A brilliant collection of stories translated for the first time into English.

First published in Russia in 1994 when Solzhenitsyn returned after years of living in exile, this is a series of nine powerfully paired stories that will secure the author's position as not just a searing political commentator but also as a true literary giant. This collection now joins Solzhenitsyn's already available work as some of the most powerful literature of the twentieth century.

With Soviet and post-Soviet life as their focus, these stories illustrate the Russian experience under the Soviet regime. In 'The New Generation', a professor promotes a dull but proletarian student purely out of good-will. Years later, the same professor finds himself arrested and, in a striking twist of fate, his student becomes his interrogator. In 'Nastenka', two young women with the same name lead routine, ordered lives - until the Revolution exacts radical change on them both.