Joseph Brodsky

Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky (24 May 1940 – 28 January 1996), also known by his anglicized name Joseph, was a distinguished Russian and American poet and essayist.

Born in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) within the Soviet Union, Brodsky encountered difficulties with Soviet authorities and was subsequently expelled in 1972, having been "strongly advised" to emigrate. He then established residence in the United States, aided by W. H. Auden and other proponents. Following his emigration, he held teaching positions at Mount Holyoke College and various universities, including Yale, Columbia, Cambridge, and Michigan. In 1987, Brodsky received the Nobel Prize in Literature, recognized for "an all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity". He was later designated United States Poet Laureate in 1991.

Professor Andrey Ranchin of Moscow State University asserts that "Brodsky is the only modern Russian poet whose body of work has already been awarded the honorary title of a canonized classic... Brodsky's literary canonization is an exceptional phenomenon. No other contemporary Russian writer has been honored as the hero of such a number of memoir texts; no other has had so many conferences devoted to them." Daniel Murphy, in his influential work Christianity and Modern European Literature, positions Brodsky among the twentieth century's most significant Christian poets, alongside figures such as T. S. Eliot, Osip Mandelstam, Anna Akhmatova (who served as Brodsky's mentor for a period), and W. H. Auden (who supported Brodsky's relocation to the United States). Irene Steckler was the first to unequivocally declare Brodsky an "unquestionably a Christian poet". Prior to this, in July 1972, subsequent to his exile, Brodsky himself stated in an interview: "While I am related to the Old Testament perhaps by ancestry, and certainly the spirit of justice, I consider myself a Christian. Not a good one but I try to be." Viktor Krivulin, a contemporary Russian poet and fellow Acmeist, observed that "Brodsky always felt his Jewishness as a religious thing, despite the fact that, when all is said and done, he's a Christian poet."

Early years

Brodsky was born into a Russian Jewish family in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). He was a descendant of the distinguished and ancient rabbinic family Schorr (Shor), with Joseph ben Isaac Bekhor Shor identified as his direct male-line ancestor. His father, Aleksandr Brodsky, worked as a professional photographer in the Soviet Navy, while his mother, Maria Volpert Brodskaya, was a professional interpreter whose earnings frequently contributed to the family's sustenance. The family resided in communal apartments, experiencing poverty and marginalization due to their Jewish heritage. During his early childhood, Brodsky endured the Siege of Leningrad, an event during which he and his parents narrowly escaped starvation; one of his aunts, however, succumbed to hunger. The siege subsequently led to the development of various health issues for him. Brodsky remarked that many of his educators held anti-Jewish sentiments, leading him to perceive himself as a dissident from a young age. He observed, "I began to despise Lenin, even when I was in the first grade, not so much because of his political philosophy or practice ... but because of his omnipresent images."

During his youth, Brodsky was characterized as "an unruly child" due to his disruptive conduct during lessons. At the age of fifteen, Brodsky discontinued his schooling and unsuccessfully attempted to enroll in the School of Submariners. He then took on employment as a milling machine operator. Subsequently, aspiring to become a physician, he worked at the Kresty Prison morgue, where his duties included cutting and sewing bodies. His career path later encompassed diverse roles in hospitals, a ship's boiler room, and geological expeditions. Concurrently, Brodsky pursued an extensive program of self-education. He acquired proficiency in Polish to translate the works of poets like Czesław Miłosz, and learned English to translate John Donne. Through these endeavors, he developed a profound interest in classical philosophy, religion, mythology, and both English and American poetry.

