"Babi Yar" is a poem by Yevgeny Yevtushenko. The tragedy of Babi Yar. Yevtushenko knew that Babi Yar was stolen by him Analysis of the poem “Babi Yar” by Yevtushenko

“Jewish blood boils in my soul

And hated with calloused malice

Just because I'm Jewish

All-Union anti-Semitic pack."

Brin writes:

After Shostakovich wrote a symphony based on the poems, Yevtushenko, using copyright, changed the key verses of Babyn Yar, effectively destroying it, although after publication there was no need for changes. In all his collections and collections, Yevtushenko publishes only an emasculated parody instead of Babyn Yar. Shostakovich refused to change even one note in the score, so after several performances in 1963, the Thirteenth Symphony was immediately banned and was not performed again. The ease with which Yevtushenko crafted the poem and his patronage by Khrushchev evoke an analogue of Lebedev-Kumach, who became the official author of many poems, the real authors of which were destroyed. It is possible that someday the KGB archives will be declassified and we will find out who really wrote Babi Yar.

“There were two changes in the first part (“Babi Yar”): between 2-3 numbers of the score and between 24-26.

Was:
It seems to me that now I am a Jew -
Here I am wandering through Ancient Egypt.
But here I am dying on the cross
And I still have nail marks on me!

Became:
I’m standing here, as if at a spring,
giving me faith in our brotherhood.
Here Russians and Ukrainians lie,
lie in the same land with the Jews.

Was:
And I myself am like a continuous silent scream
Over thousands of thousands killed,
I'm every old man here who was shot,
I'm every shot child here.

Became:
I think about the feat of Russia,
fascism, which blocked the way,
to the tiniest drop of dew
close to me with all my essence and destiny.

In all his collections and collections, Yevtushenko publishes only an emasculated parody instead of Babyn Yar. Shostakovich refused to change even one note in the score, so after several performances in 1963, which did take place despite persistent attempts by the authorities to disrupt them, the Thirteenth Symphony was immediately banned and was never performed again. “D. Shostakovich was changed by his always inherent sense of time, a sense of high responsibility... the composer, whom we consider a great thinker, elevates a minor incident in life to the rank of almost a people’s tragedy” (“Sovetskaya Belorussia”, April 2, 1963).

The ease with which Yevtushenko crafted the poem and his patronage by Khrushchev evoke an analogue of Lebedev-Kumach, who became the official author of many poems, the real authors of which were destroyed. It is possible that someday the KGB archives will be declassified and we will find out who really wrote Babi Yar.

MASTER WOLAND

... “Thanks to the international resonance of the poems “Babi Yar” and “Stalin’s Heirs,” Yevtushenko began to be invited abroad, he traveled all over the world.”

“Dmitry Shostakovich wrote the Thirteenth Symphony to the text of Babyn Yar and four other poems by Yevtushenko. Its premiere on December 18, 1962 was greeted with a thunderous ovation.”

“However, the poet could not include it in his collections. The second time “Babi Yar” was published only in a three-volume collection of his works, published in 1983.”

– Yuri Alexandrovich, how did it happen that other people “used” your poems? Was there really no way to protect ourselves from losses?

- Well, how can you protect yourself here? My poems are very strong and they led people into terrible temptation. I published with great difficulty, and the poem, if it is not yet published, is to some extent ownerless, no one’s. Whoever published it first is the author. I even understand them to some extent, that it was difficult to resist. But it was necessary for a real poet, a true creative personality, to resist, otherwise he could no longer worthily bear this title. To some extent, I demonstrated the Divine or Devilish test of people for lice. Many, unfortunately, did not pass this test.

– And who is among the first to fail this test?
- Zhenya Yevtushenko. Yes, that's it. He only used one of my poems. Now I’ll tell you how it happened. In our youth we were friends. I easily came to his house, we read to each other what I had just written, and even then it was clear that I more than covered all his creations. Zhenya became sad after I read it, then he feverishly sat down at his typewriter and tearfully asked me to dictate to him something that he had just read but had not yet published. I dictated, of course, that I was sorry? Then he published one of the poems, with some changes, under his own name. This poem later became famous, one of the best in his work. I mean "Babi Yar".

