The Devil

"I am acting badly," thought Yevgeny, "But what's one to do? Anyhow it is not for long."

Leo Tolstoy is known for epic novels that brilliantly dissect society, but the novella The Devil may be the most personally revealing—and startling—fiction he ever wrote. He thought it so scandalous, in fact, that he hid the manuscript in the upholstery of a chair in his office so his wife wouldn't find it, and he would never allow it to be published in his lifetime.

Perhaps that's because the gripping ta...