The Collected Short Stories of Maxim Gorky (Paperback)

~ Maxim Gorky (Author) "DARKENED by the dust of the dock, the blue southern sky is murky; the burning sun looks duskily into the greenish sea, as though through..." (more)
Key Phrases: stocky peasant, bast shoes, five kopecks, Aristid Fomich, Aristid Kuvalda, Ragged Bridegroom (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Maxim Gorky continues to be regarded as the greatest literary representative of revolutionary Russia. Born of the people, and having experienced in his own person their sufferings and their misery, he was enabled by his extraordinary genius to voice their grievances and their aspirations for a better life as no academic could.

His international fame rests on a tremendous literary output, including the powerful play "The Lower Depths", the monumental novel of the 1905 Russian Revolution, "Mother", his vital Autobiography and, of course, his short stories. This edition of "The Collected Short Stories of Maxim Gorky" includes his benchmark masterpieces "Creatures That Once Were Men" and "Twenty-Six Men and a Girl" as well as "Chelkash and My Fellow-Traveller" among many others. The collection represents the very best of Gorky's genius.

For this edition the renowned scholar and author Frederic Ewen has written a penetrating new introduction evaluating Gorky's place in the world's literary pantheon.

Language Notes

Text: English, Russian (translation)

Product Details

• Paperback: 424 pages
• Publisher: Citadel (August 18, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806510757
• ISBN-13: 978-0806510750
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #464,402 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars absorbing work of one brilliant individual, September 23, 2006

By	Bruce D. Wilner "Bruce David Wilner" (Alexandria, VA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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Gorky is quite unlike the other Russian writers that I've read. His works do exude the common pessimism, but that's clearly a by-product of the dreadful living conditions they all underwent. Beginning with detailed descriptions of place (even down to the nicks on a wooden lath or the odd drop of paint) that would do justice to Henry James, Gorky always delineates his characters so very painstakingly that we have not the least difficulty picturing them and vicariously living through their adventures.

Gorky is a master of the gamut of human emotion. As glorious as I find his understressed paean to nature in "Birth of a Man," equally profoundly disturbing do I find his narration of the kitten's fate in "Notch." Not even the most barely supraliminal aberration of human behavior escapes his notice and caustic commentary. Yet, the sarcasm that perpetually lies beneath the surface--so often indicative of the jaded writer--does not come across as such in Gorky: indeed, he is arguably one of the most human writers I've ever countenanced.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars very good, September 18, 2009

By	P. Reynolds (Atlanta,Georgia USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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This is the first time I have read anything by Maxim Gorky. I just wish that I could write like that. He writes about working class people in Russia. They drink and fight and work. And this is like so many other stories except Gorky does it so much better .