The Three Fat Men

The Three Fat Men

The Three Fat Men

Author: Yuri Olesha


It was the first revolutionary fairy tale in Soviet literature. The critical reaction at first was varied. V. Boichevsky in an article "How Stories For Children Should Not Be" saw it as a "sugarcoated" presentation of revolution. Anatoly Lunacharsky, however, saw in it "heart-felt apologetics by the artistic intelligentsia accepting the revolution".

Stanislavky and the Moscow Art Theater premiered a dramatic version of the story in May 1930. A ballet version with music by V. Oransky was presented in 1935. It has also been turned into an opera (composer, V. Rubin, 1956), a film and several radio versions.

Yury Karlovich Olesha (March 3 [O.S. February 19] 1899 – May 10, 1960) was a Russian and Soviet novelist. He is considered one of the greatest Russian novelists of the 20th century, one of the few to have succeeded in writing works of lasting artistic value despite the stifling censorship of the era. His works are delicate balancing acts that superficially send pro-Communist messages but reveal far greater subtlety and richness upon a deeper reading. Sometimes, he is grouped with his friends Ilf and Petrov, Isaac Babel, and Sigismund Krzhizhanovsky into the Odessa School of Writers.
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