Poetry. Translated from the Russian by John High, Michael Molnar and Michael Palmer, with Nina Gerkin, Julie Gesin, Katya Olmsted, Eugene Ostashevsky and Darlene Reddaway. Introduction by Marjorie Perloff. "Alexei Parshchikov is undoubtedly the most exciting young Russian poet today. Through this first English-language collection of his work, American readers get a glimpse of an imagination that soars freely and boldly through all times and places. Indeed, this book is the trace of a poetic road that, in Parshchikov's words, 'is the place for finding your way' while 'time's wind unwinds you and sets you against the flow'"--Andrew Wachtel, Professor of Slavic Studies, Northwestern University. "In an 1898 letter from St. Petersburg, Rainer Maria Rilke wrote that it was Russian things that would give him the names for his most tender 'devoutnesses.' Now, almost 100 years later, it would seem that it is not Russian things but Russian names--the fullness of these poems, here beautifully translated for us--that embody those devoutnesses that prolong close observation and sustain contemplative complexity. Alexei Parshchikov's detailed lingering in the world he perceives has given us the fullness of these poems. Their publication in this, his first American book, is an important occasion"--Lyn Hejinian.
About the author: Alexei Parshchikov was born in 1954, near Vladivostok. He was raised in the Ukraine and attended the Kiev Academy of Agriculture. He spent two years as an agricultural scientist before entering the Moscow Institute of Literature. In 1991 he emigrated to the United States, and in 1993, he received an MA from Stanford University. Parshchikov is regarded as the major figure of the Metametaphorism movement. In the last two decades, his works have been translated into fifteen languages. His publications in English include BLUE VITRIOL, translated by Michael Palmer, Michael Molnar and John High (Avec Books, 1994). In the last years of his life he resided in Cologne, Germany. Parshchikov passed away in April of 2009.
Reviews:
http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/2009/11/alexei-parshchikov-2008-photo-by-eugene.html
http://www.avecbooks.org/bluex.html
http://www.sibila.com.br/index.php/sibila-english/873-arkadii-dragomoshchenko
