Andrei Platonovich Platonov is known primarily for his dystopian and often satirical political tales about the construction of socialism in the Soviet Union. His works gain depth from the philosophical themes interwoven into them, and they are conveyed in an unusual prose style which in effect processes the "newspeak" of the Soviet era through the linguistic mindset of the semiliterate masses. So complex was his style that his typists asked for triple pay, not because of his handwriting, which was decipherable enough, but because his peculiar phrasing required word-by-word attention. He is the author of two preserved novels (neither published in full during his lifetime) and fragments of others, as well as nine povesti (long short stories) and many stories. He also wrote poetry (early in life), children's stories, several plays, literary criticism, and motion-picture scripts.

Platonov was a paradoxical figure within Soviet literature. In a sense, he...