In May 1842, the first volume of Gogol's Dead Souls was published. The work was conceived by the author while he was working on The Inspector General. In Dead Souls, Gogol addresses the main theme of his work: the ruling classes of Russian society. The writer himself said: “My creation is huge and great, and its end will not come soon.” Indeed, “Dead Souls” is an outstanding phenomenon in the history of Russian and world satire.
"Dead Souls" - a satire on serfdom
“Dead Souls” is a work. In this, Gogol is the successor of Pushkin’s prose. He himself speaks about this on the pages of the poem in a lyrical digression about two types of writers (Chapter VII).
Here the peculiarity of Gogol's realism is revealed: the ability to expose and show in close-up all the flaws of human nature that are not always evident. “Dead Souls” reflected the basic principles of realism:
- Historicism. The work is written about the writer’s contemporary time - the turn of the 20-30s of the 19th century - then serfdom was experiencing a serious crisis.
- Typical character and circumstances. Landowners and officials are depicted satirically with a pronounced critical focus, and the main social types are shown. Gogol pays special attention to detail.
- Satirical typification. It is achieved by the author’s characterization of characters, comic situations, reference to the heroes’ past, hyperbolization, and the use of proverbs in speech.
Meaning of the name: literal and metaphorical
Gogol planned to write a work in three volumes. He took Dante Alighieri’s “The Divine Comedy” as a basis. Likewise, Dead Souls was supposed to consist of three parts. Even the title of the poem refers the reader to Christian principles.
Why "Dead Souls"? The name itself is an oxymoron, a juxtaposition of the incomparable. The soul is a substance that is inherent in the living, but not in the dead. Using this technique, Gogol gives hope that not all is lost, that the positive principle in the crippled souls of landowners and officials can be reborn. This is what the second volume should have been about.
The meaning of the title of the poem “Dead Souls” lies on several levels. On the very surface there is a literal meaning, because dead peasants were called dead souls in bureaucratic documents. Actually, this is the essence of Chichikov’s machinations: to buy up dead serfs and take money as collateral. The main characters are shown in the circumstances of the sale of peasants. “Dead souls” are the landowners and officials themselves that Chichikov encounters, because there is nothing human or living left in them. They are ruled by the thirst for profit (officials), feeble-mindedness (Korobochka), cruelty (Nozdryov) and rudeness (Sobakevich).
The deep meaning of the name
All new aspects are revealed as you read the poem “Dead Souls”. The meaning of the title, hidden in the depths of the work, makes us think that any person, a simple layman, can eventually turn into Manilov or Nozdryov. It is enough for one small passion to settle in his heart. And he will not notice how vice will grow there. To this end, in Chapter XI, Gogol calls on the reader to look deep into his soul and check: “Is there some part of Chichikov in me too?”
Gogol laid down in the poem “Dead Souls” a multifaceted meaning of the title, which is revealed to the reader not immediately, but in the process of comprehending the work.
Genre originality
When analyzing “Dead Souls,” another question arises: “Why does Gogol position the work as a poem?” Indeed, the genre originality of the creation is unique. In the process of working on the work, Gogol shared his creative discoveries with friends in letters, calling “Dead Souls” both a poem and a novel.
About the second volume of "Dead Souls"
In a state of deep creative crisis, Gogol wrote the second volume of Dead Souls for ten years. In correspondence, he often complains to friends that things are going very slowly and are not particularly satisfying.
Gogol turns to the harmonious, positive image of the landowner Kostanzhoglo: judicious, responsible, using scientific knowledge in the arrangement of the estate. Under its influence, Chichikov reconsiders his attitude to reality and changes for the better.
Seeing “life’s lies” in the poem, Gogol burned the second volume of “Dead Souls.”
Why are there no positive heroes in the first volume of Dead Souls? How can one determine the essence of the metaphysical process occurring with the heroes of the poem? (correlate the answer with the title of the poem). Who, from Gogol’s point of view, is responsible for the process of impoverishment and death of the Russian people: the state, the social system, the authorities, the nobility, the people?
