The year 1891 was marked by the 50th anniversary of Mikhail Lermontov’s death: the event gave rise to many publications of his works, including illustrated ones. The edition prepared by the Ivan Kushnerev & Company Printing Shop and the Pryanishnikov’s Bookstore can boast of many famous painters’ contribution.

This edition included illustrations by such famous Russian artists as Ivan Aivazovsky, Viktor Vasnetsov, Vasily Polenov, Ilya Repin, Valentin Serov, Ivan Shishkin, and others. Mikhail Vrubel also took part in the project, and his works stood out.

Nikolay Wrangel, an art historian and the brother of one of the leaders of the White movement during the Civil War, reviewed this publication and wrote the following,

Wrangel thought it nonsensical to combine in one edition the works of the genre painter and wanderer Vladimir Makovsky, mysterious Mikhail Vrubel, and “vulgar and mundane” Yefim Volkov. The critic also said,

Vrubel himself wrote the following,

Although his illustrations received the art critic’s positive review, they also suffered disapproval from publishers who were more accustomed to stencils.

Vrubel’s illustrations for Mikhail Lermontov’s work introduce the modern and symbolic interpretation of the poem. The drawing titled “Swifter than stag, the noble steed…”, especially in its first version made in pencil, not in the more finished watercolor one, shows all the outlines of the shapes live, vibrate, and move in their own way to merge into the image of a horse that carries its dead master.