Career and family

Early career

In 1955, Brodsky began composing his own poetry and undertaking literary translations. These works were circulated clandestinely, with some appearing in the underground journal Sintaksis (Syntax, Russian: Си́нтаксис). His writings maintained an apolitical stance. By 1958, he had gained recognition within literary circles for his poems "The Jewish cemetery near Leningrad" and "Pilgrims." When questioned about his initial calling to poetry, Brodsky recounted an experience in 1959 in Yakutsk: "walking in that terrible city, I went into a bookstore. I snagged a copy of poems by Baratynsky. I had nothing to read. So I read that book and finally understood what I had to do in life. Or got very excited, at least. So in a way, Evgeny Abramovich Baratynsky is sort of responsible." His friend, Ludmila Shtern (Людмила Яковлевна Штерн, Ljudmíla Jákovlevna Štern), recounted their collaboration on an irrigation project during Brodsky's "geological period," when he worked as a geologist's assistant. Shtern stated: "We bounced around the Leningrad Province examining kilometers of canals, checking their embankments, which looked terrible. They were falling down, coming apart, had all sorts of strange things growing in them... It was during these trips, however, that I was privileged to hear the poems "The Hills" and "You Will Gallop in the Dark". Brodsky read them aloud to me between two train cars as we were going towards Tikhvin."

In 1960, Brodsky encountered Anna Akhmatova, a prominent poet of the Silver Age. Akhmatova encouraged his literary endeavors and subsequently became his mentor. In 1962, in Leningrad, Akhmatova introduced Brodsky to Marina Basmanova, a young painter from a distinguished artistic family who was then creating Akhmatova's portrait. A relationship developed between Brodsky and Basmanova; however, Brodsky's close friend and fellow poet, Dmitri Bobyshev, also harbored affections for Basmanova. Concurrently with Bobyshev's pursuit of Basmanova, Soviet authorities initiated their own pursuit of Brodsky; Bobyshev was widely implicated in Brodsky's denunciation. Brodsky subsequently dedicated numerous love poems to Marina Basmanova:

Denunciation

In 1963, a Leningrad newspaper condemned Brodsky's poetry as "pornographic and anti-Soviet." His personal papers were confiscated, he underwent interrogation, was twice committed to a mental institution, and subsequently arrested. In 1964, Soviet authorities charged him with social parasitism, asserting that his various odd jobs and his identity as a poet did not constitute an adequate societal contribution. He was labeled "a pseudo-poet in velveteen trousers" who allegedly failed to uphold his "constitutional duty to work honestly for the good of the motherland." During the trial, the judge inquired, "Who has recognized you as a poet? Who has enrolled you in the ranks of poets?" Brodsky famously retorted, "No one. Who enrolled me in the ranks of the human race?"

For this alleged "parasitism," Brodsky received a sentence of five years of hard labor, serving 18 months on a farm in Norenskaya village, Arkhangelsk region, located 350 miles from Leningrad. He secured a small rented cottage, which, despite lacking plumbing or central heating, was considered a significant luxury due to its private nature at that time. Among his visitors were Basmanova, Bobyshev, and Brodsky's mother. During this period, he engaged in writing on his typewriter, chopping wood, hauling manure, and reading anthologies of English and American poetry, notably works by W. H. Auden and Robert Frost, in the evenings. According to Brodsky's close friend and biographer Lev Loseff, while his confinement in the mental hospital and the trial were distressing experiences, the 18 months spent in the Arctic constituted some of the most fulfilling periods of Brodsky's life. His mentor, Anna Akhmatova, reportedly found humor in the KGB's shortsightedness, remarking, "What a biography they're fashioning for our red-haired friend! It's as if he'd hired them to do it on purpose."

Brodsky's sentence was commuted in 1965 following protests from influential Soviet and international cultural figures, including Evgeny Evtushenko, Dmitri Shostakovich, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Akhmatova. He subsequently became a cause célèbre in the West after a clandestine transcription of his trial minutes was illicitly transported out of the country, thereby establishing him as a symbol of artistic defiance within a totalitarian society, akin to his mentor, Akhmatova.

