Vazha-Pshavela
Encyclopedia
Vazha-Pshavela is the pen-name of the Georgian
poet and writer Luka P. Razikashvili , a classic of the new Georgian literature.
mountainous province in Eastern Georgia) in a family of clergyman. He graduated from the Pedagogical Seminary in Gori
1882, where he became close to Georgian populists (narodniki). Then 1883 entered Law Department of St. Petersburg University (Russia
) as a non-credit student, but returned to Georgia in 1884 due to financial restraints. Worked as a teacher of Georgian language
. He was also a famous representative of a National-Liberation movement of Georgia.
Vazha-Pshavela started his literature activities in mid-1880s. In his works, he portrayed everyday life and psychology of his contemporary Pshavs. Vazha-Pshavela is the author of many world-class literary works - 36 epics, about 400 poems ("Aluda Ketelauri", "Bakhtrioni", "Gogotur and Apshina", "Host and Guest", "Snake eater", "Eteri", "Mindia", etc.), plays, and stories, as well as ethnographic, journalistic, and critic articles. He pictured the highlanders' life almost exactly ethnographically and still recreated an entire world of mythological concepts. In his poetry, the poet addressed the heroic past of his people and appealed to the struggle against external and internal enemies (poems A Wounded Snow Leopard (1890), A Letter of a Pshav Soldier to His Mother (1915), etc.).
In his best epic compositions, Vazha-Pshavela exposed the problems of interaction between an individual and a society, a human and nature, love and duty before the nation. A conflict between an individual and a temi (community) is depicted in epics Aluda Ketelauri (1888, Russian translation, 1939) and Guest and Host (1893, Russian translation 1935); its characters choose against some obsolete laws of their community.
The poet's preferences are strong-willed people, their dignity, and zeal for freedom. The same themes are touched in the play The Rejected One (1894). Vazha-Pshavela idealized the Pshavs' old rituals, their purity, and non-degeneracy with the "false civilization". The wise man Mindia in the epic Snake-Eater (1901, Russian translation 1934) dies because he cannot reconcile his ideals with the needs of his family and society. The epic Bakhtrioni (1892, Russian translation 1943) narrates on participation of the Georgian highlander tribes in the uprising of Kakheti
(East Georgia) against the Iranian subjugators in 1659.
As a nature admirer, Vazha-Pshavela knows no comparison in Georgian poetry. His landscapes are full of motion and internal conflicts. The language is saturated with all the riches of his native language, and yet this is an impeccably exact literary language. Thanks to excellent translations into Russian (by Nikolay Zabolotsky
, V. Derzhavin, Boris Pasternak
, S. Spassky, and others), translarions into English (by Donald Rayfield
, Venera Urushadze, Lela Jgerenaia, Nino Ramishvili, and others), translarions into French (by Gaston Bouatchidzé
), translations into German (by Yolanda Marchev, Steffi Chotiwari-Jünger).
Vazha-Pshavela's compositions became available to representatives of other nationalities of the ex-USSR.
Vazha-Pshavela died in Tiflis on July 10, 1915. Buried ibidem, in the Pantheon of the Mtatsminda Mountain
. He was a representative of a National-Liberation movement of Georgia.
Poems and narrative stories of Vazha-Pshavela are published in more than 20 languages.
The mountaineer poet Vazha-Pshavela is indeed, as Donald Rayfield writes,‘qualitatively of a greater magnitude than any other Georgian writer’.
The five epic poems of Vazha-Pshavela ('Aluda Ketelauri' (1888), 'Bakhtrioni' (1892), 'Host and Guest' (1893), 'The avenger of the blood' (1897), 'Snake eater' (1901)) is based on the principle Golden ratio
, thus this poems resembles the works of Ancient and Renaissance authors.
Georgia (country)
Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...
poet and writer Luka P. Razikashvili , a classic of the new Georgian literature.