The images of landowners contemporary to the author are most widely represented on the pages of the poem. These are the “dead souls” of the poem. Gogol showed them in order of increasing moral degradation.
In Korobochka, Gogol presents us with a different type of Russian landowner. Thrifty, hospitable, hospitable, she suddenly becomes “club-headed” in the scene of selling dead souls, afraid of selling herself short. This is the type of person with his own mind.
In Nozdryov, Gogol showed a different form of decomposition of the nobility. The writer shows us two essences of Nozdryov: first, he is an open, daring, direct face. But then you have to make sure that Nozdryov’s sociability is an indifferent familiarity with everyone he meets and crosses, his liveliness is an inability to concentrate on any serious subject or matter, his energy is a waste of energy in revelries and debauchery. His main passion, in the words of the writer himself, is “to spoil your neighbor, sometimes for no reason at all.”
Sobakevich is akin to Korobochka. He, like her, is a hoarder. Only, unlike Korobochka, he is a smart and cunning hoarder. He manages to deceive Chichikov himself. Sobakevich is rude, cynical, uncouth; No wonder he is compared to an animal (a bear). By this Gogol emphasizes the degree of savagery of man, the degree of death of his soul.
This gallery of “dead souls” ends with a “hole in humanity” - Plyushkin. This is the eternal image of the stingy in classical literature. Plyushkin is an extreme degree of economic, social and moral decay of the human personality.
Provincial officials also join the gallery of landowners who are essentially “dead souls.” Who can we call living souls in the poem, and do they even exist? Perhaps Gogol did not intend to contrast the suffocating atmosphere of life of officials and landowners with the life of the peasantry.
However, the image of the nobles, the masters of the country in the countryside and in the city, significantly predominates in this single and motley picture. Landowners and officials are brought to the fore by Gogol because his book is an indictment, and the accusation falls precisely on them, the owners of the country, and, therefore, those who are responsible for its condition.
There were references to the fact that Gogol included positive images of ideal landowners in the following volumes of Dead Souls. But this link is empty, since it appeals to non-existent evidence. There are no further volumes of the poem, no one has read them and no one knows what would have been there. We know only scattered and more or less rough scraps of the second volume, written at another time by another Gogol. And what exactly Gogol wanted to put in the second or third volume when he created the first volume, we don’t know, just as we don’t know what kind of “thunder of other speeches” (the seventh chapter), and what kind of valiant husband and “wonderful Russian maiden” "(chapter eleven) should have appeared in these volumes, and what would have been their moral and social character.
In the second volume of the poem, the image of Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov, by the will of the author, was supposed to take the path of moral resurrection. The artificiality of the plan is already visible in the fact that virtuous ideas are instilled in Chichikov by the tax farmer Murazov, of whose own integrity the author was unable to convince the reader. However, the powerful artistic force of the first volume makes itself felt here in places: Chichikov can suddenly reveal his predatory face of a hoarder. True, Gogol did not paint an ideal picture of the life of the transformed Chichikov, but, unfortunately, the artistic tendency of the second volume of Dead Souls led precisely to such a picture (the third volume was also supposed to be there, where it probably should have been presented in full).
The meaning of the title of the poem is illuminated with new light. Having shown “dead souls,” Gogol is looking for “living souls.”
The people are presented in the poem as an allegorical, but tangible principle in every element of Russian life, indicating the truth of the existence of the Motherland, asserting that as long as there is hope, living souls are undead.
Left a reply Guest
Chichikov is a hero of his time. Essay based on N. Gogol’s story “Dead Souls”
Every time has its own heroes. They determine his face, character, principles, ethical guidelines. With the advent of “Dead Souls,” a new hero entered Russian literature, unlike his predecessors. The elusive, slippery feeling is felt in the description of his appearance. “In the chaise sat a gentleman, not handsome, but not bad-looking either, not too fat, not too thin; It’s impossible to say that he’s old, but it’s also not that he’s too young...” It’s even difficult for Gogol to determine his position, to give a name to this new phenomenon. In the end, the word was found: “It is most fair to call him: owner, acquirer.” This is a representative of the new, bourgeois relations that are taking shape in Russian life.
