SOURCE: "The Acmeists: Nikolai Gumilyov (1886-1921)," in Early Soviet Writers, Frederick A. Praeger Publishers, 1958, pp. 42-6.

In the following excerpt, Zavalishin discusses the recurring theme of monarchism in Gumilev's poetry, which may have led to his execution in 1921 for counter-revolutionary activity.

After Gumilyov's execution in Soviet Russia in 1921, Georgi Ivanov, one of his followers, paid him the following tribute:

Why is it that he traveled to Africa, went to war as a volunteer, took part in a conspiracy, and demonstratively, with a sweeping gesture, made a sign of the cross in front of every church he passed in Soviet Petrograd, and told the examining official to his face that he was a monarchist, instead of attempting to exonerate and save himself?

His close friends know that there was nothing of the warrior or the adventurer in Gumilyov. In Africa he was hot and bored, as a soldier he...