Born in Central Asia, Chagataev, the hero of Soul, goes on to be educated in Moscow. As an adult, he is sent back to his birthplace as a kind of missionary; believing his people are lost in the desert, he goes to rescue them and lead them towards Communism. His mission becomes a search for happiness, but his success goes only so far. The people prove that they have their own ideas about where and how they wish to be led. Andrey Platonov's style is that of myth and fable. Chagataev is an epic hero, a twentieth-century Moses leading his people to freedom and battling against the powers of darkness. At the same time, he is himself lost, vulnerable and ill at ease with the burden of responsibility which he tries to shoulder. There is a paradox in that by trying to release the people from one ruling power, he himself fills the role of another one.

In this story about being in possession of your own life, Platonov weaves together Zoroastrian myth, Sufism, Communism and Freud, creating a work of psychological and philosophical nuance.