The Master And Margarita, and anything by Nabokov. Pale Fire, Bend Sinister and Lolita are all great, but they aren't particularly easy reads. I started with Lolita, Nabokov wise.
"Doctor Who means never having to say you're kidding." - BocajI can recommend The Idiot by Dostoyevsky. It's excellent.
edited 2nd Nov '11 3:10:12 AM by DoktorvonEurotrash
Seconding Gogol, and furthering the Nabakov love. I recommend the short stories of both, especially the latter's "The Vane Sisters". Seriously, that last paragraph, once you get it...
I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.Ivan Turgenev seems to be incredibly famous in Russia, not so much in the USA, so far as I can tell. Hated by contemporary radicals, hated by contemporary conservatives, love-hate relationship with Dostoevski (who includes a parody of him as a character in Demons), I would suggest Fathers and Sons or Diary of a Superfluous Man as being the two things of his I have read.
Most of the other stuff mentioned here I have also enjoyed, so I had to dig around for something original.
Moscow-Petushki by Venedict Yerofeyev.
It's an insane stream-of-consciousness by a drunk guy, with a lot of instructions for probably dangerous cocktails.
And there is a Chevengur by Andrei Platonov which is a pretty good and hilarious description of the Russian civil war.
If any question why we died/ Tell them, because our fathers lied -Rudyard Kipling

Okay, so I've decided I'm going try and start reading some Russian literature. Like the title says. (You can partially blame Hetalia for this. <.<)
But I'm not quite sure where it would be a good place to start. Does anyone here have any favorites they would suggest?