The Fiery Angel is one of the great achievements of modern Russian literature, as powerful and revolutionary as its contemporary, Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita. In a vividly atmospheric recreation of the occult underworld of sixteenth century Germany, during an age of Inquisition, three souls meet: an innocent young man choosing between Love and Duty, a woman prone to visions and a Knight, who is either angel or demon. Religious experience and sexual hysteria meet in an apocalyptic vision of the spiritual crisis of modern life. The Fiery Angel is one of the great novels of decadent occultism.