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Russian Library
Sentimental Tales
Mikhail Zoshchenko's Sentimental Tales are satirical portraits of small-town characters on the fringes of Soviet society in the first decade of Bolshevik rule. The tales are narrated by one Kolenkorov, who is anything but a model Soviet author: not only is he still attached to the era of the old regime, he is also, quite simply, not a very good writer. Shaped by Zoshchenko's masterful hands--he takes credit for editing the tales in a series of comic prefaces--Kolenkorov's prose is beautifully mangled, full of stylistic infelicities, overloaded flights of metaphor, tortured cliché, and misused bureaucratese, in the tradition of Gogol.
Yet beneath Kolenkorov's intrusive narration and sublime blathering, the stories are genuinely moving. They tell tales of unrequited love and amorous misadventures among down-on-their-luck musicians, provincial damsels, aspiring poets, and liberal aristocrats hopelessly out of place in the new Russia, against a backdrop of overcrowded apartments, scheming, and daydreaming. Zoshchenko's deadpan style and sly ventriloquy mask a biting critique of Soviet life--and perhaps life in general. An original perspective on Soviet society in the 1920s and simply uproariously funny, Sentimental Tales at last shows Anglophone readers why Zoshchenko is considered among the greatest humorists of the Soviet era.
Yet beneath Kolenkorov's intrusive narration and sublime blathering, the stories are genuinely moving. They tell tales of unrequited love and amorous misadventures among down-on-their-luck musicians, provincial damsels, aspiring poets, and liberal aristocrats hopelessly out of place in the new Russia, against a backdrop of overcrowded apartments, scheming, and daydreaming. Zoshchenko's deadpan style and sly ventriloquy mask a biting critique of Soviet life--and perhaps life in general. An original perspective on Soviet society in the 1920s and simply uproariously funny, Sentimental Tales at last shows Anglophone readers why Zoshchenko is considered among the greatest humorists of the Soviet era.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1929
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417 people want to read
About the author
Mikhail Zoshchenko
371 books118 followersMikhail Zoshchenko (Russian: Михаил Зощенко) was born in Poltava, Ukraine, on 29th July, 1895. He studied law at the University of Petersburg, but did not graduate.
During the First World War Zoshchenko served in the Russian Army. A supporter of the October Revolution, Zoshchenko joined the Red Army and fought against the Whites in the Civil War.
In 1922 Zoshchenko joined the literary group, the Serapion Brothers. Inspired by the work of Yevgeni Zamyatin, the group took their name from the story by Ernst T. Hoffmann, the Serapion Brothers, about an individualist who vows to devote himself to a free, imaginative and non-conformist art. Other members included Nickolai Tikhonov, Mikhail Slonimski, Victor Shklovsky, Vsevolod Ivanov and Konstantin Fedin. Russia's most important writer of the period, Maxim Gorky, also sympathized with the group's views.
Zoshchenko's early stories dealt with his experiences in the First World War and the Russian Civil War. He gradually developed a new style that relied heavily on humour. This was reflected in his stories that appeared in Tales (1923), Esteemed Citizens (1926), What the Nightingale Sang (1927) and Nervous People (1927).
Zoshchenko satires were popular with the Russian people and he was one of the country's most widely read writers in the 1920s. Although Zoshchenko never directly attacked the Soviet system, he was not afraid to highlight the problems of bureaucracy, corruption, poor housing and food shortages.
In the 1930s Zoshchenko came under increasing pressure to conform to the idea of socialist realism. As a satirist, Zoshchenko found this difficult, and attempts such as the Story of one Life were not successful.
Zoshchenko increasing got into trouble with the Soviet authorities. His autobiographical, Before Sunrise, was banned in 1943 and three years later his literary career was brought to an end when he was expelled from the Soviet Writers' Union after the publication of The Adventures of a Monkey in the literary magazine, Zvezda.
Mikhail Zoshchenko died in Leningrad on 22nd July, 1958.
(source: spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk)
During the First World War Zoshchenko served in the Russian Army. A supporter of the October Revolution, Zoshchenko joined the Red Army and fought against the Whites in the Civil War.
In 1922 Zoshchenko joined the literary group, the Serapion Brothers. Inspired by the work of Yevgeni Zamyatin, the group took their name from the story by Ernst T. Hoffmann, the Serapion Brothers, about an individualist who vows to devote himself to a free, imaginative and non-conformist art. Other members included Nickolai Tikhonov, Mikhail Slonimski, Victor Shklovsky, Vsevolod Ivanov and Konstantin Fedin. Russia's most important writer of the period, Maxim Gorky, also sympathized with the group's views.
Zoshchenko's early stories dealt with his experiences in the First World War and the Russian Civil War. He gradually developed a new style that relied heavily on humour. This was reflected in his stories that appeared in Tales (1923), Esteemed Citizens (1926), What the Nightingale Sang (1927) and Nervous People (1927).
