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# Once, Without Any Warning, Mandelstam Turned Up at the Merezhkovskys'
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/odnazhdy-mandelshtam-bez-vsiakogo-preduprezhdeniia-prishel-k-merezhkovskim/
- Published: 2025-02-16T15:06:02.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:31:06.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Archive, Books, Mores, Saint Petersburg

> Once, without any warning, Mandelstam turned up at the Merezhkovskys'. Zinaida Gippius came out to him and said that if he wrote good poetry, she would be informed of it; then she would talk to him, but for the time being there was no point, since nothing ever came of anybody. Mandelstam heard her out in silence and left.

> Soon afterwards Gippius read his poems and many times, through various people, urged him to come, but he dug in his heels and never did.

> This did not prevent Gippius from pushing Mandelstam forward by every means. She wrote about him to Bryusov and to many others, and in her circle Mandelstam came to be called "Zinaida's little Yid".

**From the memoirs of Nadezhda Yakovlevna Mandelstam**

In short, a spoon is dear when dinner-time is near

![](https://theparnassian.com/content/images/2026/09/photo_15334@16-02-2025_18-06-02.jpg)