Enjoyable read.

Like many vanity press publications, this collection of Tolstoy short stories leaves much to be desired. Andrew Barger, the editor and translator of the stories, has attempted to provide an accessible yet apparently scholarly edition of twenty of the great Russian author's short stories. Are these truly the "greatest" of Tolstoy's short fiction works? It is impossible to tell, as Barger provides no criteria for his selection. The introduction by Barger is mildly informative, but brief. Following that is a 30-page "biograpy" [sic] of Tolstoy, originally written in 1902 by one R. Nisbet Bain. In typical turn-of-the-century style, the biographical information is highly ornamented and overly flattering. According to the biographical information, Tolstoy is still alive! In short, it is not an acceptable, impartial biography. And by the way, the heading on every page of the biographical section says "Biograpy of Leo Tolstoy." Just an example of the poor editing found in this book.

The stories themselves are also poorly edited. Specifically, Barger changes tense from past to present constantly. If this is indeed a feature of Russian literature, then I believe this should be explained if his goal is to translate literally. Otherwise, the translator's job is to make the story readable and enjoyable to English readers, and in this Barger has failed. The stories are littered with footnotes, but the footnotes are not helpful. In most cases, they provide the Russian word for words that Barger has already translated. Barger's style is awkward and somewhat clumsy, and although the stories are charming, I believe they're harmed by the translations.

In short, I cannot recommend this book unless you are trying to find an easy way to access some of Tolstoy's short stories. ( )

Wonderful, wonderful. Tolstoy is usually difficult for me to get into—maybe it’s because all his books are SO long. But—for the Goldilocks in all of us—these stories are just right. I enjoyed them tremendously. Mr. Barger (the editor) does a very fine job with the annotations.