The method of Innokenty Annensky, which he resorted to when writing essays included in two “Books of Reflections” (1906, 1909), was called intuitive, the author was accused of pretentiousness, his language was declared “unnecessarily vague”, and the selection of topics was random. In the poet of the first rank of the Silver Age, an outstanding expert on ancient and Western European poetry, they wanted - as soon as he began to talk about Russian literature - to see a critic and judged him as a critic. And he called himself not a “critic,” but a “reader,” and his view of Gogol, Dostoevsky, Turgenev, Chekhov, Balmont and other greats was the view of a highly subjective reader. For the impressionist poet Annensky thought in his essays in images and associations, did not give assessments - but created an impression that in itself is more important than any assessment. Nikolai Gumilyov wrote about Innokenty Annensky: “It is not a feeling that gives rise to a thought, as is generally the case with poets, but the thought itself grows so strong that it becomes a feeling, even painfully alive.” These words are fully applicable to the essays from the Books of Reflections.