Stories, sketches, a play, and short novel by a twentieth-century Russian writer express the dangers of a technological utopia and the problems of life in the modern world

Envy, and Other Works (English and Russian Edition)

Literature & Fiction

Olesha, Yuri

History & Criticism

W.W. Norton & Co., Inc.

A NEW YORK REVIEW BOOKS ORIGINAL One of the delights of Russian literature, a tour de force that has been compared to the best of Nabokov and Bulgakov, Yuri Olesha's novella Envy brings together cutting social satire, slapstick humor, and a wild visionary streak. Andrei is a model Soviet citizen, a swaggeringly self-satisfied mogul of the food industry who intends to revolutionize modern life with mass-produced sausage. Nikolai is a loser. Finding him drunk in the gutter, Andrei gives him a bed for the night and a job as a gofer. Nikolai takes what he can, but that doesn't mean he's grateful. Griping, sulking, grovelingly abject, he despises everything Andrei believes in, even if he envies him his every breath. Producer and sponger, insider and outcast, master and man fight back and forth in the pages of Olesha's anarchic comedy. It is a contest of wills in which nothing is sure except the incorrigible human heart. Marian Schwartz's new English translation of Envy brilliantly captures the energy of Olesha's masterpiece.

Envy (New York Review Books Classics)

Humor & Entertainment

Humor

NYRB Classics

Boasting a veritable menagerie of characters, including dancing instructors, pies, and talking parrots, and written in the Franco-Italian storytelling tradition, The Three Fat Men is considered an absolute endorsement of the Communist regime. Revolution is brewing outside the palace walls, and the three fat men who rule the land with an iron fist are getting fatter as the news gets worse. Led by the tightrope walker Tibul, the revolutionary forces, made up of ordinary citizens and the palace guard, embark on a mission to rescue Prospero the gunsmith from his imprisonment in the tyrants’ zoo, and to save the life of brave young circus girl Suok, who has been unmasked from her disguise as the favorite doll of the childless men’s heir, Tutti.

The Three Fat Men (Hesperus Modern Voices)

Literary

Hesperus Press

Envy (Green Integer)

Green Integer Books

Envidia

Contemporary

Acantilado

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Olesha, Yuri. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Olesha, Yuri