Chichikov grew up, although in a noble, but poor family, in a house with small windows that were not opened either in winter or in flight. Poverty, humiliation, and loneliness gradually convinced Pavlusha that there was only one way to establish herself in life - money. For the rest of his life he remembered his father’s will: “You will do everything and you will lose everything with a penny.”
Having experienced failures in the service, Chichikov poses a fair question to himself: “Why me? Why did trouble befall me?... and why should I disappear like a worm? “Chichikov does not want to “disappear” and is looking for ways to adapt to a new life. The method of enrichment he invented can be called an adventure, a scam. But time itself told him: the disorder in the country, the difficult situation of the peasants. “And now the time is convenient, recently there was an epidemic, quite a few people died out, thank God. The landowners played cards, wrapped themselves up and squandered their money; everyone has come to serve in St. Petersburg: names have been abandoned, they are managed haphazardly, taxes are becoming more difficult to pay every year.” The goods that Chichikov buys are, even today, unusual for either the ear or the mind - dead souls. But no matter how scary the unusualness of the scam offered to the landowners may be, its obvious benefits blinds one to the fact that in most cases Chichikov manages to persuade the landowners to sell him “dead souls.”
And in addition, Chichikov possesses many qualities of a man of the “new time”, a “businessman”, a “speculator”: pleasantness in behavior and concessions, and liveliness in business affairs - “everything turned out to be necessary for this world.” There was only one thing missing from the clever entrepreneur - a living human soul. Chichikov expelled all living compulsions from his life. Human feelings, the “brilliant joy” of life gave way to practicality, ideas of success, and calculation. At the end of the first volume, Chichikov did not achieve his goal. He not only experienced commercial failures, but also suffered a moral loss. But in the life of our hero there have already been defeats, and they did not force Chichikov to give up his dream of life “in all comforts, with all prosperity.” And it seems to me that he will realize it someday. After all, he has no other dreams and goals. And failure will make him more experienced and cunning. Or isn’t that why Chichikov smiles because he’s racing miles away in a troika?
The first thing that distinguishes Chichikov and Plyushkin from the rest of the characters in the poem is that they have a past - a biography. The biography of these heroes is the story of the “fall of the soul”; but if the soul “fell”, it means that it was once pure, which means that its revival is possible - through repentance.
It is no coincidence that Gogol distinguishes Chichikov from a number of other characters in the poem, talking about the hero’s past and giving his character development. According to the plan, the author was going to “lead Chichikov through the temptation of possessiveness, through life’s dirt and abomination to moral rebirth.” The hero's name is Paul, and this is the name of the apostle who experienced a spiritual revolution. If we take into account the fact that the Apostle Paul was at first one of the persecutors of Christ, and then became an ardent spreader of Christianity throughout the world, then his namesake, Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov, had to be reborn, revive the souls of people, guide them on the true path. And already in the first volume there are prerequisites for this. What is necessary for repentance, for cleansing the soul? Inner self, inner voice. The author gives Chichikov the right to mental life, to “feelings” and “thoughts.” “With some vague feeling he looked at the houses...”; “there was an unpleasant, vague feeling in his heart...”; “Some strange feeling, incomprehensible to himself, took possession of him,” Gogol records moments of his hero’s inner voice. Moreover, there are often cases when, in lyrical digressions, Chichikov’s inner voice turns into the author’s voice or merges with it - for example, a digression about the dead men of Sobakevich or about the girl Chichikov met (“Anything can be made of her, she can be a miracle, or maybe rubbish will come out, and rubbish will come out!”). Gogol trusts Chichikov to talk about Russian heroism, to admire the power and vastness of Rus'. The basis of the tragedy and at the same time the comedy of this image is that all human feelings in Chichikov are hidden deep inside, and he sees the meaning of life in acquisition. His conscience sometimes awakens, but he quickly calms it down, creating a whole system of self-justifications: “I didn’t make anyone unhappy: I didn’t rob the widow, I didn’t let anyone into the world...”. In the end, Chichikov justifies his crime. This is the path of degradation from which the author warns his hero. The writer calls on Chichikov, and with him the readers, to take the “straight path, similar to the path leading to a magnificent temple,” this is the path of salvation, the revival of the living soul in everyone.
