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City Folk and Country Folk
An unsung gem of nineteenth-century Russian literature, City Folk and Country Folk is a seemingly gentle yet devastating satire of Russia's aristocratic and pseudo-intellectual elites in the 1860s. Translated into English for the first time, the novel weaves an engaging tale of manipulation, infatuation, and female assertiveness that takes place one year after the liberation of the empire's serfs. Upending Russian literary clich's of female passivity and rural gentry benightedness, Sofia Khvoshchinskaya centers her story on a commonsense, hardworking noblewoman and her self-assured daughter living on their small rural estate. The antithesis of the thoughtful, intellectual, and self-denying young heroines created by Khvoshchinskaya's male peers, especially Ivan Turgenev, seventeen-year-old Olenka ultimately helps her mother overcome a sense of duty to her "betters" and leads the two to triumph over the urbanites' financial, amorous, and matrimonial machinations. Sofia Khvoshchinskaya and her writer sisters closely mirror Britain's Bront?s, yet Khvoshchinskaya's work contains more of Jane Austen's wit and social repartee, as well an intellectual engagement reminiscent of Elizabeth Gaskell's condition-of- England novels. Written by a woman under a male pseudonym, this brilliant and entertaining exploration of gender dynamics on a post-emancipation Russian estate offers a fresh and necessary point of comparison with the better-known classics of nineteenth-century world literature.
234 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1863
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About the author
Sofia Khvoshchinskaya
2 books3 followersSofia Khvoshchinskaya (1824–1865), a writer, translator, and painter, published fiction and social commentary in Russia's most influential journals. She and her sister Nadezhda wrote to support their family, struggling members of the nobility, alternating long stretches of toil in their native Ryazan Province with visits to Russia's capitals, where they interacted with some of the country's leading intellectuals.
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September 25, 2017Delightful and interesting. Definitely a view you don’t get from much other Russian literature. Skewers the effete intellectual class, and those hanging on to aristocratic status by the coat tails.
Khvoshchinskaya and her sister Nadezhda were professional authors; there was one more writing sister who did not produce a large body of work. However, they wrote under pseudonyms because they were part of an impoverished noble family and it was unsuitable for women to write for the public. They lived in the provinces, although they visited Moscow occasionally and Sofia had received an education in that city, studying several languages.
The action is set at a pivotal point in Russian history. The serfs have just been freed, and both landowners and serfs are working out what that means. Three visitors from the city, one of whom lives abroad most of the time, descend on a rural area. The book describes their interactions with an inherently good and reasonable woman, an ‘owner’ of about 50 souls, who lacks confidence in her own mind. The male pseudo-intellectual tries to educate her, and the two women try to mooch off her in various ways. Her teen-aged daughter is more perceptive, but at a disadvantage due to her age. Read the book to see who comes out ahead.
The broad satire is nicely done. This is an accomplishment of both author and translator. The pacing and length of the book are well calculated. A questionable sexual relationship is frankly set out, rather striking for a woman author of the time. I quite enjoyed it, especially in contrast all the big male guns of the nineteenth century Russian novel. I thought it particularly strong in arguing for the worth of the rural middle class, and women’s ways of determining value and appropriate behavior. It was also strong in handling the subtleties of how we get crowded into acting in ways contrary to our self-interest by dominant, hypocritical, but clearly immoral, people.
Another production of the Columbia University Press Russian Library. Their Strolls with Pushkin is outstanding. Worth keeping an eye on their list.
Khvoshchinskaya and her sister Nadezhda were professional authors; there was one more writing sister who did not produce a large body of work. However, they wrote under pseudonyms because they were part of an impoverished noble family and it was unsuitable for women to write for the public. They lived in the provinces, although they visited Moscow occasionally and Sofia had received an education in that city, studying several languages.
The action is set at a pivotal point in Russian history. The serfs have just been freed, and both landowners and serfs are working out what that means. Three visitors from the city, one of whom lives abroad most of the time, descend on a rural area. The book describes their interactions with an inherently good and reasonable woman, an ‘owner’ of about 50 souls, who lacks confidence in her own mind. The male pseudo-intellectual tries to educate her, and the two women try to mooch off her in various ways. Her teen-aged daughter is more perceptive, but at a disadvantage due to her age. Read the book to see who comes out ahead.
The broad satire is nicely done. This is an accomplishment of both author and translator. The pacing and length of the book are well calculated. A questionable sexual relationship is frankly set out, rather striking for a woman author of the time. I quite enjoyed it, especially in contrast all the big male guns of the nineteenth century Russian novel. I thought it particularly strong in arguing for the worth of the rural middle class, and women’s ways of determining value and appropriate behavior. It was also strong in handling the subtleties of how we get crowded into acting in ways contrary to our self-interest by dominant, hypocritical, but clearly immoral, people.
Another production of the Columbia University Press Russian Library. Their Strolls with Pushkin is outstanding. Worth keeping an eye on their list.
June 1, 2017
via my blog: https://bookstalkerblog.wordpress.com/
“And what kind of illnesses do we have here in the country? All good-for-nothing; we don’t have the more refined illnesses here. In town, if you look around, well, there they do have them.”
Why does Nastasya Ivanovna, a widow, feel so inferior to the upper classes? Just how does her teenage daughter go from vexing her widowed mother to helping her find her bite? The wit is in young Olenka’s reactions to the snobbery around her. That she perceives Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov as ridiculous and a hassle, that she resents giving up her room for her sanctimonious relative Anna, unimpressed by her status and holiness which to be fair, would annoy anyone is just what enlivens this novel.” I’m staying out of it; I’m staying out of it,” Anna Ilinishna interrupted her, waving her hands. “Do as you see fit. It’s in my nature to prevent evil- that’s all.” Shocked a man is staying in the unfinished bathhouse, Anna is too pure for these lesser relatives. Olenka sees past the social masks everyone wears, especially her Auntie Anna’s holy facade. Just how accommodating must Nastasya be to everyone? Olenka is exhausted and irritated by Anna’s ‘suffering’ and complaining nature. Olenka’s youth is refreshing and her insight, though less educated than her ‘betters’, is much wiser.
