Russian, learned properly

The first six hundred years contain almost no fiction in the modern sense: there are chronicles, saints’ lives, sermons and letters. The written language is Church Slavonic, a good distance from everyday speech, and that distance will weigh on written Russian until the eighteenth century. The most striking thing from the period is the birchbark letters of Novgorod: notes by ordinary people, in the language they actually spoke.

• Повесть временных лет

  Povest’ vremennykh let

  Нестор · ~1113

  The chronicle that built the origin story all three East Slavic nations still trace themselves to.

• Слово о полку Игореве

  Slovo o polku Igoreve

  Неизвестный автор · ~1185

  An epic poem about a failed campaign; the only manuscript burned in 1812, so its authenticity is still disputed.

• Новгородские берестяные грамоты

  Novgorodskie berestyanye gramoty

  Разные · 1050–1450

  Over a thousand letters on birchbark, showing an unexpectedly high level of literacy among ordinary Novgorodians.

• Слово о Законе и Благодати

  Slovo o Zakone i Blagodati

  Иларион Киевский · ~1050

  A sermon counted as the first work of rhetoric written by a native of Rus’ rather than translated from Greek.

• Поучение Владимира Мономаха

  Pouchenie Vladimira Monomakha

  Владимир Мономах · ~1117

  A grand prince’s instruction to his sons, rare in letting the voice of one particular man come through.

• Хождение за три моря

  Khozhdenie za tri morya

  Афанасий Никитин · ~1475

  The journal of a merchant from Tver who reached India, written before Vasco da Gama’s voyage.

• Задонщина

  Zadonshchina

  Софоний Рязанец · ~1390

  A song about the battle of Kulikovo, closely modelled on the rhythm and imagery of the Igor poem.

• Житие протопопа Аввакума

  Zhitie protopopa Avvakuma

  Аввакум Петров · 1673

  The autobiography of a schismatic priest, written in vivid spoken Russian and often called the beginning of Russian prose.

Peter the Great reforms the alphabet along with the state, and literature is commissioned to serve the court. The century’s largest achievement is technical: a way of writing verse that suits Russian, built on stress rather than on counting syllables. That is what leaves the next generation with tools ready to hand. At the century’s end Karamzin pulls the written language back towards educated speech.

• Ода на взятие Хотина

  Oda na vzyatie Khotina

  Михаил Ломоносов · 1739

  The ode that put stress-based versification into practice, the system Russian poetry has used ever since.

• Недоросль

  Nedorosl’

  Денис Фонвизин · 1782

  A comedy satirising the provincial gentry; a number of its lines have become proverbs.

• Бедная Лиза

  Bednaya Liza

  Николай Карамзин · 1792

  A sentimental tale that caused a stir in its day, and a landmark in writing close to speech.

• Путешествие из Петербурга в Москву

  Puteshestvie iz Peterburga v Moskvu

  Александр Радищев · 1790

  An indictment of serfdom; its author was exiled and the book stayed banned for over a century.

• Фелица

  Felitsa

  Гавриил Державин · 1782

  An ode to Catherine II written in a joking voice, breaking the solemn mould of the genre.

• Российская грамматика

  Rossiyskaya grammatika

  Михаил Ломоносов · 1755

  The first systematic grammar of Russian, drawing a clear line between it and Church Slavonic.

• Ябеда

  Yabeda

  Василий Капнист · 1798

  A comedy about corruption in the courts, banned from the stage after only a few performances.

• Письма русского путешественника

  Pis’ma russkogo puteshestvennika

  Николай Карамзин · 1791

  An account of a European journey that introduced Russian readers to a private, relaxed prose voice.

Within roughly twenty-five years the literary language is settled almost entirely, largely by one man. Pushkin blends Church Slavonic, the French of the gentry and ordinary speech into a written Russian that today’s readers still take at speed. Alongside him Gogol opens another route: grotesque, distorted, and full of pity for small people.

• Евгений Онегин

  Evgeniy Onegin

  Александр Пушкин · 1833

  A novel in verse, built on a fourteen-line stanza Pushkin devised for it.

