20 Classic Books you have to read before you die

2: 19 Dead Souls

Don’t be fooled by the morbid-sounding title: Dead Souls is actually one of the wittiest books of the 19th Century. It was written by Nikolai Gogol - not particularly famous outside Russia, but actually a major influence on both Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

Dead Souls is his only novel, and tells the story of an enterprising young man who travels around Russia buying up "dead souls" – that is, peasant workers who have died, but who are still registered as living in the census records. He purchases them from landowners, hoping that it will create the illusion that he owns many workers himself, and so allow him to extract huge loans from the government.

A broad and brilliant satire on society – Gogol caricatures and parodies nearly everyone, from gossiping housewives to cruel landowners to pompous officials - Dead Souls is also considered the first-ever Russian novel.