| Author | Alexander Kuprin |
|---|---|
| Original title | Олеся |
| Language | Russian |
| Publisher | Kievlyanin (1898) |
Publication date | 1898 |
| Publication place | Russian Empire |
| Media type | print (Hardback & Paperback) |
Olesya (Russian: Олеся) is a novelette by Alexander Kuprin written in late 1897 – early 1898 and serialized in Kievlyanin newspaper from October 30 to November 17, 1898. Olesya, the most acclaimed piece of his Polesye cycle, did much to build Kuprin's literary reputation and warranted his move to Saint Petersburg.[1]
According to the Kuprin scholar Nicholas Luker, "Olesya is the most charming of Kuprin's rural tales. Though meant at first to be only part of the Volhynia and Polesye cycle, this poetic story of the love between an urban intellectual and a beautiful country girl expanded into a full novelette of a significance far surpassing that of the other regional tales."[2] The story was one of Kuprin's favorites. Referring once to both Olesya and his later work "The River of Life," he said: "There is life in it and freshness and... more of my soul than in my other tales."[3]