December 5, 1820

Afanasy Fet (December 5, 1820, to December 3, 1892), was a Russian writer praised by Nicholai Gogol, and who in his adulthood, was an intimate of the family of Leo Tolstoy. Yet his name is not well-known in the West. Of his poetry we have a glimpse:

And on an occasional table, 
A basket spilling a sock; 
The frisky tabby cat leaping 
At a ball of wool on the floor; 
The granddaughter, quiet and wistful, 
In the prettiest possible frock, 
Pale hands with beautiful motions, 
Modestly lowered lids
...

This is hardly enough to evaluate the claim that his lyrical verse made him the greatest Russian poet of the 19th century. Still, the translator of Schopenhauer's The World as Will and Idea deserves more research.