Osip Mandelstam (1891- 1938), one of the three great Acmeist poets, wrote verse distinguished by classical restraint, majestic conciseness, and sonority. Much of his early poetry is embodied in his two collections Stone (1913) and Tristina (1922). Arrested in 1934, he was exiled first to the Ural region and then to Voronezh. In 1938 he was rearrested, sentenced to forced labour, and died in harrowing circumstances in Vladivostok. （那顆晴空 摘）

Osip Mandelshtam grew up in St. Petersburg in an assimilated middle-class Jewish family. His two early works, "Kamen" (1913, Stone) and "Tristia" of 1922, brought him national attention and the wrath of the Soviet censors, who silenced him for the next several years. He was arrested in 1938 and sentenced to five years of hard labor; he died of heart failure in transit to the work camp. This volume is the major American edition of "Tristia." （那顆晴空 摘）