Ovcharov is unimpressed by the home straight away, seeing the shabby old mixed with the tasteless and ugly. He should know, with his rich fashionable tastes, he-a much more cultured, worldly being. Living in the ‘backwoods’, so self proud of ‘roughing it’ with the ‘rural gentry’ it’s hard not to laugh at his snobbery. He longs to bring the peasants up to his level, him being intelligent and elegant of course in comparison to the savages. He laughs at them, not imagining he, in all his rank and glory, is comical to young teenager Olenka. The working class has their own dirt on their superiors, as they always do. To Olenka, the wealthy writer Ovcharov , is nothing but a troublemaker and how she loves to humor him, but isn’t in love with him- though he doesn’t know it. He, much like her Auntie Anna, is just another person causing her mother nothing but stress! He sees her as young, and beneath his class, he the wiser older man and of course he ‘respects ignorance.’ Ha! That is, when he isn’t set on ‘educating her’! His thoughts on femininity and the way it’s fading with the new generation certainly seems to be something said even today, much the same way the old thinks the younger generation is crude, ignorant and so on and so forth. It could be written today! My favorite ‘thought’ he shares ” They were inveterate dreamers idolizers, they read Byron and George Sand, without understanding it, but that didn’t matter.” They didn’t understand it, huh? Those… women! Well, at least he notes there is more variety in women in his present now than with his generation. Men always know just what women should be, lucky for us. So what if women are losing their femininity, which he is sure they are!
I love Olenka’s ‘coarseness’, particularly on their promenade when he is attempting to be manly and carry her across the stream. He, who is ill… “What on earth are you doing? I’m stronger than you are. If you like it, it might be better for me to carry you.” Fiery little minx she is, our Olenka. Will her mother learn to stand up to the very people she is terrified of upsetting? Finally realize what her daughter knows, that they aren’t necessarily ‘better’? Will Anna remain in residence torturing the mother and daughter forever, besmirching their characters? Will Nastasya Ivanovna wake up to the devious nature of her relative? Will Ovcharov take his leave and cease his attempts to educate the ignorant backwoods folk?
This really is what it claims to be, an unsung gem of nineteenth-century Russian literature, it was a delightful read that reminds me of the English classics, like Pride and Prejudice. What’s better than biting wit?
Publication Date: August 15, 2017
Columbia University Press
“And what kind of illnesses do we have here in the country? All good-for-nothing; we don’t have the more refined illnesses here. In town, if you look around, well, there they do have them.”
Why does Nastasya Ivanovna, a widow, feel so inferior to the upper classes? Just how does her teenage daughter go from vexing her widowed mother to helping her find her bite? The wit is in young Olenka’s reactions to the snobbery around her. That she perceives Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov as ridiculous and a hassle, that she resents giving up her room for her sanctimonious relative Anna, unimpressed by her status and holiness which to be fair, would annoy anyone is just what enlivens this novel.” I’m staying out of it; I’m staying out of it,” Anna Ilinishna interrupted her, waving her hands. “Do as you see fit. It’s in my nature to prevent evil- that’s all.” Shocked a man is staying in the unfinished bathhouse, Anna is too pure for these lesser relatives. Olenka sees past the social masks everyone wears, especially her Auntie Anna’s holy facade. Just how accommodating must Nastasya be to everyone? Olenka is exhausted and irritated by Anna’s ‘suffering’ and complaining nature. Olenka’s youth is refreshing and her insight, though less educated than her ‘betters’, is much wiser.
Ovcharov is unimpressed by the home straight away, seeing the shabby old mixed with the tasteless and ugly. He should know, with his rich fashionable tastes, he-a much more cultured, worldly being. Living in the ‘backwoods’, so self proud of ‘roughing it’ with the ‘rural gentry’ it’s hard not to laugh at his snobbery. He longs to bring the peasants up to his level, him being intelligent and elegant of course in comparison to the savages. He laughs at them, not imagining he, in all his rank and glory, is comical to young teenager Olenka. The working class has their own dirt on their superiors, as they always do. To Olenka, the wealthy writer Ovcharov , is nothing but a troublemaker and how she loves to humor him, but isn’t in love with him- though he doesn’t know it. He, much like her Auntie Anna, is just another person causing her mother nothing but stress! He sees her as young, and beneath his class, he the wiser older man and of course he ‘respects ignorance.’ Ha! That is, when he isn’t set on ‘educating her’! His thoughts on femininity and the way it’s fading with the new generation certainly seems to be something said even today, much the same way the old thinks the younger generation is crude, ignorant and so on and so forth. It could be written today! My favorite ‘thought’ he shares ” They were inveterate dreamers idolizers, they read Byron and George Sand, without understanding it, but that didn’t matter.” They didn’t understand it, huh? Those… women! Well, at least he notes there is more variety in women in his present now than with his generation. Men always know just what women should be, lucky for us. So what if women are losing their femininity, which he is sure they are!
