Russian Authors

Since the early eighteenth century, following Peter the Great’s policy of forced westernization, translation in Russia has been a very visible and much-discussed practice. Generally perceived as an important service to the state and the nation, translation was also viewed as a high art, leading many Russian poets and writers to engage in literary translation in a serious and sustained manner. As a result, translations were generally regarded as an integral part of an author’s oeuvre and of Russian literature as a whole. This volume brings together Russian writings on translation from the mid-18th century until today and presents them in chronological order, providing valuable insights into the theory and practice of translation in Russia. Authored by some of Russia’s leading writers, such as Aleksandr Pushkin, Fedor Dostoevskii, Lev Tolstoi, Maksim Gorkii, and Anna Akhmatova, many of these texts are translated into English for the first time. They are accompanied by extensive annotation and biographical sketches of the authors, and reveal Russian translation discourse to be a sophisticated and often politicized exploration of Russian national identity, as well as the nature of the modern subject. Russian Writers on Translation fills a persistent gap in the literature on alternative translation traditions, highlighting the vibrant and intense culture of translation on Europe’s ‘periphery’. Viewed in a broad cultural context, the selected texts reflect a nuanced understanding of the Russian response to world literature and highlight the attempts of Russian writers to promote Russia as an all-inclusive cultural model.

For half of the twentieth century, there were two superpowers in the world and a gulf of silence between them. Knowledge of Russian culture was based on propaganda and rumour, and their knowledge of the West was no better. When the Soviet Union fell, Russians began to travel to America more regularly, and what they discovered was a very different place to the one they had imagined, but, at the same time, not exactly the one that Americans think they know. This collection of beautifully written and entertaining literary essays by a wide range of Russian writers - young and old, funny and sombre, angry and celebratory, many being translated for the first time - offers readers a unique chance to see Americans in a whole new light, to question how the American dream stands up to the American reality, and to experience the wit and generosity of today's Russian writers.

From the award-winning translators: the complete prose narratives of the most acclaimed Russian writer of the Romantic era and one of the world's greatest storytellers. The father of Russian literature, Pushkin is beloved not only for his poetry but also for his brilliant stories, which range from dramatic tales of love, obsession, and betrayal to dark fables and sparkling comic masterpieces, from satirical epistolary tales and romantic adventures in the manner of Sir Walter Scott to imaginative historical fiction and the haunting dreamworld of "The Queen of Spades." The five short stories of The Late Tales of Ivan Petrovich Belkin are lightly humorous and yet reveal astonishing human depths, and his short novel, The Captain's Daughter, has been called the most perfect book in Russian literature.

Conceive the joy of a lover of nature who, leaving the art galleries, wanders out among the trees and wild flowers and birds that the pictures of the galleries have sentimentalised. It is some such joy that the man who truly loves the noblest in letters feels when tasting for the first time the simple delights of Russian literature. French and English and German authors, too, occasionally, offer works of lofty, simple naturalness; but the very keynote to the whole of Russian literature is simplicity, naturalness, veraciousness. Critic August Nemo selected seven short stories from authors who bring all the richness and quality of Russian literature: - The Nose by Nikolai Gogol - The Queen of Spades by Alexander Pushkin - God Sees The Truth, But Waits by Leo Tolstoy - The Bet by Anton Chekhov - The Christmas Tree And The Wedding by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - One Autumun Night by Maxim Gorky - Lazarus by Leonid Andreyev For more books with interesting themes, be sure to check the other books in this collection!

A novelist catches up with his future... a president is under house arrest after setting off a nuclear war... an off-planet skipper leads a hunt for a mysterious life-giving creature... a single mother protects her disabled son... a man finds serenity in his vacation-emptied city... a woman looks for love in silence... a thunderstorm turns lives upside down... an oligarch makes a unexpected career change... a detective solves a murder and doesn't like what he finds... a family copes with Russia's medieval future... a traveler grapples with Pushkin's killer... a disaffected son mourns his mother... These are just some of the stories in this wonderful collection of original works by 19 leading Russian writers. They are life-affirming stories of love, family, hope, rebirth, mystery and imagination. Masterfully translated by some of the best Russian-English translators working today, these tales reassert the power of Russian literature to affect readers of all cultures in profound and lasting ways. Best of all, 100% of the profits from the sale of this book will go to benefit Russian hospice -- not-for-profit care for fellow human beings who are nearing the end of their own life stories.

In their youth, Manni and Franzi, together with their brothers, Ziggy and Sebastian, captured Germany's collective imagination as the Flying Magical Loerber Brothers -- one of the most popular vaudeville acts of the old Weimar days. The ensuing years have, however, found the Jewish brothers estranged and ensconced in various occupations as the war is drawing near its end and a German surrender is imminent. Manni is traveling through the Ruhr Valley with Albert Speer, who is intent on subverting Hitler's apocalyptic plan to destroy the German industrial heartland before the Allies arrive; Franzi has become inextricably attached to Heinrich Himmler's entourage as astrologer and masseur; and Ziggy and Sebastian have each been employed in pursuits that threaten to compromise irrevocably their own safety and ideologies. Now, with the Russian noose tightening around Berlin and the remnants of the Nazi government fleeing north to Flensburg, the Loerber brothers are unexpectedly reunited. As Himmler and Speer vie to become the next Führer, deluded into believing they can strike a bargain with Eisenhower and escape their criminal fates, the Loerbers must employ all their talents -- and whatever magic they possess -- to rescue themselves and one another. Deftly written and darkly funny, Germania is an astounding adventure tale -- with subplots involving a hidden cache of Nazi gold, Hitler's miracle U-boats, and Speer's secret plan to live out his days hunting walrus in Greenland -- and a remarkably imaginative novel from a gifted new writing talent.