We live under ourselves, not sensing the country...

Osip Emilievich Mandelstam 1891 - 1938 - is one of the most significant Russian poets of the Silver Age. His poems were first published when he was only nineteen years old, and at forty-seven, he perished in a transit camp on the way to Kolyma. After twenty years of official oblivion, the gradual return of Mandelstam's poetry to readers began. What did Osip Mandelstam give to Russian poetry and Russia, and why is this gift so important? - the answer to this question can be found in the preface by Valery Shubinsky, specially written for this book, and, of course, in the poet's own verses.