One Thousand Souls

by Aleksey Pisemsky, Ivy Litvinov (Translator)

An 1858 Russian novel in which a young man marries an heiress to get ahead, betraying his roots and in the end, himself. After a spectacular early success, Pisemsky's reputation as an author suffered a terrible eclipse. This was partly because of the competition of other mid-19th century Russian writers such as Turgenev and Dostoevsky, and partly because Pisemsky grossly misjudged the taste and mores of his audience. Pisemsky's brooding romanticism, coupled with his control as a writer, suffers only in comparison with literary giants. In spite of his failings Pisemsky was a writer of consummate skill, and this is an important addition to our store of 19th century Russian literature.

Genres: Russian Literature, Fiction, Russia, Literature

576 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1871

About the author

Pisemsky was a Russian novelist and dramatist who was regarded as an equal of Ivan Turgenev and Fyodor Dostoyevsky in the late 1850s, but whose reputation suffered a spectacular decline after his fall-out with Sovremennik magazine in the early 1860s. A realistic playwright, along with Aleksandr Ostrovsky he was responsible for the first dramatization of ordinary people in the history of Russian theatre. Pisemsky's great narrative gift and exceptionally strong grip on reality make him one of the best Russian novelists.

Pisemsky's first novel Boyarschina 1847 was originally forbidden for its unflattering description of the Russian nobility. His principal novels are The Simpleton (1850), One Thousand Souls (1858), which is considered his best work of the kind, and Troubled Seas, which gives a picture of the excited state of Russian society around the year 1862. He also wrote plays, including A Bitter Fate (also translated as "A Hard Lot"), which depicts the dark side of the Russian peasantry. The play has been called the first Russian realistic tragedy; it won the Uvarov Prize of the Russian Academy.

Reviews

[João Reis]

A forgotten classic from the Russian literature's golden age.
Corruption, vanity, a world of scoundrels in a sarcastic and compelling story.

[Richard Thompson]

I have a never ending fascination with the world of Tsarist Russia -- the society life of Petersburg and Moscow where handsome hussars danced the mazurka and spoke French better than Russian with the beautiful daughters of wealthy landowners against the background of soul destroying bureaucracy and corruption, never ending oppression of the people and the intelligentsia and the mind numbing life of the provinces where the peasants were bled dry and then bled dry again to support the lifestyles of the tiny upper class. In my continuing search for novels set in this wonderfully strange world, I finally got around to Pisemsky. He's not Gogol or Pushkin (although their influence is evident in his writing), and he is way not Tolstoy, but this is a very good story that brings its world to life with deeply flawed but interesting characters. The heroine, Nastenka, is a literary descendant of Pushkin's Tatiana, but more modern, and in the end less naive. The portrayal of provincial characters and tsarist bureaucracy is very Gogolian, but without Gogol's humor and wonderful way with words. But the characters are complex and realistic, and the way that circumstances conspire against them to frustrate their best intentions is psychologically and emotionally true.

One interesting thing about this book from a modern perspective is its title, which refers to the thousand serfs owned by the wealthy woman who the hero marries, but the thousand serfs are entirely abstract and never appear in the story. The hero never once visits the estates and villages where they live. The book is filled with moral condemnation of society, bureaucracy, corruption and the damage that all of these things do to honorable people trying to live honest lives, but there isn't a word about the sufferings of the thousand human beings in slavery who enable the lifestyle that is the subject of the story.

[Roman Psota]

Tisíc poddaných (1858) - Ruská klasika ako na pohľadanie, veľmi kvalitne napísaná, so všetkým, čo k tomu patrí (bohatí vs chudobní, dediny vs mestá, Moskva vs Petrohrad, vzťahy, služobníctvo, koče, hostiny, plesy, návštevy...). Román bol napísaný v plodnej zlatej ére ruskej literatúry a možno aj preto, okrem iného, zostal tak trochu v tieni takých velikánov akými boli Turgenev, Tolstoj, Dostojevsky, Gogol, Gončarov, Saltykov-Ščedrin.
.............
One Thousand Souls (1858) - Russian classic, very well written, with everything that goes with it (rich vs. poor, villages vs. cities, Moscow vs. St. Petersburg, relationships, servants, carriages, feasts, balls, visits... ).
The novel was written in the fertile golden era of Russian literature, and perhaps for that reason, among other things, it remained somewhat in the shadow of such giants as Turgenev, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Gogol, Goncharov, Saltykov-Shchedrin.

[kp]

This was a delihgtful surprise. I had never heard of Pisemsky until a friend lent me this book. It's a biting social sature and an unsparing character analysis with a great deal to say about how class and ambition create a spiritual morass.

[Caroline]

Great detail and characters. This is the story of a young man who decides not to follow his heart but to follow the money and marries a wealthy older woman. He learns too late that money doesn't buy happiness and ends up a very miserable person.

[Anne Kadet]

Aleksey Pisemsky is Russia's Edith Wharton. Fantastic in every way.

[Olga Vainshtok]

Три четверти книги читала с большим удовольствием- качественный реалистический роман 19 века про разрушения романтических порывов. Но финал расстроил. Автор своей волей повел героя туда, куда ему хотелось и получился уже нравоучительный роман.

[Afi]

To say that I love this book is an understatement. I can’t help but hate and understand our hero. This book captures human nature and shows how little our society has really changed from the 1800s

[Kay]

Note: This should be PISEMSKY, not Pilemsky.

[Aharon]

Oh, Russia.