The Pushkin Pleiad

Literary/ Cultural Context Essay

Download PDF Add to Bookshelf Report an Error

Resources

The term “Pushkin Pleiad” (Pushkinskaia pleiada) is widely used in modern literary studies, but is notoriously difficult to define. The Soviet

Literary Encyclopaedia

(

Literaturnaia entsiklopediia

) of 1934 defines it succinctly, but vaguely, as “a group of writers, contemporaries of Pushkin and close to him in different aspects of his work: Batiushkov, Baratynsky, Iazykov, Viazemsky, Del'vig and others”. The definition is unsatisfactory since it does not make clear that the “writers” were above all poets and that it was to aspects of Pushkin's poetry, rather than of his other writings that they were all close. Furthermore, although the last four named are on any list of the Pleiad members, many would question whether Batiushkov should be included in the list, while the phrase…

2372 words

Citation: Pursglove, Michael. "The Pushkin Pleiad". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 12 September 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=5543, accessed 15 October 2024.]

5543 The Pushkin Pleiad 2 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

Save this article

Leave Feedback

The Literary Encyclopedia is a living community of scholars. We welcome comments which will help us improve.