Books - The Twelve Chairs

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	Books - The Twelve Chairs

The Twelve Chairs () (1928) is a famous satirical novel by the Soviet authors Ilf and Petrov. Its hero, Ostap Bender reappears in the book's sequel, The Little Golden Calf
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Plot

In the novel, a con man Ostap Bender meets dispossessed nobleman Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobianinov. Vorobianinov has just discovered, during the deathbed confession of his relative, that a set of jewels had been hidden from the Bolsheviks in one of the twelve chairs from the family's dining room set.

Those chairs, along with all other personal property, had been expropriated by the government after the Russian Revolution. Bender forces Kisa (Vorobianinov's childhood funny nickname preferred by Bender) to partner with him, which ultimately helps Kisa who lacks Bender's charm and street-smarts. Kisa and Bender set off together to locate the chairs and recover the fortune, but are stymied by a series of false leads and other trying events.

Early on, they find that the chairs have been split up and sold individually and so after lots of travel, meeting "comrades" from every walk of life in Soviet Russia, and perpetrating plenty of cons to pay for the enterprise, the duo eventually discovers the last, 12th chair, that must - through process of elimination - contain the treasure.

Vorobianinov attempts to murder Bender to avoid splitting the loot. He then discovers that the jewels have already been found, and their proceeds spent on building a new, grand public building.

Adaptations

The book was made into a Mel Brooks film titled, The Twelve Chairs (1970), and also provided the basis for the film The Thirteen Chairs (1969). Shortly after that, it was filmed in the USSR twice: first time in 1971 by Leonid Gaidai and then in 1976 by Mark Zakharov, featuring Andrei Mironov as Bender. See The Twelve Chairs (film) for more details on adaptations.

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