Arkady Averchenko (27 March 1880–12 March 1925) was a Russian writer, best known for his numerous short stories. He specialised in all sorts of humour, from gentle fun to Black Comedy or tragic satire (the latter is prevalent in his works after the start of World War One and especially after the October Revolution).
Tropes featured in his works:
- All Girls Want Bad Boys: Zig-zagged in The Expert On Women's Hearts – in the sense that there are different sorts of "bad". Evdokia Sergeevna says she told her daughter Lidia that the latter’s boyfriend Mastakov is a spendthrift, a womanizer and a gambler. Max tells her that it is the worst way to break up a couple, as the only result is that Lidia falls even more in love. Max himself takes a completely different route: he tells Lidia that Mastakov is awfully mean about money and that no woman wants to look at him because he never washes himself – and at the same time Max claims that Mastakov is his best and dearest friend and has a crystal-clear soul. After that, Lidia instantly breaks up with Mastakov.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: The eponymous character in The Wife, putting on a Sickeningly Sweethearts act towards her husband to hide the fact that she is a selfish, lazy, cheating Gold Digger and soon-to-be murderess.
- The Casanova: Korablyov in The Mosaic has six lovers at the same time. He explains that he would love to find a single perfect woman, but so far he can only construct one from the perfect features scattered among six ladies.
- Cloud Cuckoolander: In The Exam Problem, Semyon Pantalykin, instead of solving a math problem, mentally reimagines it into an adventure story a la Mayne Reid.
- Creator's Apathy: In-Universe in The Incurable Ones. Kukushkin is so eager to get to the sex scene in each of his stories that he doesn’t really do any research on what he writes about, so we get a fly with hips or a zeppelin which flies by flapping its wings.
- Meta Fiction: The Dust is about a shop selling Christmas Tropes to eager writers.
- Rule 34: Mocked In-Universe in The Incurable Ones. Whatever topic Kukushkin is given, he always ends up writing porn.
- Sickeningly Sweethearts:
- In The Wife, the married couple are showering each other with cooing and affectionate words. However, the reader, unlike the besotted husband, can instantly see that the wife is a Manipulative Bitch who is only after her husband’s money.
- In A Building on Sand, Mitya and Lipa are genuinely in love and are constantly kissing and cooing over each other and their future child. All of it lasts until Lipa gives birth to a set of triplets. The last scene has Mitya cursing her and the children and imagining his future financial ruin.
- Trademark Favourite Food: Marron glacé for Kitty in The Mosaic. Everyone knows that, so Korablyov is afraid to accidentally bring marron glacé to his other lover Elena, who is also Kitty’s friend.
