Edited by . Plavskina Z. and . , Zhirmunska V. In. — SPb. : Ed. C. - Petersburg . University, 1996. — 440 s. — ISBN 5-288-014450-0 . In. M. Zhirmunsky (1891-1971), an outstanding philologist, academician of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, in lectures delivered at Leningrad University several decades ago, summed up many of his original observations in the field of theory and practice of verse. great attention in the lectures is paid to the study of the biography of the writer, literary and critical assessments of the work of writers by their contemporaries, scientific bibliography and other issues. All the provisions of the lecture course are argued by examples from the history of Russian, Western European and Eastern literatures .. The book is provided with bibliographic references to the latest works on this topic. For philologists: undergraduates, graduate students and teachers, as well as for high school teachers.