Kliuev, Nikolai

Born 1887 in Olonets Province; died August 1937. Soviet Russian poet.

Kliuev came from a peasant family and was educated at home. His first collections of poetry were The Ringing of Pines (1912; preface by V. Briusov) and Brotherly Songs (1912). Kliuev was associated with Symbolist circles. He was a leader of the new peasant trend in poetry (represented by S. Esenin, S. Klychkov, and P. Oreshin) and had some influence on Esenin’s early work. Kliuev was an original poet, although his poetry, archaic in form, was permeated by patriarchal and religious moods. This attitude is also in evidence in his perception of revolutionary reality, which he treated in the spirit of a reactionary peasant utopia.