Zoshchenko satires were popular with the Russian people and he was one of the country's most widely read writers in the 1920s. Although Zoshchenko never directly attacked the Soviet system, he was not afraid to highlight the problems of bureaucracy, corruption, poor housing and food shortages.
In the 1930s Zoshchenko came under increasing pressure to conform to the idea of socialist realism. As a satirist, Zoshchenko found this difficult, and attempts such as the Story of one Life were not successful.
Zoshchenko increasing got into trouble with the Soviet authorities. His autobiographical, Before Sunrise, was banned in 1943 and three years later his literary career was brought to an end when he was expelled from the Soviet Writers' Union after the publication of The Adventures of a Monkey in the literary magazine, Zvezda.
Mikhail Zoshchenko died in Leningrad on 22nd July, 1958.
(source: spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk)
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
August 19, 2025
Little men and misfits – they want to live happily too and they wish to find their place in the sun as well. Six stories of Sentimental Tales are six little fates both funny and sad…
To any man in the street one’s own platitudinous existence is much dearer than lives of any however great monarchs or any distinguished political leaders…
And to find a little bit of happiness, a little man is capable of becoming cynical, mercantile, selfish and even hard-headed…
And most of all little man wants to love and to be loved…
Men in the street: they are many, they are all around, they are us…
Of course, some assistant or full professor on the state’s gravy train would reply, with unpleasant ease, that man exists in order to further culture and the happiness of the universe. But that’s vague and unclear, and, for the common man, even disgusting. An answer like that gives rise to all sorts of surprising things: why, for example, do beetles or cuckoos exist? They do no good to anyone, least of all to the future of culture. And to what extent is man’s life more important than that of a cuckoo – a bird that could live or not live, without changing the world one bit?
To any man in the street one’s own platitudinous existence is much dearer than lives of any however great monarchs or any distinguished political leaders…
And to find a little bit of happiness, a little man is capable of becoming cynical, mercantile, selfish and even hard-headed…
He would declare – getting a bit worked up – that cynicism was an absolutely necessary and normal quality, that no beast could get along without cynicism and cruelty, and that, in fact, cynicism and cruelty may be the most proper qualities of all, since they secure the right to live. Ivan Ivanovich would also proclaim that he had once been a foolish, sentimental puppy, but that he had now grown up and understood what it cost to live. He had even realized that his former ideals – compassion, generosity, morality – weren’t worth a rusty kopeck and a rotten egg. They were all pathetic trifles belonging to a false, sentimental era.
And most of all little man wants to love and to be loved…
Turning over in his mind the women who had passed through his life – including the deacon’s wife, with whom he had most definitely cavorted (the author is sure of it) – Bylinkin grew convinced that he had found true love and the genuine thrill of emotion only now, in his thirty-second year.
Was Bylinkin merely bloated with vital juices? Or is a person born with a predisposition and penchant for abstract romantic feelings? This remains a mystery of nature.
Men in the street: they are many, they are all around, they are us…
May 9, 2020
Popsugar Reading Challenge 2018 - A book by an author of a different ethnicity than you (25/40)
I received a copy of Sentimental Tales from NetGalley and Columbia University Press in exchange for an honest review.
As its summary states, Sentimental Tales in composed of six stories that convey portraits of small-town characters living Russia during the first decade of the Bolshevik era. All of the stories are delightful in their own way, and a little bittersweet. The author casts a subtle satirical filter on the reality of the era, looking at the life of those that a just a bit different from the rest: dreamers, wanderers, outsiders, in the context of major societal change that shifted the people's understanding of class and social status. Being someone who is wary of Russian literature as it is usually so very bleak I rejoiced in the lightheartedness of this book while still being impressed by its underlying substance. My favorite element of the stories, however, is the narrator; he provides humorous commentary with a delightful touch of self-awareness. This book is both very entertaining and educational, and I would strongly recommend it to anyone, especially if they are fond of satire.
I received a copy of Sentimental Tales from NetGalley and Columbia University Press in exchange for an honest review.
As its summary states, Sentimental Tales in composed of six stories that convey portraits of small-town characters living Russia during the first decade of the Bolshevik era. All of the stories are delightful in their own way, and a little bittersweet. The author casts a subtle satirical filter on the reality of the era, looking at the life of those that a just a bit different from the rest: dreamers, wanderers, outsiders, in the context of major societal change that shifted the people's understanding of class and social status. Being someone who is wary of Russian literature as it is usually so very bleak I rejoiced in the lightheartedness of this book while still being impressed by its underlying substance. My favorite element of the stories, however, is the narrator; he provides humorous commentary with a delightful touch of self-awareness. This book is both very entertaining and educational, and I would strongly recommend it to anyone, especially if they are fond of satire.
