Mikhail Artsybashev's short life began and ended in obscurity, but because of his sensational novel Sanin (1908; translated as Sanine, 1914) he achieved a singular reputation. Whether its readers agreed or disagreed with what his work advocated, they were all impassioned by it, and the furor it provoked echoed throughout literary Russia and beyond its borders. Preoccupied by the notoriety enjoyed by Sanin, however, most commentators have ignored Artsybashev's many other prose and dramatic works, which display a range of concerns different from those found in the novel. Thus, by critical default Sanin has become inextricably linked with Artsybashev--and Artsybashev with Sanin--and the inordinate scandal surrounding the novel has done lasting damage to his literary reputation. As a consequence his works published both before and after Sanin have fallen into undeserved neglect. A southern provincial who moved to the northern capital, Artsybashev mixed with the foremost literati in St...