Speak Memory: V.S. Yanovsky's Links to Nabokov, Auden and Brodsky

• In Event: Russophone Émigré Culture as Part of the World Intellectual Legacy

Abstract

This presentation is based on the speaker's memories of the Russian emigre writer V.S. Yanovsky, his step-father, Isabella Levitin Yanovsky, his mother, and the renowned British-American poet, W.H. Auden. This talk will present snatches of memory concerning V.S. Yanovsky’s connections with three great 20th century figures, Nabokov, whom he hardly knew personally, W. H. Auden, the great Anglo-American poet who was a close friend for thirty years and whom he drove to the airport when Auden abandoned America, and Joseph Brodsky, for whose future success on the world stage he played an important, though quite unknown role.

Author

• Alexis Levitin, SUNY Plattsburgh