– Tell me how it happened?

“At that time I went to places not so remote. I led a rather sad life at that time, and somehow fell into the hands of the authorities. On April 12, 1960, there was a trial against me, then I was imprisoned for 8 years, although I was released much earlier. Zhenya probably thought that I would not return to freedom soon, and if I did, I would have no time for poetry. One day I went into the camp library, took out the Literary Newspaper and saw this poem of mine under the name Yevtushenko. At first I couldn’t believe my eyes, but then I still had to believe it.

– And what did you then say to Yevtushenko?
– When I was free, I met Zhenya and asked him why he did it. Oddly enough, he was not at all embarrassed and said that since I sat down, he decided to save this wonderful poem in such an interesting way, not to let it go to waste, because people need it. I couldn’t find an answer to such a statement, it struck me so much. Then he calmed down, forgave him, but forbade him to use this poem in any way in the future: publish it, put it in books.”

--------

By the way, this poem was not at all from Yevtushenko’s creative repertoire, which is why it immediately aroused suspicion among many. It was too sharp, too bold for him, too real, so to speak. No matter how brave Yevtushenko was in those years, during the thaw, he was far from the courage of Vlodov. And although in those years it was already possible to play with freedom of speech, it was just a game and nothing more. And all the officially approved poets knew this, but they did not cross the boundaries of what was permitted in their play. And Yevtushenko too. Otherwise, you could lose everything.

Vlodov had nothing special to lose, since he had nothing, so he was truly sincere in his work, and was not afraid of either difficult topics or difficult questions. And one of these damned questions was precisely the Jewish topic, which no sane poet would touch upon, obeying the instinct of self-preservation. Yevtushenko, as an official poet, understood this perfectly, and in his right mind and sound memory would not have touched upon this ill-fated issue.

Vlodov undertook to develop this question because he had no instinct of self-preservation, and he was always carried into some problematic jungle. So. Vlodov, by nationality, was half Russian, half Jewish. Half-breed, as he said. Therefore, at different periods of his life he was either a Zionist or an anti-Semite, depending on which wing prevailed in his life. He stood up for those who were wronged, so to speak. In those years, the Jewish wing prevailed, and he actively began to write poetry with an obvious Zionist orientation, this became his theme for some period, and also spoke with these poems in large audiences. Until he was banned.

Osokina also recalls that Vlodov once rudely responded to Yevtushenko: “Get out, you graphomaniac mug!”

As for Yevtushenko, writes Osokina, Vlodov will experience internal rivalry and hostility towards him throughout his life. Just like Yevtushenko’s to him. I think that Yevtushenko lived all his life with Vlodov, a silent reproach present behind the scenes of Russian-language literature, and with this “Babi Yar”, like a thorn in his side. He is still trying to show off in front of the same Yuri Belikov, a journalist and poet from Perm, answering his question about whether he knows the poet Yuri Vlodov. Yes, Yevtushenko said that he does not know such a name in the history of Russian literature. But it’s unlikely that he was amused by these, perhaps winged words of his. After all, he also had a hand in lowering Vlodov’s name into the river of oblivion.

===========

To be honest, I don’t really want to delve into these Jewish graphomaniac squabbles over a mediocre poem, but for those who know the overly ambitious and unprincipled Yevtushenko, this whole story with the stolen verse seems quite true.

See also:

Who was shocked not only by this tragedy of the victims of Nazism, but also by its absolute taboo in Soviet times. It is not for nothing that these poems became, to some extent, a protest against the policies of the then USSR government, as well as a symbol of the struggle against discrimination against Jews and the silencing of the Holocaust.

