Morphine

Mikhail Bulgakov is the main Russian mystic of the 20th century. A doctor by education and a subtle satirist by vocation, he himself saw and masterfully described the collapse of eras, the Revolution, the Civil War, the difficulties of the profession and the abyss of addiction. For the cycle of stories "Notes of a Young Doctor" he took as a basis his own experience of working as a zemstvo doctor and composed a whole galaxy of colorful characters with their own quirks, fears and prejudices. And the story "Morphine", stylized as a diary, is also almost autobiographical - after an unsuccessful operation, Bulgakov was forced to inject himself with painkillers and became addicted to it.