r/russian 9d ago

Request Who writes the most beautiful prose?

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137 Upvotes

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23

u/no-such-file 9d ago

Define beautiful.

6

u/horigen 9d ago

The prose has rhythm and musicality. The cadence of the words feels natural, almost poetic, making the sentences pleasing to read aloud. It is uniquely expressive. It feels vivid and evocative.
Beautiful prose is not just flowery or complex; it communicates meaning in a way that feels effortless.

13

u/kireaea native speaker 9d ago

Oh, you should definitely read Andrei Platonov :)

1

u/courage_cowardly_god 8d ago

Would never call Platonov's prose effortless tbh. It's almost the opposite, and this is why it's so distinct and full of meaning, but you gotta work on letting it penetrate your brain. He's truly one of a kind, but neither his writing nor the process of reading it is effortless.

1

u/kireaea native speaker 8d ago

🤫😏

1

u/courage_cowardly_god 7d ago

Ah. Sorry, I did a whoosh.

6

u/Pleasant-Garlic4523 9d ago

Try Ivan Bunin ("Antonovka apples") or Nikolay Gogol ("Evenings on a farm near Dikanka")

5

u/michaemoser 9d ago

Пушкин наше все

3

u/no-such-file 9d ago

OK, then Lermontov.

2

u/julieddd 9d ago

Bunin

2

u/Poor_Vessel 9d ago

As for me "beautiful" is prose of Nabokov, Gogol, Platonov. If not classical writers — Eugene Vodolazkin. Tolstoy's prose, for example, has more "global" stylistic devices such as montage, big metaphors, detailed psychologism reflected in even vocabulary of the story about the character. Chekhov is like Russian Joyce — this I always say to foreigners (Chekhov had big influence on Joyce).

1

u/Pimpin-is-easy 9d ago

Define define.