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Stephen Dedalus

2025-10-31T17:54:08Z

2A00:1370:819A:2A1D:C61:207C:6654:F10:

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{More citations needed|date=February 2012}}
{{Infobox character
| name = Stephen Dedalus
| image = Stephen Dedalus public art.jpg
| caption = Public art of Stephen Dedalus, [[Dublin]]
| first = ''[[A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man]]''
| last = ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]''
| based_on = James Joyce (as a youth) [[Telemachus]]
| creator = [[James Joyce]]
| nickname = Kinch
| occupation = Student (''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man'') Part-time teacher (''Ulysses'')
| gender = Male
| family = Simon Dedalus (father) Mary (May) Dedalus (mother)<ref>Hunt, John. "Deadalus, Mary (May, née Goulding)." ''The Joyce Project''. Retrieved 27 January 2021. http://m.joyceproject.com/info/people.html</ref>
| nationality = Irish
}}

'''Stephen Dedalus''' is [[James Joyce]]'s literary [[alter ego]], appearing as the [[protagonist]] and [[antihero]]<ref>[http://www.hwwilson.com/print/13joyce.html Joyce, James], Abbreviated profile from ''World Authors 1900–1950''. Accessed October 16, 2008. {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080516211324/http://www.hwwilson.com/print/13joyce.html |date=May 16, 2008 }}</ref> of his first, [[autobiographical novel|semi-autobiographic novel]] of artistic existence, ''[[A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man]]'' (1916), and as a major character in his [[Literary modernism|modernist novel]] ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]'' (1922). Stephen mirrors many facets of Joyce's own life and personality. Joyce was a talented singer, for example, and in ''Ulysses'' [[Leopold Bloom]] notes the excellence of Stephen's tenor voice after hearing him sing [[Johannes Jeep]]'s song "Von der Sirenen Listigkeit".

In ''[[Stephen Hero]]'', an early version of ''A Portrait'', Stephen's surname is spelled "Daedalus," a more obvious allusion to the mythological figure [[Daedalus]], a brilliant artificer who constructed a pair of wings for himself and his son [[Icarus]] as a means of escaping the island of Crete, where they had been imprisoned by [[Minos|King Minos]]. [[Buck Mulligan]] makes reference to Stephen's mythic namesake in Ulysses, telling him, "Your absurd name, an ancient Greek!" His surname also suggests his desire to "fly" above the constraints of religion, nationality, and politics in his development as an artist. Daedalus had been contracted by King Minos to build the [[Labyrinth]] in which he would imprison his wife's son the [[Minotaur]].<ref>Ovid, in his ''Metamorphoses'', suggests that Daedalus constructed the Labyrinth so cunningly that he himself could barely escape it after he built it.</ref> Stephen's surname may also reflect the labyrinthine quality of his developmental journey in ''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man''. Stephen's first name recalls the first Christian martyr. The theme of martyrdom runs throughout the novel.

==Fictional biography==
{{Blockquote
|text = Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo ...

His father told him that story: his father looked at him through a glass: he had a hairy face.

He was baby tuckoo. The moocow came down the road where Betty Byrne lived: she sold lemon platt.
|sign = James Joyce
|source = opening to ''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man''}}

The childhood of Stephen Dedalus is recounted using vocabulary that changes as he grows, in a voice not his own but sensitive to his feelings. The reader experiences Stephen's fears and bewilderment as he comes to terms with the world in a series of disjointed episodes.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|pp=136–137}} Stephen attends the [[Jesuits|Jesuit]]-run [[Clongowes Wood College]], where the apprehensive, intellectually gifted boy suffers the ridicule of his classmates while he learns the schoolboy codes of behaviour. While he cannot yet grasp their significance, at a Christmas dinner he is witness to the social, political and religious tensions in Ireland involving [[Charles Stewart Parnell]], which drive wedges between members of his family, leaving Stephen with doubts over which social institutions he can place his faith in.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=138}} Back at Clongowes, word spreads that a number of older boys have been caught "smugging" (the term refers to the secret homosexual horseplay that five students were caught at); discipline is tightened, and the Jesuits increase use of [[School corporal punishment|corporal punishment]]. Stephen is strapped when one of his instructors believes he has broken his glasses to avoid studying. Prodded by his classmates, Stephen works up the courage to complain to the [[rector (academia)|rector]], Father Conmee, who assures him there will be no such recurrence, leaving Stephen with a sense of triumph.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|pp=138–139}}

Stephen's father gets into debt and the family leaves its pleasant suburban home to live in Dublin. Stephen realises that he will not return to Clongowes. However, thanks to a scholarship obtained for him by Father Conmee, Stephen is able to attend [[Belvedere College]], where he excels academically and becomes a class leader.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=139}} Stephen squanders a large cash prize from school, and begins to see prostitutes, as distance grows between him and his drunken father.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|pp=139–140}}

[[File:DollymountStrand 3647w.JPG|thumb|alt=A photograph of a beach.|Stephen Dedalus has an aesthetic epiphany along [[Dollymount|Dollymount Strand]].]]

As Stephen abandons himself to sensual pleasures, his class is taken on a religious retreat, where the boys sit through sermons.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=140}} Stephen pays special attention to those on pride, guilt, punishment and the [[Four last things|Four Last Things]] (death, judgement, Hell, and Heaven). He feels that the words of the sermon, describing horrific eternal punishment in hell, are directed at him and, overwhelmed, comes to desire forgiveness. Overjoyed at his return to the Church, he devotes himself to acts of ascetic repentance, though they soon devolve to mere acts of routine, as his thoughts turn elsewhere. His devotion comes to the attention of the Jesuits, and they encourage him to consider entering the priesthood.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=141}} Stephen takes time to consider, but has a crisis of faith because of the conflict between his spiritual beliefs and his aesthetic ambitions. Along [[Dollymount|Dollymount Strand]] he spots a girl wading, and has an epiphany in which he is overcome with the desire to find a way to express her beauty in his writing.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|pp=141–142}}

As a student at [[University College Dublin|University College, Dublin]], Stephen grows increasingly wary of the institutions around him: Church, school, politics and family. In the midst of the disintegration of his family's fortunes, his father berates him and his mother urges him to return to the Church.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=142}} An increasingly dry, humourless Stephen explains his alienation from the Church and the aesthetic theory he has developed to his friends, who find that they cannot accept either of them.{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|pp=142—143}} Stephen concludes that Ireland is too restrictive to allow him to express himself fully as an artist, so he decides that he will have to leave. He sets his mind on self-imposed exile, but not without declaring in his diary his ties to his homeland:{{sfn|Fargnoli|Gillespie|2006|p=143}}

{{Blockquote|... I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race.}}

In ''Ulysses'', Stephen is back in Dublin, having returned because his mother was dying. He refused to kneel at her deathbed, a memory that will haunt him throughout the day. He is the character who corresponds to [[Telemachus]]; less overtly, he embodies aspects of [[Hamlet (character)|Hamlet]]. He is the protagonist of the first three episodes. Subsequently, [[Leopold Bloom]] is introduced. The two will miss each other, not meeting until late in the novel.

