The grandson of Countess Sophia Sergeyevna Ignatieva and Count Alexei Pavlovich Ignatiev (Russian: граф Алексей Павлович Игнатьев), the former governor of Siberia, who was assassinated in 1906 for his perceived role in a plot to overthrow the Tsar, Sava's life was devoted to surgery and the pursuit of his literary ambitions.
His father was a Bulgarian who, at a time when Bulgaria was part of the Ottoman Empire, migrated to Russia.
He was forced to perform emergency surgery without any medical training that saved the life of a comrade, which induced him to pursue a career in medicine and become a surgeon.
This book is an account of his life and his struggle to rise to the top of the medical profession from absolutely nothing.
The dust jacket reads: The Healing Knife: A Surgeon's Destiny (1938) this book is translated in Marathi as 'jeevandaata' (paerson who gifts lives)