Mother

Gorky undertook the task of showing the labouring man not so much as the victim of an unjust society but as a person making history, a person valiantly fighting the social injustice of his times. The plot of the novel is based on true events: the May Day demonstration of workers in Sormovo in 1902, the activities of the Sormovo Party organisation and the trial of its members after the breaking up of the demonstration. The events, however, have been artistically refashioned and the prototypes of his heroes, Pyotr Zalomov and his mother, were recreated and thrown into new and…