In 1921 in Soviet Petrograd (St. Petersburg, then Leningrad, then St. Petersburg again) there was a society called "A house of arts". It was formed by artists, who, among other things, gave lectures on various topics. One of lecturers was a famous Russian poet Alexander Blok. It was a very cold winter and, since the country just underwent a revolution and a civil war, the heating in the lecture hall did not work. The students' headman had to keep the ink bottle on his body so that the ink did not freeze: after the lecture the lecturer had to write down the number of hours in a journal.
On a particularly cold day Blok arrived to the hall and found just a single student, the headman. He very politely asked if the student has the time to listen to the lecture. The student (who later became a writer) assured Blok that indeed he does. And Blok talked for two hours, then made a small break for ten minutes, and talked for two more hours. He then jotted down "History of Western literature, 1 hour", put on his hat and left.
The lecture topic was Servantes and Don Quixote.
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