Marina Tsvetaeva's Complete Works Volume 2: Essays and Polemics

The second volume of Marina Tsvetaeva's complete works has been published by Seuil, collecting her essays and critical writings. This volume includes seminal texts such as 'My Pushkin,' 'Your Death,' 'Intimate Prose,' 'The Chinese,' 'Earthly Signs,' 'Letter to the Amazon,' and critical studies on epic and lyric poetry in contemporary Russia, Mayakovsky, and Pasternak. A particularly sharp 'Response to Osip Mandelstam' reveals Tsvetaeva's unique stance during post-revolutionary Russia: she criticizes Mandelstam for aestheticism, accusing him of loving power over greatness and being revolutionary only when safe. The volume also features Tsvetaeva's passionate defense of Pushkin, whom she first encountered as a three-year-old through a painting of his mortal wound. She identifies with Pushkin as a 'Negro' (descendant of an Abyssinian) and argues that his existence refutes racism. Her essay 'The Chinese' further explores xenophobia, informed by her own exile. Tsvetaeva's writings on love, including letters to Abraham Vishniak and reflections on Rilke's death, display a lucid, unsentimental view of human relationships.