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Collected Stories
"The Gentleman from San Francisco" is easily the best known of Ivan Bunin's stories and has achieved the stature of a masterpiece. But Bunin's other stories and novellas are not to be missed. Over the last several years a great many of them have been freshly and brilliantly translated by Graham Hettlinger. Together, along with four new pieces, they are now published in a one-volume paperback collection of Bunin's greatest writings. In Mr. Hettlinger's renderings readers will see why Bunin was regarded by many of his contemporaries as the rightful successor to Tolstoy and Chekhov as a master of Russian letters.
398 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1978
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About the author
Ivan Bunin
478books310followersIvan Alekseyevich Bunin (Russian: Иван Алексеевич Бунин) was the first Russian writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. He was noted for the strict artistry with which he carried on the classical Russian traditions in the writing of prose and poetry. The texture of his poems and stories, sometimes referred to as "Bunin brocade", is considered to be one of the richest in the language.
Best known for his short novels The Village (1910) and Dry Valley (1912), his autobiographical novel The Life of Arseniev (1933, 1939), the book of short stories Dark Avenues (1946) and his 1917�1918 diary ( Cursed Days, 1926), Bunin was a revered figure among anti-communist White emigres, European critics, and many of his fellow writers, who viewed him as a true heir to the tradition of realism in Russian literature established by Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov.
He died November 8, 1953 in Paris.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
July 24, 2022
مجموعة قصص للكاتب إيفان بونين أول كاتب روسي يحصل على جائزة نوبل عام 1933
قصص تُصور معالم زمن قديم وتعرض مشاهد من الحياة الروسية في بدايات القرن العشرين
ينتقل بونين بين الريف والمدن والناس .. حياة الفلاحين والعمال وحياة النبلاء ومُلّاك الأراضي
سرد يُخيم عليه شيء من الكآبة والأسى والأسلوب تفصيلي مع وصف دقيق وخاصة للطبيعة
قصص تُصور معالم زمن قديم وتعرض مشاهد من الحياة الروسية في بدايات القرن العشرين
ينتقل بونين بين الريف والمدن والناس .. حياة الفلاحين والعمال وحياة النبلاء ومُلّاك الأراضي
سرد يُخيم عليه شيء من الكآبة والأسى والأسلوب تفصيلي مع وصف دقيق وخاصة للطبيعة
August 25, 2015
Five stars!
If Chekhov had lived longer, would he have written short stories like these? Would he have left Russia after the revolution? To me, he is the greatest russian short story writer, and possibly the greatest ever, but after reading these stories (and a novella), I might have to position Bunin alongside Chekhov, right at the very top, as one of the best.
The stories range from the first decade of the century to the 1940s, you can almost feel all the events that occurred in Russia and Europe through them. The earlier ones feel very much like what someone from the same generation (or the one afterwards) as Chekhov, Andreyev and Gorky would write, they range from more "traditional" themes like decaying rural estates, muzhiki, love and so on. The ones after the revolution and his emigration take on a more "international" feeling while still being very russian, they feature Paris, emigres, recollections of the wars, etc.
One last thing, his prose is very poetic, even in translation, something Chekhov's doesn't have. I guess it comes from also being a poet.
