Maksim Gorky

In Gorky's greatest work, the characters are the dregs of society hovelled in a ramshackle inn: a thief, a degenerate baron, a prostitute, an alcoholic actor, the seedy proprietor, his sister-in-law who loves the thief and others. Their discontent grows until a whistler comes to perk up their spirits and they begin to grow hopeful. In one of their quarrels a brawl erupts, the proprietor is killed, others are jailed and the drunken actor rises to the...

This book is the first of a 4-part work about the life of one Clim Sanghin, a member of the Russian gentry living in pre-Revolution Russia. The time period of "Bystander" is 1880 through about 1905 and we are shown, through a somewhat absurdist perspective, the rot and dissassociation from reality at the core of this class of Russian society.

The coming of the railroad to provincial Russia is the setting for the play about how corrupt intellectuals destroy everything in their path.

First novel written by Gorky, around 1894, but not found and published until after his death. Published with the essay, "How I Became a Writer." Book also contains a bibliography and biographical chronology of the author. The story of Orphan Paul is descriptive in its telling and so sad in its revealing of human nature. It's the story of poverty and innocence in a world that is accustomed to seeing both pummeled into the dirt with bare-knuckled fists....