November 6, 2024
Voto = ⭐⭐⭐ 1/2
La vita degli scrittori russi in patria, fatte debite eccezioni, non è mai stata facile ed anche Michail Michajlovic Zoshchenko [1894-1958] visse per molti anni appartato e in estrema povertà perché emarginato dal partito comunista sovietico fino alla assegnazione tardiva di una pensione statale pochi mesi prima della sua morte. Eppure negli anni venti e trenta del novecento lo scrittore ebbe grandissima popolarità ma, subito dopo la seconda guerra mondiale, fu stroncato dalla repressione staliniana nei confronti degli intellettuali più amati dal popolo come successe anche alla poetessa Anna Achmatova. I racconti presenti in questa raccolta mostrano tutti una capacità di intrigare e coinvolgere il lettore grazie alla abilità dello scrittore di non essere mai banale e scontato, di cercare nuove vie di dialogo e di pensiero pur rimanendo nella cornice della realtà quotidiana russa del tempo.
La vita degli scrittori russi in patria, fatte debite eccezioni, non è mai stata facile ed anche Michail Michajlovic Zoshchenko [1894-1958] visse per molti anni appartato e in estrema povertà perché emarginato dal partito comunista sovietico fino alla assegnazione tardiva di una pensione statale pochi mesi prima della sua morte. Eppure negli anni venti e trenta del novecento lo scrittore ebbe grandissima popolarità ma, subito dopo la seconda guerra mondiale, fu stroncato dalla repressione staliniana nei confronti degli intellettuali più amati dal popolo come successe anche alla poetessa Anna Achmatova. I racconti presenti in questa raccolta mostrano tutti una capacità di intrigare e coinvolgere il lettore grazie alla abilità dello scrittore di non essere mai banale e scontato, di cercare nuove vie di dialogo e di pensiero pur rimanendo nella cornice della realtà quotidiana russa del tempo.
January 6, 2020
I must admit that I had never heard of Soviet writer Mikhail Zoshchenko (1894-1958) prior to coming across this book on NetGalley. I may be forgiven for this, given the dearth of translation of his works into English. It turns out that Zoshchenko’s short stories made him very popular with the public in the 1920s, but their peculiar brand of humour rendered their politics too ambiguous for the tastes of the regime. He weathered the frowns of the authorities for several years until he was expelled from the Soviet Writers’ Union in 1946 – a blow to his reputation and his health.
Mikhail Zoshchenko’s Sentimental Tales resorts to a technique which had been used by other Russian authors, including Gogol and Pushkin in works such as Tales of Belkin and "A History of the Village of Goryukhino”. In a meta-fictional approach which seems to foreshadow postmodern techniques, the stories are allegedly written by one Kolenkorov, a mediocre writer who strives, with limited success, to conform to the ideals of a “model Soviet artist”. As a result, the narration is deliberately clunky, replete with irrelevant details, overblown metaphors and inconsequential asides. This provides much of the humour, but it also serves as a cover for Zoshchenko. Melodramatic tales of tragic, unrequited love – which otherwise might have been considered too “sentimental” – are camouflaged by this comedic approach. More importantly, the farcical elements allow Zoshchenko to get away with biting social satire.
Such works need a sensitive translator to do them justice – hats off to Boris Dralyuk (who has already shown his mettle in other challenging translations for Penguin, Maclehouse Press and Pushkin Press amongst others). He manages to transpose the particular wit of Zoshchenko into English, making it accessible to us despite the differences in language and culture.
Mikhail Zoshchenko’s Sentimental Tales resorts to a technique which had been used by other Russian authors, including Gogol and Pushkin in works such as Tales of Belkin and "A History of the Village of Goryukhino”. In a meta-fictional approach which seems to foreshadow postmodern techniques, the stories are allegedly written by one Kolenkorov, a mediocre writer who strives, with limited success, to conform to the ideals of a “model Soviet artist”. As a result, the narration is deliberately clunky, replete with irrelevant details, overblown metaphors and inconsequential asides. This provides much of the humour, but it also serves as a cover for Zoshchenko. Melodramatic tales of tragic, unrequited love – which otherwise might have been considered too “sentimental” – are camouflaged by this comedic approach. More importantly, the farcical elements allow Zoshchenko to get away with biting social satire.
Such works need a sensitive translator to do them justice – hats off to Boris Dralyuk (who has already shown his mettle in other challenging translations for Penguin, Maclehouse Press and Pushkin Press amongst others). He manages to transpose the particular wit of Zoshchenko into English, making it accessible to us despite the differences in language and culture.
October 9, 2018
Dark, bitter Russian humour, as thick and bracing as black coffee, is totally my jam. The Russians seem like the literary precursors of most things and such is the case with this collection of six tales: very postmodernist, but originally published in 1929. Through the metafictional device of an author who asserts his own opinions in every story, the actual author Zoshchenko satirises & probes the contradictions of early Bolshevik society. A delight.
