A few months ago, together with my colleagues Alex Fleming and Nicolas Pasternak Slater, I began work on a new volume of stories and essays by Maxim Osipov, whose debut collection in English, Rock, Paper, Scissor, appeared from NYRB Classic in April of 2019. On his autumn book tour, Maxim was able to spend a few days in Los Angeles. Those few days were, for me, one of the greatest pleasures of a very pleasant 2019. Jenny and I were hoping to visit Maxim in Tarusa, Russia, in 2020, but the pandemic intervened. We’re all disappointed, of course, but there are far more important things to worry about.

Maxim is not only an author. He is also a highly qualified cardiologist, as well as the founder of the Endowment in Support of Tarusa Hospital. Joshua Yaffa, who profiled Maxim for The New Yorker, describes this well-staffed small-town facility as…