THE CAUCASUS Translated by Ivan Bunin - A Short Story-1937- 5 pages- translated from the by Russian by Sophie Lund -1984 - Included in The Gentleman from San Francisco and Other Stories

 The Caucases by Ivan Bunin - A Short Story-1937- 5 pages- translated from the by Russian by Sophie Lund -1984 -

Included in The Gentleman from San Francisco and Other Stories

Ivan Bunin

“What the Russian Revolution turned into very soon, none will comprehend who has not seen it. This spectacle was utterably unbearable to any one who had not ceased to be a man in the image and likeness of God, and all who had a chance to flee, fled from Russia.” - Ivan Bunin

October 22, 1870 - Born Voronezh, Russia

March 28, 1920 - moves to Paris where he Will spend The rest of his Life, with countryside interludes 

1933 - first Russian to win the Nobel Prize

November 8, 1953 - dies in Paris 

Bunin moved to Paris in 1920, his heart broken by the fall of The Romanovs from power in Russia. He, like many Russian Émigrés, spent the rest of his life dreaming of the old days and fantasying about the restoration of a Tsar, along with the return of his family estate.

Once it became clear that the Bolsheviks would be victorious in the ensuing civil war, Bunin emigrated from Russia, never to return. In 1920, at the age of fifty, he had to start a new life and literary career in western Europe. He suffered first a long and tortured affair and then a disastrous marriage, the collapse of which was followed by the death of his only child at the age of five.

His stories bring to my mind the nostalgia for pre-revoluntunary Russian exhibited in , Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisted by Vladimir Nabokov that I read earlier this month.

"The Caucases" is the fifth story I have so far featured on The Reading Life.

Today's brief story centers on what happens when a woman married to a Tsarist Russian Army officer runs of with one of his men.

The couple has made elaborate plans how to get away. They take a train. The wife fears her husband will stop at nothing to track them down, feeling entitled by honor to kill them.

‘It seems to me,’ she said, ‘that he suspects something, maybe knows something. Perhaps he’s read one of your letters, or found a key to fit my desk … I think, with his harsh proud nature, he’s capable of anything. Once he told me, point-blank: “I’ll stop at nothing to defend my honour, the honour of an officer and a husband.” Now, for some reason, he literally watches my every move, and if our plan is to succeed I must be extremely careful … He’s already agreed to let me go because I’ve convinced him that I’ll die unless I get a glimpse of the south and the sea, but in the name of God be patient!’"

 Before she left she gave him a deceptive reason why she was leaving and gave him false information as to where she was going. They are very cautious not to be seen boarding the train together.

(Spolier alert)

Of late I have been dominated in my thoughts by the passing of my beloved wife of many years, long before her time.

The husband does find them but the ending is not what they feared. He takes his revenge:

"He searched for her in Gelendzhik, in Gagry and in Sochi. On the morning after his arrival in Sochi he swam in the sea, then shaved, put on a clean shirt and a snow-white, high-collared tunic, lunched at his hotel on the terrace of the restaurant, drank a bottle of champagne, took coffee with chartreuse, and smoked a leisurely cigar. Returning to his room, he lay down on the divan and using two revolvers shot himself through both temples."

The story elegantly describes the beauty of the Caucases. There is a delightful scene in which a family of snow leopards approach the train.

Mel Ulm 

“Late Hour” -A Set in Paris Short Story by Ivan Bunin - 1938- translated by David Richards -included The Gentleman from San Francisco and other Stories-- A Post for Paris in July 2022

 

“Late Hour” -A Set in Paris Short Story by Ivan Bunin - 1938- translated by David Humphries -included in The Gentleman from San Francisco and other Stories-- A Post for Paris in July 2022 

This will be my eighth year participating in a wonderful event, Paris in July.  The event hosts are Reader Buzz and Thyme for Tea.  Posts on any and all things Paris are welcome.  You can share your memories of a trip to Paris, your favorite French recipes or restaurants, art in the  Louvre, your favorite set in Paris Movies (mine are Ninotchka and Midnight in Paris).  Of course the French literary masters as well as contemporary writers are great subjects.

