Poetics of Boris Gissi’s Poems: On the History of the Literary Process of Novo-Nikolaevsk during the Civil War

Abstract

Currently, many of the names and fates of representatives of regional literature of the early 20th century are forgotten, their texts are unfamiliar to a wide readership. However, among them there are often really talented and original authors. The article is devoted to the work of the forgotten poet Boris Gissi, who was published in Siberian newspapers during the civil war. We have minimal biographical information about Boris Gissi. The article analyzes the poetics of his poems, published in the Novo-Nikolaevsk’s newspaper “Russian Speech” in 1919. At the moment, we know 39 poems of the poet, among them are two cycles of “Songs from a distant Volga” and “Flowers”. The first publications of Boris Gissi known to us date back to 1902. In the collection “Dawn” with the subtitle “Collection of Russian writers. Book Two” published three of his works. In the works of Gissi, there are four thematic areas: religious and patriotic poetry, poems about nature and – separately – poems dedicated to the Volga River. Throughout his work in the newspaper “Russian Speech” Gissi published his texts using thematic blocks with minor deviations. Gissi followed the poetic canon of the Russian classics of the 19th century, and his poetics developed outside the influence of the modernist currents contemporary to him. He was the epigone of literature which appeared a hundred years ago concerning to his modernity. In his work there is some dynamics: from texts devoted to nature and the Volga River to religious and patriotic poetry. His patriotic and religious poems become more plot, through it more author's individuality is seen than through lyrical themes. Developing a religious theme in his poetry, Gissi uses evangelical plots, the source of his inspiration is the Gospel of Luke. The poems of 1902 are landscape sketches, which are perceived as a series of enumerations, largely due to the fact that the poet uses simple rhymes and a simple sentence structure. He used verbal rhymes without feeling banal. In the texts published in Novo-Nikolaevsk, Gissi begins to experiment with rhyme, thinks over the rhythmic composition of poems, but at the same time, one can observe rhythmic disruptions, which can only be explained as a student's nature of his poetry. His work is part of the literary process of Novo-Nikolaevsk during the years of the Civil war, if only because he was one of the few actively printed poets.