'Never have I wanted to be understood so much as in this poem, ' said
Mayakovsky of his 3,000 line epic Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Written
immediately after the death of Lenin's in 1924, it proudly and
passionately sets the story of the Bolshevik leader's life against the
history of capitalism and the trajectory of Soviet communism. By turns
declamatory, lyrical, journalistic and colloquial, the poem is an
extraordinary record of the utopian excitement of the early years of the
Revolution - as well a warning that Lenin should not become an icon. It
was Mayakovsky's most significant work; no other book of his was ever
printed in such large numbers. A public reading of the poem at the
Bolshoi Theatre in 1930 received a 20 minute standing ovation.
Out of print in English for over thirty years, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
remains relatively unknown in the west, where Mayakovsky is
predominantly regarded as a tortured love poet. Based on Dorian
Rottenberg's 1967 translation, Rosy Carrick's new bi-lingual edition of
the poem firmly re-establishes Mayakovsky's reputation as one the most
important political poets of the twentieth century.