Their son, Andrei, was born on October 8, 1967, at which point Basmanova terminated their relationship. Andrei was registered under Basmanova's surname to shield him from the political persecutions Brodsky himself had experienced. Soviet authorities threatened Marina Basmanova, thereby preventing her from marrying Brodsky or accompanying him during his subsequent exile from the country. Even after their son's birth, Brodsky persisted in dedicating love poetry to Basmanova. In 1989, Brodsky composed his final poem addressed to "M.B.," reflecting on their shared life in Leningrad:

Upon his return to Leningrad in December 1965, Brodsky continued his literary work for the subsequent seven years, with numerous compositions translated into German, French, and English and subsequently published internationally. His published works included Verses and Poems, released by Inter-Language Literary Associates in Washington in 1965; Elegy to John Donne and Other Poems, published in London by Longmans Green in 1967; and A Stop in the Desert, issued by Chekhov Publishing in New York in 1970. Despite this international recognition, only four of his poems appeared in Leningrad anthologies during 1966 and 1967; the majority of his writings circulated clandestinely via samizdat or were published outside the Soviet Union until 1987. Due to persecution stemming from his poetry and Jewish background, Brodsky was denied travel permits. In 1972, during deliberations regarding Brodsky's potential exile, authorities sought the opinion of Andrei Snezhnevsky, a mental health expert known for advocating the controversial pseudo-medical diagnosis of "paranoid reformist delusion." This diagnostic framework served as a political instrument, enabling the state to indefinitely confine dissidents within psychiatric facilities. Without a personal examination, Snezhnevsky diagnosed Brodsky with "sluggishly progressing schizophrenia," asserting that he was "not a valuable person at all and may be let go." Brodsky received two invitations to emigrate to Israel in 1971. When summoned to the Ministry of the Interior in 1972 and questioned about his refusal, he affirmed his desire to remain in the Soviet Union. Within ten days, officials forcibly entered his apartment, confiscated his documents, and on June 4, 1972, placed him on a flight to Vienna, Austria. He never returned to Russia nor reunited with Basmanova. Brodsky later reflected, "The Last Judgement is the Last Judgement, but a human being who spent his life in Russia, has to be, without any hesitation, placed into Paradise."

While in Austria, Brodsky encountered Carl Ray Proffer and W. H. Auden, who were instrumental in his relocation to the United States and significantly influenced his subsequent career. Proffer, affiliated with the University of Michigan and a co-founder of Ardis Publishers, subsequently became Brodsky's Russian publisher. Reflecting on his arrival in Vienna, Brodsky remarked:

I knew I was leaving my country for good, but for where, I had no idea whatsoever. One thing which was quite clear was that I didn't want to go to Israel... I never even believed that they'd allow me to go. I never believed they would put me on a plane, and when they did I didn't know whether the plane would go east or west... I didn't want to be hounded by what was left of the Soviet Security Service in England. So I came to the States.

Despite receiving invitations to return following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Brodsky never revisited his homeland.

United States

Following a brief period in Vienna, Brodsky relocated to Ann Arbor, where, supported by poets Auden and Proffer, he served as poet-in-residence at the University of Michigan for one year. Subsequently, Brodsky held visiting professorships at Queens College (1973–74), Smith College, Columbia University, and Cambridge University, before returning to the University of Michigan (1974–80). He also served as the Andrew Mellon Professor of Literature and Five College Professor of Literature at Mount Holyoke College, an appointment facilitated by poet and historian Peter Viereck. In 1978, Yale University conferred upon Brodsky an honorary Doctor of Letters degree, and on May 23, 1979, he was inducted into the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. He relocated to Greenwich Village, New York, in 1980, and in 1981, he was honored with the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation "genius" award. Additionally, he received The International Center in New York Award of Excellence. In 1986, his essay collection, Less Than One, earned the National Book Critics Award for Criticism, and he was granted an honorary doctorate of literature from Oxford University.

In 1987, Brodsky was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, becoming the fifth Russian-born author to achieve this distinction. When questioned in an interview about his identity—"You are an American citizen who is receiving the Prize for Russian-language poetry. Who are you, an American or a Russian?"—he replied, "I'm Jewish; a Russian poet, an English essayist – and, of course, an American citizen." The Nobel Academy cited his "all-embracing authorship, imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity" as the basis for the award. They further described his writing as "rich and intensely vital," marked by "great breadth in time and space." Brodsky humorously remarked that it was "a big step for me, a small step for mankind." This prestigious award coincided with the first legal publication of Brodsky's poetry in Russia since his exile.