Babi Yar tragedy

On September 19, 1941, the troops of Nazi Germany entered the capital of Ukraine, the city of Kyiv. Ten days later, after an explosion at the headquarters of the German command, which was carried out by a partisan sabotage group, it was decided to blame the Jews for this. But, of course, this served only as an excuse, and not the real reason for the massacres. It was all about the “final solution” policy, which Kyiv was one of the first to experience. All the Jews of the capital were surrounded, taken to the outskirts, forced to strip naked and shot in a ravine called Babi Yar. Evgeny Yevtushenko's poem is dedicated to this terrible event. Then about thirty-four thousand men, women and children were deliberately killed during one military operation. The executions continued in the following months, and prisoners, mentally ill people, and partisans became victims. But the problem was not even this crime, or rather, not only this. For many years now, the Soviet government has refused to acknowledge that the tragic events at Babi Yar were part of the genocide of the Jewish people - the Holocaust. This shocked the poet.

History of writing

Yevtushenko Evgeniy Aleksandrovich has a controversial reputation. His biography and work are criticized and praised from different sides. Some believe that during the Soviet Union he enjoyed the love of the authorities, who favored him. Others try to read hidden protest notes and hints in almost every work of his. But be that as it may, the poet became interested in this topic in his early years. He read Ehrenburg's poem dedicated to Babi Yar. But there, as prescribed by Soviet propaganda, nothing was said about the nationality of the victims. They were called “Soviet citizens.” And Yevtushenko, as he himself wrote later, had long wanted to devote poetry to the problem of anti-Semitism in the USSR.

Travel to Kyiv

In 1961, Evgeniy Aleksandrovich Yevtushenko visits. He goes to the site of the tragedy and sees with horror that there is not only a monument to the victims, but not even any mention of them. At the place where people were shot there was a landfill. Trucks came to the place where the bones of innocent victims lay and dumped disgusting garbage. It seemed to the poet that by doing so the authorities seemed to laugh at those executed. He returned to the hotel and there, in his room, wrote “Babi Yar” for several hours. The poem began with the lines that there is no monument at the site of the tragedy.

Meaning

When the poet sees what Babi Yar has become, he experiences fear. And this seems to connect Yevtushenko with the entire long-suffering Jewish people. In the lines of the poem, he lives with him the terrible story of expulsion and persecution, including in Russia, where instead of recognizing the memory of these people, they are only spat upon. He writes about pogroms and their victims, about fascism and callousness - about anti-Semitism in all its guises. But the bureaucratic machine of totalitarianism deserved his greatest hatred - the main edge of this poem is directed against it.

First public performance

Who was the first person to read “Babi Yar” by Yevtushenko? These poems were first heard by Ukrainian poets Vitaly Korotich and Ivan Drach in a Kyiv hotel room. They asked him to read the poem at a public performance that was to take place the next day. Rumors about the poem reached local authorities, who tried to prevent the poet from meeting with the public. But it was already too late. Thus, the wall of silence that arose around the tragedy at Babi Yar was broken. The poem circulated in samizdat for a long time. When Yevtushenko read it in Moscow at the Polytechnic Museum, a crowd gathered around the building, which the police had difficulty containing.

Publication

In September of the same year, “Babi Yar,” Yevtushenko’s poem, was first published in Literaturnaya Gazeta. As the author himself admitted, writing these poems was much easier than publishing them. The editor-in-chief of Literaturka assumed that he would most likely be fired if he decided to publish the poem. But he still took this bold step, dedicating this publication to the anniversary of the capture of Kyiv by the Germans. In addition, the poem was published on the front page of the newspaper, which naturally attracted everyone's attention to it. This issue of Literature was such a shock that all copies were snapped up in one day. For the first time on the pages of an official Soviet publication, sympathy was expressed for the tragedy of the Jewish people, and the presence of anti-Semitism in the USSR was also recognized. For many, this sounded like an encouraging sign. But unfortunately, this was not destined to come true. On the other hand, these were no longer Stalinist times, and no special persecution or repression followed.

Resonance

Did Yevtushenko anticipate such a turn of events? “Babi Yar” caused a terrible scandal at the top of the Soviet leadership. The poem was considered "ideologically erroneous." But it was not only government and party officials who were unhappy. Some writers and poets published articles, poems and pamphlets directed against Yevtushenko. They said that he was emphasizing Jewish suffering, forgetting about the millions of killed Russians. Khrushchev said that the author of the poem was showing political immaturity and was singing from someone else’s voice. Nevertheless, Babi Yar, whose author became the center of all these scandals, began to be translated into foreign languages. The poems were published in seventy-two countries. In the end, these publications made Yevtushenko world famous. But the newspaper editor who published the poem was eventually fired.

