The return of K. Balmont's forgotten heritage [Book review: Balmont K.D. Uncollected and Forgotten of the Creative Heritage. 2 Vols. St. Petersburg, Rostok, 2016]

Abstract

The review is devoted to the two-volume book of not collected and “forgotten” Konstantin Balmont's poetry and prose released by the Rostok Publishing House in St. Petersburg and dedicated to the anniversary of this prominent poet-symbolist. This year will mark the 150th anniversary of the poet. The main purpose of the presented review is to inform the reader about the new book of K. Balmont's works, as well as to show the peculiarities of this edition in comparison with the earlier ones. The value of this project was far beyond the collection and combination of already existing publications of K. Balmont's heritage. This edition has the following aims: firstly, reprinting of K. Balmont's poetry and prose; secondly, creation of the commentaries to them; thirdly, introduction of the works based on manus­cripts that have not been published before; finally, attribution of some K. Balmont's texts. While analyzing this edition, we have come to the conclusions about the character of the commentaries given to K. Balmont's texts. The majority of these commentaries bring the book close to the academic edition. The commentaries sometimes also contain questions and ideas with good research potential and give the directions for the future researchers. The following question is raised: can commentaries include interpretations? We have also noticed that the author of the commentaries includes their own evaluations and opinions in them. In conclusion, we have defined the potential addressee of this edition: it was created for those who make research on K. Balmont's poetry and prose, for philological students, and for those who are interested in the creative work of this poet in all his variety of interests.

Keywords

• k. balmont
• symbolism
• anniversary
• commentaries
• attribution