A Hero of Our Time (Modern Library Classics) - Softcover

Lermontov, Mikhail

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0812970764 ISBN 13: 9780812970760

Verlag: Random House Publishing Group, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

In its adventurous happenings–its abductions, duels, and sexual intrigues–A Hero of Our Time looks backward to the tales of Sir Walter Scott and Lord Byron, so beloved by Russian society in the 1820s and ’30s. In the character of its protagonist, Pechorin–the archetypal Russian antihero–Lermontov’s novel looks forward to the subsequent glories of a Russian literature that it helped, in great measure, to make possible.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Vladimir VLADIMIROVICH NABOKOV was born on April 23, 1899, in St. Petersburg, Russia. The Nabokovs were known for their high culture and commitment to public service, and the elder Nabokov was an outspoken opponent of antisemitism and one of the leaders of the opposition party, the Kadets. In 1919, following the Bolshevik revolution, he took his family into exile. Four years later he was shot and killed at a political rally in Berlin while trying to shield the speaker from right-wing assassins. 

The Nabokov household was trilingual, and as a child Nabokov was already reading Wells, Poe, Browning, Keats, Flaubert, Verlaine, Rimbaud, Tolstoy, and Chekhov, alongside the popular entertainments of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Jules Verne. As a young man, he studied Slavic and romance languages at Trinity College, Cambridge, taking his honors degree in 1922. For the next eighteen years he lived in Berlin and Paris, writing prolifically in Russian under the pseudonym Sirin and supporting himself through translations, lessons in English and tennis, and by composing the first crossword puzzles in Russian. In 1925 he married Vera Slonim, with whom he had one child, a son, Dmitri. 

Having already fled Russia and Germany, Nabokov became a refugee once more in 1940, when he was forced to leave France for the United States. There he taught at Wellesley, Harvard, and Cornell. He also gave up writing in Russian and began composing fiction in English. In his afterword to Lolita he claimed: "My private tragedy, which cannot, and indeed should not, be anybody's concern, is that I had to abandon my natural idiom, my untrammeled, rich, and infinitely docile Russian tongue for a second-rate brand of English, devoid of any of those apparatuses--the baffling mirror, the black velvet backdrop, the implied associations and traditions--which the native illusionist, frac-tails flying, can magically use to transcend the heritage in his own way." [p. 317] Yet Nabokov's American period saw the creation of what are arguably his greatest works, Bend Sinister (1947), Lolita (1955), Pnin (1957), and Pale Fire (1962), as well as the translation of his earlier Russian novels into English. He also undertook English translations of works by Lermontov and Pushkin and wrote several books of criticism. Vladimir Nabokov died in Montreux, Switzerland, in 1977.

Von der hinteren Coverseite

Introduction by Timothy Binyon Translated by Vladimir and Dmitri Nabokov

"From the Hardcover edition.

Aus dem Klappentext

Introduction by Timothy Binyon Translated by Vladimir and Dmitri Nabokov


From the Hardcover edition.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

I

BELA

I was traveling post from Tiflis. My cart's entire load consisted of one small valise, which was half filled with travel notes about Georgia. Of these, the greater part, fortunately for you, have been lost, and the valise containing my remaining possessions, fortunately for me, is intact.

The sun was already beginning to drop behind the snowy ridge when I rode into the Koyshaur Valley. The driver, an Ossetian, drove the horses tirelessly in order to make it up Koyshaur Mountain by nightfall, singing songs at the top of his voice. A glorious spot, this valley! On every side of the mountain are impregnable reddish cliffs hung with green ivy and crowned with clusters of plane trees, yellow precipices scoured by running water, and there, high up, a golden fringe of snows, while below, the Aragva, having embraced another nameless stream gushing noisily from a black, mist-filled gorge, has stretched out like a silver thread and shimmers like a snake with scales.

When we reached the foot of Koyshaur, we stopped at an inn. Here, crowded noisily around, were a score of Georgians and mountaineers; close by, a caravan of camels had halted for the night. I was obliged to hire oxen to drag my cart up this accursed mountain because it was already autumn and the roads were icy--and this mountain was nearly two versts long.

There was nothing to be done for it: I hired six oxen and several Ossetians. One of them hoisted my valise on his shoulders, the others began helping the oxen with their shouts--and nothing more.

Behind my cart, a team of four oxen was pulling another with the greatest ease, despite the fact that it was piled high, to the very top. This circumstance amazed me. Walking behind the cart was its owner, who was smoking a small Kabardian pipe set in silver. He was wearing an officer's overcoat without epaulets and a shaggy Circassian hat. He seemed to be about fifty; his swarthy complexion showed that he was long familiar with the Caucasian sun, and his prematurely gray whiskers were not in keeping with his firm step and robust countenance. I walked over to him and bowed in greeting; he returned my bow without speaking and released a huge puff of smoke.

