DEAD SOULS BY NIKOLAI GOGAL

For my 19th Russian Literature course, we just finished reading the novel Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogal. To be fair, we only read the Part I of the novel, and we aren’t going to be reading the second part. I think this might be the best way to read it because the second part was infamously unfinished.  But, if I have the time, I”ll try to read the second part later.

It should first be said that Gogal is a funny, cruel, and unforgiving writer. The way he portrays characters, people in general, and the interactions that happen between them can come off as quite funny. For example, the entire interaction between Chichikov and Panilov, the first land owner, is one of the funnier things I’ve read. The conversation between Merely Pleasant Lady and the Lady Peasant was so vapid and stupid, that I found myself laughing out loud when reading it. And the tale of the wounded soldier with a peg leg and fake arm, and how that ended with the characters realizing that Chichikov has none of the obvious physical traits of the soldier is hilarious.

Gogol’s Dead Soul, I think, can be considered a study on humanity and the reader itself. Throughout the novel, the narrator of the story addresses the reader directly and makes us think about our place. How are we judging the characters? What vantage point do we have here that the characters may not? Although I haven’t read any of Gogol’s other works, I’ve heard that this is a common theme throughout his work.

(Spoilers) If you’re looking for a quick plot summary, I’ll give it here: Essentially, our main character Chichikov, is a mysterious man who’s come to an unnamed town in Russia. This takes place in Russia in the 19th century, where serfdom was common practice. Chichikov first wins over the trust of everyone in town, and he soon sets out to the rich land owners in town with an express purpose, to by their dead souls. By dead souls, I mean he is trying to by the right to own the serfs of landowners who are already dead. These are serfs who exist on the Russian census system, but their death has not yet been recorded. Why is he doing this? No one knows yet. In each chapter, he visits a different landlord and engages in a negotiation to by the right to their dead souls. Each of these landlords has a very distinct personality, and we get a viewpoint into very different types of people in this. Once he buys the souls from the landlords, everyone in town thinks that he’s bought a lot of living people. They through a ball in his honor and have a great party for him because everyone has already grown to like him. Once everyone in town learns about this weird thing that he’s doing, buying souls, he promptly has to leave town. After this, we learn about his past. Chichikov was a grifter since he was a child, always looking for a way to make an extra buck or Kopeck as it were. Eventually he learned that the Russian government would by souls from people for 200 kopecks, and they wouldn’t really check to see if they were alive or dead. So Chichikov thought of a scheme to buy the right to dead souls for a small price and resell it to the government at a higher one. Then the novel ends.

(End Spoiler) Although the plot might seem a bit weird, I would really recommend reading it. It’s a great study into how humans work, how they interact, and how we as a reader interact with the novel.