{"product_id":"days-in-the-caucasusisbn-9781782274896","title":"Days in the Caucasus","description":"\u003cb\u003eA   scintillatingly witty memoir telling the story of a young woman's determined   struggle for freedom\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eWe all know families that are poor but 'respectable'. Mine, in   contrast, was extremely rich but not 'respectable' at all...\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e This is the extraordinary memoir of an 'odd, rich, exotic' childhood - of   growing up in Azerbaijan in the turbulent early twentieth century, caught   between East and West, tradition and modernity.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Banine remembers her luxurious home, with endless feasts of sweets and   fruit; her beloved, flaxen-haired German governess; her imperious, swearing,   strict Muslim grandmother; her bickering, poker-playing, chain-smoking   relatives. She recalls how the Bolsheviks came, and they lost everything.   How, amid revolution and bloodshed, she fell passionately in love, only to be   forced into marriage with a man she loathed- until the chance of escape   arrived.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e By turns gossipy and romantic, wry and moving, \u003ci\u003eDays in the Caucasus\u003c\/i\u003e is a   coming-of-age story and a portrait of a vanished world, and of how the past   haunts us.\"An effervescent and irreverent feat of recollection and imagination—epic in sweep yet intimate in tone—that introduces the reader to an exotic, antique world and to characters so vividly drawn that their raucous voices seem to echo long after they have vanished from sight… A radiant jewel of a book\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e— The Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Banine’s consummate prose is marked by undertones of erudite wittiness. Educated and pragmatic, but also hopeful, she expresses wanting nothing more than to be free to pursue self-realization. D\u003ci\u003eays in the Caucasus \u003c\/i\u003ewas published in 1945; this first English translation of the memoir is an absolute joy—full of adventure, travel, and youthful dreams.” \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e— Foreword Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Banine offers us an invaluable, irresistibly readable portrait of a way of life eclipsed by the cataclysms of the 20th century.” \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e— The Calvert Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A delightful memoir of an eventful life set against the helter-skelter of the 20th century.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e— Financial Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Every so often a voice emerges from the archive so vivid that it seems impossible that it should ever have been forgotten.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e— Evening Standard \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I started to leaf through the book and was soon engrossed... So vividly and wittily does the author reveal to us an utterly unfamiliar world.\" \u003cb\u003e— Teffi\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A romantic and gloriously comic account of a heady and turbulent youth spent on the shores of the Caspian... Banine's autobiography captures a rarefied world on the brink of extinction... What commends Days in the Caucasus, quite aside from its rakish narrative, is [her] exquisite prose and unremitting eye for comic absurdity even amid the profoundest personal tragedy.\" \u003cb\u003e— Bryan Karetnyk, \u003ci\u003eSpectator\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“This jewel of a memoir, written in 1945 but only now published in English, has all the makings of a Tolstoyan drama” \u003cb\u003e— \u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eNew Internationalist\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Banine tells her story of first loves, forced marriage, exile and Paris with wit and warmth. Never one to take anything too seriously, her company and her memoir is a delight\u003ci\u003e” \u003cb\u003e— \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eTatler\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Filtering her childhood ambitions through the lens of maturity, Banine recreates a world that is both believable and thoroughly engrossing”\u003ci\u003e \u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e— \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eTimes Literary Supplement\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“A devilish story, like a finely spiced dish, bringing verve, joy and charm along with its delicious style” \u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e— \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eAction\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“An intense story, often amusing, which plunges the reader into the most unfamiliar territory imaginable”\u003ci\u003e \u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eVerités\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\"A book to give those gloomy souls who find daily existence banal”\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLettres françaises\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eBanine    was born Umm El-Banu Assadullayeva in 1905, into a wealthy family in  Baku,   then part of the Russian Empire. Following the Russian  Revolution and the   subsequent fall of the Azerbaijan Democratic  Republic, Banine was forced to   flee her home-country - first to  Istanbul, and then to Paris. In Paris she   formed a wide circle of  literary acquaintances including Nicos Kazantzakis,   André Malraux,  Ivan Bunin and Teffi and eventually began writing herself. \u003ci\u003eDays in the Caucasus\u003c\/i\u003e is Banine's   most famous work. It was published in 1945 to critical  acclaim but has never   been translated into English, until now.