1913 - the year before the catastrophe of World War - fell during a time of booming Russian cities and unresolved issues in the Russian provinces. The vastness of Russia is marked by decline and a diffuse sense of expectation. At the height of his narrative power, Ivan Bunin pursues his literary grand project to depict this world. The peasant who should sell his grain at an inopportune time, or the one who tells his lord stories of violence against landowners, the seminarian who believes himself to be destined for something better, the brutally beaten matchmaker, the horse doctor who is privy to all secrets, the wayward, tormented son, the woman who spends her life reminiscing about a youthful summer full of love, and last but not least, the townsman who briefly stops in his provincial childhood home - in all these and other characters, in each of these precise yet poetic portrayals.