TO
MRS. JOHN L. GARDNER,
WHO WAS THE FIRST TO RECOGNIZE HELPFULLY
WHATEVER MERIT THERE IS IN
THIS BOOK.
Bibliographical Preface [9]
Introduction.
I. Poetic Ideal [15]
II. Inner Life [28]
III. General Characteristics [38]
Autobiographical Poems.
Mon Portrait [59]
My Pedigree [61]
My Monument [64]
My Muse [66]
My Demon [67]
Regret [69]
Reminiscence [70]
Elegy [72]
Resurrection [73]
The Prophet [74]
Narrative Poems.
The Outcast [79]
The Black Shawl [82]
The Roussalka [84]
The Cossak [87]
The Drowned [90]
Poems of Nature.
The Birdlet [97]
The Cloud [98]
The North Wind [99]
Winter Morning [100]
Winter Evening [102]
The Winter-road [104]
Poems of Love.
The Storm-Maid [109]
The Bard [110]
Spanish Love-Song [111]
Love [113]
Jealousy [114]
In an Album [116]
The Awaking [117]
Elegy [119]
First Love [120]
Elegy [121]
The Burnt Letter [122]
"Sing not, Beauty" [123]
Signs [124]
A Presentiment [125]
"In Vain, Dear Friend" [127]
Love's Debt [128]
Invocation [130]
Elegy [132]
Sorrow [133]
Despair [134]
A Wish [135]
Resigned Love [136]
Love and Freedom [137]
Not at All [138]
Inspiring Love [139]
The Graces [141]
Miscellaneous Poems.
The Birdlet [145]
The Nightingale [146]
The Floweret [147]
The Horse [148]
To a Babe [150]
The Poet [151]
To the Poet [153]
The Three Springs [154]
The Task [155]
Sleeplessness [156]
Questionings [157]
Consolation [158]
Friendship [159]
Fame [160]
The Angel [161]
Home-Sickness [162]
Insanity [163]
Death-Thoughts [165]
Rights [167]
The Gypsies [168]
The Delibash [169]
Notes [171]
Preface: Bibliographical.
1. The text I have used for the following translations is that of the edition of the complete works of Pushkin in ten volumes, 16mo., by Suvorin, St. Petersburg, 1887. The poems form Volumes III. and IV. of that edition. Accordingly, I have designated after each heading, volume, and page where the poem is to be found in the original. Thus, for example, "My Muse, IV. 1," means that this poem is found in Volume IV. of the above edition, page 1.
2. I have translated Pushkin literally word for word, line for line. I do not believe there are as many as five examples of deviation from the literalness of the text. Once only, I believe, have I transposed two lines for convenience of translation; the other deviations are (if they are such) a substitution of an and for a comma in order to make now and then the reading of a line musical. With these exceptions, I have sacrified everything to faithfulness of rendering. My object was to make Pushkin himself, without a prompter, speak to English readers. To make him thus speak in a foreign tongue was indeed to place him at a disadvantage; and music and rhythm and harmony are indeed fine things, but truth is finer still. I wished to present not what Pushkin would have said, or should have said, if he had written in English, but what he does say in Russian. That, stripped from all ornament of his wonderful melody and grace of form, as he is in a translation, he still, even in the hard English tongue, soothes and stirs, is in itself a sign that through the individual soul of Pushkin sings that universal soul whose strains appeal forever to man, in whatever clime, under whatever sky.