The tragedy of the execution of Jews in Kyiv and its reflection in art

Following the example of Yevtushenko, who wrote “Babi Yar,” other authors began to write poems about these events. In addition, those poets who wrote lines dedicated to the execution earlier decided not to keep them in the “table” anymore. This is how the world saw the poems of Nikolai Bazhan, Moisei Fishbein, and Leonid Pervomaisky. People began to talk about this event. In the end, the famous Soviet composer Dmitry Shostakovich wrote the first part of his Thirteenth Symphony based on the text of Yevtushenko’s poem. Ten years before these verses, he also came to the scene of executions and stood there over the cliff. But when thunder and lightning erupted over the poet’s head after the publication of “Babi Yar,” he met with him and decided to write a symphony based on both these and other works by the author.

Yevtushenko, who first heard the music, was shocked by how accurately Shostakovich was able to reflect his feelings in sounds. But after that the composer also started having troubles. The singers refused to perform the vocal parts of the symphony (especially after urgent advice from the then Ukrainian authorities). Nevertheless, the premiere of the work took place and caused a full house and standing ovations. And the press was ominously silent. This led to the fact that the performance of the symphony became an involuntary demonstration of sentiments directed against the Soviet regime.

The power of art

In 1976, a monument was erected in a symbolic place. By that time, Babi Yar had already been filled up after an environmental disaster, when a dam broke and clay mixed with water splashed onto the private sector. But the sign did not say a word about the victims of the Holocaust. The monument was dedicated to the death of captured Soviet soldiers and officers. But its installation itself was still connected with Yevtushenko’s poem. The power of art played its role. The then head of the Ukrainian government asked Moscow for permission to build a memorial sign. It was criticized in the world press as not reflecting the essence of the tragedy. And Yevtushenko’s poem was forbidden to be read publicly in Kyiv until the time of “perestroika”. But still there is now a monument in the Babi Yar tract. Ukraine, having gained independence, erected a symbolic menorah lamp. And from there to the Jewish cemetery the Road of Sorrow is paved with slabs. In modern Ukraine, Babi Yar has become a historical and memorial complex of national significance. On the website of this reserve, words from Yevtushenko’s poem are given as an epigraph. When the tragedy's seventy-fifth anniversary was celebrated last year, the Ukrainian president said the creation of a Holocaust memorial at Babyn Yar was important for all humanity because it must remember the dangers of hatred, bigotry and racism.

Poet Yuri Aleksandrovich Vlodov, born Levitsky, (1932 - 2009). The true author of Babi Yar?

Yes, we didn't know. Although the publication of these poems at that time can also be considered a feat. He stole it, but with what benefit, to perpetuate the memory of the tortured and murdered Jews. He stole it, modified it, became famous and never repented.

I never liked E. Yevtushenko. For me, he was always kind of slimy (not slippery), his whole face and manner of holding himself and entering his organs.

But I did not imagine such a theft as Babi Yar and did not believe it. Therefore, I searched the Internet and found a fair amount of evidence that it was Vlodov who was the author of Babyn Yar and at the time of publication he was in the camp.

How bizarre are the interweavings of destinies.
Kharkiv residents, who are no longer too young, remember that they nominated Yevtushenko as a deputy at the last Gorbachev Congress of the USSR Soviet along with Korotich.

Both of these talented freedom fighters disappeared over the hill without even saying goodbye to Kharkov.

And, of course, without talking too much about Yuri Vlodov.

And you should know about him, Yuri Vlodov!

I am sure that there are none among you who are not familiar with the winged couplet:
“Winter has passed, summer has come.
Thanks to the party for this!”

And here is the “Ode to the Party” itself, the lines of which have gained unprecedented fame and popularity:

"Winter has passed, summer has come -
Thanks to the party for this!
Because the smoke is coming up the chimney,
Thank you, party!

