The Cliff

«And tell me, Ivan Alexandrovich, why do all your works invariably begin with the syllable „ob“? — once asked I. A. Goncharov, the author of the famous novels «A Common Story», «Oblomov», and «The Cliff». The writer replied that it was just a coincidence. Contemporaries thought otherwise: the books were considered a trilogy, each part of which described a certain stage in the life of Russia in the 1840s-1860s. Goncharov worked slowly and thoughtfully: between his debut novel «A Common Story» (which was enthusiastically received even by critics) and «Oblomov», recognized as a classic soon after publication, twelve years passed. The last novel «The Cliff» took even longer to write — twenty years. «It couldn't have been otherwise, — Goncharov reasoned. — It was written as the period of life itself stretched on.» The forebodings, anxieties, and hopes of the people of that time are described by Goncharov with astonishing fullness and accuracy; however, eternal questions of love and betrayal, creativity and talent interested the writer just as much. After ten years spent in the capital, the aspiring writer Boris Raysky returns to his estate. Here he realizes that «life is a novel, and a novel is life»: in a quiet corner on the banks of the Volga, comedy and tragedy, idyll and drama are more closely intertwined than in books full of fire and passion. This edition reproduces rare illustrations for the novel by the artist Petr Naumovich Pinkisovich (1925-2004).