Man (poem)

The poem "Man", the last poem written by Vladimir Mayakovsky before the Great October Revolution. Work on the work was begun in 1916 and completed in the first half of 1917. In his autobiography, the poet testifies that the poem was completed after the poem "War and Peace." He read it at the end of January 1918 at an evening in the apartment of the poet V. Amari, where the whole color of Russian poetry was present: K. Balmont, Vyach. Ivanov, A. Bely, D. Burliuk, V. Kamensky, I. Erenburg, V. Khodasevich, M. Tsvetaeva, B. Pasternak, A. Tolstoy, P. Antokolsky, V. Inber, Hindu poet Sura-vardi and others.

“Mayakovsky barely finished - A. Bely, pale from the experience, got up and said that he couldn’t even imagine that a poem could be written in Russia at that time, so powerful in its depth of conception and fulfillment that this thing was moved to a huge distance "all world literature, etc."

Al Mikhailov

A separate book, Man, was published by ASIS in February 1918 with the subtitle “thing” (with which Vladimir Mayakovsky replaced the definition of the genre: a poem is a big thing). ^[one]

Actually, the whole poem "Man" - even by its name - is a passionate, but somewhat recklessly desperate protest ... Reality does not make it possible to evaluate human forces so optimistically.
Prikhodovskaya Ekaterina Anatolyevna. ^[2]

The plot is built on the model of the Gospel and consists of the following parts: Mayakovsky’s Christmas, Mayakovsky’s Life, Mayakovsky’s Passion, Mayakovsky’s Ascension, Mayakovsky in Heaven, Mayakovsky’s Return, and Mayakovsky Vekam. The main character is a hybrid of a romantic superman and Mayakovsky himself. The first fights against world evil and speaks on an equal footing with Cosmos, the second passes through ordinary everyday conflicts.

"Christmas" extols man as the "crown of creation" (a theme common to the second part of "Clouds in the Pants" and the poem "War and Peace") and glorifies his mind and spirit:

That I raised my heart with a flag.

An unprecedented miracle of the twentieth century!

And the pilgrims departed from the sepulcher of the Lord.

The ancient Mecca was empty of the faithful.

"Life" is filled with suffering from the fact that this person is bogged down in minor everyday conflicts and is under the authority of the Lord of Everything (allegory of money). “Passion” introduces an element of suffering from unrequited love and satirically mentions “Cloud” and “Flute”. "Ascension" introduces a suicide motive from a combination of mental suffering, worldly disorder, and the Faustian desire to be on a par with the Universe:

And the heart breaks to a shot

And the throat raves with a razor.

In rambling ravings about a demon

My longing is growing.

Follows me, beckons to the water,

A ramp leads to the roofs.

Through death, the poet turns into a superman and ascends into space, where he lives, merging with cosmic forces, while hundreds of years pass on Earth. "Return" brings him back to Earth. Mayakovsky Century describes a hero obsessed with jealousy:

I am again recognized by earthly torment

Long live my madness again!

He learns that after his suicide, “she” also committed suicide:

"He shot himself here at the door of his beloved"

...

"Where did she go?" "There is a legend: to him from the window.

And so the body was lying on the body. "

By its finale, the poem affirms the meaninglessness of life and the tragedy of Man. Despite all his “greatness”, he, nevertheless, is powerless before a tragic love:

And only my pain is sharper -

I stand, entwined with fire

On a fire that is not burning

Unthinkable love.

The poem ends with a line from the memorial prayer "With the saints repose", when the hero again ascends to heaven.

• Mayakovsky V.V. Complete Works: In 13 vol. / USSR Academy of Sciences. Institute of World Lite. them. A. M. Gorky. - M .: State. publishing house lit., 1955-1961.
• Mayakovsky V.V. Complete Works: In 13 vol. / Vol. 1. [Poems, tragedy, poems and articles of 1912-1917] / Prep. text and note. V. A. Katanyan; Ed. Z. Paperny. - M .: State. publishing house lit., 1955. - 464 p.

• Vladimir Mayakovsky. Volume 1. Poems, poems, articles 1912-1917 (neopr.) . Ruslit.traumlibrary.net. Archived on September 4, 2013.