Masha Regina

Masha dreams of becoming one of the great European auteurs. But first she must escape the drudgery of her daily existence: a father who drinks, a dull and empty city, the fear of getting stuck in a life she doesn't want. So as soon as she is old enough she heads to the big city to claim her spot alongside the great filmmakers of the day. But she is unprepared for the sacrifices she must make to succeed. Lovers come and go - the college teacher, the cameraman, the renowned German actor - but Masha must decide whether she is prepared to forsake her happiness for her art: how far is she willing to go? Part philosophical treatise, part bildungsroman, Masha Regina is at once disturbing, intellectually challenging and unfailingly entertaining, and marks the arrival of an exciting new voice in Russian and international literature.

About the Author :
Vadim Levental was born in St Petersburg and studied Russian literature at St Petersburg State University. He is a literary critic, book editor and political commentator. Masha Regina is his first novel. He lives in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Review :
‘Sketching Masha, Saint Petersburg, and the Russian arts scene with lively and impressionistic detail, Levental swirls in fragmentary conversations, bits of internal monologue, and more than a few knowing references to the Russian literary canon to create a sophisticated twist on a bildungsroman that raises more questions than it answers and showcases the author’s own considerable literary talent.'  ‘A very fun book, one most American readers will readily recognize and relate to, though it will uncomfortably force that same reader outside the tedious ‘pull yourself up by your bootstraps via New York City’ narrative that dominates their own literature. We are all the same. We are all so very and impossibly different. It can be a bitter pill to swallow’ ‘Masha Regina is ... populated with cultural quotations from The Iliad to Star Wars, Gogol to The Godfather, fairy tales to porn sites, Don Quixote to computer games. Levantal’s work returns regularly to the “Dostoevskian spirit”, even as it spans both Shakespearean allusions and social media (“nothing drives people apart like daily status updates”).... In her acknowledgements, translator Lisa Hayden comments on these references “woven into the novel.” Her English version of this complex tapestry is, as ever, a delight, tackling multiple challenges from colloquialisms (“a drunk chick is not in charge of her twat”) to tongue twisters (“by the burbling river bank we bumblingly bagged a burbot”). Hayden’s thoughtful brilliance in this book ... helps illuminate contemporary Russian literature for Anglophone readers....The novel triumphs through imagery.’ ‘Masha Regina is the story of a successful artist, and what she sacrifices for her art, and even if variations of this story-arc are overly familiar, Levental’s approach makes for a striking personal portrait …. A compelling artist-portrait and character study.’ ‘The novel works on several levels at once and is replete with references from Pushkin to Gogol, Tom Stoppard to Star Wars and even Hegel. It's a cerebral work that urges its readers to consider the limits of ambition, the price of making art…This genre-defying novel takes on the limits of talent and ambition, fate and art in contemporary Europe.’  ‘Brilliant... this is a story about art and the cost one has to pay to become an internation­ally recognised film director.’ ‘A spectacularly mature, fine and merciless novel.’