Ivan Bunin’s ‘At the Summer Home’ Story: from the ‘To the World’s End’ Collection to the Complete Works

About the author:

Anastasiia Yu. Pavlova, Student, A.M. Gorky Literary Institute, Tverskoy bd, 25, 123104 Moscow, Russia.

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8170-2925

E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

Abstract:

The paper examines the creative history of an early little studied short story by Ivan Bunin “At the Summer Home” basing the research on three main publications. It describes in detail the successive changes that the text underwent from its first publication (in the “To the End of the World and Other Stories” collection, 1897) to the publication in the Complete Works edition (1915). The analysis also concerns such key components of the work as the images of the main characters, the conflict, and the ending. The article shows how minor changes radically change the character of the main character, how the author’s sympathies are distributed among the characters; how, due to the changes, the text turns into a work with complex interpersonal and individual internal conflicts. The circumstances of the creation of the story are also mentioned, together with the critical reviews received by the author from editors and reviewers of literary journals. On the basis of the above textual studies, the author draws conclusions about the number of editions of the story “At the Summer Home”, and which of the texts should be considered the main one.