I was going through one of those dry patches, starting books and then putting them down, when I picked up this Russian satirical novel from 1927 and started reading about a big beefy bald New Man named Babichev singing a nonsense song during his vigorous morning bowel movement, and was caught. Basking in the bright light of the new day and all afire to bring about a new world order, sausage man Andrei Babichev is viewed through the eyes of his foil, the pathetic Nikolai Kavalerov, a hyper-sensitive hanger-on who is consumed with envy of his benefactor, but at least is master of his own misery. Soon Nikolai finds himself in league with Babichev’s brother Ivan, a contrarian who thumbs his nose at progress and gleefully works to subvert the party line by getting drunk and generally acting like an idiot, gallivanting around town with a pillow proclaiming about his dubious invention of a machine or robot named Ophelia. Through the romantic entanglements (Ivan has a daughter) and sporting mishaps (there is a soccer match) that make up the loose plot, the insufferable Nikolai seems as destined to flounder as Andrei is to succeed, but even at his most biting Olesha has such affection for his characters that it is almost impossible not to like and laugh at and pity them all equally, which probably accounts for how the book could be hailed for its proletarian ideology, only to be derided soon after as Stalin’s hold tightened. Ultimately the book is not so much aimed at any particular political regime but at human nature; still, during the heyday of Socialist Realism, the indeterminacy, the digressions and whimsy of Olesha’s prose – a little reminiscent of Nikolai Gogol – was not to be trusted, and Olesha’s literary career was ruined. An offbeat little novel filled with humor, spirit and pathos, and probably a good bet for the many folks who love Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita.