The poor - Dostoevsky

...The Poor" is the first novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky, written over nine months between 1844 and 1845. Dostoevsky was in financial distress due to a life of extravagance he lived and because of his addiction to gambling. Although he had translated several foreign novels, they did not bring him notable success, and he decided to write a novel himself in an attempt to raise money. ... Contemporary critics praised the novel for its human themes. Vesaryon Balinsky said it was the first "social novel" in Russia, and Alexander Herzen called it a “great socialist work."