Pushkin's Poetic Imagination

This new study focuses on aspects of Pushkin’s poetic imagination that challenge the conventional view of his aesthetics as the epitome of simplicity, harmony and clarity. What emerges is a new understanding of Pushkin as a poet who was constantly, uncomfortably aware that the demands of his art entailed the transgression of aesthetic and ethical as well as social and political norms, and who did not shy away from this knowledge. His work is thus characterized throughout by morally laden ambiguity and a preoccupation with matters of responsibility, guilt, and conscience.