The Red Laugh

The Red Laugh was written in 1904 during the uncertain period following Russia's ignominious defeat at the hands of the Japanese It is the feverish and fragmentary monologue of a Russian officer, overcome by the horror of man's inhumanity and driven to seek refuge in insanity.Although self-consciously modern and sensational in style The Red Laugh has a disturbing and prophetic power which established Andreyev's reputation as a major European writer. 'I want to be the apostle of self-destruction. I want my book to affect man's reason, his emotions, his nerves, his whole animal nature. I should like my book to make people turn pale with horror as they read it, to affect them like a drug, like a terrifying dream, to drive them mad, to make them curse and hate me but still to read me and to kill themselves.' Leonid Andreyev