The Orloff Couple

and

Malva

By

Maxim Gorky

(Alexei Maximovitch Peshkoff)

Authorized Translation from the Russian by

Emily Jakowleff and Dora B. Montefiore

With a Portrait

London

William Heinemann

1901

CONTENTS
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
THE ORLOFF COUPLE
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
MALVA
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Alexei Maximovitch Peshkoff was born March 14, 1869, at Nijni Novgorod.On both his father's and mother's side he belonged to the people; hisfather followed the trade of a jobbing upholsterer, and his mother wasthe daughter of a dyer. He was left an orphan when quite young, and hepassed then under the care of his grandfather, a cruel and tyrannicalold man, who had already so ill-treated young Alexei's father when alad, that he ran away from home.

Peshkoff attended school for about five months, but having caughtsmallpox, his grandfather took him away from school, and sent him atthe age of nine as errand-boy to a shoemaker. Here the child scaldedhis hand badly and was sent back to his home. His grandfather nextapprenticed him to a draughtsman, from whom young Peshkoff ran away.In order to keep himself he went as galley-boy on a Volga steamer,where he helped the ship's cook. This cook was a reader, and somethingof a character; he possessed a small library which he allowed hisgalley-boy to read, and it was here that the lad felt the firstawakening of literary instinct, though he had always, from the timehe left school at nine years old, read everything that fell into hishands. The cook's library contained amongst other authors Nekrassoff;translations of the works of Ann Radcliff; a volume of Sovrememick,whose editor was Tchemishewsky, the translator and commentator of JohnStuart Mill; Iscra, and several works in Little Russian; the lives ofthe saints, and works by some mystical writers; some odd volumes ofDumas, and some Freemasons' literature. This curious collection ofmiscellaneous writings gave young Peshkoff, now fifteen, a burningdesire to obtain some degree of culture, and awoke in him the wish towrite. He left the steamer, and wandered to Kazan, where he was toldfree instruction could be obtained. Here, in order to keep himself,he had to enter a bakery at three roubles, or six shillings, a month;

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