In general, Poplavsky was attracted to evil through its aesthetic appeal. In that sense he was demonical. And when he would participate in a black mass (or would merely serve as one of its direct witnesses), he smiled with a proud, tender, suffering smile, as if knowing of something very special which covered everything up. Boris had a perfectly ordinary appearance, which could have even struck one as drab, if not for his eyes... Something in his gaze made him resemble someone who's been blind since birth (there are certain ("gusli")-players like that). By the way, he would always complain of a pain in his eyes: "as if some sand got in"... But that sand wasn't so simple, for he found it impossible to wash it out no matter how much he would try. And so he would wear sunglasses which would ordain him with the appearance of a mystical conspirator. It is said that during his childhood be was a feeble kid and a crybaby; however, through hysterical persistence, by working out on various gymnastic apparatuses, Poplavsky rapidly developed heavy biceps and shoulder muscles, which, given his concave chest would make him seem somewhat unwieldy. Whenever enraged he would argue like a cracked-up cabbie, appalledly and somehow unconvincingly. At times crude, he nevertheless would at odd times cry out if someone would touch him in even the lightest of ways as if his flesh had been skinned bare.

Poplavsky had an enormous influence upon the Russian Montparnasse at the end of the Twenties and the start of the Thirties. No matter what kind of a heresy he was expressing at the time, through it would always beam a certain "creative" fabric: after listening to him for a while, others would also temporarily begin to think in original ways (even if they were arguing with him). One day some researcher would determine just how much more dull the creativity of the critics and philosophers in the capital became after Poplavsky's death. Many people didn't like him during his life (or it just seemed that way). They would constantly argue with him, peck at him, toss themselves at him in great big piles and bury him whole, or jealously overcriticize him (a habit so typical of many people in Russia). Meanwhile, he, alike a strong cracking horse, which has been reigned into a light шарабан, would lay into it with his mighty shoulder and would drag everything out of the gorge: whether it was an unfortunate gathering, a boring report, even an impoverished evening party. This business could have ended in a scandal, but in spite of anything else, during the following morning many would discover in their consciousnesses, as if in a garden after the rain, fresh (creative) sproutlings. When performing at a gathering Poplavsky would speak in a monotone voice, singing out under his nose and kind of suffocating by the end of each long phrase. Whenever he would suffocate like that, he'd speed up his speech and heighten the pitch of his voice, so that he could have time to elucidate his thought and only after completing this process would regain his breath. But this heightening and acceleration world somehow always coincide with his sharpest thoughts (or, perhaps, we would simply perceive those thoughts as such thanks to his fortuitously complicated breathing). His poems were also read by him in a monotone sing-songy manner and under his nose (as if through a kazoo), suddenly speeding up the tempo; through at the beginning of each strophe his voice would sometimes sound like that of a schoolboy. I knew how to skilfully imitate his reading, but this ability vanished with the years. In those days people would repeat "The Dark Madonna" and "Dreamed the Flags" on all kinds of occasions and not only in Paris, but also in the various "Montparnasses" of Prague, Warsaw, and Reveille.

...

At the end of the 20's Feltzen was still a newbie in Montparnasse. All that was well known was that he was respected by Adamovich, Khodasevitch, and many rich philantropists. Of course, this could have influenced Poplavsky at the start, but later his trudging was no longer of a careerist order. While the discussion which took place back then was, by the way, of a kind utterly unsuitable for the Feltzen of that period. About Saint Sophia, about the rogue upon the cross, about a Roman patrician who was sentenced to death and was frightened of his execution: his mistress jabs a dagger into her own chest and, smiling, says: “Do you see now, it’s not scary at all...” (Poplavsky’s favorite-most story). All of these speeches of his were spangled with the most intimate of “you’s” in anticipation of some immediate miracle, response, resonance. Poplavsky would come over to my place (often at the most unseemly hour) when I lived on Rue Butterbrie and would listen as I read to him my very first short stories. He found within them a certain “drive”. After the release of the novel Mir (World) Boris repeated several times that I resemble a person whose surroundings feel too tight, cramped to him: the kind of person who constantly steps on everyone’s feet. In his own novel Apollon Bezobrazov (Apollo Unseemlin) a ressurected Lazarus says - “Merdre!” In Mir I have something similar and Poplavsky would complain of my “plagiarism”. When, using a manuscript, I proved that there was no question of direct appropriation, he sadly agreed: “Yes, we are all boiling in the same juice and are starting to resemble each other.” Arguments with him would regularly become supplanted by periods of friendly socializing. We would romp around all those infinite Parisian flea markets and bazaars, marketplaces, around botanical gardens and zoo; would start pricing up ancient muskets or looking glasses from the epoch of the Armada. Sometimes we would rest up at the cinema or replenish our strength with the unchanging combo of coffee and croissant.

I believed in medicine back then and in the midst of February freezes, for the purpose of anticipating and outmaneuvering bronchitis, would drink, while constantly burning myself, sweet hot milk. He would make fun of me something horrid, would come up with various amusing and, at times, even malevolent situations (and then would spread word of them as if they had actually taken place). So, it would be the following Saturday and one would come over to the house of our mutual friend Protsenko (this sort of a malo-Russian Socrates, a “teacher of life”), who was not distinguished, it seemed, by any formal talents and, nevertheless, would exert an enormous influence upon so many people... As soon as one would enter, before one can even ask for a glass of wine, Protsenko’s would already inquire one, with a forced strictness in his voice: -- “What is it I’m hearing, Vasiliy Semyenich, could it truly be that in your short story its heroes drink horse urine?..” I would have already gotten word about some new escapade of Poplavsky and I would spent a long while bitterly fighting back: “All that it says there is that “one’s throat begins to get sore from the aroma of horse urine”... And that’s really all!” Boris’s favorite joke was a conversation which he, if this actually happened, overheard in Monte Carlo.”Are you also a mystic?” asks one person. “No, I’m simply an unfortunate person.” Or another fancy: a monk keeps seeing a seductive image of a woman during his prayers. “What is this one asking for?” God finally inquires. “For a woooooooman.”- follows the report. “Alright, well, give him a woman then!” Poplavsky knew either a cherished or malevolent secret about each of his friends; although, he whenever he would deliver these things up publicly, he would only do so in the most casual and merciful of ways. To my question about whether the last name of one of our litterateurs was genuinely a pure Italian one, Poplavsky, sweetly and while repeatedly producing a sickly squint, explained: “He is an Armenian from the Caucasus. You know, like some kind of a Ter-Abrahamian.” And the smile of a fallen angel would illuminate the earthy, soulful face with those dark wheels of its eyes. In 1941 I read an ad in “Candide” about a fanciful exhibition of a famous painter named Ter (in Lyon) and immediately thought of Poplavsky. By the way, Boris studied painting and knew his well around the visual art world very well which was, certainly, far from being an accident in the context of his life. One would imagine that Poplavsky had an enormous reserve of life forces: just a moment and he would lightly and effortlessly take down anyone who stood in his way.. But suddenly something would snap apart: utterly unexpectedly but surely, in a way which one could clearly sense! Some central part would rip and Poplavsky would freeze up right in the midst of his run, as if a person enchanted by a medium, a person who just stands there smiling a sleepy grin. And he would give up: would concede, agree, depart!