"[H]is first important book, A Sportsman's Sketches, revealed to the world two things: the dawn of a new literary genius, and the wretched condition of the serfs. This book has often been called the Uncle Tom's Cabin of Russia; [...] It is interesting that Uncle Tom's Cabin and A Sportsman's Sketches should have appeared at about the same time, and that emancipation in each country should have followed at about the same interval..."