May 9, 2018
This book took me by surprise. A set of short stories written in the 1920s by a Russian would typically be dour and reflective covering WWI and/or the Russian revolution. Not this one. It reminds me of a series of Seinfeld episodes with George Costanza appearing at various characters. They all seem to be frustrated in their lives, with varying degrees of success by mostly failings. Their country is in turmoil but the characters focus on mundane, petty issues that are the foundations of most people's lives.
August 7, 2019
This is one of the best things I've read in a long time. I was audibly laughing for so much of it. It is satire from nearly a century ago, yes, but there's just so much richness in Zoshchenko's brutal, tongue in cheek fleecing of such universal absurdities as capitalism, war, the labor economy, French literature and, often, birds. It's simultaneously warm and cold, distant and intimate. And the tales are buried under a veritable onion of attributed and fictional authorships. Absurdity with out surrealism, and so, so funny.
October 19, 2018
Wonderful selection of short stories from this great Russian writer, some biting humour at the expense of the Bolsheviks, I am not sure how he avoided the gulag!
I laughed out loud on the train to work while reading the book.
I laughed out loud on the train to work while reading the book.
September 25, 2020
Gosh, this should be called Depressing Tales NOT Sentimental Tales. But I love depressing tales so this was amazing.
The first two were my favourites.
The first two were my favourites.
March 4, 2019
"He acknowledged that he had no sense of what he ought to have done, of what mistake he had made in his life. And had there really been a mistake ?
Perhaps there hadn’t. Perhaps it was all just life—simple, stark, and
plain—which allows only two or three people out of a thousand to
smile and enjoy themselves."
- from “Apollo and Tamara”
"… just life, plain, simple life, from which only two people out of a thousand ever manage to get back on their feet, while others
just wait it out."
- from “Apollo and Tamara”
"Some people — well, you can tell their whole story, describe their whole life, in ten minutes’ time, from their first senseless cry to their last days on earth."
- from “A Terrible Night”
"Oh, dear reader ! What a terribly uninteresting life we Russian writers lead.
A foreigner can write anything he wants — and it’s water off a duck’s back. He can write about the moon, let loose with sudden fantasy, talk all kinds of nonsense about wild beasts, or even send his hero to the moon in some kind of cannon ball . . .
Nothing will come of it.
But you just try and get away with that here. Try, for example, to send our technician Boris Petrovich Kuritsyn to the moon. They’ll laugh at you. They’ll take offense. Now you’ve gone and done it, they’ll say, you dirty dog ! What a load of bunk ! Impossible !"
- from “A Terrible Night”
"So you’re walking and walking, and everything seems so damned bad, so damned rotten that you’re just about ready to hang yourself on the first street lamp you see, if it’s lit.
And suddenly — a window.
The light in it is red or pink. It’s got curtains, too. So now you stand there, staring at this window from afar, and feel all your petty worries and concerns leaving you, and a smile spreads across your face."
- from “A Merry Adventure”
Perhaps there hadn’t. Perhaps it was all just life—simple, stark, and
plain—which allows only two or three people out of a thousand to
smile and enjoy themselves."
- from “Apollo and Tamara”
"… just life, plain, simple life, from which only two people out of a thousand ever manage to get back on their feet, while others
just wait it out."
- from “Apollo and Tamara”
"Some people — well, you can tell their whole story, describe their whole life, in ten minutes’ time, from their first senseless cry to their last days on earth."
- from “A Terrible Night”
"Oh, dear reader ! What a terribly uninteresting life we Russian writers lead.
A foreigner can write anything he wants — and it’s water off a duck’s back. He can write about the moon, let loose with sudden fantasy, talk all kinds of nonsense about wild beasts, or even send his hero to the moon in some kind of cannon ball . . .
Nothing will come of it.
But you just try and get away with that here. Try, for example, to send our technician Boris Petrovich Kuritsyn to the moon. They’ll laugh at you. They’ll take offense. Now you’ve gone and done it, they’ll say, you dirty dog ! What a load of bunk ! Impossible !"
- from “A Terrible Night”
"So you’re walking and walking, and everything seems so damned bad, so damned rotten that you’re just about ready to hang yourself on the first street lamp you see, if it’s lit.
And suddenly — a window.
The light in it is red or pink. It’s got curtains, too. So now you stand there, staring at this window from afar, and feel all your petty worries and concerns leaving you, and a smile spreads across your face."
