorodetsky was “attracted” by Gumilyov, not daring to oppose the then powerful Symbolists with only "yellow mouths". “Gorodetsky was [by that time] a famous poet...” At different times, the following took part in the work of the “Workshop of Poets”: G. Adamovich, N. Bruni, Nas. Gippius, Vl. Gippius, G. Ivanov, N. Klyuev, M. Kuzmin, E. Kuzmina-Karavaeva, M. Lozinsky, V. Khlebnikov, etc. At the meetings of the “Workshop,” unlike the meetings of the Symbolists, specific issues were resolved: the “Workshop” was a school for mastering poetic skills, a professional association.

Acmeism as a literary movement united exceptionally gifted poets - Gumilyov, Akhmatova, Mandelstam, the formation of whose creative individualities took place in the atmosphere of the “Workshop of Poets”. The history of Acmeism can be considered as a kind of dialogue between these three outstanding representatives. At the same time, the Adamism of Gorodetsky, Zenkevich and Narbut, who formed the naturalistic wing of the movement, differed significantly from the “pure” Acmeism of the above-mentioned poets. The difference between the Adamists and the triad Gumilyov - Akhmatova - Mandelstam has been repeatedly noted in criticism.

As a literary movement, Acmeism did not last long - about two years. In February 1914, it split. The "Poets' Workshop" was closed. The Acmeists managed to publish ten issues of their magazine “Hyperborea” (editor M. Lozinsky), as well as several almanacs.

“Symbolism was fading away” - Gumilyov was not mistaken in this, but he failed to form a movement as powerful as Russian symbolism. Acmeism failed to gain a foothold as the leading poetic movement. The reason for its rapid decline is said to be, among other things, “the ideological unadaptability of the movement to the conditions of a radically changed reality.” V. Bryusov noted that “the Acmeists are characterized by a gap between practice and theory,” and “their practice was purely symbolist.” It was in this that he saw the crisis of Acmeism. However, Bryusov’s statements about Acmeism were always harsh; at first he stated that “... Acmeism is an invention, a whim, a metropolitan quirk” and foreshadowed: “... most likely, in a year or two there will be no Acmeism left. His very name will disappear,” and in 1922, in one of his articles, he generally denies it the right to be called a direction, a school, believing that there is nothing serious and original in Acmeism and that it is “outside the mainstream of literature.”

However, attempts to resume the activities of the association were subsequently made more than once. The second “Workshop of Poets,” founded in the summer of 1916, was headed by G. Ivanov together with G. Adamovich. But it didn’t last long either. In 1920, the third “Workshop of Poets” appeared, which was Gumilyov’s last attempt to organizationally preserve the Acmeist line. Poets who consider themselves to be part of the school of Acmeism united under his wing: S. Neldichen, N. Otsup, N. Chukovsky, I. Odoevtseva, N. Berberova, Vs. Rozhdestvensky, N. Oleinikov, L. Lipavsky, K. Vatinov, V. Posner and others. The third “Workshop of Poets” existed in Petrograd for about three years (in parallel with the “Sounding Shell” studio) - until the tragic death of N. Gumilyov.

The creative destinies of poets, one way or another connected with Acmeism, developed differently: N. Klyuev subsequently declared his non-involvement in the activities of the commonwealth; G. Ivanov and G. Adamovich continued and developed many of the principles of Acmeism in emigration; Acmeism did not have any noticeable influence on V. Khlebnikov. IN Soviet time the poetic style of the Acmeists (mainly N. Gumilyov) was imitated by N. Tikhonov, E. Bagritsky, I. Selvinsky, M. Svetlov.

In comparison with other poetic movements of Russian Silver Age Acmeism, in many ways, seems to be a marginal phenomenon. It has no analogues in other European literatures (which cannot be said, for example, about symbolism and futurism); the more surprising are the words of Blok, Gumilyov’s literary opponent, who declared that Acmeism was just an “imported foreign thing.” After all, it was Acmeism that turned out to be extremely fruitful for Russian literature. Akhmatova and Mandelstam managed to leave behind “eternal words.” Gumilyov appears in his poems as one of the brightest personalities of the cruel times of revolutions and world wars. And today, almost a century later, interest in Acmeism has remained mainly because the work of these outstanding poets, who had a significant influence on the fate of Russian poetry of the 20th century, is associated with it.

