A Country Doctor's Notebook

Originally published in 1925, ‘A Country Doctor's Notebook’ is part autobiography and part fiction collection of short stories by Mikhail Bulgakov—Soviet playwright, novelist, and short-story writer best known for his humor and penetrating satire. This records the author’s experiences practicing in a small village hospital in Smolensk Governorate in revolutionary Russia between 1916 and 1918, originally published in installments in Russian medical journals, and later adapted into the British TV series starring Daniel Radcliffe and Jon Hamm. These stories chronicle the darkly comic adventures of a physician in rural 1917 Russia. Fresh from medical school in the winter of 1917, the young Dr. Bomgard assumes the role of the only doctor in a provincial Russian hospital. Dealing with cases ranging from the horrific to the hilarious to the surreal, Bomgard recounts his solitary time practicing medicine among the superstitious, uneducated, and deeply suspicious populace of his new town. He exhibits relentless patience and determination while fighting the daily uphill battle against the challenges of an inexperienced country doctor, including scouring ten textbooks at once, hours before a complicated surgery; dealing with patients who either refuse to take their medicine or take it all at once; and handling a colleague with a dangerous morphine addiction. Somehow, despite the near-constant chaos, Bomgard continues to focus on the life-affirming moments that make his efforts worth the uncertainty, isolation and lost sleep.