'IN order to know virtue, we must first acquaint ourselves with vice' — or so said Marquis de Sade, the 18th century French aristocrat and writer, remembered more for his scandalous lifestyle than his work. In fact de Sade's name was granted the dubious honour of being immortalised in the dictionary as the term for taking pleasure in cruelty — sadism.

The man who spent 32 years of his life incarcerated either in prison or in the lunatic asylum, and who was accused (if not always convicted) of rape, sodomy, torture and poisoning, left behind a collection of work that has both repelled and fascinated readers and critics through the years.

The time he spent locked up was put to good use as it was then that de Sade produced the bulk of his work and gave full rein to his dark fantasies. In A Dialogue between a Priest and a Dying Man the dying man regrets not having lived his life the way nature intended man to live — in the pursuit of personal pleasure. Meanwhile 120 days of Sodom, which followed, is an unbridled tale of the darkest of human passions and has often been banned due to its violent content.

Justine or The Misfortune of Virtue is perhaps de Sade's most famous work; it follows the life of a girl who tries to live a virtuous life but her attempts only lead to despair and eventually death. Unfortunately this novel so enraged the Napoleon that it also led to de Sade's final term in prison where he remained until his death on December 2, 1814.

Hailed as the father of modern Russian literature, Aleksandr Pushkin is to his native tongue what Shakespeare is to English. As the first one to write in the local vernacular, Pushkin is believed to have single-handedly changed the face of Russian literature, laying the tradition of the great Russian novel that was carried forward by writers such as Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev, and Nikolai Gogol who were all influenced by him to some extent.

Though primarily a poet, Pushkin flirted with every genre — from the novel to the short story, from drama to critical essays — and on each he left behind an indelible mark. As a journalist he was instrumental in establishing Russia's magazine culture while his narrative poems

inspired many operas by leading composers — including Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky.

Unfortunately, unlike Shakespeare, Pushkin did not receive universal
acknowledgment due to the difficulty of translating his highly complex
writing style; Eugene Onegin, commonly held to be is masterpiece is just over 100 pages in the original
but runs into two full volumes in English.

Yet his influence lives on in the works of writers, dramatists and filmmakers and in the evolution of the Russian language itself.