• Капитанская дочка

  Kapitanskaya dochka

  Александр Пушкин · 1836

  A short historical novel about the Pugachev rising; among the tightest and clearest prose of the century.

• Мёртвые души

  Myortvye dushi

  Николай Гоголь · 1842

  A man travels Russia buying up the names of dead serfs; the author burned the second part.

• Ревизор

  Revizor

  Николай Гоголь · 1836

  A comedy about a town that mistakes a drifter for an inspector sent from the capital.

• Герой нашего времени

  Geroy nashego vremeni

  Михаил Лермонтов · 1840

  Five stories out of chronological order, assembling Russian literature’s first superfluous man.

• Горе от ума

  Gore ot uma

  Александр Грибоедов · 1825

  A verse play banned in print during the author’s life yet circulated in manuscript; the source of a great many sayings.

• Шинель

  Shinel’

  Николай Гоголь · 1842

  A story about a copying clerk and his overcoat; the remark that all Russian literature came out of it refers to this.

• Медный всадник

  Mednyy vsadnik

  Александр Пушкин · 1837

  A narrative poem setting one ordinary man against the statue of Peter the Great and the flood of the city he built.

In the second half of the nineteenth century the Russian novel becomes something the whole world reads. The common subject is questions with no tidy answer: serfdom, faith, guilt, how one should live. Censorship pushed political argument into literature, and that, perversely, made literature weigh more. At the end of the period Chekhov shrinks it all into short stories and plays in which almost nothing happens.

• Преступление и наказание

  Prestuplenie i nakazanie

  Фёдор Достоевский · 1866

  A student kills in order to test a theory about himself; most of the book takes place inside his head.

• Война и мир

  Voyna i mir

  Лев Толстой · 1869

  Four families carried through the war with Napoleon, interleaved with chapters arguing about history.

• Анна Каренина

  Anna Karenina

  Лев Толстой · 1878

  Two parallel plots, one running to catastrophe and the other to ordinary life.

• Братья Карамазовы

  Brat’ya Karamazovy

  Фёдор Достоевский · 1880

  A parricide frames an argument about God; the Grand Inquisitor chapter is quoted on its own.

• Отцы и дети

  Ottsy i deti

  Иван Тургенев · 1862

  A clash between two generations, and the book that put the word nihilist into circulation.

• Обломов

  Oblomov

  Иван Гончаров · 1859

  The hero barely leaves his couch for the whole first part; his name became a common noun.

• Вишнёвый сад

  Vishnyovyy sad

  Антон Чехов · 1904

  Chekhov’s last play; he called it a comedy, the director staged a tragedy, and the argument has never ended.

• Левша

  Levsha

  Николай Лесков · 1881

  A tale told in a folk voice, full of invented words and puns; famously close to untranslatable.

Poetry returns to the centre after half a century of yielding to the novel, and for thirty years Russia has more major poets at once than at any other time. Then the revolution cuts the generation in two: half leave, half stay, and most of those who stayed did not survive the 1930s. Reading the period means reading both what was written and what was stopped.

• Двенадцать

  Dvenadtsat’

  Александр Блок · 1918

  A poem about twelve Red Guards walking through a blizzard; its ending is argued over to this day.

• Чётки

  Chyotki

  Анна Ахматова · 1914

  The collection that made Akhmatova’s name while she was still in her twenties: short, sharp love poems, and very readable.

• Сестра моя — жизнь

  Sestra moya — zhizn’

  Борис Пастернак · 1922

  A book of poems written over one summer in 1917; Pasternak was known as a poet long before he was known as a novelist.

• Петербург

  Peterburg

  Андрей Белый · 1913

  A modernist novel built on rhythm as its structure; usually shelved next to Joyce.

• Облако в штанах

  Oblako v shtanakh

  Владимир Маяковский · 1915

  A futurist poem set on the page in a stepped ladder to mark where the voice breaks.

