Andrey Gulyashki

After his first stories, printed in the newspapers "Struya" and "Trud" in the period 1933-1935, Andrei Gulyashki published several more significant works of fiction: the novels "Don Quixote of Sylvester", "Death Sentence" and the sketches "Women". These works are without particular artistic value. They are youthful experiments. The author is still a young man - he has just turned 25, an age that is too early for a fiction writer. Usually at such an age literary influences are strongest. They can be difficult to overcome. The direct life observations, impressions, all that huge life material that a fiction writer needs to build his works, has not been collected. The originality of the artist almost always depends on the depth with which his gaze penetrates reality. Early fiction works are in most cases either autobiographical on intimate themes, or to one degree or another imitative. Exceptions like Thomas Mann's "Buddenbrooks" are few.