This volume of essays and other materials offers an assessment of the short prose, verse and drama of Daniil Kharms, Leningrad absurdist of the 1920s and 1930s, who was one of the last representatives of the Russian literary avante-garde.

Part 1 Epigraph: Aleksandr Galich - "Legenda o tabake". Part 2 Introduction - Daniil Kharms, black miniaturist, Neil Cornwell; on Daniil Kharms, Iakov Druskin; a Kharms chronology, Anatolii Aleksandrov. Part 3 General studies: Daniil Kharms in the context of Russian and European literature of the absurd, Jean-Philippe Jaccard; the anti-world of Daniil Kharms - on the significance of the absurd, Anthony Anemone. Part 4 The prose works: towards an interpretation of Kharms' "Sluchi", Robin Aizlewood; Slobodan Pesic's film "Slucaj Harms" and Kharms' "Sluchai", Milena Michalski; elements of the fantastic in Daniil Kharms' "Starukha", Rosanna Giaquinta; some features of the poetics of Kharms' prose - the story "Upadanie" ("The Falling"), Aleksandr Kobrinsky. Part 5 The poetic works: on one enigmatic poem by Daniil Kharms, Lazar Fleishman; "I Raxrushenie", Daniil Kharms; Kharms' "I Razrushenie", Jerzy Faryno; Daniil Kharms' poetic system - text, context, intertext, Nina Perlina. Part 6 The theatrical works: the oberiuty and the theatricalization of life, Tatiana Nikol'skaia; Kharms' play "Elizaveta Bam", Milhail Meilakh; "Elizaveta Ham" a dramatic work - a new translation from the definitive text by Neil Cornwell, Daniil Kharms. Part 7 - beyond the turning point - an afterword, Robin Milner-Gulland.