Twenty-six and One, and Other Stories

by Maksim Gorky

"Twenty-six and One, and Other Stories" by Maksim Gorky is a collection published in 1899. The title story follows twenty-six men toiling in a cellar bakery, scorned by those around them. Their sole comfort is sixteen-year-old Tanya, who visits each morning. When a boastful soldier arrives and disrupts their fragile refuge, their devotion is tested. This cruelly realistic yet poetic tale explores beauty, disillusionment, and human dignity among society's downtrodden, earning recognition as one of Gorky's finest early works.