The Village (Alma Classics Limited)
A short novel that portrays the harsh reality of rural Russia through the lives of two brothers.
Work Information
The roughness of rural life becomes the roughness of human relations.
Set around the 1905 Revolution, the novel layers poverty, violence, and stagnation to expose a broader social darkness.
Book Information
- Publisher
- Alma Books
- Published
- 2013-02-01
- Pages
- 165 pages
- Language
- 英語
- Size
- 12.85 x 1.02 x 19.84 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9781847492838
- ISBN-10
- 1847492835
- Price
- 2404 JPY
- Category
- 洋書/Literature & Fiction/Genre Fiction/Historical
The Village, Ivan Bunin’s first full-length novel, is a bleak and uncompromising portrayal of rural life in south-west Russia. Set at the time of the 1905 Revolution and centring on episodes in the lives of a landowner and his self-educated peasant brother, the book follows characters sunk so far below the average of intelligence as to be scarcely human. A triumph of bitter realism, Bunin’s cruel, lyrical prose reveals the pettiness, violence and ignorance of life on the land, foreshadowing the turbulences of Russia in the twentieth century.
Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin (1870-1953) was the first Russian writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. His last book of fiction, Dark Avenues, is arguably the most widely read 20th-century collection of short stories in Russia.
Reviews
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The Village gives us a snapshot of rural russian life in the last years before the Bolshevik revolution told through the lives of two brothers Tikhon and Kusma both born into peasant poverty and now in middle age. Beautifully written with an attention to detail that brings alive the harshness and squalor of peasant life. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the russian revolution and the last years of the tzar.
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I enjoyed this Novel that has all the rich word painting that Bunin is so gifted in. This novel about Russian village life comes close to the intimacy of Chekhov and also in it's bare knuckle presentation that avoids the guilty Tolstoy 'peasant -worship over kill of sentimentality' and presents the reality of peasant life that Bunin and Chekhov, who was a doctor, do not forget, experienced and knew.
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It’s a good “story”... it paints an intriguing portrait. The language is awkward, and it makes it a little hard to read. Most of the issues I had are stylistic, and far be it from me to judge a renowned writer on style, but I think the translators could have possibly made the language more natural.
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A great Russian writer who specialises in short stories and novellas! How ironic! They even gave this guy a Nobel and it's clear why! A lovely writer. I look forward to his short stories.
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Great