“Choir”, “harmony” and solo singing in the lyrics of A. Fet in the second half of the 1850s

The article analyzes Afanasy Fet's poetic texts of the second half of the 1850's which are devoted to the theme of music. The focus is on the poems “There was a wonderful May Day in Moscow...” where the key image is an image of choir, and “Anruf an die Geliebte (by Beethoven)”, which is about solo singing. Some other texts published for the first time or created in 1856-1857, are also analyzed. In Fet's lyrics of the period under review, solo singing is opposed to the sound of “choir” and is clearly associated with the memories of tragic events. It seems that the poem, which is about solo singing, and the poem where they sing in chorus, are addressed to different addressees. “There was a wonderful May day in Moscow...” refers to a complex of texts written during the romantic relationship with the poet's future wife, Maria Botkina, presumably shortly before the wedding. At this time, Fet found a need for a language to describe the new relationship of the lyrical subject with the new heroine. The article shows that for this, Fet refers to the lyrics of Zhukovsky and to the image of choral singing. The poem “Anruf an die Geliebte (by Beethoven)” is written in a more traditional manner of Fet. It describes solo singing and introduces a quotation-reminiscence layer that goes back to the verbal part of Beethoven's vocal cycle “An die ferne Geliebte”. The study of the deep semantics of both poems leads to the conclusion that the lyrical plots of both mentioned texts intersect. They reflect the imagery associated with Fet's new love, Maria Botkina, and poet's memories of his lost beloved - Maria Lazich. The text-mediator, which combines both works, is Beethoven's vocal cycle on the words by A. Jeitteles.