Eugene Onegin (Russian: Евгений Онегин, BGN/PCGN: Yevgeniy Onegin) is a novel in verse written by Aleksandr Pushkin. It was one of the classics of Russian literature and its hero served as the model for a number of Russian literary heroes. It was published in serial form between 1825 and 1832. The first complete edition was published in 1833, and the edition on which the current accepted version is based was published in 1837.
The work's primary defining feature is that it is almost entirely written in verses of iambic tetrameter with the unusual rhyme scheme "aBaBccDDeFFeGG", where the lowercase letters represent feminine rhymes while the uppercase letters represent masculine rhymes. This form has become known as the "Onegin stanza" (or "Pushkin sonnet").
The story is told by an idealised version of Pushkin, who often digresses from the story and while the plot of the novel is quite scant the book is more loved for the telling than what is told. It is partly because of this garrulous narrator that the book has been compared to Tristram Shandy.