title: Tolstoy, Rasputin, Others, and Me: The Best of Teffi (New York Review Books Classics)
author: Teffi
description: "Teffi is a courageous companion for anyones life. Erica Wagner, <i>The New Statesman<br /></i><br />If Teffi hadn't existed, no one could have invented her. Read and admired by Nicholas II and Lenin, scornful of the Whites and the Bolsheviks, pursued in vain by Rasputin, constitutionally incapable of suffering fools, Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya was one of prerevolutionary Russia's brightest literary beacons. Michael Robbins,<i><i>Chicago Tribune</i></i><br /><br />"Nearly all her portraits  both of famous historical figures and of ordinary people  are sharp and vivid. There is only one person in Teffis autobiographical prose who we are not really allowed to see. This is Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, carefully concealed by her witty, observant and humane alter ego Teffi." Masha Karp, <i>The World Today<br /></i><br />"Teffis genius lies in applying a light, ironic and at times satirical flair of humour to deeply serious subjects. She uses this light-hearted humourous touch to appear detached from subjects which she evidently holds very deep feelings about. Its this combination of light, superficial levity with profound depth that makes her work so compelling<i>The Best of Teffi</i>is an excellent collection, a wonderful and compelling introduction to the work of a brilliant and underappreciated writer who deserves much greater recognition in the literary world. Lets hope this marks the beginning of that process.Hans Rollmann,<i>Popmatters</i><br /><br />[Teffi is] an inimitable presence in Russian literature, a genuine wonder. -Georgy Ivanov<br /> <br /> [Teffi] can write in more registers than you might think, and is capable of being heartbreaking as well as very funny. I wish she were still alive, and I could have met her. But then I realised she would have seen right through me. I cant recommend her strongly enough. Nicholas Lezard, <i>The Guardian</i>
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  TEFFI (1872–1952) was the pen name of Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya, born in St.
  Petersburg into a distinguished family that treasured literature. She and her
  three sisters all became writers. Teffi wrote in a variety of styles and
  genres: political feuilletons published in a Bolshevik newspaper during her
  brief period of radical fervor after the 1905 Revolution; Symbolist poems that
  she declaimed or sang in Petersburg literary salons; popular one-act plays,
  mostly humorous or satirical (one was entitled _The Woman Question_ ); and a
  novel titled simply _Adventure Novel_. Her finest works are her short
  stories—collected in _Other Worlds_ and _Tolstoy, Rasputin, Others, and Me_
  —and _Memories_ , a witty, tragic, and deeply perceptive account of her last
  journey across Russia and what is now Ukraine, before going by boat to
  Istanbul in the summer of 1919. Teffi was widely read; her admirers included
  not only such writers as Bunin, Bulgakov, and Zoshchenko but also both Lenin
  an