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...Segel called "the first truly modern writer in the history of Russian literature," (4) provided the Russian reading public in 1755 with its first translations of three sonnets by the German Baroque poet Paul Fleming (1609-40)--translations which are significant both for Russian literary history (5) and for the history of the international reception of German Baroque literature. Sumarokov's selection of these three poems--"an die grosse Stadt Mosskaw / als er schiede," "An den Fluss Mosskaw / als er schiede," and "Er redet die Stadt Mosskaw an / Als er ihre verguldeten Thurme von fernen sahe"--was for obvious reasons a natural one; Fleming had three times visited Moscow (1634, 1636 and 1639) with Adam Olearius on the Holstein trade mission sent by Duke Friedrich III, and had written the poems while there, glorifying the Russian capital.

Sumarokov, along with Mikhail Vasil'evich Lomonosov (1711-65) and Vasilii Kirillovich Trediakovskii (1703-69), was instrumental in establishing the norms for the foundation of modern Russian literature. He had learned German (along with French, of course) and had become acquainted with contemporary European literatures at the Corps of Cadets (Sukhoputnyi shliakhetnyi korpus) in St. Petersburg, an academy for the sons of the nobility. He worked at introducing into Russian literature the various poetic and dramatic genres then current in western Europe, and although the sonnet was not one of the fashionable genres of the eighteenth century, Sumarokov tried his hand at it, producing, however, only nine, including the three Fleming translations.

Sumarokov was naturally familiar with the major European literary movements of the preceding century, and particularly with Fleming's poetry; the noted Russian literary historian Mikhail Pavlovich Alekseev specifically points this out in his article on Fleming in the USSR Academy of Sciences' Istoriia nemetskoi literatury v piati tomakh. (6) Sumarokov would have been able to read Fleming's sonnets in one of the many reprints of the German poet's works that had appeared since his death. That he was also familiar with other writers of the Baroque is clear; in his "Epistola II" of 1747 (his two-verse "Epistles"--one on the Russian language, the other on versification--are important works in the history of Russian poetry) he includes the Hollander Joost van den Vondel (1587-1679) and the German poet of the late Baroque Johann Christian Gunther (1695-1723) among models worthy of imitation. (7) Incidentally, according to the editor of Sumarokov's Izbrannye proiz-vedeniia, P. N. Berkov, Sumarokov compiled the first Russian biographical lexicon of Russian and foreign writers, although a brief one, for his two "Epistles." (8) Entitled "Primechaniia na upotreblennye v sikh epistolakh stikhotvortsev imena" ("Notes on the names of poets used in these epistles"), this list included the following note on Gunther: "a recent German poet whose carefully composed and polished verses, though far fewer than those of others, merit the highest praise." (9)

Sumarokov's translations of Fleming's sonnets appeared in 1755 in a prestigious publication--Ezhemesiachnye Sochineniia k pol'ze i uveseleniiu sluzhashchie ("Monthly compositions serving to benefit and entertain"), published by the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg, the first scholarly literary journal in Russian literary history, which had begun publication that same year, with the purpose of raising the cultural level of the literate public. Since only the aristocracy was literate, the readership would have been limited, and the fact that the journal was printed in 2,000 copies (10) attests its significance, as does the fact that it numbered all three of the giants of early Russian literary history--Sumarokov, Lomonosov, and Trediakovskii--among its contributors.

The translations of the three sonnets were later included in the Polnoe sobranie vsekh sochinenii, v stikhakh i proze ... Aleksandra Petrovicha Sumarokova ("Complete collected works in verse and prose ..."), published in 1782 in Moscow by Nikolai Ivanovich Novikov (1744-1818), a noted critic and publisher; the second edition appeared in 1787. A publisher's note to the translations reads, "This and the following two sonnets were composed by Paul Fleming, a notable German poet who was in Moscow in 1634 and 1636, with the Holstein embassy, and were transposed into Russian verses by Mr. Sumarokov." (11) The Soviet edition of Sumarokov's works, the standard Izbrannye proizvedeniia referred to above, published in the series "Biblioteka poeta, Bol'shaia seriia" (1957), which contains the three translations (pp. 473-74), is the edition used in citing Sumarokov's translations here.

In November 1633 the embassy of Duke Friedrich III (1597-1659) of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorf embarked on a six-year journey to Moscow and the Near East in an attempt to secure an overland trade route to Persia, primarily for the importation of silk. The travel account published by Fleming's friend and fellow traveler Adam Olearius, ... Beschreibung / Der Newen ORIENTALISCHEN REJSE, became an instant bestseller, was translated into French, Dutch, and English during the seventeenth century, and provided information about those parts of the world for years to come. (12) Among the members of the entourage was the poet Paul Fleming, the author of these three sonnets about Moscow. To date the Russian translations have received no attention from Germanists. (13) The following investigation treats Fleming's poems as independent literary works and as companion pieces to Olearius's travel description. The literary and cultural value of the poems will thereby be highlighted; it is this combination of factors which prompted Sumarokov's Russian translations.

