6 .Karolina Pavlova
Over the past few decades Karolina Pavlova (born Jaenisch, 1807–93)
has become the best-known Russian woman poet of her generation. This
is not to suggest that she has received her due. As mentioned in the in-
troduction, historically she has been considered less important than her
husband, Nikolai Pavlov (1803–64), a littérateur who authored a total of
six short stories. As recently as 1998 a five-hundred-page authorized
Russian university textbook on mid-nineteenth-century Russian litera-
ture included seven index entries for Nikolai Pavlov, four for Pavlova,
and no discussion of her poetry. Several anthologies of nineteenth-
century Russian poetry do not include her work.^1
Nonetheless, one is struck by the contrast between Pavlova’s poeticreputation and that of Khvoshchinskaia. While Khvoshchinskaia never
saw a book of her poetry in print—nor have any yet appeared—Pavlova
during her lifetime published five books; four other editions of her work
have been published since her death.^2 While no reliable printed versions
of Khvoshchinskaia’s poetry exist, much of Pavlova’s work is available
in the scholarly Biblioteka poeta series with notes and variant readings.
While Khvoshchinskaia has been lost to literary history as a poet,
Pavlova, especially since the 1970 s, has been the subject of an increas-
ing amount of scholarship and criticism. How can we account for such
a contrast in the reputations of two excellent poets?
This chapter first considers those biographical factors that have madeit possible for Pavlova to gain recognition as a poet, albeit sporadically
and usually as a curiosity.^3 Such an examination may bring to light over-
looked determinants of literary reputation. Next, since much of Pav-
lova’s oeuvre up to the 1860 s is available to us, we shall consider how in
her poetry she responded to the literary issues facing the woman poets
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