Are you a Russian lit geek? I love Russian classics. I even saved my adorable notes from a long-ago Russian Literature in Translation class. And I recently reread two 19th-century Russian novels, Ivan Goncharov’s comic masterpiece, Oblomov, and Tolstoy’s short novel, The Cossacks.
I have never read a funnier novel than Oblomov. The enchantingly slothful hero, Ilya Ilyich Oblomov, prefers sleep to action. He naps and lazes all day in his dusty apartment, where his servant Zakhar does as little as possible. In the opening chapter, the two quarrel about the housekeeping. Zakhar claims he can’t dust or sweep the cobwebs unless Oblomov goes out for a day. The prospect horrifies Oblomov. “Good lord! what next? Go out indeed! You’d better go back to your room.”
Nothing can wake up Oblomov: neither his bailiff’s cheating him of money, nor the landlord’s eviction notice. But when his energetic half-German friend Stolz shows up, Oblomov reluctantly make the rounds of social visits. But he doesn’t truly wake up tills he falls in love with Olga, a young woman determined to direct his life: she insists that he read books and take long walks. The romance can’t last, of course. Oblomov becomes sluggish in the fall. And he suffers from what he calls “Oblomovism.”
One of the most famous chapters is “Oblomov’s Dream,” the longest single scene in Russian literature, according to critic Richard Freeborn. Oblomov dreams of his idyllic childhood and future with a wife and children on his beautiful country estate. The power of Oblomov’s imagination radically changes our attitude toward his sleepy mode of living. Critics in the 19th century interpreted “Oblomovism” as an illustration of the Russian character flaw that prevented reform and revolution. Stolz is successful only because he is half German. But Goncharov also believed the artist must be a passive vehicle, “an artist of the eye” who relies on his subconscious. And Oblomov fits that description, I think on a third reading. Yet such an interpretation is out of context.
I have read and loved David Magarshack’s translation of Oblomov (Penguin) and Natalie Duddington”s (Everyman’s Library).
Tolstoy wrote The Cossacks, a partly autobiographical novel, over 10 years. He traveled to the Caucasus in 1851 and in 1852 joined the army as a cadet. Writing The Cossacks was Tolstoy’s attempt to deflate the romantic view of the Caucasus. It was published in 1863.
The Cossacks begins as the story of Olenin, an upper-class young man who wonders “how to live.” He leaves Moscow for the Caucasus, because he seeks a new kind of life. In the Caucasus he is overwhelmed by the beauty of the mountains. And he becomes infatuated with the simplicity and naturalness of the Cossacks.
The most interesting part of the book is a series of sketches of Cossack characters. The women farm and do the work; the men hunt, drink, and fight. Tolstoy focuses on three characters: Lukashka, a fearless Cossack soldier who does exactly what he wants, Maryanka, a gorgeous young woman who is understood to be engaged to Lukashka, and “Uncle” Yokashka, an old man who tells stories and drinks to excess. Olenin falls in love with Maryanka. He wants to be a Cossack, but in the end realizes he will never fit in.
It is not my favorite Tolstoy, but he could not have written War and Peace if he had not written stories about the Caucasus and Crimea.
I have two good translations of this: David McDuff’s (Penguin) and Aylmer and Louise Maude’s in Great Short Works of Leo Tolstoy. As so often, I preferred the Maude.
I am attracted to read Russian literature for some reason, but ’till now I managed to read only few classics (“War and Peace”, “Crime and Punishment”, “Anna Karenina”). And recently I bought “The Devils”, hopefully I’ll read it this summer.
It might be a good idea to try to read smaller books. How long is Oblomov? From your review I think I would enjoy it 🙂
I’m sure you would love Oblomov. It’s not exactly short–600 pages–but one gallops through it!
Two excellent choices. That scene at Oblomovka is priceless! The Cossacks is very good, but Tolstoy was still progressing as a writer. And that says a lot about the standard of his later works. Many a writer would be very happy if they could write something as good as The Cossacks!
Oblomov is so sweet, even though all he wants to do is sleep! I adore that book. Yes, the early Tolstoy is uneven. The Cossacks is an odd little book, and Tolstoy had a long way to go before he wrote his masterpieces.
On Thu, Apr 25, 2019 at 12:37 PM Thornfield Hall: A Book Blog wrote:
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Oblomov is one of a kind!
Yes!
I had never heard of Oblomov before your post, but I’m sitting here reading Donna Leon’s latest Commissario Brunetti mystery and he’s mentioned! I love these literary intersections.
Oh my goodness! I need to read Donna Leon. She’s been on my list forever.
Just having PTSD flashbacks of grinding through “Oblomov” for my comps…and then grinding through “Oblomov’s Dream” with a bunch of undergrads during a literature recitation where I made them read through stuff in the original. In retrospect it was very good for us, and I’m glad I did it, but it may take a while before I can properly appreciate “Oblomov” without a shudder running up and down my spine. I don’t know why I found that particular “brick” harder to read than all the other massive tomes I powered through, but I did. I should read it again someday, without a scary deadline looming over my shoulder.
I re-read “Cossacks” last year and was absolutely blown away. The only reason it’s not more of a classic than it is, is because Tolstoy followed it up with “W&P” and “Anna Karenina.”
I don’t know Russian, so I got to appreciate the comedy. The lord only knows what we’re missing in translation: it seems like such a gentle read in English. I did appreciate The Cossacks much more this time around. It does suffer by comparison with what came later.
On Thu, Apr 25, 2019 at 4:01 PM Thornfield Hall: A Book Blog wrote:
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Oblomov isn’t that bad, but it’s long, and there’s a ton of 19th-century vocabulary that’s a pain to wade through if you don’t know it. Basically any of the big novels are a real challenge in the original until you learn to recognize all the different words for carriage and muslin and sturgeon and so on.
I do empathize with the vocabulary problems. It’s the same in Greek and Latin: different vocabulary for different genres and centuries. I spent a lot of time with my dictionaries~
On Thu, Apr 25, 2019 at 5:12 PM Thornfield Hall: A Book Blog wrote:
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