[[Ovid]] described Daedalus in the ''Metamorphoses'' (VIII:183–235) as being shut up in a tower to prevent his knowledge of the Labyrinth from spreading to the public. Stephen is introduced taking breakfast in the [[Sandycove]] [[Martello tower]] in Dublin on the morning of 16 June 1904. Stephen shares his opinions about religion, especially as they relate to the recent death of his mother, with his quasi-friend Buck Mulligan, who manages to offend Stephen before making plans as they part ways to go drinking later that evening. In the second episode Stephen teaches a class of boys a history lesson on ancient Rome. In the "Proteus" episode (in Greek myth [[Proteus]] was the old man of the sea and the shepherd of sea animals who knew all things past, present, and future but disliked telling what he knew), Stephen ambles along the strand as his thoughts are related in the form of an internal monologue.

Following several episodes centering on Bloom, Stephen returns to the fore of the novel in the library episode, in which he expounds at length to some acquaintances his theory of the obscurely autobiographical nature of Shakespeare's works and questions the institution of fatherhood, deeming it to be a fiction. He discredits his own ideas afterward, suggesting a lack of self-confidence.

Bloom visits the maternity hospital where Mina Purefoy is giving birth, and finally meets Stephen, who has been drinking with his medical student friends and is awaiting the promised arrival of Buck Mulligan. The young men become boisterous, and start discussing such topics as fertility, contraception and abortion. They continue on to a pub to continue drinking, following the successful birth of a son to Mina Purefoy.

The episode is written as a play script, complete with stage directions. The action is frequently interrupted by "hallucinations" experienced by Stephen and Bloom—fantastic manifestations of the fears and passions of the two characters. Stephen and his friend Lynch walk into [[Monto|Nighttown]], Dublin's [[red-light district]]. Bloom pursues them and eventually finds them at [[Bella Cohen]]'s brothel. Bloom sees Stephen overpay at the brothel, and decides to hold onto the rest of his money for safekeeping. Stephen hallucinates that his mother's rotting cadaver has risen up from the floor to confront him. He cries "Non serviam!," uses his walking stick to smash a chandelier,<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Lang |first1=Frederick K. |title=The Sentence That Makes Stephen Dedalus Smash the Lamp |journal=Colby Quarterly |date=June 1986 |volume=22 |issue=2 |pages=88–92 |url=https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=2627&context=cq#:~:text=I'll%20bring%20you%20all,chandelier%22%20(U%20583). |access-date=15 March 2024}}</ref> and flees the room. Bloom quickly pays Bella for the damage, then runs after Stephen. He finds Stephen engaged in an argument with an English soldier, Private Carr, who, after a perceived insult to the King, punches Stephen. The police arrive and the crowd disperses. As Bloom tends to Stephen, he has a hallucination of his deceased son, Rudy, as an 11-year-old.

Bloom takes Stephen to a cabman's shelter near [[Butt Bridge]] to restore him to his senses. There, they encounter a drunken sailor, D. B. Murphy (W. B. Murphy in the 1922 text). The episode is dominated by the motif of confusion and mistaken identity, with Bloom, Stephen and Murphy's identities being repeatedly called into question. Bloom returns home with Stephen, makes him a cup of [[hot chocolate|cocoa]], discusses cultural and linguistic differences between them, considers the possibility of publishing Stephen's parable stories, and offers him a place to stay for the night. Stephen refuses Bloom's offer and is ambiguous in response to Bloom's proposal of future meetings. The two men urinate in the backyard, Stephen departs and wanders off into the night,<ref>Hefferman, James A. W. (2001) [https://archive.today/20120915084713/http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/coursedesclong2.aspx?cid=237 ''Joyce's Ulysses'']. Chantilly, Virginia: The Teaching Company LP.</ref> and Bloom goes to bed, where Molly is sleeping.

[[Hugh Kenner]], writing in 1948, was critical of Stephen Dedalus, the protagonist of ''A Portrait'', arguing that he “does not become an artist at all . . . but an aesthete” and “to take him seriously is very hard indeed.” Kenner lamented, “It is painful to be invited to close the book with an indigestibly Byronic hero stuck in our throats.”<ref>{{cite journal|title = The 'Portrait' in Perspective|first = Hugh|last = Kenner|journal=The Kenyon Review|volume = 10|issue = 3|date=Summer 1948|publisher = [[Kenyon College]]|jstor = 4332957|pages=369, 380}}</ref>

A later version of Kenner’s 1948 essay appeared in his first book on Joyce published in 1955.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kenner |first1=Hugh |title=Dublin's Joyce |date=1955 |publisher=Chatto & Windus |location=London |pages=109–33 |url=https://archive.org/details/dublinsjoyce0000kenn/page/108/mode/2up?view=theater |access-date=13 March 2024}}</ref>

Writing in 1959, [[William York Tindall]] was also critical of Stephen Dedalus, saying “he never sees himself entirely.” Tindall regretted Stephen’s “failure to realize himself,” adding that “this is attended to in ''Ulysses'', which makes ''A Portrait'' seem preliminary sketch.”<ref>{{cite book |last1=Tindall |first1=William York |title=A Reader's Guide to James Joyce |date=1959 |publisher=Thames and Hudson |location=London |page=50 |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.124372/page/n55/mode/2up?view=theater |access-date=13 March 2024}}</ref>

