The poet Evgeny Bunimovich spoke about the gift of Zoya Boguslavskaya

She is always ahead of fashion

The 100th anniversary of Zoya Boguslavskaya is an incredible date in itself and the anniversary of a completely unique woman. She is a brilliant writer, and she has always been involved in what later became fashionable.

For example, non-fiction is now popular, and it is in this genre that her most famous works have been written since the 1960s. We came up with the concepts of “art manager”, “curator of cultural projects”, and she did it all brilliantly, when there were no such words.

The Triumph Prize and the Parabola Poetry Prize (in memory of Voznesensky), created by her, and various kinds of events prove that Zoya Boguslavskaya is a person who understands creativity and an excellent organizer.

And, undoubtedly, the unique story is that she was next to Andrei for almost half a century, starting from the time of his love, she was both a wife and a muse – indeed, we know both wonderful poems and the poem “Oza” (a phonetic anagram of “Zoya” . – I.V.), dedicated to her. In fact, while remaining an outstanding personality, she dedicated her life to him. This is especially clearly visible in recent years, when Andrei was seriously ill.

It so happened that I spoke with Andrei at the Paris Book Salon and at the famous Frankfurt Book Fair: he could hardly speak, he was in a wheelchair – but it was Voznesensky! Zoya accompanied him and until his last days made sure that he would not be isolated, could write poetry and be inside the poetic world.

When Andrei passed away, Zoya not only preserved his memory, but made sure that he existed in the living literary process. The Voznesensky Foundation and the Voznesensky Center in Zamoskvorechye are living organisms, but only dedicated to the memory of one person.

At Zoya Borisovna’s age it is impossible to imagine such activity, and yet quite recently they launched a project in which artists of different generations read poems by Andrei Voznesensky. I wrote a preface to the project, then Zoya and I presented it in the center of Moscow, and you can’t imagine how interesting and meaningful she answered the public’s questions—readers literally wouldn’t let her go.

It is impossible to comprehend the number that we are calling today – I am in admiration for Zoya Boguslavskaya.