poetry, prose
Ilya (Karl) Lvovich Selvinsky(1899-1968) - Russian Soviet writer, poet and playwright, representative of the literary movement of constructivism. Member of the CPSU(b) since 1941
My paternal grandfather, Eliohu (Eliyahu), was a Krymchak, at the age of 12 he became a cantonist and in the army received the surname Selvinsky.
Biography
Selvinsky was born into a Jewish family of a wealthy furrier contractor who took part in the Russian-Turkish war. Selvinsky began studying at the age of six in a Catholic monastery in Istanbul; in 1905, due to his father’s financial failures, the family returned to Simferopol, where they soon experienced a pogrom, which was forever imprinted in the writer’s memory. Then Selvinsky lived in Yevpatoria, where he graduated from the city school in 1915, and from the gymnasium in 1919 with a gold medal. During the holidays, Selvinsky traveled a lot, was a cabin boy, a fisherman, a longshoreman, an actor in a traveling theater, and a wrestler in a circus. During civil war He joined the anarchist detachment of Marusya Nikiforova, and after its defeat he joined the Red Guard. In 1919 he entered the medical faculty of Tauride University in Simferopol. In 1921 he moved to Moscow, studied at the law department of the faculty social sciences Moscow University, from which he graduated in 1923. Since 1922, Selvinsky worked in the Centrosoyuz, then in the Selsoyuz, and in 1928–32. - in Soyuzpushnina, thanks to which he traveled almost the entire country - the Central Russian strip, the Urals, the Far North and the Far East, Kyrgyzstan, Kamchatka. As a correspondent for the newspaper Pravda in 1933–34. took part in an expedition along the Northern sea route on the steamship "Chelyuskin". During the Second World War he was a battalion commissar (joined the Communist Party in 1941), fought on various fronts, and was wounded several times. For many years, Selvinsky taught at the M. Gorky Literary Institute in Moscow.
The beginning of a creative journey
Selvinsky began writing poetry in his youth (first publication in 1915 in the newspaper “Evpatoria News”). The gymnasium poems were signed by Elliy Karl Selvinsky, adding to his slightly modified Hebrew name the name of K. Marx, whose “Capital” he was interested in at that time. In 1920 he wrote several wreaths of sonnets, similar in style to the early poems; among them is “Bar Kokhba” (published in 1929 in the collection “Early Selvinsky”), dedicated to the leader of the anti-Roman uprising in Judea (see Bar Kokhba uprising). From imitation of A. Blok and I. Bunin, Selvinsky soon came to the denial of traditional poetics. In experimental poems of the 1920s - early 1930s. Selvinsky uses various jargons, including thieves (“Thief”, 1926), foreign language vocabulary (Ukrainian, Gypsy, Jewish), creating macaroni poems. This period is characterized by the poems “Anecdotes about the Karaite philosopher Babakai-Sudduk” (1931) and the short story “Motke-Malkhamoves” (1926), written in a mixture of Odessa thieves’ jargon and Jewish words (Yiddish, Hebrew), intonations and expressions (sometimes almost untranslatable into Russian: “And one pulled the other by the pants”). The image of the hero, the Odessa raider, arose under the influence of “Odessa Stories” (1921–23) by I. Babel. In 1922–23 Selvinsky, together with K. Zelinsky, initiated the creation of a literary group of constructivists, which, like LEF, sought to find ways to depict the themes of socialist reality. The constructivists in their aesthetics were generally close to LEF, which, however, did not prevent them from conducting fierce polemics (especially the leaders of the groups - Selvinsky and V. Mayakovsky). When the Constructivist Literary Center (1924–30) took organizational form, which included E. Bagritsky, Vera Inber, E. Gabrilovich (1899–1993) and others, Selvinsky became its main ideologist, theorist and leading poet. After the publication in 1926 of the collection of poems “Records”, in 1927 - the poems “Ulyalaevshchina” (written in 1924) and “Notes of a Poet”, and in 1928 - the novel in verse “Pushtorg” and the tragedy “Commander 2" Selvinsky gained wide popularity. These works, built on the principle of constructivist “double realism”, with its narrative nature, the introduction of numbers, technical terminology, digressions on economic topics, documents and statistical data into the poetic text, were distinguished by bold experimentalism. The colorfully written “Ulyalaevshchina” tells the story of the emergence and defeat of the anarchist-kulak uprising of Ulyalaev. The head of the uprising, as well as the Jewish anarchist Stein depicted in the poem, according to official criticism, were much more expressive than the pale images of the communists (in 1956. was published a new version poem in which V. Lenin became the central figure, and “seditious” lines about freedom of creativity, etc. were also excluded). In “Pushtorg”, through the tragic conflict of a brilliant specialist with a mediocre communist bureaucrat, Selvinsky emphasizes the tragedy of the fate of the intelligentsia during the period of so-called socialist construction. Both in “Ulyalaevshchina” and in “Pushtorg” there are Jewish reminiscences, such as “Jew Bernadotte, French marshal...”, “biblical Haggadah”, etc.
