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Title: Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
Author: Nikolay Leskov
Narrator: Vladimir Stukalov
Format: Unabridged
Length: 1 hr and 45 mins
Language: English
Release date: 01-30-15
Publisher: IDDK
Ratings: 5 of 5 out of 4 votes
Genres: Classics, European Literature
Publisher's Summary:
Audiokniga "Ledi Makbet Mcenskogo uezda" po odnoimennoj povesti Nikolaja Leskova. Glavnaja geroinja - molodaja kupchiha, Katerina L'vovna Izmajlova. Ejo muzh postojanno v rabote, v otluchkah. Ej skuchno i odinoko v chetyrjoh stenah bol'shogo bogatogo doma. Suprug besploden, no vmeste so svoim otcom poprekaet zhenu. Katerina vljubljaetsja v molodogo krasivogo prikazchika Sergeja, postepenno ejo uvlechenie perehodit v strast', ljubovniki nochujut vmeste. Ona na vse gotova radi svoej greshnoj, prestupnoj ljubvi, radi svoego vozljublennogo. I nachinaetsja chereda ubijstv.
Please note: This audiobook is in Russian.
Members Reviews:
A shocking tale beguilingly told
Katerina Lvovna is a childless, bored housewife, left alone day upon day in the manor house of her much older, merchant husband. With gates, iron locks and guard dogs, the house is, for Katerina, effectively a prison. After five years of this barren life, and with her husband away from home for a week or more, she becomes the target of a recently arrived young steward. Young Sergei already has a reputation as a womanizer and a deceiver, but Katerina ignores this and willfully throws herself into a tempestuous love affair. The inevitable follows (inevitable, that is, in a 19th century novella), and Katerina and Sergei are soon plunged into ever deepening trouble.
This was an early work by Leskov, and the story swings along at a brisk pace, reading as if narrated by a worldly-wise peasant observer. Multiple homicides and ultimate self-destruction are not characteristic of Leskov's later stories, but his folksy way of telling a story, his trademark interest in the ordinary people of the region in which he grew up, also in the Russian Orthodox Church and its ways, and the schismatic Old Believers, are already in place. So is his game of causing the simpler of his folk to sometimes choose the wrong word as they speak, or to use made-up words - e.g. romanticness - though this feature is not as far developed in Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk as it became in some of Leskov's later stories.
The translator of this volume, Robert Chandler, is well-known for his reliable translations of several classic Russian writers; also for his helpful introductions and notes, both of which are found in this volume too. Besides translator, Chandler serves the reader well as interpreter, a slightly different function.
This Hesperus edition has potential as a good first introduction to Leskov's work, especially perhaps for those who have encountered Shostakovich's opera of the same name and are curious about the original story. If encouraged to seek out more by Leskov, do look up The Steel Flea, sometimes known as Lefty, which is the ultimate example of Leskov's malapropisms and wordplay and can be found inRussian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida, edited (but not in the case of the Steel Flea translated) by Robert Chandler, or in the newerThe Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories by Nikolai Leskovtranslated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The latter also includes Pevear and Volokhonsky's translation of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. I have read the two Lady Macbeth of Mtsensks side by side and find it impossible to say that one translation is overall better than the other.