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August 13, 1803

The quotes below come from Vladimir Odoevsky and Romantic Poetics: Collected Essays by Neil Cornwell (1998), which I mention now since our post today features an obscure literary figure Vladimir Odoevsky. Cornwell makes major claims about this figure, and I, being unfamiliar with the subject, am reliant on this secondary research. 

Prince Vladimir Odoevsky (August 13, 1803 to March 11, 1869) is described as a polymath -- an engineer, a philosopher, and a  writer of fiction which encompasses romanticism and mysticism in a particularly Russian alchemical mixture. He also had a pedigree as glorious as that of the then ruling Romanov dynasty.

His short piece, "The Story of a Cock, a Cat and a Frog," is set in imaginary province of Rezhensk. and illustrates Odoevsky's tendency to "whimsical ...black  humor." His other writing sometimes contains "...visions [which]come disturbingly close, as romantic writing occasionally could, to what has more recently been labeled, 'near death experience.'" 

Odoevsky's importance to his era may be guessed from the fact he co-edited a literary journal with Pushkin. Russkie Nochi, is a philosophic novel expected to gain increasing acclaim now that it has been rediscovered, according to Dr. Cornwell. Cornwell also quotes another comparison of Odoevsky to Diderot, to the effect neither were "[capable] ...of completing his grand encyclopedic scheme ..." 

We may note, in view of the obscurity of this literary personage, now, some biographical facts. In 1826  Odoevsky married and entered government service. He was on the staff of the Imperial Public Library and later in charge of the Rumyantsev Museum. His stature was such that when Wagner visited Russia, Odoevsky was his host. 

In 1844 Vladimir Odoevsky's collected works were published, but the public mood had shifted and there was little acclaim; a period of oblivion followed.

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