I love Olenka’s ‘coarseness’, particularly on their promenade when he is attempting to be manly and carry her across the stream. He, who is ill… “What on earth are you doing? I’m stronger than you are. If you like it, it might be better for me to carry you.” Fiery little minx she is, our Olenka. Will her mother learn to stand up to the very people she is terrified of upsetting? Finally realize what her daughter knows, that they aren’t necessarily ‘better’? Will Anna remain in residence torturing the mother and daughter forever, besmirching their characters? Will Nastasya Ivanovna wake up to the devious nature of her relative? Will Ovcharov take his leave and cease his attempts to educate the ignorant backwoods folk?
This really is what it claims to be, an unsung gem of nineteenth-century Russian literature, it was a delightful read that reminds me of the English classics, like Pride and Prejudice. What’s better than biting wit?
Publication Date: August 15, 2017
Columbia University Press
August 22, 2018
Recommended to me by Guy from His Futile Preoccupations (thanks, Guy!), City Folk and Country Folk is a gentle but sophisticated satire from the pen of a 19th century novelist, somewhat in the manner of Jane Austen but without the resolution of the plot with marriage.
Set in the countryside, the story centres on the visits of the nobility to the estate of Nastasya Ivanova Chulkova. Unlike her more sophisticated visitors who move in the best circles and feel entitled to express their disdain, Nastasya, a widow of mature years, is self-sufficient due to her capable management of her estate. Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov is a pompous, pseudo-intellectual hypochondriac who has neglected his much bigger estate for so long that it is now uninhabitable. So he ends up lodging in Nastasya’s bathhouse while he sorts out his newly legislated responsibilities to his emancipated serfs and indulges his fussy dietary preoccupations. Nastasya isn’t able to offer the hospitality of her house because she already has a most disagreeable visitor, Anna Ilinishna Bobova. Anna has fallen out with her patron Princess Paltseva and somehow has contrived to have nowhere else to go. She is a patronising, sanctimonious woman of ostentatious piety whose condescension flummoxes Nastasya into servile humility.
The one character who sees all this with very clear eyes is 17-year-old Olenka. Wilful, headstrong and intelligent, Olenka finds everything amusing until her temper flares. She can’t bear to see her mother’s anxiety about pleasing these pretentious guests, and when not mocking them behind their backs, she tells her mother exactly what she thinks of them.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/08/22/c...
Set in the countryside, the story centres on the visits of the nobility to the estate of Nastasya Ivanova Chulkova. Unlike her more sophisticated visitors who move in the best circles and feel entitled to express their disdain, Nastasya, a widow of mature years, is self-sufficient due to her capable management of her estate. Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov is a pompous, pseudo-intellectual hypochondriac who has neglected his much bigger estate for so long that it is now uninhabitable. So he ends up lodging in Nastasya’s bathhouse while he sorts out his newly legislated responsibilities to his emancipated serfs and indulges his fussy dietary preoccupations. Nastasya isn’t able to offer the hospitality of her house because she already has a most disagreeable visitor, Anna Ilinishna Bobova. Anna has fallen out with her patron Princess Paltseva and somehow has contrived to have nowhere else to go. She is a patronising, sanctimonious woman of ostentatious piety whose condescension flummoxes Nastasya into servile humility.
The one character who sees all this with very clear eyes is 17-year-old Olenka. Wilful, headstrong and intelligent, Olenka finds everything amusing until her temper flares. She can’t bear to see her mother’s anxiety about pleasing these pretentious guests, and when not mocking them behind their backs, she tells her mother exactly what she thinks of them.
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/08/22/c...
January 29, 2022
I think I enjoyed this so much because I could compare it to War & Peace (the Peace part), where nobles dealt with their various social issues which were actually trivial and completely unimportant except to them. I was also impressed by the wit and humor displayed by the author, which reminded me so much of Jane Austen (though Austen fans may kill me for that comparison). Character personalities were, weak/meek Mom, strong opinionated modern daughter, annoying passive-aggressive cousin, sexist arrogant entitled City-guy tenant, country bumpkin priest, and selfish matchmaker. Those character types were well-formed, and they were all crucial to the story. We could clearly see the author's respect for country folk over the city folk who just felt like everyone else was below them. I guess because this is a very recent translation of a very unknown author from around 1860, I had low expectations. However I was very pleasantly surprised.
August 29, 2017
What a joy it has been to discover this unknown little gem of Russian literature. Despite having studied Russian and having explored that country’s literature for many years this one had completely passed me by, and I am so pleased to see it finally translated into English and become available to a wider audience. And to discover a book by a woman writer is an added pleasure – I didn’t even know there were any! Perhaps there are more hidden away waiting to be discovered. This charming novel is the story of a noblewoman, Nastasya Ivanovna, a widow, living happily with her teenage daughter Olenka on their estate in provincial Russia, one year after the liberation of the serfs. She’s a pragmatic woman with a common sense attitude to life, but the arrival of two visitors creates considerable upheaval into her previously calm existence. A gentle satire on Russian life, an engaging and entertaining social commentary, and an authentic portrait of Russian provincial society, the novel is a wonderful adjunct to other more well-known classics of Russian literature and is a thoroughly enjoyable read.
March 30, 2022
Finished my homework just before class.
Though I mostly enjoyed this small town comedy, it was excruciating to read about the complete blowhard that was Erast Ovcharov. I was eagerly awaiting his comeuppance, but it never came.
(PS. I wonder if Khvoshchinskaya wrote this book as a sort of response to Eugene Onegin?)
Though I mostly enjoyed this small town comedy, it was excruciating to read about the complete blowhard that was Erast Ovcharov. I was eagerly awaiting his comeuppance, but it never came.
(PS. I wonder if Khvoshchinskaya wrote this book as a sort of response to Eugene Onegin?)
