BOOKS
Boarding School Stories
“Boarding School Stories” is an autobiographical book - as far as memory allows. The setting is a Moscow boarding school in the early nineties, where children study in an environment characterized by/full of poverty and violence, but where there is also roomfor exciting adventures and meetings with extraordinary people. The protagonist is a neglected but “bookish” junior high school student who meets with unexpected assistance on her path and then finds (discover) the road that will lead her out of the boarding school walls.
In January 2025, Riva Evstifeeva’s book Boarding School Stories was shortlisted for the independent literary prize Dar founded by Mikhail Shishkin. This prize aims to support literature written in Russian that does not conform to the dictates of Russian propaganda.
French translations:
In January 2025, Riva Evstifeeva’s book Boarding School Stories was shortlisted for the independent literary prize Dar founded by Mikhail Shishkin. This prize aims to support literature written in Russian that does not conform to the dictates of Russian propaganda.
French translations:
- "Récits d’une interne", trad. Odile Melnik-Ardin, Revue russe, №64 (2025), p. 247-252
- Récits de l’internat, trad. Daria Sinichkina, Paris, ÉditionsTourgueneff, 2025
Without Mother
Riva Evstifeeva's new book continues the autobiographical series that began with The Internat Stories [cioè? Oppure qui “Boarding School” oppure sopra “Internat” реши] (Éditions Tourgueneff, 2023). Now the center of the narrative is a teenage girl who has escaped from the terrible reality of boarding school. A new, domestic life begins. And the most difficult thing in this new life turns out to be communication with her mother. Mother, a bright and yet difficult person, does not like to talk about the past. And only gradually do the contours of her own story emerge from family photos and stories – a story ordinary in its nightmarishness, as the stories of Soviet women often are.
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