In 1991, Brodsky was appointed Poet Laureate of the United States. The Librarian of Congress noted Brodsky's profound interest in American life, characteristic of immigrants, highlighting the significant contributions of foreign-born individuals to American creativity. His inauguration address was subsequently published in Poetry Review. Brodsky held an honorary degree from the University of Silesia in Poland and was an honorary member of the International Academy of Science. In 1995, Gleb Uspensky, a senior editor at the Russian publishing house Vagrius, invited Brodsky to return to Russia for a tour, an offer he declined. During the final decade of his life, Brodsky experienced significant pressure from individuals who perceived him as a "fortune maker." As a highly esteemed professor, he maintained close relationships with leaders of major publishing houses and was well-connected within prominent American literary circles. According to his friend Ludmila Shtern, numerous Russian intellectuals in both Russia and America believed his influence was boundless, assuming his endorsement could guarantee book contracts, teaching positions, or grants, thereby ensuring a distinguished career. Shtern indicates that his assistance or refusal to aid petitions often caused considerable controversy within Russian literary circles, sometimes escalating into highly personal disputes. His status as a celebrated émigré and Nobel laureate generated animosity and resentment, the political complexities of which, Shtern observes, ultimately left him feeling "deathly tired."

In 1990, while teaching literature in France, Brodsky married Maria Sozzani, a young student of Russian-Italian heritage; their daughter, Anna Brodsky, was born in 1993.

Marina Basmanova endured fear of Soviet authorities until the Soviet Union's dissolution in 1991, after which their son, Andrei Basmanov, was permitted to join his father in New York. During the 1990s, Brodsky extended an invitation to Andrei for a three-month Andrei married in the 1990s and had three children, all acknowledged and financially supported by Brodsky as his grandchildren; Marina Basmanova, Andrei, and Brodsky's grandchildren currently reside in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Andrei gave readings of his father's poetry in a documentary about Brodsky. The film features Brodsky's poems dedicated to Marina Basmanova, composed between 1961 and 1982.

Brodsky died of a heart attack at age 55, in his apartment in Brooklyn Heights, a neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York City, on January 28, 1996. He underwent open-heart surgery in 1979, followed by two bypass operations, and remained in delicate health thereafter. He was interred in a non-Catholic section of the San Michele cemetery in Venice, Italy, a resting place also shared by Ezra Pound and Igor Stravinsky. In 1997, a plaque featuring his portrait in relief was placed on his former house in St. Petersburg, inscribed with the words "In this house from 1940 to 1972 lived the great Russian poet, Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky." Brodsky's close friend, Nobel laureate Derek Walcott, memorialized him in his 2004 collection The Prodigal.

Work

Brodsky is primarily recognized for his poetry collections, A Part of Speech (1977) and To Urania (1988), alongside the essay collection Less Than One (1986), which received the National Book Critics Circle Award. Other notable works include the play Marbles (1989) and Watermark (1992), a prose meditation on Venice. Throughout his career, he composed in both Russian and English, undertaking self-translation and collaborating with distinguished poet-translators.

Themes and forms

In the introduction to Brodsky's Selected Poems (New York and Harmondsworth, 1973), W. H. Auden characterized him as a traditionalist lyric poet captivated by "encounters with nature, ... reflections upon the human condition, death, and the meaning of existence." His thematic scope was extensive, encompassing subjects from Mexican and Caribbean literature to Roman poetry, thereby interweaving "the physical and the metaphysical, place and ideas about place, now and the past and the future." Critic Dinah Birch posits that Brodsky's inaugural English poetry collection, Joseph Brodsky: Selected Poems (1973), demonstrates his remarkable versatility and technical prowess across various forms, despite his primary strength lying in a distinctive, dry, meditative soliloquy.