In 1963 S. L. Goldberg took issue with Kenner’s negative appraisal of Stephen, conceding that “Mr. Kenner is certainly right in pointing to the irony with which Joyce views him in both the ''Portrait'' and ''Ulysses'',” but faulting him for concluding that in doing so Joyce is rejecting Stephen himself. For Goldberg, Joyce’s “irony is a qualifying criticism, which does not imply a total rejection.”<ref>{{cite book |last1=Goldberg |first1=S. L. |title=The Classical Temper: A Study of James Joyce's "Ulysses" |date=1963 |publisher=Chatto and Windus |location=London |pages=109–10 |url=https://archive.org/details/classicaltemper0000slgo/page/108/mode/2up |access-date=13 March 2024}}</ref>

It has been argued that Joyce used the doctrines of the [[Incarnation (Christianity)|Incarnation]] cited early in ''Ulysses'' to characterize his relation to both Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom and their relation to each other. Two of the doctrines have been linked to signify that Stephen, though a separate person, shares Joyce’s nature and that Joyce speaks through him. His [[Hamlet]] theory is a continuation of his aesthetic theory in ''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.''<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lang |first1=Frederick K. |title="Ulysses" and the Irish God |date=1993 |publisher=Bucknell University Press, Associated University Presses |location=Lewisburg, London and Toronto |isbn=0838751504 |pages=20-2, 67-91 |url=https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stephen_Dedalus&action=edit&section=2 |access-date=7 March 2024}}</ref>

== Quotations ==
{{Copy to Wikiquote|section=yes}}
When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight. You talk to me of nationality, language, religion. I shall try to fly by those nets.

:—''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,'' Chapter 5

A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.

:—''Ulysses,'' Episode 9

Welcome, O life, I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race. Old father, old artificer, stand me now and ever in good stead.

:—''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man''

History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.

:—''Ulysses,'' Episode 2

I fear those big words that make us so unhappy.

:—''Ulysses,'' Episode 2

Touch me. Soft eyes. Soft soft soft hand. I am lonely here. O, touch me soon, now. What is that word known to all men? I am quiet here alone. Sad too. Touch, touch me.

:—''Ulysses,'' Episode 3

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==Sources==
* {{cite book
|last1 = Fargnoli
|first1 = A. Nicholas
|last2 = Gillespie
|first2 = Michael Patrick
|title = Critical Companion to James Joyce: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work
|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=QaHVANQByVUC
|year = 2006
|publisher = Infobase Publishing
|isbn = 978-1-4381-0848-3
}}

{{Ulysses}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dedalus, Stephen}}
[[Category:Ulysses (novel) characters]]
[[Category:Fictional writers]]
[[Category:Fictional Irish people]]
[[Category:Literary characters introduced in 1918]]
[[Category:Characters in novels of the 20th century]]
[[Category:Author surrogates]]
[[Category:Male characters in literature]]
[[Category:Cultural depictions of Harun al-Rashid]]

Andrei Bely

2025-10-31T17:51:00Z

2A00:1370:819A:2A1D:C61:207C:6654:F10:

{{Short description|Russian-Soviet poet, writer and critic (1880–1934)}}
{{family name hatnote|Nikolaevich|Bugaev|lang=Eastern Slavic}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Andrei Bely
| image = Andrei Bely in Brussels (1912).jpg
| image_size =
| caption = Bely in 1912
| birth_name = Boris Nikolaevich Bugaev
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1880|10|26|df=y}}
| birth_place = Moscow, Russian Empire
| death_date = {{Death date and age|1934|01|08|1880|10|26|df=y}}
| death_place = Moscow, [[Russian SFSR]], Soviet Union
| alma_mater = [[Imperial Moscow University]] (1903)
| occupation = {{hlist|Prose writer|poet|essayist|literary critic|dramatist}}
| period = 1900—1934
| movement = {{hlist|[[Russian symbolism]]|[[Literary modernism|Modernism]]}}
| notable_works = ''[[The Silver Dove]]'' (1910) ''[[Petersburg (novel)|Petersburg]]'' (1913/1922)
| signature = Andrei Bely Signature.svg
}}

'''Boris Nikolaevich Bugaev''' ({{langx|ru|Бори́с Никола́евич Буга́ев}}, {{IPA|ru|bɐˈrʲis nʲɪkɐˈlajɪvʲɪdʑ bʊˈɡajɪf|IPA|Boris Nikolayevich Bugayev.ru.vorb.oga}}; {{OldStyleDate|26 October|1880|14 October}} – 8 January 1934), better known by the [[pen name]] '''Andrei Bely''' or '''Biely''',{{efn|{{langx|ru|Андре́й Бе́лый}}, {{IPA|ru|ɐnˈdrʲej ˈbʲelɨj|IPA|Andryey Byelyy.ru.vorb.oga}}; [[Reforms of Russian orthography|pre-reform]] spelling: Андрей Бѣлый.}} was a Russian and Soviet novelist, [[Symbolism (movement)|Symbolist]] poet, theorist and literary critic. He was a committed [[Anthroposophy|anthroposophist]] and follower of [[Rudolf Steiner]].<ref>{{Cite book|last=Norwich|first=John Julius|title=Oxford illustrated encyclopedia|date=1985–1993|publisher=Oxford University Press|others=Judge, Harry George., Toyne, Anthony.|isbn=0-19-869129-7|location=Oxford [England]|pages=43|oclc=11814265}}</ref> His novel ''[[Petersburg (novel)|Petersburg]]'' (1913/1922) was regarded by [[Vladimir Nabokov]] as the third-greatest masterpiece of [[Literary modernism|modernist literature]].<ref>1965, Nabokov's [http://lib.ru/NABOKOW/Inter05.txt television interview] TV-13 NY</ref><ref>{{YouTube|p3fsSL4Bw9w|Nabokov and the moment of truth}}</ref><ref>[http://wmjas.wikidot.com/nabokov-s-recommendations Nabokov’s Recommendations (opinions on other writers)]</ref> The [[Andrei Bely Prize]] ({{lang|ru|Премия Андрея Белого}}), one of the most important prizes in Russian literature, was named after him. His poems were set to music and performed by Russian singer-songwriters.<ref>''[http://elenafrolova.info/album/%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%8C%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9-%D0%B1%D0%B0%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%B3%D0%B0%D0%BD-%D0%BD%D0%B0-%D0%BC%D0%B0%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%8C%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B9-%D0%BF%D0%BB%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B5/ Little theater on the planet of Earth]'', sound tracks of songs on poems by Andrei Bely, music and performance by [[Elena Frolova]]</ref>

