Kniga dlya Chteniya. / Khrestomatiya. "Okhota pushche nevoli."

Item Details

Moscow, I. D. Sytin, 1913, 1917, Cloth

Good.

Two Russian readers published by the firm of I. D. Sytin.

Those who read Russian can see the title pages in the photos. Here we will give the titles in translation Yu. P. Struve, Reader for lessons in the Russian language. For preparatory middle-school classes. With problems, themes and questions for oral and written tasks of a literary character. Moscow, I. D. Sytin, 1913. 158 pp. Selections from Krylov, Pushkin, Tolstoy, Goncharov, etc./ N. I. Sokolov and V. N. Panov, Chrestomathia for Preparatory Classes of Middle-Level Educational Institutions. Moscow, I. .D. Sytin, 1917. 248 pp. Readings on a variety of subjects. The proverb “Okhota pushche nevoli” on the title page means roughly “Doing something willingly is superior to being forced.” Illustrations are interspersed in both titles. Paper in the second title is browned, presumably due to a decline in quality during the war. Both rebound in half-cloth with moire cloth-covered boards.

Ivan Dmitrievich Sytin (1851-1932), born into a peasant family, was among the most important publishers of pre-Revolutionary Russia. He was especially known for producing inexpensive editions of Russian classics that workers and others of modest means could afford. He was especially close to Tolstoy. After the Bolshevik Revolution, his business ended but he chose not to emigrate. These two books were published in the last years of the monarchy and in the last years of his activity as well. They use the old-style alphabet and spelling.