Michael Wachtel studied comparative literature at Yale University (B.A. 1982) and Harvard University (Ph.D. 1990), as well as at the University of Konstanz (West Germany, 1982–83, 1987–88) and at Moscow State University (1988–89). Since 1990 he has been teaching in the Slavic Department at Princeton University. His research focuses on Russian poetry and poetics and German-Russian cultural relations. Among his books are Russian Symbolism and Literary Tradition: Goethe, Novalis, and the Poetics of Vyacheslav Ivanov (University of Wisconsin Press, 1994), The Development of Russian Verse: Meter and its Meanings (Cambridge University Press, 1998), The Cambridge Introduction to Russian Poetry (Cambridge University Press, 2004), and A Commentary to Pushkin’s Lyric Poetry, 1826–1836 (University of Wisconsin Press, 2011). He has also edited numerous books of archival materials in German and Russian, including most recently (with Philip Gleissner), Vjačeslav Ivanov und seine deutschsprachigen Verleger: Eine Chronik in Briefen (Peter Lang Verlag, 2019). At present Dr. Wachtel is at work on an annotated edition of the correspondence of Evsei Shor and Rudolf Roeßler and a biography of the poet Viacheslav Ivanov.
Michael Wachtel
Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Princeton University