- from “A Merry Adventure”
May 16, 2022
Kind of sums it up:
"He rubbed his hands vigorously and patted himself on the back in his mind, saying: 'Don't you worry, brother Volodin - seems like life's beginning to smile at you too.' But that smile - well, it wasn't so very good-natured." (p.180)
"He rubbed his hands vigorously and patted himself on the back in his mind, saying: 'Don't you worry, brother Volodin - seems like life's beginning to smile at you too.' But that smile - well, it wasn't so very good-natured." (p.180)
July 6, 2018
This collection of 6 short stories by Soviet author Zoshchenko is an excellent introduction to his work, as well as a delight for anyone already familiar with his writing. Written between 1923 and 1936, they are deceptively simple in style, and deal with the ordinary Soviet man and his everyday struggles in the early years of the new Soviet Union. Satirical in tone, they are never overtly political or critical of the regime but they often seem to have a hidden agenda behind their apparent innocence. Zoshchenko’s protagonists are often simple people commenting on the new world around them and we can read between the lines about what the actual situation is. The humour is usually gentle and I feel that they have more heart to them than some Russian satirical writing. They are playful but with an underlying seriousness, often having a sly dig at the many absurdities that were all too familiar in Soviet society. Due to the ambiguity in his stories he managed to survive unscathed in an increasingly repressive literary atmosphere and was very popular. He served in the war but in 1946 Stalin began to feel that his writing was potentially dangerous and (along with Akhmatova) he was expelled from the Writers’ Union. From being critically acclaimed he was now an outcast. He was reinstated after Stalin’s death in 1953 but died not long after. There’s a helpful introduction to the book, and it is to be hoped that with the publication of this collection Zoshchenko will be discovered by a new readership.
April 8, 2022
Divertente, ironico, pieno di personaggi originali e di nozioni sull'URSS nascosti dietro racconti rapidi come un soffio, come un sorriso.
August 28, 2018
These stories, whose narrative device is that they are written by an incompetent writer (his attempts at "artistic description" are hilariously painful), are about romances between somewhat seedy and self-interested characters. From the guy who splits with his fiancee over her mom's chest of drawers to the thuggish, acid-throwing "brother of mercy" (nurse), almost none of the characters are people you'd want to meet/put up with, but the hilarious narrative voice keeps the stories moving fast. Also check out 1917: Stories and Poems from the Russian Revolution (edited by the translator of these stories, Boris Dralyuk) for some more direct political commentary by Zoshchenko.
March 17, 2019
Not exactly what I expected, but it won me over.
I had read a couple of late Zoshchenko stories including the one that got him in trouble in the late Forties. That had an urban setting.
These stories take place in small cities and show people trying to cope with social upheaval. The narrator is a delight, and while you realize that these stories are about people coping with huge loss and turmoil, Zoshchenko has found the right voice and distance from the characters to make the mishaps he describes funny.
This book is frequently laugh-out-loud funny. A splendid introduction to Zoshchenko.
I had read a couple of late Zoshchenko stories including the one that got him in trouble in the late Forties. That had an urban setting.
These stories take place in small cities and show people trying to cope with social upheaval. The narrator is a delight, and while you realize that these stories are about people coping with huge loss and turmoil, Zoshchenko has found the right voice and distance from the characters to make the mishaps he describes funny.
This book is frequently laugh-out-loud funny. A splendid introduction to Zoshchenko.
May 12, 2020
Mikhail Zoshchenko is one of the few people who can write pretending to be another person and make it funny. These tales offer a tragic and humorous window into the early years of Soviet Russia. Zoshchenko truly was one of the best satirists Russian or otherwise.
April 15, 2022
A nice selection of stories from this restrained but wonderfully funny and immensely popular Soviet satirist.
February 17, 2019
Today is your lucky day, as it’s the day you find out about your next favorite Russian author of black humor. Imagine Norm MacDonald was Russian and lived in the 1920s-1930s. I loved this book of bizarre short stories very much. Adding to the good feelings, it’s also an easy, breezy read, especially compared to other Russians. Highly recommended.
Read
October 24, 2024Dark humor, Russian style, about befuddled men trying to survive in early years of communist Russian. The stories are funny and sad, and the translation by Boris Dralyuk brings the writing to life.
June 2, 2019
This is definitely one of the freshest, most delightful, most brilliantly translated books published in the past decade.
Read
November 30, 2022A bunch of stories about slovenly late 20's men failing to get gf's or ruining their relationships with their gf's. Ostensibly this is a damning indictment of Soviet bureaucracy. I don't get that. It's very funny and charming though.
April 29, 2018
Having enjoyed and endured some books in this series before now, in equal measure, it's a relief to say this is one of the better ones – indeed, that perhaps it should have been presented earlier, as a calling-card. The first tale is light in its archness, and conveys the woes of a man who doesn't get what (who) he wants out of life. The narrator points out that only three in a thousand people survive life enjoyably – but the point is that it's not delivered with the attitude to unhappiness you normally associate with Soviet literature. You don't get the typical bleakness second time out, either, but have laughs more associated with Chekhov's shorts, as a man gets cuckolded because of his attitude to education and careers. The fourth story shows how mundanity can ruin a relationship that seems nailed on, while mundane is the description of the career in the third tale's hero's life – and the fact that it takes a tramp to wake him up to that truth is very much the point. Mundane is also the reason why a bloke in the fifth tale struggles with affording a date. It only seems to be the last tale that can actually present two people in a happy marriage, both getting at least something they sought.
