{"product_id":"rock-paper-scissors-isbn-9781681373324","title":"Rock, Paper, Scissors","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe first English-language collection of a contemporary Russian master of the short story, recenly profiled in \u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMaxim Osipov, who lives and practices medicine in a town ninety miles outside Moscow, is one of Russia’s best contemporary writers. In the tradition of Anton Chekhov and William Carlos Williams, he draws on his experiences in medicine to write stories of great subtlety and striking insight. Osipov’s fiction presents a nuanced, collage-like portrait of life in provincial Russia—its tragedies, frustrations, and moments of humble beauty and inspiration. The twelve stories in this volume depict doctors, actors, screenwriters, teachers, entrepreneurs, local political bosses, and common criminals whose paths intersect in unpredictable yet entirely natural ways: in sickrooms, classrooms, administrative offices and on trains and in planes. Their encounters lead to disasters, major and minor epiphanies, and—on occasion—the promise of redemption.Table of Contents:\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003ePreface: The Cry of the Domestic Fowl\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eMoscow-Petrozavodsk\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Gypsy\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eRock, Paper, Scissors\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eRenaissance Man\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eIn the Wave of the Sea\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003ePolish Friend\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eThe Mill\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eAfter Eternity\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eOn the Banks of the Spree\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eGood People\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eObjects in Mirror\u003c\/i\u003eNominated for the 2020 Read Russia Prize\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“In these stories, the borders between hope, delusion and dishonesty are hazy and heavily trafficked ... Dr. Osipov is a master of dramatic irony, wringing bittersweet humor from what the reader sees but the protagonist cannot.” —Laura Kolbe, \u003ci\u003eThe Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Readers are reminded of Chekov repeatedly throughout the collection … This is subtle, honest and unaffected storytelling where the lives of normal people are picked up and examined closely — to remarkable effect.” —Martha Alexander, \u003ci\u003eThe Independent\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Osipov makes his English-language debut with this masterful and sublime collection, largely set in rural Russian villages ... This collection showcases Osipov’s talent in creating subtle,  sophisticated character portraits that carry a good dose of suspense.\" —\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e, starred review\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This short-story collection … feels like a journey back in time. Osipov, a practicing doctor, has been compared to Anton Chekhov, owing not only to their shared vocation but also to the Chekhovian way in which Osipov delves into the lives of ordinary people in dismal circumstances.” —Sophie Pinkham, \u003ci\u003eForeign Affairs\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Masterful and often startling stories, suffused with an irony that is as merciless as it is tender.” —Daniel Medin \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Maxim Osipov's stories cut me to the quick, because he does what true writers do: he tries to make sense of life with \u003ci\u003ehis own\u003c\/i\u003e mind, puts his soul into the effort, and, most importantly, presents everything in \u003ci\u003ehis own\u003c\/i\u003e words.” —Sergey Gandlevsky \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Osipov’s prose — remarkable, transparent, Russian, painful and tough, timely and timeless — is imbued with compassion. It may not always console, but it always gratifies.” —Lev Dodin \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Osipov writes not only laconically, but simply, plainly, without going into excessive details but ‘going into’ the essence of contemporary Russian life ... Irony, Robert Musil once noted in his diaries, combines enmity with compassion. And this is what we find in the work of Maxim Osipov.” —Alexander Livergrant, \u003ci\u003eNovyi Mir\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Maxim Osipov’s stories are kaleidoscopic. [He] is continuing Russian literature’s great love story with medicine, a flame lit by writer-physicians Mikhail Bulgakov and Anton Chekhov.\" —Matthew Janney\u003ci\u003e, The Calvert Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eMaxim Osipov\u003c\/b\u003e (b. 1963) is a Russian writer and cardiologist. In the early 1990s he was a research fellow at the University of California, San Francisco, before returning to Moscow, where he continued to practice medicine and also founded a publishing house that specialized in medical, musical, and theological texts. In 2005, while working at a local hospital in Tarusa, a small town ninety miles from Moscow, Osipov established a charitable foundation to ensure the hospital’s survival. Since 2007, he has published short stories, novellas, essays, and plays, and has won a number of literary prizes for his fiction. He has published six collections of prose, and his plays have been staged all across Russia. Osipov’s writings have been translated into more than a dozen languages. He lived in Tarusa up until February 2022, when he moved to Germany.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBoris Dralyuk\u003c\/b\u003e is the executive editor of the \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e. His recent translations include Isaac Babel’s \u003ci\u003eRed Cavalry\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eOdessa Stories\u003c\/i\u003e and Mikhail Zoshchenko’s \u003ci\u003eSentimental Tales\u003c\/i\u003e. He is the editor of \u003ci\u003e1917: Stories and Poems from the Russian Revolution\u003c\/i\u003e and co-editor of \u003ci\u003eThe Penguin Book of Russian Poetry\u003c\/i\u003e and Lev Ozerov’s \u003ci\u003ePortraits Without Frames\u003c\/i\u003e (published by NYRB Classics). \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAlex Fleming\u003c\/b\u003e is a translator of Swedish and Russian literature and children’s  fiction. Her previous translations include works by Therése Söderlind  and Cilla Naumann, and in 2015 she was awarded the British Centre for  Literary Translation’s Emerging Translator Mentorship for Russian. She  is based in London.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAnne Marie Jackson\u003c\/b\u003e has lived for extended periods in Russia and Moldova. She is a co-translator, with Robert Chandler and Rose France of \u003ci\u003eTolstoy, Rasputin, Others, and Me: The Best of Teffi\u003c\/i\u003e, and with Robert Chandler, Elizabeth Chandler, and Irina Steinberg of \u003ci\u003eMemories: From Moscow to the Black Sea\u003c\/i\u003e (both published by NYRB Classics). Her previous translations include works by Alexei Nikitin and Olga Slavnikova.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSvetlana Alexievich\u003c\/b\u003e is a Belarusian journalist, writer, and historian. The daughter of two teachers, she studied journalism at the Belarusian State University in Minsk and went on to work as a teacher and newspaper journalist. She published her first book, \u003ci\u003eThe Unwomanly Face of War\u003c\/i\u003e, an oral history of women’s experiences in World War II, in 1985, and since then has released five chronicles of Soviet and post-Soviet history, including \u003ci\u003eBoys in Zinc\u003c\/i\u003e (1991) and \u003ci\u003eVoices from Chernobyl\u003c\/i\u003e (1997). In 2015, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, the first time it had been given to a journalist.","brand":"NYRB Classics","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46300476670181,"sku":"NP9781681373324","price":17.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781681373324.jpg?v=1767735870","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/rock-paper-scissors-isbn-9781681373324","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}