Певцы

by Ivan Turgenev, Иван Тургенев

Genres: Short Stories, Classics, Fiction, Russia, Literature, Russian Literature, Audiobook

25 pages, Kindle Edition

About the author

Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev (Cyrillic: Иван Сергеевич Тургенев) was a novelist, poet, and dramatist, and now ranks as one of the towering figures of Russian literature. His major works include the short-story collection A Sportsman’s Sketches (1852) and the novels Rudin (1856), Home of the Gentry (1859), On the Eve (1860), and Fathers and Sons (1862).

These works offer realistic, affectionate portrayals of the Russian peasantry and penetrating studies of the Russian intelligentsia who were attempting to move the country into a new age. His masterpiece, Fathers and Sons, is considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.

Turgenev was a contemporary with Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy. While these wrote about church and religion, Turgenev was more concerned with the movement toward social reform in Russia.

Reviews

[Mark Porton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found Ivan Turgenev’s – The Singers a little bit of a drag. This is another of the short stories I am reading (with our Lisa) from George Saunders’ – A Swim in a Pond in the Rain (A Masterclass – my words).

This is a story of a stranger wandering through rural Russia in the late 1800’s and he comes across a shabby little pub. Full of an interesting group of locals – a singing contest erupts between two of the characters – The Contractor and Yashka the Turk.

Turgenev lost me (even before I discovered, from Saunders, a common issue readers have with this story) because of his uber-detailed descriptions of pretty much everything. I found my mind wandering, then re-reading certain passages. The reason for my re-reading certain parts was because of Saunders’ emphasis on ‘economy’ in a short story. A point he made while analysing the first short story in this book - In the Cart – by Chekhov. That is, a short story writer mustn’t, or shouldn’t include extraneous material. Everything needs to have a purpose.

So, I thought the forensic descriptions were important, using Saunder’s law of economy. But it was too much. I mean, how important is it to remember the forehead of the pub owner, or the eyebrows of a certain local?

Well, it seems (according to Saunders – and who am I to argue?), these descriptions did serve a purpose, a particularly important one. I did get what he meant – but the story still annoyed me, and I didn’t enjoy this one.

Saunders’ description of the ending – still passes me by.

However, Turgenev’s writing did serve a purpose, for this reader, as it described the landscape and the environment in such detail that it felt real. Grim, as one would expect.

So mixed feelings for me. Saunders’ teaching made sense to me. I still didn’t enjoy this, but because of the analysis I could appreciate what Turgenev was up to.

……………….and that’s a good thing surely.

3 Stars

The story can be found here: https://public-domain-poetry.com/stor...

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Story #2 discussed in George Saunders' A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life.

“I must confess I have seldom heard such a voice … A warmhearted, truthful Russian soul rang and breathed in it and fairly clutched you by the heart, clutched straight at your Russian heartstrings. The song expanded and went flowing on.”

An unusual little story about a hunter who, visiting a small town of peasants, witnesses a singing contest judged in a local pub.

What makes a Russian story Russian? For me it’s a certain quality, some element of soul, some painful and long-forgotten yearning that gives me as a reader an uncomfortable feeling in my chest that I can’t explain in words.

So really, this story is about that something, that quality, that Russian thing I can’t explain but know when I read it. It surprised me, and will stay with me a long time.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The second story that George Saunders explores in A Swim in a Pond in the Rain (see my review) is ‘The Singers’ by Ivan Turgenev (1818-1893). It comes from an 1852 collection of short stories called A Sportsman’s Sketches also translated as A Sportsman’s Notebook, The Hunting Sketches and Sketches from a Hunter’s Album. According to Wikipedia, this collection was a milestone of Russian realism, and it made Turgenev’s name.

When I read Fathers and Sons, I was very taken by the characterisation of the young idealist Bazarov and in the comments below my review you can see where I admired the way Turgenev uses dialogue to differentiate his characters. There is not much dialogue, however, in this most engaging short story about a singing competition in a remote rural pub. Instead, it is Turgenev’s powers of description which impel the reader on.

