Pavel Davidovich Kogan (russian: Па́вел Дави́дович Кога́н; 7 July 1918,

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

– 23 September 1942, near

Novorossiysk Novorossiysk ( rus, Новоросси́йск, p=nəvərɐˈsʲijsk; ady, ЦIэмэз, translit=Chəməz, p=t͡sʼɜmɜz) is a city in Krasnodar Krai, Russia. It is one of the largest ports on the Black Sea. It is one of the few cities hono ...

) was a Jewish

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

poet who died fighting as a soldier in the Second World War.

Life

Though born in

, Pavel and his family moved to

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

in 1922. He studied at the

Maxim Gorky Literature Institute The Maxim Gorky Literature Institute (russian: Литературный институт им. А. М. Горького) is an institution of higher education in Moscow. It is located at 25 Tverskoy Boulevard in central Moscow. History The insti ...

and at the Moscow Institute of History, Philosophy and Literature. Kogan twice hiked the trails of central

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

. He learned about

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

while on a geological expedition to

Armenia Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ''Ox ...

. Returning immediately to Moscow, he tried to enlist in the army, but was turned down due to his poor health. Undeterred, he finished a series of courses and became a

military interpreter An interpreter officer or army interpreter is a commissioned officer of an armed force, who interprets and/or translates to facilitate military operation. Interpreter officers are used extensively in multinational operations in which two or more ...

. In 1942, Kogan was killed by the Germans while leading a reconnaissance mission, aged 24. All of his poems were published posthumously. They became famous during the

Khrushchev Thaw The Khrushchev Thaw ( rus, хрущёвская о́ттепель, r=khrushchovskaya ottepel, p=xrʊˈɕːɵfskəjə ˈotʲ:ɪpʲɪlʲ or simply ''ottepel'')William Taubman, Khrushchev: The Man and His Era, London: Free Press, 2004 is the period ...

, mainly due to a popular song called "Brigantina" (''Brigantine'', 1937) which was written using his lyrics.

References

External links

Biography and list of Kogan's poems in Russian
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kogan, Pavel 1918 births 1942 deaths Jewish poets Poets from Kyiv Soviet military personnel killed in World War II Soviet poets Soviet male writers Ukrainian Jews Soviet Jews in the military