Read By: Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky

The 92nd Street Y, New York · Apr 27, 2020 · 22m

Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky on their selections: Chekhov’s story “The Beggar” was written in 1887, when Chekhov was 27. This was the moment in his life when he was turning from his early comic sketches to something a bit more serious. But the comedy is still there, of course. We chose it because it is essentially a dialogue between a successful, well-off lawyer and a ne’er-do-well. It has a delightful surprise ending. For our second text, we’ve chosen two passages from “The Pearl Necklace” by Nikolai Leskov. Leskov is one of the great masters of Russian storytelling, from the…