Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Tsvetaeva
Tsvetaeva in 1925
Tsvetaeva in 1925
BornMarina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva
(1892-10-08)8 October 1892
Moscow, Russian Empire
Died31 August 1941(1941-08-31) (aged 48)
Yelabuga, Tatar ASSR, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union
OccupationPoet and writer
EducationSorbonne, Paris
Literary movementRussian symbolism
Spouse
(m. 1912)
Children3, including Ariadna Efron
Signature

Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva (Russian: Марина Ивановна Цветаева, IPA: [mɐˈrʲinə ɪˈvanəvnə tsvʲɪˈta(j)ɪvə]; 8 October [O.S. 26 September] 1892 – 31 August 1941) was a Russian poet. Her work is some of the most well-known in twentieth-century Russian literature.[1] She lived through and wrote about the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent Moscow famine.

Marina attempted to save her daughter Irina from starvation by placing her in a state orphanage in 1919, where Irina died of hunger. Tsvetaeva left Russia in 1922 and lived with her family in increasing poverty in Paris, Berlin and Prague before returning to Moscow in 1939. Her husband Sergei Efron and their daughter Ariadna (Alya) were arrested on espionage charges in 1941, when her husband was executed.

Tsvetaeva died by suicide in 1941. As a lyrical poet, her passion and daring linguistic experimentation mark her as a historical chronicler of her times and the depths of the human condition.

  1. ^ "Tsvetaeva, Marina Ivanovna" Who's Who in the Twentieth Century. Oxford University Press, 1999.