Last year I posted on six short stories by Russian Émigré writers who moved to Paris after the fall of the Tsars, among others works.  Ivan Bunin is given illuminating coverage in After the Romanovs.

Paris in July is an excellent way to meet bloggers outside the Book Blog world, to expand your knowledge of Parisian history and culture.

Ivan Bunin

October 22, 1870 - Born Voronezh, Russia

March 28, 1920 - moves to Paris where he Will spend The rest of his Life, with countryside interludes

1933 - first Russian to win the Nobel Prize

November 8, 1953 - dies in Paris 

Bunin moved to Paris in 1920, his heart broken by the fall of The Romanovs from power in Russia.  He, like many Russian Émigrés, spent the rest of his life dreaming of the old days and fantasying about the restoration of a Tsar, along with the return of his family estate.  

“Late Hour”, set in Paris, is narrated by a widower wandering the streets of Paris, imagining it as Moscow in the old days. As he crosses the Seine on a bridge,he begins to search for the home in which his late wife grew up. He prays he can kiss her feet in heaven.  

Mel Ulm

The Primer of Love by Ivan Bunin - A Short Story - 1915. - translated by David Richards - 1984 - included The Gentleman from San Francisco and other Stories by Ivan Bunin

The Primer of Love by Ivan Bunin - A Short Story - 1915. - translated by David Richards - 1984 - included The Gentleman from San Francisco and other Stories by Ivan Bunin 

Ivan Bunin

October 22, 1870 - Born Voronezh, Russia

March 28, 1920 - moves to Paris where he Will spend The rest of his Life, with countryside interludes

1933 - first Russian to win the Nobel Prize

November 8, 1953 - dies in Paris 

The Primer of Love” is considered one of Bunin’s three greatest works, along with “The Gentleman from San Francisco” and “Chang’s Dreams”.

Today’s story begins with a journey through the Russian country side.   The story begins with a trip

“Ivlev was travelling once at the beginning of June over to the far side of his province…Ivlev gave himself over to that calm and aimless watching the world pass by which goes so well with the rhythm of hooves and the tinkling of halter-bells.”

He was staying at his brother-in-laws estate.  He loaned Ivlev a three horse cart with a driver.  The driver is concerned about not tiring the horses out too much.  They make a stop at the home of a countessa.  The driver waits out in the rain, Ivlev enjoys tea with the countess.  

“The countess was wearing a flowing pink tea-gown, which revealed her powdered neck. She was smoking, inhaling deeply, and constantly adjusted her hair, baring her firm round arms to the shoulder. Inhaling and laughing, she kept bringing the conversation round to love and amongst other things spoke about her near neighbour Khvoshchinsky, who, as Ivlev had known since he was a child, had all his life been unhinged by love for his maidservant Lushka who’d died very young.”

His destination is the home of now deceased Lushka, he has been thinking about her since childhood.  When they arrive Ivlev meets her only child,a man in his late teens.  He tours her house, stopping at the library which he says he might buy.

He finds a hundred year old book, The Primer of Love, full of advise on all aspects of a man’s love for a woman.  Ivlev reads much of the advise.  It ends up being the only book he buys.

This story deals with the power of love to control lives, with the simple pleasures of existence as well as a celebration of late Czarist Russia.

There are 17 works in collection, including a novella.  I will, i hope read them all.  

Mel Ulm

“In Paris” - A Short Story by Ivan Bunin - 1942- translated from the Russian by Robert Chandler. 2005.

 “In Paris” - A Short Story by Ivan Bunin - 1942- translated from the Russian by Robert Chandler. 2005.

I read this story in Russian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida- edited and introduced by Robert Chandler.