In “Commander 2” (the tragedy staged by Vs. Meyerhold in 1929), the dramatic conflict is built on the collision of revolutionary expediency with the spontaneous impulse of the masses, and in the contrast of two types of revolutionaries, the civil war commanders Chub and Okonnikov, were noticeable, especially in theatrical embodiment, hints at the struggle between I. Stalin and L. Trotsky. In the avant-garde social-satirical play Pao-pao (1932), an orangutan, freed under the influence of communist ideas from animal and bourgeois instincts, becomes human (in 1956, Selvinsky reworked the play, transferring the action from Germany in the 1920s to Nazi Germany). In Selvinsky’s poetry collection “Declaration of Rights”, published in 1933, in the “Agitki” section, a small poem “From Palestine to Birobidzhan” (written in 1930) was placed, created for the propaganda purposes of OZET and contrasting the failure of Zionism (especially after the riots of 1929 g., see Land of Israel (Eretz Israel). Historical sketch) to the success of the construction of Jewish Birobidzhan. Jewish themes and reminiscences are also noticeable in Selvinsky’s poetry of the 1930s; Thus, in the lyrical poem “Portrait of My Mother” (1934), the mother’s alienation from her son is conveyed by the comparison: “The son’s face is desecrated from now on, like Jewish Jerusalem, which suddenly became a Christian shrine.” In the poems later included in the “Foreign” cycle, there is a strong anti-Nazi orientation (“Anti-Semites”, “ Jewish Question", "Fascism is war" - all in 1936). Since the late 1930s. Selvinsky began to develop the genre of historical tragedy in verse, which over time became the main one in his work (“Knight John”, 1937; “Babek”, 1941; “Livonian War”, 1944; “From Poltava to Gangut”, 1951, “Big Kirill” ", 1957). During the war years, the theme of patriotism, the great historical mission of Russia, became the main one in Selvinsky’s poetry, drama (General Brusilov, 1943) and journalism.
Persecution
Selvinsky, who was often subjected to official “elaborative criticism,” fell into disgrace in 1943 for the poem “Russia” (1942), which Stalin did not like, in which, speaking about the greatness of his homeland, the poet thanked all his teachers, “from Pushkin to Pasternak". The persecution of Selvinsky resumed in 1946 (speech by A. Fadeev) and continued during the period of struggle against cosmopolitanism (see “Cosmopolitans”). The poet was accused of contempt for Russia, its culture and people, of polluting the Russian language, of promoting enemy theories about the degeneration of the Soviet state apparatus, of making the “anarchist, cosmopolitan Stein” the spokesman for his views, and of other similar crimes.
During the Second World War
Some of Selvinsky's works were published in Hebrew, including excerpts from "Ulyalaevshchina" and the poem "Chelyuskiniana" (1937–38) translated by Abraham Shlensky.
Selvinsky died on March 22, 1968 in Moscow.
Family
The daughter of Ilya Selvinsky is the artist and poetess Tatyana Ilyinichna Selvinskaya (born November 2, 1927, Moscow), laureate of the State Prize of Russia.
Works
Lyrics
- "Gymnasium Muse" Cycle of poems
- 1926 - “Records”. Poetry collection
- 1930 - “Declaration of the Rights of the Poet”
- 1931 - “Electrozavodskaya Gazeta” (poems)
- "Pacific Poems"
- "Foreign"
- War poems (including “Motherland”, “Who are we?”, “I saw it!”, “On Leninism”, “Adzhi-Mushkai”; “Fascism” (1941))
- 1947 - “Crimea, Caucasus, Kuban.” Collection.
Poems and novels in verse
- 1920 - “Youth”. Crown of sonnets (poem).
