With his translation, Michael R. Katz makes available the first bestselling novel in Russia, Faddei Bulgarin's social satire Ivan Vyzhigin (1829). The novel is an amusing picaresque filled with local color and comical portraits, narrated by its hero, an orphaned peasant who relates his many adventures as a young man. The book is remarkable for its accurate descriptions of nineteenth-century Russian day-to-day reality: the clothes, food, surroundings, and characters that Ivan Vyzhigin encounters. Its publication ushered in the age of prose in nineteenth-century Russian literature, and Bulgarin was hailed by Pushkin as a major prose writer.
As William Mills Todd III notes in his introduction, Ivan Vyzhigin opens a window onto what Russians were reading between the late eighteenth century and the 1917 Revolution. Along with Todd's introduction, Katz's annotations provide literary, historical, and cultural context.
Preface to Novel by Faddei Bulgarin
1. The Little Orphan, or a Portraitof Humanity in the Manner of theFlemish
School
2. Mr. Gologordovsky and His Family
3. Love
4. Matchmaking
5. The Ball and Abduction
6. Marriage and Parting with theNewlyweds
7. A Rich Yid. Sources of His Wealth.
8. Meeting a Civil Servant, Returningfrom a Certain Place, with the OtherOne
Going to a Certain Place. I Leavethe Yid.
9. An Unexpected Meeting.A Transformation. My Aunt. My Education.
10. Examination in Boarding School.A Tempter. My Aunt's New Friend.
Something Like First Love.Departure from Moscow.
11. I Get to Know Vorovatin Better.An Overheard Conversation.Premonitions. A
Police Captain.
12. An Emancipated Man. A Lunatic.Deceived in Love.
13. A Prisoner of the Kirghiz. A Kirghiz Philosopher, Arsalan-Sultan.I
Become a Horseman.
14. Arsalan-Sultan's Account of His Stayin Russia
15. Consequences of a Hard Winter inthe Steppe. The Attack. A JoyfulReunion
with My First Benefactor.
16. Milovidin's Tale. A MoralAutomaton and His Housekeeper.An Old Maid's
Family. A Panoramaof Moscow Society. A FriendlyQuadrille. A Russian
Foreigner.Society at the Spa. A Viewof Venice.
17. The Resolution of the KirghizElders Concerning My Reward. The
Continuation of Milovidin's Tale.A Duel. The Flight. The Apostate Yid.
Arrival in Constantinople. What IsPera? Betrayal. Slavery. Liberation.
18. Departure from the Steppe.The Police Chief Once Again!Collectors of
Transit Dues.The Officials' Feast.
19.
20. A Landownerthe Kind We NeedMore of in Russia. Judge the Flock byIts
Priest.
21. The Audacious LandownerSilaMinich Glazdurin
22. A Retired Soldier's Story. Arrival in Moscow. My Aunt's History. I
FindMy Mother. The Seducer. Murderers.
23. The Conclusion of AdelaidaPetrovna's Story. Marriage.Reeducation. The
Free Life. The Fatal Consequences of Negligence. I Enterthe World. Paying
Visits.
24. A Picture of High Society. Meetingwith a Kind Enemy. Oh, Human
Weakness!
25. Grunya's Story. Friendship witha Clever Actress, or The Shortest,Surest,
and Nicest Path to Ruin.
26. Deliver Us from Evil! A Lesson inDaytime Piracy. Advice from an Old
Soldier. I Come into Money Again.
27. False Gamblers. A Letter fromMilovidin. He Located HisWife. Petronella's
Repentance. Sequestration in Poland, or Checkand Mate to Creditors. The Death
ofMr. Gologordovsky. Mr. Pochtivsky,His Other Son-in-Law.
28. The Young Nobleman. Glupashkin.An Aficionado of Dramatic Art.Disorder in
the Robbers' Den.Misfortune. Grunya's Flight. Honestyin Wolf's Clothing, or
Don't Judge by Appearances. The Egoist.
29. My Intention to Marry. Official Arithmetic. Acquaintance with aWealthy
Tax Farmer. A Feast in theHome of the Merchant Moshnin. His Family. Domestic
Theater.
30. Failure in Matchmaking. Lettersfrom the Kirghiz Steppe and fromParis.
Departure for the Army. War. Distinction. Return to Moscow.
31. Retirement. Departure for Petersburg.The Difference between
Petersburgand Moscow Society. A WickedPlan. The Unfortunate Olinka. I Am
Imprisoned. It's Possible to Be HappyEven in a Disastrous Situation.
32. A Savior. It's the Crime, Not thePlace, That Dishonors a Man. A Just
Punishment for a Villain. A Secret Revealed. Last Will and Testament.Love and
Friendship. The Lawsuit. Solicitors. Secretaries. A Visit tothe Judges. There
Are Good People Everywhere.
Michael R. Katz received his doctorate from Oxford. He taught at Williams College, the University of Texas at Austin, and Middlebury College. He has written two monographs and has translated more than twenty-five Russian novels into English. William Mills Todd III is Research Professor and Harry Tuchman Levin Professor of Comparative Literature Emeritus at Harvard University and author of Fiction and Society in the Age of Pushkin.
