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The Green Snake: An Autobiography
Margarita Woloschin; Translated by Peter Stebbing
| Price: |
£20.00 |
| Publication Date: |
22 Jul 2010 |
| Availability: |
Available to buy
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| Format: | paperback | Extent: | 432 pages |
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| Size: | 234 x 156 mm | ISBN: | 9780863157615 |
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| Publisher: | Floris Books | Subject: | Philosophy; Biography |
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| Illustrations: | 10 colour illustrations | |
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Told from the perspective of the anthroposophical artist, Margarita Woloschin, this is a first-hand account of her privileged upbringing in Russia and subsequent life. Her vivid recollections of Moscow and rural Russia at the end of the nineteenth century are related in a lyrical, evocative timbre that echoes throughout the book. It records, in lavish detail, Woloschin's meetings with the Russian intellectual elite, including Tolstoy, the impressions they made upon her, her extensive travels throughout Europe and her marriage to the journalist-poet Max Voloshin.
Instrumental in the introduction of anthroposophy into Russia, Woloschin recounts the construction of the original Goetheanum in Dornach, Switzerland, in which she was involved, and its ultimate destruction. The narrative is interspersed with the artist's personal memories and insights of Rudolf Steiner and the struggle for meaning in her own turbulent life.
As the First World War spreads through Europe, she details the harsh deprivations of the Russian Revolution and its effects on her family and friends, which stand in brutal contrast to the earlier bucolic aspect of her testimony.
Set against the extremes of tsarist Russia and the Bolshevik Revolution, this haunting, historical memoir is testament to a fascinating and inspirational life.
About the Author(s)
Margarita Woloschin (1882-1973, née Sabashnikova) was born in Moscow and grew up in a well-to-do family with broad cultural links. She studied art in St Petersburg and Paris. From an early age she wanted to find out more about spirituality, and in 1905 met Rudolf Steiner for the first time. In St Petersburg she was part of the Symbolism art movement. In 1906 she married the poet and artist, Maximilian Voloshin.
From 1908 she followed Rudolf Steiner on his lecture tours across Europe, and in 1914 she went to Dornach, Switzerland, where she worked the building of the first Goetheanum. In 1917 she returned to her native country, now in the midst of a revolution.
From 1924 until her death in 1973 she lived in Stuttgart, Germany, where she was at her most creative artistically, painting portraits as well as altar pictures.
