Сказку "Черная курица, или Подземные жители" Антоний Погорельский (настоящее имя - Алексей Алексеевич Перовский) написал для своего племянника Алеши, воспитание которого считал главным делом своей жизни. Мальчик вырос и стал замечательным писателем Алексеем Константиновичем Толстым, а удивительная история дружбы Алеши и министра Чернушки положила начало русской литературной прозе для детей - тонкой, мудрой, душеобразующей и вечной.
Antony Pogorelsky was a Russian prose writer. His remarkable set of stories Dvoinik (The Double, or My Evenings in Little Russia) (1828) was closely related to the German fantastic tradition (Serapion Brothers by Hoffman) and anticipated the famous Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka by Nikolai Gogol and Russian Nights by Vladimir Odoevsky. In 1829 Pogorelsky published the book that brought him real fame: it was the fairy tale Black Hen, or Living Underground written for his nephew, the first book about childhood in Russian literature. His novel Monastyrka, a “moral-descriptive novel” combining both sentimental and romantic elements was very well accepted by public and critics.