Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk: Selected Stories

"From Nikolai Leskov's enormous and varied literary output over some forty years, we have selected six works which represent each period and the contrasting genres and subjects of his fiction. Two of these stories - 'The Unmercenary Engineers' and 'The Innocent Prudentius' - have never been translated into English before. Of the other four, 'Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk' received a definitive, accurate translation by Robert Chandler some years ago, and because of the British film version, as well as Shostakovich's opera, this has become the best-known work by Leskov in the English-speaking world, as well as Leskov's most approachable story. William Edgerton's version of 'The Steel Flea' is, like Chandler's 'Lady Macbeth', another rare example of a perfectly translated Leskov story, albeit in a much lighter vein. The other two stories, 'The Sealed Angel' and 'The Enchanted Wanderer' are, by general consensus, as well as Leskov's own estimation, his greatest works. Earlier English versions have been inadequate:the new versions in this collection not only correct mistakes by previous translators, but are based on Leskov's original text, not the censor's deletions, and aim, we believe successfully, at capturing the peculiarly enchanting qualities of Leskov's narratives." Leskov has been overlooked outside Russia, where the general critical opinion is that he is a writer who deserves the same status as Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, or Chekhov. This selection should go a long way to restoring Leskov to the ranking he merits"--
A new collection of the renowned Russian writer's best short work, including a masterful translation of the famous title story.Nikolai Leskov is the strangest of the great Russian writers of the nineteenth century. His work is closer to the oral traditions of narrative than that of his contemporaries, and served as the inspiration for Walter Benjamin's great essay "The Storyteller," in which Benjamin contrasts the plotty machinations of the modern novel with the strange, melancholy, but also worldly-wise yarns of an older, slower era that Leskov remained in touch with. The title story is a tale of illicit love and multiple murder that could easily find its way into a Scottish ballad and did go on to become the most popular of Dmitri Shostakovich's operas. The other stories, all but one newly translated, present the most focused and finely rendered collection of this indispensable writer currently available in English.