M. Ageyev (russian: М. Агеев) was the

pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

of the writer of the Russian ''

Novel with Cocaine ''Novel with Cocaine'', (russian: Роман с кокаином, Roman s kokainom, also translated as ''Cocain Romance'' and ''Romance with Cocaine''), is a novel first published in 1934 in a Russian émigré literary magazine ''Chisla'' (''Num ...

''. He is believed to be Mark Lazarevich Levi (russian: Марк Ла́заревич Ле́ви; August 8, 1898August 5, 1973).

Biography

His best-known work, ''

Novel With Cocaine ''Novel with Cocaine'', (russian: Роман с кокаином, Roman s kokainom, also translated as ''Cocain Romance'' and ''Romance with Cocaine''), is a novel first published in 1934 in a Russian émigré literary magazine ''Chisla'' (''Num ...

'' (also translated as the ''

Cocain Romance ''Novel with Cocaine'', (russian: Роман с кокаином, Roman s kokainom, also translated as ''Cocain Romance'' and ''Romance with Cocaine''), is a novel first published in 1934 in a Russian émigré literary magazine ''Chisla'' (''Numb ...

''), was published in 1934 in the Parisian émigré publication, ''Numbers''.

Nikita Struve Nikita Alexeyevich Struve (russian: Никита Алексеевич Струве; 16 February 1931 – 7 May 2016) was a French author and translator of Russian descent, specializing in the study of Russian émigrés. Biography Struve was part o ...

alleged it to be the work of another Russian author employing a pen name -

Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov (russian: link=no, Владимир Владимирович Набоков ; 2 July 1977), also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin (), was a Russian-American novelist, poet, translator, and entomologist. Bor ...

; this idea was debunked by Nabokov's son

Dmitri Dmitri (russian: Дми́трий); Church Slavic form: Dimitry or Dimitri (); ancient Russian forms: D'mitriy or Dmitr ( or ) is a male given name common in Orthodox Christian culture, the Russian version of Greek Demetrios (Δημήτρι� ...

in his preface to "

The Enchanter ''The Enchanter'' is a novella written by Vladimir Nabokov in Paris in 1939. As ''Волшебник (Volshebnik)'' it was his last work of fiction written in Russian. Nabokov never published it during his lifetime. After his death, his son Dm ...

", where he claims Ageyev is Mark Levi. Levi's life is shrouded in mystery and conjecture. He seems to have returned to the

U.S.S.R. The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

in 1942 and spent the rest of his life in Yerevan, where he died on August 5, 1973.

References

Kseniya Ragozina's article "Detektiv s romanom"

External links

* 1898 births 1973 deaths Writers from Moscow Russian Jews Russian male novelists Soviet novelists Soviet male writers 20th-century Russian male writers 20th-century pseudonymous writers {{Russia-writer-stub