" And you don't want to hurry - it's lovely in those open fields on a cool and sunny day! You can see far into the distance across the level plains. The sky is light-a deep, expansive blue. Carts and carriages have smoothed out the road since the rains, and now its oily-looking surface gleams like metal rails in the bright sun that slopes across it. All around you spreads the winter wheat in triangulated fields of rich, green shoots. A young hawk rises out of nowhere, hovers over something, fluttering its small, sharp wings in the transparent air. Telegraph poles lead far into the clear distance; like silver strings their wires curve along the sloping edge of the sky. Merlins perch on them in rows like sharp black notes written on a sheet of music. "
----
" When he reached that sentence, Mitya balled the letter up and buried his face in the wet straw, violently clenching his teeth and choking on sobs, for there she had addressed him inadvertently with the informal form of "you" in Russian. And with all the intimacy it invoked, that accidental -ty- was more than he could bear: it reminded him of every thing he'd lost and at the same time established all their closeness once again. "
----
" She stepped quickly and obediently away from the pile of under clothes discarded on the floor, wearing nothing but grey stockings, a simple garter belt, and cheap black shoes. Her flesh looked lilac-grey in the twilight, and in that way unique to a woman's body it was chilled with nervousness, taut and cool, goose bumps spreading all across its surface. She glanced at him with an air of drunken triumph, gathered her hair in her hands, and began taking out its pins while he observed her every movement, growing cold. Her body was better, younger than he ever would have thought. Her thin collarbone and sharp ribs accorded with her gaunt face and her delicate shins. But her hips were wide and generous. With its small, deep belly button, her stomach curved inward past the ribs; the prominent triangle of dark, pretty hair rising from beneath it was in keeping with the hair that grew in rich abundance on her head. She removed the last pins and that mane spilled thickly down her back, where each vertebra appeared in sharp relief. She stooped to raise her fallen stockings, and her small breasts, their brown nipples wrinkled from the cold, drooped like thin pears, utterly enchanting in their poverty. And he did indeed force her to experience those extremes of shamelessness that suited her so poorly and therefore stirred in him such pity, tenderness, and passion ....
The window blinds were pointed up, and nothing could be seen through their slats, but she glanced at them with exultant terror, heard the footsteps and the idle talk of people walking on the deck, passing just below that very window-and all of this increased still more terribly the transports of her dissipation. Oh, how close they are! How nearby they walk and talk-and no one has an inkling of what's being done in here, just a step away from them, in this white cabin. "
If Chekhov had lived longer, would he have written short stories like these? Would he have left Russia after the revolution? To me, he is the greatest russian short story writer, and possibly the greatest ever, but after reading these stories (and a novella), I might have to position Bunin alongside Chekhov, right at the very top, as one of the best.
The stories range from the first decade of the century to the 1940s, you can almost feel all the events that occurred in Russia and Europe through them. The earlier ones feel very much like what someone from the same generation (or the one afterwards) as Chekhov, Andreyev and Gorky would write, they range from more "traditional" themes like decaying rural estates, muzhiki, love and so on. The ones after the revolution and his emigration take on a more "international" feeling while still being very russian, they feature Paris, emigres, recollections of the wars, etc.
One last thing, his prose is very poetic, even in translation, something Chekhov's doesn't have. I guess it comes from also being a poet.
" And you don't want to hurry - it's lovely in those open fields on a cool and sunny day! You can see far into the distance across the level plains. The sky is light-a deep, expansive blue. Carts and carriages have smoothed out the road since the rains, and now its oily-looking surface gleams like metal rails in the bright sun that slopes across it. All around you spreads the winter wheat in triangulated fields of rich, green shoots. A young hawk rises out of nowhere, hovers over something, fluttering its small, sharp wings in the transparent air. Telegraph poles lead far into the clear distance; like silver strings their wires curve along the sloping edge of the sky. Merlins perch on them in rows like sharp black notes written on a sheet of music. "
----
" When he reached that sentence, Mitya balled the letter up and buried his face in the wet straw, violently clenching his teeth and choking on sobs, for there she had addressed him inadvertently with the informal form of "you" in Russian. And with all the intimacy it invoked, that accidental -ty- was more than he could bear: it reminded him of every thing he'd lost and at the same time established all their closeness once again. "
----
" She stepped quickly and obediently away from the pile of under clothes discarded on the floor, wearing nothing but grey stockings, a simple garter belt, and cheap black shoes. Her flesh looked lilac-grey in the twilight, and in that way unique to a woman's body it was chilled with nervousness, taut and cool, goose bumps spreading all across its surface. She glanced at him with an air of drunken triumph, gathered her hair in her hands, and began taking out its pins while he observed her every movement, growing cold. Her body was better, younger than he ever would have thought. Her thin collarbone and sharp ribs accorded with her gaunt face and her delicate shins. But her hips were wide and generous. With its small, deep belly button, her stomach curved inward past the ribs; the prominent triangle of dark, pretty hair rising from beneath it was in keeping with the hair that grew in rich abundance on her head. She removed the last pins and that mane spilled thickly down her back, where each vertebra appeared in sharp relief. She stooped to raise her fallen stockings, and her small breasts, their brown nipples wrinkled from the cold, drooped like thin pears, utterly enchanting in their poverty. And he did indeed force her to experience those extremes of shamelessness that suited her so poorly and therefore stirred in him such pity, tenderness, and passion ....