All is delivered in a breezy style, that could even be called quite meta, were that term not coming to the party fifty years after these six stories. There's a line in here somewhere that says "Later, something a bit more fun might turn up". That potentially does not apply to this book, which is really worth reading. It's well presented, with decent notes and (spoiler-free!) introductory essay; the pieces themselves are literate and say things about Soviet life, and the social changes wrought as a result of the Revolution, but are also plain enjoyable. Four and a half stars.
All is delivered in a breezy style, that could even be called quite meta, were that term not coming to the party fifty years after these six stories. There's a line in here somewhere that says "Later, something a bit more fun might turn up". That potentially does not apply to this book, which is really worth reading. It's well presented, with decent notes and (spoiler-free!) introductory essay; the pieces themselves are literate and say things about Soviet life, and the social changes wrought as a result of the Revolution, but are also plain enjoyable. Four and a half stars.
August 1, 2018
SENTIMENTAL TALES is a collection of six short stories by Mikhail Zoshchenko, a popular satirist in Russia in the 1920s. The copy I was lucky enough to be granted access to was translated by Boris Drayluk.
Zoshchenko was, as stated above, a satirist. He wrote in the earliest decades of the USSR and his stories are colored by what he experienced during World War I and the revolutions that transformed Russia from a tsarist state into the most powerful Communist nation in the world. They are a commentary on life in those early years, and it’s rather shocking that Zoshchenko did not end up the dead at the hands of the state because the commentaries and depictions are neither flattering nor kind.
The first story in SENTIMENTAL TALES is called “Apollo and Tamara.” Apollo Semyonovich Perepenchuko played the piano and loved a girl named Tamara. Tamara wanted to love someone famous, which Apollo was not. Yet, he said. Apollo went to war and survived. More or less. He came back for her but Tamara still didn’t want him. He tried to kill himself but someone saved him. Sort of. He died awhile later. So did Tamara. (3/5 stars)
“People” is the second story in the collection. The first parts of Zoshchenko’s stories seem to have the theme that the ‘author’ gives a third-person account of the author’s own actions, and it’s definitely a theme that works very well. It comes across as unique and interesting, making it almost a sort of self-insert story. Anyway, in “People” Ivan is so naive, which seems to be a theme with Zoshchenko. A reader can’t help but feel for him, which means he’s probably supposed to represent the lower classes
of the larger USSR. (5/5 stars)
“A Very Bad Night” is the third, and slightly unremarkable story. My notes after I read it indicate that I wasn’t even sure this is the title. But it’s about Boris, who plays the triangle in an orchestra. It’s not a lucrative career in the best of times, and far less so in the early years of the USSR. Boris’ wife is not a fan of his poverty, never has been, and Boris spends most of the story panicking about money. And his wife. (3/5 stars)
And then we have “What The Nightingale Sang” which is, in total honesty, one of the best short stories I’ve ever read and one of the best things I’ve read this year. I haven’t laughed at a story like this in a very long time! The author’s commentary on his actions in the beginning and at the end of the story fit modern times as well as when the story was written. It is the story of Vasily and Lizochka, and it is perfectly cliched and adorable in the way it looks at Love in any time and at any place. (5/5 stars)
The fifth story in the collection is called “A Merry Adventure” and is the story of Sergei, a typical bumbling fool. Sergei is constantly scrabbling for money because he is so eager to please certain people, like pretty girls who want him to take them to the pictures. He is willing to take advantage of a dying aunt to please this girl. It seems as this story is an allegory of Communism and the USSR, in which the weak are manipulated to please the strong. (4/5 stars)
And the final story in the collection, “Lilacs in Bloom,” is about Volodin, who is a beautiful man who wants nothing more than to be adored by the most beautiful ladies in town. The catch is that Volodin is married, and his brother-in-law finds out about his affairs and hatches a plan to splash acid on his nose to make him less beautiful, or to have his wife do it. She misses and Volodin takes that as permission to carry on, especially when his brother-in-law quickly admits defeat. (3/5 stars)
(I received a copy of SENTIMENTAL TALES from NetGalley and Columbia University Press in exchange for an honest and original review. All thoughts are my own.)
Zoshchenko was, as stated above, a satirist. He wrote in the earliest decades of the USSR and his stories are colored by what he experienced during World War I and the revolutions that transformed Russia from a tsarist state into the most powerful Communist nation in the world. They are a commentary on life in those early years, and it’s rather shocking that Zoshchenko did not end up the dead at the hands of the state because the commentaries and depictions are neither flattering nor kind.
