Mud and Stars

Travels in Russia with Pushkin, Tolstoy, and Other Geniuses of the Golden Age

By: Sara Wheeler

Narrated by: Sara Wheeler

With the writers of the Golden Age as her guides—Pushkin, Tolstoy, Gogol, and Turgenev, among others—Sara Wheeler searches for a Russia not in the news, traveling from rinsed northwestern beet fields and the Far Eastern Arctic tundra to the cauldron of nation­alities, religions, and languages in the Caucasus. Bypassing major cities as much as possible, she goes instead to the places associated with the country’s literary masters. With her, we see the fabled Trigorskoye (“three hills”) estate that Pushkin frequented during his exile, now preserved in his honor. We look for Dostoevsky along the waters of Lake Ilmen, site of the only house the restless writer ever owned. We pay tribute to the single stone that remains of Tol­stoy’s birthplace. Wheeler weaves these writers’ lives and works around their historical homes, giving us rich portraits of the many diverse Russias from which these writers spoke.

As she travels, Wheeler follows local guides, boards with families in modest homestays, eats roe and pelmeni and cabbage soup, invokes recipes from Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking, learns the language, and observes the pattern of outcry and silence that characterizes life under Vladimir Putin. Mud and Stars gives us timely, witty, and deeply personal insights into Russia, then and now.

Traveling through the golden age, and now

Picked this title up because I loved Wheeler’s Antarctica book. The form is similar: part travelogue, part history, part literary appreciation, part autobiography—all with Wheeler’s wit and, this time, melancholy. Something has happened—we are not told what, and that’s fine, and her business—but whatever it is, it mixes with the sadnesses and strange humor of the lives of Russian writers of the golden age and more contemporary citizens of both the Soviet Union and Putin’s Russia. New notes here are culinary history, struggles with language(s), and Wheeler’s family. I love the writers she visits, and had quite forgotten how much, but now I’m going to read Chekhov again. Thank you Sara Wheeler. I am too old and decrepit to go myself, but I can think of no better guide to the lives of these writers.

Great idea for a book!

Really liked how this book was set up. Started it on audible but was just too much detail for me (to listen to at work) so ended up reading it instead. Would have been so much better in my opinion without all the personal/family background of author and instead kept to relevant observations during her travels in Russia. Would have liked more discussion of Russian authors themselves.

Great Overview

Great overview of 19th century Russian writers, their works, their lives, their country homes in the past and now. Ms Wheeler also provides insight into contemporary Russia and Russians and their relationships to the great Russian writers. Literary review, travel book and memoir wrapped up together. Engaging and witty.

Lovely reading, funny and interesting

Wry humour, details and descriptions. I loved the history-cum-travelogue-cum-memoir style, which weaves together the stories of the authors with their time periods and the present day. I personally think it’s much nicer and more honest for an historian to include themselves in their work, because it immediately addresses something integral to the genre: bias and point of view are, either implicitly and explicitly, irrevocably entwined with the recounting of facts. I feel you get a much more honest perspective of the subject if the author is up front about their own opinions and experiences—for example, the author tells us explicitly that she loves Dostoevsky, and also that he was a bigoted xenophobe in real life and in his work often gets lost in his own psychological miasma, which to me allows the reader to more honestly consider their own opinion than if they were reading a drier biography that presents the author’s interpretation as objective fact. Ultimately I liked the circuitousness of this book, and learned wide-ranging information both about the authors and contemporary Russia. The author’s performance has a nice cadence, clarity and sense of humour.

tarnished by author's personal political views

It would have been so much better if the author had not felt the need to constantly inject her own biased, hayseed political opinions into the narrative at every other paragraph.