0624 Thurs lecture.pdf - Thursday 6/24 Lecture: Ivan Bunin ...

Thursday 6/24
Lecture:
Ivan Bunin, “Antonov
Apples,” & close reading

Ivan Bunin (1870-
1953)
•
First Russian author to be awarded the
Nobel Prize for Literature
•
Primarily wrote short stories and novellas
• Bunin’s life straddled a significant event in
Russian history: he was 47 years old at the
time of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution.
Bunin’s social background (he came from a
family of gentry landowners) and personal
ideology led him to oppose Bolshevism,
and in 1920 he emigrated to Paris, where
he spent the remainder of his life.

Bunin’s Social Background:
Prerevolutionary Russia’s Gentry Landowners
•
Bunin was born on his family estate in Voronezh province in
Central Russia; this upbringing is evident in both “Antonov
Apples” and next week’s novella, “Drydale.”
•
Both stories were written and take place in prerevolutionary
(tsarist) Russia, but already there is a degree of nostalgia
present for a passing way of life. By the early 1900s,
Russia’s rural aristocracy (the landowning class) was
disappearing and/or sinking further into debt and ruin.