Master and Man: Stories

Russian writer Leo Tolstoy is probably best known to the Western world for his epic novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, but during his long lifetime Tolstoy wrote numerous shorter works to fill many volumes.

In Master and the Man, Tolstoy follows an impatient merchant and his peasant labourer into a blinding winter blizzard on the road to Goryáchkin. The novella pairs the grasping trader Vasíli Brekhunóv with Nikíta—a destitute peasant who has sworn off vodka—in an open sledge as night approaches.

The village of Gríshkino offers only brief respite before the merchant ventures back into the frost, leaving both men stranded beside a deep ravine.

Included here are two of his finest short novels—Family Happiness and Master and the Man—and one short story, "Alyosha the Pot."

• Morally Grey Characters: Vasíli Andréevich Brekhunóv secretly draws on church funds in his keeping to finance a speculative timber purchase, confident that his sharp commercial instincts will outwit rival buyers.
• Forced Proximity: Stranded, an arrogant church elder and his labourer must confront the freezing Russian night together.
• 19th-Century Realism: From the twenty-two family members crowded into a Gríshkino homestead to young Petrúshka reciting schoolroom verses, Tolstoy renders Russian village life with unsparing clarity.