'The History of a City' is a caustic work full of irony, in which, under the guise of a 'chronicle' of the fictional city of Glupov, the author mercilessly denounces the typical vices of Russian society - stupidity, tyranny and bribery of those in power, embezzlement and cringing of officials, laziness, ignorance and obscurantism. Unfortunately, we have to admit that Saltykov-Shchedrin's homerically funny and cruel phantasmagoria has not lost its relevance even today.