The chapter about Plyushkin is compositionally highlighted by Gogol; it is located exactly in the middle of Chichikov’s journey through the surrounding landowners’ estates. The chapter begins and ends with lyrical digressions, which was not the case when describing other landowners. All other stories follow the same pattern: Chichikov gets acquainted with the estate, the house, then buys peasants, has dinner and leaves. But the chapter dedicated to Plyushkin seems to interrupt this monotonous chain: the life story, a detailed biography of the hero is shown, that is, before us is not just a man with a frozen soul, but we see how he reached such a state. In the distant past, he was an exemplary owner, the direct opposite of all the other landowners of Dead Souls: “But there was a time when he was just a thrifty owner! He was married and a family man, and his neighbor came to have dinner with him, listen and learn from him about housekeeping and wise stinginess... Too strong feelings were not reflected in his facial features, but intelligence was visible in his eyes; His speech was imbued with experience and knowledge of the world, and the guest was pleased to listen to him.” It becomes clear that at first Plyushkin was a completely different person. In early Plyushkin there is only the possibility of his future vice. This is hinted at by “wise stinginess” and the absence of “too strong feelings.” Gogol describes the dying of an initially good person.
If in all other landowners their typicality was emphasized, then in Plyushkin the author sees not so much a phenomenon characteristic of landowner Russia, but a kind of exception. Even Chichikov, who has seen “a lot of all kinds of people,” has “never seen this before,” and in the author’s description of Plyushkin it is said that “a similar phenomenon rarely comes across in Rus'.” The state in which Chichikov finds him is truly terrifying. Drawing a portrait of Plyushkin, the author thickens the colors to the limit: Chichikov could not even “recognize what gender the figure was: a woman or a man,” and in the end decided that in front of him was the housekeeper. But, perhaps, even the housekeeper will not wear the rags that Plyushkin wears: on his robe, “the sleeves and upper flaps were so greasy that they looked like yuft, the kind that goes on boots.” Gogol gives a devastating description of Plyushkin - “a hole in humanity.” But did his soul die completely? In revealing the image of Plyushkin, it is incredibly important not only to describe his clothes, but also his appearance. Although Gogol writes that the face of this character was nothing special, it stands out from the gallery of previous faces: “the little eyes had not yet gone out and ran from under the high eyebrows, like mice, when, sticking out their sharp muzzles from dark holes, they were alert ears and blinking their whiskers, they look out to see if a cat or a naughty boy is hiding somewhere, and they sniff the very air suspiciously.” Plyushkin has the most lively eyes of all the heroes. Maybe not human, but alive! At the mention of his comrade’s name, “some kind of warm ray slid across Plyushkin’s face, it was not a feeling that was expressed, but some kind of pale reflection of a feeling.” This means that there is something alive left in him, that his soul has not frozen, has not ossified at all. The sixth chapter contains a detailed description of Plyushkin’s garden, overgrown, neglected, but still alive. The garden is a kind of metaphor for the hero’s soul. Only on his estate there are two churches. Of all the landowners, only Plyushkin pronounces an accusatory monologue after Chichikov’s departure.
It is very important to know the intention of the second and third volumes of Dead Souls. Of all the heroes of the first volume, Gogol wanted to lead only two through purification to the rebirth of the soul in the third volume - Chichikov and Plyushkin. This means that the author’s position is far from being as straightforward as it might seem at first glance. It is Plyushkin, according to the author, who, although insignificant, still has a chance for spiritual rebirth.
