Poet, critic, and mentor, Innokentii Annensky remains less well known than his considerable and wide-ranging achievements merit. Anna Andreevna Akhmatova considered Annensky her teacher and felt he had influenced an entire generation of Russian poets. He was one of the best Russian literary critics, although his complete critical heritage is still inaccessible--whether lost or in editions that are, for all intents and purposes, unavailable. He also completed the standard translation of Euripides' tragedies. Because of his age at the time that the movement came into vogue (late nineteenth century), he could have been called the father of Russian Symbolism, but in fact he was hardly noticed by the Symbolists. Instead, the Acmeists were the first to recognize him, and they immediately enlisted him as their teacher. By the time his first book of poetry and his first volume of critical prose appeared--in 1904 and 1906, respectively--for some writers, such as...