Nasha zhiznʹ : Sbornik tretij (Our Life : Third Collection) [Literary skeches]

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Very good condition; creased front cover, foxing on the back cover, repaired spine, restored missing piece of the upper left corner of front cover; internally mostly unopened book, inscriprion on the title page „T. Skorikovu“ (to ..

Tags: rare books, first edition books, Russian avant-garde, constructivism, cubism, futurism, RAPP, Novaja Kuznitsa

Very good condition; creased front cover, foxing on the back cover, repaired spine, restored missing piece of the upper left corner of front cover; internally mostly unopened book, inscriprion on the title page „T. Skorikovu“ (to T. Skorikov), minor damage of the outer margin of several pages.

Kuznitsa (the Smithy) - a literary group that existed in 1920-1932. It was founded by proletarian writers  who broke away from the Proletkult on the grounds that it was too dominated by non-proletarians and hampering the development of a proletarian literature.  [Proletkult, abbreviation of Proletarskaya Kultura (Proletarian Culture) - an organization established in the Soviet Union in 1917 to provide the foundations for a truly proletarian art—i.e., one that would be created by proletarians for proletarians and would be free of all vestiges of bourgeois culture.] The Smithy opposed itself to pre-revolutionary literary movements - symbolism, futurism, imagism. The main themes of the Smithy were labor, machines, and the proletarian masses. The group promised to offer writers "complete freedom in the choice of literary method and style" and was opposed to the state control over culture and the NEP (New Economic Policy). After a long struggle for its positions, in 1930 the Kuznitsa subsumed into the most influential RAPP (Russian Association of Proletarian Writers), which draw lessons from the sad experience of its preceders and encouraged censorship of literature by state on ideological grounds. While discussing accession conditions within the ranks of the Smithy occured the split into two groups - the Moscow central group "Kuznitsa" headed by Bakhmet'ev, and "Novaya Kuznitsa" led by I. Zhiga. Both entered the RAPP (after the purge) on the rights of creative groups. Like all other independent literary organizations, the Smithy was dissolved in 1932 in connection with the creation of the Soviet Writers Union. 

This third (of four published) collection of literary sketches was written by the participants of the section of sketch-writers organized by the "Novaya Kuznitsa" creative group belonging to RAPP. According to the note attached to the title page, two previous collections were published by the „Kuznitsa“ group from which the "Novaya Kuznitsa" was emerged at the end of 1930, and due to an oversight the current book includes manifesto providing principles and purposes of sketch-writers section activity of the „Kuznitsa“. As follows from the manifesto sketch-writers section „Kuznitsa“ was founded in November 1928. The construction of the new life that was taking place in the Soviet Union capturing the millions of workers and worker-peasants required the comprehensive coverage in the simple and understable to the mass reader liteterary form, which should be a literary sketch. The members of the sketch-writers section and authors of the sketches were the same common people from the masses. 

In foreword by leading essayist and chronicler of „Kuznitsa“, head of the „Novaya Kuznitsa“ Ivan Zhiga and writer Dmitri Prokof’ev outlined the focus of the current publication – to show aspects of daily life of different etchnic groups of the Soviet Unoin living on the outlying areas, also much attention is paid to the emerging industry of Soviet republics. The collection includes twelve sketches, starts with the foreword and ends with manifesto. 

Book’s eye-catching avant-garde cover design by Vladimir Roskin (1896-1984) – famous Soviet artist, book illustrator, master of propaganda posters. After the Revolution (1917), he became an art instructor at the Department of the State Education and travelled throughout Russia giving lectures on Modern Art. He also picked avant-garde works by Malevich, Chagall, Kandinsky, Rodchenko, Stepanova and others for new museums as a representations of the new left movement. Collaborated with Mayakovsky on the ROSTA posters. In 1928 with  El Lissitzky participated in the International Print Exhibition in Koln. As an active member of international art community, Roskin worked at international art fairs in London (1930), Leipzig (1932), the Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne (International Exposition of Art and Technology in Modern Life) in Paris (1937), where he won a Grand Prix, and the 1939-40 New York World's Fair, among others.

Title Nasha zhiznʹ : Sbornik tretij (Our Life : Third Collection)
Author Ivan Zhiga; Dmitrij Prokof’evj; and others
Artist Vladimir Roskin
Publisher Izdatelstvo Federatsiya, Moskva
Published year 1931
Country Russia
Edition 1st edition
Binding Soft cover
Octavo 15 x 21 cm.
Weight 0.220 kg.
No. of pages Wrappers, 207 pp.
Print run 5000 copies
Language Russian