“Brooklyn Bridge”: A Russian Homage to America

“Brooklyn Bridge:”
A Russian Homage to America

Dr. G. SRIRAMA MURTY
A. M. A. I. College, Anakapalle

One of the important features of the twentieth century is the divergent development of two cultures based on two different socio-political ideologies resulting from two great revolutions of the world. One of the revolutions was the American revolution which was followed and strengthened by the Industrial revolution that occurred on European soil at first. The other was the Russian revolution of 1917 which was followed and strengthened by the New Economic Policy of Lenin. The gains of the proletarian revolution were consolidated by Stalin and his followers later on. Today we find the capitalistic culture of America contrasting with the proletariat culture of Russia.

The Brooklyn Bridge is a breathtaking achievement of American engineering skill. Whoever goes to America pays his homage to the genius that went into its shaping and the spirit it symbolizes. It is not merely a steel structure spanning the sides of the River Hudson but a visible symbol of the American adventurous spirit and the mechanistic civilization of the twentieth century. It is no wonder that the great American poet Hart Crane made it the theme of his magnificent epic poem The Bridge. Even as the poet was exploring the possibilities of the theme, Lewis Mumford had prophetically written thus:

“…...beyond any other aspect of New York, I think, the Brooklyn Bridge has become a source of joy and inspiration to the artist….All that the age had just cause for pride in its advances in science, its skill in handling iron, its personal heroism in the face of dangerous industrial processes, its willingness to attempt the united and the impossible, came to a head in the Brooklyn Bridge.”

Hart Crane was a proud American and the thought that no apology was necessary for its civilization and culture. In him the dichotomy between the “virgin” and the “dynamo” disappears and the grass roots of American culture lay, but also holds a hope for the future.

If Hart Crane is the Homer of American civilization Vladimir Mayakovsky is the supreme singer of Russian revolution and Soviet culture. A rank and file follower of Lenin, he watched the growth of the young Soviet Republics and the establishment of the new proletarian culture with the concern of an elder brother. When this staunch protagonist of proletarian culture visited America, the Brooklyn Bridge enticed his attention at once and demanded its wonted meed of praise from him too. That he did not fail to respond to the call of the bridge speaks volumes of his unfettered spirit and refined sensibility. While he recognizes what is valuable in American civilization and pays it a handsome tribute, he also reminds us of the desperate lot of “the martyrs of unemployment”, dashing headlong into the Hudson’s scowl.

This presentation of the other side of the medal need not be attributed to his proletarian bias of mind. It seems to be an ingrown habit of his mind, for we are told, that this poetic envoy of Russia had not hesitated to lay his finger on the weak spots of Soviet life itself. The scornful denigration of American exploitation comes in the later poems of the “American Cycle.” But his first spontaneous outburst on seeing the prestigious American Bridge at New York is an unmixed admiration of the heroic in man. It is also worthy of note that he was the first poet to grasp the symbolic significance of the bridge and his poem “Brooklyn Bridge” seems to anticipate “The Bridge “ of Hart Crane.

The tone of the opening lines in which he accosts the then American President, Coolidge, makes it plain that he admires the bridge in spite of its Americanness:

Coolidge, old boy,
Give a woop of joy;
What’s good is good–
No need for debate
Blush red with my praise,
Swell with pride till
you are spherical
Though you be ten times
United States of America.

The poet now proceeds to describe the spirit with which he approaches the celebrated bridge by means of three suggestive similes. In the first one he compares himself to a devout church-goer on Sunday who is “bewitched” by “faith.” The religious image suggests, that to appreciate a genuine work of art irrespective of its ground is an act of faith on the part of the poet. It suggests his absolute catholicity of taste. In the second simile

As a conqueror rides
through the town he crushes
On a canon by which
Himself’s a midge

he alludes to the Russian revolution and the new culture which rose on the ruins of capitalism. As an apostle of the new Russian culture, he is a conqueror riding through the fallen city. But again, he suggestively says that he himself is Small–“a midge” in comparison with the “power”–“canon” –he wields. It is not merely an expression of modesty. It suggests his creed that the individual willis of no account when collectivism is the order of the day. The glory with which he was drunk is not the glory of individual achievement but that of collective willwhose triumph in Russia made “all life” luscious.”

In the next simile, Mayakovsky compares himself to a happy painter:

As a silly painter
into a museum virgin
Infatuated
plunges
his optics fork.

The adjective “silly” here connotes innocent “happiness” as in the phrase “silly” shepherd. The delight of the artist in the presence of an artistic masterpiece like the picture of Raphael’s Madonna, in a museum is likened to delight which Mayakovsky feels in the presence of the mighty, awe-inspiring Brooklyn Bridge. That the painting is a feast to the eye is suggested by the gustative image introduced by the word “fork.” The pain of the painter’s eyes connected optic nerves to his brain behind is the “fork” with which he enjoys the dinner of the pictorial beauty spread before him. The sensuous joy of the feast is coloured by its solemn Association with the picture of the Virgin Mary. Hence it is a serene joy. Behind all the three similes discussed we find an attitude of reverence and worship.

The poet “clambers” to the heaven verging height of the bridge and from there looks at New York through the haze of the evening. He is now aloof from the buzz and din of the city. The noise of the city fades before it reaches the place where he lands now. The bustle of the railway train afar is “rubbered by the distance” and is heard

Like crockery
being put by
in a cupboard.

He scans the scene of the sugar-bearing cargo ships floating on the distant waters of the river beneath, winds receding farther and farther towards north and south, until they appear to be “tinier than the tiniest pebbles.”

Presently he struts across the “steel-wrought” mile of the bridge, seeing visions. The functional character of the bridge appealed to him more than its style. It is as though his dream came true. He imagines what the future historian would say if the bridge alone should survive after everything else had been washed away by time, towering over the colossal debris around it. The future historian would reconstruct the history of our times on the basis of this lone survivor in much the same as a geologist rebuilds denosaurs in museums on the basis of “a needle-thin bone” of a fossil. He would tell how the mile long bridge “welded oceans and prairies”; how the European forefathers marched towards the wild west and “swished” the Red-Indian aborigines to the winds; how after the colonial period of ruthless exploitation, there came the great era of machine age via the all too brief steam age. He would certainly dilate on their achievement in electronics and aeronautics. Finally, he would remark on the American way of life crisply as

Here life
for some
was a scream of enjoyment,
for others–
one drawn-out
hungry howl.

What an objective analysis of American history and civilization!

In the last few lines, Mayakovsky says that the future historian will also remember how he stood on the same bridge, “at the stars’ own feet” “hammering his verses beat by beat” while the whole history of America and the story of its civilization founded on ruthless exploitation unfolded before him in a vision. In none of his American poems is he so sober and objective, so free from satire and sarcasm. In a language that is simple and direct, using scarcely any figure but a simile, he achieved a tremendous artistic success in making the Brooklyn Bridge symbolic of everything that the U. S. A. is and can be. When we compare it with Hart Crane’s stupendous epic poem “The Bridge” we cannot but appreciate the ease with which he scored a success. Mayakovsky is like a modernist painter who, with a few dots and strokes thrown apparently haphazardly, gains a tremendous immediate effect which greater artists with larger canvases and pots, colours and paints often fail to produce. “Brooklyn Bridge” seems, in fine, to be no less a memorial to Mayakovsky than a homage to America.