The Steel Flea is an uproarious and alcohol-soaked shaggy-dog story from one of Russia's great comic masters. Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th-century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions. Nikolay Leskov (1831-1895). Leskov's works are available in Penguin Classics in Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and Other Stories and Russian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida.
Andrei Bely's Petersburg is a colourful evocation of Russia's capital during the short, turbulent period of the first socialist revolution in 1905 ➤ подробнее about Petersburg.
Chichikov, a mysterious stranger, arrives in the provincial town of 'N', visiting a succession of landowners and making each a strange offer ➤ подробнее about Dead Souls.
Russia's great nineteenth-century satirical absurdist shows what happens when a man wakes up with his nose missing, and illustrates the folly of boasting. 'Strangely enough, I mistook it for a gentleman at first ➤ подробнее about The Nose.
"Oh, good God," he kept saying with great relish. "Good God..." 'Gooseberries' is accompanied here by 'The Kiss' and 'The Two Volodyas' - three exquisite depictions of love and loss in nineteenth-century Russia by Chekhov, the great master of the short story form ➤ подробнее about Gooseberries.