The Inspector-General

The Government Inspector, also known as The Inspector
General (Russian: Revizor or in German Der Revisor), is a
satirical play by the Russian playwright and novelist Nikolai Gogol, published
in 1836 and revised for the 1842 edition. Based upon an anecdote allegedly
recounted to Gogol by Pushkin, the play is a comedy of errors, portraying human
greed, stupidity, and the deep corruption of powers in Tsarist Russia.

According to D.S. Mirsky, the play "is not only supreme in character and
dialogue -- it is one of the few Russian plays constructed with unerring
art from beginning to end. The great originality of its plan consisted in the
absence of all love interest and of sympathetic characters. The latter feature
was deeply resented by Gogol's enemies, and as a satire the play gained
immensely from it. There is not a wrong word or intonation from beginning to
end, and the comic tension is of a quality that even Gogol did not always have
at his beck and call."

— Excerpted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.