Small prose of Bunin is not very large, but it is very difficult to perceive. The author skillfully uses images, symbols and artistic details in the text, which can not always be easily remembered in the lesson, especially in a nervous environment. Therefore, each student will come in handy our summary of “Mr. from San Francisco” for the reader's diary. And to write an interesting review, the Literaguru team also wrote a kind of hint - an analysis of Bunin's legendary story. Enjoy reading!
(435 words) Fifty-eight-year-old rich gentleman from San Francisco, whose name no one remembered, decided to go on a two-year cruise to the Old World. He rode with his apathetic wife, who was never distinguished by impressionability, and a painful daughter.
The plans that the “master” built meant a wide range of countries visited by him: Southern Italy, Nice, Monte Carlo, Rome, Venice, Paris, Egypt and even Japan. Life on a cruise ship was more like a big hotel, where they drank coffee every day, took baths, sipped hot chocolate, relaxed, read and simply enjoyed their “position”. The peculiarity of Atlantis consisted in a rich night program.
In the evening, people seemed to come to life, the orchestra played, the ladies were in elegant dresses, and the gentlemen in suits. The gentleman from San Francisco was awkwardly built, dry and short, but the tuxedo, which sat perfectly on him, very young him. The wife also did not differ in fair “beauty”: she was full and wide, while her daughter was a real beauty, tall and stately. Dinner lasted about an hour, after which dances were announced, while men who looked like “gentlemen” sat at the table and smoked cigars, which were brought to them by blacks in red coats.
On the second day of their journey, the picture of the horizon changed, and Naples appeared. In the meantime, the daughter of the “master” stood on the deck with the prince, whom she had been introduced to by a lucky chance. He was not handsome, with a flat face and dark skin, but she found him charming. The “master” himself was looking at a beautiful blonde with a dog, while her daughter in every possible way pretended not to notice him.
After a while, “Atlantis” entered the harbor, and the “gentleman” left the ship, realizing that he could go to any hotel, even the one the prince wanted to choose. Having stopped at a new place, the family leads the usual daily routine, consisting of breakfast, excursions to new places, lunch and tea. However, the weather brings them: instead of the sunny city, they expect slush and dirt, so they decide to go to the island of Capri, where, according to the locals, lemons are always warm and grow.
The small steamboat served as their transportation method, which delivered them to their place, despite the sea sickness through which the whole family of the “master” passed. They find themselves in a hotel where they are invited to go to change clothes for dinner. A gentleman from San Francisco goes to his reading room, sits down on an armchair and picks up a newspaper, but there comes a surprise: words blur, the newspaper falls, and the "gentleman" dies. The guests are terrified, the owner understands that he needs to get out of this terrible situation.
The gentleman is relocated to the most miserable room so that hotel guests are not afraid to live in it further. The widow asks to bring a coffin, to which the owner replies that he can provide only a long box from under the bottles of soda.
On the deck of the same Atlantis, life boils, while deep down below - in the hold of the liner - lies the dead rich Master from San Francisco in a cheap box.
