[RUSSIAN IMAGINISM - AVANT-GARDE - FIRST PRINTING OF POEMS BY MANDELSTAM AND ESENIN] Gostinitsa dlia puteshestvuiushchikh v prekrasnom [A guesthouse for travelers in the beautiful]. Nos. 1-4 (1922-1924)

Moscow: Vol'nitsa; Izdanie Assotsiatsii vol'nodumtsev (Association of Freethinkers), 1922-1924. Quartos (34.4 × 25.5 cm). Original staple-stitched pictorial wrappers; 16-20 pp. per issue. Illustrated throughout with works by V. Chekrygin and G. Iakulov, as well as set design by K. Medunetskii and the Stenberg Brothers. Bookstore stamp to rear wrappers of nos. 2 and 4. Nos. 1 and 3 marked to wrapper in blue pencil "O Esenine". Professional restoration to spine and some individual leaves; foxing and discoloration to wrappers; still good or better.

Four issues (all published) of this main journal of the Russian "Imaginists" (Imazhinisty), one of the leading avant-garde literary movements, which included the poets Sergei Esenin, Anatolii Mariengof, Vadim Shershenevich, Nikolai Erdman, Riurik Ivnev, and others. Of special note are the first publication in Russia of Osip Mandelstam's poem "Senoval" ("Hayloft", 1922), the first printing of Sergei Esenin's "Proshchanie s Mariengofom" ("A farewell to Mariengof", 1922), and "Moskva kabatskaia" ("The Backstreets of Moscow", 1924), and illustrations by the avant-garde painter and set designer Georgii Iakulov. Most closely associated with the Symbolists and Futurists (and involved in heated polemic with the latter), the Imaginists were especially active in Moscow 1919-1924 and were popular with the audiences for the anarchic and sensationalist tendencies in their poetry. Vadim Shershenevich was in continuous competition with the Futurist Vladimir Mayakovsky; the two poets both wrote texts for the ROSTA (Russian Telegraph Agency) window displays during the Russian Civil War (1918-1922). The third issue of the journal includes "Eight Points", a kind of late Imaginist manifesto which contains a polemic with the LEF group connected with Mayakovsky, and closes with the words: "Imaginism is fighting for the abolition of the serfdom of the soul and consciousness". The final two issues also contain rare lifetime publications of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, an author who obtained cult status for his Kafkakesque prose posthumously, after his rediscovery in the 1980s. The third issue contains an article by Fernand Léger about his costume designs for the ballet "Sotvorenie mira" (Creation of the world). Each issue published in 1500-2000 copies. The attractive modernist wrapper design is unattributed.

MoMA 439. Getty 215.

As of April 2026, KVK, OCLC show seven complete runs in North America.