frell, it's cold out there.

[lyssie]

*shudders and hides under a blanket* 9 degrees f, feels like -4. Gee, ya think?

Also, I was having the weirdest dream this morning--teacher trying to freak his 12 or so students out in his one-room schoolhouse was going on about ghosts, myths and legends of the valley they were living in. Out the window on the porch was standing this blonde woman, surrounded by fog. Kids were trying to get his attention, but he was ignoring them, and then he turned around and scared himself when he saw her. Luckily, not a ghost. He'd had her come down to read to his kiddies!

So, she came in and read Alize of Green Gables to the kids, starting in the middle. And mocked the American girl for her accent.

Then nique woke me up to drive her to work.

So, guys, I could use some suggestions. My mom wants 'books by Russian novelists'. I know she likes Victor Hugo/Les Mis, but I know nothing about Russian novelists. So, um. Anyone got any suggestions/recs?

(srsly, my mother and I are the worst people to shop for. sigh)

Comments

[aj.livejournal.com]

Anna Karinninna! (Or however you spell it.) Anything Chekov will probably work. Lord, Russian authors depress me more than Victorian-era British authors, and that's saying a bloody lot.

Also, ahahaha, 19 here and feels like 9. I love walking to work.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

Modern or classic? I think Pushkin and Doestoyevsky are some of the more classic ones. Boris Pasternak and Mikhail Bulgakov are sort of early 20th century. (Pasternak wrote Dr. Zhivago, and Bulgakov wrote The Master and Margarita.)

(Also Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Russian_novelists) can help.)

[maddeinin.livejournal.com]

I would second The Master and Margarita, definitely, and also Anna Karenina.

[trinalin.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed the Flying Karamazov Brothers. Oh yeah, and the book, the Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky.

[kiri-l.livejournal.com]

Depends on what you are looking for and from what era. Poetry? Prose? radical thought/writings? Philosophical? (again dependent upon the era). There is some truly amazing stuff to choose from. I've had a chance to read some of the much less well known writers here in the wet [it has been raining a lot *ahem*] west. - and I think they 're much more interesting than those already named, however it is a personal preference.

Some of the Writings written "in secret" (cause I can't recall the correct term right now) or those writers who were in exile, and so forth during the Soviet years are just stunning. Your mom might be interested in those.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

What kind of novels and novelists? Because I am Russian so could go on for pages here.

[lyssie.livejournal.com]

Les Mis/Anna Karenina are good starts. My mother likes classics, too.

[desert-vixen.livejournal.com]

This is pretty good, IMO:

http://www.amazon.com/Forty-Stories-Anton-Chekhov/dp/0679733752/
ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1197140654&sr=8-2

It's some of Chekov's short stories.

DV

[daisycm83.livejournal.com]

I hate all things Tolstoty - a hatred prompted by Anna K. But Chekov's short stories are fabulous, and short enough that they don't have the whole "I want to jump in front of a train to get rid of this book" thing. "Considering Love" (sometimes translated as simply "On Love") is particularly good.

[quietlybemused.livejournal.com]

That is cold. Brrrr.