Yama by Aleksandr Kuprin (best ereader for pdf TXT) 📕
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Yama (The Pit) recounts the lives of a group of prostitutes living and working in Anna Markovna’s brothel in the town of K⸺. The women, subject to effective slavery through the removal of their papers and onerous debts, act out a scene of easy affability every evening for the part ignorant, part monstrous clients, while keeping secret their own pasts and wished-for futures.
The book was Kuprin’s attempt to denormalize the cultural ambiguity of the legal brothels of the time. His dedication—“to mothers and youths”—expresses his desire that there should no longer be a silent acceptance of the actions of the “fathers, husbands, and brothers.” The novel was notable for portraying the inhabitants of the brothels as living, breathing people with their own hopes and desires, not purely as a plot point or scenario.
The critical response was mixed: many found the subject matter beyond the pale. Kuprin himself placed his hopes on a favourable review from Leo Tolstoy, which didn’t come; but there was praise for Yama as both social commentary and warning, and an appreciation for Kuprin’s attempt to detail the everyday lives of his subjects.
The novel had a troubled genesis, with the first part taking nine years between initial proposal and first publication; the second and third parts followed five years later. It was a victim of the Russian censors who, tellingly, disapproved more of scenes involving officials visiting the brothels, than the brothels themselves. It was only later during preparations for an anthology of his work that an uncensored version was allowed to be released. This edition is based on the translation to English by Bernard Guilbert Guerney of that uncensored version, and was first published in 1922.
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- Author: Aleksandr Kuprin
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Orenburg has as high a reputation for woolens as Sheffield has for steel. —Trans. ↩
Schoolbooks (taking their names from their authors), upon which generation after generation of gymnazists have been brought up. —Trans. ↩
This story is Lit No. 29, by Guy de Maupassant. —Trans. ↩
In English, a “toff”; in American, a “swell.” —Trans. ↩
“My mastery of the German language is a trifle worse than that of the French, but I can always keep up my end in parlor small talk.” ↩
“O, splendid! … You have a bewitching Riga enunciation, the most correct of all the German ones. And so, let us continue in my tongue. That is far sweeter to my ear—my mother tongue. All right?” ↩
“All right.” ↩
“In the very end you will give in, as though unwillingly, as though against your will, as though from infatuation, a momentary caprice, and—which is the main thing—as though on the sly from me. You understand? For this the fools pay enormous money. However, it seems I will not have to teach you.” ↩
“Yes, my dear madam. You say very wise things. But this is no longer small talk; it is, rather, serious conversation …” ↩
Zolotorotzi—a subtle euphemism for cleaners of cesspools and carters of the wealth contained therein. —Trans. ↩
The first edition in English consisted—if the publisher is to be believed—of 1,225 copies, retailing from ten to sixty dollars per copy; the next edition—with the same qualification of its publisher’s statement—was of 1,550 copies, also prohibitively priced. This revised, augmented edition is the third. —Trans. ↩
In a delightful letter to me Kuprin has written: “I am not at all mistaken in saying that Yama was translated in all lands and realms—with the possible exception of the Touaregs and the Bottoludi. … I must say that in England and in Holland neither Yama nor Sulamith was allowed: the first for its naked truth; the second for its light-minded attitude toward the Bible. …” I myself, as a bookseller, have had occasion to supply Yama in Yiddish. And since the above was written, this version of Yama has been published in England and has met with deserved success. —Trans. ↩
List of IllustrationsA visiting card, reading “Eumenii Poluectovich, Egmont—Lavretzki, Dramatic Artist of Metropolitan Theatres.” There is an illustration of a dramatic mask in the top left.
ColophonYama
was published between 1909 and 1915 by
Aleksandr Kuprin.
It was translated from Russian in 1922 by
Bernard Guilbert Guerney.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Robin Whittleton,
and is based on a transcription produced in 2003 by
Robert Rowe, Charles Franks and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans available at the
Internet Archive.
The cover page is adapted from
Vampire,
a painting completed in 1893 by
Edvard Munch.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
December 21, 2020, 11:13 p.m.
You can check for updates to this ebook, view its revision history, or download it for different ereading systems at
standardebooks.org/ebooks/aleksandr-kuprin/yama/bernard-guilbert-guerney.
The volunteer-driven Standard Ebooks project relies on readers like you to submit typos, corrections, and other improvements. Anyone can contribute at standardebooks.org.
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