"You and I are fellow travelers, it seems."

He again bowed, without speaking.

"You must be on your way to Stavropol."

"Exactly so...with government property."

"Tell me, please, why is it that four oxen are pulling your heavy cart easily, while six beasts can scarcely budge my empty one, even with the help of these Ossetians?"

He smiled slyly and gave me a significant look.

"You doubtless have not been in the Caucasus long."

"About a year," I replied.

He smiled a second time.

"But what is the matter?"

"What's the matter! Horrible brutes, these Asiatics! You think they're helping by shouting? The devil only knows what they're shouting! The oxen understand them; you could harness up a score of them and still, if they shouted in their way, the oxen would never budge. Horrible swindlers! But what can you expect from them?... They enjoy fleecing the travelers who pass through. The rogues have been spoiled! You'll see, they're going to get a tip from you as well. Oh, I know them, they can't fool me."

"Have you served here long?"

"Yes, I served here under Alexei Petrovich," [Ermolov] he replied, assuming a dignified air. "When he arrived at the frontier, I was a second lieutenant," he added, "and under him I received two promotions for actions against the mountaineers."

"And now you are...?"

"Now I'm counted with the Third Frontier Battalion. And you, may I be so bold as to ask?"

I told him.

At this the conversation ended, and we continued to walk in silence, side by side. At the mountain's summit we found snow. The sun set and night followed day without interval, as usually happens in the South; however, thanks to the reflection off the snow, we could easily distinguish the road, which was still going uphill, although no longer as steeply. I ordered my valise placed on the cart and the oxen exchanged for horses, and for the last time I looked back down on the valley--but a thick mist, which surged in waves from the gorges, had covered it completely, and not a single sound reached our hearing from there. The Ossetians had gathered volubly around me and were demanding tips; but the staff captain shouted at them so menacingly that they scattered instantly.

"You see, what a nation," he said. "They can't say 'bread' in Russian, but they've learned 'Officer, give me a tip!' To my mind, the Tatars are better than this; at least they don't drink."

It was another verst or so to the station. All around it was quiet, so quiet that from the buzzing of a gnat you could follow its flight. On the left lay a deep black gorge; and beyond it and in front of us dark blue mountain peaks, furrowed with creases and covered in layers of snow, were outlined against the pale skyline, which was still clinging to the sunset's last reflection. In the darkening sky, stars began to flicker, and oddly, they seemed much higher than in our North. On either side of the road jutted bare black rocks; here and there I caught glimpses of shrubs under the snow, but not a single dry leaf rustled, and it was cheering to hear, amid this lifeless dream of nature, the snorting of the weary post troika and the uneven tinkle of the little Russian bell.

"Tomorrow will be glorious weather," I said. The captain said not a word in reply but pointed to the tall mountain rising directly across from us.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Mount Gud."

"Well and what of it?"

"Look at how it's smoking."

And indeed, Mount Gud was smoking; down its sides slid light streaks of clouds, and on its peak lay a black cloud, so black it looked like a blot on the dark sky.

We had already made out the post station, as well as the roofs of the huts surrounding it, and before us twinkled welcoming lights, while we smelled the damp, cold wind, heard the gorge's rumble, and felt the fine rain. Scarcely had I managed to throw my felt cloak on when the snow began coming down. I looked with awe at the captain.

"We're going to have to bed down here," he said with annoyance. "In a blizzard like this you aren't going to cross the mountains. What do you say? Have there been avalanches on the Mountain of the Cross?" he asked the driver.

"No, there haven't, sir," replied the Ossetian driver, "but there's a lot hanging, a lot."

For lack of a room at the station for those passing through, we were given lodging in a smoky hut. I invited my companion to have a glass of tea with me, for I had brought along an iron teakettle--my sole indulgence on my travels through the Caucasus.

One side of the hut was built into a cliff; three slippery, wet steps led to its door. Groping my way in, I bumped into a cow (the cowshed with these people takes the place of the servant's room). I didn't know where to turn: sheep were bleating here; a dog was growling there. Fortunately, a dim light glowed at one side and helped me to find another doorlike opening. Here a fairly entertaining picture was revealed: the large hut, whose roof rested on two smoke-blackened posts, was full of people. In the middle flickered a fire that had been laid on the bare earth, and the smoke, pushed back by the wind from the opening in the roof, was spread around in such a thick shroud that for a long time I could not get my bearings. By the fire...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Random House Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2004
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0812970764
• ISBN 13: 9780812970760
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 200
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Purmerul LTD; https://strengholt.nl/en/; ; 22 Liuleburgaz Str., floor 4, app. 9; Plovdiv; Bulgarien