THE VOICE OVER
RUSSIAN LIBRARY
The Russian Library at Columbia University Press publishes an expansive selection of Russian literature in English translation, concentrating on works previously unavailable in English and those ripe for new translations. Works of premodern, modern, and contemporary literature are featured, including recent writing. The series seeks to demonstrate the breadth, surprising variety, and global importance of the Russian literary tradition and includes not only novels but also short stories, plays, poetry, memoirs, creative nonfiction, and works of mixed or fluid genre.
Editorial Board:
Vsevolod Bagno
Dmitry Bak
Rosamund Bartlett
Caryl Emerson
Peter B. Kaufman
Mark Lipovetsky
Oliver Ready
Stephanie Sandler
For a list of books in the series, see page 307
Published with the support of Read Russia, Inc.,
and the Institute of Literary Translation, Russia
Columbia University Press
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
Copyright © 2021 Columbia University Press
All rights reserved
EISBN 978-0-231-55168-7
Poems “Bus Stop: Israelitischer Friedhof,” “The light swells and
pulses at the garden gate,” “In the village, in the field, in the
forest,” “A deer, a deer stood in that place,” “The last songs are
assembling,” “Don’t wait for us, my darling,” Spolia, and War of the
Beasts and the Animals from Maria Stepanova, War of the Beasts
and the Animals, translated by Sasha Dugdale (Bloodaxe Books,
2021). Reproduced with permission of Bloodaxe Books, www.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Stepanova, Marii︠a︡, author. | Shevelenko, Irina, editor.
Title: The voice over : poems and essays / Maria Stepanova ; edited
by Irina Shevelenko.
Description: New York : Columbia University Press, [2021] |
Series: Russian library
Identifiers: LCCN 2020044582 (print) | LCCN 2020044583 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780231196161 (hardback ; acid-free paper) |
ISBN 9780231196178 (trade paperback ; acid-free paper) |
ISBN 9780231551687 (ebook)
Subjects: LCGFT: Poetry. | Essays.
Classification: LCC PG3488.T4755 A2 2021 (print) |
LCC PG3488.T4755 (ebook) | DDC 891.71/5–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020044582
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020044583
A Columbia University Press E-book.
CUP would be pleased to hear about your reading experience with this e-book at cup-ebook@columbia.edu.
Cover design: Roberto de Vicq de Cumptich
CONTENTS
Preface
Bibliographic Note
Introduction. “Speaking in Voices”: On Maria Stepanova’s Literary Creation, by Irina Shevelenko
PART I: THE HERE-WORLD
from On Twins
A Gypski, a Polsk I, a Jewski, a Russki
The North of sleep. Head’s in a pillow cradle
from The Here-World
Adieu, until one branched floor higher
Ahoy! Beyond the azure’s tempest
For you, but the voice of the straitened Muse
from Songs of the Northern Southerners
The Bride
The Pilot
from Happiness
The morning sun arises in the morning
As Danaë, prone in the incarce-chamber
It is certainly time to stop
Even bluer than the toilet tiles
(a birthday on the train)
(half an hour on foot)
from Physiology and Private History
July 3rd, 2004
1. I’ll now make a couple of
2. Doctors, lectors and actors, young widows
The Women’s Locker Room at Planet Fitness
Sarah on the Barricades
1. The year nineteen-oh-five
2. Of all those lying in the earth, foreheads tossed back
The Desire to Be a Rib
1. Me and myself, we’re uneasy, like a lady with her pitbull
2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Bus Stop: Israelitischer Friedhof
from O
Zoo, Woman, Monkey
PART II: DISPLACED PERSON
from The Lyric, the Voice
And a vo-vo-voice arose
In the festive sky, impassivable, tinfurled
Saturday and Sunday burn like stars
In every little park, in every little square
from Kireevsky
from the cycle Young Maids Sing
Translator’s Note by Eugene Ostashevsky
Mom-pop didn’t know him
Mama, what janitor
A train is riding over Russia
Ordnance was weeping in the open
The A went past, Tram-Traum
Well I don’t sing Kupitye papirosn
from the cycle Kireevsky
The light swells and pulses at the garden gate
In the village, in the field, in the forest
A deer, a deer stood in that place
The last songs are assembling
from the cycle Underground Pathephone
My dear, my little Liberty
There he lies in his new bed, a band of paper round his head
Don’t wait for us, my darling
Don’t strain your sight
Four Operas
1. Carmen
2. Aida
3. Fidelio
4. Iphigenia in Aulis
Essays
In Unheard-of Simplicity
Displaced Person
PART III: SPOLIA
Spolia
War of the Beasts and the Animals
Translator’s Note by Sasha Dugdale
War of the Beasts and the Animals
Essays
Today Before Yesterday (excerpt)
After the Dead Water
Intending to Live
At the Door of a Notnew Age
PART IV: OVER VENERABLE GRAVES
Essays