So, Chichikov and Plyushkin, unlike other characters in the poem, are shown in development, but in the opposite development, that is, in degradation, and, according to Gogol’s plan, they were supposed to be reborn in the second volume of the work.
But Manilov, for example, has nowhere to degrade. It has long frozen, like a bookmark in a book that has been lying on page fourteen for two years.
All the heroes of the poem can be divided into groups: landowners, ordinary people (serfs and servants), officers, city officials. The first two groups are so interdependent, so merged into a kind of dialectical unity, that they simply cannot be characterized separately from each other.
Among the surnames of landowners in “Dead Souls,” the ones that primarily attract attention are those surnames that come from the names of animals. There are quite a few of them: Sobakevich, Bobrov, Svinin, Blokhin. The author closely introduces the reader to some landowners, while others are only mentioned in passing in the text. The surnames of landowners are mostly dissonant: Konopatiev, Trepakin, Kharpakin, Pleshakov, Mylnoy. But there are exceptions: Pochitaev, Cheprakov-Colonel. Such surnames already by their sound inspire respect, and there is hope that these are really smart and virtuous people, unlike other half-humans, half-beasts. When naming the landowners, the author uses sound notation. So the hero Sobakevich would not have acquired such heaviness and solidity if he had the surname Sobakin or Psov, although in meaning they are almost the same thing. What adds further solidity to Sobakevich’s character is his attitude towards the peasants, the way they are indicated in his notes given to Chichikov. Let us turn to the text of the work: “He (Chichikov) scanned it (the note) with his eyes and marveled at the neatness and accuracy: not only was the craft, rank, years and family fortune written down in detail, but even in the margins there were special notes about behavior, sobriety, - in a word , it was nice to watch." These serfs - carriage maker Mikheev, carpenter Stepan Probka, brickmaker Milushkin, shoemaker Maxim Telyatnikov, Eremey Sorokoplekhin - and after their death they are dear to the owner as good workers and honest people. Sobakevich, despite the fact that “it seemed that this body had no soul at all, or it had one, but not at all where it should be, but, like the immortal Koshchei, somewhere behind the mountains and covered with such a thick shell, that whatever was stirring at the bottom of it did not produce absolutely any shock on the surface,” despite this, Sobakevich is a good owner.
The serf Korobochki have nicknames: Peter Savelyev Disrespect-Trough, Cow Brick, Wheel Ivan. “The landowner did not keep any notes or lists, but knew almost everyone by heart.” She is also a very zealous housewife, but she is not so interested in the serfs as in the amount of hemp, lard and honey that she can sell. Korobochka has a truly telling surname. She surprisingly suits a woman of “elderly years, in some kind of sleeping cap, put on hastily, with a flannel around her neck,” one of those “mothers, small landowners who cry about crop failures, losses and keep their heads somewhat to one side, and meanwhile gain little by little.” money in colorful bags placed in dresser drawers."
The author characterizes Manilov as a man “without his own enthusiasm.” His surname consists mainly of sonorant sounds that sound soft without making unnecessary noise. It is also consonant with the word “to beckon.” Manilov is constantly attracted by some kind of fantastic projects, and, “deceived” by his fantasies, he does absolutely nothing in life.
Nozdryov, on the contrary, with his last name alone gives the impression of a man in whom there is too much of everything, like too many noisy vowels in his last name. In contrast to Nozdryov, the author portrayed his son-in-law Mizhuev, who is one of those people who “before you even have time to open your mouth, they are ready to argue and, it seems, will never agree to something that is clearly opposite to their way of thinking, that they will never call someone stupid smart and that in particular they will not agree to dance to someone else’s tune; but the end will always be that their character will be soft, that they will agree to exactly what they rejected, they will call the stupid thing smart and then go to dance as best they can to someone else’s tune - in a word. , they will start as a smooth surface, and end up as a viper." Without Mizhuev, Nozdryov’s character would not have played so well with all its facets.
