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Androgyny as an Exemplary Feature of Marina Tsvetaeva's Dichotomous Poetic Vision

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

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The peculiar treatment of sex in Marina Tsvetaeva's poetry has been noted by a number of literary critics. Simon Karlinsky, for example, points out the “reversal of sex roles” of the main characters in the fairy tale Tsar'-Devitsa (The Tsar-Maiden) and comments on the “interesting and significant” nature of this phenomenon “when viewed within the whole of Tsvetaeva's work and in terms of her personal biography.“

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Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1979

References

1. Karlinsky, Simon, Marina Cvetaeva: Her Life and Art (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966), p. 224.Google Scholar

2. Ivask, Iurii, “Tsvetaeva—Maiakovskii—Pasternak,” Novyi shurnal, no. 95 (1969), p. 168.Google Scholar

3. Gove, Antonina Filonov, “The Feminine Stereotype and Beyond: Role Conflict and Resolution in the Poetics of Marina Tsvetaeva,” Slavic Review, 36, no. 2 (June 1977): 23155.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4. Heilbrun, C., Toward a Recognition of Androgyny (New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1973), p. xii.Google Scholar

5. Ibid., p. x.

6. Singer, J., Androgyny: Toward a New Theory of Sexuality (New York: Anchor Books, 1977), p. xi.Google Scholar

7. Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Language, 2nd ed., s.v. “androgynous.”

8. See, for example, the discussion in Oakley, Ann, Sex, Gender and Society (New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1972 Google Scholar, and in Singer, Androgyny, particularly pp. 14—42.

9. Cf. C. Heilbrun's statement: “Androgyny suggests a spirit of reconciliation between the sexes” (Heilbrun, Toward a Recognition of Androgyny, p. x).

10. Tsvetaeva, Marina, “Geroi truda,” Proza (New York: Izdatel'stvo imeni Chekhova, 1953), p. 223 Google Scholar; emphasis in original.

11. Tsvetaeva, Marina, “Iunosheskie stikhi,” Neizdannoe: Stikhi, Teatr, Prosa (Paris: YMCA-Press, 1976, p. 15.Google Scholar

12. Tsvetaeva, Marina, “Georgii,” Nesobrannye proizvedeniia (Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1971, p. 154.Google Scholar

13. Tsvetaeva, “Ale,” Neizdannoe, p. 43.

14. See, for example, a passage in Tsvetaeva's letter to O. E. Chernova-Kolbasina: “Eto pis'mo Vam peredast M. L… . Iz mnogikh liudei—za mnogie gody—on mne samyi blizkii: po ne-muzhskomu svoemu, ne-zhenskomu, —tret'ego tsarstva—obliku …” ( Tsvetaeva, Marina, Neissdannye pis'mo [Paris: YMCA-Press, 1972], p. 177).Google Scholar

15. Tsvetaeva, Marina, “Prikliuchenie,” Izbrarmye proizvedeniia (Moscow, 1965), p. 584.Google Scholar

16. Ibid., p. 584.

17. Ibid., p. 580.

18. Ibid., p. 584.

19. Ibid., p. 594.

20. Many examples discussed in Gove's study, “The Feminine Stereotype and Beyond,” and interpreted as instances of the poet's rejection of the female stereotype are illustrative of the same method of androgynous representation.

21. Tsvetaeva, , “Ale,” Severnye zapiski, 1916, no. 3, p. 54.Google Scholar

22. Tsvetaeva, “Remeslo,” Nesobrannye proizvedeniia, p. 198.

23. Tsvetaeva, “Iunosheskie stikhi,” Neizdannoe, p. 74.

24. Tsvetaeva, “Koli milym nazovu—ne soskuchish'sia!,” Nesobrannye proizvedeniia, p. 96.

25. Tsvetaeva, “Iunosheskie stikhi,” Neizdannoe, p. 120.

26. Tsvetaeva, “Bog!—Ia zhivu!,” Neizdannoe, pp. 124-25.

27. See, for example, the works of Shanskaia, T. V., “Stilisticheskoe ispol'zovanie kategorii roda,” in Voprosy stilistiki, Vomperskii, V. P., gen. ed. (Moscow, 1966)Google Scholar; Shcherba, E. V., Izbrannye trudy po russkomu iazyku (Moscow, 1967)Google Scholar; and A. F. Gove, “Gender as a Poetic Feature in the Verse of Zinaida Gippius,” American Contributions to the Eighth International Congress of Slavists, vol. 1: Linguistics and Poetics, ed. Henrik Birnbaum (Columbus: Slavica Publishers, 1968), pp. 379-407.