To Urania: Selected Poems 1965–1985 compiles translations of earlier works alongside new material composed during his American exile, exploring themes of memory, home, and loss. His two essay collections comprise critical analyses of poets including Osip Mandelshtam, W.H. Auden, Thomas Hardy, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Robert Frost, in addition to autobiographical sketches and profiles of contemporaries such as Akhmatova, Nadezhda Mandelshtam, and Stephen Spender.

Brodsky's literary works frequently explore the intricate relationship between poets and the broader societal context. He notably highlighted literature's capacity to positively influence its readership and to foster the evolution of the language and culture it inhabits. Brodsky posited that the Western literary tradition played a role in humanity's ability to surmount the twentieth century's major catastrophes, including Nazism, Communism, and two World Wars. As Poet Laureate, Brodsky advocated for broadening the American public's access to Anglo-American poetic heritage, proposing a government-sponsored initiative to distribute free poetry anthologies. According to James Billington, the Librarian of Congress:

Joseph struggled to comprehend why poetry failed to attract the substantial audiences in the United States that it commanded in Russia. He took pride in acquiring American citizenship in 1977, following his stateless expulsion by the Soviets in 1972, and deeply valued the liberties afforded by life in the United States. Nevertheless, he considered poetry to be "language's highest degree of maturity" and desired universal receptiveness to it. During his tenure as Poet Laureate, he proposed making affordable anthologies of premier American poets accessible in various public spaces, including hotels, airports, hospitals, and supermarkets. His belief was that individuals experiencing restlessness, fear, loneliness, or weariness might encounter poetry and unexpectedly find that others had previously navigated similar emotions, utilizing them to affirm life rather than evade it. Joseph's concept gained traction, resulting in thousands of such books being strategically placed for people to discover, whether by necessity or curiosity.

Brodsky's profound commitment to underscoring poetry's gravity and significance was evident in his inaugural address as U.S. Poet Laureate in October 1991. He stated, "By failing to read or listen to poets, society dooms itself to inferior modes of articulation, those of the politician, the salesman or the charlatan. ... In essence, it relinquishes its inherent evolutionary potential. For the defining characteristic separating humanity from other animal species is precisely the faculty of speech. ... Poetry transcends mere entertainment and, in a specific sense, even art; rather, it represents our anthropological, genetic objective, our evolutionary, linguistic guiding light." This perspective resonates consistently across his body of work. During a 1979 interview with Sven Birkerts, Brodsky articulated:

Within the compositions of superior poets, one perceives that their discourse is no longer directed at individuals or even celestial beings. Instead, they are engaging in a dialogue with language itself, reflecting its inherent beauty, sensuality, wisdom, and irony—facets for which the poet serves as an unblemished mirror. Poetry is not merely an art form or a subset of art; it is something more profound. If speech differentiates humanity from other species, then poetry, as the paramount linguistic operation, constitutes our anthropological, and indeed genetic, imperative. To perceive poetry as mere entertainment or "a read" is to commit an anthropological transgression, primarily against oneself.

Influences

Dr. James Billington, the Librarian of Congress, observed:

Brodsky was the esteemed protégé of Anna Akhmatova, the venerable figure of Petersburg; witnessing him recite her poems in Russian at the Library of Congress evoked a profound, visceral reaction, even for those unfamiliar with the language. Joseph Brodsky personified the aspirations not only of Anna Akhmatova, the final eminent Petersburg poet from the early twentieth century, but also of Nadezhda Mandelstam, the widow of the distinguished martyred poet Osip Mandelstam. Both women perceived Joseph as a beacon, potentially guiding Russia back to its foundational cultural heritage.

Brodsky was also profoundly shaped by the English metaphysical poets, spanning from John Donne to W. H. Auden. Numerous of his compositions were dedicated to fellow writers, including Tomas Venclova, Octavio Paz, Robert Lowell, Derek Walcott, and Benedetta Craveri.

