It is very easy to just buy and read what you know you enjoy and feel comfortable with and this is what I do most of the time however every now and again I like to dip into a literary genre which I do not usually go for. This time I opted for classic Russian literature and picked up “The Idiot” by Dostoyevsky. In the past this book has defeated me, I think mainly because I lost track of who was who because the names are ever so confusing for a non-Russian. Not only do the surnames all end in –ova (for women) and –ovich (for men) but the first names are often used in both their full and diminutive forms which are not necessarily easily to link to each other. For example, in Russian the diminutive of Ivan is Vanya and Aleksandr becomes Sasha. So it is quite easy for about half the book not to link the two names as being one and the same character and this can cause it to be all very befuddling.
So my very first tip would be to pay special attention to names, surnames and the diminutive form and maybe jot some down in case you take a break from reading the book and have to go back to it. Also look up the diminutive if you are not a hundred percent sure which character it is relating to.
My second piece of advice is to stay alert. If you read in bed before going to sleep like I do, you will probably reach a point where u get sleepy and your mind starts to drift off. With some books you can carry on reading them for a little while and still retain the gist of it. This is not one of these books, if you carry on reading without giving it your full attention you will lose entire pages of it and then next time you pick it up you will not know what is going on or where you should go back to in order to catch up.
My third and last tip is to take reading Russian literature on as a challenge. Do not pick up a work of Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky or Pushkin expecting it to be an easy read because then you will most probably end up giving up. However, do not feel overly daunted. To read one of these books is doable and interesting, the characters are beautifully written, there is drama, tragedy and sometimes a little humour. Most importantly you get to plunge yourself head first into nineteenth century Russia which is fascinating. Whilst I believe that you should not take the task of reading a classic Russian novel lightly, as that will never be an easy task, just remember that often the more difficult challenges will have greater rewards. So there we go, a few ideas for you to learn from my mistakes and pick up “The Idiot” or “Anna Karenina” or even “War and Peace” and manage to get right to the end undefeated.
A good way to start with russian literature is to read Dostoyevsky’s short stories to get you used to his writing styles, I have to say russian literature is one of my favourite forms of text, but honestly i get lost in names as well…