Silver Age poet and prose writer, an outstanding figure of Russian avant-garde art, one of the initiators of Russian futurism; a reformer of poetic language, and an experimentalist in word creation and “zaum” (roughly translated as “trans-sense” or “trans-rational”), i.e. the ultimate poetic language, devised by him.
Khlebnikov (real - Viktor Vladimirovich Khlebnikov) attracted everyone’s attention and evoked interest due to his original personality and outlook, as well as independence of views, rare for his age.
His life was full of resettlements; he had no home, no employment, and no money. Yet, wherever he lived, the poet was possessed by creative work, thinking and research. A scholar and fantast, a poet and essayist, he was fully immersed into creativity.
On 28 June 1922 the “most honest knight of poetry”, as Vladimir Mayakovsky called him, died of a painful illness in Novgorod Province.