As I read the first page of White Nights, I couldn't help but fall in love immediately with the writing. How could I not, when I have a soft spot for youth, the starry sky, and existential questions you can only ask under the moonlight?

White Nights is about two lonely people. He a dreamer, she lost in love. Two lonely souls who meet by chance under the starry sky of Petersburg. 

We meet our narrator, a self-proclaimed dreamer. Every time he steps out the door, he falls in love with the city, with strangers, and even with the beautiful houses he sees along his route. His problem is that he lives too much inside his head. He has convinced himself his daydreams are the only place he can fully live, but he still hopes to experience the same vivid richness in real life.

One night, he meets a woman and they quickly become friends. For a handful of nights, they share each other’s stories. They were both feeling lost and alone, but now their evenings come alive with this newfound friendship. They come to know one another in a series of conversations, and he inevitably falls in love with her. 

But what happens under the moonlight will not always survive the light of day. And sometimes, something so fleeting and temporary can leave a lasting impression on you.

White Nights is full of beautiful writing exploring loneliness, love, and a thirst for life. This story hurt me. But it also made me feel hopeful.

This Little Black Classics edition of White Nights also contains a second short story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. While White Nights tugs at your heartstrings, Bobok is a little more absurd. 

In Bobok, we follow a writer who after attending a funeral decides to chill in the cemetery, sit by the gravestones, and have a little rest. He suddenly hears voices. Voices of the recently departed who have been buried around him. The dead retain their consciousness for a while before finally fading, and they talk to each other about various things. But mostly, they are trying to retain the same type of pecking order that they experienced in society while still alive. A society lady is so offended by the fact that she is buried next to a shopkeeper, but he reminds her that she hasn’t paid her bills in his shop for months. But they are both equally dead, and there is no point in discussing debts. 

Eventually the dead come to the conclusion that death is a new chance for them to live, as absurd as that sounds. In death, or before their consciousness truly fades away, they decide to live without shame and in complete honesty. Freed from the shackles of life, will they rise to their highest potential, or will they give in to the depravity of their base desires?

Bobok was such a silly read and I had fun eavesdropping on the dead. But it also makes you think, doesn’t it? 

This little book was my first taste of Dostoyevsky. Excited to read more of his work!