Bulgakov’s novella Heart of a Dog tells the story of an experiment gone badly wrong in 1920s Moscow. A Professor plucks a hungry stray dog off the streets, performs an operation to implant the pituitary gland from a criminal’s corpse into the dog’s body, and creates a grotesque human-canine hybrid called Sharikov. Professor Preobrazhensky realises his mistake once his creation runs riot in his household and starts to persecute him, in league with the local Soviet authorities. Just in time, the Professor turns him back into Sharik the dog, outfoxing the Soviet authorities who are trying in vain to investigate what has happened to their protégé.