Translated by C.J. Hogarth. Poor Folk was the first novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky, which he wrote over the span of nine months. First published in 1846, it was lauded by the influential critic Belinsky, who (among others) hailed him as the new Gogol. This book was partly inspired by Nikolai Gogol''s short story The Overcoat. This novel is written in a form of letters of correspondence between two characters. Like The Overcoat, the novel gives heart wrenching account of life of low income Russians in mid-nineteenth century. OCo Excerpted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Intuitive navigation. . Text annotation and mark-up. More Titles by MobileReference - Search keyword MobileReference for a complete list. ."