Talk:Aleksandr I. Kuprin

Pathetic adventure seekers

Who are the pathetic adventure seekers in The Garnet Bracelet? I beieve it is an absolutely wrong term for the most of his novels.abakharev 21:23, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Best Known Work

Also are you sure that the Shtabs-capitain Rybnikov is the pinnacle? Indeed search for Japaneese spyes became a national pastime in 30 years after publishing the story, but I am not sure it was the Kuprin's influence. Why not The Garnet Bracelet? Sashka? Sulamif? The Solomon Ring? or the Pit? abakharev 21:23, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

THE DUEL is one of the greatest novels iv read —Preceding unsigned comment added by [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] ([[User talk:{{{1}}}|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/{{{1}}}|contribs]])

"The Duel" is his masterpiece. It's the work that made him famous in literary circles at the time, and generally why he is best known today. Fothergill Volkensniff IV (talk) 01:50, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that's open to debate between The Duel and The Garnet Bracelet. Besides an author can have more than one masterpiece and many articles can review just one of the masterpieces, which is not to say that the author did not have any other masterpieces or that one masterpiece is greater than another masterpiece. And critical review by a critic is in itself subjective to the person doing a review. In addition, there was a fairly acclaimed movie made from The Garnet Bracelet (as well as several other stories), which would likely make Kuprin "best known" for the Garnet Bracelet as far as general populace is concerned. For example, see assistedreadingbooks.com as just a sample website. As you can see, it calls “The Idiot” "a unique masterpiece" and further goes on to say: "His Poyedinok (1905) meaning The Duel made him famous in the literary circles. . . . His eminent works include the story Reka zhizni (The River of Life, 1906) and the novel, Yama (The Pit, 1909-1915). So, while the Duel made him famous in the literary circles as the first piece to get him noticed, the page does call The River of Life and The Pit as his eminent works which may be another word for most important. Again, there is of course a distinction between just a website trying to sell a book and a literary review and a biography calling The Duel Kuprin's Masterpiece, but there may be other reviews that think otherwise. I'm not quite sure, yet, that the two citations (one without year or page numbers) is quite the consensus on which single work is a masterpiece. So, I didn't change the part that called The Duel a masterpiece, but I would hesitate to go beyond calling it THE masterpiece or the best known piece. --RossF18 (talk) 04:13, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I try to stick with scholarly sources on Wikipedia, when available. All these pronouncements of greatness are of course subjective, but it is still possible to give the reader some sense of direction where the majority (scholarly) opinion leans (ie. signed (named) author and/or university press or well known critic). Re: page number it's viewable via Google indirectly through JSTOR (first entry). Some further cites found on books.google.com (search on Kuprin "the duel")

Noone can access the links you provide. The JSTOR article is pay only and the google book only makes certain pages available. If better links exist, please provide those if you'd like.--RossF18 (talk) 12:31, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

• "The Duel, which first brought Kuprin to the forefront of Russian literature" - Reference Guide to Russian Literature - Page 474
• "The Duel made Kuprin famous, and he became a prominent and much discussed figure of literary Petersburg" - A History of Russian Literature: Comprising A History of Russian Literature - Page 388
• "Kuprin became widely known after the success of The Duel (1905)," - From Chekhov to the Revolution: Russian Literature, 1900-1917 - Page 173
• "The Duel, 1916), however, that made him famous and remains his best-known work" Columbia Dictionary of Modern European Literature pg. 452
• " his most famous novel, The Duel" - The Cambridge History of Russian Literature - Page 373
• "He is best known for his novel The Duel" - Academic American Encyclopedia - Page 138
• "Though the tale "Moloch" (1896) first made Kuprin known, it was his novel The Duel (1905) which brought him fame." -- An Anthology of Russian Neo-realism: The "Znanie" School of Maxim Gorky - Page 137
• "first success was a long novel, The Duel (1905)" -- Russian Short Stories - Page 429

Thanks for the sources, but many just say that the Duel was either his first success or brought him greater reknown. Which is not the same as saying it's his masterpiece. Just because something is best known also doesn't make it his masterpiece (but I take it that was for my Garnet Bracelet movie claim, in which case the point is taken). Other quotes are good.--RossF18 (talk) 12:33, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

As you can see there are a ton of reliable, scholarly verifiable sources available. Unfortunately the article is heavily slanted towards a single source, a journalism article, in Russian, that is not online - hardly verifiable or reliable IMO.Fothergill Volkensniff IV (talk) 12:01, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

The 'one' source is not in Russian. Yes, it was first published in Russia, but I got it off of a English language translation published by Lexis Nexis which is a reputable news media service. Besides, if you check, that source is just there to verify basic information, like birthday, parents' names, death, and major works. The article is not used to make any claims about works. In addition, if you'd like a copy of the article, I can paste it into the talk page, if that would help. Again, it's in English.--RossF18 (talk) 12:39, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can tell Nicholas J. L. Luker appears to be the most prolific and recent specialist on Kuprin (in English). If I was looking for an authoritative source, Luker would be at the top of the list. This article would be more reliable and mainstream if it had more citations to his work (some of which is freely online already in the ext links section). This is true for most minor but important authors, there is usually one or two scholars who are the authorities. Big fish, small pond. So in a way it's not too difficult to filter out the noise because most sources are just parroting a few specialists (or are unreliable). Fothergill Volkensniff IV (talk) 12:22, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Kuprin Alexander Ivanovich.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 01:37, 9 April 2020 (UTC)