The image of Plyushkin in the poem is one of the most interesting. If the images of other landowners are given without a backstory, they are what they are in essence, then Plyushkin was once a different person, “a thrifty owner! He was married and a family man, and a neighbor came to him for lunch, listened and learned from him about farming and wise stinginess." But his wife died, one of his daughters died, and the remaining daughter ran away with a passing officer. Plyushkin is not so much a comic hero as a tragic one. And the tragedy of this image is grotesquely emphasized by the funny, absurd surname, which has something of the kolach that his daughter Alexandra Stepanovna brought to Plyushkin for Easter along with a new robe, and which he dried into breadcrumbs and served to rare guests for many years. Plyushkin's stinginess is brought to the point of absurdity, he is reduced to a "hole in humanity", and it is in this image that Gogol's "laughter through tears" is felt most strongly. Plyushkin deeply despises his serfs. He treats his servants as Moor and Proshka, scolds them mercilessly and mostly just like that, not to the point.
The author is deeply sympathetic to ordinary Russian people, servants, serfs. He describes them with good humor, take for example the scene in which Uncle Mityai and Uncle Minyai are trying to force stubborn horses to walk. The author calls them not Mitrofan and Dimitri, but Mityai and Minyai, and before the reader’s mind’s eye appears “the lean and long Uncle Mityai with a red beard” and “Uncle Minyai, a broad-shouldered man with a jet-black beard and a belly similar to that gigantic samovar. In which sbiten is cooked for the entire vegetated market." Chichikov's coachman Selifan is called by his full name because he claims to have some kind of education, which he pours out completely on the horses entrusted to his care. Chichikov's lackey Parsley, with its special smell that follows him everywhere, also evokes a good-natured smile from the author and the reader. There is no trace of the evil irony that accompanies descriptions of landowners.
The author's thoughts, put into Chichikov's mouth, are full of lyricism about the life and death of the “dead souls” he bought. Chichikov fantasizes and sees how Stepan Probka “lifted himself... for greater profit under the church dome, and maybe he dragged himself onto the cross and, slipping, from there, from the crossbar, fell to the ground, and only some one standing nearby... Uncle Micah, scratched. With his hand at the back of his head, he said: “Eh, Vanya, you’ve been lucky!” - and, tying himself with a rope, he climbed into his place. It is no coincidence that Stepan Cork is named Vanya here. It’s just that this name contains all the naivety, generosity, breadth of soul and recklessness of the ordinary Russian people.
The third group of heroes can be conventionally designated as officers. These are mostly friends and acquaintances of the landowner Nozdryov. In a sense, Nozdryov himself also belongs to this group. Besides him, one can name such revelers and bullies as Captain Potseluev, Khvostyrev, and Lieutenant Kuvshinnikov. These are real Russian surnames, but in this case they ambiguously indicate such characteristics of their owners as a constant desire to drink wine and something stronger, and not in mugs, but preferably in jugs, the ability to curl their tail behind the first skirt they come across and give out kisses left and right . Nozdryov, who himself is a bearer of all the above qualities, talks about all these exploits with great enthusiasm. We should also add a cheating card game here. In this light, N.V. Gogol portrays representatives of the great Russian army, who were quartered in the provincial city, which to some extent represents the whole of vast Rus'.
And the last group of persons presented in the first volume of the poem can be designated as officials, from the lowest to the governor and his retinue. In the same group we will include the female population of the provincial city of NN, about whom a lot is also said in the poem.
