September 01, 2021 The Heat By Darya Grebenshchikova There’s no doing without hay in the village. The cows eat it, and the sheep, and the hens need loads of it for their nests. And it comes in handy for people too, when they stuff their mattresses with it and lie on them forevermore, because the scent is just marvelous. Agriculture Rural Life
July 01, 2021 Kvass By Darya Grebenshchikova Our old gals in the village cast a wary eye on all food from the store, because who knows what they’ve got in there? Food & Drink Rural Life
September 01, 2020 Life is Just a Bowl of... Raspberries? By Darya Grebenshchikova When you are deep in the woods, enjoying a day of raspberry picking with friends, anything is possible. Humor Rural Life
July 01, 2020 The Thimble By Darya Grebenshchikova A woman returns to the village of her birth and an unlikely and fateful connection ensues. Culture Humor Rural Life
November 01, 2019 Grandpa Cuckoo By Darya Grebenshchikova What do you do with a thief and miscreant who just won’t stop thieving? Why, send him off to St. Petersburg of course.
July 01, 2019 Nikolayev's Birthday By Darya Grebenshchikova It was Nikolayev’s birthday, which in ordinary years would always start bright and early... but this was no ordinary year... Customs Humor Rural Life
January 01, 2019 A Winter's Tale (mostly about valenki) By Darya Grebenshchikova In Russia, valenki are as near as you can get to the country's number-one footwear after regular leather boots. Customs Humor Rural Life
November 01, 2018 People's Court By Darya Grebenshchikova In which the Rural Council takes up the case of “The Conduct of Nikolayev, N. N.” Law Rural Life
May 01, 2018 Avdotya and the District Medic By Darya Grebenshchikova When the district medic comes around, the stage is set for a skirmish between modern and traditional medicine. Rural Life
September 01, 2017 Bath Day in Sheshurino By Darya Grebenshchikova “On Saturdays, smoke drifts over the village. The banyas are being heated.” Let’s go! Culture Customs Rural Life
July 01, 2017 Raspberry Beetles By Darya Grebenshchikova It is surprisingly simple (in certain circumstances) to mix up homebrew with other, less harmful things. Humor Rural Life
March 01, 2017 Nikolayev and Lyuska By Darya Grebenshchikova “Nikolayev hated the cat, wet socks, and his mother-in-law.” Rural Life
November 01, 2021 to November 30, 2021 Yuri Gorbachev's 18th Annual Exhibition at the Byrne Gallery in Middleburg, Virginia The Byrne Gallery | Middleburg, VA Susan Byrne and Bill Byrne are celebrating their Gallery's 26th anniversary this year in Middleburg with a celebration and exhibition of the vivid oil and enamel paintings of internationally-acclaimed artist Yuri Gorbachev. Art Exhibit
October 15, 2021 to April 03, 2022 Icons for Our Time: Orthodox Art from Around the World Museum of Russian Icons | Clinton, MA Fifteen contemporary icons from fifteen countries explore iconography today. Presented in celebration of the museum's 15th Anniversary. Art Exhibit
Murder and the Muse KGB Chief Andropov has tapped Matyushkin to solve a brazen jewel heist from Picasso’s wife at the posh Metropole Hotel. But when the case bleeds over into murder, machinations, and international intrigue, not everyone is eager to see where the clues might lead.
Life Stories: Original Fiction By Russian Authors The Life Stories collection is a nice introduction to contemporary Russian fiction: many of the 19 authors featured here have won major Russian literary prizes and/or become bestsellers. These are life-affirming stories of love, family, hope, rebirth, mystery and imagination, masterfully translated by some of the best Russian-English translators working today. The selections reassert the power of Russian literature to affect readers of all cultures in profound and lasting ways. Best of all, 100% of the profits from the sale of this book are going to benefit Russian hospice—not-for-profit care for fellow human beings who are nearing the end of their own life stories.
Murder at the Dacha Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin has a problem. Several, actually. Not the least of them is the fact that a powerful Soviet boss has been murdered, and Matyushkin's surly commander has given him an unreasonably short time frame to close the case.
Survival Russian Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.
Red Star Tales: A Century of Russian and Soviet Science Fiction For over 100 years, most of the science fiction produced by the world’s largest country has been beyond the reach of Western readers. This new collection changes that, bringing a large body of influential works into the English orbit.
Resilience: Life Stories of Centenarians Born in the Year of Revolution Call it resilience, grit, or just perseverance – it takes a special sort of person to have survived the last 100 years of Russian and Soviet history.
Resilience ~ The Russian Version (Переживем) Call it resilience, grit, or just perseverance – it takes a special sort of person to have survived the last 100 years of Russian and Soviet history.
Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography This astonishingly gripping autobiography by the founder of the Russian Women’s Death Battallion in World War I is an eye-opening documentary of life before, during and after the Bolshevik Revolution.
East of the Sun: The Epic Conquest and Tragic History of Siberia The very word Siberia evokes a history and reputation as awesome as it is enthralling. In this acclaimed book on Russia’s conquest of its eastern realms, Benson Bobrick offers a story that is both rich and subtle, broad and deep.
Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.
Russia Rules From the shores of the White Sea to Moscow and the Northern Caucasus, Russian Rules is a high-speed thriller based on actual events, terrifying possibilities, and some really stupid decisions.
The Frogs Who Begged for a Tsar The fables of Ivan Krylov are rich fonts of Russian cultural wisdom and experience – reading and understanding them is vital to grasping the Russian worldview. This new edition of 62 of Krylov’s tales presents them side-by-side in English and Russian. The wonderfully lyrical translations by Lydia Razran Stone are accompanied by original, whimsical color illustrations by Katya Korobkina.
May 26, 2016 Two Miracles of Russian Love Poetry By Anatoly Liberman On the occasion of Pushkin's birthday, we offer a post on the challenge of translating his most famous love lyrics, "Я вас любил," with a bonus look at Innokenty Annensky's "Среди миров." Literature
March 15, 2017 Who Invented the Ancient Slavic Gods, and Why? By Kasya Denisevich How it was that in the eighteenth century Russian mythology was trumped-up in the Western manner? Who wanted it? And where did we get Lel, Yarilo and Zimtserla? We explain everything you'd want to know about Russian fakelore. Culture History Literature Religion
April 23, 2014 Peace, Land, Bread By Eugenia Sokolskaya Peace! Land! Bread! This was the battle cry of the 1917 October Revolution (old calendar) that changed the history of Russia and indeed the entire world. Since the time of Ivan the Terrible, the tsars concentrated on centralization of their power and control. The most common way of doing this was to take power away from the nobility, appeasing them by giving them dominion over their land and workers. This soon developed into the oppressive, slave-style condition known as serfdom. History
September 01, 2021 Profiles in Courage By Paul E. Richardson It takes something special in a human being to create a thing from scratch, to see a slab of stone and carve it into a sculpture, to see an empty storefront and turn it into a store, to sketch out a multistory building on paper and then shepherd it into existence in the real world. History Journalism
September 01, 2019 Returning from Afar By Benson Bobrick An excerpt from Benson Bobrick’s new book, a memoir of his life and work as a writer. Memoir Travel
October 31, 2016 Why Stalin's Corpse Was Exhumed on Halloween By Alice E.M. Underwood The body of Joseph Stalin was removed from the mausoleum on Red Square on October 31, 1961. It may not be as spooky as Halloween, but the former leader still haunts Russia today. History Politics Social Issues
