View source for Velimir Khlebnikov

{{Short description|Russian playwright, poet and futurist (1885-1922)}}
{{ infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] -->
| image         = Chlebnikow.jpg
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| pseudonym     = Velimir Khlebnikov
| birth_name     = Viktor Vladimirovich Khlebnikov
| birth_date     = {{OldStyleDate|9 November|1885|28 October}}
| birth_place    = [[Malye Derbety]], [[Astrakhan Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]]
| death_date     = {{death date and age|1922|6|28|1885|11|9|df=yes}}
| death_place    = [[Kresttsy, Krestetsky District, Novgorod Oblast|Kresttsy]], [[Novgorod Oblast]], [[Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic|Russian SFSR]], [[Soviet Union]]
| occupation    = 
| language    = Russian, Zaum
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| movement      = [[Russian Futurism]]
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'''Viktor Vladimirovich Khlebnikov''', better known by the [[pen name]] '''{{Transliteration|ru|Velimir Khlebnikov}}'''{{refn|name=romanization|group=Note|Also [[romanization of Russian|romanized]] {{Transliteration|ru|Velemir}} and {{Transliteration|ru|Chlebnikov}}, {{Transliteration|ru|Hlebnikov}}, or {{Transliteration|ru|Xlebnikov}}.}} ({{lang-rus|Велими́р Хле́бников|p=vʲɪlʲɪˈmʲir ˈxlʲɛbnʲɪkəf}};{{Refn|In [[reforms of Russian orthography|old orthography]], {{lang|ru-petr1708|Велем́ір Хле́бников}}|name=Orthography|group=Note}} {{OldStyleDate|9 November|1885|28 October}} &ndash; 28 June 1922), was a Russian poet and [[playwright]], a central part of the [[Russian Futurist movement]], but his work and influence stretch far beyond it. Influential linguist [[Roman Jakobson]] hailed Khlebnikov as "the greatest world poet of our century".<ref>[http://literatura5.narod.ru/jakobson_o_hlebnikove.html Roman Jakobson on Velimir Khlebnikov (in Russian)]</ref><ref name=":0" />

==Biography==
Viktor Vladimirovich Khlebnikov was born in 1885 in [[Malye Derbety]], [[Astrakhan Governorate]], [[Russian Empire]] (in present-day [[Kalmykia]]). He was of [[Russians|Russian]], [[Armenians|Armenian]] and [[Zaporozhian Cossacks|Zaporozhian Cossack]] descent.<ref name="JAS">James R. Russell, "The Black Dervish of Armenian Futurism," ''Journal of Armenian Studies'', 10</ref> His younger sister, Vera Khlebnikova, was an artist. He moved to [[Kazan]], where he attended school. He then attended school in [[Saint Petersburg]]. He eventually quit school to become a full-time writer.<ref name="WDL"/> His earliest works are from 1908.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Velimir Khlebnikov|url=https://www.monoskop.org/Velimir_Khlebnikov|access-date=28 July 2020|website=Monoskop}}</ref>

{{Quote box
| width = 250px
| align = left
| quoted = true
| bgcolor = #FFFFF0
| salign = right
| quote = <poem>
Wingletting with the goldenscrawl
Of its finest sinews,
The grasshopper loaded its trailer-belly
With many coastal herbs and faiths.
     "Ping, ping, ping!" tra-lah-ed the zingzinger.
O, swanderful!
O, illuminate!
</poem>
| source = Кузнечик/Grasshopper (1908-1909)
}}

In 1909-10, he met the to-be Russian Futurists [[Vasily Kamensky]], [[David Burliuk]], and [[Vladimir Mayakovsky]].<ref name=":0" /> Soon Khlebnikov would belong to [[Hylaea (literature)|Hylaea]], the most significant Russian Futurist group (along with Mayakovsky, [[Aleksei Kruchenykh]], David Burliuk and [[Benedikt Livshits]]). However, he had already written many significant poems before the Futurist movement in Russia had taken shape. Among his contemporaries, he was regarded as "a poet's poet" (Mayakovsky referred to him as a "poet for producers") and a maverick genius.{{citation needed|date=September 2013}} Khlebnikov was involved in the publication of ''A Slap in the Face of Public Taste'' in 1912, which was a critical component of the Russian futurist poetry.<ref name="WDL"/>