- 1923-1924, published 1927 - Ulyalaevshchina. Poem
- 1927 - “Notes of a poet.” Poem (poetic story, includes a collection of poems “Silk Moon”)
- 1927-1928, published 1929 - “Pushtorg”. Novel in verse
- 1937-1938 - “Chelyuskiniana” poem
- 1956 - second edition of “Ulyalaevshchina”
- 1960 - “Arctic” novel
- “Three heroes” (a collection of Russian epics).
Plays
- 1928 - “Commander 2”. Tragedy (in verse)
- 1932 - “Pao-Pao”. Drama
- 1933 - “Umka - Polar bear" Play
- 1937 - “Knight John”. Tragedy (in verse).
- 1941 - “Babek” (wearing an eagle on his shoulder). Tragedy (in verse).
- "Russia". Dramatic trilogy.
- 1941-1944 - 1. “Livonian War” (in verse).
- 1949 - 2. “From Poltava to Gangut.”
- 1957 - 3. “Big Kirill”.
- 1943 - “General Brusilov”,
- 1947 - “Reading Faust.” Tragedy
- 1962 - “Man is above his fate.” Play
- "The Swan Princess." Lyrical tragedy
- "Tushino camp"
Prose
- 1928 - “The Constructivist Code”
- 1959 - “Features of my life” Autobiographical manuscript
- 1962 - “Studio of Verse”. Book
- published in 1966 - “Oh, my youth!” Novel (autobiographical).
Movies
Awards
- 5 orders;
- medals.
Quote
Notes
Links
Biography and works- Ilya Selvinsky on the website "Element"
- Ilya Selvinsky on the website “Russian Poetry of the 1960s”
- Ilya Selvinsky at the “Electronic bookshelves of Vadim Ershov and Co.”
- Ilya Selvinsky on the “Century of Translation” website
- Ilya Selvinsky on the website “Poetry of Moscow University from Lomonosov to...”
- Ilya Selvinsky on the website “The Best Russian Poets and Poems”
- “Ulyalaevshchina” in the Moshkov Library.
- "Ulyalaevshchina". Facsimile reproduction of the 1935 edition in pdf in the library "ImWerden"
- “Poems for children 4-7 years old” in the library “ImWerden”
- “Tushinsky camp” - Mirror: Literary and artistic magazine
- “Kerch” on the website “Military Literature”
- Selvinsky on the “Soviet Music” website
Born into a simple working-class family, Ilya Lvovich from adolescence strives to write poetic works, standing out among his peers with his eloquence and rare sharpness of mind. Selvinsky finds his true creative direction only after studying many secondary trends, so diverse in the art of poetry. After many years of hard work, the poems written by Ilya Lvovich attracted the attention of the public, which later contributed to his becoming the chairman of the literary center. Having changed many professions, Selvinsky still does not break away from writing his works, persistently polishing each of the written lines. However, Ilya Lvovich’s creativity leads to dissatisfaction with the Soviet authorities, who considered his poems unacceptable for citizens to read.
The views of the constructive movements of the twentieth century are invariably visible in Selvinsky’s works. The poet is of the opinion that the dominance of technology in modern human life. Having membership in one of the clubs following avant-garde traditions, Ilya Lvovich finds himself among non-standard views on the world and unusual rhyme structure.
SELVINSKY, ILYA LVOVICH(1899–1968), Russian poet, prose writer, playwright. Born on October 12, 1899 in Simferopol in the family of a furrier. After the First Russian Revolution of 1905, fearing Jewish pogroms, the mother took the children to Constantinople. A year later, my father went bankrupt and had to return to Crimea. In 1915, Selvinsky graduated from the Evpatoriya elementary school and entered the gymnasium, which he graduated in 1919. During his studies, earning a living, Selvinsky was a sailor on a fishing schooner, a model, newspaper reporter, factory worker, traveling music hall actor. During October revolution 1917 carried out tasks for Bolshevik underground fighters, during the Civil War he became a Red Guard soldier, and was wounded near Perekop. Upon returning to Sevastopol, he was arrested by White Guard counterintelligence and released from prison at the request of friends.
Selvinsky began writing poetry while still a student at primary school (some of them were published in 1915 in the newspaper “Evpatoria News”). The poet subsequently combined the poems written during his years at the gymnasium into a cycle Gymnasium muse. IN early works (Sound, Harbor, Breeze etc.) the influence of N. Gumilyov, I. Severyanin, A. Blok and I. Bunin is felt.
