The novel was written in 1892-1893; On March 2, 1892, Kravchinsky made a note in his notebook: “I sat down to read a Stundist novel,” and on October 16, 1893: “I read the novel in the evening and was declared finished.” It was originally conceived as a collective work by Kravchinsky and the Englishwoman Hesba Stretton (pseudonym of the writer Sarah Schmit), the author of a number of novels and stories in a moral and Christian spirit. About the history of the creation of “Stundist Pavel Rudenko,” the writer’s wife, F. Stepnyak, later wrote: “When the Russian government began to persecute the Stundists with special zeal... English newspapers were full of information about outrageous abuses of peaceful sectarians, and English society was strongly was indignant at the outrages committed by Pobedonostsev and company. At this time, one English writer... came to Sergei Mikhailovich with a proposal to jointly write a novel about the life of the persecuted Stundists."