Question by maya: What books are popular with Russian teenagers???
Hi, I’m a teenage girl (15 yrs old) & my family is from Russia (but i live in America). I read, write, & speak Russian & I want to know what are some good Russian books that are popular with teenagers in Russia today. I’ve asked my parents for suggestions, but…..they keep telling me to read Classical Literature like Pushkin, Lermontov, Chekhov, etc…..but those arent my favorite types of books though.
So i was just wondering if there are some more modern Russian books written for teenagers that Russian people around my age like to read (i would really appreciate it if you could just name a few book titles and/or authors!)
thank you!! =]
Answers and Views:
Answer by Vot Anarж
Well, there are some detective/ romance novels…. I never read any so I can’t remember any titles.
I used to see a lot of youths with those paperbacks.
Read all the answers in the comments.
What do you think?
Misanthropist says
Um, Джейн Эир you say? Why would you want to read Jane Eyre in Russian when you can understand English perfectly well. That's almost as dumb as reading Crime and Punishment in English…
Your parents are mostly right – nothing beats the classics. Of course, having them shoved down my throat in school has unfortunately cooled my love for good literature, but nevertheless I think you'd enjoy some of Chekhov's stories as well as "Мастер и Маргарита" by Bulgakov (also try "Собачье сердце"). Personally I've always hated Turgenev and Gogol, so maybe you should steer clear of those. "Князь Серебряный" by A.K. Tolstoy turned out to be an exceptionally good book, even though it was part of the required reading.
If you want something a bit more recent, I like Pelevin (none of his books are exceptionally long, they're mostly collections of stories). He is a bit unconventional though, so if you're more of a "clear-cut plot and characters" fan, Pelevin is not the one for you.
A lot of people like Maria Semenova ("Волклдав", "Валькирия") . Her stories are mostly in the Slavic/Scandinavian historical fiction genre.
Another author that I really like is Andrzej Sapkowski. Although his books are originally in Polish, he has a huge fanbase in Russia. His books are about a fictional universe similar to Medieval Europe. Another cucle is about the Hussite wars (also quite interesting, but I bit too historical)
Anyway, here's the stuff I like, hope at least some of it appeals to you. Here's a link to Pelevin's website, he's released most of his early work in to the public domain: http://pelevin.nov.ru/texts/
And here is Библиотека Мошкова, where you'll find almost all of the books you can think of: http://www.lib.ru/
Russian_chick says
One good book is: Джейн Эир (that is the title)
My dad gave me a Pushkin book for Christmas, and is now making me read it, I hate it!! So boring!