Anna Barkova

Anna Barkova
Gulag photo of Barkova
Born	July 16, 1901(1901-07-16) Ivanovo, Russia
Died	April 29, 1976(1976-04-29) (aged 74) Moscow, Soviet Union

Anna Alexandrovna Barkova (Russian: А́нна Алекса́ндровна Барко́ва), July 16, 1901 – April 29, 1976, was a Soviet poet, journalist, playwright, essayist, memoirist, and writer of fiction. She was imprisoned for more than 20 years in the Gulag.

Early life

Anna was born into the family of a private school janitor in the textile town of Ivanovo in 1901. She was allowed to attend the school because of her father's position, a rare opportunity for a young working class girl in pre-revolutionary Russia.^[1][2]

In 1918 she enrolled as a member of the Circle of Genuine Proletarian Poets, a writers group based in Ivanovo.^[2] Soon after joining she began to write short pieces for the group's paper The Land of the Workers. She also published poetry in the paper under the pseudonym Kalika perekhozhaia ("the wandering cripple"), a name given to blind or maimed singers who went from village to village singing devotional ballads to obtain alms.^[1]

Literary work

Anna's early poetry attracted the attention of the Bolshevik literary establishment, including the leading critic Aleksandr Voronsky and the Commisar of Enlightenment Anatoly Lunacharsky. Lunacharsky became her patron,^[2][3] and in 1922 she moved to Moscow to act as his secretary. Also in 1922 her first poetry collection Woman was published with a forward by Lunacharsky. In 1923 her play Nastasya Bonfire was published.^[1]

She also attended the writer's school in Moscow directed by Valery Bryusov, and wrote for his paper Print and Revolution. Later, Maria Ulyanova, the sister of Vladimir Lenin, found Anna a position at the paper Pravda, and helped her to put together a second collection of poems that was never published.^[1]

Imprisonment and exile

She became increasingly disillusioned with Soviet life in the late 1920s. Her poems of the early 1930s were highly critical of Soviet life and institutions.^[3] In 1934 Anna was denounced and arrested, and some of her poetry was used against her as evidence. She was sentenced to five years imprisonment. She endured repeat arrests in 1947 and 1956, and served 9 years in the Gulag for each arrest. She also suffered 2 long periods of exile from 1939 to 1947 and from 1965 to 1967.^[2] In 1967 she was allowed to return to Moscow after the intervention of a group of writers led by Alexander Tvardovsky and Konstantin Fedin. She lived out the remainder of her life in relative poverty in a communal flat in the Garden Ring, where she preserved her enthusiasm for books, friends, and conversation.^[1][3]

Notes

English translations

• A Few Autobiographical Facts and Tatar Anguish, (poems), from An Anthology of Russian Women's Writing, 1777-1992, Oxford, 1994.

References

v t e Soviet dissidents Andrei Amalrik Mykola Bakay Anna Barkova Vasile Bătrânac Yuri Bezmenov Larisa Bogoraz Yelena Bonner Leonid Borodin Alexei Borovoi Vladimir Bougrine Joseph Brodsky Vladimir Bukovsky Valery Chalidze Lev Chernyi Viacheslav Chornovil Lydia Chukovskaya Yuli Daniel Vadim Delaunay David Devdariani Mihai Dolgan Ivan Drach Alexander Esenin-Volpin Eliyahu Essas Benjamin Fain Viktor Fainberg Moysey Fishbein Ilya Gabay Yuri Galanskov Alexander Galich Zviad Gamsakhurdia Alexander Ginzburg Yevgenia Ginzburg Semyon Gluzman Natalya Gorbanevskaya Pyotr Grigorenko Vasily Grossman Paruyr Hayrikyan Oleksa Hirnyk Mykola Horbal Grigory Isayev Boris Kagarlitsky Romas Kalanta Sofiya Kalistratova Ihor Kalynets Vitaliy Kalynychenko Dina Kaminskaya Ivan Kandyba Ephraim Kholmyansky Yuliy Kim Lev Kopelev Boris Korczak Anatoly Koryagin Merab Kostava Lina Kostenko Sergei Kovalev Zoya Krakhmalnikova Jüri Kukk Eduard Kuznetsov Anatoly Kuznetsov Yaroslav Lesiv Eduard Limonov Pavel Litvinov Levko Lukyanenko Kronid Lyubarsky Michail J. Makarenko Guram Mamulia Nadezhda Mandelstam Osip Mandelstam Anatoly Marchenko Valeriy Marchenko Myroslav Marynovych Roy Medvedev Zhores Medvedev Naum Meiman Yosef Mendelevitch Ion Moraru Viktor Muravin Mustafa Abdülcemil Qırımoğlu Lev Navrozov Viktor Nekipelov Alexander Nekrich Valeria Novodvorskaya Vasile Odobescu Yuri Orlov Boris Pasternak Yekaterina Peshkova Leonid Plyushch Alexandr Podrabinek Grigory Pomerants Irina Ratushinskaya Maria Rozanova Mykola Rudenko Ain Saar Andrei Sakharov Dmitri Savitski Shmuel Schneurson Efraim Sevela Igor Shafarevich Varlam Shalamov Vladimir Shelkov Danylo Shumuk Andrei Sinyavsky Victor Sokolov Sergei Soldatov Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Vladimir Strelnikov Vasyl Stus Sultan Galiev Nadiya Svitlychna Vasyl Symonenko Les Tanyuk Alexander Tarasov Valery Tarsis Enn Tarto Georgi Vins Georgi Vladimov Vladimir Voinovich Michael Voslenski Gleb Yakunin Yevgeny Zamyatin Aleksandr Zinovyev Yosyf Zisels