Abstract

This article examines Yan Satunovsky’s literary-critical and theoretical body of work. Although relatively small, this corpus is significant. Satunovsky’s analysis of the poetics of children’s folklore, specifically counting rhymes, as well as the works of his predecessors and contemporaries (Vladimir Mayakovsky, Korney Chukovsky, Genrikh Sapgir, and others), helps the poet formulate his own creative principles. The poet identified and drew attention to the “Korney stanza”, analyzing its genesis in Chukovsky’s works for children and tracing the origins of this stanza to the works of Chukovsky’s predecessors and Russian folklore. Satunovsky’s application of a tactometric approach to the rhythmic organization of verse clarifies not only the importance of this aspect of verse form for the poet, but also the influence of the poetic theories of Alexander Kviatkovsky and Ilya Selvinsky – theorists of poetic constructivism. Additionally, the article helps refine the interpretations of some of Satunovsky’s poems.