This book was begun by Maxim Gorky in 1907, less than two years after the unsuccessful armed rebellion on Bloody Sunday, with which he had been closely involved. Frail, battered and orphaned, Yevsey Kimkov creeps through the undergrowth of life; his intelligence remains observant, but his will is cowed, and his is easily coerced into spying for the military in support of the Tsar. He makes some friends who are capable of defying oppression, and his heart responds to them – but it is this association which is going to brink him to the terrible crisis of his life, which coincides with the insurrection and its suppression.