28. “Slova raznogo roda ispol'zuiutsia dlia sozdaniia olitsetvorenii pri assotsiativnom perenose na grammaticheskoe poniatie roda razlichii sushchestv muzhskogo i zhenskogo pola. Etot priem ves'ma rasprostranen v poezii i v ustnom narodnom tvorchestve” (see Kozhina, M. N., Stilistika russkogo iazyka [Moscow, 1977], p. 129).Google Scholar

29. Antonina Gove also notes the importance of the grammatical gender in androgynous characterization. Discussing the poem “Vskryla zhily,” she maintains that in this poem one finds “another instance of Tsvetaeva's many attempts to remove the barrier between the masculine and the feminine, in this case on the grammatical—hence subconscious—level” (Gove, “The Feminine Stereotype and Beyond,” p. 254).

30. Tsvetaeva, “Na krasnom kone,” Isbrannye proiavedeniia, pp. 436 and 441. I see here a direct reference to, and a polemic with, two of Pushkin's poems, “Muza” and “Naperstnitsam volshebnoi stariny.”

31. Ibid., p. 165.

32. “la prochla u Afanas'eva skazku … i zadumalas’ …” (Tsvetaeva, “Poet o kritike,” Nesobrannye proisvedeniia, p. 613).

33. The image of the tsar-maiden is found in the Russian oral tradition. Innokentii Annenskii, looking for the roots of Turgenev's symbol of beauty as applied to his female personages, found it in byliny: “Sredi etikh skuchnykh stepnykh skazok … est’ odna, v kotoroi izobrazhaetsia udalaia polianitsa. Bogatyr’ osharashivaet ee raz po razu svoei shalygoiu podorozhnoi, a krasavitse chuditsia, chto eto komariki ee pokusyvaiut. I vot, chtoby prekratit’ eto nadoevshee ei shchekotan'e, Nastas'ia Mikulichna opuskaet bogatyria s ego konem v svoi glubokii karman. Priekhav na otdykh, ona vprochem, ustupila zhenskomu Hubopytstvu i, naidia bogatyria po svoemu vkusu, predlozhila emu tut zhe sotvorit’ s neiu liubov'. Konets byl pechalen, no ne v kontse delo” ( Annenskii, Innokentii, Knigi otrashenii, 2 vols, in 1 [Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1969], 2: 17.Google Scholar I am grateful to Professor Simon Karlinsky for pointing out this work to me). Another image of the tsar-maiden is found in the collection of Russian fairy tales prepared by Chulkov, entitled The Tales of Alesha Popovich. The main hero of these tales encounters the tsar-maiden in the fields of Lithuania on his way to Kiev: “Ona ezdit po svetu, pobivaet bogatyrei i nedavno, proezzhaia russkoi zemleiu, nadelala uzhasnye razoreniia.” The fairy tale “Skazka o molodil'nykh iablokakh i zhivoi vode,” retold by A. N. Tolstoi, describes a female bogatyr', Sineglazka, in a similar manner (see, for example, Tolstoi, A. N., Russkie narodnye skazki [Moscow, 1948], pp. 93–124).Google Scholar Folk tales about the tsar-maiden recorded by Afanas'ev, for example, “Tsar'-Devitsa,” “Skazka o sil'nom i khrabrom nepobedimom bogatyre Ivane Tsareviche i o ego prekrasnoi supruzhnitse Tsar'- Devitse,” “Skazka o trekh korolevichakh,” and “Utitsa zlatokrylaia ili skazka o Petretsesareviche i supruge ego Tsar'-Devitse,” published in a separate edition in 1820, as well as the famous Konek-Gorbunok by P. P. Ershov, all depart from the image of the tsarmaiden in the byliny in that they all portray a beautiful, gentle maiden rather than a womanwarrior. Compare, for instance, the description of the tsar-maiden in Konek-Gorbunok: Ilapb-fleBHi, TaK ITO HHBO ! 9ia BOBce He KpacHBa: H 6jiejrHa-T0, H TOHica, “laft, B o6xBai-TO Tpn Bepmica; A HOJK0HKa-T0, HOJKOHKa ! Ti$y TH ! CJIOBHO y inamieHKa! IlycTB nojno6HTca KOMy, fl H flapOM H6 B03BMy ( Ershov, , Konek-Gorbunok [Moscow, 1974], p. 73).Google Scholar Among the other Russian poets attracted to this motif, the most notable is Derzhavin, who wrote his ” Tsar'-Devitsa” in 1812. The heroine of Derzhavin's work approximates that of the byliny and is depicted as a super woman of great beauty and physical and intellectual power, more inclined toward riding, hunting, and combat than toward courtship. Tsvetaeva's fairy tale in its depiction of the tsar-maiden echoes Derzhavin's version much more closely than Afanas'ev's and is closer to the one originated in the byliny. However, she departs from the byliny in her portrayal of the man who wins the tsar-maiden's love. Among other works which utilize the image of the tsar-maiden is the opera Khrabryi i smelyi vitiaz’ Akhrideich, written by Catherine II.

