Joseph Brodsky (May 24, 1940 – January 28, 1996), born Iosif Aleksandrovich Brodsky (Russian:Ио́сиф Алекса́ндрович Бро́дский) was a Russian-American poet, winner of the 1987 Nobel Prize in Literature, and Poet Laureate of the United States for 1991-1992. May 24 is the 144th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (145th in leap years). ... 1940 was a leap year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ... January 28 is the 28th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1996 is a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ... Poets are authors of poems, or of other forms of poetry such as dramatic verse. ... 1987 is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Nobel Prize in literature is awarded annually to an author from any country who has produced the most outstanding work of an idealistic tendency. The work in this case generally refers to an authors work as a whole, not to any individual work, though individual works are sometimes... A Poet Laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government and often expected to compose poems for state occasions and other government events. ... 1991 is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1992 is a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Joseph Brodsky

Joseph Brodsky This work is copyrighted. ...

Life

Young Joseph Brodsky

Brodsky was born in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, the son of a Jewish photographer. In the early childhood he survived the Siege of Leningrad. When he was fifteen, after the eighth grade, Brodsky left school. He worked at a wide variety of jobs, including a hospital, a morgue, a factory, a ship boiler room, and a geological expedition. Image:Brodsky young. ... Image:Brodsky young. ... Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea. ... Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the delta of the river Neva at the east end of the Gulf of Finland... The word Jew ( Hebrew: יהודי) is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or someone of Jewish descent with a connection to Jewish culture or ethnicity and often a combination of these attributes. ... Siege of Leningrad Conflict World War II Date September 8, 1941 - January 18, 1944 Place Leningrad, USSR Result Soviet victory The Siege of Leningrad (today Saint Petersburg), during World War II, lasted from September 8, 1941, to January 18, 1944. ...

Brodsky taught himself English and Polish, acquired deep interest in classical philosophy, religion, mythology, English and American poetry and began writing poetry in 1957. He had no degree in the liberal arts. Later in life he admitted that he picked up books from anywhere he could find them, including even garbage dumps. The young Brodsky was encouraged and influenced by the poet Anna Akhmatova who called some of his verses "enchanting". The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... The term philosophy derives from a combination of the Greek words philos meaning love and sophia meaning wisdom. ... Mythology is the study of myths: stories of a particular culture that it believes to be true and that feature a specific religious or belief system. ... 1957 was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... In the history of education, the seven liberal arts comprise two groups of studies, the trivium and the quadrivium. ... Anna Akhmatova by Zinaida Serebryakova,1922 Anna Akhmatova (Анна Ахматова, Анна Андреевна Горенко, June 23, 1889 (June 11, Old Style and also St. ...

In 1963 he was charged with parasitism ("тунеядство") by the Soviet authorities. A famous excerpt from the transcript of his trial (smuggled to the West): 1963 was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will take you to calendar). ... The Nazi propaganda poster titled New People reads: This person suffering from hereditary defects costs the people 60,000 Reichmarks during his lifetime. ... The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) (Russian: (СССР)   listen?; tr. ... West is most commonly a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. ...

Judge: "Who has decided that you're a poet? Who has ranked you as a poet? Have you studied poetry at an institution? Have you prepared for a university course where you're taught to write poetry?"

Brodsky: "I don't think poetry comes from an education."

Judge: "Well then, where does it come from?"

Brodsky: "I think that it comes from God."

For his parasitism Brodsky was sentenced to five years of hard labor in internal exile and served 18 months in Archangelsk region. The sentence was commuted in 1965 after prominent Soviet literary figures protested. The term God (capitalized in English language as a proper noun) is often used to refer to a Supreme Being. ... Murmansk, Archangelsk, Dikson, Tiksi, on the Arctic Ocean The city of Arkhangelsk (Арха́нгельск, formerly in English Archangel) lies on the Northern Dvina River (Се́верная Двина́) near its exit into the White Sea in the far north of European Russia. ... 1965 was a common year starting on Friday (link goes to calendar). ...

As the 1960s Khrushchev Thaw period ended, only four of his poems were published in the Soviet Union. Most of his work has appeared only in the West. On June 4, 1972 Brodsky was exiled and became a U.S. citizen in 1977. He was a tenured professor at Mount Holyoke College. The 1960s, or The Sixties, in its most obvious sense refers to the decade between 1960 and 1969, but the expression has taken on a wider meaning over the past twenty years. ... In Soviet history, Kruschevs Thaw or Khrushchev Thaw refers to the period between the end of 1950s and the beginning of 1960s, when repressions and censorship reached a low point. ... West is most commonly a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography. ... June 4 is the 155th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (156th in leap years), with 210 days remaining. ... 1972 was a leap year that started on a Saturday. ... United States citizenship is membership of the United States political system. ... 1977 was a common year starting on Saturday (the link is to a full 1977 calendar). ... Mount Holyoke College, a liberal arts college in South Hadley, Massachusetts, is the oldest continuing institution of womens higher education in the world. ...

Joseph Brodsky

He achieved major successes in his career as an English language poet. Image:Brodsky1wb. ... Image:Brodsky1wb. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...

Brodsky died of a heart attack in his New York City apartment and was buried at Isola di San Michele cemetery in Venice, Italy. Midtown Manhattan, looking north from the Empire State Building, 2005 New York City (officially named the City of New York) is the most populous city in the United States, and is at the center of international finance, politics, communications, music, fashion, and culture. ... San Michele, nicknamed The Island of the Dead, is the cemetery island of Venice. ... Location within Italy Venice (Italian Venezia), the city of canals, is the capital of the region of Veneto and of the province of Venice, 45°26′ N 12°19′ E, population 271,663 (census estimate 2004-01-01). ...

Works

Poetry (English)

• A Part of Speech (1977)
• To Urania (1984)
• So Forth (1996)
• Collected Poems in English (2000)
• Nativity Poems (2001)

The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... 1977 was a common year starting on Saturday (the link is to a full 1977 calendar). ... 1984 is a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1996 is a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ... 2000 is a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 2001: A Space Odyssey Dr. Dre 2001 2001 is a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Essays (English)

• Less Than One (1986)
• Watermark (1992)
• On Grief and Reason (1996)

The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... 1986 is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1992 is a leap year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... 1996 is a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...

Plays (English)

• Marbles (1986)

The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... 1986 is a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

see also

• St. Petersburg

Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the delta of the river Neva at the east end of the Gulf of Finland...

External link

• Wikiquote: Joseph Brodsky
• biographical information about Brodsky
• Short Biography
• Some prose and essays by Brodsky in Russian
• 21 English poems by Brodsky
• Last published interview