Because the day has replaced the dawn,
I thank the party!
After Friday we have Saturday -
After all, this is the party's concern!

And Saturday is a day off.
Thanks to the party dear!
Thanks to the party with the people
For breathing oxygen!

My darling's breasts are white -
The party gave all this.
And even though I sleep in bed with her,
I love you, party!"

In the early fifties, a young poet showed up in the writers' village of Peredelkino and decided to get acquainted... with the classics. Met with Ilya Selvinsky, Korney Chukovsky, Boris Pasternak. And the masters, recognizing a colleague in Yuri Vlodov, predicted a great literary future for him.

With a foreword by Selvinsky, a selection of his poems was published in the Smena magazine. Pasternak admonished him this way: “Each poem by the poet Yuri Vlodov is a brick laid in the foundation of modern Russian-language poetry. Bon voyage, my brother Yuri!” And here is the opinion of Alexander Solzhenitsyn: “The power of this poet lies in the fact that he comes not from books, but from life itself, and therefore, despite his timeless themes, he is always modern.”

During the Soviet years, Yuri Aleksandrovich’s literary career did not work out; he did not publish; KGB officers were often interested in his poems, which were too sharp and unusual for that time. And in general, there are many dark spots in the poet’s fate, starting with close ties with the criminal world in his youth...;

Lev Novozhenov recalls: “Blasphemer. Didn't want to publish. It didn’t matter whether they printed it or not. I didn’t see this as a tragedy. He wrote like a god. I think we can put him on a par with Brodsky."

But during and after perestroika, Yu. Vlodov’s poems splashed out powerfully onto the pages of magazines, collections, and almanacs. And his first book, “The Cross,” was published in 1996, when the poet turned 64 years old...;

And a couple more interesting facts. In addition to “Winter has passed, summer has come...”, the poet wrote no less famous lines: “Under our red banner, we will burn with a blue flame.” Yuri Aleksandrovich composed poems of 8-12 lines, or even less, often in one- and two-line lines.

“I lead through life like a blade,
Blind Girl - Poetry"

* * *
The war crucified childhood.
Left a legacy:
Dry capacity of phrases,
Almost an animal's eye
Hypervigilant mind
Poisoned stomach
Hot Heart Stone
And the spirit of a fellow believer...;

And it's not my fault
That I am a poet of war!

* * *
Talent is essentially thick.
And a genius is as thin as a sliver.
It doesn't matter what's there: canvas,
Poem, fugue, sculpture.
Fate, like a pole in the side, -;
What they gave, he grabbed...;
Talent in spirit is God,
And genius is a real Devil!

* * *
I see Anna Akhmatova:
Crazy rosary in hands
And roses on an open wound
On the black silks of life.

And in a slow glance - bravado
And a viscous darkness of passion...;
And in a royal gesture - a blockade,
In which she lived until her grave.

* * *
I think: Jesus wrote poetry,
Weaving webs of magical nonsense...;
And the life of Christ was the soul of a poet...;
Otherwise - how?! — where would all this come from?!

In the circle of blind sick tribes
He, like a blind man, fed himself with deception...;
And wasn't Judas a graphomaniac?
Unrecognized Salieri of those times?!

* * *
They betrayed each other...;
And immediately it became easier.
Judas - hot and dark -
Walked from corner to corner,
Walked from corner to corner,
The sweaty mustache tormented me!..
And the thought struck my nerves:
“I wish I could be the first to betray!
To be able to betray first!..
Until Jesus betrayed..."

* * *
I will say that it is too hard for me -;
I'll almost lie:
Like a convict in a quarry
I can live.

Blink from the stone dust
Eye of a flower...;
And trembling with fear
The pick will freeze.

* * *
He was an obedient servant -
I walked through life following a staff.
Became a rebellious disobedient -
Amazing deafness!…;
Waiting for the troublemaker artist
The path is unexpected, unexpected...;
And God calls him -
I’m just as desperate!…;

* * *
Sweeter than sky-high manna
Sweet drug of creations.
A genius is always a drug addict.
But a drug addict is not a genius.