April 18, 2018
Nora Favorov deserves a lot of credit for doing the arduous work of exhuming this minor gem in the Russian literary cannon. Although the Khvoshchniskaya sisters Praskovia, Sofia and Nadezhda were prolific and important writers, they aren't household names, not even in their native country. This is partly because Sofia, who died at age 41, as I learned from the introduction to this volume, didn't want her works to be republished. Most of their work appeared in periodicals, and to this day are only accessible on microfiche. "City Folk" isn't quite as brilliant as Nadezhda's "The Boarding-school Girl", but it is a delightful and well-crafted story that throws light on a turning point in Russian history, namely the period following the emancipation of the serfs in 1862. The story takes place on a modest but well-run estate where widowed Nastasya lived in complete harmony with her daughter Olenka and her servants, until a cousin of hers, Anna Ilinishna, invades their peace. A female Tartuffe, Anna Ilinishna made a career of pretending to be some sort of a saint, while sponging off a princess. However, when the princess cut her loose, Anna Ilinishna had no recourse except abusing the hospitality of soft-hearted Nastasya. Simultaneously, another parasite, Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov, takes up residence in Nastasya's bath-house, because after spending years in Moscow and abroad, he finds that his own country estate is uninhabitable. A third person, Katerina Petrovna, tries to take advantage of Nastasya by arranging a marriage between her own lover, Semyon Ivanovich, and Olenka, so that she can keep the young man attached to her without having to support him. What Anna, Erast and Katerina have in common is that they belong to the higher echelons of the aristocracy, even in tenuously, and have pretensions unmatched by their resources. While Olenka sees through them immediately, her excessively charitable mother bends over backwards to accommodate the whims of her guests and neighbors, even as they look down on her and bully her around. Finally, this being a comedy, mother and daughter rebel against their oppressors and send them packing. As Favorov points out in her introduction, "Nastasya and Olenka are unusual Russian heroines in that they are emphatically not extraordinary". Like Elmire and Mariane in Molière's "Tartuffe", they are good people because they have a moral compass and solid common sense, not because they are especially educated. Olenka finds books boring and her idea of the perfect suitor seems to be a guy with a shining uniform and nice whiskers. But she is a shrewd judge of character and, like her mother, will prove capable of handling the tricky relationships with the peasants, something the snobbish or ideologically-minded aristocrats are totally unable to cope with. With its pretty and witty cover design, this book is a joy to own as well as to read.
October 27, 2021
What a wonderful discovery this little gem from Russia’s Golden Age of Literature was. It’s a brilliantly told tale about the clash between various ‘city folks’ and a simple old country woman and her daughter, with fantastic character sketches. A bourgeoisie landowner, a pious “holy” woman, and a bullying matchmaker all look down on the ‘country folks’, yet they themselves are hypocritical and pretentious. Khvoshchinskaya is deft at painting this picture with nuance, she shows insight into human psychology, and her writing is clear and direct. There is also a strong feminist message, as the daughter stands up for herself, and makes quite a hero. Khvoshchinskaya wrote under the pseudonym Ivan Vesenev, and as her sisters Nadezhda and Praskovia wrote as well, it’s hard not to compare them to the Brontë sisters. If this book is any indication, the comparison is apt, and I will have to seek out more of their work. Highly recommended.
October 28, 2018
A very amusing book, really liked the depiction of Ovcharov, a man who flatters himself as having progressive views but who is actually elitist and sexist - and rather insignificant. The most admirable character to my mind is Olenka, who - even if she does not care for literature - is spirited, sees right through other people's hypocrisy, and laughs a great deal. I hope she ended up finding a good match. A good 'snapshot' of a pivotal period in Russian history - the emancipation of the serfs. Top-notch translation.
August 20, 2023
Incredibly fun, terribly aggravating, witty and sharp. Indeed, the Khvoshchinskaya sisters are akin to the Brontë's and Austen with their gentry class intrigues. Olenka is my hero in this as the one who turns tradition on its head and sees situations and people for who they truly are.
February 25, 2022
Everyone is a bit (or a lot) ridiculous but an enjoyable read.
August 18, 2023
I really enjoyed this novel!!
August 26, 2017
In "City Folk and Country Folk," not-particularly-rich minor gentry Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov has returned to his home village to take a rest cure and drink whey. His own estate is not inhabitable, so he ends up renting a bathhouse from his neighbor, Nastasya Ivanovna Chulkova. This draws the both of them into a summer of miscommunications and genteel misunderstandings.
"City Folk and Country Folk" has been compared to Jane Austen's novels, and it has that element of a 19th-century comedy of manners, full of social commentary. However, while Khvoshchinskaya's wit is not quite as elegantly cutting as Austen's, and the only love plot is foiled pretty quickly, "City Folk and Country Folk" is more overtly socially oriented than Austen's novels, more like something by Turgenev. It is a pointed portrait of the mid-19th-century minor Russian gentry, who are struggling to deal with the rapid social changes around them. The novel takes place in 1862, one year after the emancipation of the serfs, and both Nastasya Ivanovna and her former serfs, now peasants who still serve in her house or work her land, are trying to figure out how to negotiate the transition. Meanwhile, Erast Sergeyevich sits in his bathhouse and writes tracts about the bad behavior of modern women (the "woman question" was a major issue at the time, just as it continues to be to this day) and how women must be enlightened (by men) in order to gain a masculine way of thinking without becoming overly impertinent, forward, or independent. One of the more comic moments in the novel comes when he gives some of these tracts to Nastasya Ivanovna and her daughter Olenka, who are furiously offended by them, much to his surprise.
