Maksim Bahdanovich

Maksim Bahdanovič

Maksim Petrovich Adama Bahdanowitsch (also Maxim Bogdanovich or Maxim Bogdanowicz ; Belarusian Максім Адамавіч Багдановіч ; born November 27 ^{. Jul} / 9. December  1891 ^greg. In Minsk ; † May 12 ^jul. / 25 May  1917 ^greg. In Yalta ) was a Belarusian poet, writer, translator and publicist, who, along with Jakub Kolas and Janka Kupala, is considered one of the main characters of the Belarusian rebirth (Belarus: Адраджэнне ) at the beginning of the 20th century.

life and work

Bahdanovich was born in Minsk in 1891. In 1896 the family left Belarus (which at that time still belonged to the Russian Empire ) and moved to Nizhny Novgorod in Russia. Here a close friendship developed between the poet's father and Maxim Gorky , which was to have an impact on the young Maxim as well.

Although Bahdanowitsch lived far away from the Belarusian-speaking area and also attended Russian schools and later also the Russian-language legal lyceum in Yaroslavl , he was so fascinated by the language of his home region that he subscribed to Belarusian newspapers (for example , Nascha Niwa, which appeared in Vilnius ) and from 1907 also published poems in Belarusian. Bahdanowitsch, who was just as familiar with Russian culture as it was with Belarusian culture, also published in Russian newspapers and magazines and worked for a while in the editorial team of the Yaroslavl newspaper Golos ("The Voice").

After graduating from high school in 1911, he visited his homeland again for the first time, especially Vilnius, the spiritual and cultural center of the Belarusian rebirth movement, and during this time made the acquaintance of various Belarusian poets and writers of the time, including Janka Kupala.

In 1914, Bahndanowitsch's only book of poetry published during his lifetime was published in Vilnius with the title Вянок ( Eng . "The wreath").

After graduating from the Lyceum in 1916, Bahdanovich returned to Minsk for good. Having suffered from tuberculosis since 1909, Bahndanovich's condition deteriorated more and more during this time. In the same year he traveled to the Crimea to recover , where he died in May of the following year. Bahdanovich was buried in the Yalta Municipal Cemetery.

plant

Bahdanowitsch achieved fame primarily as a poet. But he also wrote prose, for example short stories and fairy tales, translated into Belarusian from various languages ​​(especially from Russian, Polish, German, Ukrainian, Latin and French). His adaptations by Paul Verlaine , Heinrich Heine , Alexander Puschkin , Horaz and Ovid deserve special mention here. He translated Belarusian and Ukrainian texts into Russian, in particular by Janka Kupala, Taras Shevchenko and Iwan Franko . In addition, Bahdanowitsch left a rich journalistic work.

With his work Bahdanowitsch had a formative influence on the development of the modern Belarusian literary language.

Web links

Commons : Maksim Bahdanowitsch  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Maksim Bahdanowitsch in the catalog of the German National Library
• Selected works (Belarusian and other languages)
• Nascha Niwa (Belarusian)
• Belarusian Anthology - A Reading Book (Belarusian / German)
• Biography , Museum of Literature (Russian)