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Minilibros Quimantú

Series · 8 books

By Alfonso Alcalde, Gonzalo Drago, Jose de la Cuadra, and more

In 1919, during the Russian Civil War, a small force of Red Army soldiers that survived a crushing defeat by the Whites is forced to flee into the Karakum Desert. Among them is female sniper Maria, who has already claimed thirty-eight enemies dead. When the unit ambushes a camel caravan transporting White soldiers, she kills two of them and tries to shoot their officer, who will be her forty-first, but misses. The man, a lieutenant named Govorukha-Otrok, is carrying a letter from Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak to General Anton Denikin that states he has secret information to be conveyed orally to General Dratsekno. Maria is entrusted with guarding him. Tensions arise between the two: the officer is a well-educated aristocrat who is both amused and impressed by the crude attempts of Maria, a fisherman's orphan daughter, to compose Agitprop poetry. When their camels are stolen, their commander decides to send his captive on a boat to their headquarters in Kazalinsk via the Aral Sea. The vessel capsizes in a sudden storm, and only Maria and Otrok remain alive, stranded on an isolated island. The Red soldier treats the White officer when he catches a fever and is slowly charmed by his manners, while he is overcome with gratitude and begins to call her 'Man Friday' with affection. When she demands to know what he means, he tells her the story about Robinson Crusoe. The two fall in love and seem to forget about the war.

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Author

Boris Lavrenyov

Author · 1 books

Born July 5 (17), 1891, in Kherson; died Jan. 7, 1959, in Moscow. Soviet Russian writer and playwright. Son of a literature teacher. Lavrenev graduated in law from Moscow University in 1915. He fought in World War I (1914–18) and in the Civil War (1918–20). His literary debut came with the publication of his poetry in 1911, and his first story was published in 1924. The novellas The Wind, The Forty-first (both 1924; made into motion pictures in 1927 and 1956), and A Story About Something Simple (1927) were devoted to events of the Great October Socialist Revolution and the Civil War. Lavrenev was drawn to heroic characters and the elemental, romantic aspect of heroism (the wind image). In the late 1920’s, Lavrenev wrote primarily about the intelligentsia, the people, and the Revolution (the novella The Seventh Fellow-traveler, 1927), as well as the fate of culture and the arts (the novella Wood Engraving, 1928). His prose is dramatic, with intricate plotting and character development through direct action. The play Break (1927; staged by many theaters at home and abroad) epitomized Lavrenev’s artistic concerns. He treated the Revolution and the heroic character in a thorough and new way, depicting heroism in its everyday rather than its extraordinary manifestations. This attitude was reflected in such later works as the novella Big Earth (1935) and the plays The Song of the Black Sea Sailors (1943) and To Those in the Sea! (1945). Lavrenev criticized bourgeois society in the novel The Fall of the Itl’ Republic (1925), the novella A Strategic Mistake (1934), and journalistic articles, pamphlets, and feuilletons. He received the State Prize of the USSR (1946 and 1950) and was awarded two orders and several medals. WORKS Sobr. sock, vols. 1–6. Introduction by E. Starikova. Moscow, 1963–65. REFERENCES Vishnevskaia, I. Boris Lavrenev. Moscow, 1962. Kardin, V. “Prostye veshchi (Zametki o proze Borisa Lavreneva).” Novyi mir, 1969, no. 7. D. P. MURAV’EV The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.