by Jon Lackman | 21 June 2006 | Uncategorized
From the New Republic: “Divorcing Gumilyov, [Anna Akhmatova] married an irascible Babylonian scholar named Vladimir Shileiko, who was considerably older than she was, and when she tired of his bullying and his jealousy, she moved on to the noted art historian Nikolai Punin. Punin was in many ways the love of her life, but he, too, was a disaster. Congenitally promiscuous, Punin was married to a doctor when Akhmatova met him, and was to remain married to her throughout their long affair–which did not stop Akhmatova from moving into Punin’s Leningrad apartment (on a famous street, the Fontanka) and staying in one room (where he came at night) for fifteen years, even after Punin’s wife had given birth to a baby daughter. Then Punin, still married, took another mistress to live with him, forcing Akhmatova to move to another room, and they remained that way until their evacuation during World War II. She briefly returned after the war was over, this time with the addition of Punin’s granddaughter, and when Punin’s new mistress had become his second wife.”
