Two Princesses

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Authors : Vladimir Odoevsky Foreword Writer: Bridget Kendall Translator: Neil Cornwell Editor: - Series: Hesperus Classics Publication Date: September 2010 ISBN 13: 9781843911388 ISBN 10: 1843911388 Page Extent: 162 Price: £ 7.99 Add To Cart

Overview:

The eponymous princesses are both spinsters, but there any similarity must end. Zizi, thwarted in love, takes her lot meekly until she comes face to face with her erstwhile lover’s perfidy, and her sense of justice and familial devotion compel her to claim a bittersweet revenge. Mimi meanwhile, whose own romantic failures have left her bitter and resentful, takes her revenge falsely, leading those around her to a tragic end.

Princess Mimi and Princess Zizi, Odoevsky’s complementary society tales from the 1830s, portray the two diametrically opposed sides of the nature of the Russian aristocracy and can be seen as the precursors to Anna Karenina and the works of Dostoevsky.

Additional information:

About the foreword writer:
Bridget Kendall is the BBC's Diplomatic correspondent and host of The Forum, the BBC World Service programme about global ideas. She studied Russian Literature at Oxford University, Moscow University and Harvard and was BBC Russian correspondent from 1989 to 1994.

‘We are privy to their initial girlish hopes, trace their disappointments, and watch their options narrow as opportunities slip away.’

– Bridget Kendall

'This is a glimpse of the Russia, and the Russian literary tradition, out of which Tolstoy, Dostoevsky and Turgenev sprang, and it's well worth pursuing.'

– Booktrust