Odessa enters the narrative through two distinct accounts of beginnings. For Anna Urbanova, it is where she worked in a tavern after running away from home and where, in 1919, Ivan Rosotsky discovered her performing in a regional theater on the city’s outskirts. For Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov, the city is part of Anna’s story as he hears it: her experience of tavern work prompts him to ask about the practical labor of deboning fish. Odessa is not developed as a continuous setting, but as a place associated with work, departure, and the first turn toward a new life.

Anna Urbanova’s Early Work

Before Anna became a celebrated screen actress, she had run away from home and worked in a tavern in Odessa. The narrative gives no date for this period or further particulars about the tavern, but the detail locates her early life in paid work rather than in the glamorous public identity she would later acquire. Her experience comes into view when the Count asks about deboning fish, making a specific task of tavern labor the point at which her past surfaces in conversation.

Discovery on the City’s Outskirts

In 1919, Ivan Rosotsky discovered Anna in a regional theater on the outskirts of Odessa and cast her as the leading lady in his next two films. That encounter connects the city to the beginning of her rise: from regional performance, she moved into films that became popular and found favor with the Politburo. Odessa is therefore a point of departure, not the setting of the fame that followed.

Odessa as a Place of Beginnings

The two references give Odessa a modest but meaningful role in the novel’s geography. Anna’s account associates it with the circumstances she left behind and with the labor that preceded her discovery; Rosotsky’s encounter makes its outskirts the setting for her first step toward cinematic celebrity. These episodes are not presented as one continuous sequence, and the narrative does not specify how much time separates her tavern work from her theater appearance. Together, however, they place Odessa at the edge of a transition: from running away and earning a living to being seen, cast, and eventually made famous.