By Russian standards this is a very short novel, and it does not have the extensive philosophizing that readers might expect after reading the works of Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. What it does have is a keen insight into the everyday problems of the low-level gentry and simple country folk who made up the bulk of the "real Russia" of the provinces (and who continue, in changed form, to do so today). The humor is not malicious, but it is at times quite sharp, and the tone and message are sneakily feminist--not only are most of the main characters women, but Nastasya Ivanovna is shown to be the one who is capable of managing an estate more or less competently, while her daughter Olenka is a decisive young lady who repels unwanted physical advances with her superior strength. There are very few, one might even say no, female authors in the 19th-century Russian canon, so seeing someone like Khvoshchinskaya being revived and translated is very welcome. Certainly worth reading for those interested in Russian literature or women authors who are finally getting the recognition they deserve.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a review copy of this book. All opinions are my own.
"City Folk and Country Folk" has been compared to Jane Austen's novels, and it has that element of a 19th-century comedy of manners, full of social commentary. However, while Khvoshchinskaya's wit is not quite as elegantly cutting as Austen's, and the only love plot is foiled pretty quickly, "City Folk and Country Folk" is more overtly socially oriented than Austen's novels, more like something by Turgenev. It is a pointed portrait of the mid-19th-century minor Russian gentry, who are struggling to deal with the rapid social changes around them. The novel takes place in 1862, one year after the emancipation of the serfs, and both Nastasya Ivanovna and her former serfs, now peasants who still serve in her house or work her land, are trying to figure out how to negotiate the transition. Meanwhile, Erast Sergeyevich sits in his bathhouse and writes tracts about the bad behavior of modern women (the "woman question" was a major issue at the time, just as it continues to be to this day) and how women must be enlightened (by men) in order to gain a masculine way of thinking without becoming overly impertinent, forward, or independent. One of the more comic moments in the novel comes when he gives some of these tracts to Nastasya Ivanovna and her daughter Olenka, who are furiously offended by them, much to his surprise.
By Russian standards this is a very short novel, and it does not have the extensive philosophizing that readers might expect after reading the works of Dostoevsky or Tolstoy. What it does have is a keen insight into the everyday problems of the low-level gentry and simple country folk who made up the bulk of the "real Russia" of the provinces (and who continue, in changed form, to do so today). The humor is not malicious, but it is at times quite sharp, and the tone and message are sneakily feminist--not only are most of the main characters women, but Nastasya Ivanovna is shown to be the one who is capable of managing an estate more or less competently, while her daughter Olenka is a decisive young lady who repels unwanted physical advances with her superior strength. There are very few, one might even say no, female authors in the 19th-century Russian canon, so seeing someone like Khvoshchinskaya being revived and translated is very welcome. Certainly worth reading for those interested in Russian literature or women authors who are finally getting the recognition they deserve.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a review copy of this book. All opinions are my own.
November 16, 2018
This satire of nineteenth-century Russian manners and social hierarchies centres around the rural estate of widow Natasya Ivanova Chulkova and her daughter Olenka who work hard to maintain their home and their lives in relative comfort. But as rural figures with modest property they are subjected to the metropolitan snobbery and disdain of two unwelcome guests. The first is Anna, a demanding cousin with her self-righteous religious preoccupation who goes out of her way to undermine and harry Natasya with demands and accusations. There is also Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov the self-absorbed former neighbour who rents their bathhouse for the sake of his health.
Natasya Ivanova is troubled by her sense of duty to her neighbours and perceived social betters, even against her better judgement. She struggles to meet the needs of her “guests” and the superior attitude of the urban nobility towards those they see as simple and rustic. Ocharov is keen to give advice and spends much of his time writing pseudo-intellectual pamphlets about Russia’s backwardness but he has allowed his own large estate languish into disrepair and in the aftermath of the emancipation he grapples ineffectually with the changed relationships with his former serfs. His paternalistic and patronising attitude sees the nobility remaining central to the organisation of the land with few real concessions to the needs of peasants and workers while Natasya and Olenka have managed to adapt to the sweeping changes with relative success.
Olenka objects to her mother’s servility, recognising the weaknesses of their guests. She’s an independent girl who trusts her own judgements more than society’s dictates. She’s often amused by the peccadilloes of Anna and Ocharov but increasingly resents their fussy demands on her mother. As the situation reaches a head with interference from all sides, Natasya and Olenka begin to fight back, recognising their own strength, their independence and hard work as more valuable than titles and prospects. In this they clearly represent the experience of their creators, who lived in similar circumstances.
There’s match-making, affairs, betrayal and social conflicts and Khvoshchinskaya brilliantly sends up the pomposity of her characters, clinging to the social conventions propping up the crumbling hierarchy. The incisive wit and humour are reminiscent of Jane Austen’s works, particularly in the clever dialogue, but the wider considerations of the political and social landscape give it a different intensity and the lack of a neat resolution is immensely satisfying.
Natasya Ivanova is troubled by her sense of duty to her neighbours and perceived social betters, even against her better judgement. She struggles to meet the needs of her “guests” and the superior attitude of the urban nobility towards those they see as simple and rustic. Ocharov is keen to give advice and spends much of his time writing pseudo-intellectual pamphlets about Russia’s backwardness but he has allowed his own large estate languish into disrepair and in the aftermath of the emancipation he grapples ineffectually with the changed relationships with his former serfs. His paternalistic and patronising attitude sees the nobility remaining central to the organisation of the land with few real concessions to the needs of peasants and workers while Natasya and Olenka have managed to adapt to the sweeping changes with relative success.
Olenka objects to her mother’s servility, recognising the weaknesses of their guests. She’s an independent girl who trusts her own judgements more than society’s dictates. She’s often amused by the peccadilloes of Anna and Ocharov but increasingly resents their fussy demands on her mother. As the situation reaches a head with interference from all sides, Natasya and Olenka begin to fight back, recognising their own strength, their independence and hard work as more valuable than titles and prospects. In this they clearly represent the experience of their creators, who lived in similar circumstances.