The critical reception of Brodsky's oeuvre often highlights its significant enrichment through the contributions of distinguished translators. His second substantial English collection, A Part of Speech (published in New York and Oxford, 1980), features translations by Anthony Hecht, Howard Moss, Derek Walcott, and Richard Wilbur. However, critic and poet Henri Cole observes that Brodsky's "own translations have been criticized for turgidness, lacking a native sense of musicality."

Following the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014, Joseph Brodsky's controversial poem, "On the Independence of Ukraine" (Russian: На независимость Украины), originally from the early 1990s and publicly recited but never formally published, gained renewed prominence in state-affiliated Russian media, which frequently designated it the "Poem of the Year." Consequently, the Estate of Joseph Brodsky initiated legal action against several websites that published the poem, seeking its removal.

Awards and Honors

• 1978 – Honorary Doctor of Letters degree, Yale University
• 1979 – Fellowship, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters
• 1981 – John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Award
• 1986 – Honorary Doctor of Literature degree, Oxford University
• Award of Excellence, The International Center in New York
• 1986 – National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism, for Less Than One (essay collection)
• 1987 – Nobel Prize
• 1989 – Honorary Doctorate, University of Essex
• 1989 – Honorary Degree, Dartmouth College
• 1991 – Honorary Doctorate, Faculty of Humanities, Uppsala University, Sweden
• 1991 – United States Poet Laureate
• 1991 – Struga Poetry Evenings Golden Wreath Award
• 1993 – Honorary Degree, University of Silesia, Poland
• Honorary Member, International Academy of Science, Munich

Works

Poetry Collections

• 1967: Elegy for John Donne and Other Poems. Selected, translated, and introduced by Nicholas William Bethell. London: Longman.
• 1968: Velka elegie. Paris: Edice Svedectvi.
• 1972: Poems. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Ardis.
• 1973: Selected Poems. Translated from the Russian by George L. Kline. New York: Harper & Row.
• 1977: A Part of Speech.
• 1977: Poems and Translations. Keele: University of Keele.
• 1980: A Part of Speech. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 1981: Verses on the Winter Campaign 1980. Translated by Alan Myers. London: Anvil Press.
• 1988: To Urania: Selected Poems, 1965–1985. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 1996: So Forth: Poems. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 1999: Discovery. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 2000: Collected Poems in English, 1972–1999. Edited by Ann Kjellberg. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 2001: Nativity Poems. Translated by Melissa Green. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 2020: Selected Poems, 1968–1996. Edited by Ann Kjellberg. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.

Essay and Interview Collections

• 1986: Less Than One: Selected Essays. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. (Awarded the National Book Critics Circle Award)
• 1992: Watermark. Noonday Press; New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux. This work reflects the author's profound connection with Venice, a city he visited over twenty times.
• 1995: On Grief and Reason: Essays. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 2003: Joseph Brodsky: Conversations. Edited by Cynthia L. Haven. Jackson, Miss.: University Press of Mississippi Literary Conversations Series.

Plays

• 1989: Marbles: A Play in Three Acts. Translated by Alan Myers with Joseph Brodsky. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
• 1991: Democracy! Published in Granta 30: New Europe. Translated by Alan Myers and Joseph Brodsky.

In Film

• 2008 – A Room And A Half (Полторы комнаты или сентиментальное путешествие на родину, Poltory komnaty ili sentimental'noe puteshestvie na rodinu), a feature film directed by Andrei Khrzhanovsky, offering a fictionalized portrayal of Brodsky's life.
• 2015 – Brodsky is not a Poet (Бродский не поэт, Brodskiy ne poet), a documentary film by Ilia Belov, focusing on Brodsky's period in the United States.
• 2018 – Dovlatov (Довлатов), a biographical film about writer Sergei Dovlatov, a friend of Joseph Brodsky, directed by Aleksei German-junior. The film is set in 1971 in Leningrad, shortly before Brodsky's emigration, and features Brodsky in a significant role.

