In Russia Platonov is increasingly considered the best writer of the post-revolutionary epoch yet he has not so far enjoyed the international reputation that he deserves. To a large extent, this is because he fell from favour with the Soviet authorities and suffered years of exile and labour in the gulags. Much of his finest work was suppressed for up to sixty years. Combining an almost scientific realism with a poetic vision and a strong feeling for the traditional Russian folk tale, Platonov managed to get deep under the skin of the Soviet regime, vividly presenting the dreams of the builders of socialism in all their inarticulate confusion. The ten stories in The Return present the full range of Platonov’s gifts to an English-speaking readership and demonstrate why writers like Joseph Brodsky and others considered him the equal of Joyce and Kafka.