The Gambler

The creation story of this book is very interesting: a writer who was down to his last penny in Wiesbaden and desperately needed money entered a contract with a publishing house, according to which he had to write a novel… in 26 days. These utterly implausible deadlines forced Dostoevsky, for the first time in his life, to use the services of a secretary stenographer—whom he dictated the text to. That’s how the young Anna Snitkina entered the genius’s life—a woman destined to become his wife and muse.

Aleksei Ivanovich, a 25-year-old impoverished nobleman, a home tutor living with the family of the Russian general Zagoryansky (stepdaughter Polina and small children) in a hotel at a German resort, Rouletenburg. The general and his surrounding French adventurers—the marquis de Grieu and the beautiful Blanche—are waiting for a wealthy inheritance from a sick Moscow “grandmother” (la baboulinka): then De Grieu will be able to marry Polina, and Blanche will become a general’s wife. Aleksei Ivanovich is in love with Polina, but she answers him with contempt. He understands: only money can help him win her over. And Aleksei goes to a gambling house… .

Dostoevsky’s novel “The Gambler” has been adapted into films many times. The first films with the same title were released in 1938—in Germany and France. Later, filmmakers from Argentina, the USA, the UK, France, Italy, and Hungary presented their own visions of the work. In the USSR, in 1972, Alexei Batalov directed a drama based on Dostoevsky’s text. In it, Nikolai Burliaev played the Gambler.

Based on Dostoevsky’s novel, S. S. Prokofiev wrote an opera of the same name.