He began his official career as a librarian, then became part of the management of the Imperial Theatres, and lastly served as director of the Moscow Armory Museum.

His historical novels, including Yury Miloslavsky, were open imitations of Sir Walter Scott, and were immensely popular.

Zagoskin attempted to Russify his characters and provided authentic descriptive detail; his "contribution lies in his innovative of language to create an illusion of antiquity.

"[1] Sergey Aksakov described the extraordinary impact of Yury Miloslavsky:We did not yet have a popular writer in the accurate and full sense of the word .

The enormous number of snuffboxes and printed kerchiefs with depictions of various scenes from Yury Miloslavsky carried to all corners of the Russian expanse uphold the renown of its author.