Aetherial Worlds: Stories
Written by Tatyana Tolstaya
Narrated by Anya Migdal
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this audiobook
From one of modern Russia's finest writers, a spellbinding collection of eighteen stories, her first to be translated into English in more than 20 years.
Ordinary realities and yearnings to transcend them lead to miraculous other worlds in this dazzling collection of stories. A woman's deceased father appears in her dreams with clues about the afterlife; a Russian professor in a small American town constructs elaborate fantasies during her cigarette break; a man falls in love with a marble statue as his marriage falls apart; a child glimpses heaven through a stained-glass window. With the emotional insight of Chekhov, the surreal satire of Gogol, and a unique blend of humor and poetry all her own, Tolstaya transmutes the quotidian into aetherial alternatives. These tales, about politics, identity, love, and loss, cut to the core of the Russian psyche, even as they lay bare human universals. Tolstaya's characters—seekers all—are daydreaming children, lonely adults, dislocated foreigners in unfamiliar lands. Whether contemplating the strategic complexities of delivering telegrams in Leningrad or the meditative melancholy of holiday aspic, vibrant inner lives and the grim elements of existence are registered in equally sharp detail in a starkly bleak but sympathetic vision of life on earth.
A unique collection from one of the first women in years to rank among Russia's most important writers.
Tatyana Tolstaya
Tatyana Tolstaya is the great grandneice of Leo Tolstoy. Since the 1980s, she has enjoyed a reputation as one of Russia’s foremost original literary voices. The TLS hailed her first novel, The Slynx, a postmodern literary masterpiece of the same stature as Gogol’s Dead Souls and Nabokov’s Pale Fire, while Joseph Brodsky called her ‘the most original, tactile, luminous voice in Russian prose today.’ She lives in Moscow. She has written for New York Review of Books and The New Yorker.
Related to Aetherial Worlds
Related audiobooks
White Nights Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5War And Peace: The Original Manuscript Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Greatest Russian Stories of Crime and Suspense Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsB. J. Harrison Reads A Christmas Tree and a Wedding Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Red Plenty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Adolescent Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Poor Folk Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLike a Drop of Ink in a Downpour: Memories of Soviet Russia Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5B. J. Harrison Reads The Dream of a Ridiculous Man Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dressed Up for a Riot: Misadventures in Putin's Moscow Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Short History of Russia: How the World's Largest Country Invented Itself, from the Pagans to Putin Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dostoyevsky Collection: Crime & Punishment Notes From The Underground Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Gift Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Penitent Sinner Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Russian Riddle:: Stalin's Deadly Date with Destiny Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUnder Western Eyes Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDeceit: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Double and The Gambler Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Glory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Humorless Ladies of Border Control: Touring the Punk Underground from Belgrade to Ulaanbaatar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Man Who Couldn't Die: The Tale of an Authentic Human Being Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Chorus Girl Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Poor Folk Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary, Analysis, and Review of Amor Towles’s A Gentleman in Moscow Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Encased Man Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Pandora's Matryoshkas: A Rampant American in Moscow Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFrom Odessa With Love: Political And Literary Essays from Post-Soviet Ukraine Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Fathers and Sons Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsStalin: Passage to Revolution Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Literary Fiction For You
Remarkably Bright Creatures: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Picture of Dorian Gray: Classic Tales Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Song of Achilles: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stardust Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Demon Copperhead: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Blood Meridian: Or the Evening Redness in the West Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bell Jar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Yellowface: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Measure: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The House in the Cerulean Sea Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes: A Hunger Games Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tom Lake: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Overstory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Year of Magical Thinking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Name of the Wind Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5CATCH-22 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beneath a Scarlet Sky: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Nothing to See Here Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Future Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Poisonwood Bible Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kindred Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hang the Moon: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Parable of the Sower Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for Aetherial Worlds
1 rating0 reviews