Sleepwalker in a Fog
by Tatjana Tolstaja
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By "the most original, tactile, luminous voice in Russian prose today" (Joseph Brodsky), Sleepwalker in a Fog is a collection of seven stories and a novella set in contemporary Russia. Here is Denisov, who fears his greatest accomplishment in life will be the treatise he wrote and tore up. He is betrothed to Lora, an incessant talker who dreams of having a fluffy tail. We also read of Natasha, who searches Leningrad and her memory for her lost love; of Dmitry Ilich's elaborate seduction of show more Olga Mikhailovna; and more. In the tradition of such writers as Gogol and Chekhov, Tatyana Tolstaya transforms ordinary lives into something magical and strange. Translated from the Russian by Jamey Gambrell From the Trade Paperback edition. show lessTags
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Aunt Zina, Lyonechka's aunt, not yet suspecting what a dirty trick her her nephew was planning to play on her and her well-being, said to Judy, "Chin up, daughter. Life is hard on everyone." But her husband, Uncle Zhenya, whose diplomatic career was taking off - and who was expecting appointment to the corner of the African continent opposite Judy's at any moment, as it so happened - did not approve of contact with the foreign citizen, even though she was homeless. As the hour of the final paperwork on his appointment grew nearer, he became more strict and vigilant, so as not to take a false step in any direction.Thus, he forbade Aunt Zina to subscribe to Novyi Mir, remembering that its poisonous aura had not yet evaporated; he crossed show more all suspiciously surnamed acquaintances out of his address book, and hesitating, even crossed out a certain Nurmukhammedov (which he bitterly regretted later, when, straining his eyes, he held the page up to the light in an attempt to restore the telephone number, since the guy turned out to be nothing but a car repair swindler); and in the last, crisis-fraught week, he even smashed all the jars of imported food in the house and threw them in the incinerator, including the Bulgarian apple jam, and was already eyeing products from the other republics, but Aunt Zina protected the beet horseradish with her body.
A book of short stories first published in 1991, and presumably set during the last years of the USSR. The Russians of the stories are used to queues, shortages, and bureaucratic red tape, and mostly live in communal flats, although some have dachas that they can escape to in the summer. There is a touch of the grotesque and gothic in most of these stories, but only "Serafim" is truly a fantasy story (and even there the protagonist may be mad rather than the ethereal creature that he sees himself as being). My favourites were the title story and "Limpopo". show less
A book of short stories first published in 1991, and presumably set during the last years of the USSR. The Russians of the stories are used to queues, shortages, and bureaucratic red tape, and mostly live in communal flats, although some have dachas that they can escape to in the summer. There is a touch of the grotesque and gothic in most of these stories, but only "Serafim" is truly a fantasy story (and even there the protagonist may be mad rather than the ethereal creature that he sees himself as being). My favourites were the title story and "Limpopo". show less
A couple of the short stories in this collection are amazing-- and none disappoint. Tolstaya can move from almost factual description to magical imaginings (?-- unfortunately, I have no better way to elaborate, since "magical realism" just doesn't fit) with no problem at all.
Tremendous promise in some stores. A ferocious beginning, with as much irritated energy per page as the best Henry Miller. But the energy is highest when she starts. After the opening scenes, the stories wander and flag.
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Russian Literature
184 works; 35 members
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60+ Works 2,028 Members
Tatyana Tolstaya---"the most original, tactile, luminous voice in Russian prose today," according to Joseph Brodsky---worked at various publishing jobs after graduating from Leningrad University and appeared on the Moscow literary scene in 1983 with the favorably received story "Loves Me, Loves Me Not." Her first collection, On the Golden Porch show more (1988), proved extremely popular. Soon afterward she came to the United States on the first of a series of visiting university appointments and has plunged actively into cultural life in this country: She writes for the New York Review of Books, the New Republic, The New Yorker, and other magazines, as well as for publications in Russia. Her forte is the short story, her writing distinguished by exuberance, a talent for description, a comic sensibility, and more than a touch of the surreal. For one reviewer, "the discrepancy between fondest desires and disappointing reality" lies at the core of her writing, which is "a fiction of vast possibility, propelled not by plot, but by a narrative voice that imaginatively conveys the ambiguities of her characters' inner lives" (Baltimore Morning Sun). Sleepwalker in a Fog (1991) is her second book. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Sleepwalker in a Fog
- Original publication date
- 1990
Classifications
- Genres
- General Fiction, Fiction and Literature
- DDC/MDS
- 891.73 — Literature & rhetoric Asian Literature East Indo-European and Celtic literatures Russian and East Slavic languages Russian fiction
- LCC
- PG3489 .O476 .A24 — Language and Literature Slavic languages and literatures. Baltic languages. Albanian language Slavic. Baltic. Albanian Russian literature Individual authors and works 1961-2000
- BISAC
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- 177
- Popularity
- 184,312
- Reviews
- 3
- Rating
- (3.68)
- Languages
- 6 — Dutch, English, French, Hebrew, Norwegian, Spanish
- Media
- Paper
- ISBNs
- 11
- ASINs
- 1