== Life and career ==
Boris Bugaev was born in [[Moscow]], into a prominent intellectual family. His father, [[Nikolai Bugaev]], was a noted mathematician<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Pattison|first1=George|title=The Oxford Handbook of Russian Religious Thought|last2=Emerson|first2=Caryl|last3=Poole|first3=Randall A.|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2020|isbn=978-0-19-879644-2|location=Oxford, UK|pages=294}}</ref> who is regarded as a founder of the Moscow school of mathematics. His mother, Aleksandra Dmitrievna (née Egorova), was not only highly intelligent but a famous society beauty, and the focus of considerable gossip. She was also a pianist, providing Bugaev his musical education at a young age.

Young Boris grew up at the Arbat, a historical area in Moscow.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Matich|first=Olga|title=Erotic Utopia: The Decadent Imagination in Russia's Fin de Siecle|publisher=Univ of Wisconsin Press|year=2005|isbn=978-0-299-20883-7|location=Madison|pages=89}}</ref> He was a [[polymath]] whose interests included mathematics, biology, chemistry, music, philosophy, and literature. Bugaev attended university at the [[University of Moscow]].<ref>{{cite arXiv |author= Noah Giansiracusa |author2=Anastasia Vasilyev |author3= Matthew Morgan |eprint=1709.02483 |title= Mathematical Symbolism in a Russian Literary Masterpiece |date= 7 Sep 2017 |class= math.HO }} Accessed 12 February 2018.</ref> He would go on to take part in both the [[Russian Symbolist movement|Symbolist movement]] and the Russian school of [[neo-Kantianism]]. Bugaev became friendly with [[Alexander Blok]] and his wife; he fell in love with her, which caused tensions between the two poets. Bugaev was invited but was unable to attend their wedding due to his father's death.<ref name=":0" />
[[File:Бакст Леон. Андрей Белый.jpg|thumb|left|200px|Portrait of Bely by [[Léon Bakst]], 1905]]
Nikolai Bugaev was well known for his influential philosophical essays, in which he decried [[geometry]] and [[probability]] and trumpeted the virtues of hard [[Mathematical analysis|analysis]]. Despite—or because of—his father's mathematical tastes, Boris Bugaev was fascinated by probability and particularly by [[entropy]], a notion to which he frequently refers in works such as ''Kotik Letaev''.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Janecek|first1=Gerald|title=The Spiral as Image and Structural Principle in Andrej Belyj's ''Kotik Lataev''|journal=Russian Literature|date=1976|volume=4|issue= 4|pages=357–63|doi=10.1016/0304-3479(76)90010-7}}</ref>

As a young man, Bely was strongly influenced by his acquaintance with the family of philosopher [[Vladimir Solovyov (philosopher)|Vladimir Solovyov]], especially Vladimir's younger brother Mikhail, described in his long autobiographical poem ''The First Encounter'' (1921); the title is a reflection of Vladimir Solovyov's ''Three Encounters''. It was Mikhail Solovyov who gave Bugaev his pseudonym Andrei Bely.{{Citation needed|date=February 2021}}
[[File:Andrei Bely 1933.jpg|thumb|280x280px|Bely in 1933]]
In his later years Bely was influenced by [[Rudolf Steiner]]'s [[anthroposophy]]<ref>Judith Wermuth-Atkinson, ''The Red Jester: Andrei Bely's Petersburg as a Novel of the European Modern'' (2012). {{ISBN|3643901542}}</ref><ref>[http://www.bartleby.com/65/be/Bely-And.html Bely, Andrei. The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001–07] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070701101433/http://www.bartleby.com/65/be/Bely-And.html |date=July 1, 2007 }}</ref> and became a personal friend of Steiner's. His ideas covering this philosophy included his attempts to connect Vladimir Solovyov's philosophical ideas with Steiner's Spiritual Science.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bely|first=Andrey|title=The First Encounter|publisher=Princeton University Press|year=1979|isbn=978-1-4008-6722-6|location=Princeton, NJ|pages=104|language=en}}</ref> One of his notions was the ''Eternal Feminine'', which he equated it with the "[[Anima mundi|world soul]]" and the "supra-individual ego", the ego shared by all individuals.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Smith|first=Kenneth M.|title=Skryabin, Philosophy and the Music of Desire|publisher=Taylor & Francis|year=2013|isbn=978-1-4094-3891-5|location=Oxon|pages=56}}</ref> He spent time between Switzerland, Germany, and Russia, during its revolution. He supported the [[Bolsheviks|Bolshevik]] rise to power and later dedicated his efforts to Soviet culture, serving on the Organizational Committee of the [[Union of Soviet Writers]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.britannica.com/biography/Andrey-Bely|title = Andrey Bely | Russian poet| date=16 February 2024 }}</ref> He died, aged 53, in Moscow. Several of the numerous poems written in Moscow in January 1934 were inspired by Bely's death.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Lacqueur|first=Walter|title=Survey, A Journal of Soviet and East European Studies|publisher=Eastern News Distributors|year=1963|isbn=|location=|pages=153}}</ref>

=== Literary career and legacy ===
{{blockquote|Bely did not accomplish his reformation of Russian prose single‐handedly: other major Symbolist novelists, especially [[Fyodor Sologub]] and [[Alexei Remizov]], also had a hand in it. It is to Bely's influence, however, more than anyone else's, that we can trace the literary origins of some of the finest early Soviet writers, such as [[Yevgeny Zamyatin|Zamyatin]], [[Boris Pilnyak|Pilnyak]], [[Isaac Babel|Babel]] and [[Andrei Platonov]]... Moreover, Bely's novels prefigure and map out both the sensibility and the structural devices of the later Western novel with such thoroughness that a person familiar with his work who reads Joyce's ''Ulysses'' or [[Alain Robbe-Grillet|Robbe‐Grillet]]'s ''[[La Jalousie|Jealousy]]'' or even [[Thomas Pynchon]]'s ''[[Gravity's Rainbow]]'' for the first time can't shake off the feeling that their authors somehow must have known Bely, even though there's not a chance that they did.|Simon Karlinsky, ''[[The New York Times]]'', 1974<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1974/10/27/archives/the-silver-dove-unknown-here-suppressed-there.html | title=The Silver Dove | newspaper=The New York Times | date=27 October 1974 | last1=Karlinsky | first1=Simon }}</ref>}}

