In Memory of the Great Russian Poet Konstantin Kedrov

Konstantin Alexandrovich Kedrov has passed away — a poet, philosopher, literary critic, author of the theory of the “metacode” and the term “metametaphor,” founder and visionary of metametaphorism in Russian poetry. His word was as precise as a formula, and as infinite as the universe.

Konstantin Kedrov was born in Rybinsk in 1942. At birth, he bore the surname Berdichevsky. He began his poetic journey in the early 1960s. His work became a brilliant manifestation of intellectual and philosophical poetry, where science and cosmos, lyricism and logic fused into a powerful literary energy.

He was a professor at the Gorky Institute of Literature, Doctor of Philosophy, Candidate of Philological Sciences, and a member of the USSR Writers’ Union since 1989. He was also a member of the executive committee of the Russian PEN Club. He founded the literary group and abbreviation DOOS — the Voluntary Society for the Protection of Dragonflies — one of the most poetic and free associations in the history of contemporary literature.

Konstantin Alexandrovich was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature (2003–2005), and became the laureate of the South Korean Manhae Prize (2013) and the World Literary Prize WOW, established in 2023. His concept of the metametaphor transformed our understanding of the poetic image as a universe.

He taught us to see the universe in every line, to feel the infinite in every word. His ideas and poems will live on — as the light of distant stars continues to shine.

Bright memory to the poet, thinker, and man for whom poetry was the breath of the cosmos.