After graduating from high school, Selvinsky entered the medical faculty of Tauride University. To earn money, he hired himself to pump water to the Dulber Hotel in Evpatoria. Artists, writers, musicians, painters, and art critics gathered at the hotel and accepted the gifted young man into their circle. In an autobiographical manuscript Features of my life(1959) Selvinsky wrote: “Impressionism became my school. The essence is boundless devotion to the god of art. Life side by side with people of menial labor, the views of these people, their sympathies and assessments fostered spontaneous democracy in me and forced me more than once to think about the meaning of art, divorced from the people.” The clash of these aspirations is palpable in the early poem (the crown of sonnets) Youth(1920): “And I’m nobody’s. I dream about everything that is not my own. / The wonderful pages are ringing, ringing, / A new volume appears behind the volume. / But in life you wander in empty air.”
After the establishment of Soviet power in Crimea, Selvinsky worked in the theater department of Narurobraz and at the same time studied at the Faculty of Law of Tauride University. In 1920 he transferred to Moscow State University to the Faculty of Social Sciences. The young poet immediately found himself in the thick of literary events: he read his poems in student audiences, his poetry was noticed by critics. His first collection of poetry was published in 1926. Records. Selvinsky gathered a small circle of literary like-minded people, on the basis of which the LCC group (Literary Center of Constructivists) was created in 1924. By 1929, in addition to Selvinsky, the LCC included E. Bagritsky, V. Asmus, E. Gabrilovich, V. Inber, V. Lugovskoy and other writers.
In 1928 Selvinsky wrote Constructivist Code, in which the basic aesthetic principles of the new movement in poetry were formulated: beat verse, local method (a technique in which the main thing is the functional meaning of rhymed words), etc. In Constructivist Code it was said that “the bearer of the constructivist (i.e., aggressively organizational and cultural) movement should be first of all the proletariat, and then the intermediate social groups, under the ideological influence of the proletariat."
Selvinsky's creativity has always been characterized by intensity. After graduating from Moscow State University (1923), he served for some time in the Central Union and often went on business trips, visited Far East and the Far North. During these years he conceived the idea of a poetic epic Ulyalaevshchina(1923–1924, publ. 1927). The theme of the poem is the fight against gangs in the steppes, the rampant rebellious elements and its suppression. Even before publication, the poem was circulated in lists. Critics noted the unexpected rhythms, the use of folklore and dialect, the combination of humor and lyricism, grotesqueness and realism. At the same time, the poet was accused of romanticizing the bandit leader Ulyalaev and schematizing the image of the communist commissar Guy. In 1956 Selvinsky published the second edition Ulyalaevshchina, focusing on the image of Guy and introducing into the text the image of Lenin dictating a decree on the tax in kind.
In 1927 he wrote a poetic story Notes of the poet. Main character, poet Evgeny Ney, is endowed with autobiographical features. The story ended with a collection of his poems Silk moon, in which the aesthetic preferences of Selvinsky the constructivist were clearly felt.
Selvinsky has always been attracted to drama. His poetic tragedy Commandarm-2(1928) was staged by Vs. Meyerhold. Subsequently, Selvinsky constantly turned to dramatic form, creating a kind of “poet’s theater.” Poetic tragedies on historical themes occupy a significant place in it - Wearing an eagle on his shoulder (1941), Livonian War(1944) and many others. etc.
The poet’s impressions of working in the Central Union were embodied in a novel in verse Pushtorg(1927–1928), the main theme of which was the relationship of the intelligentsia with the Soviet government. The novel was written in octines, using a variety of intonation moves and metaphors.
After the dissolution of the LCC in 1930–1932, Selvinsky worked as a welder at the Moscow Electric Plant, authorized by Soyuzpushnina in Kamchatka. In 1933 he became a correspondent for the newspaper Pravda and visited many countries. Western Europe, writing poems with narrative content about his trips ( Panna Poland, Conversation with the Devil of Paris and etc.). During these years he also wrote a satirical-fantasy drama Pao Pao(1932) - about an orangutan who, thanks to the communists, becomes human, and the play Umka Polar bear(1933). Impressions from Chelyuskin’s epic are reflected in the poem Chelyuskiniana(1937–1938), and subsequently in the novel Arctic(1960).
During the Great Patriotic War Selvinsky was a war correspondent. His poems of the 1940s, imbued with pathos, are devoted to the military theme. Motherland, Who are we?, I saw it!, About Leninism and many more etc. In the poem Fascism(1941) defined fascism as "the revolt of the red beast / Against the dominion of man."
