Oblomov - Ivan Goncharov

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Résumé :
Ivan Goncharov was a Russian novelist who achieved literary fame later in life, after a career in the civil-service which spanned more than thirty years. His first novel, A Common Story, was a definitive success and his notoriety was cemented with the publication of his second novel, Oblomov, in 1850. Based on a short story written a year prior, Oblomov is about a cultured, intelligent, upper middle class man experiencing a mid-life crisis. Ilya Ilyich Oblomov has sunk into a lethargic stupor, which he calls Oblomovism, and spends the majority of his time lying on the sofa or in bed. Goncharov portrays beautifully the process of Oblomov's decline, as well as its consequences, at first through flashbacks and then through the intervention of Andrey Stoltz, a man quite the opposite of Oblomov. The novel was revered for its brutal but honest representation of the slothfulness of the Russian gentry, and has become a timeless classic of Russian and psychological fiction. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper and follows the translation of C. J. Hogarth.

Biographie:
Ivan Alexandrovich Goncharov (1812 - 1891) was a Russian novelist best known for his novels A Common Story (1847), Oblomov (1859), and The Precipice (1869). He also served in many official capacities, including the position of censor. He served for a short time in the office of the Governor of Simbirsk, before moving to Saint Petersburg where he worked as government translator and private tutor, while publishing poetry and fiction in private almanacs. Goncharov's first novel, A Common Story, was published in Sovremennik in 1847. Goncharov's second and best-known novel Oblomov was published in 1859 in Otechestvennye Zapiski. His third and final novel The Precipice was published in Vestnik Evropy in 1869. He also worked as a literary and theatre critic. Towards the end of his life Goncharov wrote a memoir called An Uncommon Story, in which he accused his literary rivals, first and foremost Ivan Turgenev, of having plagiarized his works and prevented him from achieving European fame. The memoir was published in 1924. Fyodor Dostoyevsky, among others, considered Goncharov an author of high stature. Anton Chekhov is quoted as stating that Goncharov was ...ten heads above me in talent.