Terry Southern is “the hippest guy on the planet,” as the New York Times wrote about him, one of the best satirical writers of the “Broken Generation.” It's safe to call him Mr. Gloom. His subtle irony, running like a red thread through all his works, refers to everyday life, to ordinary things that, at first glance, seem undeserving of attention. In the novel “Brilliant and Refined” - “an incredibly funny commentary on the dark side of national life” - the author puts a successful doctor, the world-famous dermatologist Frederick Eichner, into incidental, absurd situations, leads him through a chain of incomprehensible events: he is confused with a famous gangster and therefore there is an attempt on his life, he is pursued by a homosexual maniac, and the private detective he hired throws a hashish party for him...