Basic principles of Acmeism:

Liberating poetry from symbolist appeals to the ideal, returning it to clarity;

Refusal of mystical nebula, acceptance of the earthly world in its diversity, visible concreteness, sonority, colorfulness;

The desire to give a word a specific, precise meaning;

Objectivity and clarity of images, precision of details;

Appeal to a person, to the “authenticity” of his feelings;

Poeticization of the world of primordial emotions, primitive biological natural principles;

Roll call with the past literary eras, the broadest aesthetic associations, “longing for world culture.”

"To the earthly source of poetic values"

Lydia Ginzburg

In 1906, Valery Bryusov stated that “the circle of development of that literary school, which is known as “ new poetry", can be considered closed."

From symbolism a new literary movement emerged - Acmeism - which contrasted itself with the first, at a time of its crisis. He reflected new aesthetic trends in the art of the “Silver Age,” although he did not completely break with symbolism. At the beginning of his creative path young poets, future acmeists, were close to symbolism, attended “Ivanovo Wednesdays” - literary meetings in the St. Petersburg apartment of Vyacheslav Ivanov, called the “tower”. In Ivanov’s “tower” classes were held for young poets, where they learned versification.

The emergence of a new movement dates back to the early 1910s. It received three non-identical names: “acmeism” (from the Greek “acme” - flowering, peak, highest degree of something, edge), “Adamism” (from the name of the first man Adam, courageous, clear, direct view of the world) and “clarism” (beautiful clarity). Each of them reflected a special facet of the aspirations of the poets of a given circle.

So, Acmeism is a modernist movement that declared a concrete sensory perception of the external world, returning the word to its original, non-symbolic meaning.

The formation of the platform of participants in the new movement takes place first in the “Society of Admirers of the Artistic Word” (“Poetic Academy”), and then in the “Workshop of Poets” created in 1911, where the artistic opposition was led by Nikolai Gumilyov and Sergei Gorodetsky.

“The Workshop of Poets” is a community of poets united by the feeling that symbolism has already passed its highest peak. This name dates back to the time of medieval craft associations and showed the attitude of the “guild” participants towards poetry as a purely professional field of activity. "Workshop" was a school of professional excellence. The backbone of the “Workshop” was formed by young poets who had only recently begun to publish. Among them were those whose names in subsequent decades made up the glory of Russian literature.

The most prominent representatives of the new trend included Nikolai Gumilyov, Anna Akhmatova, Osip Mandelstam, Sergei Gorodetsky, Nikolai Klyuev.

We gathered at the apartment of one of the members of the “Workshop”. Sitting in a circle, one after another they read their new poems, which they then discussed in detail. The responsibility for leading the meeting was assigned to one of the syndics - the leaders of the "Workshop".

The syndic had the right to interrupt the speech of the next speaker using a special bell if it was too general.

Among the participants of the “Workshop” “home philology” was revered. They carefully studied world poetry. It is no coincidence that in their own works one can often hear someone else’s lines and many hidden quotes.

Among their literary teachers, the Acmeists singled out François Villon (with his appreciation for life), François Rabelais (with his inherent “wise physiology”), William Shakespeare (with his gift of insight into the inner world of a person), Théophile Gautier (a champion of “impeccable forms”). We should add here the poets Baratynsky, Tyutchev and Russian classical prose. The immediate predecessors of Acmeism include Innokenty Annensky, Mikhail Kuzmin, and Valery Bryusov.

In the second half of 1912, the six most active participants in the “Workshop” - Gumilyov, Gorodetsky, Akhmatova, Mandelstam, Narbut and Zenkevich - held a number of poetry evenings, where they declared their claims to lead Russian literature in a new direction.