Patti Fleming was in Moscow three times. (14) These encounters with the Russian capital etched a permanent image of the foreign city on the poet's mind and provided his imagination with the impetus for the three poems on the subject, with promise of more to come. The poet's initial encounter with Moscow was in August 1634, when the entourage first entered the city on the political mission to the czar to obtain permission to cross Russian lands for the trade route to Persia. The Holstein embassy was in Moscow from August 14 until December 24, 1634. Upon receiving the czar's permission for the trade mission, the embassy returned to Reval (Tallinn), whereupon some members of the group, including Olearius, returned to Holstein to consult with Duke Friedrich as to further procedure in the matter, while the rest of the group, including Fleming, remained in Reval. During his stay in Reval Fleming became engaged to Elsabe Niehus (daughter of Heinrich Niehus). Although his beloved eventually married another man during the poet's subsequent long absence, she was the subject of many poems by Fleming, both during his stay in Reval and on his extended journeys. The poet's second visit to Moscow, from March 29 until June 30, 1636, was poetically very productive, and it was this entry into and departure from the Russian capital that inspired the three sonnets under consideration here. Olearius's description of Russia and the Russians is very extensive at this point of the travel report, whereas for both the earlier and the later trips, he devotes only a few pages to these topics. (15) Fleming's third and last sojourn in Moscow extended from January 2 until March 15, 1639, after completion of the trip to Persia. (Enroute to Holstein, the entourage stopped again in Reval, where Fleming learned of Elsabe's marriage and then became engaged to her younger sister Anna.)

Of Fleming's three sonnets about Moscow, (16) the first two sonnets occur as numbers 32 and 44 respectively in his second book of sonnets, "Gluckwunschungen," (17) and the last one occurs as number 26 in his third book of sonnets, "Liebesgedichte." (18) This poem is chronologically the oldest, since it was written on the occasion of Fleming's second entry into Moscow in the spring of 1636. The other two poems both date from his departure from Moscow to Persia in the summer of 1636. Despite the thinly-veiled Petrarchan allusions to his beloved Elsabe in the poem on the occasion of his entry into Moscow, all three poems reflect the lasting image of the Russian city ingrained on his poetic consciousness and the promise of further poetic offerings to the eternal fame of the city, should he survive to compose them. All three poems appeared in the above order in the earliest edition of his works, Prodromus (1641), (19) published after Fleming's death by Adam Olearius. (20) It is significant that Olearius edited and published Fleming's poetry and only later turned to the compilation of his own travel description. After the completion of the travels in 1639 and subsequent to Fleming's death in April 1640, Olearius produced two editions of Fleming's poetry, before his own work first appeared in 1647. (21) Olearius travelled to Reval in 1641 where the poet's literary remains were in the possession of Heinrich Niehus, Fleming's intended father-in-law. The foreword of Prodromus is dated Reval, June 10, 1641; Olearius wrote the foreword to the complete collected works in 1642, although publication was delayed until 1646. (22) In the latter, Olearius discusses the importance of Fleming's poetry, also with regard to the embassy of Duke Friedrich:

Inmassen seine von anbegin / am meisten bey denen nach Mosskow und Persien verrichteten Weltkundigen Legationen, welchen Er von Anno 1633. biss 1639. ruhmlich mit beygewohnet / verfertigte Carmina mehr dann uberflussig / und so viel bezeugen / dass fast nichtes auff der Reise sich eussern / begeben oder ihme und andern furkommen mugen / dartiber Er nicht alsobald nach Beschaffenheit der Sachen herrliche Inventiones gehabt / und einem ieden seine Zierlichkeit pro renata gegeben. Wie nun sein Geist nach verrichtcten Feriis nimmer ruhen konhen / Also haben seine Poetisch Labores von Tage zu Tage zugenommen / biss Sie endlich zu einem grossen Convolut erwachsen / und weil Sie zugleich in vieler Hande / entweder von lhme selbst / oder auch da ein Liebhaber dem andern solche einzeln comuniciret, gerathen / ist Er von vielen furnehmen Leuten in Schrifften auch mundlich ersucht / ermahnet und gereitzet worden / Er solchen seinen Partum nicht untergehen lassen / sondern der Posteritat durch offenen Druck consecriren mochte / gleich (oder viel mehr) wie solchs unterschiedliche / so an Ihm / als andere seine Freunde / deswegen ausgelassene annoch vorhandene Missiven bezeugen. Dannenhero Er Ursach...

NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.



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