Arina Petrovna rules the Golovlev family with an iron hand. Around her swarm her family; her alcoholic sons, dissipated grandchildren and degenerate husband. But in his darkened study, her son Porfiry schemes for an overthrow of power. In this powerful novel, the great Russian satirist presents a stark portrait of the Russian gentry sapped by generations of idleness and social irrelevance.

Mikhail Yevgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin (1826-1889) spent most of his life working as a civil servant in various capacities. After the death of poet Nikolay Nekrasov he acted as editor of the well-known Russian magazine, Otechestvenniye Zapiski, until the government banned it in 1884. His best-known work, the novel The Golovlevs, appeared in 1876.