The first story in SENTIMENTAL TALES is called “Apollo and Tamara.” Apollo Semyonovich Perepenchuko played the piano and loved a girl named Tamara. Tamara wanted to love someone famous, which Apollo was not. Yet, he said. Apollo went to war and survived. More or less. He came back for her but Tamara still didn’t want him. He tried to kill himself but someone saved him. Sort of. He died awhile later. So did Tamara. (3/5 stars)
“People” is the second story in the collection. The first parts of Zoshchenko’s stories seem to have the theme that the ‘author’ gives a third-person account of the author’s own actions, and it’s definitely a theme that works very well. It comes across as unique and interesting, making it almost a sort of self-insert story. Anyway, in “People” Ivan is so naive, which seems to be a theme with Zoshchenko. A reader can’t help but feel for him, which means he’s probably supposed to represent the lower classes
of the larger USSR. (5/5 stars)
“A Very Bad Night” is the third, and slightly unremarkable story. My notes after I read it indicate that I wasn’t even sure this is the title. But it’s about Boris, who plays the triangle in an orchestra. It’s not a lucrative career in the best of times, and far less so in the early years of the USSR. Boris’ wife is not a fan of his poverty, never has been, and Boris spends most of the story panicking about money. And his wife. (3/5 stars)
And then we have “What The Nightingale Sang” which is, in total honesty, one of the best short stories I’ve ever read and one of the best things I’ve read this year. I haven’t laughed at a story like this in a very long time! The author’s commentary on his actions in the beginning and at the end of the story fit modern times as well as when the story was written. It is the story of Vasily and Lizochka, and it is perfectly cliched and adorable in the way it looks at Love in any time and at any place. (5/5 stars)
The fifth story in the collection is called “A Merry Adventure” and is the story of Sergei, a typical bumbling fool. Sergei is constantly scrabbling for money because he is so eager to please certain people, like pretty girls who want him to take them to the pictures. He is willing to take advantage of a dying aunt to please this girl. It seems as this story is an allegory of Communism and the USSR, in which the weak are manipulated to please the strong. (4/5 stars)
And the final story in the collection, “Lilacs in Bloom,” is about Volodin, who is a beautiful man who wants nothing more than to be adored by the most beautiful ladies in town. The catch is that Volodin is married, and his brother-in-law finds out about his affairs and hatches a plan to splash acid on his nose to make him less beautiful, or to have his wife do it. She misses and Volodin takes that as permission to carry on, especially when his brother-in-law quickly admits defeat. (3/5 stars)
(I received a copy of SENTIMENTAL TALES from NetGalley and Columbia University Press in exchange for an honest and original review. All thoughts are my own.)
April 17, 2021
Zoshenko scrive dei racconti divertentissimi prendendo spunto dalle peculiarità più buffe che scorge nella società russa, appena diventata comunista: un uomo si infervora quando viene cacciato da un ristorante elegante perché in tuta da lavoro e minaccia “Adesso vado dai commissari del popolo a lamentarmi delle vostre azioni” salvo scoprire che il motivo dell’allontanamento era la sua ubriachezza manifesta – aveva vomitato sulla scala; una fabbrica va a fuoco ma essendo di proprietà privata i pompieri restano a guardarla bruciare e quelli che li incitano ad intervenire sono accusati di trasgredire “la linea politica di classe”.
Altri simpatici leitmotiv travalicano invece i confini nazionali: Z scherza sulle trafile burocratiche e sulle mazzette che le oliano, sui malati nelle sale d’attesa che fanno a gara a chi sta peggio, sulla difficoltà di affittare casa a buon prezzo, sulle raccomandazioni necessarie a trovare un impiego.
I miei racconti preferiti sono “L’aristocratica” (un giovanotto porta al teatro la ragazza su cui vuol far colpo ma ha pochi soldi in tasca e al terzo pasticcino preso dall'ambulante le toglie il dolce di bocca), “Occhi Malinconici” (un uomo si innamora della malinconia che traspare dagli occhi della sua bella ma la vacuità dietro cui pensa si celino profondi pensieri è solo tisi), “Fiuto da cani” e un racconto in cui un uomo, caduto in mare dopo un bombardamento nemico, si aggrappa ad una grossa mina galleggiante credendola una boa (non sa nuotare).
Addirittura mi ha fatto sorridere la cronostoria presentata in questo volume! Sembra importante riportare il tentativo di suicidio di Zoshenko da liceale per via di un brutto voto e l’anno esatto in cui ha sostenuto l’esame per diventare istruttore negli allevamenti di polli e conigli!
Tutte queste informazioni sull'autore si aggiungono al raccontino in cui lo stesso Z parla di sé (“Io, l’ideologia e qualcos’altro”).
