The poem "The Black Man", Yesenin. Analysis of the Soul of a Generation

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

In the January issue of Novy Mir magazine in 1926, a stunning

publication: “S. Yesenin. "Black man". The text of the poem made a particularly strong impression against the backdrop of the recent tragic death of a young poet (as you know, on December 28, 1925, Yesenin was found dead in the Angleterre hotel in Leningrad). Contemporaries considered this work a kind of penitential confession of a "scandalous poet." And indeed, the Russian lyre did not know such merciless and painful self-accusation as in this work. Here is a summary of it.

"The Black Man": Yesenin alone with himself

The poem opens with an appeal that the poet will repeat in his dying poem: “My friend, my friend,” the lyrical hero begins to confess, “I am very, very sick…”. We understand that we are talking about mental suffering. The metaphor is expressive: the head is compared to a bird, striving to fly away, “She has legs on her neck / can no longer loom”. What is going on? At the time of tormenting insomnia, the mystical Black Man comes to the hero and sits on the bed. Yesenin (an analysis of the sources for the creation of the poem confirms this) appeals to some extent to Pushkin's Mozart and Salieri. On the eve of his death, the great composer also saw a sinister black man. However, Yesenin interprets this figure in a completely different way. The black man is the alter-ego of the poet, his other "I". What torments the lyrical hero bad Black man?

Yesenin: analysis of the poet's inner world on the eve of suicide

In the third stanza of the poem, the image of a book arises, in which all human life is described to the smallest detail. In the Bible, in the Revelation of John the Theologian, it is said that, reading the Book of Life, God judges each person according to his deeds. The letters in the hands of Yesenin's Black Man demonstrate that the devil is also closely following the fate of people. True, his notes do not contain a detailed history of the personality, but only a brief summary of it. The black man (Yesenin emphasizes this) chose all the most unattractive and evil. He talks about "a scoundrel and a bully", about an adventurer "of the highest brand", about a "graceful poet" with "grasping strength". He argues that happiness is only "sleight of mind and hands", even if they bring "a lot of torment … broken / And deceitful gestures." Here it is worth mentioning the newfangled theory that developed in the decadent circles of the early 20th century, about the special mission of sign language, to which Yesenin was an adherent, and the “queen” of which was the great dancer Isadora Duncan. The marriage with her was short-lived and did not bring blessings to the poet. "To appear smiling andsimple”at a time when the heart was torn by longing, he had to do it not only at the behest of the then prevailing fashion. Only in this way could the poet hide from himself the darkness of impending hopelessness, connected not only with the internal contradictions of the personality, but also with the horrors of Bolshevism in Russia.

What lies at the bottom of the soul?

In the ninth stanza of the poem, we see how the lyrical hero refuses to speak with the intruder, he still wants to disown the terrible story that the Black Man is leading. Yesenin still does not accept the analysis of everyday troubles of "some" moral "swindler and thief" as a study of his own life, he resists this. However, he himself already understands that it is in vain. The poet reproaches the black guest for daring to invade the depths and get something from the very bottom, because he is "not in the service of … diving." This line is polemically addressed to the work of the French poet Alfred Musset, who in December Night uses the image of a diver wandering along the "Abyss of Oblivion". The grammatical structure (“diving service”) appeals to the morphological delights of Mayakovsky, who boldly broke the established forms in the language in a futuristic way.

One at the window

The image of the night crossroads in the twelfth stanza is reminiscent of the Christian symbolism of the cross, connecting all directions of space and time, and contains a pagan idea of the crossroads as a place of unclean conspiracies and charms. Both of these symbols were absorbed by the impressionable peasant youth Sergei Yesenin from childhood. Poems "Black Man"combine two opposite traditions, which is why the fear and torment of the lyrical hero acquire a global metaphysical connotation. He is “alone at the window” … The word “window” is etymologically connected in Russian with the word “eye”. This is the eye of the hut, through which light pours into it. The night window resembles a mirror where everyone sees their own reflection. So in the poem there is a hint of who this Black Man really is. Now the mockery of the night guest takes on a more concrete tone: we are talking about a poet who was born “maybe in Ryazan” (Yesenin was born there), about a fair-haired peasant boy “with blue eyes” …

Killing a doppelgänger

Unable to contain his rage and anger, the lyrical hero tries to destroy the damned double, throwing a cane at him. This gesture - to throw something at the dreaming devil - is found more than once in the literary works of Russian and foreign authors. After that, the Black Man disappears. Yesenin (an analysis of the allegorical murder of a double in world literature proves this) is trying, as it were, to protect himself from the persecution of his other "I". But such an ending is always associated with suicide.

The poet, standing alone in front of a broken mirror, appears in the last stanza of the work. The symbolism of the mirror, as a guide to other worlds, leading a person away from reality into a deceitful demonic world, enhances the gloomy and meaningful finale of the poem.

Requiem for Hope

It's hard, almost impossible to castigate yourself like thatthe eyes of a huge audience, as Yesenin does. His incredible sincerity, with which he reveals his pain to the world, makes confession a reflection of the spiritual breakdown of all Yesenin's contemporaries. It is no coincidence that the writer Veniamin Levin, who knew the poet, spoke of the Black Man as an investigating judge "on the affairs of our entire generation," who had many "the most beautiful thoughts and plans." Levin noted that in this sense, Yesenin's voluntary burden is somewhat akin to the sacrifice of Christ, who "took infirmities" upon himself and bore all human "diseases."