First edition. A friend of Esenin and Mariengof, Shirman (1888–1956) graduated from the medical faculty at Moscow University in 1912 and worked as a doctor in the city. He was arrested four times (1927, 1937, 1941, 1949), but was released each time without charge. His first book of verse, Mashina tishiny (Engine of Silence), came out in 1924, to be followed in 1926 by four further collections (Cuneiform of Lightnings, Skull, Zodiac Carousel, Constellation of the Snake) and a piece of erotica (A Banned Poem). Further writing, of which there was much, was all ‘for the drawer’, but he destroyed the majority of his work, fearful of further arrests and searches.

No locations in OCLC. Tarasenkov p. 416; not in Kilgour.

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