Author Description

Dmitrii Bobyshev (b. 1936 in Leningrad) was one of the group of poets, including J. Brodsky, A. Naiman, and Evg. Rein, who communicated closely with Anna Akhmatova (so called "Akhmatova's orphans"). Bobyshev emigrated in 1979 and teaches Russian literature at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His memoir is about Leningrad of the 1950-1960s, and how poets lived during that time. His book communicates with memoirs of the other three members of this circle, and is about their friendship-competition with J. Brodsky.