Pushkin

Pushkin
T. J. Binyon

Note that due to the limitations of some ereading devices not all diacritical marks can be shown.A major biography of one of literature’s most romantic and enigmatic figures, published in hardback to great acclaim: ‘one of the great biographies of recent times’ (Sunday Telegraph).Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin is indisputably Russia’s greatest poet – the nearest Russian equivalent to Shakespeare – and his brief life was as turbulent and dramatic as anything in his work. T.J Binyon’s biography of this brilliant and rebellious figure is ‘a remarkable achievement’ and its publication ‘a real event’ (Catriona Kelly, Guardian).‘No other work on Pushkin on the same scale, and with the same grasp of atmosphere and detail, exists in English… And Pushkin is well worth writing about… he was a remarkable man, a man of action as well as a poet, and he lived a remarkable life, dying in a duel at the age of thirty-seven.’ (John Bayley, Literary Review)Among the delights of this beautifully illustrated and lavishly produced book are the ‘caricatures of venal old men with popping eyes and side-whiskers, society beauties with long necks and empire curls and, most touchingly, images of his “cross-eyed madonna” Natalya’ (Rachel Polonsky, Evening Standard).Binyon ‘knows almost everything there is to know about Pushkin. He scrupulously chronicles his life in all its disorder, from his years at the Lycee through exile in the Crimea, Bessarabia and Odessa, for writing liberal verses, and on to the publication of Eugene Onegin and, eventually, after much wrangling with the censor, Boris Godunov’ (Julian Evans, New Statesman) and in this, ‘Binyon is unbeatable’(Clive James, TLS).

PUSHKIN

A Biography

T. J. BINYON

DEDICATION (#ulink_c8c62aee-1146-50a8-8591-7ad6ef398424)

For Helen

and In memory of my father Denis Binyon

EPIGRAPH (#ulink_47abc179-f2f3-5b03-8f7a-ee9a55d80d56)

What business is it of the critic or reader whether I am handsome or ugly, come from an ancient nobility or am not of gentle birth, whether I am good or wicked, crawl at the feet of the mighty or do not even exchange bows with them, whether I gamble at cards and so on. My future biographer, if God sends me a biographer, will concern himself with this.

PUSHKIN, 1830

CONTENTS

Cover (#uf5af31a6-d9c6-53c9-b39e-a28c953f6fb7)

Title Page (#u30626c63-5232-58c9-be9c-6e2c6d1242ec)

Dedication (#u461fc24d-185d-521b-9d32-0d3839f56b94)

Epigraph (#u9e9d8271-e7ee-5409-8401-92f923eccf0f)

Family Trees (#uf1787c22-ab71-5f3c-bf80-fc21ea17b057)

Maps (#u5c5ddd7c-0b7c-5609-850a-c3cc82496db1)

Prologue (#u1a59ac2b-5737-5f27-be2f-5c5fb5ad24ce)

1 Ancestry and Childhood, 1799–1811 (#u6b993431-e910-5e40-ba82-60f74575fafe)

2 The Lycée, 1811–17 (#u28480fb0-dca6-5d3c-b63b-4df20497f1a2)

3 St Petersburg, 1817–20: I Literature and (#ud45c209f-f3cf-556b-b673-b226277b1340)

4 St Petersburg, 1817–20: II Onegin’s Day (#uf845baa9-12f5-5c52-af40-5d4947ced148)

5 St Petersburg, 1817–20: III Triumph (#u42b26451-6580-51bf-a789-02338d598c31)

6 The Caucasus and Crimea, 1820 (#u84d84af2-6751-58ce-a503-6e6ed8d88088)

7 Kishinev, 1820–23 (#u6b6adb76-2de8-5dff-b65c-78cae0a34bc7)

8 Odessa, 1823–24 (#u4d4c7ab7-2586-5dce-b0d6-ac1df303a294)

9 Mikhailovskoe, 1824–26 (#litres_trial_promo)

10 In Search of a Wife, 1826–29 (#litres_trial_promo)

11 Courtship, 1828–31 (#litres_trial_promo)

12 Married Life, 1831–33 (#litres_trial_promo)

13 The Tired Slave, 1833–34 (#litres_trial_promo)

14 A Sea of Troubles, 1834–36 (#litres_trial_promo)

15 The Final Chapter, 1836–37 (#litres_trial_promo)

Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)

List of Abbreviations (#litres_trial_promo)

Bibliography (#litres_trial_promo)

Index (#litres_trial_promo)

Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Notes (#litres_trial_promo)

A Note on Translation, Transliteration, Dates, Currency and Ranks (#litres_trial_promo)

Praise (#litres_trial_promo)

Other Works (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

FAMILY TREES (#ulink_bfc863ec-1389-557f-b9e0-24d46dc2bf53)

MAPS (#ulink_5006a2cf-83a5-597b-b375-27700e44bb71)

PROLOGUE (#ulink_5891a1ff-f428-56a2-b3e8-efa92e476a53)

By now it is not so much Pushkin, our national poet, as our relationship to Pushkin that has become as it were our national characteristic.