''The Year 4338: Petersburg Letters'' (russian: 4338-й год: Петербургские письма) is an 1835 novel by Vladimir Odoevsky. It is a futuristic novel, set in the year 4338, a year before Biela's Comet was to collide with the

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

as computed in the 1820s although the comet burned up later in the nineteenth century. This work was originally conceived as the third part of a

trilogy A trilogy is a set of three works of art that are connected and can be seen either as a single work or as three individual works. They are commonly found in literature, film, and video games, and are less common in other art forms. Three-part wor ...

, which was also to have featured depictions of

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

in the time of

Peter the Great Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...

and in the author's contemporary period, the 1830s. The first part was never written and the second and futuristic parts remained unfinished. Fragments were published in 1835 and 1840, with the fullest version appearing in 1926. The world described in Odoevsky's work is in some respects similar to the 21st century and yet differs significantly from the present we currently encounter. Some of the technological advances included in the Petersburg Letters are air and space travel, the

telephone A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...

, artificially controlled climates and the ability to

photocopy A photocopier (also called copier or copy machine, and formerly Xerox machine, the generic trademark) is a machine that makes copies of documents and other visual images onto paper or plastic film quickly and cheaply. Most modern photocopiers u ...

. Hallucinogenic and truth

drug A drug is any chemical substance that causes a change in an organism's physiology or psychology when consumed. Drugs are typically distinguished from food and substances that provide nutritional support. Consumption of drugs can be via insuffla ...

s, in the forms of gaseous drinks and "magnetic baths" remove hypocrisy from social life. In this envisioned future, Russia and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

are the centers of global power. Russia and China united their efforts to avoid Earth's collision with another planet. In the novel, China is described as having experienced a "deadly stagnation" which came to an end with the rule of Hin Gin in the 39th century. The main character of the story is actually a Chinese student, Ippolit Tsunguev, (not a Russian character, as might be expected) who attends St. Petersburg's "Main School". His letters to his fellow students constitute the novel.Lukin, A. (2003). ''The Bear Watches the Dragon: Russia's perceptions of China and the evolution of Russian-Chinese relations since the 18th century.'' Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, Inc.

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Original text including extra fragments

1835 Russian novels Russian science fiction novels Novels by Vladimir Odoevsky Utopian novels 1830s science fiction novels Fiction set in the 5th millennium Unfinished novels {{poli-novel-stub