Mystical Stories by Russian Writers

«The Dream of a Ridiculous Man» by Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (1821-1881) is not just a story—it is full of feeling, a piercing philosophical parable. Here reality flows into the fantastic, and the fantastic becomes life. A desperate man, searching for answers to many pressing questions, comes to the idea of suicide, but as he thinks about what will happen to the world after his death, he falls asleep—and the truth that appears to him in his dream makes him forget about suicide once and for all.

Osip Ivanovich Senkovsky (1800-1858) was a journalist, critic, prose writer, and scholar of the East. As a novelist, he often appeared under the pseudonym Baron Brambeus. In fact, he became the creator of the feuilleton genre in Russian literature. Senkovsky authored many literary hoaxes; readers simply adored him, while writers disliked him intensely (for example, N.V. Gogol and V.G. Belinsky spoke sharply against him, and Herzen even called him “a cold and indifferent skeptic… a Mephistopheles who doesn’t believe in anything”). Listen to his story on this disc—and you’ll understand why.

Cast for the dramatizations:

«The Dream of a Ridiculous Man» (based on a story by F.M. Dostoevsky)
A one-person show by Sergey Dreiden

«The Transformation of Heads into Books and Books into Heads» (based on a story by O.I. Senkovsky)
By the Author—Rifat Safiulin
Poet—Timofey Piskunov
Morto—Dmitry Kreminsky
Smirdin—Nikolay Ryabkov
Gatekeeper—Andrey Tushkanov
Reader—Andrey Averyanov
Lady—Larisa Brokham
Thick guest—Andrey Balyakin
Young man—Alexander Kaplun