The window blinds were pointed up, and nothing could be seen through their slats, but she glanced at them with exultant terror, heard the footsteps and the idle talk of people walking on the deck, passing just below that very window-and all of this increased still more terribly the transports of her dissipation. Oh, how close they are! How nearby they walk and talk-and no one has an inkling of what's being done in here, just a step away from them, in this white cabin. "
December 27, 2022
was the first Russian writer to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature (in 1933). The stories in were all translated by Graham Hettlinger and include three novelettes in addition to the short stories: "Sukhodol" ("Dry Valley") -- perhaps the most lyrical evocation of Russian rural life I have ever read; "Mitya's Love"; and "The Elagin Affair." Included is Bunin's most famous short story, "The Gentleman from San Francisco," a memento mori along the lines of Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich.
Virtually all the stories in this collection reflect the author's preoccupation with love, loss, and the Russian landscape. Many of the stories are about foredoomed affairs between young barins (landowners) and peasant women.
Bunin continued these themes well into the 1940s. From about 1919 on, he lived as a Russian emigré, first in areas under White Russian control, and then in Western Europe. (He died in Paris in 1953.) Over and over again, he describes a Russia as it was under the Czars, despite the fact that long since that Russia had ceased to exist. At first he was banned by the Communist authorities, and later, after his death, re-instated. Once he left Russia, he never returned.
So typical of Bunin's pessimism are these lines from "In Paris":
Virtually all the stories in this collection reflect the author's preoccupation with love, loss, and the Russian landscape. Many of the stories are about foredoomed affairs between young barins (landowners) and peasant women.
Bunin continued these themes well into the 1940s. From about 1919 on, he lived as a Russian emigré, first in areas under White Russian control, and then in Western Europe. (He died in Paris in 1953.) Over and over again, he describes a Russia as it was under the Czars, despite the fact that long since that Russia had ceased to exist. At first he was banned by the Communist authorities, and later, after his death, re-instated. Once he left Russia, he never returned.
So typical of Bunin's pessimism are these lines from "In Paris":
Yes, from day to day, from year to year, you wait in secret for only one thing -- that moment when you'll stumble into happy love. Ultimately it is this hope that alone enables you to live, and all of it's in vain.The stories in this collection are, to my mind, equal to the best of Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Turgeniev, and Chekhov. It is a pity that Bunin is no longer so well known in the West.
September 8, 2014
Loved everything except Dry Valley which I gave up on - will return to it later, when degeneration stories don't bore me quite so much.
It's a shame that The Gentleman from San Francisco is his most famous work because it really isn't his best.... it is still good but I think mostly, it's just more accessible to a western audience than the rest of his stories.
It's a shame that The Gentleman from San Francisco is his most famous work because it really isn't his best.... it is still good but I think mostly, it's just more accessible to a western audience than the rest of his stories.
March 22, 2015
This is a great collection of Bunin's stories, although not all-inclusive. I love the way he writes, how he involves all of your senses to allow you to experience the story as a memory.
December 26, 2023
Bunin often casts a wistful view backwards, highlighting the impermanence of moods and relationships. (Contains the Sunstroke & Elagin volumes & 4 other stories.)
