I like that the introduction describes his temptation to retcon embaressing verse when translating from the Russian first penned half a century prior, weighed against the commensurate shame of trying to pass oneself off as better than he is

Footnote about the poem "Lilith" which describes an engagement with the miller's daughter

Intelligent reads will abstain from examining this impersonal fantasy for any links with my later fiction

"Evening on a Vacant Lot"

You haven't

changed much since you died

“The Poets”

The poem was published in a magazine under the pseudonym of “Vasiliy Shishkov” in order to catch a distinguished critic (G. Adamovich, of the Poslednei novosti) who atomatically objected to everythign I wrote. The trick worked: in his weekly review he welcomed the appearance of a mysterious new poet with such eloquent enthusiasm that I could not resist keeping up the joke by describing my meetings with the ficticious Shishkov in a story which contained, among other plums, a criticism of the poem and of Adamovich’s praise

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