A poem that grew out of the rumble of the collapse of the old world

On February 10, 1918, Alexander Blok finished, probably, his most controversial work, the poem “The Twelve”. After the publication, the entire enlightened society immediately divided into two camps: some declared the poet the ideologist of hated Bolshevism, vilified, boycotted, others, on the contrary, admired.

On this day, in his “Notebook” he will note: “Today I am a genius.” And this entry, in my opinion, should be interpreted not as an overestimated self-esteem of a poet accustomed to popularity, but as the author’s statement of the fact that this work was “dictated” by time itself, bursting to the surface by the elements of the revolution … This poem was created in the apocalyptic atmosphere of post-revolutionary St. Petersburg in the terrible winter of 1918 . A city covered in snowdrifts, no trams, no street lamps. People in fur coats, in ice apartments. Instead of bread – pieces of black clay, rotten vobla and biscuits made from potato husks. Blok was starving, tormented by the fact that he could not help his relatives, that he had almost no income, that he had lost the habit of literary work.

As the literary critic of the first wave of emigration, professor of the Paris St. Sergius Orthodox Theological Institute Konstantin Mochulsky wrote (in the book “Alexander Blok”, ch. 12), in the October Revolution, Blok saw the last, victorious uprising of the elements, “final destruction”, “world fire” and the end of the “new history”. And in his “revolutionary” poem, which caused a storm of indignation among the majority of representatives of the Russian intelligentsia, he welcomed this “uprising of the elements”.

As Blok noted in his “Notebook”, he literally felt “the noise of the collapse of the old world”, which became the sound theme of “The Twelve” during the period of work on the poem:

“The other day, lying in the dark with open eyes, I listened to the rumble, rumble; I thought there was an earthquake. A few days later, another entry: “A terrible noise growing in me and around. This noise was heard by Gogol (to muffle it, he called for family and Orthodox order).

According to Konstantin Mochulsky, the poem first appeared in the Znamya Truda newspaper, then in the Our Way magazine, and finally, in the same year, it was published as a separate book:

“A literary storm has risen; a rare work of art was subjected to such absurd rumors, caused so much hatred, anger, delight and misunderstanding; the poet was declared the ideologist of Bolshevism, vilified, boycotted; recent friends refused to give him a hand. The poet Vsevolod Rozhdestvensky in the book “The Tale of My Life” (“Star”, No. 3, 1945) tells about a dramatic episode that took place at the literary morning of the Arzamas circle in the hall of the Tenishevsky school on May 13, 1918. Lyubov Dmitrievna (wife of Alexander Blok. – S.I.) read the poem “The Twelve”. In a small room backstage, passionate arguments ensued between the participants in the morning. “And suddenly,” writes Rozhdestvensky, “everyone fell silent. Block entered the room. He felt this sudden and painful silence. They parted before him silently and unkindly. Someone defiantly turned his back. A bearded man in a narrow uniform coat withdrew his outstretched hand… Blok stopped in the middle of the room, as if not daring to go any further. “Look,” the professor whispered to his neighbor, “what a guilty back he has.” This rather distinct whisper could not but reach Blok’s ears. He turned sharply and looked almost point-blank at the speaker. And then I saw his face for the first time. It was immensely tired and, as it seemed to me then, covered with a web of contemptuous indifference. Slowly, coldly and somewhat impudently, Blok looked around at those present. Everyone, looking down, was silent. He was also silent, apparently waiting for something, ready for anything. The corners of his heavy, mournful mouth twitched bitterly … “

Very characteristic of the attitude of the “intelligentsia” to the “traitor” is the story of Zinaida Gippius about the meeting with Blok in the tram on September 17, 1918:

“The face under some kind of cap (it was a cap, not a hat) is long, dry, yellow, dark. “Will you give me a hand?” Slow words, also pronounced with effort, just as heavy. I extend my hand to him and say: “Personally, yes. Only – personally. Not public.” He kisses the hand and, after a pause, “Thank you.” After another pause: “You, they say, are leaving?” (Gippius answers. – S.I.): “Well … Here you either die or leave. Unless, of course, to be in your position … “. He is silent for a long time, then he says especially gloomily and distinctly: “You can die in any situation.”

In April 1919, Zinaida Gippius, as if continuing this short dialogue on the tram, wrote the poem “A. Blok”, prefaced with a prosaic epigraph:

“At a dance in Kronstadt, a heavily drunk sailor, offended by the young lady’s refusal, tore off the icon of the Mother of God and began to dance with her. He died an hour later. Legend (or truth) of our days.

Christ did not go ahead of the 12:

So the louts themselves told me.

But in Kronstadt a drunken sailor

I danced the polka with the Beautiful Lady.

They say he died … And if not?

Don’t you feel sorry for your Lady, poor poet?”

On August 7, 1921, after the Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) rejected the petition of Lunacharsky and Gorky to allow the seriously ill poet Alexander Blok to leave for Finland for treatment, he died before he was 41 years old from scurvy caused by poor nutrition and asthma. As the poet Georgy Ivanov writes in his memoirs, before his death, Blok constantly raved: “He raved about the same thing: were all copies of The Twelve destroyed? Isn’t there just one left somewhere?” (Turning to his wife. – S.I.): “Lyuba, look well, and burn, burn everything.”

Sergei Ishkov.

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