The Russian prose writer and playwright Mikhail Bulgakov was born in Kiev and grew up in a snug middle class environment – his father was a professor of theology. Shortly after obtaining his medical degree in 1916, Bulgakov registered as a volunteer for the Red Cross. He worked at a field hospital, where he mainly carried out amputations. After this, he became a district medical officer in a r...

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The French author Anne Rambach was born Anne Rosseau in Saint-Brieuc, Bretagne. She read literature before she joined the Act-Up Paris, an organisation dedicated to fighting AIDS. She chaired the society in 1994. Rambach has written essays and screenplays for television together with her partner Marine Rambach. Both are active within the gay rights movement and they previously ran a publishing...

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