There’s match-making, affairs, betrayal and social conflicts and Khvoshchinskaya brilliantly sends up the pomposity of her characters, clinging to the social conventions propping up the crumbling hierarchy. The incisive wit and humour are reminiscent of Jane Austen’s works, particularly in the clever dialogue, but the wider considerations of the political and social landscape give it a different intensity and the lack of a neat resolution is immensely satisfying.
March 8, 2022
Widow Nastasya Ivanova Chulkova and her seventeen-year-old daughter, Olenka live in the village of Snetki managing their own property, while adapting to new way of life and thinking as the time changes. The whole novel centers around several drama (however low key) - Katerina Petrovna trying to set up Olenka with her own protégé Semyon Ivanovich, cousin Anna Ilinisha Bobova who came to their household and never left, Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov, a nobleman and intellect who came back to this village after traveling around the world, and ended up staying at their bathhouse with interactions with Olenka that are shockingly intimate.
March 30, 2022
Thoroughly enjoyed this comical satire, really reminiscent of Jane Austen novels. And Erast is the worst, Olenka is the best.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 22, 2022
i like a lot-
fucking hate ovcharov-
fucking hate ovcharov-
February 6, 2024
I am so happy to have discovered the Russian Library series, which consists of English translations of Russian books by writers who are not as well-known as they should be in the English-speaking world and whose works were previously unavailable or hard to find in English translation. This my fourth book from the Russian Library and the best one yet. I studied Russian literature in college and have continued to read and enjoy it throughout my adult life. I have read more Russian literature than 99.9% of Americans, but I admit that before now, I had never heard of Sofia Khvoshchinskaya. I don't know how I missed her. She's an excellent writer.
In almost all of Russian literature, the city folk come off better than the country folk. The country people are ignorant and cruel, like Shchedrin's Golovlyov family or dupes like the landowners in Dead Souls. Provincial life is generally portrayed as being dull and backward. The countryside is a sometimes-necessary retreat from life in Petersburg, Moscow and western Europe when finances press, but generally a place to avoided. Yes, we sometimes have earthy peasants who embody values and wisdom of the people from Gogol's Dikanka to Turgenev's Huntsman's Sketches to Nekrasov's Who Can Live Happy and Free in Russia? And there are a few, very few, instances of wise landowners - Levin from Anna Karenina and Tushin in Goncharov's Precipice come to mind. But as far as I know, this book is unique in giving us country folk who are ordinary, unidealized good people, who care for their land and their peasants and live simple but fulfilling lives. The Russian country landowner's life in the time of the tsars that is portrayed here is something that I knew must surely have existed, but that seems to have missed the attention of every other nineteenth century novelist.
Nastasya Ivanovna and her daughter, Olenka, are great characters, who I loved from start to finish. They may not be intellectuals, but they both have native intelligence, good common sense, strength of character and an abiding love for each other and their small estate. Nastasya Ivanovna's servants and her village priest, Porphyry, are also country folk with good common sense who are instantly likeable. But then we have the city folk, who are principally embodied in Nastasya Ivanovna's neighbor, Ovcharov, who, having returned for a visit to the country, has to take up residence in Nastasya Ivanovna's bath house for the summer, because the estate house on his own much bigger property became dilapidated through neglect and had to be torn down. Ovarchov is weak and sometimes a little silly, but he isn't a bad man. His good qualities make him believable and make him a better foil for Nastasya Ivanovna and Olenka than he would have been, if had been portrayed as being more on the dark side. The two other principal city folk are Katarina Petrovna, the busybody matchmaker, who schemes to marry off Olenka to her gigolo, Simon, and Anna Ilinishna, the old maid cousin, who has made a career out of sponging and excessive piety in Moscow until being thrown out by her patroness princess and descending on her country relative, Nastasya Ivanovna, for a new round of sponging. These two are both irredeemably bad, though still they come off as humans whose bad traits are in some ways the product of the false lives that city society has thrust them into. Mixed all together, these characters create a classic novel of manners that provides a wonderful picture of Russian country life at the time of the emancipation of the serfs in the 1860s and that shows in a quiet and very human way the contrasts between city and country in Russia that become caricatures in the hands of other writers.
In almost all of Russian literature, the city folk come off better than the country folk. The country people are ignorant and cruel, like Shchedrin's Golovlyov family or dupes like the landowners in Dead Souls. Provincial life is generally portrayed as being dull and backward. The countryside is a sometimes-necessary retreat from life in Petersburg, Moscow and western Europe when finances press, but generally a place to avoided. Yes, we sometimes have earthy peasants who embody values and wisdom of the people from Gogol's Dikanka to Turgenev's Huntsman's Sketches to Nekrasov's Who Can Live Happy and Free in Russia? And there are a few, very few, instances of wise landowners - Levin from Anna Karenina and Tushin in Goncharov's Precipice come to mind. But as far as I know, this book is unique in giving us country folk who are ordinary, unidealized good people, who care for their land and their peasants and live simple but fulfilling lives. The Russian country landowner's life in the time of the tsars that is portrayed here is something that I knew must surely have existed, but that seems to have missed the attention of every other nineteenth century novelist.