Khlebnikov is known for poems such as "Incantation by Laughter", "Bobeobi Sang The Lips", "The Grasshopper" (all 1908-1909), "Snake Train" (1910), the prologue to the Futurist opera ''[[Victory over the Sun]]'' (1913), dramatic works such as "Death's Mistake" (1915), prose works such as "Ka" (1915), and the so-called 'super-tale' (сверхповесть) "[[Zangezi]]", a drama written partly in [[zaum]]. He published ''Selected Poems with Postscript, 1907–1914'' circa 1914. [[Kazimir Malevich]] and [[Pavel Filonov]] co-illustrated it.<ref name="WDL">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/9236/ |title = Selected Poems with Postscript, 1907–1914 |website = [[World Digital Library]] |year = 1914 |access-date = 2013-09-28 }}</ref>

[[File:Velimir Khlebnikov by M. Larionov (1910).jpg|thumb|Velimir Khlebnikov, painted in 1910 by [[Mikhail Larionov]]]]

In his work, Khlebnikov experimented with the [[Russian language]], drawing upon its roots to invent huge numbers of [[neologisms]], and finding significance in the shapes and sounds of individual letters of [[Cyrillic script|Cyrillic]]. Along with Kruchenykh, he originated [[zaum]], a language defying translation. He wrote [[futurology|futurological]] essays about such things as the possible evolution of mass communication ("The Radio of the Future") and transportation and housing ("Ourselves and Our Buildings"). He described a world in which people live and travel about in mobile glass cubicles that can attach themselves to [[skyscraper]]-like frameworks, and in which all human knowledge can be disseminated to the world by [[radio]] and displayed automatically on giant book-like displays at streetcorners. In 1912, he also published a method to predict historical events; one of the examples given was a "collapse of an empire in 1917".<ref name=":0" />

Although Khlebnikov had supported the [[1917 Russian Revolution]] and shared many of its utopian visions, his works were criticized by the Soviets for not conforming to the structures of [[socialist realism]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Cooke |first1=Raymond |title=Velimir Khlebnikov: A Critical Study |url=https://archive.org/details/velimirkhlebniko0000cook |url-access=registration |date=1987 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=[https://archive.org/details/velimirkhlebniko0000cook/page/2 2]}}</ref>

In 1921, he was able to travel to Persia; excited at his arrival, he wrote poems chronicling exciting events and the sights around him.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Khlebnikov|first=Velimir|title=The King of Time: Selected Writings of the Russian Futurian|publisher=Harvard University Press|others=Translated by Schmidt, Paul|year=1985|editor-last=Douglas|editor-first=Charlotte|pages=39}}</ref> He also made friends with several [[dervish]]es. He was forced to go back to Russia in August of that year.

In his final years, Khlebnikov became fascinated with [[Slavic mythology]] and [[Pythagorean numerology]], drawing up long "Tables of Destiny" decomposing historical intervals and dates into functions of the numbers 2 and 3.

Khlebnikov died while a guest in the house of his friend Pyotr Miturich near [[Kresttsy, Krestetsky District, Novgorod Oblast|Kresttsy]], in June 1922. There has been no medical diagnosis of his last illness; he suffered from [[gangrene]] and paralysis (he seems not to have recovered the use of his legs after his 1920 hospitalization in Kharkov), and it has been suggested that he died of blood poisoning or toxemia.<ref>''Collected Works of Velimir Khlebnikov: Letters and Theoretical Writings'' (Harvard University Press, 1987; {{ISBN|0674140451}}), p. 33, n. 98.</ref>

A [[minor planet]] [[3112 Velimir]] discovered by [[Soviet Union|Soviet]] astronomer [[Nikolai Stepanovich Chernykh]] in 1977 is named after him.<ref>{{cite book
|title=Dictionary of Minor Planet Names
|author=Lutz Schmadel
|year=2003
|publisher=Springer
|isbn=3-540-00238-3
|edition=5
|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VoJ5nUyIzCsC&q=3111+Misuzu+1977&pg=PA257
}}</ref>{{page needed|date=July 2020}}

==Publishing history==

[[File:Velemir Khlebnikov 1913.jpg|thumb|Khlebnikov in 1913]]

