Alexander Odoyevsky

Alexander Odoevsky

Alexander Ivanovich Odoevsky
Born	8 December 1802 Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire
Died	22 October 1839 aoremovetag(aged 36) Psezuape, Russian Empire
Nationality	Russian
Genres	poetry, playwright
Notable work(s)	Prophetic strings' igniting sounds

Alexander Ivanovich Odoevsky (Алекса′ндр Ива′нович Одо′евский, November 26 (December 8), 1802, Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire – October 10 (22) or August 15 (27), 1839, Psezuape, now Lazarevskoe, Sochi, Russia) was a Russian poet and playwright, one of the leading figures of the 1825 Decembrist revolt. One single Odoyevsky's line, "A spark will start a flame" (Iz i′skry vozgori′tsa pla′mya) came down in history as a long-lasting slogan of the Russian revolutionary movement. Its been chosen as a motto (signed: "Decembrists' reply to Pushkin") to the Lenin-founded newspaper, and has given it its title: Iskra (Spark).

Biography

Alexander Odoevsky was born in Saint Petersburg, to an old family of Russian aristocrats. He received high quality home education and in 1821 joined the military. One of his best friends and the major influence was Aleksander Griboyedov, his relative. By 1825 Odoevsky has been writing poetry already, but very few of his works remained, The Ball (1825), a high society life critique, being one of them.

In the late 1824 Odoyevsky joined the secret Northern Society to become part of its most radical flank. On December 13, 1825, he supported Kondraty Ryleev who expressed his will to "give their lives to the first ever attempt to bring freedom to Russia". On the day of December 14 (25) Odoyevsky was one of the mutineers' commanders in the Senate Square where 3 thousand military men gathered to refuse to swear allegiance to the new tsar, Nicholas I of Russia, proclaiming instead their loyalty to Constantine Pavlovich and the Constitution. After the coup's failure he's been arrested, sent to the Petropavlovskaya fortress, later convicted to hard labour and deported to Siberia. Odoevsky's best-known poems, including Prophetic strings igniting sounds (Strun ve′shchikh pla′mennye zvu′ki) where his famous "A spark will start a flame" line has come from, were written in the late 1820s-early 1830s, first in the Petersburg prison, then at a Siberian factory he's been sent to labour at.

In the early 1833 Odoyevsky was relieved from the hard labour sentence and sent to a settlement, first in Irkutsk, then Tobolsk. In August 1837 he found himself amongst several Decembrists who, by the special Nikolai I decree, have been transferred to serve at the Caucasus. As a Nizhegorodsky dragoon regiment sentry, he forged great friendship with Mikhail Lermontov, an officer there. It was the latter who responded to the news of Odoyevsky's death in 1839 with a tribute Knew him. We wandered side by side… that has become famous in its own right.

In Odoyevsky's lifetime only the play Saint Bernard has been published (in Sovremennik 1838, Vol.X). In 1862 in Leipzig the first book of his poetry collection came out. Its fuller version, including the author's biography, was published in 1883 in Saint Petersburg.

References

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