Vladimir Narbut and Mikhail Zenkevich in their poems not only defended “everything concrete, real and vital” (as Narbut wrote in one of his notes), but also shocked the reader with an abundance of naturalistic, sometimes very unappetizing details:

And the wise slug, bent into a spiral,
Sharp, lidless eyes of vipers,
And in a closed silver circle,
How many secrets the spider weaves!

M. Zenkevich. "Man" 1909–1911

Like the futurists, Zenkevich and Narbut loved to shock the reader. Therefore, they were often called “left-wing Acmeists.” On the contrary, on the “right” in the list of Acmeists were the names of Anna Akhmatova and Osip Mandelstam - two poets who were sometimes recorded as “neoclassicists”, meaning their commitment to a strict and clear (like the Russian classics) construction of poems. And finally, the “center” in this group was occupied by two poets of the older generation - the syndics of the “Workshop of Poets” Sergei Gorodetsky and Nikolai Gumilev (the first was close to Narbut and Zenkevich, the second to Mandelstam and Akhmatova).

These six poets were not absolute like-minded people, but seemed to embody the idea of ​​balance between the two extreme poles of contemporary poetry - symbolism and naturalism.

The program of Acmeism was proclaimed in such manifestos as “The Legacy of Symbolism and Acmeism” by Gumilyov (1913), “Some Trends in Modern Russian Poetry” by Gorodetsky, and “The Morning of Acmeism” by Mandelstam. In these articles, the goal of poetry was to achieve balance. “Art is a state of balance, first of all,” wrote Gorodetsky. However, between what and what did the Acmeists primarily try to maintain a “living balance”? Between “earthly” and “heavenly”, between life and being.

Worn rug under the icon
It's dark in a cool room -

wrote Anna Akhmatova in 1912.

This does not mean “a return to the material world, an object,” but a desire to balance” within one line the familiar, everyday (“Worn rug”) and the lofty, Divine (“Worn rug under the icon”).

Acmeists are interested in the real, not the other world, the beauty of life in its concrete sensory manifestations. The vagueness and hints of symbolism were contrasted with a major perception of reality, the reliability of the image, and the clarity of the composition. In some ways, the poetry of Acmeism is the revival of the “golden age”, the time of Pushkin and Baratynsky.

S. Gorodetsky, in his declaration “Some Currents in Modern Russian Poetry,” spoke out against the “blurring” of symbolism, its focus on the unknowability of the world: “The struggle between Acmeism and symbolism... is, first of all, a struggle for this world, sounding, colorful, having shapes, weight and time...", "the world is irrevocably accepted by Acmeism, in all its beauties and ugliness."

The Acmeists contrasted the image of the poet-prophet with the image of a poet-craftsman, diligently and without unnecessary pathos connecting the “earthly” with the “heavenly-spiritual”.

And I thought: I won’t flaunt
We are not prophets, not even forerunners...

O. Mandelstam. Lutheran, 1912

The organs of the new trend were the magazines “Apollo” (1909–1917), created by the writer, poet and historian Sergei Makovsky, and “Hyperborea”, founded in 1912 and headed by Mikhail Lozinsky.

The philosophical basis of the new aesthetic phenomenon was pragmatism (philosophy of action) and the ideas of the phenomenological school (which defended the “experience of objectivity”, “questioning of things”, “acceptance of the world”).

Almost the main one distinctive feature“Workshop” developed a taste for depicting earthly, everyday life. Symbolists sometimes sacrificed outside world for the sake of the inner, hidden world. “Tsekhoviki” decisively opted for a careful and loving description of the real “steppes, rocks and waters.”

The artistic principles of Acmeism were entrenched in his poetic practice:

1.​ Active acceptance of colorful and vibrant earthly life;
2.​ Rehabilitation of a simple objective world that has “Shapes, weight and time”;
3. Denial of transcendence and mysticism;
4.​ Primitive-animal, courageously firm view of the world;
5.​ Focus on the picturesqueness of the image;
6.​ Transfer of a person’s psychological states with attention to the bodily principle;
7.​ The expression of “longing for world culture”;
8.​ Attention to the specific meaning of the word;
9.​ Perfection of forms.

