Selected Short Stories of Bunin (Includes CD)

Author: Zhang Jianhua
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-03-01
Features: This collection gathers twelve of Bunin's excellent short stories, written in different periods, varying in length, but basically covering the main themes of the author's creation. The different literary styles and narrative styles are included. "Anton's Apple," "The Gentleman from San Francisco," "The Rose of Jericho," and "Old Stories" are very representative lyrical philosophical novels by Bunin. "Anton's Apple" is a famous narrative masterpiece with an impressionistic color. The author depicts the daily life scenes of aristocratic estates in the waning years of the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the declining history of the Russian Empire, with delicate and poetic realist brushwork, vividly portraying the life impressions and traces that occurred in the Russian landlord estates. The story gradually evolves from simple narration into a scene display with the effect of a cinematic close-up, presenting a rare magnificence and shock in Russian literature before the readers, giving the novel both cultural reflection and artistic appreciation value. Readers can feel the desolate, simple, pure, and affectionate atmosphere that permeates the entire novel. The theme of "seeking the fusion of beauty and eternity" is also reflected in "The Gentleman from San Francisco." The extravagance and brilliance of modern material civilization, wealth, and luxury are merely fleeting clouds—they cannot save the "master of the New World" from death, nor can they contend with the vast waves of the unfathomable ocean, nor can they heal the loneliness and distress of the human spirit. Beauty and eternity only bloom in the harmony between humans and nature, in the vibrant youth. The miniature short story "The Rose of Jericho" uses the wild thorny plant with a poetic name—The Rose of Jericho—as a metaphor for the eternity of life. "What has existed and experienced will not perish! As long as my heart, my love, my memory live, there will be no separation or loss." "Old Stories" narrates the spring in a distant Moscow, where encounters occur between three people with different historical identities. The meeting and understanding between people are all a matter of fate. Every separation may not be a final farewell, and the fleeting passersby on the stage of life should be full of friendship and family love—why resort to hatred and competition, burning each other too fiercely? The main part of the collection is love stories, totaling seven. Most of them are collected in the author's love story collection "Hidden Paths."