Eugene Onegin was written between 1823 and 1831, serialized in chapters from 1825, and published complete in 1833. It is universally regarded as the founding text of Russian literature — the work that established the Russian literary language, created the template for the Russian novel, and provided the characters (the superfluous man, the suffering woman, the romantic friend) that Russian fiction would explore for the next century.
The story appears simple: Eugene Onegin, a Petersburg dandy exhausted by society’s pleasures, retires to a country estate. There he befriends the poet Lensky and meets Tatiana, a provincial girl who falls passionately in love with him. Onegin rejects her. Lensky challenges Onegin to a duel over a trivial social slight; Onegin kills him. Years later, Onegin encounters Tatiana in Petersburg society — now a princess, poised and beautiful — and discovers that he loves her. She refuses him: she still loves him, she admits, but she is married and will remain faithful.
The miracle of Eugene Onegin is its tone: Pushkin maintains a conversational intimacy with the reader, digressing into literary criticism, autobiography, descriptions of food and weather and social custom, creating a portrait not merely of his characters but of an entire society at a specific historical moment. The Onegin stanza (AbAbCCddEffEgg) gives the poem a musical structure that is simultaneously formal and natural.
Collecting Eugene Onegin
First complete edition (St. Petersburg, 1833): Extremely rare.
Key translations: Nabokov literal (1964), Johnston verse (1977), Falen verse (1990), Mitchell verse (2008).
Market values:
- Original Russian first editions (individual chapters): Museum pieces, $50,000+
- Nabokov translation first (Bollingen, 1964), 4 vols, fine/fine: $200–$600
- Johnston translation first (Penguin, 1977): $20–$50