St. John's Eve

How far will a man go for love? The short story "St. John's Eve" by Nikolai Gogol from the 19th century recounts the sinister events that transpired in a poor hamlet generations ago, as relayed by the narrator's grandfather. In a village that no longer exists, a young man called Petro falls head over heels for a beauty, whose father disapproves of the union. Petro is determined to win the hand of the woman of her choosing and solicits an ominous local associated with the devil himself to help him. The consequences are wicked and dangerous and cannot be reversed. The story provided inspiration for Modest Mussorgsky's tone poem Night on Bald Mountain and was adapted into the Soviet-Ukrainian movie The Eve of Ivan Kupalo (1968).