About this audiobook
A concealed fortune sends Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov in search of a set of chairs that once belonged to his family. He joins forces with the resourceful adventurer Ostap Bender, whose inventiveness appears to offer a way through the obstacles ahead. The promise of hidden jewels turns ordinary furniture into the centre of an increasingly complicated pursuit.
Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov follow the pair through a succession of encounters that reveal the habits and contradictions of early Soviet everyday life. Official procedures, private ambitions and the desire to be important create opportunities for Bender's schemes. The search is continually redirected by people whose interests are as persistent as those of the two protagonists.
The novel combines an adventure of pursuit with a satire of greed, vanity and social pretension. Its humour grows from the difference between what people claim to want and what actually moves them, making the chase a varied portrait of a changing society.
