Ivan Zhdanov
b. 1948

Ivan Zhdanov was born in Siberia, the ninth child in a peasant family. After studying at Barnaul Agricultural College, he entered Moscow State University as a student of journalism but was soon expelled for being politically immature. He completed his education at Barnaul Institute of Education. In 1979, a few poems were published in a literary almanac. Zhdanov was one of the leaders of the Metarealists, a group of poets that included Alexey Parschikov and Vladimir Yeremenko. His first collection, Portret (Portrait), was published in 1982, and was violently criticized by Soviet loyalist critics. His next collection, Nerazmennoe Nebo (The Inconvertible Sky) appeared in 1990; an English translation came 7 years later. His best work, Fotorobot Zapretnogo Mira (Photorobot of a Forbidden World) was published in 1997, he won the Apollon Grigoriev Prize in the same year.  In 1988, he was awarded Andrey Bely Prize, which is the oldest independent literary prize awarded in Russia.

The Inconvertible Sky

1997
Paperback
56 p.

Zhdanov emerged in the early 1980s as one of the leading Russian poets of his generation, admired by the traditionalists and the avant-garde alike. Zhdanov's work has been honored by poets and critics around the world. 

Translated from the Russian by John High and Patrick Henry

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