“Everything was different back then, but everything was the same.” Chapter Summaries Bricks and Mortar by Clemens Meyer is a fragmented, multi-perspective novel set in an unnamed German […]
Russian literature
My Universities
“Life is always better where people are fighting for their rights.” My Universities is the third and final installment of Maxim Gorky’s autobiographical trilogy, following My Childhood and […]
Russian literature
My Apprenticeship
“Life is always surprising us—not by its rich, seething complexity, which is inexhaustible, but because, in spite of all its squalor and monotony, it sometimes throws up something […]
Russian literature
The Lower Depths
“Man! It’s great! It sounds… proud! Man! You’ve got to respect man!” The Lower Depths by Maxim Gorky is a play set in a dilapidated overnight shelter, where […]
Russian literature
On the Eve
“There are moments in life, in love, when…” Chapter 1 The novel opens in the summer of 1853 at a country estate near Moscow. Elena Nikolaevna Stakhova, a […]
Russian literature
Anna Karenina
“Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.” — Epigraph to Anna Karenina Part 1 The novel opens with the famous line: “All happy families are alike; […]