This is the tale of the insalubrious and utterly failed life of the notorious nineteenth-century thief, murderer, professional impostor, and would-be philologist Edward Rulloff, who was condemned to die and hanged for his crimes. The life of Rulloff is a sordid account of misguided genius and abysmal consequences. Those who loved him courted disaster, and, in every case, the courtship flowered into catastrophe. Richard Bailey's narrative, calm and...