History of Cavalier de Gari and Manon Lesko

The novel of Abbot Prevo (1697-1763) "Manon Lesko" (1831) invariably falls on the lists of literary masterpieces, no matter what country they are compiled. Many books and articles are devoted to why this short novel about love touches the hearts so. Here is one of the first reviews: "The book is written with such skill that even decent people sympathize with a fraudster and a public girl." But not everyone arose sympathy: immediately after the first publication, the novel was prohibited and went to Samizdat for twenty years. The author was forced to withdraw some scenes and write "Prevention", in which he called the novel a "moral treatise set forth in the form of an entertaining story." Anatole France ironically called this trick a "shawl, thrown over the shoulders of Mademoiselle Manon". And this shawl is clearly not enough to cover that tornado of passions, happiness, suffering, grief, love, despair and hope that rages on the pages of "Manon". Another review of a contemporary: "View the" Manon Lesko ", and then throw her into the fire, but once you read it." Follow only the second part of this advice. It is useless to throw this book into the fire - it will not burn.
Evgeny Anatolyevich Gunst (1901-1993) - Russian translator and literary critic, specialist in French literature. Since 1931, he worked in the leading publishers of the USSR - "Fiction", "Science", "Art", "Academia". "His strongest love was the Abbot Prevo. Gunch collected his books and literature about him, "Manon Lesko" was in his dozens of publications. He was literally in love with the heroine of this wonderful novel, so that his wife was even jokingly jealous of him to Manon. To translate this book was a long-standing dream of Gunst, but when such an opportunity was presented, he refused it, because he considered it necessary to publish a translation of his teacher, older brother F. A. Petrovsky, Mikhail Alexandrovich (1887-1940), an innocently convicted and died in the Stalinsky camps. Gunch only prepared a reprint of this translation, providing it with a thorough commentary and inspired article "(Literary monuments. 1948-1998: Annotized catalog)