FET or FOETH, AFANASI AFANASIEVICH (1820 1892), who assumed by decree in 1876 the name of Shenshin, Russian poet, was born at Novoselki, Orel, on Dec. 5, 182o, the illegitimate son of a landowner named Shenshin. He was still a student at Moscow university when, in 1842, he published some admirable lyrics in the Moskvityanin. In 185o a volume of his Poems appeared, followed by another in 1856. He then served for some years in the army, retiring with the grade of captain in 1856. In 186o he settled on an estate at Stepanovka, where he was often visited by Turgeniev and Tolstoi. Fet's sincere and passionate lyric poetry strongly influenced later Russian poets, but during his lifetime he was decried because of his reactionary political views, and somewhat unattractive personality. He published very little after 1863, but he continued to write nature poetry and love lyrics which were published in a collected edition (4 vols. 1894). Fet also made some fine translations from Horace, Catullus and Tibul lus, of Goethe's Faust and Hermann and Dorothea. He died in Moscow on Dec. 3, 1892.
See a paper on Fet in Oliver Elton's Sheaf of Papers (192 2) which includes some translations.