Bely started his literary career as the author of ''The Symphonies'', a cycle of experimental prose works, written from 1900 to 1908. In 1909 he published his first novel, ''[[The Silver Dove]]''. As critics note, it is notable for its ''[[skaz]]'' techniques and its unique ornamental prose, for its "ability to capture haunting, mesmerizing sense of apocalyptic doom". The novel is the first part of Bely's unfinished trilogy ''East or West''.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ehaZrlRY_YgC&q=silver+dove&pg=PA743|title = Reference Guide to Russian Literature|isbn = 9781884964107|last1 = Cornwell|first1 = Neil|last2 = Christian|first2 = Nicole|year = 1998| publisher=Taylor & Francis }}</ref>

Bely's novel ''[[Petersburg (novel)|Petersburg]]'' (1913/1922), the second part of the unfinished trilogy, is generally considered to be his masterpiece. The book employs a striking prose method in which sounds often evoke colors. The novel is set in the somewhat hysterical atmosphere of turn-of-the-century Petersburg and the [[Russian Revolution of 1905]]. To the extent that the book can be said to possess a plot, this can be summarized as the story of the hapless Nikolai Apollonovich, a ne'er-do-well who is caught up in revolutionary politics and assigned the task of assassinating a certain government official – his own father. At one point, Nikolai is pursued through the Petersburg mists by the ringing hooves of the horse in the famous bronze statue of [[Peter I of Russia|Peter the Great]].{{citation needed|date=October 2013}} There are scholars who have suggested that ''Petersburg'' included ideas from [[Sigmund Freud]]'s therapeutic method. An example is the way in which psychoanalysis was used as Bely's interpretive tool for literary criticism, and as a source of creativity.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Livak|first=Leonid|title=A Reader's Guide to Andrei Bely's "petersburg|publisher=University of Wisconsin Press|year=2018|isbn=978-0-299-31930-4|location=Madison|pages=111|language=en}}</ref>

After the Revolution, Bely wrote two psychological autobiographical novels, highly influenced by [[Rudolf Steiner]]'s anthroposophy, ''Kotik Letaev'' (1918) and ''The Christened Chinaman'' (1921). [[D. S. Mirsky]] called ''Kotik Letaev'' "Bely's most unique and original work", while ''The Christened Chinaman'' was called by Mirsky "the most realistic and the most amusing of Bely's works".<ref>{{Cite book | url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015000668403&view=1up&format=plaintext&seq=252&skin=2021&q1=silver%20dove | title=Contemporary Russian literature, 1881-1925 | series=Contemporary literature series | year=1926 | publisher=A. A. Knopf }}</ref> He also wrote poems ''Christ is Risen'' (1918), in which he glorifies the Revolution, ''Glossolalia'' (1917), and ''The First Encounter'' (1921).

Bely's last novel is ''Moscow'' (1926–1932), an attempt to give an image of Russian [[intelligentsia]] during [[World War I]] and the [[Russian Revolution]]. It differs from ''The Silver Dove'' and ''Petersburg'' with complex, multi-faceted characters who experience a transformation of personality. It also continues Bely's linguistic experiments. The first part of ''Moscow'', ''The Moscow Eccentric'', was published in English in 2016; the other two have not yet been translated into English.

Bely's essay ''Rhythm as Dialectic in The Bronze Horseman'' is cited in [[Vladimir Nabokov|Nabokov]]'s novel ''[[The Gift (Nabokov novel)|The Gift]]'', where it is mentioned as "monumental research on rhythm".<ref name="NabokovRhythm">Nabokov (1938) ''[[The Gift (Nabokov novel)|The Gift]]'', chapter 3, p. 141.</ref> Fyodor, poet and main character, praises the system Bely created for graphically marking off and calculating the 'half-stresses' in the [[Iamb (foot)|iambs]]. Bely found that the diagrams plotted over the compositions of the great poets frequently had the shapes of rectangles and trapeziums. Fyodor, after discovering Bely's work, re-read all his old [[iambic tetrameter]]s from the new point of view, and was terribly pained to find out that the diagrams for his poems were instead plain and gappy.<ref name="NabokovRhythm"/> Nabokov's essay "[[Notes on Prosody]]" follows for the large part Bely's essay "Description of the Russian Iambic Tetrameter" (published in the collection of essays ''Symbolism'').

==Selected bibliography==

===Novels===
* ''[[The Silver Dove]]'' (Серебряный голубь, 1910)
* ''[[Petersburg (novel)|Petersburg]]'' (Петербург, 1913, revised and shortened 1922)
* ''Kotik Letaev'' (Котик Летаев, 1918)
*Notes of an Eccentric (1922)
* ''[http://community.middlebury.edu/~beyer/cc/index.htm The Christened Chinaman]'' (Крещёный китаец, 1927)
* ''Moscow'' (Москва, 1926–1932)
** ''The Moscow Eccentric'' (Московский чудак, 1926) - Volume 1, Part 1
** ''Moskva pod udarom'' (Москва под ударом, 1926, not translated yet, ''Moscow Under Siege'', ''Moscow in Jeopardy'') - Volume 1, Part 2
** ''Maski'' (Маски, 1932, not translated yet, ''Masks'') - Volume 2

===Short fiction===
*Story No. 2 (from the Notes of an Official) (1902)
*A Light Tale (1903)
*We're Waiting for his Return (1903)
*[[Argonaut]]s (1904)
*The Bush (1906)
*The Mountain Lady (1907)
*Notes on Adam (1908)
*The Yogi (1918)
*Human. the Preface to the novel ''"Man"'' - a Chronicle of the 25th Century (1918)
*Return to the Motherland (excerpts from the story, 1922)