In Music

The 2011 contemporary classical album Troika features Eskender Bekmambetov's critically acclaimed song cycle, "there ...", which adapts five of Joseph Brodsky's Russian-language poems and Brodsky's own English translations. Victoria Poleva composed Summer Music (2008), a chamber cantata for violin solo, children's choir, and strings, drawing inspiration from Brodsky's verses. Additionally, Poleva created Ars Moriendi (1983–2012), a collection of 22 monologues on death for soprano and piano, with two of these monologues ("Song" and "Empty Circle") specifically based on Brodsky's poetry.

Collections in Russian

• 1965: Stikhotvoreniia i poemy, published in Washington, D.C. by Inter-Language Literary Associates.
• 1970: Ostanovka v pustyne, published in New York by Izdatel'stvo imeni Chekhova (Revised edition published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis, 1989).
• 1977: Chast' rechi: Stikhotvoreniia 1972–76, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1977: Konets prekrasnoi epokhi : stikhotvoreniia 1964–71, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1977: V Anglii, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1982: Rimskie elegii, published in New York by Russica.
• 1983: Novye stansy k Avguste : stikhi k M.B., 1962–1982, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1984: Mramor, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1984: Uraniia : Novaia kniga stikhov, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis.
• 1989: Ostanovka v pustyne, revised edition, published in Ann Arbor, Michigan, by Ardis (original edition: New York: Izdatel'stvo imeni Chekhova, 1970).
• 1990: Nazidanie : stikhi 1962–1989, published in Leningrad by Smart.
• 1990: Chast' rechi : Izbrannye stikhi 1962–1989, published in Moscow by Khudozhestvennaia literatura.
• 1990: Osennii krik iastreba : Stikhotvoreniia 1962–1989, published in Leningrad by KTP LO IMA Press.
• 1990: Primechaniia paporotnika, published in Bromma, Sweden, by Hylaea.
• 1991: Ballada o malen'kom buksire, published in Leningrad by Detskaia literatura.
• 1991: Kholmy : Bol'shie stikhotvoreniia i poemy, published in Saint Petersburg by LP VTPO "Kinotsentr".
• 1991: Stikhotvoreniia, published in Tallinn by Eesti Raamat.
• 1992: Naberezhnaia neistselimykh: Trinadtsat' essei, published in Moscow by Slovo.
• 1992: Rozhdestvenskie stikhi, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta (revised edition in 1996).
• 1992–1995: Sochineniia, four volumes, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 1992: Vspominaia Akhmatovu / Joseph Brodsky, Solomon Volkov, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta.
• 1992: Forma vremeni : stikhotvoreniia, esse, p'esy, two volumes, published in Minsk by Eridan.
• 1993: Kappadokiia, published in Saint Petersburg.
• 1994: Persian Arrow/Persidskaia strela, with etchings by Edik Steinberg, published in Verona by Edizione d'Arte Gibralfaro & ECM.
• 1995: Peresechennaia mestnost ': Puteshestviia s kommentariiami, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta.
• 1995: V okrestnostiakh Atlantidy : Novye stikhotvoreniia, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 1996: Peizazh s navodneniem, compiled by Aleksandr Sumerkin, published in Dana Point, California, by Ardis.
• 1996: Rozhdestvenskie stikhi, revised edition of a work originally published in 1992, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta.
• 1997: Brodskii o Tsvetaevoi, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta.
• 1998: Pis'mo Goratsiiu, published in Moscow by Nash dom.
• 1996 and after: Sochineniia, eight volumes, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 1999: Gorbunov i Gorchakov, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 1999: Predstavlenie : novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, published in Moscow.
• 2000: Ostanovka v pustyne, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Chast' rechi, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Konets prekrasnoi epokhi, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Novye stansy k Avguste, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Uraniia, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Peizazh s navodneniem, published in Saint Petersburg by Pushkinskii fond.
• 2000: Bol'shaia kniga interv'iu, published in Moscow by Zakharov.
• 2001: Novaia Odisseia : Pamiati Iosifa Brodskogo, published in Moscow by Staroe literaturnoe obozrenie.
• 2001: Peremena imperii : Stikhotvoreniia 1960–1996, published in Moscow by Nezavisimaia gazeta.
• 2001: Vtoroi vek posle nashei ery : dramaturgija Iosifa Brodskogo, published in Saint Petersburg by Zvezda.

