Vladimir Mayakovsky

VLADIMIR MAYAKOVSKY (1893-1930) has always sparked a wide range of emotions and opinions. He was reviled by many for his support of the Bolshevik Revolution. Yet, by the end of the 1920s, the numbing effects of the system he had so welcomed eventually led to his suicide. For the next few years, his work was officially censored. Then, on Stalin's personal decision, Mayakovsky was transformed into the "greatest Soviet poet." This led later generations to perceive him as a shill for the communist regime. But even as early as the late 1950s, an alternative view of him developed – as a freespirited rebel – spurred by young poets who would gather at his monument in Moscow and demonstratively read his poetry.