Plunging into the story reproduced in Saunders’ book without an introduction or any context, it’s not immediately obvious who the unnamed narrator is and why he is roaming about in the vicinity of Kolotovka, a small and cheerless village. But within a couple of pages we have learned that he’s an observant outsider, (which is apparently an element of the Russian realist tradition where the narrator is usually an uncommitted observer of the people he meets.) However, he passes by regularly enough to be acquainted with some of the drinkers at the Cosy Corner pub, and to make some judgements about them. He’s a gentleman well-educated enough to have ‘readers’ and even if we didn’t have Wikipedia, we could guess that he’s either a journalist or that he’s writing a newsy letter for educated people at home, who’re going to read it en famille as people did in those days. He explains his reasons for being in such a dismal place by saying that he’s a sportsman who goes everywhere. Since he’s pursuing this sport alone out in the middle of nowhere this is enough to identify him as a hunter, (though some of us would dispute that shooting animals is any kind of sport.)

Outside, the narrator witnesses an excited exchange between two patrons of the pub. Booby exhorts Blinker to hurry up because everyone is waiting: there is Yashka the Turk, the Wild Gentleman, and the contractor from Zhizdra. (The contractor is not named, not even with an intriguing nickname although Russians are past-masters at giving nicknames.) The excitement is because Yashka and the contractor have made a bet: they’ve wagered a quart of beer to see who wins.

So in this remote rural outpost, with nothing to commend it, an extraordinary cultural moment takes place—a singing competition between the local hero and a challenger from a nearby village.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2021/06/15/t...

[Corbin Wright · Rating 3 out of 5]

“During the contest, we watched the tavern morph into a church. A holy thing happened there: these rough people (peasants, poor men, worked nearly to death in this sweltering, oppressive setting) were uplifted and transformed through art. They recognized beauty when they saw it. Now, the church descends back into tavern.”
-George Saunders (A Swim in a Pond in the Rain)

What a beautiful short story

[Soefae · Rating 3 out of 5]

A few peasant Russian men are united through art. Fine, sure, lovely. But that isn’t enough to make up the dragging writing.

[Max Cannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little too realist to the point of feeling like a documentary, and yet, it is not a true story. That is why the boredom and exhaustive description is unjustifiable. Intention is everything I suppose.

[Hester · Rating 4 out of 5]

Realist short story in which we learn something about the soul of Russia , fleeting moments of transformation even in the most unlikely settings . Thank you to George Saunders for introducing me to this and for deconstructing it to allow me to see it's anatomy .

[armghan ahmad · Rating 5 out of 5]

an operatic, heartfelt masterpiece. Turgenev's writing is not unlike the Chicago wind - it burrows through every opening, no matter the size, and leaves a chill

[Northwestern Skies · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful tale. A vicarious trip. Delightfully atmospheric.
The peasants sing of life; songs of sorrow, joy, memory, and endurance. Music and singing are the variety of life, as natural and inevitable as the changing of day to night, warmth to cold.

Turgenev offers a beautiful description of a Russian steppe village: a tight-knit community, rugged and unadorned. Despite its barren and bleak appearance, the villagers make do - gratefully - with what the earth offers them gratis. Though individually flawed and often viewing one another with contempt, the peasant remains loving and accommodating, taking care of their own.

[Trounin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Рассказ пришёлся по душе и славянофилам, получившим для примера наглядное доказательство, насколько сильны народные традиции. Если такое чудо происходит повсеместно, оное следует развивать. Ведь действие развивается не в императорском театре, а в простом помещении заурядного кабака, и то представление никогда не станет предметом интереса высшего света, так как дворяне не станут нисходить до мужицких забав. А вот Тургеневу повезло притомиться от жары, подойти к кабачку и стать очевидцем описанного.

