Aeneid

5 hrs. 30 min.

Humor & Satire

Language Russian

Author Ivan Kotlyarevsky

Narrator Boris Loboda

Description

Ivan Kotlyarevsky is called the founder of a new Ukrainian literature. Not without reason. If in Russia everyone knows Ivan Krylov’s fables, then in Ukraine everyone knows Ivan Kotlyarevsky’s “Aeneid.” Not by heart, of course—but surely everyone will remember a few lines. As well as the main twists and characteristic features of the work.

This is not surprising. People always remember things that astonish and amuse them. The “Aeneid” does both. Here there is a serious foundation too—mythology, which has already lasted for more than a thousand years. And there’s also no small amount of surprise, because the author offers an unusual, bold look both at classical plots and at literature as a whole. Not to mention the human essence—Kotlyarevsky mocks its shortcomings harshly, vividly, uncompromisingly, but—fairly; there’s no doubt about that. And there is no doubt either about the modern relevance of this work: unfortunately, over the last two hundred years people have not reduced their list of imperfections much.

So it turns out that both in the eighteenth and in the twenty-first centuries, the “Aeneid” serves as a high-quality, deep, and talented satire—one that makes you laugh a lot, but also makes you think a lot.