Anna of All the Russias: A Life of Anna Akhmatova » (Reprint)

Elaine Feinstein is a prizewinning poet and novelist and the author of highly praised biographies of Pushkin, Marina Tsvetayeva, and Ted Hughes. She lives in London.

In this definitive biography of the legendary Russian poet, Elaine Feinstein draws on a wealth of newly available material–including memoirs, letters, journals, and interviews with surviving friends and family–to produce a revelatory portrait of both the artist and the woman.Anna Akhmatova rose to fame in the years before World War I, but she would pay a heavy price for the political and personal passions that informed her brilliant poetry. In Anna of All the Russias we see Akhmatova's work banned from 1925 until 1940 and again after World War II. We see her steadfast opposition to Stalin, even while her son was held in the Gulag. We see her abiding loyalty to such friends as Mandelstam, Shostakovich, and Pasternak as they faced Stalinist oppression. And we see how, through everything, Akhmatova continued to write, her poetry giving voice to the Russian people by whom she was, and still is, deeply loved.

The Washington Post - Michael Dirda

Feinstein has written a highly engaging biography of this great poet and determined woman, a fine companion volume to her previous life of Marina Tsvetaeva. It makes a superb introduction to Akhmatova and her world.

List of Illustration     ix
Acknowledgements     xi
Notes on the Text     xv
Preface     xvii
St. Petersburg 1913     3
Becoming Akhmatova     12
Marriage to Gumilyov     30
Petrograd     52
Revolution     67
In a Time of Famine     81
Infidelities     102
The House on the Fontanka     121
The Vegetarian Years 1928-1933     130
The Terror 1933-1938     144
The Lamb     165
War     186
Peace     211
The Thaw     236
Last Years     260
Aftermaths     278
Epilogue     284
Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva     287
Notes     289
Select Bibliography     309
Index     317