Born in 1809 and died in 1852, Nikolai Gogol was a Russian writer, poet, playwright and literary critic. He started writing in 1829, but his first work was a huge failure. He worked in the administration and then became a teacher. Encouraged by Alexander Pushkin, he continued to write. He published a collection of short stories called Evenings on a farm near Dikanka, which was very well received by the critics and made him famous. He pursued a prolific literary career, and is now considered one of the classic writers of Russian literature.