The fate of literary acmeism is tragic. He had to assert himself in a tense and unequal struggle. He was repeatedly persecuted and defamed. Its most prominent creators were destroyed (Narbut, Mandelstam). First World War, the October events of 1917, the execution of Gumilyov in 1921 put an end to further development Acmeism as a literary movement. However, the humanistic meaning of this movement was significant - to revive a person’s thirst for life, to restore the feeling of its beauty.

Literature

Oleg Lekmanov. Acmeism // Encyclopedia for children “Avanta+”. Volume 9. Russian literature. Part two. XX century M., 1999

N.Yu. Gryakalova. Acmeism. Peace, creativity, culture. // Russian poets of the “Silver Age”. Volume two: Acmeists. Leningrad: Leningrad University Publishing House, 1991

Acmeism (from Greek Akme- the highest degree of something, blossoming, maturity, peak, edge) - one of the modernist movements in Russian poetry of the 1910s, formed as a reaction to the extremes of symbolism. Acmeists united in the group "Workshop of Poets" in 1912-1913. published the magazine "Hyperborea". The main ideas of Acmeism were set out in the programmatic articles by N. Gumilyov “The Heritage of Symbolism and Acmeism” and S. Gorodetsky “Some Currents in Modern Russian Poetry”, published in 1913 in No. 1 of the magazine “Apollo” (the literary organ of the group during its heyday) , published under the editorship of S. Makovsky.

Acmeism did not put forward a detailed philosophical and aesthetic concept. The poets shared the views of the Symbolists on the nature of art, absolutizing the role of the artist. But they called for clearing poetry of the use of vague hints and symbols, proclaiming a return to the material world and acceptance of it as it is.

For the Acmeists, the impressionistic tendency to perceive reality as a sign of the unknowable, as a distorted likeness of higher entities, turned out to be unacceptable. Acmeists valued such elements of artistic form as stylistic balance, pictorial clarity of images, precisely measured composition, and precision of detail. Their poems aestheticized the fragile edges of things, establishing an atmosphere of admiring everyday, familiar little things.

Basic principles of Acmeism:

• liberation of poetry from symbolist appeals to the ideal, returning it to clarity;
• rejection of mystical nebula, acceptance of the earthly world in its diversity, visible concreteness, sonority, colorfulness;
• the desire to give a word a certain, precise meaning;
• objectivity and clarity of images, precision of details;
• appeal to a person, to the “authenticity” of his feelings;
• poeticization of the world of primordial emotions, primitive biological natural principles;
• echoes of past literary eras, broad aesthetic associations, “longing for world culture”

Acmeists have developed subtle ways of conveying the inner world lyrical hero. Often the state of feelings was not revealed directly; it was conveyed by a psychologically significant gesture, a listing of things. This manner of materializing experiences was characteristic, in particular, of many poems by A. A. Akhmatova.

O. E. Mandelstam noted that Acmeism is not only literary, but also social phenomenon in Russian history. With him, moral strength was revived in Russian poetry. Depicting the world with its joys, vices, injustice, the Acmeists pointedly refused to resolve social problems and affirmed the principle of “art for art’s sake.”

After 1917, N. S. Gumilyov revived the “Workshop of Poets,” but as an organized movement, Acmeism ceased to exist in 1923, although there was another attempt to restore this literary movement in 1931.

The fates of the Acmeist poets turned out differently. The leader of the Acmeists, N.S. Gumilyov, was shot. O. E. Mandelstam died in one of Stalin’s camps from extreme exhaustion. A. A. Akhmatova suffered severe hardships: her first husband was shot, her son was arrested twice and sentenced to hard labor in a camp. But Akhmatova found the courage to create a great poetic testimony to the tragic era - “Requiem”.

Only S. M. Gorodetsky lived a fairly prosperous life: having abandoned the principles of Acmeism, he learned to create “according to new rules,” obeying the ideological demands of the authorities. In the 1930s created a number of opera librettos (“Breakthrough”, “Alexander Nevsky”, “Dumas about Opanas”, etc.). During the war years he was engaged in translations of Uzbek and Tajik poets. IN last years life Gorodetsky taught at the Literary Institute. M. Gorky. He died in June 1967.