Black Snow

Mikhail Bulgakov (1891 - 1940) was born and educated in Kiev where he graduated as a doctor in 1916. He rapidly abandoned medicine to write some of the greatest Russian literature of this century. After a lifetime at odds with the stultifying Soviet regime, he died impoverished and blind in 1940, shortly after completing his masterpiece, The Master and Margarita. None of his major fiction was published during his lifetime.

"A masterpiece of black comedy" Irish Times "The novel moves with mad exuberance" Independent "Bulgakov, the first magical realist-is regarded as the Soviet writer who made the strongest impact on twentieth-century Western fiction" Irish Times "A writer of fantastic genius" Sunday Times