''Burning Buildings'' (russian: Горящие здания /pre-1917: Горящiя зданiя, translit=Goryashchiye zdaniya, subtitled: Lyric of the Modern Soul, russian: Лирика современной души) is the fifth book by

Russian Silver Age Silver Age (Сере́бряный век) is a term traditionally applied by Russian philologists to the last decade of the 19th century and first two or three decades of the 20th century. It was an exceptionally creative period in the history of ...

modernist poet

Konstantin Balmont Konstantin Dmitriyevich Balmont ( rus, Константи́н Дми́триевич Бальмо́нт, p=kənstɐnʲˈtʲin ˈdmʲitrʲɪjɪvʲɪdʑ bɐlʲˈmont, a=Konstantin Dmitriyevich Bal'mont.ru.vorb.oga; – 23 December 1942) was a Rus ...

. It was first published in 1900 by

Scorpion Scorpions are predatory arachnids of the order Scorpiones. They have eight legs, and are easily recognized by a pair of grasping pincers and a narrow, segmented tail, often carried in a characteristic forward curve over the back and always en ...

in Moscow and made its author famous across his country. The collection comprised 131 poems, most of them written in late 1899 at the house of the publisher and close friend Sergey Poliakov.Makogonenko, Darya. — Life and Destiny. The Select K.D.Balmont. Moscow, Pravda Publishers. 1990. — The ''Burning Buildings'' second edition came as part of an anthology entitled ''The Collection of Poems'' (Собрание стихов) which came out in 1904 in Moscow. The book's third edition was included into the ''Complete Poems'' (Moscow, Scorpion, 1908). Its fourth and fifth editions followed in 1914 and 1917, respectively.

History

As Balmont wrote in 1899, the whole collection has been created "under the spell of one single emotional wave" which turned his "life into a fairytale." According to critic M. Stakhova, "The author saw his artistic mission in "discovering new amalgams of ideas, colours and sounds." His main ideology in those times revolved around the idea of creating "a lyric of the modern soul," the one with many facets, but also self-liberation and self-knowledge." Balmont was apparently looking for a new character, 'genius of Elements' and 'superhero'. Yet, sending the book to

Leo Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich TolstoyTolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; russian: link=no, Лев Николаевич Толстой,In Tolstoy's day, his name was written as in pre-refor ...

, he wrote: "This is but one long scream of a soul, torn apart, lowly and, if you like, ugly. But I'll repudiate not a single page of it, not until I cease loving ugliness no lesser than I love harmony."

Reception

Prince Alexander Urusov whose opinion was crucial for Balmont, did not appreciate the poet's new, aggressive brand of modernism, abhorring what he called "the extremes of decadence." Nikolai Gumilyov greeted Balmont's new development; in the article called "Leaders of the New School", praised the emergence of "all those hunchbacks, demons, all things beastly and perverse that have swept away the horde of old words, all those romances and dreaming, girls and boys, flowers and sunrises."

References

{{Konstantin Balmont 1900 poetry books Russian poetry collections Scorpion (publishing house) books Poetry by Konstantin Balmont