After the war, Selvinsky continued to work fruitfully in various genres. Published a book of theoretical articles Verse Studio(1962), a play about Lenin A man above his destiny(1962), autobiographical novel Oh my youth! (published 1966). He led a creative seminar at the A.M. Gorky Literary Institute and continued to write poetry. Poem An old man needs to get used to a lot... written two days before his death.
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Ilya Lvovich Selvinsky (in the 1920s he used the pseudonym Elliy-Karl Selvinsky; 1899-1968) - Russian Soviet poet of Krymchak origin. He also acted as a prose writer and playwright. Founder and Chairman of the Constructivist Literary Center.
Born on October 12 (24 n.s.) in Simferopol in the family of a furrier, a disabled veteran of the Turkish war of 1874. His childhood years were spent in Crimea, where he graduated from the Evpatoria gymnasium, then studied at Faculty of Medicine Tauride University (did not graduate). In gymnasiums and student years tried many professions: he was a cabin boy on a schooner, a port loader, a model, a crime reporter, an actor in a traveling theater, an agricultural worker, etc. In 1918, having become a Red Guard fighter, he defended Perekop. Selvinsky continued his education in Moscow, graduating from the Faculty of Law of the University, then from the Faculty of Social Sciences (1923).
The Cossacks rode, and the Cossacks rode,
Yes, the Cossacks were driving, forelocks on their lips.
Selvinsky Ilya Lvovich
From 1922 to 1926, then in 1932 he was an instructor at the Central Union for fur exports. Along with all this activity, Selvinsky is looking for his place in poetry, creating experimental poems. In the 1920s he became one of the leaders of constructivism (the poems "Ulyalaevshchina", 1924, and "Notes of a Poet", 1927). He writes a novel in verse "Pushtorg" (1928) and tries his hand at drama: the tragedy "Commander 2", 1928 (staged by V. Meyerhold in 1929), the play "Pao-Pao", 1931; "Umka - Polar Bear", 1933.
In 1933 - 34, Selvinsky, as a special correspondent for Pravda, participated in the Arctic expedition of prof. O.Yu. Schmidt on the icebreaker "Chelyuskin", subsequently writing the poem "Chelyuskiniana".
In the 1930s he travels through Europe and Asia. During this period, he developed the genre of historical tragedy in verse: “Knight John” (1937), “Babek” (1941).
During the Patriotic War, Selvinsky was on the Crimean, Caucasian and Baltic fronts. It was during these years that he began working on the dramatic trilogy "Russia", which he completed in 1957.
The result of many years of thought and poetry research was the book “Studio of Verse” (1962).
Ilya Lvovich Selvinsky(in the 1920s he used the pseudonym Elliy-Karl Selvinsky, double name Ilya-Karl performs in some of his official documents; 1899-1968) - Russian Soviet writer of Krymchak origin, poet and playwright, representative of the literary movement of constructivism.
Biography
Selvinsky was born on October 11 (24), 1899 in Simferopol into a Krymchak family. His grandfather, Elya (Eliogu) Shelevinsky, was a cantonist of the Phanagorian regiment. Father, Leiba Elshaelovich (Lev Ilyich) Selevinsky, participated in Russian-Turkish War 1877, then traded in furs and furs. Mother - Nadezhda Piastro. As Selvinsky himself wrote in his autobiography (1967), his father “was a furrier, and then, having gone bankrupt, turned into a furrier.”
The future writer studied at the Evpatoriya elementary school, and from 1915 to 1919 - at the gymnasium. Since 1915, he began to publish his works (in particular, in the newspaper “Evpatoria News”).
During the years of the revolution he took part in the revolutionary movement, and during the civil war he fought in the Red Army. He changed many professions (he was a loader, model, reporter, circus wrestler, etc.).
In 1923, Selvinsky graduated from the Faculty of Social Sciences of the 1st Moscow state university. The actual leader of the constructivist group. In 1926 he published his first collection of poems. In the late 20s he wrote experimental epic poems, and in the early 30s avant-garde poetic dramas.
In 1927-1930 led a heated debate with V.V. Mayakovsky. In 1930 he made statements of repentance. At the same time, as follows from his autobiography, he went “to work as a welder at an electrical plant.”
In 1933-1934. correspondent for Pravda, he was on an expedition led by Otto Schmidt on the steamship Chelyuskin, and walked with the Chukchi on dogs across the ice of the Arctic Ocean and the tundra to Cape Dezhnev.