===Poetry===
* ''Gold in Azure'' (Золото в лазури, 1904)
* ''Ash'' (Пепел, 1909)
* ''Urn'' (Урна, 1909)
* ''Christ Has Risen'' (Христос воскрес, 1918)
* ''The First Encounter'' (Первое свидание, 1921)
* ''[http://community.middlebury.edu/~beyer/gl/glossenglish/glosseng.html Glossolalia: Poem about Sound]'' (Глоссолалия. Поэма о звуке, 1922)

===Symphonies===
* ''Second Symphony, the Dramatic'' (Симфония (2-я, Драматическая), 1902)
* ''The Northern, or First—Heroic'' (Северная симфония (1-я, героическая), 1904, written in 1900)
* ''The Return''—Third (Возврат. III симфония, 1905)
* ''Goblet of Blizzards''—Fourth (Кубок метелей. Четвертая симфония, 1908)

===Essays===
* ''Symbolism'' (Символизм, 1910)
* ''Green Meadow'' (Луг зелёный, 1910)
* ''Arabesques'' (Арабески, 1911)
* ''Revolution and Culture'' (Революция и культура, 1917)
* ''Recollections of Blok'' (Воспоминания о Блоке, 1922)
* "Reminiscences of Rudolf Steiner"
* ''Rhythm as Dialectic in The Bronze Horseman'' (Ритм как диалектика и «Медный всадник», 1934)
* ''Gogol's Artistry'' (Мастерство Гоголя, 1934)

===Non-fiction===
* ''In the Kingdom of Shadows'' (Одна из обителей царства теней, 1925)
* ''At the Border of Two Centuries'' (На рубеже двух столетий, 1930)
* ''The Beginning of the Century'' (Начало века, 1933)
* ''Between Two Revolutions'' (Между двух революций, 1934)

===English translations===
*'''''Petersburg'''''
**John Cournos, [[Grove Press]], 1959.
**Robert A. Maguire and John E. Malmstad, Indiana University Press, 1978.
**David McDuff, [[Penguin Classics|Penguin 20th Century Classics]], 1995.
**John Elsworth, [[Pushkin Press]], 2009.
*'''''The Silver Dove'''''
**George Reavey, Grove Press, 1974.
**John Elsworth, Northwestern University Press, 2000.
* '''''The Symphonies'''''
**''The Dramatic Symphony'', John Elsworth, Grove Press, 1987.
**''The Symphonies'', Jonathan Stone, Columbia University Press, 2021.
*''Kotik Letaev'', Gerald Janecek, [[Ardis Publishing|Ardis]], 1971.
*''The Complete Short Stories'', Ronald E. Peterson, Ardis, 1979.
*''Selected Essays of Andrey Bely'', Steven Cassedy, University of California Press, 1985.
*''Reminiscences of Rudolf Steiner: Andrei Belyi, Aasya Turgenieff, Margarita Voloshin'', Adonis Press, 1987
*''The Christened Chinaman'', Thomas Beyer, Hermitage Publishers, (a publisher specializing in Russian writers in English translation, started and owned by [[Igor Yefimov]]), 1991.
*''In the Kingdom of Shadows'', Catherine Spitzer, Hermitage Publishers, 2001.
*''Glossolalia'', Thomas Beyer, SteinerBooks, 2004.
*''Gogol's Artistry'', Christopher Colbach, Northwestern University Press, 2009
*''The Moscow Eccentric'', Brendan Kiernan, Russian Life Books, 2016.

== See also ==
* [[Alexander Blok]]
* [[Aleksey Remizov]]
* [[Fyodor Sologub]]
* [[Russian Symbolism]]
* [[Russian literature]]

==Notes==
{{notelist}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Sources==
* {{cite book| title =Imperial Moscow University: 1755-1917: encyclopedic dictionary | via = A. Andreev, D. Tsygankov |location= Moscow |year= 2010 |publisher= Russian political encyclopedia (ROSSPEN) | pages =63 | isbn = 978-5-8243-1429-8| ref =Imperial Moscow University}}

== External links ==
*{{commonscat-inline|Andrei Bely}}
* {{Gutenberg author | id=40302| name=Andrey Bely}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Andrei Bely}}
* [https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Bely%2C+Andrey%2C+1880-1934%22 Works by Andrei Bely at Internet Archive]
* [https://archive.org/details/silverdove00bely ''The Silver Dove'' at the Internet Archive (translation by George Reavey, 1974)]
* [https://archive.org/details/silverdove00andr ''The Silver Dove'' at the Internet Archive (translation by John Elsworth, 2000)]
* [http://aanatolivich.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/bely_yogi.pdf Translation of Andrei Bely's short story "The Yogi"]
* [https://archive.org/details/modernrussianpo00yarmgoog English translations of 3 poems by Babette Deutsch and Avrahm Yarmolinsky, 1921]
* [http://www.albany.edu/offcourse/issue41/cigale_translations2.html#bely English translations of 4 poems]
* [http://www.stihi.ru/2008/09/27/1347 English translation of Rus' (Russia)]
* [https://arxiv.org/abs/1709.02483 Mathematical Symbolism in a Russian literary masterpiece], by Noah Giansiracusa and Anastasia Vasilyeve published 7 September 2017, [[ArXiv]].
* [https://www.amazon.com/Andrei-Bely-Literature-Symbolism-Anthroposophy/dp/1387022237 Andrei Bely] – A biography with selections translated from the Russian by Daniel H. Shubin {{ISBN|978-1387022236}}

{{Anthroposophy series}}
{{Modernism}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bely, Andrei}}
[[Category:1880 births]]
[[Category:1934 deaths]]
[[Category:Writers from Moscow]]
[[Category:Russian male novelists]]
[[Category:Soviet novelists]]
[[Category:Soviet male writers]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian poets]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian male writers]]
[[Category:Russian male poets]]
[[Category:Russian literary critics]]
[[Category:Symbolist novelists]]
[[Category:Anthroposophists]]
[[Category:Symbolist poets]]
[[Category:Burials at Novodevichy Cemetery]]
[[Category:Modernist writers]]
[[Category:Imperial Moscow University alumni]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian memoirists]]
[[Category:20th-century pseudonymous writers]]
[[Category:Soviet literary critics]]

Petersburg (novel)

