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Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka marks the extraordinary debut of Nikolai Gogol, one of literature's most original and enigmatic voices. First published in two parts between 1831 and 1832, this collection of short stories draws readers into the heart of rural Ukraine, where folklore, humour, and the supernatural collide in dazzling fashion.
Presented in the pioneering translation by Constance Garnett and freshly edited for the contemporary reader, this edition combines the vivacity of Gogol's imaginative prose with a modernised yet faithful rendering of the original. It also features a new introduction and atmospheric illustrations that bring the tales to life for a twenty-first-century audience.
At once comic and eerie, Dikanka presents devils who steal moons, witches hiding neighbours in sacks, spectral maidens luring men to their doom, and storytellers who blend rustic charm with narrative brilliance. The characters are unforgettable, from the lovesick blacksmith Vakula and his proud sweetheart Oksana, to the bumbling village dignitaries and the mysterious sacristan Foma Grigoryevitch, whose voice carries echoes of an oral storytelling tradition now vanished.
Yet for all its supernatural elements, the heart of the collection is rooted in a vibrant sense of place - the sights, smells and sounds of a Ukrainian village on a summer's night, the laughter and gossip of its people, and the shadows that lengthen after dusk. Beneath the humour and folklore lies a rich cultural and historical portrait of a region both exotic and intimately human.
Gogol's Ukraine is not a nostalgic fantasy but a living landscape, filled with earthy vitality, boisterous characters, and uncanny undercurrents. This collection remains, nearly two centuries later, one of the most powerful literary celebrations of folk imagination ever written.