(c) Trounin

[Moaraj Hasan]

Theres a little kashka in all of us, beautiful masterpeice

[Dave Schaafsma · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The Singers” by Ivan Turgenev is the second story that George Saunders explores in his book on reading and writing fiction, A Swim in the Pond, and I decided to respond briefly to it without benefit of his analysis. The story was published in Turgenev’s short story collection, A Sportsman’s Sketches (1852). Turgenev was a master of realism, much loved as a chronicler of everyday life in Russia. This story focuses on rich characterization and description of peasant life.

The location is bleak and grimy and hot summer Kolotovka, particularly the Corner Pub owned by Nikolai Ivanovich, where an apparently spontaneous singing contest occurs between Yashka the Turk and the contractor from Zhizdra. Other characters enliven the scene, such as Blinker and Booby, the Wild Gentleman. No singing--and very little dialogue, little “voice”--happens in the first half of the story, which is taken up with description of the bleak town and its lively peasant characters as a kind of set-up for the competition.

The contractor is an impressive technician, but Yashka sings with deep passion and soul, of grief:

“A warmhearted, truthful Russian soul rang and breathed in it and fairly clutched you by the heart, clutched straight at your Russian heartstrings. The song expanded and went flowing on. Yashka was evidently overcome by ecstasy: he was no longer diffident; he gave himself up entirely to his feeling of happiness; his voice no longer trembled—it quivered, but with the barely perceptible inner quivering of passion which pierces like an arrow into the hearer’s soul. . .”

The Russian peasantry, the Russian soul, contains multitudes, but the heart and soul of it all is in this comparison, where passion and depth win over technical expertise. And this point is mirrored in Turgenev's own stylistic choices, his focus on atmosphere and affectionate portraiture over structure.

The narrator is a kind of journalist and a “sportsman,” moved very much by the scene, which is increasingly drunken, so he sleeps in a barn for some time, awakening to view the pub in the completion of the revelry, in which all the dismal scene of poverty had been transformed into the joy of Russian song. However, in a coda, a boy yells for his missing brother, who promises his father wants him home to thrash him. Back to reality. A midsummer night’s dream comes back to earth. The ending elevates the somewhat mundane story to a kind of realistic realization of the peasant life in this village. It feels like magic, balancing the music with the mundane morning after.

PS: After this review I read Saunders's pretty extensive commentary on this story. He likes it more than his students. One thing he says is that the boys in the epilogue are actually kind of singing to each other: "Rohhhhh-bert!" "Wha-at?" in the dark, paralleling the two singers in the bar, though the end of this song exchange is less joy than an admission that some songs lead to violence, sadness, sometimes. Saunders also calls attention to all the binaries, the opposites, that happen in the story. Neither of those things had I noticed, cool.

[Laysee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ivan Turgenev (1818 – 1883) was a Russian novelist and short story writer. I first read his novella, ‘First Love,’ and enjoyed it.

Published in a 1852 short story collection titled A Sportsman’s Sketches, this story is about a singing contest in a Russian village pub. An unnamed narrator, likely a journalist, stopped by Cozy Corner, a pub located in a ravine. He was thirsty and stopped for beer. Turgenev provided a rather discursive description of the pub setting and the characters in the pub.

The singing contest: Yashka, the Turk vs. the contractor from Zhizdra; emotion vs. technique; reception of tears vs. applause. The reader is called upon to judge the singing and weigh the degree of confidence to attach to each character’s response to the contestants.

The contest ends. The winner is declared. The story closes with the narrator taking a nap by the ravine and waking up to the shouting voices of two boys, the older ordering the younger to go home for a beating. An odd ending, it seems to me.

The Singers is a story reviewed by George Saunders in his book, A Swim in the Pond. Like Saunder’s students, I did not take to this story. This is when we need a teacher to elucidate what we have missed. Among other observations, Saunders discussed the binaries and opposites (e.g., rooks/crows vs. sparrows) in the story, features I had not noticed. This is insightful. That said, in my view, it is a bit of a stretch to say that the pair of boys calling out to each other parallels the singing of the two contestants.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

In The Singers, Ivan Turgenev has written a tale of contrasts. From the town of Kolotovka, a dry, searing, wasteland of a place, the road not even a road but a ravine, he takes us toward a light that beacons and feels warm and inviting, the pub of Nickolai Ivanych, aptly called the Cozy Corner.

