Keynote
A deeply moving meditation on memory, history, love, and art by the author of Dreams of My Russian Summers
Book Title
The Life of an Unknown Man
Subtitle
A Novel
Cover Image
- “Andreï Makine has been hailed as a Russian Proust and a French Chekhov. . . . Once again, Makine has written a book about the indomitability of the human spirit.”—NPR.org
Body
In The Life of an Unknown Man, Andreï Makine explores what truly matters in life through the prism of Russia's past and present. Shutov, a disenchanted writer, revisits St. Petersburg after twenty years of exile in Paris, hoping to recapture his youth. Instead, he meets Volsky, an old man who tells him his extraordinary story: of surviving the siege of Leningrad, the march on Berlin, and Stalin's purges, and of a transcendent love affair. Volsky's life is an inspiration to Shutov—because for all that he suffered, he knew great happiness. This depth of feeling stands in sharp contrast to the empty lives Shutov encounters in the new Russia, and to his own life, that of just another unknown man . . .
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About the Author
Credit: Hermance TRIAY/Opale
Praise
- “[Makine’s] new novel feels like a last book, a meditation on lost love, the chaos of war, the terrible repetitions of history.”—Star Tribune (Minneapolis)
- “Reading the new novel by the author of Dreams of My Russian Summers feels like encountering a rediscovered classic.”—The Daily Beast
- “A lyrical little novel about hope triumphing over adversity.”—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
- “In deceptively simple, suffused language (there’s real iron underneath), Makine helps us relive an awful moment in the 20th century. A humbling read.”—Library Journal
