Nikolai Gogol was talented enough to catch the notice of not just his contemporaries but his government. Considered one of Russia's greatest writers during his day, Gogol's Dead Souls satirized the corruption of the Russian government enough that it forced him into exile. Dead Souls features Gogol's classic prose and verse forms, with Gogol himself considering it epic poetry. Despite the fact that it was technically unfinished, with Gogol famously burning the second part of the manuscript, it's still universally hailed as one of Gogol's classics.