Russian Language Blog
Menu
Search

Tag Archives: Dostoevsky

Read Famous Opening Lines in Russian – Part II Posted by on May 28, 2015

We are continuing from last week’s post on reading famous Russian book beginnings. This time, let’s look at books likely to be known by Russian literature aficionados. Eugene Onegin (Евге́ний Оне́гин) Eugene Onegin is a famous rhymed novel by Alexander Pushkin (Алекса́ндр Пу́шкин). Several English translations have been done. While Pushkin tends to trail Tolstoy and Dostoevsky…

Continue Reading

The Return of «ибо»! Posted by on Feb 2, 2010

When in Moscow it is a rule to go for a stroll «на Красной площади» [on the Red Square], «ибо это делают все» [because everybody does that] «и туристы, и провинциалы» [both tourists and people from the provinces]. «Провинциал» means ‘provincial, backwoodsman; unsophisticated person’. The female version of the word is «провинциалка». When I first…

Continue Reading

And the ‘Name of Russia’ is… Posted by on Dec 29, 2008

…АлександрНевский [Alexander Nevsky]! If you remember (and have been a reader of this blog for long enough – thanks, by the way!) I wrote about the Russian people voting in the national contest/TV show «ИмяРоссии» [Name of Russia] in a post of mine back in July [ИмяРоссии: who’s your pick?]. Well, ladies and gentlemen, yesterday…

Continue Reading

A Great Russian Writer: Варлам Шаламов [Varlam Shalamov] Posted by on Dec 7, 2008

Though it’s been over a month since I finished reading his masterpiece «Колымскиерассказы» [“The Kolyma Tales”] I have not yet been able to let go of him as a writer. Not only the fate of Варлам Шаламов [Varlam Shalamov] but also his person has stuck on me for good. I wanted to write about him…

Continue Reading