{{Incomplete list|date=March 2013}}
;Long poems
*1910: “Snake Train”
*1913: Prologue to the Futurist opera ''[[Victory over the Sun]]''

;Plays
*1912: ''The Little Devil''<ref name="WDL3">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/9556/ |title = Creations, 1906–1908 |website = [[World Digital Library]] |year = 1912 |access-date = 2013-09-29 }}</ref>

;Books
*1912: ''Teacher and Student. Conversation''<ref name="WDL4">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/9604/ |title = Teacher and Student. Conversation |website = [[World Digital Library]] |year = 1912 |access-date = 2013-09-29 }}</ref>
*1914: ''Roar! Gauntlets, 1908–1914''<ref name="WDL2">{{cite web |url = http://www.wdl.org/en/item/9555/ |title = Roar! Gauntlets, 1908–1914 |website = [[World Digital Library]] |year = 1914 |access-date = 2013-09-28 }}</ref>
*1915: ''Death’s Mistake''<ref name="home.earthlink.net">{{cite web |url=http://home.earthlink.net/~gwkern/Khleb.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070329130957/http://home.earthlink.net/~gwkern/Khleb.htm |archive-date=2007-03-29 |title=Khlebnikov Poems}}</ref>
*1921: "Washerwoman & other poems <ref name="home.earthlink.net"/>
*1922: ''[[Zangezi]] (сверхповесть)''

;Radio project
*1921: ''The Radio of the Future''{{citation needed|date=May 2022}}

;Short stories
*1913: “Nikolai”<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780142437575|url-access=registration|quote=velimir.|title=The Portable Twentieth-century Russian Reader|last=Brown|first=Clarence|date=1993-01-01|publisher=Penguin|isbn=9780142437575|language=en}}</ref>

==Notest==
<references group="Note"/>

== References ==
{{reflist}}
* Khlebnikov, Velimir, ''Snake Train: Poetry & Prose'', translated by Gary Kern, Richard Sheldon, Edward J. Brown, Neil Cornwell & Lily Feiler. Edited by Gary Kern, with an introduction by Edward J. Brown. (Ann Arbor: Ardis, 1976), 338 pages {{ISBN|0-88233-177-9}} (cloth), {{ISBN|0-88-233-178-7}} (paperback).
* Khlebnikov, Velimir, ''The King of Time'' (Schmidt, Paul, trans.; Douglas, Charlotte, ed.) Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1990. {{ISBN|0-674-50516-6}}
* MacKay, John. ''Inscription and Modernity: From Wordsworth to Mandelstam.'' Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006. {{ISBN|0-253-34749-1}}

== External links ==
{{Commons}}
{{wikisource|works=or}}
*[http://cordite.org.au/essays/velimir-khlebnikov-displacement/ 'Velimir Khlebnikov and ‘Displacement’ as Poetics'] in ''Cordite Poetry Review'' (English)
*[http://max.mmlc.northwestern.edu/~mdenner/Demo/poetpage/khlebnikov.html Selected Poems by Khlebnikov] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080513150329/http://max.mmlc.northwestern.edu/~mdenner/Demo/poetpage/khlebnikov.html |date=2008-05-13 }} (Bilingual)
*[http://acousmata.com/post/90347897/the-radio-of-the-future Listen to an interpretation of Khlebnikov's "Radio of the Future" at Acousmata music blog]
*[http://www.albany.edu/offcourse/issue41/cigale_translations2.html#khlebnikov English translations of five poems]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20131212103645/http://www.em-review.com/issues/2012/(em)_issue_1_F2012.pdf Includes English translations of five poems, 113–117]
*[http://elevenelevenjournal.com/2012/01/24/velimir-khlebnikov-1885-1922/ English translations of five poems]
*[http://elimae.com/2010/07/Tote.html English translations of nine poems]
{{Futurism|state=expanded}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Khlebnikov, Velimir}}
[[Category:1885 births]]
[[Category:1922 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Kalmykia]]
[[Category:People from Astrakhan Governorate]]
[[Category:Russian male poets]]
[[Category:Russian avant-garde]]
[[Category:Russian people of Armenian descent]]
[[Category:Burials at Novodevichy Cemetery]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian poets]]
[[Category:20th-century Russian male writers]]
[[Category:Palindromists]]
[[Category:Constructed language creators]]