Akhmatova feared that it would be too dangerous for herself and those around her if she released the poem during the 1940s when it was written. It wasn't until after the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953 that she finally decided that it was the right time to have it published. The whole cycle of Requiem was finally published in the USSR by 1987.[1] After finally being published, Akhmatova's critics described Requiem as a blend of graceful language and complex classical Russian forms of poetry.[2]