318:. A girl brought up in the remote forests, untouched by civilization. An "idealized, romantic creation, the archetypal daughter of nature, as beautiful and free as the virgin forests to which she belongs" (Luker). Delightfully attractive as she is, Olesya is a mysterious creature acutely sensitive to the ever-changing moods of the forest around her. Her oneness with the wild beauty of nature lends her supernatural powers that Timofeyevich finds disturbing and sinister. She possesses the gifts of prophecy and hypnosis, and can unerringly foretell death. "Framed by the quietly evocative beauty of Polesye, his miraculous heroine stands out in brilliant relief against the somber hostility around her." (Luker)
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village for alleged sorcery. The narrator, who is deeply intrigued and touched by the girl's natural beauty, intelligence, insight and indeed some uncanny talents, becomes a frequent visitor, much for the displeasure of the old woman. Ivan and Olesya become close friends, then lovers, sharing deep and passionate mutual affection, doomed from the start - as Olesya's cards had foretold her.
296:, "a shadowy but attractive figure whose ready irony at his own expense endears him to us," "a noble- hearted but weak-willed urban animal whose hesitant nature contrasts sharply with the bold decisiveness of Olesya's rural temperament." (Luker) Olesya the fortuneteller characterizes him neatly: "...though you're a good man, you're weak ... not a man of your word."
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that our souls belong"). Ivan concedes that such a forfeit would indeed give him some satisfaction. After the service Olesya gets mobbed and beaten by the locals. Tearing off, she issues some threats. Next day hail falls and destroys the harvest. Horrified with the news brought by his servant, Ivan
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which came out in the Moscow Book
Publishers. Here Kuprin removed footnotes explaining details of the local dialect and changed several foreign words for their Russian analogues. Of the several minor additions one is of note: to Yarmola's words describing Manuylikha (Olesya's grandmother) "... But
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newspaper (Nos. 300, 301, 304, 305–308, 313–315, 318) in late 1898 (October 30 - November 17). This original version of the work, subtitled "From the
Memories of Volhynia," came out with an introduction alleging that this was the story told to the author by an Ivan Timofeevich Poroshin, now an old
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Both women live in constant fear of repression from the local authorities (their little house has been granted to them by a former landlord and now is to be retrieved by the new one) and aggression from the locals. Ivan manages to bribe a local policemen into leaving them alone for a while, but
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Ivan
Timofeevich seeks restorative peace in Polesye, but gets only intolerable boredom, from which the prospect of meeting a real witch offers a welcome diversion. Once, having lost his way in the woods, he hits upon a hut where abide an old woman and her granddaughter, hated and feared in the
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and
Polesye cycle, this poetic story of the love between an urban intellectual and a beautiful country girl expanded into a full novelette of a significance far surpassing that of the other regional tales." The story was one of Kuprin's favorites. Referring once to both
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was written. Kuprin considered several months spent in
Volhynia and Polesye to be most beneficial of his life. "There I absorbed my most vigorous, noble, extensive, and fruitful impressions... and came to know the Russian language and landscape," he remembered.
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has never been explained. "It could be surmised that the magazine leaders disagreed with the way the peasants' mob (which tried to lynch Olesya) was portrayed there. Depicting the rural people as an ignorant, aggressive and cruel mob totally contradicted the
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Before the parting which proves to be imminent (Ivan proposes, but the girl declines), Olesya, just to please her lover suggests that she'd go to the church - something she avoided all her life ("for it's for
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According to the Kuprin scholar
Nicholas Luker, "Olesya is the most charming of Kuprin's rural tales. Though meant at first to be only part of the
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Pitlyar, I. Notes and commentaries. The Works of A.I.Kuprin in 9 volumes. Pravda
Publishers. The Ogonyok Library. Moscow, 1964. Vol.2, pp. 479-494
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and his later work "The River of Life," he said: "There is life in it and freshness and... more of my soul than in my other tales."
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hurries to the forest hut only to see it abandoned, with just cheap red beads left to him hanging on a window as a memory token.
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figure - the traditional witch of
Russian fairy tales" - she proves to be an intelligent, although rather unpleasant woman.
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The story is autobiographical. "All this has happened to me," Kuprin wrote mysteriously toward the end of his life.
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234:(No 9, September 1898), "The Backwoods" was intended as the first work in the cycle, to be followed by
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In 1905 the novel came out as a separate edition, published by M.O. Wolf's
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cycle, did much to build Kuprin's literary reputation and warranted his move to
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man, as he recalled his youthful love for the "real
Polesye sorceress" Olesya.
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Kiselyov, B.M. Speaking of Kuprin // Rasskazy о Kuprine. Moscow, 1964, p. 175.
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In 1897 Kuprin went first to Volhynia Province in the northwest
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Afanasyev, V.N. Aleksandr Ivanovich Kuprin. Moscow, 1960, p. 43
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was at the time propagating," biographer I.Pitlyar suggested.
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in 1901, this delay leaving the whole cycle incomplete.)
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written in late 1897 – early 1898 and serialized in
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249:The reason why Olesya was rejected by
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365:Luker, Nicholas J. L. (1978).
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188:Olesya was first published in
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16:Novelette by Alexander Kuprin
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369:. Boston, G K Hall, USA
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499:The Garnet Bracelet
216:" - "...or perhaps
35:Original title
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525:On a Moonlit Night
260:Russkoye Bogatstvo
251:Russkoye Bogatstvo
231:Russkoye Bogatstvo
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532:The Inquiry
475:In the Dark
224:Controversy
190:Kiyevlyanin
555:Categories
373:2014-05-01
323:References
306:Manuylikha
288:Characters
240:Kievlyanin
156:Background
121:Kievlyanin
58:Kievlyanin
310:Baba Yaga
203:In 1908,
93:Paperback
53:Publisher
541:" (1906)
534:" (1894)
520:" (1889)
467:Novellas
448:The Duel
256:Narodnik
145:Volhynia
89:Hardback
45:Language
456:The Pit
300:Yarmola
266:Summary
218:Gypsies
214:Katsaps
184:History
166:Belarus
162:Ukraine
134:Polesye
108:Russian
87:print (
48:Russian
20:Olesya
527:(1893)
502:(1911)
494:(1898)
491:Olesya
486:(1896)
483:Moloch
478:(1893)
459:(1915)
451:(1905)
440:Novels
316:Olesya
236:Olesya
205:Olesya
174:Olesya
170:Ryazan
150:Olesya
130:Olesya
103:Olesya
91:&
61:(1898)
25:Author
112:Олеся
39:Олеся
126:1898
71:1898
281:Him
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351:^
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425:e
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