SOURCE: “The Poet of Thought in ‘Vse mysl’ da mysl’!…’: Truth in Boratynskij's Poetry,” in Bulletin of the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association, Vol. 35, No. 1, 1981, pp. 31-42.

In the following essay, Burton explores Baratynsky's expression of the pain and emotional exposure caused by trying to remain true to his poetic vision, focusing on the poem “Vse mysl’ da mysl’!…”

In Boratynskij's early and well-known poem “Bogdanovicu” (“To Bogdanovic,” 1824) the poet, at the zenith of his fame, enthusiastically announces his readiness to sacrifice the beauty of his verse for truth: “V zamenu krasoty, daju stixam moim / Ja silu istiny” (I give the power of truth, in place of beauty, to my verse).¹ A few years later, in 1827, a less famous but more mature and confident poet alters his lines to underscore not only the likelihood of the perfect harmony of truth and beauty, but to indicate further that the...