Белый скит

by Alexey Chapygin, Алексей Чапыгин

Алексей Павлович Чапыгин (1870—1937) — русский советский писатель, один из основоположников советского исторического романа, создатель крупных исторических полотен "Разин Степан" и "Гулящие люди".
Предлагаемый сборник познакомит читателей с ранним (1900—1920-е годы) творчеством Чапыгина, представленным "петербургскими" рассказами — о "потемках народных" и "серых подвалах" и рассказами и повестями о Севере, о жизни и нравах северной деревни, об охотниках-звероловах.
Эти произведения отличает реализм в освещении народной жизни и поэтичность в изображении северной природы.

525 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1912

About the author

Aleksey Pavlovich Chapygin (Russian: Алексе́й Па́влович Чапы́гин; 17 October [O.S. 5 October] 1870 - 21 October 1937) was a Russian writer, and one of the founders of the Soviet historical novel.

Chapygin was born in Kargopol Uyezd, Olonets Governorate. His northern peasant origins are reflected in his works. His first book of stories, Those Who Keep Aloof, and his novel The White Hermitage, describing northern life, were published before the Russian Revolution of 1917. He is best known for his two novels about peasant uprisings in the 17th century, Itinerant Folk (1934–37) and Stepan Razin (1926–27). Stepan Razin is considered a classic of Soviet literature.
Chapygin drew upon Russian folklore for both the style of Stepan Razin and the positive and romanticized portrait of Razin himself. The Soviets excused this modernization of history as a justifiable polemic against the negative portrayal of Razin in 19th-century Russian literature. Stepan Razin was published in the magazine Red Virgin Soil.

Reviews

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vices and ignorance are ruination of man… And Alexey Chapygin was a master at depicting tragedies of an ignorant and poor man both in the country and the city and he did it very colourfully and graphically. A short novel of the everyday life in a northern village The White Hermitage is a centerpiece of this excellent anthology.

“I’m not arguing, I know you’re an exile… We’re crooked folks, right since the birth, in literateness we’re blind, we count our profit marking it with crosses. But however, my dear chap, we’re no rebels! You’re a new man and it is fun to talk to a new man from city… Just drink a glass of vodka and eat some flounder! I’m not a pauper – eat, drink until you’re full… Don’t mind my swearing. I cuss those, rotten fish, who having enough bread attempts to be a freeloader anyway.”

Peasants and hunters, clerics and nuns, merchants and farmhands, males and females, an exile and a miller – all becomes whimsically interconnected and interlaced in the most sinister and tragic ways.
Drunkenness, lust, greed, envy, feud and hate rule over minds and human life is worth nothing…
Drunken fights and wicked murders, deadly enmity and mean vindictiveness and all the hopes and dreams are ruined.
Without knowledge and culture man is reduced to his primordial and cruel nature of a brute.