Any lovers of Russian literature round here?

[Sancho]

I'm a huge fan of 19th century Russian literature; in particular, the works of Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov. For me, Anna Karenina is the supreme piece of literature.

Any other aficionados out there?

[Seak]

I just finished the Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky and it was great. Definitely slow and unmistakably the ramblings of a madman at times, but it was a great one. The ending is beautiful. I don't know how else I can describe it.

[Sancho]

Unfortunately I cannot confess to having read a great deal of Dostoevsky; I'm not one for sticking with a book if I'm having a hard time of reading it, and I have a harder time reading Dostoevsky than of any other prominent writer. I just get the feeling that he's messing with his readership.
But off the back of your recommendation I’ll give the Brothers Karamazov a go; I’ve heard that it’s his greatest composition.

[Seak]

It's definitely difficult for a while, as in, not a lot of plot movement for at least half of the thousand page book. The only reason I really got through it was because I had a goal to finish it and because a good friend of mine loved it. Having it on audiobook may have been a drawback as it was all but impossible to keep up on all the names.

[zachariah]

Audiobook? I salute your endurance. I loved the book, it's one of my all-star favourites. And he was in his eighties when he wrote it! It would have been longer, but he died!

I've also read Crime and Punishment of course, like everyone else, and I am ashamed to say I started but never finished The Idiot. I loved The House Of The Dead.

Sad to say I don't speak a word of Russian, so my hat is tipped to the unsung geniuses who translate the classics for the English-speaking world.

[Siberian]

I grew up in Russia so I read a lot of Russian classics, mostly at school, which, of course, didn't help with loving them The novels that stood out for me were War and Peace (by the way the more accurate translation is War and People) and The Hero of Out Times by Lermontov. It's probably not known outside of Russia, but it contain one of the best example of Russian prose and it almost reads like an adventure novel at times. From the 20th century, my absolute favorite is The Master and Margaret by Bulgakov. It has a lot of humor and fantastical elements, and can be categorized as "magical realism", I suppose. Of course, it has a lot of satire so you have to have at least some idea of the history and culture of Russia in the 1930s to enjoy it fully.

Finally, there's a huge body of great poetry, but I don't think it's fully translatable into other languages.

[Chekhov]

Asimov was indeed Russian, but he's not usually considered a Russian author because he generally wrote in English (and emigrated to the United States I believe).