Novel
Days in the Caucasus
Jours caucasiens
Banine · 1945
Synopsis
Banine recounts her childhood and adolescence in Baku, in a family enriched by oil: a luxurious residence, a German governess from the Baltic countries and a pious, authoritarian Muslim grandmother, her father Mirza, her stepmother Amina, her sisters and summers in the countryside. Then come the pogroms, the October Revolution, the end of the Empire and the arrival of the Red Army, which takes away the family fortune. At fifteen, she is married to Jamil, who is thirty-five and whom she does not love, and looks for a way to leave.
Context
The book appeared in Paris from René Julliard in 1945, three hundred and fifteen pages, and was followed by Jours parisiens in 1947. Presented on its cover as a novel, it is read as memoirs, a coming-of-age story and the portrait of a vanished world. It was translated into Azerbaijani by Hamlet Qoca, in Baku, in 2006, twice into Russian, into Spanish from Siruela, and into English by Anne Thompson-Ahmadova under the title Days in the Caucasus; Emerging Europe hailed it as a thoughtful and moving account.
Who it is for
About three hundred pages in French, lively to read; the book reads like memoirs more than like a novel.
Prizes and reception
The book that made its author known, translated into English, Spanish, Russian and Azerbaijani.
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