A Hero of Our Time

Formats & Editions

'I remain in unchanged admiration for this bold, headstrong, carefree undertaking, a first novel published when the author was twenty-five, which proved to be the first prose masterpiece in Russian' Julian Barnes from his preface.

Published in Russian in April 1840, A Hero of Our Time reached English in 1853, under the title 'Sketches of Life in the Caucasus, by a Russe.' Full of towering landscapes and local colour, it can be read as the travelogue of a poet and serving officer, but also as a portrait of the romantic as self-destructive anti-hero.

Vladimir Nabokov's translation of A Hero of Our Time was published in the United States in 1958, the same year as Lolita: world fame was about to overtake this committed Russian living in America.

Read More

Related books

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.