Marina Tsvetaeva

Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva (Russian: Мари́на Ива́новна Цвета́ева, IPA: [mɐˈrʲinə ɪˈvanəvnə tsvʲɪˈtaɪvə]; 8 October [O.S. 26 September] 1892 – 31 August 1941) was a Russian and Soviet poet. Her work is considered among some of the greatest in twentieth century Russian literature. She lived through and wrote of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Moscow famine that followed it. In an attempt to save her daughter Irina from starvation, she placed her in a state orphanage in 1919, where she died of hunger. Tsvetaeva left Russia in 1922 and lived with her family in increasing poverty in Paris, Berlin and Prague before returning to Moscow in 1939. Her husband Sergei Efron and her daughter Ariadna Efron (Alya) were arrested on espionage charges in 1941; and her husband was executed. Tsvetaeva committed suicide in 1941. As a lyrical poet, her passion and daring linguistic experimentation mark her as a striking chronicler of her times and the depths of the human condition. 2Early years Marina Tsvetaeva was born in Moscow, the daughter of Ivan Vladimirovich Tsvetaev, a professor of Fine Art at the University of Moscow, who later founded the Alexander III Museum (known from 1937 as the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts). (The Tsvetayev family name evokes association with flowers - the Russian word цвет (tsvet) means "color" or "flower".) Tsvetaeva's mother, Maria Alexandrovna Meyn, Ivan's second wife, was a concert pianist, highly literate, with German and Polish ancestr