Maxim Gorki is the pen name of a Russian social writer whose real name (Aleksei Maksimovich Peshkov) is hardly pronounceable by an English reader. He was born at Nijni-Novgorod. He was by turns a shoemaker's apprentice, a scullery boy, baker, ship's cook, porter, gardener, painter of ikons or sacred images, lawyer's clerk, and literary tramp. His writings set forth the thoughts and want of thoughts of the vagrant and working classes with which his life has made him familiar. His novels began to attract attention in 1892.
Foma Gordyeeff is best known. Titles more easily remembered are
The Orloff Couple,
About the Devil,
More About the Devil,
The Reader,
The Outcasts Three Men,
Mother,
The Spy. Gorky visited the United States ín 1906, lecturing on social themes and advocating the extreme measures of the Russian radicals.
