Боярщина

by Aleksey Pisemsky, Алексей Писемский

В середине 19 века имя Алексея Феофилактовича Писемского часто можно было услышать в одном ряду с именами Толстого и Достоевского. Его книги были необычайно популярны, и эта популярность была вполне заслуженной, но судьба распорядилась так, что сейчас мы мало помним сочинения этого выдающегося писателя. Между тем, романы и повести Писемского — это литература с большой буквы, и любому, кто впервые открывает для себя творчество Алексея Феофилактовича, можно только позавидовать.

232 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1858

About the author

Pisemsky was a Russian novelist and dramatist who was regarded as an equal of Ivan Turgenev and Fyodor Dostoyevsky in the late 1850s, but whose reputation suffered a spectacular decline after his fall-out with Sovremennik magazine in the early 1860s. A realistic playwright, along with Aleksandr Ostrovsky he was responsible for the first dramatization of ordinary people in the history of Russian theatre. Pisemsky's great narrative gift and exceptionally strong grip on reality make him one of the best Russian novelists.

Pisemsky's first novel Boyarschina 1847 was originally forbidden for its unflattering description of the Russian nobility. His principal novels are The Simpleton (1850), One Thousand Souls (1858), which is considered his best work of the kind, and Troubled Seas, which gives a picture of the excited state of Russian society around the year 1862. He also wrote plays, including A Bitter Fate (also translated as "A Hard Lot"), which depicts the dark side of the Russian peasantry. The play has been called the first Russian realistic tragedy; it won the Uvarov Prize of the Russian Academy.