Adam Thirlwell: Luxury Muzhik (opens in new tab)

Gorky was the designated mourner for a vanished moment in Russian culture. He wanted socialism or democracy but he no longer wanted Bolshevism, which seemed to him psychopathically preoccupied with power. Something was at stake, it was partly Russia, it was partly politics, and it was partly the kind of writing Tolstoy, Chekhov and Andreyev practised – always in pursuit of something they liked to call ‘truth’.