The biography
Vazha-Pshavela was born in a small village Chargali (PshaviPshavi
Pshavi is a small historic-geographic area in Georgia, included in today’s Mtskheta-Mtianeti region and laying chiefly on the southern foothills of the Greater Caucasus mountains along Aragvi River and the lower Iori River. The Pshavs, who are locally called the Pshaveli, speak a Georgian dialect...
mountainous province in Eastern Georgia) in a family of clergyman. He graduated from the Pedagogical Seminary in Gori
Transcaucasian Teachers Seminary
The Transcaucasian Teachers Seminary in Gori was a 4-year specialized secondary school in the Russian Empire in 1876–1917 aimed at professional training of primary school teachers.-History:...
1882, where he became close to Georgian populists (narodniki). Then 1883 entered Law Department of St. Petersburg University (Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
) as a non-credit student, but returned to Georgia in 1884 due to financial restraints. Worked as a teacher of Georgian language
Georgian language
Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 4 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...
. He was also a famous representative of a National-Liberation movement of Georgia.
Vazha-Pshavela started his literature activities in mid-1880s. In his works, he portrayed everyday life and psychology of his contemporary Pshavs. Vazha-Pshavela is the author of many world-class literary works - 36 epics, about 400 poems ("Aluda Ketelauri", "Bakhtrioni", "Gogotur and Apshina", "Host and Guest", "Snake eater", "Eteri", "Mindia", etc.), plays, and stories, as well as ethnographic, journalistic, and critic articles. He pictured the highlanders' life almost exactly ethnographically and still recreated an entire world of mythological concepts. In his poetry, the poet addressed the heroic past of his people and appealed to the struggle against external and internal enemies (poems A Wounded Snow Leopard (1890), A Letter of a Pshav Soldier to His Mother (1915), etc.).
In his best epic compositions, Vazha-Pshavela exposed the problems of interaction between an individual and a society, a human and nature, love and duty before the nation. A conflict between an individual and a temi (community) is depicted in epics Aluda Ketelauri (1888, Russian translation, 1939) and Guest and Host (1893, Russian translation 1935); its characters choose against some obsolete laws of their community.
Kakheti
Kakheti is a historical province in Eastern Georgia inhabited by Kakhetians who speak a local dialect of Georgian. It is bordered by the small mountainous province of Tusheti and the Greater Caucasus mountain range to the north, Russian Federation to the Northeast, Azerbaijan to the Southeast, and...
(East Georgia) against the Iranian subjugators in 1659.
As a nature admirer, Vazha-Pshavela knows no comparison in Georgian poetry. His landscapes are full of motion and internal conflicts. The language is saturated with all the riches of his native language, and yet this is an impeccably exact literary language. Thanks to excellent translations into Russian (by Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Zabolotsky
Nikolay Alexeyevich Zabolotsky - a Russian poet, children's writer and translator. He was a Modernist and one of the founders of the Russian avant-garde absurdist group Oberiu.-Life and work:...
, V. Derzhavin, Boris Pasternak
Boris Pasternak
Boris Leonidovich Pasternak was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia, Pasternak's anthology My Sister Life, is one of the most influential collections ever published in the Russian language...
, S. Spassky, and others), translarions into English (by Donald Rayfield
Donald Rayfield
Donald Rayfield is professor of Russian and Georgian at Queen Mary, University of London. He is an author of books about Russian and Georgian literature, and about Joseph Stalin and his secret police...
, Venera Urushadze, Lela Jgerenaia, Nino Ramishvili, and others), translarions into French (by Gaston Bouatchidzé
Gaston Bouatchidzé
Gaston Bouatchidzé is a Georgian-French writer and translator.Bouatchidzé was born in Tbilisi, of a Georgian father and French mother who had lived in France for ten years before moving to the Soviet Union in 1934. Bouatchidzé graduated from the Lviv University, Ukrainian SSR, in 1958 and...
), translations into German (by Yolanda Marchev, Steffi Chotiwari-Jünger).
Vazha-Pshavela's compositions became available to representatives of other nationalities of the ex-USSR.