34. Actually two versions of the fairy tale recorded under numbers 232 and 233 are found in vol. 2 in Afanas'ev, A. N., Narodnye russkie skaski, 3 vols. (Moscow, 1957)Google Scholar; see also Russian Fairy Tales, 2nd ed., comp. A. Afanas'ev, trans. Norbert Guterman (New York: Pantheon Books, 1973), pp. 229-34.

35. Tsvetaeva, “Tsar'-Devitsa,” Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 341.

36. Ibid., p. 343.

37. Afanas'ev, Narodnye russkie skaski, 2: 233.

38. Tsvetaeva, “Tsar'-Devitsa,” Isbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 348. 39. Ibid., p. 356. 40. Ibid., p. 344. 41. Ibid., p. 354. 42. Ibid., p. 364. 43. Ibid., pp. 364-65. 44. Ibid., p. 365.

45. Ibid.

46. Ibid.

47. The cherub is “any of the second order of angels, usually ranked just below the seraphim and described as excelling in knowledge” (Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary, s.v. “cherub” ). I do not attach any particular significance to the slight differences terin rank of the angels and believe that the primary reason for naming the tsar-maiden a seraph rests with her leaning over the sleeping tsarevich. The phrase “nad tumanom—dym” ( “over the fog—smoke” ), parallel to the phrase “nad kheruvimom—serafim,” does not support the slight vertical subordination expressed in the latter phrase because it is very difficult to distinguish between the fog and the smoke: “It is a manifestly difficult task, often requiring arbitrary considerations, for an ordinary observer to decide whether he is enveloped in a thin water fog, or a light haze (British ” mist “), or a light obscuration by smoke and dust. Even the dense fog reported in cities may be caused as much by smoke as by water” ﹛Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1956 ed., s.v. “fog” ).

48. Tsvetaeva, “Poet o kritike,” Nesobrannye proizvedeniia, p. 597.

49. Tsvetaeva, “Rolandov rog,” Isbrannye proisvedeniia, p. 168.

50. M. Troupin, “Marina Tsvetaeva's ‘Remeslo': A Commentary” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1974), p. 2.

51. leva Vitins, “Escape from Earth: A Study of the Four Elements and Their Associations in Marina Cvetaeva's Work” (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1974), p. 2. See also Vitins, , “Escape From Earth: A Study of Tsvetaeva's Elsewheres,” Slavic Review, 36, no. 4 (December 1977): 644–57.Google Scholar

52. For a description of Tsvetaeva's poetic model in terms of a series of antitheses, such as body versus soul, love versus poetry, the terrestrial world versus the Elysian Fields, see Anya M. Kroth, “Dichotomy and ‘Razminovenie’ in the Work of Marina Tsvetaeva” (Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 1977).

53. The Universal Dictionary of the English Language, 1899 ed., s.v. “dualistic.”

54. Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary, s.v. “dichotomous.”

55. Ibid., s.v. “dualism.”

56. Universal Dictionary, s.v. “dichotomy.”

57. Tsvetaeva to E. Chernosvitova, in Novyi mir, 1969, no. 4, p. 199; emphasis added.

58. Tsvetaeva to A. Bakhrakh, July 1923, in Mosty, 1960, no. 5, p. 315.

59. Tsvetaeva to M. Gorky, October 4-7, 1927, in Novyi mir, 1969, no. 4, p. 203.

60. Tsvetaeva, “Ariadna,” Izbrannye proizvedeniia, p. 675.

61. Based on lecture notes from a seminar on poetry conducted by Joseph Brodsky, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Michigan, 1972.

62. Efron, A., “Stranitsy bylogo,” Zvezda, 1975, no. 6, p. 181 Google Scholar; emphasis added.