A Volga Tale

The longest river in Europe, the Volga, divides the continent in two. On one side are mighty mountains, large Russian cities with white stone churches, translucent blue lakes of icy water, and a cold wind blowing from the North Sea. In the early years of the twentieth century, the winds of momentous change blew even harder, bringing revolution and ideologies that would shape the next two centuries of human history.

On the other side lies a world that belongs to the past, shored up by the vast Western Steppe, where small villages dot wide farmlands and life is perfumed by a hot, fragrant breeze that has its source in the Turkmen desert and the salty Caspian Sea. Two worlds that could not be further apart.

Those worlds are brought together when Jakob Bach is hired by Udo Grimm to give lessons to Grimm’s daughter, Klara. The love that grows between Jakob and Klara has unimaginable consequences. Expelled from Gnadenthal when their affair is discovered, they settle in a secluded hamlet hidden deep in the woods to live in peace. After a tragic episode, Jakob, psychically scarred, is forced to raise his daughter Anche alone.

The fairy tales he invents and puts to paper in an effort to forge a bond with his daughter become widely known, and slowly life in the German colonies along the Volga begins to resemble the stories created by Bach.

In the 18th century, the Russian empress Catherine the Great invited Europeans to immigrate, become Russian citizens, and farm Russian lands while maintaining their language and culture. The settlers came mainly from Germany. Following the Russian Revolution, the Volga German Soviet Republic was founded; it lasted until 1941, when it was abolished after the Germans invaded the region. In September 1941 all Volga Germans were deported, and over half a million were sent into exile in Siberia and Kazakhstan.

Jakob Bach’s life reflects and foreshadows that of his native colony, Gnadenthal, in this sweeping epic set from the dying years of the 19th century through the mid-twentieth century, a story of personal tragedy and resilience. In telling a stirring family story, Yakhina also recounts the story of a people, a republic, a nation — a tale that begins in quietude, flows and grows mighty, crosses space and time like the Volga River itself.

Endorsements

Finalist for the Prix Médicis 2021.

Longlisted for the European Literature Prize 2021.