The Doll

38 hrs. 39 min.

Classics

Language Russian

Author Bolesław Prus

Narrator Vyacheslav Gerasimov

Description

The novel “The Doll” is considered a masterpiece of Polish realism. For more than forty years, the writer lived and worked in Warsaw, taking part in its public and artistic life. B. Prus was an outstanding connoisseur of his city—indeed, many of his works unfold precisely in Warsaw. The most famous literary portrait of Warsaw, depicting its inhabitants, architecture, and atmosphere, became the novel “The Doll.”

The protagonist, Stanislav Wokulski, is a man of great energy and unusual abilities—he achieved everything in life through his own efforts, going through need and deprivation and becoming a major financier. For the sake of wealth and a high social position, he makes a compromise with his own conscience: he betrays his ideals and suffers because of it. And his love for the soulless beauty, the aristocrat Izabela Łęcka, only intensifies his suffering…

Bolesław Prus (pen name Aleksander Głowacki, 1847–1912) is one of the most famous Polish writers in the world. Outside Poland, his most well-known novels are “The Doll” (1887–1879) and “Pharaoh” (1895–1896).