num_pages: 234
description: My Childhood, which appeared in 1913, is the first part of Maxim Gorky's autobiographical trilogy. The ordinary experiences of a Russian boy in the nineteenth century are recalled by an altogether extraordinary man, whose gift for recapturing the world of a child is uncanny. Across the vision of the boy perched above the stove the Russian contrasts flicker - barbaric gaiety and deep gloom, satanic cruelty and saintly forebearance, clownish knaves and holy fools. A shutter in the mind closes: thirty years later the pictures develop, as fresh, as vivid, as exotic as when they were taken.
language: English
title: My Childhood
titlecomplete: My Childhood
genres: 20th Century, Russia, Biography, Literature, Russian Literature, Classics, Autobiography, Nonfiction, History, Memoir
ratings_count: 7778
series: Autobiography
publisher: Penguin Books