The reader somehow learns the names of officials in passing, from their conversations with each other; for them, rank becomes more important than their first and last name, as if it grows to the skin. Among them, the central ones are the governor, the prosecutor, the gendarmerie colonel, the chairman of the chamber, the police chief, and the postmaster. These people seem to have no soul at all, even somewhere far away, like Sobakevich. They live for their own pleasure, under the guise of their rank, their lives are strictly regulated by the size of their rank and the size of the bribes that they are given for the work that they are required to do by virtue of their position. The author tests these sleeping officials with the appearance of Chichikov with his “dead souls.” And officials, willingly or unwillingly, must show who is capable of what. And they turned out to be capable of a lot, especially in the area of guessing about the personality of Chichikov himself and his strange enterprise. Various rumors and opinions began to circulate, which, “for some unknown reason, had the greatest effect on the poor prosecutor. They affected him to such an extent that, when he came home, he began to think and think and suddenly, as they say, for no reason at all.” on the other hand, he died either from paralysis or something else, but as he sat there he fell backwards from his chair... Only then did they learn with condolences that the deceased definitely had a soul, although in his modesty he never showed it.” The rest of the officials never showed their souls.
Ladies from the high society of the provincial city of NN helped the officials a lot in causing such a big commotion. Ladies occupy a special place in the anthroponymic system of Dead Souls. The author, as he himself admits, does not dare to write about ladies. “It’s even strange, the pen doesn’t rise at all, as if some kind of lead were sitting in it. So be it: about their characters, apparently, we need to leave it to someone who has livelier colors and more of them on the palette, and we’ll only have to say two words about appearance and about what is more superficial. The ladies of the city of NN were what is called presentable... As for how to behave, maintain tone, maintain etiquette, many of the most subtle decencies, and especially pay attention to the very last details, then in this they were ahead of even the ladies of St. Petersburg and Moscow... A calling card, whether it was written on a two of clubs or an ace of diamonds, was a very sacred thing.” The author does not give names to the ladies, and explains the reason as follows: “It is dangerous to call a fictitious surname. Whatever name you come up with, you will certainly find it in some corner of our state, fortunately, someone bearing it will certainly not be angry.” to the stomach, and to death... Call it by rank - God forbid, and even more dangerous. Now all ranks and classes are so irritated that everything that is in a printed book already seems to them to be a person: such is the disposition in them. in the air. It is enough to just say that there is a stupid person in one city, and a gentleman of respectable appearance will suddenly jump out and shout: “After all, I am also a man, therefore, I am also stupid,” - in a word, he will instantly realize what’s going on. ". This is how a lady pleasant in all respects and a simply pleasant lady appear in the poem - collective female images that are delightfully expressive. From the conversation between the two ladies, the reader subsequently learns that one of them is called Sofya Ivanovna, and the other is Anna Grigorievna. But this doesn’t really matter, because no matter what you call them, they will still remain a pleasant lady in all respects and simply a pleasant lady. This introduces an additional element of generalization into the author's characterization of the characters. A lady pleasant in all respects “acquired this title in a legitimate way, because, as a matter of fact, she did not regret anything in becoming amiable to the last degree, although, of course, through the amiability, oh, what a nimble agility of a woman’s character crept in! And although sometimes it stuck out in every pleasant word wow, what a pin! But all this was clothed in the most subtle secularism that only happens in a provincial city." "The other lady... did not have that versatility in character, and therefore we will call her: just a pleasant lady." It was these ladies who laid the foundation for the loud scandal about dead souls , Chichikov and the abduction of the governor’s daughter. A few words need to be said about the latter. She is no more and no less than the governor’s daughter says about her: “Glorious grandmother! The good thing is that now, apparently, she has just been released from some boarding school or institute, that, as they say, there is nothing feminine about her yet. That is, exactly what is most unpleasant about them. She is now like a child, everything about her is simple, she will say whatever she wants, laugh wherever she wants to laugh. Anything can be made of her, she can be a miracle, or she can turn out to be rubbish...” The governor’s daughter is untouched virgin soil, (tabula rasa), so her name is youth and innocence, and it doesn’t matter at all whether her name is Katya or Masha. After the ball, on in which she aroused universal hatred from the ladies, the author calls her “poor blonde.” Almost “poor lamb.”
