Odessa Stories

Odessa Stories

Tales of Benya Krik, the King of the Odessa underworld, and other Jews

Isaac Babel and Yulia Basharova, Translator

The cycle of stories describes the vivid and daring world of the Moldavanka raiders, led by the legendary Benya Krik, nicknamed the King. Babel portrays the life of Jewish Odessa in the early 20th century, where a gangster code of honor is mixed with humor, grand gestures, and brutality. The plots center around grandiose raids, lavish weddings, and family dramas, showing the decline of this unique world in the fires of the revolution and the Civil War.

An edition from the "Golden Tattoo" series. Printed in 12pt type with wide line spacing for maximum readability. Unabridged. Modern translation.

About the Authors

Isaac Babel was born in Odessa in 1894, the son of a Jewish tradesman. At the age of twenty-one he went to St Petersburg, where he had to avoid the Tsarist police because he lacked the residence certificate required of all Jews. Gorky was the first to encourage Babel by printing two of his stories in his magazine. During the First World War, Babel fought with the Tsarist army and in 1917 went over to the Bolsheviks. In 1923 he returned to literature with a number of short stories printed in periodicals. An instant literary success, these formed the nucleus of the Odessa Stories, a group of vivid sketches of Russian Jewish life, and the unforgettable Red Cavalry (1926), written out of his experiences with Budyonny’s cavalry in the Polish campaign of 1920. Other stories, scenarios and plays followed. Unable to conform to the demands for political conformism that were being made on him, however, Babel was arrested suddenly in 1939. He died, possibly in 1941.

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