A complete collection of short fiction by the award-winning author of The Time: Night captures the lives of women as they search for love, living space, and money, and cope with their children, family strife, and the problems of aging in Soviet Russia.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Born in Moscow in 1938 at the height of Stalinist terror, Ludmilla Petrushevkaya's writing reflects the moral despair and stifling conditions that were part of the fabric of existence under Communism. Uncomfortably absent of love, this collection of stories revolves honestly around the themes of strangled intimacy; the victimization of women; and the affairs, lies, and secrets people cling to that help carry them from one day to the next.
From Library Journal
A mother who has just taken her son back to the kindergarten where he is a boarding student persuades him to stop grasping her skirt by suggesting he pick her a bouquet of wildflowers. But when he runs to do her bidding, she quickly leaves the school. Vera is attracted to a "little man" in her office, much to the consternation of her father, who works for the same company; Tolya, invited to the home of a friend, falls asleep after dinner and doesn't wake until morning; Shura, professing to be interested only in the "principle of the chase," bores his friends with too many retellings of the night "N" tried to seduce him. And so the stories go. Characters, many without names, people these 36 short pieces, most of which are between five and ten pages long. Petrushevskaya's characters and settings rarely receive a physical description, resulting in stories that too often appear to be only a working outline. Still, the author has solid credentials, having won a Pushkin Prize, been runner-up for the first Russian Booker Prize (1992), and been translated into many languages. Recommended for Russian literature collections.?Olivia Opello, Onondaga Cty. P.L., N.Y.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Classic stories, immaculately translated.,
By
This review is from: IMMORTAL LOVE: Stories (Hardcover)
Petrushevskaya has referred to Russia as "a land of female Homers". She presumably means two things: that everyday life in Russia is an epic journey in itself, and that Russian women have a particular gift for telling their stories.Petrushevskaya herself has an extraordinary sense of the importance of story-telling. These stories are not simply stories of everyday life in Russia during the seventies and eighties; they are stories about the importance of the stories we are all constantly telling: stories we tell in order to survive or to help others survive, stories we make up to protect ourselves from truth, stories we make up to protect others from truth, apparently banal stories that fail to conceal tragedy...
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
amazing!,
By TNJURA "mTc" (Mexico) - See all my reviews
This review is from: IMMORTAL LOVE: Stories (Hardcover)
I can only say it left me bewitched. It is an amazing and very unique collection of stories by a wonderful writer. I take my hat off!
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