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'"Golden-Mouthed Anna of All The Russias": Canon, Canonisation, and Cult'

Harrington, Alex

'"Golden-Mouthed Anna of All The Russias": Canon, Canonisation, and Cult' Thumbnail


Authors



Contributors

Katharine Hodgson
Editor

Alexandra Smith
Editor

Joanne Shelton
Editor

Abstract

This chapter argues that Akhmatova's pre-eminent status in the contemporary canon rests not only on poetic talent but on extra-literary factors and processes which have elevated her to a form of secular sainthood. It explores the role played by biographies, critical studies, museums, and iconography in organising and generating her 'meaning' as cultural icon, and discusses the auto-canonization and self-mythologization strategies she employed to cultivate the paradoxical image of herself as victimized martyr and triumphant survivor. Akhmatova has become a compelling role model and icon for the post-Soviet intelligentsia, having successfully inscribed herself into a hitherto almost exclusively male tradition of Russian poet as heroic fighter against tyranny through a form of passive resistance which her gender made available to her. The chapter culminates in readings of two poetic works which have a particular canon-making thrust, 'Nas chetvero' and Poema bez geroia, and proposes a way of accounting for the canonical status of Akhmatova's major cycle Rekviem through its mnemonic qualities.

Citation

Harrington, A. (2017). '"Golden-Mouthed Anna of All The Russias": Canon, Canonisation, and Cult'. In K. Hodgson, A. Smith, & J. Shelton (Eds.), Twentieth-century Russian poetry : reinventing the canon (63-93). Open Book Publishers. https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0076.03

Acceptance Date Jul 17, 2015
Online Publication Date Apr 1, 2017
Publication Date Apr 1, 2017
Deposit Date Apr 20, 2016
Publicly Available Date Nov 30, 2017
Pages 63-93
Book Title Twentieth-century Russian poetry : reinventing the canon.
ISBN 9781783740888
DOI https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0076.03

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http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
© 2017 Alexandra Harrington This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work; to adapt the work and to make commercial use of the work providing attribution is made to the authors (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).





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