Despair in Russian was written by Vladimir Nabokov and originally published as a serial in Sovremennye Zapiski during 1934. It was then published as a book in 1936 and later translated to English by the author in 1937. Most copies of the 1937 English translation of the book were destroyed by German bombs, and only a handful remain. Nabokov revised the second translation in 1965, now the only version sold in English. The narrator and protagonist of the story, Hermann Karlovich, a Russian emigre businessman, meets a tramp in the city of Prague, whom he believes to be his exact double. Even... though Felix, the supposed doppelgänger, is seemingly unaware of their resemblance, Hermann insists that their likeness is most striking. Hermann is married to Lydia, a sometimes silly and forgetful wife who has a cousin named Ardalion. It is insinuated at times that Lydia and Ardalion are, in fact lovers, although Hermann continually stresses how much Lydia loves him. Ardalion is an awful artist, although he refuses to admit it.
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