Nikolai Ivanovich Gneditsch

Portrait of the poet Nikolai Gneditsch (in front of a bust of Homer) by Mikhail Prokopjewitsch Vishnevetskij (1801–1874) in the A. Pushkin Memorial Museum , St. Petersburg

Grave in the Tikhvin cemetery

NI Gneditsch with Vasily Schukowski , Alexander Pushkin , Iwan Krylow . Illustration by Grigory Grigoryevich Tschernezow (1835)

The poet on the National Monument Thousand Years of Russia in Veliky Novgorod .

Nikolai Ivanovich Gneditsch ( Russian: Николай Иванович Гнедич ; scientific transliteration Nikolaj Ivanovič Gnedič ; born February 13, 1784 in Poltava , Russian Empire , died February 15, 1833 in Saint Petersburg ) was a Russian poet and translator ( Ilias von Homer ).

Live and act

Nikolai Gneditsch was born in Poltava to an impoverished aristocratic family and lost his parents at an early age. As a child, he contracted smallpox and went blind in his right eye. After a theological training at his place of birth and in Kharkov , he came to Moscow in March 1800 , where he continued his training with the later Decembrist Yuschnewski and then completed his studies at the Philosophical Faculty of Moscow University at the end of 1802. In Saint Petersburg he then became an official in the Ministry of Education.

He is the author of a well-known translation of Homer's Iliad and also translates Schiller , Shakespeare and Voltaire into Russian.

In his speech, given at the opening of the St. Petersburg Imperial Public Library , On the Reasons that Inhibit the Success of our Literature, he complained that the classical languages are being neglected in Russia.

With works such as the poem Roschdenije Gomera ( The Birth of Homer , 1816), the Idyll Rybaki ( The Fishermen , 1822) and in particular the speech O nanatschenii poeta ( On the calling of the poet , 1821) he became the “teacher of the Decabrist poets”.

He is buried in the Tikhvin Cemetery at the Alexander Nevsky Monastery in Saint Petersburg .

The pre-romantic poet was portrayed many times, including among the writers and artists on the national monument Thousand Years of Russia in front of the St. Sophia Cathedral in the Novgorod Kremlin .

His poems were included in the library of world literature (Khudoschestvennaja literatura) .

The author Mara Kazoknieks deals with the ancient elements in the work of the poets KN Batjuschkow (1787–1855), AA Delwig (1798–1831) and Gneditsch.

Works (selection)

Peruanez k ispanzu Перуанец к испанцу ( A Peruvian to a Spaniard ), 1804 (poem)
Obschtscheschitije Общежитие ( The Community ), 1804 (poem)
Roshdenije Gomera Рождение Гомера (The Birth of Homer), 1816
Rybaki Рыбаки ( The Fishermen ), 1822 (Idyll)
O nasnatschenii poeta О назначении поэта ( On the calling of the poet ), 1821 (speech)
Krassoty Ossiana Красоты Оссиана ( The Beauty of Ossian )
Na rough materi На гробе матери ( At the mother's grave )
K drugu К другу ( To a friend )

Translations

Iliad by Homer
Conspiracy of Fiesko by Friedrich Schiller
Tancrède of Voltaire
King Lear ( King Lear ) by Shakespeare

Individual evidence

↑ Russian Вишневецкий, Михаил Прокопьевич
↑ Russian Григорий Григорьевич Чернецов , scientific transliteration Grigorij Grigor'evič Černecov
↑ cf. Sieglinde Holzheid: The nominal compounds in the Iliad translation by NI Gnedič. Slavic Contributions, Volume 19. Sagner, 1969.
↑ Russian О причинах замедляющих успехи отечественной словесности / O pritschinach samedljajuschtschich uspechi otetschestwennoi slowesnosti , Wiss. Transliteration O pričinach zamedljajuščich uspechi otečestvennoj slovesnosti
↑ cf. Grigory Starikovsky: “Men in Cases”: The Perception of Classical Schools in Prerevolutionary Russia , in: A Handbook to Classical Reception in Eastern and Central Europe , edited by Zara Martirosova Torlone, Dana LaCourse Munteanu, Dorota Dutsch. 2017, p.457 .
↑ G. Schaumann : Gneditsch , in: Harri Jünger (ed.): Literatures of the peoples of the Soviet Union. Leipzig 1967, 2nd edition Leipzig 1968, p. 195.
↑ Mara Kazoknieks: Studies on the reception of antiquity among Russian poets at the beginning of the XIX. Century. (Ed. By Alois Schmaus). Munich, Otto Sagner, 1968 (= Slavic Contributions, Vol. 35).

literature

Brian James Baer; Natalia Olshanskaya: "Nikolai Gneditch (1784-1833)", in: Russian Writers on Translation: An Anthology. London / New York: Routledge, 2013
G. Schaumann: Gneditsch , in: Harri Jünger (ed.): Literatures of the peoples of the Soviet Union. Leipzig 1967, 2nd edition Leipzig 1968.

Web links

Wikisource: Николай Иванович Гнедич - sources and full texts

Commons : Nikolay Gnedich - Collection of images, videos and audio files

personal data
SURNAME	Gneditsch, Nikolai Ivanovich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Николай Иванович Гнедич (Russian); Nikolay Gnedich; Nikolaj Ivanovič Gnedič; Nicolas Gnéditch
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Russian poet and translator
DATE OF BIRTH	February 13, 1784
PLACE OF BIRTH	Poltava , Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH	February 15, 1833
Place of death	St. Petersburg

[1] Russian Вишневецкий, Михаил Прокопьевич

[2] Russian Григорий Григорьевич Чернецов , scientific transliteration Grigorij Grigor'evič Černecov

[3] . Sieglinde Holzheid: The nominal compounds in the Iliad translation by NI Gnedič. Slavic Contributions, Volume 19. Sagner, 1969.

[4] Russian О причинах замедляющих успехи отечественной словесности / O pritschinach samedljajuschtschich uspechi otetschestwennoi slowesnosti , Wiss. Transliteration O pričinach zamedljajuščich uspechi otečestvennoj slovesnosti

[5] . Grigory Starikovsky: “Men in Cases”: The Perception of Classical Schools in Prerevolutionary Russia , in: A Handbook to Classical Reception in Eastern and Central Europe , edited by Zara Martirosova Torlone, Dana LaCourse Munteanu, Dorota Dutsch. 2017, p.457 .

[6] G. Schaumann : Gneditsch , in: Harri Jünger (ed.): Literatures of the peoples of the Soviet Union. Leipzig 1967, 2nd edition Leipzig 1968, p. 195.

[7] Mara Kazoknieks: Studies on the reception of antiquity among Russian poets at the beginning of the XIX. Century. (Ed. By Alois Schmaus). Munich, Otto Sagner, 1968 (= Slavic Contributions, Vol. 35).