2025-10-31T17:48:17Z

2A00:1370:819A:2A1D:C61:207C:6654:F10:

{{Short description|1913/1922 novel by Andrei Bely}}
{{more citations needed|date=January 2020}}
{{infobox book
| 
|name = Petersburg
|title_orig = {{lang|ru|Петербургъ}}
|translator = [[John Cournos]] John E. Malmstad Robert A. Maguire [[David McDuff]] [[John Elsworth]]
|image = AndreiBelyPetersburg.jpg
|caption = Cover of 1916 edition
|author = [[Andrei Bely]]
|country = [[Russia]] and [[Germany]]
|language = [[Russian language|Russian]]
|genre = {{hlist|[[Russian symbolism|Symbolist novel]]|[[Literary modernism|modernist novel]]|[[Philosophical fiction|philosophical novel]]|[[Political fiction|political novel]]}}
|release_date= [[1913 in literature|1913]] and [[1922 in literature|1922]]
|series = ''East or West''
|preceded_by = [[The Silver Dove]]
|followed_by = [[Moscow]] Duology
}}

'''''Petersburg''''' ({{langx|ru|Петербург|''Peterburg''}}; [[Reforms of Russian orthography|pre-reform spelling]]: Петербургъ) is a novel by Russian writer [[Andrei Bely]]. A [[Symbolism (movement)|Symbolist]] work,<ref>{{cite arXiv |last1=Giansiracusa
|first1=Noah |last2=Vasilyeva |first2=Anastasia |date=2017-09-07 |title=Mathematical Symbolism in a Russian Literary Masterpiece |class=math.HO |eprint=1709.02483 }}</ref> it has been compared to other "city novels" like ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]'' and ''[[Berlin Alexanderplatz]]''.<ref name="Nabokov58RussianWriters">[[Vladimir Nabokov|Nabokov]], ''Russian Writers, Censors, and Readers'', Read at the Festival of the Arts, [[Cornell University]], April 10, 1958</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Cornwell |first=Neil |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_sm-DAAAQBAJ |title=James Joyce and the Russians |date=2016-07-27 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-1-349-11645-4 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Barta |first=Peter I. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bD_BwAEACAAJ |title=Bely, Joyce, and Döblin: Peripatetics in the City Novel |date=1996 |publisher=University Press of Florida |isbn=978-0-8130-1450-0 |language=en}}</ref> The first edition was completed in November 1913 and published serially from October 1913 to March 1914 (and later reissued as a book in 1916).<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Livak |first=Leonid |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yS93DwAAQBAJ |title=A Reader's Guide to Andrei Bely's Petersburg |date=2018-12-11 |publisher=University of Wisconsin Pres |isbn=978-0-299-31930-4 |pages= |language=en}}</ref> It received little attention and was not translated into English until 1959 by [[John Cournos]] (revised version) and David McDuff in 1995 (first version), over 37 years after the shortened and revised version and 82 years after the first version was published respectively.<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite book |last=Matich |first=Olga |title=Petersburg/Petersburg: Novel and City, 1900–1921 |publisher=[[University of Wisconsin Press]] |year=2010 |isbn=9780299236038 |pages=24 |language=en}}</ref>

Today the book is generally considered Bely's masterpiece; [[Vladimir Nabokov]] ranked it one of the four greatest "masterpieces of [[20th century literature|twentieth-century prose]]", after ''Ulysses'' and ''[[The Metamorphosis]]'', and before "the first half" of ''[[In Search of Lost Time]]''.<ref name="NabokovTv13">1965, Nabokov's [http://lib.ru/NABOKOW/Inter05.txt television interview] TV-13 NY</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3fsSL4Bw9w |archive-url= https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/p3fsSL4Bw9w |archive-date=2021-12-21 |url-status=live |title=Nabokov and the moment of truth |date= 21 April 2008 |via=www.youtube.com}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

In [[1922 in literature|1922]], Bely published in [[Berlin]] a revised edition which was shorter by a third than the first one. As Bely noted, "the new edition is a completely new book for the readers of the first edition". In the Berlin version Bely changed the [[Foot (prosody)|foot]] of his rhythmic prose from [[anapest]] to [[amphibrach]], and removed ironical passages related to the revolutionary movement. The second version is usually considered as inferior to the first one.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://polka.academy/articles/536|title=Петербург|website=Полка}}</ref>

The novel is the second part of Bely's unfinished trilogy ''East or West'', while ''[[The Silver Dove]]'' is the first one.
[[File:Chekhov Ableukhov.jpg|thumb|[[Michael Chekhov|Mikhail Chekhov]] as Apollon Apollonovich Ableukhov ([[Moscow Art Theatre|Second Moscow Art Theatre]] production of the novel, 1925)]]

==Plot summary==
Just after the conclusion of the [[Russo-Japanese War]] in 1905, Nikolai Apollonovich Ableukhov is given the task of assassinating his bureaucrat father, Apollon Apollonovich, using a time bomb supplied to him by a fellow radical, Alexander Ivanovich Dudkin. Nikolai Apollonovich spends much of his time dressing himself in a red domino costume with a black [[domino mask]], making a fool of himself in front of Sofya Petrovna Likhutina, a woman who has rebuked his flirtations in the past. Instead of focusing on the immense task he has agreed to undertake he gets himself into the newspaper's gossip columns with his antics and attends a party. His father notices these exploits and decides that his son is a scoundrel. Dudkin himself answers to a higher power, a man named Lippanchenko who is the leader of their radical group. Eventually both Nikolai Apollonovich and Dudkin experience a change of heart about their mission, however there is much to detain Nikolai Apollonovich on his way to throw the bomb into the river.

