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Title: The Golovlyov Family (New York Review Books Classics) by Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov, Natalie Duddington, James Wood ISBN: 0-940322-57-9 Publisher: New York Review of Books Pub. Date: 12 March, 2001 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.5 (2 reviews)
Rating: 1
Summary: It's No Accident
Comment: It's no accident that this novel ranks 1.5 millionth on Amazon in sales. It offers the reader nothing but relentless cruelty, hatred, depression, loveless relationships, one-dimensional characters, and repetitious writing. And in the middle of this book is an anti-French rant that asserts the French are inherently hypocritical because that is part of their culture and makes them civil, whereas Russian culture is more honest because it is directly crude, boorish, and spontaneous in its hypocrisy and stupidities. The matriach of this family is a greedy obsessed woman who gives nothing to her husband or children except reprimands for what she suspects them of doing, which is undermining her and stealing from her. She also expresses little regret at their deaths which she in no small measure has caused. Her husband is a bitter sickly man who never gets out of bed, and we learn precious little more about him. Her children are mere products of this loveless relationship except one, who is a greedy, conniving, religious hypocrite who manipulates his beliefs and words to take possession of everyone else's properties, including his mother's. He earns the name "bloodsucker," which is uttered into his purposely deaf ears again and again. In short, there is nothing redeeming in this novel, nothing that recommends it. The whole mixture can also be boiled under a flame and be reduced from over 300 pages to a third of that without missing a thing. If Chekov had written about this family, he would have produced a short story that might have had a point, but as this stands, I would stay very very far away from this work, unless you are a masochist who enjoys getting depressed.
Rating: 4
Summary: Classic Russian literature
Comment: "The Golovlyov Family" by Shchedrin is an excellent book. I've read both American and English literature, but this is a whole new literature form that seems to have the best of both worlds; it has the vivid descriptions of English literature, yet the simplicity of American works, that is, there's no nonesense dialog of meaninglessness that's often found in English novels. My first thought at reading the book was how could a translation be SO good, and how good would the Russian version be?
There is much emotion in the book, and the feelings permeate or pulse out of the book, absorbing and drawing in the reader like a good book should. Although set in the 1800's at the time the first Russian revolution ( I'm by no means a historian by the way), the book is not heavily focused on politics as works of Orwell are. The political affairs are a very distant and small prop on this rich stage of a book.
When reading the book, however, I strongly recommend the note taking of names, because some characters are referred to by more than one name. It's not hard to follow if you jot a few reminders down when introduced to each character, this will save much confusion later.
On a final note, if you're reading this book, read it purely for it's own sake. This isn't an adventure book with a climax and an unbelievable series of events at the end, so if that's what you're expecting, you'll regret reading the book. However, if you're after some brilliantly rich literature, with excellent characters, settings, and unfoldings of events, then this is a book I highly recommend. It truly is a masterpiece.
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Title: Austerlitz by Winfried Georg Sebald, Anthea Bell ISBN: 0375756566 Publisher: Modern Library Pub. Date: 03 September, 2002 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: The Enchanted Wanderer: Selected Tales by N. S. Leskov, David Magarshack ISBN: 0812966961 Publisher: Modern Library Pub. Date: 14 January, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Virgin Soil (New York Review Books Classics) by Ivan Turgenev, Ivan Turgenev ISBN: 0940322455 Publisher: New York Review of Books Pub. Date: 01 September, 2000 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Smoke by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, Constance Black Garnett ISBN: 188598300X Publisher: Turtle Point Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Spring Torrents (Penguin Classics) by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, Leonard Schapiro, Leonard Bertram Schapiro ISBN: 014044369X Publisher: Penguin Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 1980 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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