[FIRST THE CUTTING OF THE FOREST AND SECOND SEVASTOPOL SKETCH]
St. Petersburg: 1855. Item #209
Noch. Vesnoiu 1855 goda v Sevastopole // Sovremennik. Tom LIII [i.e. The Night. Sevastopol in Spring of 1855 // The Contemporary. Vol. LIII]. Pp. 5-30.
Rubka lesa // Sovremennik. Tom LIII [i.e. The Cutting of the Forest // The Contemporary. Vol. LIII]. Pp. 35-68. 24x15 cm. In contemporary half-leather with stamping, new paper on boards. Near fine, marking on the title page, restoration of margins of the few pages.
First publication of the second of Sevastopol Sketches 'The Night. Sevastopol in Spring of 1855' (now known as 'Sevastopol in May') and 'The Cutting of the Forest'.
'The Night' was based on the event that Tolstoy was eyewitness to during Sevastopol Siege. After Nekrasov read it and wrote to Turgenev: «...this essay is so full of sober and deep truth so there is nothing even to think about printing it». When the story was typed for print Musin-
Pushkin, the chairman of the St. Petersburg censorship committee decided to read its proofs. He was outraged by the depiction of Russian
officers and made a lot of corrections which made it unrecognizable. It was printed unsigned.
'The Cutting of the Forest' is a short story about one day of the platoon at Caucasia war and is a part of the Caucasus series. The story
was signed by Tolstoy (L.N.T.) and dedicated to Ivan Turgenev. Turgenev wasn’t acquainted with the author at that time, wrote him a letter to
thank him («Nothing in my literary carier had so flattered my vanity yet»). Nekrasov later wrote to Tolstoy about the story: «...it reminds of
Turgenev by its form, but only that. Everything else is all yours».
Price: $3,200.00