The Life of Monsieur de Molière by Mikhail Bulgakov

It's not hard to discern what drew the author of The Master and Margarita to Molière. The Russian shared the Frenchman's relish for folly as dramatic material; both wrote under repressive regimes and regularly saw their plays either never performed or banned after being staged; both were admired by autocrats - Louis XIV became Molière's patron, Stalin was a Bulgakov fan - but could never count on these unpredictable megalomaniacs' backing or protection. Written in 1932-33, Bulgakov's biography was eventually published posthumously in 1963. It opens with an address to the midwife who delivered Molière and closes with a fictionalised portrayal of the satirist's last days. In between is a more conventional chronological narrative, but with frequent engaging interventions (like those of a 19th-century novelist) in which Bulgakov discusses such issues as why "my hero" daftly persisted in believing he was equipped to write tragedies. In its playfulness and hybridity, it looks forward to contemporary "faction" that fuses fiction and biography.