A number of their works of Acmeist period is as an amalgamation of crude naturalism, explicit eroticism with unusual fantastic elements and displays, especially in Narbut’s case, an abundance of the ugly, the unnatural, and the deformed. They pronounced the coming of the “New Adam”, praised not only the life of the body itself, but also life in general, a life that “knows everything, – God, and vice, and death, and immortality” (Gumilev, 1968). Indeed, while propagating general Acmeist principles, such as the innovative treatment of the poetic word, deliberate craftsmanship, clear and concise imagery, creation of a new language and a new culture, Zenkevich and Narbut went in a direction quite different from the rest of Acmeists – namely, the one of extreme glorification of the earthly world in all its manifestations. Their names were surrounded by controversy as critics have often viewed their literary activity through the negative prism of their service to the authorities, or in the light of their particular behaviour towards their Acmeist friends. Narbut called himself and Zenkevich “naturo-realisty” (“naturo-realists”) and “zemliaki” (“the earthly ones”), stressing their connections to Baudelaire, Gogol’, and Skovoroda but, at the same time, trying to dissociate themselves from the “older Acmeists.” Unlike their famous sojourners, “these minor Acmeists” have been under-read and under-studied. In his letters to Zenkevich, he wrote, “I am sure, there are only two Acmeists: you and I”. Narbut, however, had no doubts about his own and his friend’s importance for Acmeism. The association of these poets with Acmeism has been often referred to as one of a societal and rather conventional nature. Mikhail Zenkevich (1886-1973), a poet, prose writer, literary critic, translator, and the longest surviving Acmeist, together with Vladimir Narbut (1888-1938), represented Adamism, the left wing of Acmeism.
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