Less Than One: Selected Essays

by Joseph Brodsky

This collection of essays thrusts Brodsky--heretofore known more for his poetry and translations--into the forefront of the "Third Wave" of Russian emigre writers. His insights into the works of Dostoyevsky, Mandelstam, Platonov, as well as non-Russian poets Auden, Cavafy and Montale are brilliant. While the Western popularity of many other Third Wavers has been stunted by their inability to write in English, Brodsky consumed the language to attain a "closer proximity" to poets such as Auden. The book, which won a National Book Critics Circle Award, opens and closes with revealing autobiographical essay.

Genres: Essays, Nonfiction, Russia, Poetry, Literature, Russian Literature, Literary Criticism

512 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Joseph Brodsky (Russian: Иосиф Бродский) was a Russian-American poet and essayist. Born in Leningrad in 1940, Brodsky ran afoul of Soviet authorities and was expelled from the Soviet Union in 1972, settling in America with the help of W. H. Auden and other supporters. He taught thereafter at several universities, including Yale, Columbia, and Mount Holyoke. Brodsky was awarded the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature "for an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity." A journalist asked him: "You are an American citizen who is receiving the Prize for Russian-language poetry. Who are you, an American or a Russian?" Brodsky replied: "I'm Jewish; a Russian poet, an English essayist – and, of course, an American citizen." He was appointed United States Poet Laureate in 1991.

Reviews

[Diego Gonzalez]

Gracias Brodsky por esos paseos por San Petersburgo y Estambul. Gracias por mostrarme esa cara que no conocía de Ajmátova, de los Mandelstam, de Marina Tsvietáieva y de Auden. Y gracias por esa carta de amor a los padres y esa carta llena de odio hacia los tiranos.

[Facundo Fagnano]

Este libro me acompañó durante mis vacaciones de verano y no podría haber elegido mejor. Los ensayos de Brodsky van desde pequeñas narraciones sobre su vida (y la de su familia) en la difícil atmósfera del San Petersburgo de la URSS (es decir, Leningrado), hasta análisis de poetas cómo Ajmátova, Auden y otros.
La prosa de Brodsky es clara y sencilla, y su lectura del mundo y la poesía son enriquecedores para cualquiera que esté interesado en la literatura.

[Carlos Alberto Escotet]

Muchos podrán calificar este libro como denso, pero es uno al que debemos volver siempre. Cada oración es una demostración de lucidez y sabiduría inigualables. El sentido de realidad en todo lo que desmenuza -desde un verso, hasta un Estado- colocan a Brodsky, como un ser elevado. No será la la única vez que leeré este libro.

[Fritz Arnold]

Leído en un par de dias.Tema emotivo: una oda al recuerdo y a sus padres en una Unión Sovietica, tan lejana en tiempo, en forma y en nuestra consciencia.