As the Russian Revolution breaks out, the main character, Cezary Baryka, escapes from Baku with his father, a Polish political exile from Siberia (see also, Poles in Azerbaijan).

[9] The novel tells of his disillusionment as the Poland he discovers does not resemble that of which his father told him; a feeling only magnified by the Baryka's deep suspicion of the Bolshevik solutions about the poor.

A live action version was released in two formats in Poland on 2 March 2001, adapted and directed by Filip Bajon, produced by Dariusz Jabłoński, and featuring Mateusz Damięcki as Cezary Baryka.

After a while, Cezary reaches Warsaw and meets his mother's former lover - Simon Gajowiec, a proponent of slow reform and work at grassroots.

Convinced that both revolution and a return to tradition are futile attempts to improve the well-being in Poland, begins a correspondence with Anthony Lulek - a devoted Marxist rhetorician.

The revolution leads to miss-management of labour, human cruelty, food shortages: all of which later serve as fertile ground for violence motivated by racial hatred.

As he grows to love his mother, forced to do labour at old age, later stripped of her wedding-ring upon her death - Cezary rejects the foundation of dialectical-materialist thinkers, which is to achieve freedom through armed conflict.