born May 15, 1891, Kiev, Ukraine, Russian Empire
died March 10, 1940, Moscow, Russian S.F.S.R., U.S.S.R.
Russian playwright, novelist, and short-story writer.
He wrote and staged many popular plays in the years 192529, including dramatizations of his own novels, but by 1930 his trenchant criticism of Soviet mores had caused him to be effectively prohibited from publishing. His works, known for their scathing humour, include the novella The Heart of a Dog (written 1925), a satire on pseudoscience that did not appear openly in the Soviet Union until 1987, and the dazzling fantasy The Master and Margarita , not published in unexpurgated form until 1973.