In Paris - A Short Story by Ivan Bunin - 1942

Website for Paris in July 2021- Hosted by Thyme for Tea

Works read so far for Paris in July 2021

1. Lost in Paris by Elizabeth Thompson - 2021
2. Loving Modigliani by Linda Lappin - 2020
3. Russian Émirgé Short Stories from Bunin to Yanovsky - edited by Bryan Karetnky. 2018 - an overview 
4. Pancakes in Paris - Living The American Dream in France by Craig Carlson - 2016
5. The Paris Apartment by Kelly Bowen- 2021
6. The Paris Architect by Charles Belfoure - 2013

A Paris in July 2021 post.  The event is now in its tenth year.  

Ivan Bunin

“What the Russian Revolution turned into very soon, none will comprehend who has not seen it. This spectacle was utterably unbearable to any one who had not ceased to be a man in the image and likeness of God, and all who had a chance to flee, fled from Russia.”

October 22, 1870 - Born Voronezh, Russia

March 28, 1920 - moves to Paris where he Will spend The rest of his Life, with countryside interludes

1933 - first Russian to win the Nobel Prize

November 8, 1953 - dies in Paris 

Last month I read “A Gentleman from San Francisco” by Ivan Bunin.  I found it very worth of a Nobel Prize.  “In Paris” shows us two lonely Russian Émigrés living in Paris.  It also shows how Émigrés stayed largely within their own culture.

The man is forty, once a general in the White Army.  His wife left him for a rich Greek.  He makes his living writing articles for Russian language publications.  One evening he stops for dinner at a Russian delicatessen.

The waitress is a Russian, she thinks her husband is fighting in still in the White Army but to her he is lost.  Bunin has great descriptive power. We see the man scrutinizing the woman, wondering if she has a rich boyfriend as her attire is beyond that of a waitress.  There are lots of food descriptions to enjoy. Emigrates of all countries hate to give up their food.

He comes back and asks her to a movie.  Their cab driver is a Russian.  In a very erotic scene they go to his apartment.  The ending is tragic.

“In Paris” is a beautiful story.  To me it conveyed the feel of being a Russian émigré  in Paris, trying to survive, keeping your culture, knowing you once had better times.

There is a deep sense of resignation to fate feel to the work.

The Gentleman from San Francisco- A Short Story by Ivan Bunin - First published in 1916 Translated by S. S. Koteliansky, D. H. Lawrence and Leonard Woolf from Russian

 The Gentleman from San Francisco- A Short Story by Ivan Bunin - First published in 1916 Translated by S. S. Koteliansky, D. H. Lawrence and Leonard Woolf from Russian 

I read this story in a marvelous anthology, Russian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida - edited and introduced by Robert Chandler

“What the Russian Revolution turned into very soon, none will comprehend who has not seen it. This spectacle was utterably unbearable to any one who had not ceased to be a man in the image and likeness of God, and all who had a chance to flee, fled from Russia.”

Ivan Bunin

October 22, 1870 - Born Voronezh, Russia

March 28, 1920 - moves to Paris where he Will spend The rest of his Life, with countryside interludes.  He will be forever anti-Soviet and later Anti Nazi

1933 - first Russian to win the Nobel Prize

November 8, 1953 - dies in Paris 

“The Gentleman from San Francisco” is considered among the finest works of Ivan Bunin. I consider the reading of this wonderful story to justify the acquisition of this collection.  

A wealthy man from San Francisco has embarked on a two year pleasure tour of Europe.  In his fifties, the is accompanied by his wife and their unmarried daughter in her 20s.  They are on a luxury boat in the 

Mederteranian Sea, catering to the Idol rich with luxurious rooms, wonderfully described meals and lots of serving staff.  Bunin makes sure we see this opulence is paid for by workers living in very harsh conditions.

The fellow travelers, the Captain, the dining room wait staff, the room staff are perfectly realized.  We feel the trubulence of the sea in a storm.  We check in a hotel in Capri with the Gentleman from San Francisco and his Family. His daughter is infatuated with “An Asiatic Prince”,   The room staff totally suck up to them, hoping for good tips.  There Will be a painful truth revealed revealed to us behind the sycophantic behaviour.

The ending is really powerful, Under cutting all the luxury and money as transient glories.  

I will soon read his 1910 novel, The Village showing the harsh lives of Russisn peasants and next Month his story “In Paris”..

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