Notes

References

Works cited

• Balina, Marina; Lipovet͡skiĭ, Mark Naumovich (2004). Dictionary of Literary Biography: Russian Writers Since 1980. Gale. ISBN 978-0-7876-6822-8. OCLC 52518877.Birch, Dinah, ed. (24 September 2009). "Brodsky, Joseph". The Oxford Companion to English Literature. OUP Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-103084-0.Brintlinger, Angela; Vinitsky, Ilya (2007). Madness and the mad in Russian culture. University of Toronto Press. p. 92. ISBN 978-0-8020-9140-6.Cole, Henri (1996). "Brodsky, Joseph". In Stringer, Jenny; Sutherland, John (eds.). The Oxford companion to twentieth-century literature in English. Oxford; New York : Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-212271-1.Dingle, Carol (2003). Memorable Quotations: Jewish Writers of the Past. New York: iUniverse, Inc. p. 22. ISBN 978-0-595-27245-7.Miłosz, Czesław (2006). Cynthia, Haven (ed.). Czesław Miłosz: Conversations. Univ. Press of Mississippi. ISBN 978-1-57806-828-9.Rottenberg, Dan (1986). Finding Our Fathers: A Guidebook to Jewish Genealogy. Genealogical Publishing Com. ISBN 978-0-8063-1151-7.Shtern, Li︠u︡dmila (2004). Brodsky : a personal memoir. Fort Worth, Tex. : Baskerville Publishers. ISBN 978-1-880909-70-6.
  • Bethea, David M. (1994). Joseph Brodsky and the Creation of Exile. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-06773-5.
  • Loseff, Lev (2010) Joseph Brodsky: a Literary Life, Yale University Press (New Haven, CT)
  • Mackie, Alastair (1981), a review of A Part of Speech, in Murray, Glen (ed.), Cencrastus No. 5, Summer 1981, pp. 50 & 51
  • Speh, Alice J (1996) The Poet as Traveler: Joseph Brodsky in Mexico and Rome, Peter Lang (New York, NY)
  • Steele, Peter (March 1996). "Joseph Brodsky 1940–1996". Tribute. Quadrant. 40 (3): 16–17.
  • Volkov, Solomon (1998) Conversations with Joseph Brodsky: A Poet's Journey Through the 20th Century, translated by Marian Schwartz, The Free Press, (New York, NY)
  • Joseph Brodsky poetry
  • Joseph Brodsky Poems (Translations)
  • 'The birds of paradise sing without a needing a supple branch': Joseph Brodsky and the Poetics of Exile Cordite Poetry Review
  • 19 February 1996 "Death of a Poet Laureate: Joseph Brodsky Turned Exile into Inspiration" Library of Congress, obituary.
  • Sven Birkerts (Spring 1982). ""Joseph Brodsky", interview. The Art of Poetry No. 28". The Paris Review. Spring 1982 (83).
  • Interview 29 January 1996 Archived 24 March 2013 at the Wayback Machine PBS (US)
  • Profile, poems and audio files from the Academy of American Poets.
  • Brodsky Biography and bibliography, Poetry Foundation (US)
  • Petri Liukkonen. "Joseph Brodsky". Books and Writers.
  • Joseph Brodsky on Nobelprize
  • Written in Stone – Burial locations of literary figures.
  • Joseph Brodsky Papers. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
  • Brodsky speaks about his life, with translated readings by Frances Horowitz - a British Library sound recording
  • Joseph Brodsky Collection at Mount Holyoke College Archived 2 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine
  • Works by or about Joseph Brodsky at the Internet Archive
  • Joseph Brodsky Collection at Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, & Rare Book Library, Emory University