At the beginning of the last century, the whole of Russia knew the name of Ivan Sytin. During his life, he published a combined circulation of 500 million books: every house had a Sytinsky primer, thanks to his publishing house millions of children learned about the fairy tales of the brothers Grimm and Charles Perrault, he was the first to print complete works of Russian classics. Sytin owned 10 newspapers and 20 magazines, one of which is still published under its original name — "Around the World". The legendary Russian book publisher talks about his book publishing career. Starting from working in the Moscow bookstore of merchant Sharapov and ending with the management of commercial publishing houses during the NEP. About meetings with various people from Tsar Nicholas II and ending with the writer Maxim Gorky.