March 9, 2014
Maybe Chekhov was the Russian master, the authorial doctor crafting stories about the little tragedies and tales in daily life. You would be hard pressed to find any autobiographical details that would allude to the man behind 'The Lady with the Lapdog' or 'The Kiss' and so forth. Chekhov hides there, a casual observer, someone studying the world from a carriage window or a dacha porch.
Ivan Bunin is too close to his subject matter to be discreet. His stories, based on his biography, reflect too intimately some of the episodes in his life. We know he loved many women and cheated on his wife. Yet we also know he was born at that inopportune time when the Russian Revolution not only overshadowed the Silver Age of Russian literature but sent many of its greatest artists, composers and writers into permanent exile.
Like Joseph Roth, a near contemporary, Bunin wrote about that lost world of early twentieth century Europe. Back then, in that twilight realm there was a rise in technology but many of the greatest writers had a nostalgic penchant for the grand and uneven 19th century, for the tales of their grandparents, the folklore of the villages, the rustic and barbaric simplicity of a dying age. Bunin knew these legends and myths and blended them into his stories of evocative and sensuous prose. He calls to life harvest scenes along with spring and summer mornings, the verdant smell of evening fields. He describes the lush scent of sex not with a pornographic touch but more of eros, the perfume of a woman's sun burnished hand or a peasant's girl wet skin. All of it paints a masterful and at times gentle picture of a bygone and yet irreplaceable era. In fact, a fair sum of stories in this collection Bunin basks in this forgotten world as if it were a place outside of time, an Eden of sorts.
Still, we have young love halted and thwarted by patriarchs or girls on the less than virtuous verge of woman hood meeting an untimely end. Beyond The Gentleman from San Francisco, Bunin's most well known story in the West you'll find this collection offers a substantial selection of stories that run the gamut. The Elagin Affair is a novella-sized tale about two death-obsessed lovers while shorter works, Cold Fall and In Paris, show the plight of the Russian bourgeois and aristocracy following the Revolution. There's even the prose poem, First Class in which a mouzhik must ride with the nobles specifically because he missed getting on the first carriage designated for workers. The clay and mud-spattered man in rags must endure being amongst the well-to-do. It's only a page long and manages to show both Bunin's dark humor and compassionate side.
What I like most about Bunin is that he isn't Chekhov. There is pulse and sensuality in Bunin's stories. One feels the painful loss of love, that morose and conflicted sense of wanting to do more but being unable to in the face of society's restrictions. Bunin's love is always taboo but not for the sake of it. The young men who fall for the servant girl or the peasant or the intellectual are ardent and knowingly naive. They throw themselves into their passions because they are simple and adolescent. At times we learn they will become like their fathers, other times we can only guess and at other times, they are already old and looking back, happy but sparingly cynical.
If I could compare these stories to music, they would remind me of the Nocturnes and Preludes of Rachmaninoff. Prose that feels like good piano music.
Ivan Bunin is too close to his subject matter to be discreet. His stories, based on his biography, reflect too intimately some of the episodes in his life. We know he loved many women and cheated on his wife. Yet we also know he was born at that inopportune time when the Russian Revolution not only overshadowed the Silver Age of Russian literature but sent many of its greatest artists, composers and writers into permanent exile.
Like Joseph Roth, a near contemporary, Bunin wrote about that lost world of early twentieth century Europe. Back then, in that twilight realm there was a rise in technology but many of the greatest writers had a nostalgic penchant for the grand and uneven 19th century, for the tales of their grandparents, the folklore of the villages, the rustic and barbaric simplicity of a dying age. Bunin knew these legends and myths and blended them into his stories of evocative and sensuous prose. He calls to life harvest scenes along with spring and summer mornings, the verdant smell of evening fields. He describes the lush scent of sex not with a pornographic touch but more of eros, the perfume of a woman's sun burnished hand or a peasant's girl wet skin. All of it paints a masterful and at times gentle picture of a bygone and yet irreplaceable era. In fact, a fair sum of stories in this collection Bunin basks in this forgotten world as if it were a place outside of time, an Eden of sorts.
