Nikolai Gogol

 The first great Russian novelist was Nikolai Gogol. Russian novelist Nikolai Gogol's best-known work is the *1842 novel Dead Souls.* A fanatical priest convinced him to burn the second volume in 1852.

Russian novelist Nikolai Gogol was born on March 31, 1809, in Sorochintsy, Ukraine. His first successful book was *Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka,* which he wrote in the early 1830s, but his 1842 novel Dead Souls is considered his masterpiece. A fanatical priest convinced Gogol to burn the second volume of *Dead Souls in 1952.* He died later that year, on March 4, 1852, in Moscow, Russia; it's believed that he starved himself to death.