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Maksym Tadeyovych Rylsky
Born	Максим Тадейович Рильський (1895-03-19)March 19, 1895 Kiev
Died	24 July 1964(1964-07-24) (aged 69) Kiev
Resting place	Baikove Cemetery
Occupation	Poet
Nationality	Ukrainian
Notable awards

Maksym Tadeyovych Rylsky (Template:Lang-uk; 19 March [O.S. 7 March] 1895 in Kiev – 24 July 1964 id.) was a Ukrainian poet. He began writing poems as a representative of the "pure art" doctrine, during the years when the Stalinists adopted the official doctrine of "socialist realism". In 1937 he was involved in rewriting the libretto of Mykola Lysenko's opera Taras Bulba, returning later to neo-classical forms.

Rylsky joined Communist party in 1943 and was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1946, being awarded the prestigious Lenin Prize in 1960, and Stalin Prize in 1943 and 1950.

Maksym Rylsky is one of the most outstanding Ukrainian poets of the 20th century and master of the genres of the modern sonnet and the long narrative poem. He was closely associated with the Neoclassicist group of Ukrainian poets, who employed traditional poetic forms with rhyme and meter, wrote in a clear and accessible contemporary idiom, and often referenced Ancient Greek and Roman mythology as well as numerous other authors from world literature in their poetry.

Rylsky was also a prolific translator from English, French, German, and Polish as well as a folklore and literary scholar, who worked most of the earlier part of his life as a teacher of philology. He published his first book of poetry at the precocious age of fifteen—On White Islands in 1910. His other early books of poetry include The Edge of the Forest: Idylls (1918), Under Autumn Stars (1918), The Blue Distance (1922), Long Poems (1924), Through a Storm and Snow (1925), Beneath Autumn Stars (1926), Thirteenth Spring (1926), Where Roads Meet (1929), and Echo and Re-echo (1929).

During the wartime period he wrote two masterful long poems that deviated from socialist realism—“Thirst” (1942) and “Journey to Youth” (1941-4), for which he was again publicly chastised. In 1942 he became Director of the Institute of Fine Arts, Folklore and Ethnography in Kyiv, a post that he held until his death in 1964. The Institute now bears his name. He published some 30 collections of original poetry during his lifetime as well as numerous translations and scholarly works. By 1974 almost five million copies of his works in the original or in translation had appeared in the USSR.

External links

• Rylsky's works in Ukrainian

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• 1895 births
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• Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv alumni
• Full Members of the USSR Academy of Sciences
• Ukrainian-language poets
• Communist Party of the Soviet Union members
• Stalin Prize winners
• Lenin Prize winners
• Poets from Kiev
• People from Kiev Governorate
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