Nastasya Ivanovna and her daughter, Olenka, are great characters, who I loved from start to finish. They may not be intellectuals, but they both have native intelligence, good common sense, strength of character and an abiding love for each other and their small estate. Nastasya Ivanovna's servants and her village priest, Porphyry, are also country folk with good common sense who are instantly likeable. But then we have the city folk, who are principally embodied in Nastasya Ivanovna's neighbor, Ovcharov, who, having returned for a visit to the country, has to take up residence in Nastasya Ivanovna's bath house for the summer, because the estate house on his own much bigger property became dilapidated through neglect and had to be torn down. Ovarchov is weak and sometimes a little silly, but he isn't a bad man. His good qualities make him believable and make him a better foil for Nastasya Ivanovna and Olenka than he would have been, if had been portrayed as being more on the dark side. The two other principal city folk are Katarina Petrovna, the busybody matchmaker, who schemes to marry off Olenka to her gigolo, Simon, and Anna Ilinishna, the old maid cousin, who has made a career out of sponging and excessive piety in Moscow until being thrown out by her patroness princess and descending on her country relative, Nastasya Ivanovna, for a new round of sponging. These two are both irredeemably bad, though still they come off as humans whose bad traits are in some ways the product of the false lives that city society has thrust them into. Mixed all together, these characters create a classic novel of manners that provides a wonderful picture of Russian country life at the time of the emancipation of the serfs in the 1860s and that shows in a quiet and very human way the contrasts between city and country in Russia that become caricatures in the hands of other writers.
May 27, 2017
Written in Russian in the 1860s and just now translated into English for the first time, this novel is a light satire to accompany the serious philosophy of contemporaries like Dostoyevsky or Tolstoy.
The plot: Nastasya Ivanovna is a member of the rural lower gentry, a widow living contentedly with her teenage daughter Olenka. Their summer is interrupted when a distant relative, Anna Ilinishna, comes to live with them, and a rich neighbor, Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov, decides to move into their bathhouse. Anna Ilinishna has spent most of her life living with various princesses in Moscow, and is widely renowned for her religious faith and ability to call down miracles with her prayers. She spends her time in their house sulking and trying to convince witnesses that she's being horrendously mistreated. Ovcharov is an intellectual writer who usually spends his summers travelling to various fashionable European resorts and is only in the countryside because he's decided he needs to drink fresh whey daily for his health. He's convinced that his presence is the philosophical, urbane, and enlightened light come to change everyone's lives: from his serfs to Nastasya Ivanovna to Olenka, who he is of course sure is in love with him and his cutting-edge clothes. In reality Olenka thinks he's a boring old man with weird habits, but Ovcharov is spectacularly bad at realizing this. He also tends to conveniently change his political theories to go along with whoever is flattering him at that moment.
It's a very fun book, and is a completely charming antidote to classic Russian literature (at least of the sort that gets read in the US). My one complaint is that the ending felt very abrupt, but when your only problem is that you wanted to spend more time with the characters, you know it's a good book.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
The plot: Nastasya Ivanovna is a member of the rural lower gentry, a widow living contentedly with her teenage daughter Olenka. Their summer is interrupted when a distant relative, Anna Ilinishna, comes to live with them, and a rich neighbor, Erast Sergeyevich Ovcharov, decides to move into their bathhouse. Anna Ilinishna has spent most of her life living with various princesses in Moscow, and is widely renowned for her religious faith and ability to call down miracles with her prayers. She spends her time in their house sulking and trying to convince witnesses that she's being horrendously mistreated. Ovcharov is an intellectual writer who usually spends his summers travelling to various fashionable European resorts and is only in the countryside because he's decided he needs to drink fresh whey daily for his health. He's convinced that his presence is the philosophical, urbane, and enlightened light come to change everyone's lives: from his serfs to Nastasya Ivanovna to Olenka, who he is of course sure is in love with him and his cutting-edge clothes. In reality Olenka thinks he's a boring old man with weird habits, but Ovcharov is spectacularly bad at realizing this. He also tends to conveniently change his political theories to go along with whoever is flattering him at that moment.
It's a very fun book, and is a completely charming antidote to classic Russian literature (at least of the sort that gets read in the US). My one complaint is that the ending felt very abrupt, but when your only problem is that you wanted to spend more time with the characters, you know it's a good book.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
January 13, 2018
Definitely worth reading and one of the few Russian novels of the 1860s written by a woman. Even so, it had to appear anonymously. As in England fifty years ago, writing novels was just not thought to be a "decent" thing for women to do. The story is set just as the abolition of serfdom has taken place, but the introduction is more informative about that than the book itself, which centres on the variably impecunious "minor" nobles forced in some cases to take bureaucratic government jobs and in others steadily to dispose of their remaining estates. If I understand the book right, there was still a capital value in "mouths", i. e. serfs. Fifty would make a nice little dowry. This is because the serfs are having to buy themselves out in some form and haven't all managed to do so. On a human level the story is highly satisfactory and the one you like best turns out to be the one who is right. More I won't say for fear of giving away the story.
July 10, 2021
Satira e comedia de costumes ao estilo de Jane Austen,com dialogos afiados como Oscar Wilde e analises sociais da epoca como Pais e Filhos de Turgueniev, e tudo isso escrito ppr uma escritora russa esquecida :Sofia Khvoshchinskaya , que junto com a suas irmãs também escritoras,eram comparadas aa irmãs Bronte(também da mesma epoca).
Adorei este obra,una surpresa, a estoria se passa um ano depois da liberação dos servos na Rússia e a pequena semente que germinara no futuro,da decadencia da nobreza e a revolução. Aqui vemos essas relações absurdas e pitorescas entre servos,e donos de terras(gente do campo) e a nobreza (gente da cidade),com a chegada de hospedes que vem interromper a vida tranquila e bem organizada da mãe e filha , Nesteya e Olenka,que representam uma forca indepentente e feminina de pensamento inesperada, para um intruso contraditório Nikolai Demyanovich,que tem ideias modernas e progressistas mas é um conservador enraizado...
