Yama: The Pit (1909–1915) is the most ambitious work of Alexander Kuprin (1870–1938), one of the leading Russian prose writers of the early 20th century. Set in the licensed brothels of a fictional Russian city, the novel is a naturalistic study of the women who live and work within the system — their histories, their inner lives, and the social forces that have trapped them — written with great compassion and without sentimentality.
A landmark of pre-revolutionary Russian realism and a courageous work of social conscience, this novel is now freely available as an EPUB download in this public-domain edition.