An Analysis of Babi Yar

An Analysis of Babi Yar

Yevtushenko speaks in first person throughout the poem. This

creates the tone of him being in the shoes of the Jews. As he says in

lines 63-64, "No Jewish blood is mixed in mine, but let me be a Jew .

. . " He writes the poem to evoke compassion for the Jews and make

others aware of their hardships and injustices. "Only then can I call

myself Russian." (lines 66-67). The poet writes of a future time when

the Russian people realize that the Jews are people as well accept

them as such. If you hate the Jews, he asks, why not hate me as well?

True peace and unity will only occur when they have accepted everyone,

including the Jews.

Stanza I describes the forest of Babi Yar, a ravine on the

outskirts of Kiev. It was the site of the Nazi massacre of more than

thirty thousand Russian Jews on September 29-30, 1941. There is no

memorial to the thirty thousand, but fear pervades the area. Fear that

such a thing could occur at the hands of other humans. The poet feels

the persecution and pain and fear of the Jews who stood there in this

place of horror. Yevtushenko makes himself an Israelite slave of Egypt

and a martyr who died for the sake of his religion. In lines 7-8, he

claims that he still bars the marks of the persecution of the past.

There is still terrible persecution of the Jews in present times

because of their religion. These lines serve as the transition from

the Biblical and ancient examples he gives to the allusions of more

recent acts of hatred. The lines also allude to the fact that these

Russian Jews who were murdered at Babi Yar were martyrs as well.

The next ezza reminds us of another event in Jewish history

where a Jew was persecuted solely because of his religious beliefs.

The poet refers to the "pettiness" (line 11) of anti-Semitism as the

cause of Dreyfus' imprisonment. Anti-Semitism is his "betrayer" (line

12) when he is framed, and anti-Semitism is his "judge" (line 12) when

he is wrongly found guilty. Lines 13-14 claim that even the fine and

supposedly civilized women of society shun Dreyfus because he is a Jew

and fear him like they would fear an animal.

In ezza III, Yevtushenko brings himself to the midst of the