Fyodor Dostoyevsky
1) White Nights
Also known as "The Beggar Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree," this is a Christmas-time short story. The author begins by telling us he has made this story up, but that even so, he thinks it must have actually happened—on Christmas Eve, in a great town, at a time of terrible frost.
The boy of the title, "six years old or younger," awakens in a frigid cellar, reaches for his mother, and finds she is "as cold
...The story opens around the holiday season of Easter, with the narrator wandering the prison camp. After a Polish political prisoner utters his hatred for the low bred convicts (both the Pole and the narrator are nobles), the narrator heads back to the bunks to rest. As he lies in his bed, he vividly recalls a memory from his early childhood. While playing near a birch wood, he had heard the shout "Wolf! Wolf!" Panicked, the boy runs away
...6) Bobok
The story relates the events that befall one Ivan Matveich when he, his wife Elena Ivanovna, and the narrator visit the Passage on Nevsky Avenue to see a crocodile that has been put on display by a German entrepreneur. After teasing the crocodile, Ivan Matveich is swallowed alive. He finds the inside of the crocodile to be quite comfortable, and the animal's owner refuses to allow it to be cut open, in spite of the pleas from Elena Ivanovna.
...8) Polzunkov
Excerpt:
"I began to scrutinize the man closely. Even in his exterior there was something so peculiar that it compelled one, however far away one's thoughts might be, to fix one's eyes upon him and go off into the most irrepressible roar of laughter. That is what happened to me."
Humiliated and Insulted also known in English as The Insulted and the Injured.
Natasha leaves her parents' home and runs away with Alyosha (prince Alexey) – the son of Prince Valkovsky. As a result of his pain, her father, Nikolai, curses her. The only friend that remains by Natasha's side is Ivan – her childhood friend who is deeply in love with her, and whom Natasha has rejected despite their being
...10) A Little Hero
Excerpt:
"At that time I was nearly eleven, I had been sent in July to spend the holiday in a village near Moscow with a relation of mine called T., whose house was full of guests, fifty, or perhaps more.... I don't remember, I didn't count. The house was full of noise and gaiety. It seemed as though it were a continual holiday, which would never end. It seemed as though our host had taken a vow to squander all his vast fortune
..."A Nasty Story," also translated as "An Unpleasant Predicament", is a satirical short story by Fyodor Dostoevsky concerning the escapades of a Russian civil servant. One of Dostoevsky's more obscure works, it was written and published in 1862 following his brief tour of Spain. (from Wikipedia)
Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky is today best remembered for his longer works, including the sprawling philosophical epic The Brothers Karamazov. Although his shorter works of fiction have received less attention, critics and fans alike recognize them as thought-provoking, complex and elegant. This volume, which collects two of Dostoyevsky's novellas, is a perfect introduction to the writer's oeuvre.