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnne-Thompson  Ahmadova is a writer and translator from Azerbaijani,  French and  Russian. She lived in   Baku for twenty years, moving there  in 1997  initially to set up a Caucasus   bureau for the BBC Monitoring  Service.We all know families that are poor but ‘respectable’. Mine,\u003cbr\u003e in contrast, was extremely rich but not ‘respectable’ at all.\u003cbr\u003e At the time I was born they were outrageously wealthy, but those\u003cbr\u003e days are long gone. Sad for us, though quite right in the moral\u003cbr\u003e scheme of things. Anyone kind enough to show interest might\u003cbr\u003e ask in what way my family wasn’t ‘respectable’. Well, because on\u003cbr\u003e the one hand it could not trace its ancestral line further than my\u003cbr\u003e great-grandfather, who went by the fine name of Asadullah, meaning\u003cbr\u003e ‘loved by Allah’. This proved very apt: born a peasant, he died\u003cbr\u003e a millionaire, thanks to the oil gushing from his stony land, where\u003cbr\u003e sheep had once grazed on meagre pickings. On the other hand\u003cbr\u003e because my family included some extremely shady characters on\u003cbr\u003e whose activities it would be better not to dwell. If I get caught up\u003cbr\u003e in the story, I might reveal all, though my interest as an author is at\u003cbr\u003e odds with my concern to preserve the last shreds of family pride.\u003cbr\u003e So, I was born into this odd, rich, exotic family one winter’s\u003cbr\u003e day in a turbulent year; like so many ‘historic’ years, this one was\u003cbr\u003e full of strikes, pogroms, massacres and other displays of human\u003cbr\u003e genius (especially inventive when it comes to social unrest of all\u003cbr\u003e kinds). In Baku, the majority of the population of Armenians and\u003cbr\u003e Azerbaijanis were busy massacring one another. In that year, it\u003cbr\u003e was the better-organized Armenians who were exterminating the\u003cbr\u003e Azerbaijanis in revenge for past massacres, while the Azerbaijanis\u003cbr\u003e made the best of it by storing up grounds for future slaughter.\u003cbr\u003e There was, therefore, something for everyone—except of course\u003cbr\u003e for the many who sadly lost their lives.*\u003cbr\u003e No one would have considered me capable of taking part in the\u003cbr\u003e work of destruction, but I clearly was, since I killed my mother as\u003cbr\u003e I came into the world. To escape the bloodshed, she had chosen\u003cbr\u003e to give birth in an oil-producing area in the hope that it would be\u003cbr\u003e quieter there; but in the chaos of the time she ended up giving birth\u003cbr\u003e in dreadful conditions and contracted puerperal fever. In addition,\u003cbr\u003e the house was cut off from outside help by a violent storm, compounding\u003cbr\u003e the confusion into which we’d been plunged. Without\u003cbr\u003e the complex care that her condition required, my mother fought\u003cbr\u003e the illness in vain. She was lucid when she died, full of regret at\u003cbr\u003e leaving life so young and of anxiety at the fate of her loved ones.\u003cbr\u003e My memories of conscious awareness begin with toys that\u003cbr\u003e my father brought from Berlin. It was through these that life was\u003cbr\u003e revealed to me: I first perceived the world through the purring\u003cbr\u003e stomach of a plush cat, the beautiful gleam of a maharajah astride a\u003cbr\u003e grey buckskin elephant, the bowing and scraping of a multicoloured\u003cbr\u003e clown. I perceived it all, felt it, marvelled and began to live.\u003cbr\u003e My early years were the happiest; I was so young compared\u003cbr\u003e to my three older sisters that I enjoyed all kinds of privileges and\u003cbr\u003e knew how to make the most of them.\u003cbr\u003e But, more than anything, my happiness was the result of my\u003cbr\u003e upbringing by a Baltic German governess—she was my governess,\u003cbr\u003e my mother and my guardian angel too. This saint (the noun is no\u003cbr\u003e exaggeration) gave us her health, and her life; she wore herself out\u003cbr\u003e for us, suffered all sorts of trouble because of us, and received little\u003cbr\u003e joy; she always sacrificed herself and asked for nothing in return.\u003cbr\u003e In a nutshell, she was one of those rare beings who are able to give\u003cbr\u003e without receiving.\u003cbr\u003e Fräulein Anna had fair skin and flaxen hair, while the four of\u003cbr\u003e us had brown skin, black hair and a markedly oriental, hirsute\u003cbr\u003e appearance. We made a fine group when we surrounded her in\u003cbr\u003e photographs, all hook noses and close-set eyebrows, she completely\u003cbr\u003e Nordic. And I should say that in those days—despite the prohibition\u003cbr\u003e of the Prophet, enemy of the image—we often had our photograph\u003cbr\u003e taken, dressed in our finery and flanked by as many relatives as\u003cbr\u003e possible, all against the background of a painted park. A harmless\u003cbr\u003e obsession that can be explained by the novelty of the process for\u003cbr\u003e the near savages that we were; an obsession to which I owe several\u003cbr\u003e hilarious and touching pictures that I preserve with great care.","brand":"Pushkin Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46299908636901,"sku":"NP9781782274896","price":17.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781782274896_3276215f-207a-4164-86fd-15794c3441ce.jpg?v=1730743017","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/days-in-the-caucasusisbn-9781782274896","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}