Hot fog and dope
Hotter than Sudan and Kenya.
A genius is always a graphomaniac,
But a graphomaniac is not a genius!

* * *
I saw myself from the outside
In the treacherous glow of the moon:
I’m standing with my back pressed to the crucifix,
Two abysses - above me and below me...;
And the ghost of the night with a reflection of the day
The spirit was scorched by an icy breath...;
It's probably not me at all,
But only my lost destiny...;

* * *
I looked into the mirror of Genesis...;
A transparent ringing lightly touched the ear...;
Chu! - there was a beggar behind him!
“Are you my Death?” - I barely said a word.
“I am your Life...” mumbled the old woman.

But this poem also belongs to Kharkov resident Vlodov...
Yuri Vlodov. Babi Yar

YURI VLODOV
(1932-2009)

BABIY YAR

There are no monuments above Babi Yar.
A steep cliff, like a rough tombstone.
I'm scared.
I am so old today
as the Jewish people themselves.
It seems to me now -
I'm Jewish.
Here I am wandering through ancient Egypt.
But here I am, crucified on the cross, dying,
and I still have nail marks on me.

I think -
I'm a boy in Bialystok.
Blood flows, spreading across the floors.
The leaders of the tavern stand are rampaging
and they smell like vodka and onions.
I, thrown back by a boot, am powerless.
In vain I pray to the pogromists.
To the guffaw:
"Beat the Jews, save Russia!" -
The meadowsweet rapes my mother.
I think -
I am Anne Frank
transparent,
like a twig in April.
And I love.
> And I don't need phrases.
I need,
so that we look into each other.
How little you can see
smell!
We can't have leaves
and we cannot have heaven.
But you can do a lot -
it's gentle
hug each other in a dark room.
Are they coming here?
Don't be afraid - these are ghouls
of spring itself -
she's coming here.
Come to me.
Give me your lips quickly.
They break down the door?
No - it's an ice drift...
The rustling of wild grasses above Babi Yar.
The trees look menacing
in a judicial way.
Everything here screams silently,
and, taking off his hat,
I feel,
I'm slowly turning gray.
And myself,
like a continuous silent scream,
over thousands of thousands buried.
I -
everyone here is an old man who was shot.
I -
Every child here has been shot.
Nothing in me
won't forget about it!
"International"
let it thunder
when he will be buried forever
the last anti-Semite on earth.

Jew's blood boils in my soul
And, hated with calloused malice,
For all anti-Semites, I am a Jew! -;
And that’s why I’m a real Russian!

Yevtushenko recognized the authorship of Vlodov... and defended himself by saying that, they say, he still had to sit, and I brought the poem to the people... Although what Yevtushenko wrote in is no weaker than the original, I don’t like it.
And Yevtushenka’s whole life and adventures look different... If you know that he is a thief.

=======================================

Wikipedia:
Yuri Aleksandrovich Vlodov (December 6, 1932, Novosibirsk, RSFSR - September 29, 2009, Moscow) - Russian wandering poet, poet of the Moscow underground; The main theme of his work, by his own admission, is about God, the Devil and Christ.

Vlodov almost never published during his lifetime (his name was banned in the USSR), he often wrote “to order” for so-called “literary clients”, and allowed his poems to be published under the names of other poets. Vlodov is known to a wide Russian reader as the author of such sharply political epigrams as “Winter has passed, summer has come. Thanks to the party for this!” Vlodov’s acquaintances also consider him the real author of the poem “Babi Yar,” which Yevgeny Yevtushenko “borrowed” from Vlodov when he was in prison.

