Sofia Yulievna Pregel (1897-1972) was one of the main figures in the literature of Russia Abroad and had strong social and creative connections with many writers and artists. Born in Odessa, she loved her city till the end of her days though since 1922 lived abroad (Constantinople, Berlin, Paris, New York). Together with Isaak Babel, Yurii Olesha, Edward Bagritsky, Valentin Kataev, Iliya Ilf, Eugenii Petrov she belonged to “South-Western” (“Odessa”) group of writers (the term invented by Victor Shklovsky). All of them lived in the Soviet Union and hardly ever read Sophia Pregel’s books, and still many of her poems, the three-volume autobiographical novel “My Childhood”, a series of memoirs are connected with the so-called “Odessa text” both thematically and stylistically. Here we face a very interesting phenomenon when, using the well-known proverb, the apple does not fall far from the tree no matter where the tree is left. The literary phenomenon in this case — by virtue of objective existence — proved to be much stronger than the forms of its individual awareness.
Leave a Reply