The Pit

14 hrs. 2 min.

Romance & Prose

Language Russian

Author Alexander Kuprin

Narrator Maxim Sukhanov

Description

“The Pit” is the most tragic novella by the Russian writer, as interpreted by Maxim Sukhanov. At the time, this book had an effect among readers and critics like a bomb that tore apart—yet even now it continues to shock with its power and ruthless realism.

A sad story about the inmates of a brothel is told with almost photographic accuracy. The women’s characters, their clients, and the only friend—a journalist, whose image in Kuprin has autobiographical traits—are striking in psychological depth and vividness. Alexander Kuprin’s novella captivates not with the “piquantness” of the theme, but with the author’s honest, compassionate, and humane attitude toward the fate of women who, circumstances thrust them into “The Pit.” Korney Chukovsky called “The Pit” a “slap in the face of society,” and one of the critics called it Kuprin’s best work. Many refused to read it—even without knowing the novella’s plot in detail, but having only a superficial idea of its issues. The writer understood that his sensitive readers would find the novella indecent, immoral. Nevertheless, he dedicated “The Pit” to mothers and youth.

Today, interest in Kuprin’s “The Pit” has revived. And in 1990, a film of the same name was released on screens with Tatyana Dogileva and Oleg Menshikov in the lead roles; and in 2014, a TV series “Kuprin” appeared with Mikhail Porechenkov and Svetlana Khodchenkova in the lead roles—largely based on Kuprin’s “The Pit.”