Joseph Brodsky was born in Leningrad in 1940. Although he was considered one of the most promising soviet poets, he was not allowed to publish his poems until 1970 and had to do so underground.

In 1972, Brodsky immigrated to the United States of America and in 1987, he received the Nobel prize in literature “for his all-embracing authorship, which is imbued with clarity of thought and poetic intensity.”