Russian essentials

Hope so, looks like I'll be reading alot of Dostoevsky in the future!

And no Brothers Karamazov? Shame on you!
Seriously, you have to have that book!

If you see the first post on this thread you will see a list of russian novels I already own, and you will find it there, bazarov!

:p Ups!:blush:
Great collection! You will like Crime and Punishment, believe me.

Hi,

the list you have read is pretty good. I would still recomment you reading "The crime and punishment". I read it when I was 16. The book is fairly difficult, since it has much to do with psychology, but it is VERY interesting. You'll enjoy it.
Still there are much more Russian Classical writers that you can read and enjoy your reading. For instance, do not forget Chekhov and his short stories and dramas. They are engoyable and easy to read. I loved Kuprin. What about Pushin and Lermontov??? They belong to the bloom of the Russian Classical Literature.
How did you expose Russian Literature for you anyway?
Cheers,
Olga

Well, as I said in the first post of this thread I used to read WW1 and WW2 litterature. A lot. My favourite subject on WW2 is the Eastern Front. The Battle of Stalingrad, the Leningrad Siege, and so forth. I then started reading a book written by Vasily Grossman, and when I googled his name on the internet, the name Solzhenitsyn popped up, can't remember where. After reading some books about the Eastern Front I heard the name Gulag alot, and wanted to investigate that further. As many people know, Solzhenitsyn is a great source if you want to learn more about Gulag, and after reading some of his books, I tried to find out more about Russian litterature. Long story short, I ended up on this forum! ;)

And, if you look on the bottom of page 3 in this thread, I made a list of the books I've recently purchased. Crime and Punishment is on the list.

I've read A Hero of our Time by Lermontov, with a translation from Vladimir Nabokov.
I don't remember much of it though, it's been some years since I read it. I see that Everyman's Library has published it so if I'm ever gonna re-read it, I will probably get the Everyman's edition.

I haven't read anything by Pushkin yet. I've purchased a book that contains the most popular russian short-stories, and The Queen of Spades is in that book. Everyman's Library has published two books by Pushkin. One is called The Collected Stories and contains The Tales of the Late Ivan Petrovich, Dubrovskii, The Queen of Spades, The Captain's Daughter, A History of Pugachev, Egyptian Nights and some other stories and some unfinished work. The other book is called Eugene Onegin and Other Poems. Not sure which one to get if I will read anything by Pushkin. Maybe you could recommend one of the two?

O'k. I haven't read the whole thread, of course, I'm also a member since ca. half an hour here. It was just an interesting topic. One is always glad to know that other nationalities are interested somehow in his/her culture:)

Hehe, agreed. But could you help me with Pushkin? I don't know which is best to buy, "The Collected Stories" or "Eugene and Other Poems".

"The Collected Stories" does not include "Eugene".

You can see the stories included in "The Collected Stories" in my post above.

It would be a sin to miss Eugene Onegin! It's a great poem, probably the best Pushkin's work, one of my Top 5 favorites; much better then Captain's daughter, Mozart and Salieri or Boris Godunov.
Of course, that's just my opinion.

I'm not sure, though. I have never read poems except World War 1 poems. On the other hand, the Everyman's Library edition only costs about $16.

That's not a poem(sorry, different meaning of word poem in my language), it's a novel in verse.

Oh, I thought it was a poem in verse :p

Yeah, I realized! Sorry, my mistake!:blush:

Err, you were right. It is a novel in verse!

Ah well, I ordered Eugene Onegin and Other Poems by Pushkin and The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. I also ordered The Good Soldier Švejk by Jaroslav Hašek, which has been one of my favourite books since I loaned it from the local library about 4 years ago. All from Everyman's Library, of course. Now my wallet hurt so much that I won't buy another book for 10 years.

I'm not a big reader of poetry and I was kind of intimidated by Eugene Onegin but once you get into it, you almost forget it's in verse. It has a very nice flow, very easy so you're able to focus on the story and not the rhyme and meter.