Since 1937 he has been writing historical dramas in verse. Member of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) since 1941. From 1941 to 1945 he was at the front in the Red Army, first with the rank of battalion commissar, then lieutenant colonel. He received two shell shocks and one serious wound near Bataysk.
In the 1950s he made new editions of works from the 1920s.
With his long poems and tragedies in verse, which were the specific result of the search for new possibilities in the field of poetic technique, Selvinsky earned himself a very special place in Soviet literature. Selvinsky’s belonging to the constructivists determined his fascination with the “local technique,” when the main thing is the functional meaning of rhyming words.
Family
The daughter of Ilya Selvinsky is the artist and poetess Tatyana Ilyinichna Selvinskaya (born November 2, 1927, Moscow), laureate of the State Prize of Russia.
Movies
- Poems in the film “The Tale of the Siberian Land” (1947)
Awards
- 5 orders; Order of the Red Banner of Labor - 1939
- medals.
Quote
Editions
- Selvinsky I. Collected works in six volumes. T. 1-6. M.:GIHL ( Fiction), 1971-1974.
- Selvinsky, I. How to make a light bulb. M.: Ogonyok, 1931. 48 p. (Library "Ogonyok").
- Selvinsky I. Poet's Theater. M.: Art, 1965. 508 p.
- Selvinsky, Ilya. Selected works. L.: Soviet writer. Leningrad branch, 1972. 958 p. (Poet's Library. Large series).
- Selvinsky, Ilya. What is right? / Rice. M. Romadina M.: Children's literature, 1976. 16 p. (For little ones).
- Selvinsky, Ilya. Poems; The Swan Princess: Tragedy. - M.: Fiction, 1984. - 383 p.
- Selvinsky, Ilya. Three heroes: Epic / Preface. I. Mikhailova; Artist V. Pertsov. M.: Soviet writer, 1990. 256 p. ISBN 5-265-00719-9.
- Selvinsky, Ilya. From ashes, from poems, from dreams. - M.: Time, 2004. - 750 pp. - (Poetry Library). ISBN 5-94117-060-2. - Contents: Poems; Ulyalaevshchina: Epic; Notes of a poet: Tale; Pushtorg: Chapters from a novel; Pao Pao: Drama. (Early editions).
- Poetry of the East / [Trans. I. L. Selvinsky]. - Rostov-on-Don: Phoenix, 2008. - 279 p. - (“Gold Fund”).
Works about Selvinsky
- Levchenko M. Intertextuality of the novel in poems by Ilya Selvinsky “Pushtorg” (Byron - Pushkin - Mayakovsky) // Russian Philology. 10. Collection of works of young philologists. Tartu, 1998.
- Reznik O. Life in poetry. The works of Ilya Selvinsky, 2nd ed. M., 1972.
- Russian Soviet writers. Poets: Biobibliogr. decree. / State publ. fuck them. M. E. Saltykova-Shchedrina; [Editorial committee: O. D. Golubeva (pres.) and others]. - Vol. 23: I. Selvinsky - Y. Smelyakov / [Compiled by: D. B. Asiatsev and others]. - M.: Book, 2000. - 575 p. ISBN 5-8192-0048-9
- G.K. Selvinsky // Literary Encyclopedia: In 11 volumes - T. 10. - [M.: GIHL, 1937]. - Stb. 613-617.
- Selvinsky Ilya (Karl) Lvovich // Russian Humanitarian encyclopedic Dictionary: In 3 volumes - M.: VLADOS; Philol. fak. St. Petersburg state University, 2002. T. 3.
- Farber L. M. Selvinsky Ilya (Karl) Lvovich // Great Soviet Encyclopedia.
- Selvinsky Ilya // Brief Jewish Encyclopedia. T. 7. Col. 741-744.
- Shoshin V. A. Selvinsky Ilya (Karl) Lvovich // Russian literature of the 20th century: Prose writers, poets, playwrights: Bio-bibliographic dictionary: In 3 volumes - M.: Olma-press invest, 2005. - T. 3. - pp. 293-295 .
- About Selvinsky: Memoirs / [Comp. T. A. Voskresenskaya, I. P. Sirotinskaya]. - M.: Sov. writer, 1982. - 399 p.
- Boyko M. By the age of forty, he was broken: Pasternak was forgiven for his conversation with Stalin, but Selvinsky was not forgiven for his poems about Pasternak: [Interview with Tatyana Ilinichnaya Selvinskaya] // Exlibris-NG. 2009. No. 015 (507).