First Hotel Reisen, Stockholm (Joseph Brodsky)

Skeppsbron 12, 111 30 Stockholm, Sweden

Joseph Brodsky often visited Sweden, even calling it his ecological niche. For six years, from 1988 to 1994, he spent several months almost every summer living at the First Hotel Reisen in Stockholm.

Joseph Brodsky often visited Sweden, even calling it his ecological niche. For six years, from 1988 to 1994, he spent several months almost every summer living at the First Hotel Reisen in Stockholm.

Brodsky greatly valued his Stockholm refuge. The Reisen Hotel was established on the site of an 18th-century coffeehouse, where enterprising owners began renting rooms to guests. The building itself is based on the vaults of the 17th-century city wall, parts of which are now displayed as historical exhibits. But what attracted Brodsky most were the views from the hotel windows. They reminded him of Russia.


After receiving the Nobel Prize in 1987, these visits became frequent and regular. In August 1989, Brodsky wrote from Stockholm: "It’s hot here, a jackhammer in the yard from 7 a.m., accompanied by sandblasting. Normal stuff; the main thing is the water and everything else — familiar in color and texture. The whole city is like Petrograd Side. Steamships dart through the skerries, and so on, and so forth. Terribly reminiscent of childhood — not what it was, but the opposite." The most important thing for him was the beautiful view of the river, where he sought inspiration. "In this city, as soon as you step out of the hotel, a salmon jumps out of the water to greet you," wrote Joseph Brodsky about his room at the Reisen Hotel. The corner room, where the poet worked on 'The Shore of the Unhealable,' was small but faced the city center and allowed him to admire the white ship moored practically at the hotel entrance.

 

Sources:

https://dom.mail.ru/articles/60270-6-istoricheskih-otelej-v-kotoryih-zhili-izvestnyie/

designdeluxegroup.com/magazine/2021/12/17/отелей-где-творилась-история/

Ya.A. Gordin "The Knight and Death, or Life as a Design: On the Fate of Joseph Brodsky"

https://bergberg.livejournal.com/777436.html

 

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More stories from Great Writers: Joseph Brodsky (Petersburg and the Whole World)

The Case of the Parasite Brodsky - First Hearing

36 Vosstaniya Street, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 191014

On February 13, 1964, Brodsky was arrested on charges of parasitism. The next day, he suffered his first heart attack in the cell. A few days later, the first court hearing took place. Journalist and writer Frida Vigdorova took notes during the two sessions, which were periodically attempted to be confiscated.

Trial of the Parasite Brodsky - Finale

Fontanka River Embankment, 22, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 191028

Brodsky systematically fails to fulfill the duties of a Soviet citizen in producing material goods and personal provision, as evidenced by his frequent job changes.

Childhood and Youth of Brodsky. One and a Half Rooms.

Liteyny Ave., 24, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 191028

The aesthetic views of Brodsky were formed in Leningrad during the 1940s–1950s. Neoclassical architecture, heavily damaged during the bombings, the endless perspectives of Leningrad’s outskirts, water, the multiplicity of reflections — motifs connected with these impressions from his childhood and youth are invariably present in his work.

Jewish cemetery

Stachek Square, 4, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 198095

Jewish cemetery near Leningrad. A crooked fence made of rotten plywood. Behind the crooked fence lie side by side lawyers, merchants, musicians, revolutionaries.

Treatment in a psychiatric hospital

Moika River Embankment, 126, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 190121

"...exhibits psychopathic personality traits, but does not suffer from a mental illness and, according to the state of their neuro-psychological health, is capable of working."

Beloved of Joseph Brodsky

15 Glinki St., Saint Petersburg, Russia, 190068

The poet dedicated many poems to M.B. — it is by these very first letters of the name and surname that they can be found in Brodsky’s collections.

Memorial plaque to Joseph Brodsky

195196, Stakhanovtsev St., 19, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 195196

The idea of installing a monument to Iosif Alexandrovich Brodsky on Malaya Okhta originated among local residents, it is believed, in the late 1990s. However, more than ten years passed before their own "Brodsky point" appeared on the map. The commemorative sign to the outstanding poet was solemnly unveiled near house No. 19 on Stakhanovtsev Street on December 1, 2011.

Monument "Brodsky Has Arrived"

Universitetskaya Embankment, 11, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 199034

The first monument in Russia to a poet, essayist, playwright, translator, and Nobel Prize laureate in Literature was unveiled on November 16, 2005, on Vasilievsky Island, in the courtyard of the Faculty of Philology at Saint Petersburg State University.

Monument "Portrait of Joseph Brodsky" or THIS IS NOT HIM!

Bering Street, 27k6, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 199397

Granite Joseph Alexandrovich materialized unexpectedly and suddenly. The sculpture was installed in December 2016. There was no opening ceremony. The monument was unloaded from the trailer of an old "Gazelle" and placed on the ground... It turned out unpoetic.

The grave of Joseph Brodsky

San Michele, 30121, 30121 Venice VE, Italy

In January 1996, Joseph Brodsky passed away. He was buried in one of his favorite cities — Venice, in the old cemetery on the island of San Michele. The epitaph on Brodsky's grave reads: "Not all ends with death" (from Propertius' elegy *Letum non omnia finit*).