Grammar of Love

The stories included in this collection are united by the "main themes" of Bunin's prose—themes to which the great writer returned throughout his life. The Russian village of the early 20th century, with its poverty and hopelessness, and distant, exotic lands scorched by the southern sun. The beauty and poetry of nature—and the secret, dark depths of the human mind and heart. And, of course, the theme in which Bunin had no equal in Russian literature and with which his name is associated for generations of readers: love. A dramatic, tragic love, which for Bunin's heroes and heroines is truly "as strong as death."