Bely’s Books

When Andrei Bely returns to Russia in 1916 he leaves several volumes with his wife, Asya, who remained in the Anthroposophical community of Rudolf Steiner in Dornach, Switzerland. While Asya did encounter Bely in Berlin during the time he was there from November 1921 to October 1923, they were never again as man and wife.

Only two books can be identified with certainty as belonging to Bely. One is a copy of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason that belonged to Nikolai Bugaev, Bely’s father. The other is a volume of verse by Nikolai Gumilev with a inscribed dedication to Bely.

One other volume likely belonged to Bely. There is a volume of Pushkin’s poetry that contains “The Bronze Horseman.” Bely notes in his “Intimate Biography that he was working on the poem while in Dornach and it became  the core of his study in metrics: Ритм как диалектика.

The Geier collection of books also contains several volumes authored by Bely, but they were published after his departure to Russia and belonged to others.

In April 2013 with the permission of the Geier family, the three books noted were returned to the Andrei Bely Memorial Apartment in Moscow.

GifttoBelyMuseum