==Characters==
* Apollon Apollonovich Ableukhov - a senior official in the Russian Imperial government
* Nikolai Apollonovich Ableukhov (Nikolenka/Kolenka) - Apollon Apollonovich's son; a student involved in radical politics
* Anna Petrovna Ableukhova - Apollon Apollonovich's estranged wife and Nikolai's mother; lives in Spain
* Sofya Petrovna Likhutina (Angel Peri) - a socialite who runs an informal salon from her apartment
* Mavrushka - Sofya Petrovna's maid
* Sergei Sergeyevich Likhutin (Seryozhka) - a second lieutenant in the Gregorian Regiment; Sofya's husband; Nikolai Apollonovich's childhood friend
* Nikolai Stepanovich Lippanchenko (Lipensky) - attends Sofya Petrovna's salon; a provocator and leader of the radical terrorist wing of the party; based on [[Yevno Azef]]
* Varvara Yevgrafovna Solovyova - an intellectual well versed in Marxist theory; friends with Sofya Petrovna; involved with the party
* Nikolai Petrovich Tsukatov (Coco) - a wealthy man who hosts a ball attended by many of the main characters
* Lyubov' Alekseyevna Tsukatova - Nikolai Petrovich's wife
* Leib Hussar Shporyshev - attends Sofya Petrovna's salon
* Baron Ommau-Ommergau - a "yellow cuirassier"; attends Sofya Petrovna's salon
* Count Aven - a "blue cuirassier"; attends Sofya Petrovna's salon
* Herman Hermanovich Verhefden - a clerk in Apollon Apollonovich's office; attends Sofya Petrovna's salon
* Aleksandr Ivanovich Dudkin - a former political prisoner and local party operative reporting to Lippanchenko
* Zoya Zakharovna Fleisch - lives with Lippanchenko; probably a party member
* Pavel Yakovlevich Morkovin or Voronkov - possibly a secret policeman; possibly also a party member
* Mindalini (Mantalini) - Sofya Petrovna's Italian lover
* Matvei Morzhov - a yardkeeper
* Dmitrich Semyonych - the Ableukhovs' doorkeeper
* Ivan Ivanych Ivanov - a merchant
* Bessmertny - a shoe salesman
* Neintelpfain - a hack journalist
* Stepan Styopka - a friend of Dudkin's
* Grishka - a lackey in the Ableukhov household

==Structure==
{{More citations needed section|date=April 2022}}
Bely drew many of his characters from historical models: Apollon Apollonovich shares many characteristics with Procurator of the Holy Synod [[Konstantin Pobedonostsev]]; Dudkin resembles the revolutionary terrorist [[Boris Savinkov]]; Lippanchenko shares many characteristics with the infamous double agent [[Yevno Azef]].

There are similarities with James Joyce's ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]''. The linguistic rhythms, wordplay, Symbolism, politics, and general structure and themes of the novel have all been compared to Joyce's novel, as well as the setting of the action in a capital city ([[Dublin]]; [[St. Petersburg]]) that is itself a character and the unusual use of humor. However, the differences are also notable; the English translation of Bely remains more accessible than Joyce, for example. Bely's work is based on a complex rhythm of patterns, yet does not use such a wide variety of innovations as Joyce.

The comparison of ''Petersburg'' to ''Ulysses'' has been made for both its symbolist style and for the centrality of the city within the narrative. There are many allusions within the novel to the city's history going back to its [[History of Saint Petersburg|founding]] by [[Peter the Great]], and it incorporates a number of literary allusions to literature set in Petersburg (especially ''[[The Bronze Horseman (poem)|The Bronze Horseman]]'') as well as Russian literature in general. The characters such as Apollon Apollonovich and Alexander Ivanovich often merge with their environments, while the city itself forms a significant role in the story's unfolding.

The book was informed by many of the philosophies Bely and others of his time were concerned with, both political and spiritual. One of the major influences on the somewhat mystical tone of the book was Bely's experience with [[Rudolf Steiner]] and his philosophy of [[anthroposophy]]. The characters undergo various transcendent states, and these are generally drawn from Bely's spiritual studies. There are also discussions of [[Marxism]] and [[Friedrich Nietzsche]]'s ideas, and, though the book revolves around a political action, much of it is concerned with spiritual states.

==Translations==
There have been 4 major translations of the novel into English:

===1922 version===
# ''St. Petersburg'' (or ''Saint Petersburg''), translated by [[John Cournos]] (1959, based on the Berlin version)<ref>{{Cite web |url= https://www.themodernnovel.org/europe/europe/russia/bely/petersburg/|title=Bely: Petersburg |website=www.themodernnovel.org}}</ref>
# ''Petersburg'', translated and annotated by John E. Malmstad and Robert Alan Maguire ([[Indiana University Press]], 1978; based on the Berlin version) {{ISBN|0-253-20219-1}}

===1913 version===
# ''Petersburg'', translated by [[David McDuff]] ([[Penguin Books]], 1995)
# ''Petersburg'', translated by [[John Elsworth]] ([[Pushkin Press]], 2009); winner of the 2012 [[Rossica Translation Prize]]

===Comparisons===
In a review of all the existing English translations, Professor Michael R. Katz writes that, "if someone wants to read Bely's masterpiece and to understand ''most'' of it, then learn Russian and read it in the original; if he/she wants to understand ''some'' of it, then read Maguire and Malmstad's magisterial annotated, introduced, and reasonably well-translated scholarly edition; and if someone wants just to say that he/she has read Bely's ''Petersburg'' for the sake of adding one notch to his cultural gun [then] go read Elsworth's version."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Katz |first=Michael R. |date=Spring 2010 |title='Petersburg' Only Seems to Exist--Bely in English Translation |journal=The Slavic and East European Journal |volume=54 |issue=1 |pages=165–167}}</ref> In the ''Times Literary Supplement'', Thomas Karshan noted that "Elsworth's version conveys little of Bely's sonic patterning" but that "McDuff's distinguished 1995 version does a good job of approximating the music of Bely's Symbolist prose poetry".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Karshan |first=Thomas |date=2009-01-16 |title=From oo to hem |journal=Times Literary Supplement |issue=5520 |pages=21}}</ref>

==See also==
{{for timeline|Timeline of the Russian Revolution of 1905}}
{{for outline|Outline of the Russian Revolution of 1905}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

[[Category:1913 novels]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian novels]]
[[Category:Novels set in Saint Petersburg]]
[[Category:Novels about revolutionaries]]
[[Category:Novels set in the Russian Empire]]
[[Category:Symbolist novels]]
[[Category:Novels about cities]]
[[Category:Novels about terrorism]]
[[Category:Fiction about patricide]]
[[Category:Russian philosophical novels]]
[[Category:Russian political novels]]
[[Category:Russian Revolution of 1905]]