When our narrator reaches the pub, he finds a singing contest between a local favorite, Yashka the Turk, and another man, referred to as “the contractor, is about to begin. The contest, of course, is the focal point of the story. There is a marked difference between the singing styles of the two men, and they elicit completely different reactions from the listeners. There is a noticeable change of tone to the story when the singing has ended, and the lessons from the contest do not end when the winner is declared.

I read this in conjunction with George Saunders’ brilliant literary commentary. There is a lot to be gleaned from the story and it is worth reading not once, but twice, which I immediately did, armed with a much greater understanding of both its form and purpose.

[Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this within 'A Swim in a Pond in the Rain' by George Saunders. A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life.

I appreciate the stories more after each analysis and want to reread them.

I kept thinking to myself: how does one write about a sing-off in a pub, something so inherently musical?

[Jimgosailing · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful story taken from Turgenev’s A Sportsman’s Sketches - a singing contest, but the village people are essentially the judges, based on Turgenev’s descriptions. George Saunders does an amazing job of peeling back the layers of this story in his A Swim in the Pond in the Rain. The highlight is his explanation of the two brothers calling for each other (or not) at the end and how this parallels the singing contest. You should read that. Then read the rest of the stories Saunders provides analysis of.

[lyla55 · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Singers by Ivan Turgenev, is about a wealthy man traveling to a poor village to watch a singing contest. The contractor, who is arrogant and has an ego, versus Yaksha the Turk, who is a nervous man, and was hesitant to sing.

I wasn’t really sure what to get from this book. Russian classics are incredibly hard to decipher, however, I believe it is about a hierarchy. The narrator (who is not described at all) describes the other characters who are peasants, in so much detail because he sees them as actual people.

Other than that?

I got nothing from it.

[Daphne]

read if interested in: provincial Russian pub life

read in a swim in the pond in the rain by George Saunders. the story itself didn’t speak to me too much on first read, but I love Saunders’ interpretation. Turgenev can be annoying to read with all of the digressions but Saunders argues that this is what makes it uniquely his / what makes it work so well

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of seven short stories I've read to prepare for reading A swim in the pond in the rain by George Saunders.

A story that is largely made up of rich character studies. I love the peek into the main character in the end; he knows how to leave on a high note. The funny coda of the brothers... That's a fun puzzle that I look forward to solving.

[Qamar Mohamed · Rating 4 out of 5]

أن أسمى أهداف الفن هو التأثير في الجمهور وهو ما فعله إيفان تورجنيف ببراعة من خلال قصة المغنيان. وعن طريق ياشكا وصوته الحزين الذي أثر بهم لدرجة جعلت كل الشخصيات عكس ما وصفه تورجينف عنهم في بداية القصة. لنجد الخفيف يصمت بشكل غير متوقع والشخص الوحشي القوي الجامد ينزل دمعة. ولكن كعادته الفن يتأثر بالقبح وما هي إلا لحظات حتي عاد السكون لمجون.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not great because of the skill demonstrated in it, but for the picture that it paints so beautifully, the very message of the story and therefore a masterpiece. But you gotta do a lot of critical gymnastics to get there...

[Barry · Rating 3 out of 5]

This story is discussed in George Saunders’ excellent book, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain.

[Paul Bard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a beautiful story!

[Ericka Clou · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely appreciate this more after George Saunders exploration of it.

[Tessa]

Obsessed with the descriptive quality.

[Vanya · Rating 4 out of 5]

good

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting short story about a singing contest in a rural tavern.

[cinlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

The swell and fall of this narrative arc is gorgeous. I understand (?) the purpose of the supporting character descriptions vs action ratio, but it is still a bit odd to me.

[lanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A Swim in the Pond in the Rain

[Dara Kossok-Spieß · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hat mich nicht gecatched