The Peasants
Translated by Michael Henry Dziewicki
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This Nobel Prize-winning masterpiece offers an unflinching yet poetic portrait of rural life, exploring timeless themes of desire, injustice, and resilience that resonate far beyond its 19th-century Polish setting.
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Book Summary
Set in the late 19th-century Polish village of Lipka, this epic novel follows the intertwined lives of peasants bound to the land, centering on the beautiful Yagna's disastrous marriage to the wealthy but aging Boryna, which ignites family conflict, scandal, and community upheaval against the backdrop of seasonal labor and social injustice.
The story opens as autumn arrives in Lipka, introducing the Boryna family and the village's rigid social order. The widower Maciej Boryna, seeking a young wife, marries the beautiful Yagna, daughter of Dominikova, despite the objections of his son Antek. Yagna's restless nature and beauty attract multiple men, including Antek, leading to a passionate affair that fractures the family. Meanwhile, the community grapples with poverty, gossip, and resistance against the gentry and authorities, such as when peasants hide the subversive Roch from gendarmes. Antek is eventually caught and sentenced to penal servitude, while Yagna becomes the target of village scorn after rumors of her promiscuity spread, culminating in a mob demanding her expulsion. The novel follows the cycle of seasons—from autumn rains to harvest—mirroring the peasants' relentless labor and struggles. Key subplots include Simon's determination to build a life on new land, the Voyt's embezzlement scandal, and the priest's ambiguous moral authority. The narrative ends with the village in turmoil, yet bound to the eternal rhythms of the land.
Reading guide
Go deeper in The Peasants
Character guides, themes, chapter companions — plus Character Web, narrative arc, and theme heatmap teasers that unlock fully beside the text in BetterReads.
Narrative arc
Story tension across the book.
Yagna Borynova
Yagna enters Boryna's farm as his young wife, warned by her mother to guard her reputation and never let the old man be slighted. Yet she flares with impulsive sympathy for Antek, the son her husband has disinherited, and her tears at his name betray feelings she can barely name. Her presence splits the family and sets tongues wagging across the village, making her the still point around which the novel's early conflicts turn.
Antek Boryna
Antek labors on Boryna's farm alongside his wife Hanka and the hired hands, but his father's refusal to settle the land has poisoned everything between them. He is drawn to Yagna, his father's young wife, in a tangle of resentment and desire that threatens to consume them both. His rebellion against the patriarch's authority drives the family toward open rupture, and his choices ripple through every household in the village.
Hanka Boryna
Hanka moves through her morning rounds—barn, shed, wheat-fields—praying with her lips while her mind churns over Antek's faithlessness and the family's precarious hold on Boryna's land. She has endured six months that would break many, and she clings to the hope that Antek will return to himself and the farm will be theirs. Her quiet endurance and sharp-eyed management of the household make her the moral counterweight to the passions swirling around her.
Maciej Boryna
Maciej Boryna holds thirty acres and a name that commands respect, but his decision to marry Yagna has turned his own sons into enemies and made his house a battlefield. He broods over Antek's defiance, the blacksmith's scheming, and the thanklessness of children who want his land before he is cold. Proud, quick to anger, and jealously guarding his authority, he embodies the old peasant order even as his choices hasten its fracture.
Yuzka Boryna
Yuzka keeps Boryna's house running while her father rages at Antek and her brother-in-law the blacksmith circles for land. She is caught between her father's trust and her sister Magda's claims, asked to withhold the blacksmith's share and then gently granted leave to send Magda a piece. Her small negotiations of loyalty and fairness show the household's fractures from the inside, and her steadiness throws her father's volatility into relief.
Matthew Golab
Matthew Golab drives the sawmill crew through a brutal frost, shouting, joking, and working harder than any man on the platform above the rushing river. Even Antek, who resents him, admits he is a good craftsman—and well paid for it. His energy and ambition mark him as a rising figure among the village's younger men, and his courtship of Nastka threads him into the web of rural alliances and rivalries.
Peasant Life and Labor
The book vividly depicts the harsh, cyclical nature of peasant existence, centered on agricultural work, seasonal rhythms, and the constant struggle for survival against poverty, weather, and land disputes.
Social Class and Injustice
The narrative explores the deep divide between peasants and the gentry, highlighting systemic exploitation, legal oppression, and the peasants' powerlessness against authorities like the Squire, officials, and gendarmes.
Community and Conflict
The village of Lipka is portrayed as a tightly-knit but fractious community, where solidarity against outsiders coexists with internal rivalries, gossip, envy, and violent disputes over land, resources, and honor.
Tradition and Religion
Catholic faith and folk customs permeate daily life, from prayers and pilgrimages to superstitious rites and seasonal festivals, serving as both comfort and a source of social control.