These seemingly undistinguished possessions, stuffed into a worn-out suitcase, take on a riotously funny life of their own as Dovlatov inventories the circumstances under which he acquired them, occasioning a brilliant series of interconnected tales: A poplin shirt evokes the bittersweet story of a courtship and marriage, while a pair of boots (of the kind only the Nomenklatura can afford) calls up the hilarious conclusion to an official banquet. Some driving gloves—remnants of Dovlatov’s short-lived acting career—share space with neon-green crepe socks, reminders of a failed black-market scam. And in curious juxtaposition, the belt from a prison guard’s uniform lies next to a stained jacket that once belonged to Fernand Léger.Imbued with a comic nostalgia overlaid with Dovlatov’s characteristically dry wit, The Suitcase is an intensely human, delightfully ironic novel from “the finest Soviet satirist to appear in English since Vladimir Voinovich.”

    His insights into the works of Dostoyevsky, Mandelstam, Platonov, as well as non-Russian poets Auden, Cavafy and Montale are brilliant. While the Western popularity of many other Third Wavers has been stunted by their inability to write in English, Brodsky consumed the language to attain a "closer proximity" to poets such as Auden. The book, which won a National Book Critics Circle Award, opens and closes with revealing autobiographical essay.

    After leaving the Soviet Union following a series of unsatisfying relationships, Marusya Tatarovich quickly becomes the center of the Russian community in Queens, New York, but finds that it mirrors in many ways the community she left behind

    Between 1929 and 1932 the Soviet Communist Party struck a double blow at the Russian peasantry: dekulakization, the dispossession and deportation of millions of peasant families, and collectivization, the abolition of private ownership of land and the concentration of the remaining peasants in party-controlled "collective" farms. This was followed in 1932-33 by a "terror-famine," inflicted by the State on the collectivized peasants of the Ukraine and certain other areas by setting impossibly high grain quotas, removing every other source of food, and preventing help from outside--even from other areas of the Soviet Union--from reaching the starving populace. The death toll resulting from the actions described in this book was an estimated 14.5 million--more than the total number of deaths for all countries in World War I.Ambitious, meticulously researched, and lucidly written, The Harvest of Sorrow is a deeply moving testament to those who died, and will register in the Western consciousness a sense of the dark side of this century's history.

    

    Received opinion says that there are two Tolstoys, the pre-conversion artist and the post-conversion religious thinker and prophet, but Professor Gustafson argues convincingly that the man is not two, but one.Originally published in 1986.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

    One of our foremost historians of Russia dramatically recounts the story of how the Russian people lived through the terrible gales of war and revolution that swept their land between 1914 and 1918; based on documents up to now inaccessible.

    

    A collection of Russian folk tales, including: Marya the Fair, Plait of Golden Hair / Marya Morevna / Sister Alyonushka and Brother Ivanushka / Wee Little Havroshechka / Altyn-Saka the Golden Knucklebone / The Golden Cup / Hiysi's Millstone / How the Rich Man Was Taught a Lesson / The Girl and the Moon Man / Kotura, Lord of the Winds.

    The central theme of the book is the shaping and evolution of the identity of these people, focusing on the history of the first non-Christian and non-Slavic people incorporated into the Russian state.

    Throughout his book, Kropotkin ties his interpretation of the course of the revolution to the continuous stream of popular action, which he sees as beginning long before the revolution itself. Volume One of The Great French Revolution illustrates clearly the regenerative power of the mass of the people and passes on an important message to future generations and future revolutions.

    

    

    

    

    Settlers of all nationalities went there to seek their fortune, among them Jews who came to form one of the largest, wealthiest, and most culturally fertile Jewish communities in Europe. This history of Jewish Odessa traces the rise of that community from its foundation in 1794 to the pogroms of 1881 that erupted after the assassination of Alexander II. Zipperstein emphasizes Jewish acculturation: changes in behavior, attitude, and ideology as reflected in schools, synagogues, newspapers, and other institutions of the period. The patterns set then affected the community's cultural development well into the second decade of the twentieth century. More a modern metropolis than any other Russian city with a significant Jewish population, Odessa offers a window into the diversity of Russian Jewish experience.

    

    Mark, haunted by terrible memories of the Russian Civil War and of the beautiful woman he loved and lost, arrives in Shanghai to investigate and rebuild a collapsed railway bridge; but he comes under extreme pressure from Alexandra's ruthless father to falsify his report, and at the site of the bridge itself has to contend with a violent colleague, and hostile coolies who believe that the place is protected by legendary dragons.As Mark struggles to complete the bridge, he has to fight his attraction for Alexandra, who alternately angers and delights him, and with the reappearance in his life of Marie, and aristocratic Russian emigree, he finds himself painfully torn between the rival claims of his past and present loves. But personal troubles are swept aside as the three are tragically caught up in the rapid advance of the Kuomintang revolutionary army and violence intrudes shockingly on all their lives.Based on true accounts and memoirs of the Shanghai emergency of 1927, THE BRIDGE OF A HUNDRED DRAGONS is a gripping story of love, heroism and tortured human relationships set against the background of an exotic and mysterious country.

    I absolutely love her books, she really makes the characters come to life." - 5 STARS"A really enjoyable read; difficult to put down!" - 5 STARS"Good book, well written, very entertaining and another one to add to my collection of Mary Jane Staples, well done Mary..." - 5 STARS******************************CAN THE SECRETS OF THE PAST BE FORGOTTEN? 1925: Berlin. Englishman Philip Gibson, in Germany to seek the answers to a tantalising mystery surrounding the Grand Duchess Anastasia, witnesses an attack on Natasha, a young woman who has fled from Russia.When Philip takes the fragile, lonely Natasha in to help her recuperate, she quickly falls for his kind and caring nature. But when further threats are made on her life, Philip finds himself at the heart of another mystery.What is it that links Natasha to this mysterious, damaged woman? And will her love for Philip survive the secrets that will be unearthed?

    The author chronicles his work with the FBI in uncovering the Rosenberg spy network, including Judi

    

    

    Professor Martin reconstructs the fur-trade network of each centre (including Kiev, Novgorod and Moscow) and examines the changes they experienced. She shows how aggressive principalities enhanced their political authority through manipulation of such factors as fur resources and trade routes: thus the mid-sixteenth-century supremacy of Muscovy was based upon both political advantage and monopolisation of the networks of the fur trade. Quantitative analysis of the available data substantiates this conclusion: control over the trade of those 'lands of darkness' mentioned in contemporary Islamic texts was of fundamental importance to the political development of medieval Russia.