Still, we have young love halted and thwarted by patriarchs or girls on the less than virtuous verge of woman hood meeting an untimely end. Beyond The Gentleman from San Francisco, Bunin's most well known story in the West you'll find this collection offers a substantial selection of stories that run the gamut. The Elagin Affair is a novella-sized tale about two death-obsessed lovers while shorter works, Cold Fall and In Paris, show the plight of the Russian bourgeois and aristocracy following the Revolution. There's even the prose poem, First Class in which a mouzhik must ride with the nobles specifically because he missed getting on the first carriage designated for workers. The clay and mud-spattered man in rags must endure being amongst the well-to-do. It's only a page long and manages to show both Bunin's dark humor and compassionate side.
What I like most about Bunin is that he isn't Chekhov. There is pulse and sensuality in Bunin's stories. One feels the painful loss of love, that morose and conflicted sense of wanting to do more but being unable to in the face of society's restrictions. Bunin's love is always taboo but not for the sake of it. The young men who fall for the servant girl or the peasant or the intellectual are ardent and knowingly naive. They throw themselves into their passions because they are simple and adolescent. At times we learn they will become like their fathers, other times we can only guess and at other times, they are already old and looking back, happy but sparingly cynical.
If I could compare these stories to music, they would remind me of the Nocturnes and Preludes of Rachmaninoff. Prose that feels like good piano music.
January 13, 2017
Great find. Knocked off a star because Bunin dissed my boy Mayakovsky even after the suicide. Some of the revered stories, short and long, did little for me. Good collection to have beside an electronic fireplace or just a gated window.
November 26, 2019
Bunin describes nature beautifully. But his characters are so consumed by love or lust that they end up killing themselves or their loved one. There is no possibility of redemption, only despair about life. I got tired of it after a few stories.
September 12, 2019
Despite winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1933, Ivan Bunin remains relatively unknown in the West. This volume of Collected Stories is an excellent introduction to Bunin's writing, which features a unique lyrical beauty.
Themes of love, loss and the Russian landscape dominate Bunin's stories, with many containing that sweet melancholy familiar to readers of Russian literature.
Particular highlights are 'The Gentleman from San Francisco', 'Sukhodol' and 'Mitya's Love'.
Highly recommended to readers of Russian fiction, short stories or just good writing.
Themes of love, loss and the Russian landscape dominate Bunin's stories, with many containing that sweet melancholy familiar to readers of Russian literature.
Particular highlights are 'The Gentleman from San Francisco', 'Sukhodol' and 'Mitya's Love'.
Highly recommended to readers of Russian fiction, short stories or just good writing.
June 17, 2016
In this collection of his tales, it is interesting to see the development of Bunin's style during his career. Since his earliest works, though, it is possible to see how clear and lyrical are his narratives, making justice to the tradition of great Russian tale authors. Perhaps the quality of his prose cannot be equaled to that of Chekhov of Tolstoy, but he can be considered one of the main voices in the Russian literature of the 20th century.
March 24, 2014
One my my favorite finds this year. Bunin's fantastic; I'd put him in the same handful as Edith Pearlman, William Trevor, J.S. Powers, and Chekhov.
Best story in the collection (and the only one I'd heard of before): "The Gentleman from San Francisco."
Other really, really good stories: "Ida," "Chang's Dreams," "Mitya's Love," "Zoyka and Valeriya," "Rusya," and "Cleansing Monday."
Best story in the collection (and the only one I'd heard of before): "The Gentleman from San Francisco."
Other really, really good stories: "Ida," "Chang's Dreams," "Mitya's Love," "Zoyka and Valeriya," "Rusya," and "Cleansing Monday."
October 3, 2015
Wonderful collection of short stories -- some only a few paragraphs long -- and novellas. Bunin, first a poet, wrote these from 1900 to 1945. He was anti-Communist and lived abroad, mostly in France, after 1920. However, the stories clearly are RUSSIAN (no italics, so all-caps will do); they evoke scents and feelings. I definitely would re-read these.
