Osip Mandelstam Critical Essay | Critical Essay by David McDuff

Critical Essay by David McDuff

SOURCE: "Teleological Warmth," in Poetry Review, Vol. LXX, Nos. 1-2, September, 1980, pp. 48-53.

In the following essay, McDuff considers the role of religion in Mandelstam's poetry, contending that "the essential point to grasp about Mandelstam is that he was a profoundly Christian poet."

The upsurge of interest which of recent years has manifested itself in the West towards the poetry and the personality of Osip Mandelstam is without doubt to be welcomed. Through the translations of his work and of the two large volumes of memoirs by his widow, Nadezhda Yakovlevna, Western readers have had the chance to glimpse something of the central significance of this poet to an understanding of the dire historical and cultural situation in which we find ourselves. That it has been no more than a glimpse is due to various factors, not the least of which is the traditional tendency of the English—and the...
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