Vazha-Pshavela died in Tiflis on July 10, 1915. Buried ibidem, in the Pantheon of the Mtatsminda Mountain
Mtatsminda Pantheon
The Mtatsminda Pantheon of Writers and Public Figures is a necropolis in Tbilisi, Georgia, where some of the most prominent writers, artists, scholars, and national heroes of Georgia are buried. It is located in the churchyard around St. David’s Church "Mamadaviti" on the slope of Mount Mtatsminda...
. He was a representative of a National-Liberation movement of Georgia.
Poems and narrative stories of Vazha-Pshavela are published in more than 20 languages.
The mountaineer poet Vazha-Pshavela is indeed, as Donald Rayfield writes,‘qualitatively of a greater magnitude than any other Georgian writer’.
The five epic poems of Vazha-Pshavela ('Aluda Ketelauri' (1888), 'Bakhtrioni' (1892), 'Host and Guest' (1893), 'The avenger of the blood' (1897), 'Snake eater' (1901)) is based on the principle Golden ratio
Golden ratio
In mathematics and the arts, two quantities are in the golden ratio if the ratio of the sum of the quantities to the larger quantity is equal to the ratio of the larger quantity to the smaller one. The golden ratio is an irrational mathematical constant, approximately 1.61803398874989...
, thus this poems resembles the works of Ancient and Renaissance authors.
Epic Poems
- Aluda Ketelauri, 1888
- Bakhtrioni, 1892
- Host and Guest, 1893
- The avenger of the blood, 1897
- Snake eater, 1901
Verses (poetry)
- A feast, 1886
- The ogre's wedding, 1886
- A goldfinger's will, 1891
- A night in the highland, 1890
Short stories
- The story the roebuck, 1883
- An old beech, 1889
- The mountains height, 1895
Plays (theatre)
- The scene in the mountain, 1889
- Hunted of the homeland (drama), 1894
- The forest comedy, 1911
Movies
- Vedreba (The encounter), The romantic drama, according to the Vazha-Pshavela poems "Aluda Ketelauri" and "Host and Guest", (this movie was awarded the Grand Prix at the 17th San Remo international Festival of Author Films, 1974), the film director Tengiz AbuladzeTengiz AbuladzeTengiz Abuladze was a Georgian film director.Abuladze studied theatre direction at the Shota Rustaveli Theatre Institute, Tbilisi, Georgia, and filmmaking at the VGIK in Moscow. He graduated VGIK in 1952 and in 1953 he joined Gruziya-film as a director...
- 1967 - Mokvetili, The romantic drama, according to the Vazha-Pshavela's dramaDramaDrama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
Hunted of the homeland, the film director Giorgi (Gia) Mataradze - 1992
Literature
- Grigol RobakidzeGrigol RobakidzeGrigol Robakidze was a Georgian writer, publicist, and public figure primarily known for his exotic prose and anti-Soviet émigré activities....
, "Georgian Poet Vazha Pshavela".- J. "Russkaya Mysl", August, 1911 (in Russian) - Isidore Mantskava, "Vazha Pshavela".- J. "Damoukidebeli Sakartvelo", Paris, No: 119, 1935, pp. 9–11 (in Georgian)
- Miho MosulishviliMiho MosulishviliMiho Mosulishvili is a Georgian writer.- Biography :In 1986 Miho Mosulishvili has graduated from Tbilisi state university , geological-geographical faculty on a speciality of the engineer-geologist...
, "Vazha-Pshavela (biographical novel)Vazha-Pshavela (biographical novel)Vazha-Pshavela is a 2011 Georgian Biographical novel by author Miho Mosulishvili.-Anniversaries with which UNESCO is associated in 2010-2011:...
", Non-fiction, a series of The Illustrative Biographies from Publishing house Pegasi, 2011, ISBN 978–9941-9179-6-7 (in Georgian)
External links
- "Georgian literature." Encyclopædia Britannica.
- Anniversaries with which UNESCO is associated in 2010-2011, (24) 150th anniversary of the birth of Vazha Pshavela, writer (1861-1915) (Georgia)
- Celebration of anniversaries with which UNESCO is associated in 2010-2011, (Brochure (pdf), page 68)
- Vazha Pshavela
- The snake-eater
- Host and Guest
- Vazha-Pshavela