October 9, 2015
عندما يغالي الكاتب في الصور البيانية والتشابيه والتحدث عن أدق تفاصيل الطبيعة يفقد الكتاب معناه حتى أنك لن تتزكر الأحداث وبعد ١٠٠ صفحة توقفت لأنني لم أجد قصة وإنما ١٠٠ صفحة من مدح الطبيعة والإغداق عليها باستعارات وصور لا فائدة منها
January 6, 2021
Потрясающие рассказы. Неспешные, про жизнь, успеваешь, удается прочувствовать то, о чем пишет автор.
November 15, 2021
Nobody does the end of the Russian empire like Bunin. I especially recommend "The Scent of Apples" and "Sukhodol"
July 30, 2024
Een prachtige verzameling korte verhalen, helemaal in de stijl van de oude Russische schrijvers, zoals b.v. Toergenjev. Bunin was na de revolutie naar Frankrijk gevlucht, maar je voelt zijn heimwee in deze verhalen. De meeste spelen nog op het oude Russische platteland en laten toch ook zien waarom uiteindelijk de revolutie kon slagen. Er zijn prachtige natuurbeschrijvingen en ook laat hij zien hoe het leven in die oude tijd was in de dorpjes. Misschien wat geidealiseerd, maar mooi om te lezen.
September 29, 2024
A very good potpourri carrying the essence of Russias saccharine literature with dolorous leitmotifs. Bunin's prose (and the translation) is flavourful and the stories infused with a bittersweet nostalgia, longing and saudade.
The gentleman from SF might be his most well known story but honestly felt it pale in comparison to the others. Proust's influence can be felt quite tangibly
Certified hood classic 😎 👍 Bunin's an OG playa and a perfect read for the colder seasons.
The gentleman from SF might be his most well known story but honestly felt it pale in comparison to the others. Proust's influence can be felt quite tangibly
Certified hood classic 😎 👍 Bunin's an OG playa and a perfect read for the colder seasons.
February 7, 2018
Undeniable talent, put in service to sickly nostalgia for a world that deserved to die. The sorts of things that the likes of T. C. Boyle or Joyce Carol Oates will write after the world next turns upside down.
July 6, 2024
დიდა� მოთხრობები� მკითხველ� არ ვა�, ახალ� ამბი� დაწყებ� ჭირს და მე� კონცენტრირებას მოითხოვს, თა� მალე მავიწყდება ხოლმ�, თუმც� ბუნინი� მოთხრობები ძალიან მომეწონა, სასიამოვნოდა� იკითხებოდა და დალაგებული� თითქოს ის� იყ� რო� ერთი ხაზი� დაჭერა შეიძლებოდა
March 31, 2013
There are some very strong stories about life as a privileged landowner or serf in pre-revolution Russia and about overly proud and arrogant capitalists and sundry kulaks. The book winds up with stories about the joys and travails of seducing or forcing oneself on the young house serfs..typically around 15 years old or so, or falling in love with the infrequent nurse or guest. Enjoyed the haystack scene with the gift of a special kiss...to be young again. Enjoy most Russian writers but don't believe Bunin ranks with the top tier even though Tolstoy and Turgenev wrote some similar themes. The man's joy of nature and his exploration of love are almost psychedelic and sometimes painful. Would recommend a read.
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October 19, 2015وصف الطبيعة أهم من الأحداث والشخصيات المتشابهة، الترجمة جيدة جداً، الشخصيات معظمها ريفية وقروية، العلاقات بين الطبقات الاجتماعية، البرجوازيين والعمال، الموت موضوع أساسي في معظم القصص، القصص مرجع ممتاز لروائح الأشجار والمحاصيل الروسية من خضار وفواكه وكذلك الأطعمة والمأكولات الروسية التقليدية ..
مسلية ثم تصبح مملة مع استمرارها بنفس الرتم والنمط ..
مسلية ثم تصبح مملة مع استمرارها بنفس الرتم والنمط ..
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