Poetry
The Twelve
Двенадцать
Alexander Blok · 1918
Opening lines
Черный вечер.
Белый снег.
Ветер, ветер!
На ногах не стоит человек.
Black evening.
White snow.
Wind, wind!
A man cannot stand on his feet.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from ru.wikisource.org
Synopsis
In a Petrograd swept by snow and wind, in the winter after the revolution, twelve Red Guards march on patrol. In twelve cantos, the poem mixes street couplets, political slogans and the language of the suburbs. One of the twelve, Petka, comes across Katka and Vanka, a former comrade who has gone over to the old order; he is shaken by it, and his companions call him back to the discipline of the march.
Context
Written in a few days in January 1918 and revised over the following weeks, the poem appeared on 3 March 1918 in the left-wing newspaper Znamia truda, then in book form the same year with Alkonost, with illustrations by Yuri Annenkov. It at once shocked a large part of the author's admirers, who accused it of bad taste or of servility towards the new regime, while the Bolsheviks themselves were wary of it.
Who it is for
A short poem, in twelve cantos, which is best read aloud; several French translations, the most recent in 2021.
Prizes and reception
One of the first poetic responses to the Bolsheviks' seizure of power; Shklovsky compared it to Pushkin's The Bronze Horseman.