In Dovlatov’s prose, people’s relationships are equally funny and sad. In real life, such a balance is unlikely. That’s why, with all the parameters of “everyday realism,” his prose is not a mere copy of reality: the author values the truth of fiction higher than the truth of facts. Dovlatov’s characters are his contemporaries—people who always find a common language, whether they live in Russia or in America—yet despite all their sociability, they remain lonely.
The author finds any categorical moral rules amusing: a person is either kind or vile! People are capable of both bad and good. He is sad about that fact. And therefore he wants circumstances of place and time that make room for good.
Volume 1
Andrey Ariev “Our Little Life”
Zone
Compromise
Sanctuary
Volume 2
Craft
Ours
Suitcase
They met, talked
Ariel
Volume 3
Foreigner
Branch office
The Demarche of the Enthusiasts
Notebooks
A writer in emigration