Maria Moravskaya: Difference between revisions

Maria Magdalina Francheska Ludvigovna Moravskaya
Maria Moravskaya when he was living in Saint Petersburg
Native name	Мари́я Магдали́на Франче́ска Лю́двиговна Мора́вская
Born	(1890-01-12)January 12, 1890 Warsaw
Died	July 26, 1947(1947-07-26) (aged 57) Miami
Occupation	poetess, translator, critic
Language	ru
Citizenship	Russian Empire USA

Maria Magdalina Francheska Ludvigovna Moravskaya (12 January 1890 Warsaw, Russian Empire — 26 June 1947 Miami, USA or after 1958 Chile) was a Russian poetess, writer, translator and literary critic. She had written several poetical collections and prose works, include works on children literature.

She was ethnic Polish and active participant of liberal-democratic movement in Russian Empire at early 20-th century. At 1917 she emigrated from Russia to the USA, then she was living and writing in Florida. Information about her last years and death is contradictory: according to some sources, she dead in 1947 in Miami but other sources tell that she dead in Chile not earlier than 1958 year.

Maria Moravskaya was born at 12 Janury 1890 (31 December 1889 by Julian) in Warsaw in a not rich Catholic Polish family. When she was two years old her mother dead. After that Ludvig Moravskiy, her father, married sister of his deceased spouse. Then family of Moravskaya moved to Odessa^[1][2].

Maria Moravskaya thought well of her father and described him as a good and dreamy man. Also she thought well of her younger stepbrothers and stepsisters. But when Maria was 15 years old she was forced to leave home due to conflict with her stepmother. Some time later she had moved from Odessa to Saint Petersburg where she worked as secretary, private tutor and translator. At that period of time she started her literary activity and has significant financial difficulties. She joined the Bestuzhev Courses but not graduated from it.^[1][2].

From her young years Moravskaya had active civic stand and took part in the activity of different political circles. Initially she was a supporter of self-determination of Poland. At times of beginning of the Revolution of 1905 she was identifying herself as socialist. In 1906 and 1907 he had been arrested twice and detained for short times in transit prisons^[1][2].

There are data about her early and brief marriage which Moravskaya thought to be an “occational”^[1].

In Saint Petersburg Moravskaya joined to the literary circles fast enough, mostly due to patronage of Maximilian Voloshin who dated with she at January 1910^[3]. Also she had support of Zinaida Gippius. At 1911 Moravskaya began visiting “Literature Wednesdays” ({{lang|ru|Сре́ды}) by Vyacheslav Ivanov and “Academy of Poem” (Академия стиха) founded by V. Ivanov too. At 1911 too she was accepted into “The Guild of Poets” (Цех поэтов) just after founding of it by Nikolay Gumilyov and Sergey Gorodetsky^[1]. Moravskaya became a frequenter of Petersburg bohemia meetings in Stray Dog Café^[4].

She had accepted the events of World War I, partially bitter combat operations and disasters affected civilian people in her native Poland, quite emotionally. Her friend Ilya Ehrenburg wrote “Слышишь, как воет волчиха” (Do you hear howl of she-wolf?)^[5].

In 1917 Moravskaya took a trip to Japan. From Japan she travelled to Latin America and then she moved to the USA.^[1]. In accordance to her memories, the motives for immigration to the United States were idealized idea about this country and her aspiration for “mix of typical Russian an typical American to make a new, gentle, judicious and harmonious creature”^{[transl.note 1][6]}. Later new country had disappointed Moravskaya by spiritual impoverishment of society, manifestations of racism and low level of political freedoms, and she had been declaring against this in the local mass media. For example, it one of the first her English-language articles named “Your Newspapers and Ours” she proved that American journalists at peaceful year 1919 have lesser freedom of expression than their Russian colleagues under tsar Nicholas II even in war conditions. Ten years later, in 1946 Moravskaya had written a letter to Ehrenburg and she had been acknowledging her nostalgia for Russia and her doubt about her creative work is needed in the USA^[7]:

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Despite of certain disappointment about the American life, Moravskaya practically broke all the contacts with Russia, settled in Miami and continued sufficiently active literary and journalistic work there. She had been acquiring good not only English but also Spanish and lectured at Latin Amarica^[2][6].