Altri simpatici leitmotiv travalicano invece i confini nazionali: Z scherza sulle trafile burocratiche e sulle mazzette che le oliano, sui malati nelle sale d’attesa che fanno a gara a chi sta peggio, sulla difficoltà di affittare casa a buon prezzo, sulle raccomandazioni necessarie a trovare un impiego.
I miei racconti preferiti sono “L’aristocratica” (un giovanotto porta al teatro la ragazza su cui vuol far colpo ma ha pochi soldi in tasca e al terzo pasticcino preso dall'ambulante le toglie il dolce di bocca), “Occhi Malinconici” (un uomo si innamora della malinconia che traspare dagli occhi della sua bella ma la vacuità dietro cui pensa si celino profondi pensieri è solo tisi), “Fiuto da cani” e un racconto in cui un uomo, caduto in mare dopo un bombardamento nemico, si aggrappa ad una grossa mina galleggiante credendola una boa (non sa nuotare).
Addirittura mi ha fatto sorridere la cronostoria presentata in questo volume! Sembra importante riportare il tentativo di suicidio di Zoshenko da liceale per via di un brutto voto e l’anno esatto in cui ha sostenuto l’esame per diventare istruttore negli allevamenti di polli e conigli!
Tutte queste informazioni sull'autore si aggiungono al raccontino in cui lo stesso Z parla di sé (“Io, l’ideologia e qualcos’altro”).
October 2, 2018
This prime virtue of this book is its hilarious voice. The somewhat-priggish narrator is constantly arguing with himself, doubling back, making assumptions, and telling you all about the stories he _isn't_ writing (it's a little like Tristram Shandy in this way). However, this voice is also the prime drawback. At times I got tired of the voice and just wanted to get to the story! One of the stories I skipped because it seemed all voice and no events. After awhile I got the sense of the narrator's outlook and of what the collection had to offer, and I became less interested in the individual stories.
Problematically, the first story is by far the best! So that if you read to the end, you'll always be expecting that flash of humanity--the flash of something deeper beneath the satire--that never comes. He's clearly strongly influenced by Tolstoy, and many of the stories feel a little like the Death of Ivan Ilyich or like War and Peace (he has exactly that same sort of authoritative, all-encompassing voice), but sometimes I felt like the moral force was lacking.
Of course, partly this was due to the era. He wrote and published many of these stories during the terror of the 1930s, and he not only survived, he was at times rewarded! It's exactly this ambiguity about where he stands that makes the stories so intriguing. Definitely worth the time of any lover of Russian literature.
Problematically, the first story is by far the best! So that if you read to the end, you'll always be expecting that flash of humanity--the flash of something deeper beneath the satire--that never comes. He's clearly strongly influenced by Tolstoy, and many of the stories feel a little like the Death of Ivan Ilyich or like War and Peace (he has exactly that same sort of authoritative, all-encompassing voice), but sometimes I felt like the moral force was lacking.
Of course, partly this was due to the era. He wrote and published many of these stories during the terror of the 1930s, and he not only survived, he was at times rewarded! It's exactly this ambiguity about where he stands that makes the stories so intriguing. Definitely worth the time of any lover of Russian literature.
August 17, 2024
I am a staunch advocate of New Historicism. This school of thought argues that, in order to understand a text, one has to understand its social, historical, and cultural contexts. I don’t think this has ever been more true than when I read Sentimental Tales, a short story collection by Mikhail Zoshchenko and translated by Boris Dralyuk. This strange and blackly funny collection is written from the perspective of a frustrated writer who doesn’t know how to tell a story that will please himself, his potential readers, and the Soviet Writers’ Union...
Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley, for review consideration.
Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley, for review consideration.
March 19, 2018
I love this kind of writing. The narrator shares his views before divulging the story and it gave me a feel of being a bystander and also taking part in the stories. The narrator is unapologetic as he reveals the human condition from Apollo, Tamara, Ivan and the stories each reflect what people live for, how they go about achieving their goals and the frustrations that come with it in a country that's on the verge of losing itself. I requested to read this book off NetGalley and there's no ebook, on my device that I've highlighted ad much as this one. It's thought provoking.
May 9, 2021
Light hearted fun , and how many Russians classics can you say that of?
December 10, 2022
Amusing and wry! Subtly subversive tales from the 20s.
July 7, 2019
Funny and bleak at once. The author's self-deprecating depiction of himself (a fictional version of himself, that is) within the stories adds immensely to their charm and wit. It feels as if he's playing a kind of hide-and-seek game with the cultural establishment, but that doesn't weigh down the writing in the least; the stories stand on their own, and are only made stronger by considering their historical context. I didn't (and couldn't) read the original Russian, but it's self-evident that the English language translation by Boris Dralyuk is, as one critic quoted on the back cover states, "a real tour de force."
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