Russian literature : The Matrioshkas
A little reading?
We are going to introduce you to the best-known titles in Russian literature, as well as the great contemporary promises. Russian literature : The Matrioshkas
Russian literature : The Matrioshkas
The books that we are going to name next are works that a large part of Russian readers have read or looked at on occasion. In addition, many of these titles are required reading in school: War and Peace (1869), Lev Tolstoy; The Karamazov brothers (1879), Fyodor Dostoevsky; Eugene Onegin (1833), Alexander Pushkin; The cherry garden (1904), Antón Chekhov; The underworld (1903), Maxim Gorky; Doctor Zhivago (1957), Borís Pasternak; The teacher and Margarita (1967), Mikhail Bulgákov.
To discover Russia from the hand of current Russian authors we can name Svetlana Aleksievish with The War does not have a woman’s face ; Zajar Prilepin with Pathologies ; Liudmila Ulískaya with Sóniechka; a trip to the future in Metro 2033 by Dmitry Glukhovsky; Anna Starobinets brought us A Difficult Age ; Vladimir Sorokin with The Ice ; The life of insects by Víktor Pelevin; Zueleijá opens your eyes , by Guzel Yájina …
The Matrioshkas
This element well deserves a section for its traditional and famous worldwide recognition. If we know something about Russian culture, it is the matrioshkas.
Matryoshka, also known as mamushka or babushka, were created around 1890. Who and how is unclear. Some say that it was due to the influence of similar dolls that were in Japan, others that in Russia this concept of keeping some objects inside others was already common … Be that as it may, in 1900 MA Mámontova, wife of Savva Mámontov, a patron who worked with the toy designer Maliutin, he presented the doll at the Universal Exhibition in Paris. He won the third prize, the bronze medal and, given his success, Mammontov was in charge of making the doll known; and each town or city towards its version.
Likewise, their fame grew even more when the matrioshkas began to represent well-known characters from the Soviet Union.
It is a series of dolls that are hollow inside, where they house a smaller doll. Normally in a matrioshka we have a total of 5 dolls, but you can have more whenever space allows. The matrioshka with the most dolls manufactured to date has 75 dolls.
These dolls are made of wood, traditionally with linden wood for its lightness and finesse. Each doll that constitutes the marioshka must be built from the same block of wood, since each block has its own expansion and contraction. Once carved, they are painted with oil paints, although in the past it was done with gouache.