never grew up to experience a life shared with a
man she loved. The speaker does not identify
himself as a poet or even as a Russian. His own
identity is obscured by the suffering of the Jews
and cannot resurface until all anti-Semites in the
Soviet Union are dead and forgotten. Only then
can his own identity as a Russian once again be
the role he assumes.
Remembering
The opening line of Yevtushenko’s poem is about
remembering the massacre that occurred at Babi
Yar. When he visited Babi Yar twenty years after
the events took place, Yevtushenko was dismayed
to see that the area was a refuse dump. There was
no monument to the nearly 34,000 Jews who were
slaughtered at that place in September 1941; there
was also no memorial to the many thousands,
including additional Jews, Gypsies, Communists,
and Soviet prisoners of war, who were also
slaughtered at Babi Yar in the following months
and years. Although Yevtushenko uses his poem
to remember Jewish victims from throughout the
centuries, his main theme is that those who died at
Babi Yar should not be forgotten. Although
monuments help to memorialize the Jews and
other victims who died, they can be vandalized
or even destroyed. In contrast, Yevtushenko’s
poem will be a more lasting memorial to those
who perished.
Style
Historical Allusion
In ‘‘Babii Yar,’’ Yevtushenko alludes to a num-
ber of events and people, trusting that his readers
will understand or determine what he means.
When he alludes to the Jews in ancient Egypt,
he trusts his readers to know that the Jews were
slaves under the reign of the pharaohs. The refer-
ence to Dreyfus is also an indirect allusion that
relies upon the reader’s having or gaining aware-
ness of the events that occurred in late nine-
teenth-century France. Dreyfus’s name suggests
anti-Semitism, just as Anne Frank’s name sug-
gests the events of the Holocaust. Yevtushenko
refers to notable events and people with whom
his readers can identify, and thus he does not
need to provide the complete stories. Allusions
serve as a kind of shorthand for the poet; they
require some effort on the part of the reader to
fill in the gaps, but understanding the allusions
makes the poem more enjoyable.Human Rights Poetry
Although this poem might be considered a poem
of political protest, it is really more a call to civic
responsibility or to human rights and justice.
Human rights poetry is concerned about the
rights of the individual, including freedom of
expression, such as through religion, and the
right to live free of oppression. Poets and poetry
are often focused on the individual, since the
creation of poetry is a very individual occupa-
tion. Concern about human rights formed a sig-
nificant movement for twentieth-century poets,
including Yevtushenko, who uses his poetry to
call attention to injustice, in this case the anti-
Semitism of the Soviet Union, which intensified
after World War II ended. For Yevtushenko,
equality is a human right for all Russians,
which he makes clear in the final lines of the
poem when he reminds his readers that they
will all be true Russians when the last anti-Sem-
ite is dead and buried. That will be the moment
when all Russians can sing the ‘‘Internationale,’’
the song of the Soviet Union.Free Verse and Split Lines
There is no pattern of rhyme or meter to ‘‘Babii
Yar,’’ and in fact, there is no division into stan-
zas. Instead, the irregular line breaks give the
poem more of a sing-song rhythm that is best
appreciated by reading it aloud. For many poets,
the practice of splitting lines is simply an aes-
thetic choice, with no function. Yevtushenko,
however, splits lines of poetry to emphasize the
concluding thoughts. If the reader reads the
poem aloud, the emphases on the second parts
of lines becomes clearer. Splitting the lines sim-
ply highlights this importance.Historical Context
The Soviet Union, Communism, and the
Nazis
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Repub-
lic was the largest and most populated of the
fifteen countries that comprised the Soviet
Union, which collapsed in 1991. Russia became
an established country in 1917 and part of the
Soviet Union in 1922. Moscow, the capital of
Russia, then became the capital of the SovietBabii Yar