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lobelia321 I last read this in the 1970s, lauded and loaned by my grandmother, and it is as phenomenal as it was then. It's been haunting my memory on and off and finally I got around to re-reading. <cut> I don't think I have ever read a book that ratchets up the suspense in such a brilliant, understated, foreshadowing, backshadowing, sideshadowing way. The premise is genius: an anarchist insinuates himself into an haut-bourgeois household in Russia sometime before 1910 with the view to [spoiler -- you must read it!]. The anarchist / revolutionary is on principle opposed to everything the bourgeois class stands for but is at the same time drawn into / bewitched by the family's cosmopolitan charm, refined and cultured beauty, and easy-going affection. The individuals are brilliantly drawn; all are told through letters (this is the best epistolary novella I have ever read) and each voice is unique, vivid, complex. This is a miracle of a book, and the ending... omg, the ending. [I am not spoilering! Go and read it!]
To me, a huge extra pleasure derives from Ricarda Huch's wonderful prose in German. I am moderately allergic to 21st-century anglo-ified German and relish, indeed wallow, in the German style of yore. I was in Konjunktiv-heaven in sentences such as the following (both Konjunktiv 1 and 2): "...sei es num, weil keine Gefahr vorhanden sei oder weil ich nicht dafür einstehen könnte, daß ich sie abzuwenden imstande wäre.'
Other wonderful sentences (among a cornucopia of such): 'denn auch der Herrscher ist gebunden, nicht nur der Beherrschte." (not only politically profound but also narratively poignant) Something like 'for the ruler / dominator is bound, not only the ruled / dominated'.
The mother does not want politics to be talked about: "...überhaupt sollte man sie mit politischen Dingen, von denen die Frauen doch ausgeschlossen wären, in Ruhe lassen. Warum sollte sie sich ein Urteil bilden, das sie doch nicht geltend machen könnte?" So before we have a chance to condemn the woman of the house for being uninterested in politics, we get a subtle authorial intervention as to the justified reason; this is, after all, a time of women's rights lobbyists agitating for women's suffrage (their struggles bore fruit when German women got the vote in 1919; Russian women in 1917). Because why indeed should a woman form a political judgement if she couldn't act on it, anyway?
Very interesting historical detail about buying an 'Automobil' and wondering whether one with petrol or one with electricity would be cheaper. And this in 1910! Who knew! (Not I.)
A sample of the beautifully nuanced and occasionally metaphorically effusive (justified by the individual letter writer's temperament) characterisation: "...er ist wie ein schöner Dolch mit kunstvollem Griff und einer mit Edelsteinen buntgeschmückten Scheide, wie sie zuweilen in Museen ausgestellt sind; Lju ist wie de schlichte Bogen des Apollo, der nie fehlende Pfeile entsendet." (something like: '...he s like a handsome dagger with artful handle and a sheath decorated with colourful gems as is sometimes exhibited in museums; Lju is like the simple bow of Apollo that sends out unerring arrows")
A beautiful and resonant Chekhovian novella that gains additional poignancy for us now, knowing that war and communist revolution were to come four and seven years after publication.
This German version of 1910 is available for free via the Gutenberg Project.
To me, a huge extra pleasure derives from Ricarda Huch's wonderful prose in German. I am moderately allergic to 21st-century anglo-ified German and relish, indeed wallow, in the German style of yore. I was in Konjunktiv-heaven in sentences such as the following (both Konjunktiv 1 and 2): "...sei es num, weil keine Gefahr vorhanden sei oder weil ich nicht dafür einstehen könnte, daß ich sie abzuwenden imstande wäre.'
Other wonderful sentences (among a cornucopia of such): 'denn auch der Herrscher ist gebunden, nicht nur der Beherrschte." (not only politically profound but also narratively poignant) Something like 'for the ruler / dominator is bound, not only the ruled / dominated'.
The mother does not want politics to be talked about: "...überhaupt sollte man sie mit politischen Dingen, von denen die Frauen doch ausgeschlossen wären, in Ruhe lassen. Warum sollte sie sich ein Urteil bilden, das sie doch nicht geltend machen könnte?" So before we have a chance to condemn the woman of the house for being uninterested in politics, we get a subtle authorial intervention as to the justified reason; this is, after all, a time of women's rights lobbyists agitating for women's suffrage (their struggles bore fruit when German women got the vote in 1919; Russian women in 1917). Because why indeed should a woman form a political judgement if she couldn't act on it, anyway?
Very interesting historical detail about buying an 'Automobil' and wondering whether one with petrol or one with electricity would be cheaper. And this in 1910! Who knew! (Not I.)
A sample of the beautifully nuanced and occasionally metaphorically effusive (justified by the individual letter writer's temperament) characterisation: "...er ist wie ein schöner Dolch mit kunstvollem Griff und einer mit Edelsteinen buntgeschmückten Scheide, wie sie zuweilen in Museen ausgestellt sind; Lju ist wie de schlichte Bogen des Apollo, der nie fehlende Pfeile entsendet." (something like: '...he s like a handsome dagger with artful handle and a sheath decorated with colourful gems as is sometimes exhibited in museums; Lju is like the simple bow of Apollo that sends out unerring arrows")
A beautiful and resonant Chekhovian novella that gains additional poignancy for us now, knowing that war and communist revolution were to come four and seven years after publication.
This German version of 1910 is available for free via the Gutenberg Project.