I Am a Smuggler

6 hrs. 18 min.

Language Russian

Author Andrey Neklyudov

Narrator Yury Zaborovsky

Description

A smuggler works out of passion, out of calling—F. M. Dostoevsky wrote once. The hero of the Petersburg writer Andrei Neklyudov’s tale, I am a smuggler: a young scholar, ended up in this illegal trade not by calling, but because of life circumstances, out of despair. Never before would he have imagined that he would suddenly find himself in exotic South Korea with a mind-blowing (by his standards) sum of money in his pocket—and that he would, like a seasoned businessman, buy and hide huge quantities of contraband goods in the holds of a ship from customs. Never would he have imagined that he would be standing on the brink of catastrophe, that he and his partners would truly face criminal punishment...

The author explores a painful and sad phenomenon of our time—how the struggle to survive, the chase for profit, deforms a person and leads them into professional degradation. The novella is vivid and rich, with many humorous scenes. But after reading the last page, the famous Pushkin sigh comes back: God, how sad our Russia is!