Lermontov and His Friends
 

13
 

death Lermont<n-'s fame rested on some forty odd poems and a
novel published during his lifetime. But so great was the impact of
Lermontov's poetry and personality upon his readers that the de-
 

Pencil sketch bv Lermontov of a group dancing the quadrille.

mand for postiiumous editions of his works kept soaring, and the
financial success of those publications spurred the publishers to
undertake extensive searches for Lermontov's verses. So energetic
were their efforts in that direction that they caused a controversy
among literary critics, some maintaining that the poet's wish to
offer the public only his best should be respected, others insisting
that Lermontov's early death made it imperative to acquaint his
admirers with everything that had come from his pen. The latter
opinion prevailed, and the conmiemorative edition of 1889-91 ap¬
peared in five volumes of collected works plus one volume of
biographical information. The materials had come from the old
notebooks and manuscripts the poet had left with his relatives,
who stubbornly opposed their publication on the ground that the
poet himself had discarded them as too weak.