• Мы

  My

  Евгений Замятин · 1924

  A dystopia printed abroad first; a direct influence on Orwell and Huxley.

• Господин из Сан-Франциско

  Gospodin iz San-Frantsisko

  Иван Бунин · 1915

  A novella about a rich man who dies on his travels; Bunin later became the first Russian to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.

• Стихи о Москве

  Stikhi o Moskve

  Марина Цветаева · 1916

  A cycle with broken syntax and dashes everywhere — Tsvetaeva is recognisable from the first line.

This is the period in which the date of publication and the date of writing are often decades apart. Many of the most important books were written for the drawer, circulated as typescripts passed from hand to hand — “самиздат” — or printed abroad. Reading by publication date therefore gets the order wrong; look at when a book was written. Alongside this an official literature continued, and some of it is very good.

• Мастер и Маргарита

  Master i Margarita

  Михаил Булгаков · 1967

  Finished around 1940 and printed in full only much later; probably the most loved Russian novel of the twentieth century.

• Один день Ивана Денисовича

  Odin den’ Ivana Denisovicha

  Александр Солженицын · 1962

  The first book to speak plainly about the camps that was openly printed in the Soviet Union, which was possible only for a few years.

• Тихий Дон

  Tikhiy Don

  Михаил Шолохов · 1940

  An epic of the Don Cossacks through war and civil war; it brought the Nobel Prize in 1965.

• Котлован

  Kotlovan

  Андрей Платонов · 1930

  Written in 1930 and printed sixty years later; its Russian is deliberately bent in a way no one else has matched.

• Жизнь и судьба

  Zhizn’ i sud’ba

  Василий Гроссман · 1980

  The manuscript was confiscated in 1961; a copy was hidden and taken abroad on microfilm.

• Колымские рассказы

  Kolymskie rasskazy

  Варлам Шаламов · 1978

  Stories of Kolyma by a man who spent seventeen years in the camps; the voice is cold and offers no consolation.

• Москва — Петушки

  Moskva — Petushki

  Венедикт Ерофеев · 1973

  A prose poem about a suburban train journey; it circulated underground and became endlessly quoted.

• Собачье сердце

  Sobach’e serdtse

  Михаил Булгаков · 1925

  Written in 1925 and printed in the Soviet Union in 1987; the 1988 film is now quoted as much as the book.

Censorship loosened and then tightened again in stages, while at the same time seventy years of banned books arrived on the market at once. Contemporary writing has therefore had to digest the past and find new subjects at the same time. A considerable share of today’s Russian-language authors live outside Russia, so the notion of a national literature is once again hard to draw a line around.

• Чапаев и Пустота

  Chapaev i Pustota

  Виктор Пелевин · 1996

  The civil war and a post-Soviet psychiatric ward laid over each other; the satirical voice of the 1990s.

• Время секонд хэнд

  Vremya sekond khend

  Светлана Алексиевич · 2013

  A book built entirely from ordinary people’s testimony; its author received the Nobel Prize in 2015.

• Лавр

  Lavr

  Евгений Водолазкин · 2012

  A novel set in medieval Rus’ that mixes layers of language from several eras.

• Зулейха открывает глаза

  Zuleykha otkryvaet glaza

  Гузель Яхина · 2015

  The story of a Tatar woman deported to Siberia; a first novel that sold very widely.

• Казус Кукоцкого

  Kazus Kukotskogo

  Людмила Улицкая · 2001

  A doctor’s family across the Soviet decades; Ulitskaya writes about ordinary life rather than politics.

• Время ночь

  Vremya noch’

  Людмила Петрушевская · 1992

  A grandmother’s diary, told in a relentless voice that spares no one, including the narrator.

• Generation «П»

  Generation «P»

  Виктор Пелевин · 1999

  A novel about the newly formed Russian advertising trade, thick with the slang and loanwords of the 1990s.

• Оправдание Острова

  Opravdanie Ostrova

  Евгений Водолазкин · 2020

  An invented chronicle of an island that never existed, written in several voices and time layers.