In the photo: Evgeny Yevtushenko (1961)

Evgeny Yevtushenko. Poem "Babi Yar"

At the request of Viktor Nekrasov, Anatoly Kuznetsov brought the young poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko to Babi Yar. It was already August 1961. 16 years have passed since the end of the war. Instead of monuments to dead people, he saw garbage dumps and desolation.
Evgeny Yevtushenko writes:

– When we [with Anatoly Kuznetsov. MK] came to Babi Yar, then I was completely shocked by what I saw. I knew that there was no monument there, but I expected to see some kind of memorial sign or some kind of well-kept place. And suddenly I saw the most ordinary landfill, which had been turned into such a sandwich of foul-smelling garbage. And this is in the place where tens of thousands of innocent people lay in the ground: children, old people, women. Before our eyes, trucks drove up and dumped more and more heaps of garbage on the place where these victims lay.

Yevtushenko could not even hint about the Kurenev tragedy - no one would have missed this material, and he himself would have been accused of slander and God knows what else. And his thoughts were about those executed at Babi Yar.

Kuznetsov would later write about this day: “Yevtushenko, with whom we were friends and studied at the same institute, conceived his poem on the day when we went together to Babi Yar. We stood over a steep cliff, I told where people came from and how they drove them away, how the creek later washed away the bones, how there was a struggle for a monument that still doesn’t exist.”

And Yevgeny Yevtushenko wrote about what struck him in the very heart - about human memory, and the moral strength of his poem began to break the callousness and callousness of the ruling power.

There are no monuments above Babi Yar.
A steep cliff, like a rough tombstone.
I'm scared.
I am so old today
as the Jewish people themselves.

It seems to me now -
I'm Jewish.
Here I am wandering through ancient Egypt.
But here I am, crucified on the cross, dying,
and I still have nail marks on me.

It seems to me that Dreyfus -
It's me.
Philistinism –
my informer and judge.
I'm behind bars.
I hit the ring.
Hunted down
spat upon,
slandered.
And ladies with Brussels frills,
squealing, pointing umbrellas in my face.

Oh, my Russian people! -
I know -
You
Essentially international.
But often those whose hands are unclean
they rattled your purest name.
I know the goodness of your land.
How mean
that, without even flinching a vein,
anti-Semites pompously called
ourselves as the “Union of the Russian People”!

I think -
I am Anne Frank
transparent,
like a twig in April.
And I love.
And I don't need phrases.
I need,
so that we look into each other.

How little you can see
smell!
We can't have leaves
and we cannot have heaven.
But you can do a lot -
it's gentle
hug each other in a dark room.

Are they coming here?
Don't be afraid - these are ghouls
spring itself -
she's coming here.
Come to me.
Give me your lips quickly.
They break down the door?
No - it's an ice drift...

The rustling of wild grasses above Babi Yar.
The trees look menacing
in a judicial way.
Everything here screams silently,
and, taking off his hat,
I feel,
I'm slowly turning gray.

And myself,
like a continuous silent scream,
over thousands of thousands buried.
I -
everyone here is an old man who was shot.
I -
Every child here has been shot.

Nothing in me
won't forget about it!
"International"
let it thunder
when he will be buried forever
the last anti-Semite on earth.

There is no Jewish blood in my blood.
But hated with calloused malice
I am anti-Semitic to all,
like a Jew
and that's why -
I'm a real Russian!
1961

The poet read “Babi Yar” from the stage of the Polytechnic Museum. This is what an eyewitness says (taken from Dmitry Tsvibel’s “Babi Yar”. Kyiv is Jewish. On the website:
“In mid-September 1961, the poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko read his poem “Babi Yar” for the first time, which made him world famous.

I was lucky enough to be on this day at the poet’s creative evening, which took place in Moscow at the Polytechnic Museum. Long before the start, the entire area in front of the museum was filled with people eager for tickets. Order was ensured by mounted police. Despite having a ticket, I made my way to the museum building for a long time and had difficulty getting onto the balcony of the third tier.

Yevtushenko was 40 minutes late; he himself could not get through the dense crowd of people. The police helped, literally carrying him into the museum in their arms. There were
not only all the aisles were filled, but also the stage, where there were chairs close together, and where there were none, people simply sat on the floor. An area of no more than one square meter was left for the poet.

