E. DERLEMENKO
MON AME Y CHERCHE TOUJOURS REFUGE
Artistic photo – literary composition

Alexander Pushkin, a great Russian poet of the 19th century, traditionally commands boundless love and respect by the people of Ukraine. After being exiled to the South of Russia by the authorities, he spent four years in Ukraine and Moldova. There went by his youth full of hard work and inspirations. The opening chapters or “Evgeniy Onegin”, as well as many a lyric and romantic poem were written in these parts. Here, in the South, surrounded by distinguished people of the time, matured and firmed up Pushkin’s freedom loving spirit, his “wondrous impulses of soul”. Despite hardships and constraints of the exile, these years made Pushkin aware for the first time of the true spread of the wings of his poetic genius.

His most productive years in the villages of Mikhailovskoe and Boldino still lied ahead of him.

In spite of the scarcity of information on Pushkin’s tenure in the South, some priceless artifacts from those days are available and many are presented in the album.

The photographic line-up in the album is appropriately complemented by the verbiage designed to give the viewer and reader a wholesome impression of the important period in Pushkin’s life, places he visited and people he met.

Professor L . A. Ozerov