Este livro me divertiu e me surpreendeu e adorei Olenka,que já entrou na minha lista de heroinas literárias inspiradoras.
Adorei este obra,una surpresa, a estoria se passa um ano depois da liberação dos servos na Rússia e a pequena semente que germinara no futuro,da decadencia da nobreza e a revolução. Aqui vemos essas relações absurdas e pitorescas entre servos,e donos de terras(gente do campo) e a nobreza (gente da cidade),com a chegada de hospedes que vem interromper a vida tranquila e bem organizada da mãe e filha , Nesteya e Olenka,que representam uma forca indepentente e feminina de pensamento inesperada, para um intruso contraditório Nikolai Demyanovich,que tem ideias modernas e progressistas mas é um conservador enraizado...
Este livro me divertiu e me surpreendeu e adorei Olenka,que já entrou na minha lista de heroinas literárias inspiradoras.
April 18, 2025
First time reading a female 19th century Russian writer and wow I can see how this would read like a Russian version of a Jane Austen novel.
Set in the immediate years following the Emancipation of the Serfs, the book centers on a widowed landowner Natasya Ivanovna and her daughter Olenka (considered one of the lower ranked gentry as their land was only in posession of 50 souls) and contrasts her against three wealthier, more sophisticated nobles: her cousin Anna, her neighbor Ovcharov and Katerina Petrovna who all exert influence over Natasya Ivanovna by virtue of being "of a higher social standing". But throughout the novel, we see that Natasya and her daughter (the country folk) are more admirable while the city folk are pretentious, ridiculous, selfish and self-important.
Enjoyed this book a lot for its lighthearted but clever social commentaries.
Set in the immediate years following the Emancipation of the Serfs, the book centers on a widowed landowner Natasya Ivanovna and her daughter Olenka (considered one of the lower ranked gentry as their land was only in posession of 50 souls) and contrasts her against three wealthier, more sophisticated nobles: her cousin Anna, her neighbor Ovcharov and Katerina Petrovna who all exert influence over Natasya Ivanovna by virtue of being "of a higher social standing". But throughout the novel, we see that Natasya and her daughter (the country folk) are more admirable while the city folk are pretentious, ridiculous, selfish and self-important.
Enjoyed this book a lot for its lighthearted but clever social commentaries.
July 25, 2017
This was so hysterical! I really loved the characters, especially Nastasya and Obcharov. I read the book and then read the intro. and it all made sense. I think the story was a great illustration of the political climate at the time. A good way to be subversive. I didn't know about the emancipation of the serfs until reading this and I think that Nastasya's speech to her servants was wonderful. She was the voice of the future for the working class people of Russia. It was just long enough. I really didn't know about the sisters who wrote this either. Any similarities with the Brontes' is always interesting. Really enjoyed this read.
May 31, 2017
4.5
Per la prima volta, un romanzo di cui mi si dice che "ricorda Jane Austen" mantiene le promesse.
C'è ironia, satira sociale, occhio acuto e grande attenzione ai problemi e alle follie del proprio tempo in questo romanzo, appena riproposto in traduzione inglese, misconosciuto per un secolo; e sebbene la levità miracolosa di Jane sia lontana, pure non si può non sorridere dei maneggi dei nobili di città e delle credenze dei nobili di campagna, volti a preservare gottescamente un passato che non è più.
Da scoprire, davvero.
Per la prima volta, un romanzo di cui mi si dice che "ricorda Jane Austen" mantiene le promesse.
C'è ironia, satira sociale, occhio acuto e grande attenzione ai problemi e alle follie del proprio tempo in questo romanzo, appena riproposto in traduzione inglese, misconosciuto per un secolo; e sebbene la levità miracolosa di Jane sia lontana, pure non si può non sorridere dei maneggi dei nobili di città e delle credenze dei nobili di campagna, volti a preservare gottescamente un passato che non è più.
Da scoprire, davvero.
February 19, 2019
City Folk and Country Folk is a delightful satire, ridiculing a variety of “city folk” and everyone else besides. Among the cast of characters is the intellectual Ovcharov, a dead ringer for Austen’s Mr. Collins. The book centers on neighbors visiting each other, eating each other’s food, drinking each other’s tea and generally getting on each other’s nerves until they all decide to stop seeing one another. Needless to say, this was a plot line I adored.
March 24, 2022
City Folk and Country Folk by Sofia Khvoshchinskaya is a 19th century multi-layered tale of manners, personalities, and morality. It has been compared to Jane Austen's works, but that seems a bit of a stretch. This book is witty and insightful at times, but not consistently. It was, however, an enjoyable read, and easily creates the atmosphere of what must have been a very challenging time in the Russian Empire.
May 1, 2022
City Folk and Country Folk by Sofia Khvoshchinskaya is a 19th century multi-layered tale of manners, personalities, and morality. It has been compared to Jane Austen's works, but that seems a bit of a stretch. This book is witty and insightful at times, but not consistently. It was, however, an enjoyable read, and easily creates the atmosphere of what must have been a very challenging time in the Russian Empire.
July 29, 2017
3.5 stars
Another NetGalley book. For lovers of Jane Austen, this is an excellent look into the social maneuverings of the changing classes in late 19th century Russia. The English translation is very readable, with many passages given in French, but glossed with their meaning at the bottom of the page. Overall, a decent read.
Another NetGalley book. For lovers of Jane Austen, this is an excellent look into the social maneuverings of the changing classes in late 19th century Russia. The English translation is very readable, with many passages given in French, but glossed with their meaning at the bottom of the page. Overall, a decent read.
May 6, 2018
Very flat. Reads like a play not a novel.
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