Lyudmila Stefanovna Petrushevskaya (born 26 May 1938) is a Russian writer, novelist, painter, singer, screenwriter and playwright. She began her career writing and putting on plays, which were often censored by the Soviet government, and following perestroika, published a number of well-respected works of prose. She is best known for her plays, novels, including 'The Time: Night' (1992), and collections of short stories, notably 'There Once Lived a Woman Who Tried to Kill Her Neighbor’s Baby'. In 2017, she published a memoir, 'The Girl from the Metropol Hotel'. She is considered one of Russia's premier living literary figures, having been compared in style to Anton Chekhov and in influence to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Her works have won a number of accolades, including the Russian Booker Prize, the Pushkin Prize, and the World Fantasy Award.