[H4F]≫ PDF Free The Golovlyov Family New York Review Books Classics Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Natalie Duddington James Wood Natalie Duddington James Wood Books

The Golovlyov Family New York Review Books Classics Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Natalie Duddington James Wood Natalie Duddington James Wood Books

Download As PDF : The Golovlyov Family New York Review Books Classics Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Natalie Duddington James Wood Natalie Duddington James Wood Books

The Golovlyov Family New York Review Books Classics Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Natalie Duddington James Wood Natalie Duddington James Wood Books

Shchedrin is often listed as the greatest Russian satirist and this novel as the gloomiest of the 19th century. Gloomy it certainly is; a satire it certainly is not. Shchedrin had published several of the novel's episodes before connecting them into this longer format. The seams clearly show. The world he describes is that of Russia's small landowners who, "having no work, no connection with public life, and no political importance" (p. 321) are a class in sad decline, living in an "emotional and spiritual wasteland" (as the back cover of the book informs us). This decline is portrayed--in greatly varying detail and with greatly varying success--in the histories of nine members of the Golovlyov family. Only two figures gain any real profile: the strong-willed matriarch and her second son, Porphyry. His character is Shchedrin's greatest accomplishment. Porphyry, a meek, oily, bigoted, and cold-blooded egoist is memorable for the endless stream of religious and moralistic drivel he is able to release to inveigle everyone in his family. These unstoppable outpourings in the end overpower their own speaker as he rants on even after nobody is there to listen to them anymore. One could argue that the novel is worth reading simply for the sake of this truly remarkable creation. Critics (even James Wood in his overly clever introduction to the novel) have called his character a study in hypocrisy. But Shchedrin rejects this (pp 129-130). Hypocrisy, so Shchedrin in an astute observation, demands a society of firmly established moral principles for the hypocrite to imitate. It is precisely the absence of such firm moral values that is the chief focus of Shchedrin's critique. -- For the rest, the book is not very notable. There are the well-rehearsed and by now rather dated stories of Russian drunkenness, tuberculosis, embezzlement, of harrowing death-bed scenes and suicides. At the end--so far sex made only brief appearances as a furtive necessity--we are even treated to a sensationalized and sentimentalized account of the descent of two Golovlyov girls from the life of provincial actresses into barely disguised prostitution. (Warnings about not losing one's maidenly "treasure" are of course freely dispensed.) There is much that seems tagged on, not properly developed, not even properly motivated. The Russian literature of the 19th century produced a miraculous array of masterpieces (by Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy etc). It is of course hard for Shechedrin to compete in this arena. You might prefer to turn towards these giants (to read or re-read them) before you venture to try the Golovlyovs and their rather mixed bag of family dramas.


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The Golovlyov Family New York Review Books Classics Shchedrin Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov Natalie Duddington James Wood Natalie Duddington James Wood Books Reviews

This novel must surely qualify as the darkest, most mordant comic novel ever written. It is the ultimate "Russian" novel, as we anglophones think of 'em, and it leaves no stone unturned. The description of an alcoholic's progress alone would make the Consul in Under The Volcano wince and Schedrin's deadpan playing out of every possible variation upon human greed, loathing, hatred, jealousy and utter boredom is virtuosic. Best read in a remote rural setting in the depths of winter. Should be required reading for all devotees of the windbag novels of Dostoevesky, Tolstoy, Lermontov, etc etc
I just finished reading THE GOLOVLOV FAMILY and am still reeling from it. That anyone could read this novel and not feel utterly gripped by it is beyond me. On the back cover the publishers felt the need to compare this masterpiece to Faulkner and Marquez, but I think Balzac is much closer in spirit Balzac channeled through a Russian soul. The plotline involving Annika, though crushing, is embued with a haunting rapturousness. Such a shock to read a book as long neglected as this one (in the US, at least) and find a character so compellingly alive.
Shchedrin is often listed as the greatest Russian satirist and this novel as the gloomiest of the 19th century. Gloomy it certainly is; a satire it certainly is not. Shchedrin had published several of the novel's episodes before connecting them into this longer format. The seams clearly show. The world he describes is that of Russia's small landowners who, "having no work, no connection with public life, and no political importance" (p. 321) are a class in sad decline, living in an "emotional and spiritual wasteland" (as the back cover of the book informs us). This decline is portrayed--in greatly varying detail and with greatly varying success--in the histories of nine members of the Golovlyov family. Only two figures gain any real profile the strong-willed matriarch and her second son, Porphyry. His character is Shchedrin's greatest accomplishment. Porphyry, a meek, oily, bigoted, and cold-blooded egoist is memorable for the endless stream of religious and moralistic drivel he is able to release to inveigle everyone in his family. These unstoppable outpourings in the end overpower their own speaker as he rants on even after nobody is there to listen to them anymore. One could argue that the novel is worth reading simply for the sake of this truly remarkable creation. Critics (even James Wood in his overly clever introduction to the novel) have called his character a study in hypocrisy. But Shchedrin rejects this (pp 129-130). Hypocrisy, so Shchedrin in an astute observation, demands a society of firmly established moral principles for the hypocrite to imitate. It is precisely the absence of such firm moral values that is the chief focus of Shchedrin's critique. -- For the rest, the book is not very notable. There are the well-rehearsed and by now rather dated stories of Russian drunkenness, tuberculosis, embezzlement, of harrowing death-bed scenes and suicides. At the end--so far sex made only brief appearances as a furtive necessity--we are even treated to a sensationalized and sentimentalized account of the descent of two Golovlyov girls from the life of provincial actresses into barely disguised prostitution. (Warnings about not losing one's maidenly "treasure" are of course freely dispensed.) There is much that seems tagged on, not properly developed, not even properly motivated. The Russian literature of the 19th century produced a miraculous array of masterpieces (by Pushkin, Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy etc). It is of course hard for Shechedrin to compete in this arena. You might prefer to turn towards these giants (to read or re-read them) before you venture to try the Golovlyovs and their rather mixed bag of family dramas.