Yevtushenko read his already known poems and new ones written after a recent trip to Cuba. However, it was felt that the audience was expecting something unusual. And at the end of the second part, Yevtushenko announced: “And now I will read you a poem written after my trip to Kyiv. I recently returned from there, and you will understand what I’m talking about.” He took out the sheets of text from his pocket, but, in my opinion, he never looked at them.

And a slow, hammered voice rang out in the frozen hall: “There are no monuments above Babyn Yar...”. In the dead silence, the poet’s words sounded like hammer blows: they knocked on the brain, on the heart, on the soul.
Frost walked down my back, tears flowed from my eyes. In the dead silence, sobs were heard in the hall.

In the middle of the poem, people began to rise, as if spellbound, and listened to the end while standing. And when the poet finished the poem with the words: “I am like a Jew to all anti-Semites, and therefore I am a real Russian,” the audience was silent for some time. And then it exploded. It “exploded”. I can’t find another word for what happened. People jumped up, shouted, everyone was in some kind of ecstasy, unbridled delight. There were shouts: “Zhenya, thank you! Zhenya, thank you!” People, strangers, were crying, hugging and kissing each other.

And not only Jews did this: the majority in the hall were, naturally, Russians. But now there were neither Jews nor Russians in the hall. There were people who were tired of lies and hostility, people who wanted to cleanse themselves of Stalinism. The year is 1961, the famous “thaw” has arrived, when the people, after many years of silence, got the opportunity to speak the truth. The rejoicing continued for a long time. A corridor was formed along which dozens of people brought bouquets of flowers to the poet, then they began to pass them along the chain. Flowers were placed directly on the stage at the feet of the poet.

“Zhenya, more! Zhenya, more!” - people shouted, and he stood, stunned and confused. Finally, Yevtushenko raised his hand, and the hall fell silent. No one sat down: the poem was listened to while standing.
And after the second time, “Babi Yar” sounded both as a memory of the dead Jews, and as a condemnation of anti-Semitism, and as a curse on the past. For the first time, it was said out loud that not just “peaceful Soviet people” were shot at Babi Yar, but Jews. And only because they were Jews.”

Reviews

Interview with Vlodov" - Yuri Alexandrovich, how did it happen that other people “used” your poems? Was there really no way to protect yourself from losses?
- Well, how can you protect yourself here? My poems are very strong and they led people into terrible temptation. I published with great difficulty, and the poem, if it is not yet published, is to some extent ownerless, no one’s. Whoever published it first is the author. I even understand them to some extent, that it was difficult to resist. But it was necessary for a real poet, a true creative personality, to resist, otherwise he could no longer worthily bear this title. To some extent, I demonstrated the Divine or Devilish test of people for lice. Many, unfortunately, did not pass this test.
– And who is among the first to fail this test?
- Zhenya Yevtushenko. Yes, that's it. He only used one of my poems. Now I’ll tell you how it happened. In our youth we were friends. I easily came to his house, we read to each other what I had just written, and even then it was clear that I more than covered all his creations. Zhenya became sad after I read it, then he feverishly sat down at his typewriter and tearfully asked me to dictate to him something that he had just read but had not yet published. I dictated, of course, that I was sorry? Then he published one of the poems, with some changes, under his own name. This poem later became famous, one of the best in his work. I mean "Babi Yar".
– Can you tell me how this happened?
“At that time I went to places not so remote. I led a rather sad life at that time, and somehow fell into the hands of the authorities. On April 12, 1960, I was put on trial, and I was imprisoned for 8 years, although I was released much earlier. Zhenya probably thought that I would not return to freedom soon, and if I did, I would have no time for poetry. One day I went into the camp library, took out the Literary Newspaper and saw this poem of mine under the name Yevtushenko. At first I couldn’t believe my eyes, but then I still had to believe it.
– And what did you then say to Yevtushenko?
– When I was free, I met Zhenya and asked him why he did it. Oddly enough, he was not at all embarrassed and said that since I sat down, he decided to save this wonderful poem in such an interesting way, not to let it go to waste, because people need it. I couldn’t find an answer to such a statement, it struck me so much. Then he calmed down, forgave him, but forbade him to use this poem in any future way: publish it, put it in books."