When Chichikov goes to the court chamber to formalize the purchase of “dead” souls, he encounters the world of petty officials: Fedosei Fedoseevich, Ivan Grigorievich, Ivan Antonovich the jug’s snout. “Themis simply received guests as she was, in a negligee and robe.” “Ivan Antonovich seemed to be well over forty years old; his hair was black and thick; the whole middle of his face protruded forward and went into his nose - in a word, it was the face that is called in the hostel a jug’s snout.” Apart from this detail, there is nothing remarkable about the officials, except perhaps their desire to receive a larger bribe, but this no longer surprises anyone about the officials.
In the tenth chapter of the first volume, the postmaster tells the story about Captain Kopeikin, calling it a whole poem in some way.
Yu. M. Lotman in his article “Pushkin and “The Tale of Captain Kopeikin” finds prototypes of Captain Kopeikin. This is the hero of folk songs, the thief Kopeikin, whose prototype was a certain Kopeknikov, an invalid during the Patriotic War of 1812. He was refused help by Arakcheev, after which he became, as they said, a robber. This is Fyodor Orlov - a real person, a man who was disabled in the same war. Lotman believes that “the synthesis and parodic reduction of these images gives rise to the “hero of the penny” Chichikov.
Smirnova-Chikina, in her comments to the poem “Dead Souls,” considers Kopeikin as the only positive character conceived by Gogol in the first part of his work. The author writes that Gogol wanted to do this in order to “justify her<поэмы>genre, which is why the narrator-postmaster prefaces the story with the words that “this, however, if told, would turn out to be a whole poem, in some way interesting for some writer.”” In addition, the author pays attention to the role of contrasts, which is also considered in my work , contrasts in the composition of the story. She says that this “helps to deepen the satirical meaning of the story.” Smirnova-Chikina draws attention to how Gogol contrasts the wealth of St. Petersburg, the luxury of its streets with the poverty of Kopeikin.
“The Tale...” appears in the poem at the moment when the high society of the city of N, having gathered together, is wondering who Chichikov really is. Many assumptions are made - a robber, a counterfeiter, and Napoleon... Although the postmaster's idea that Chichikov and Kopeikin were the same person was rejected, we can see a parallel between their images. It can be noticed by at least paying attention to the role the word “kopek” plays in the story about Chichikov’s life. Even in childhood, his father, instructing him, said: “... most of all, take care and save a penny, this thing is most reliable, as it turns out, “he was only versed in the advice of saving a penny, and he himself accumulated a little of it,” but Chichikov turned out to have “a great mind from the practical side." Thus, we see that Chichikov and Kopeikin have the same image - a penny.
The surname Chichikov cannot be found in any dictionary. And this surname itself does not lend itself to any analysis, either from the side of emotional content, or from the side of style or origin. The surname is unclear. It does not carry any hints of respectability or humiliation, it does not mean anything. But that is precisely why N.V. Gogol gives such a surname to the main character, who “is not handsome, but not bad-looking, neither too fat nor too thin; one cannot say that he is old, but not that he is too young.” . Chichikov is neither this nor that, however, this hero cannot be called an empty place either. This is how the author characterizes his behavior in society: “Whatever the conversation was about, he always knew how to support it: whether it was about a horse farm, he talked about a horse farm; whether they talked about good dogs, and here he made very practical comments whether they interpreted the investigation carried out by the treasury chamber, he showed that he was not unaware of the judicial tricks; whether there was a discussion about the billiard game - and in the billiard game he did not make a mistake; even with tears in his eyes; he knew about the production of hot wine, and there was no use in hot wine; and he judged them as if he himself were both an official and an overseer... He spoke neither loudly nor quietly, but absolutely as it should be." The life story of the main character, included in the poem, explains a lot about “dead souls,” but the living soul of the hero remains as if hidden behind all his unseemly actions. His thoughts, which the author reveals, show that Chichikov is not a stupid person and not devoid of conscience. But it is still difficult to guess whether he will correct himself as he promised or whether he will continue along his difficult and unrighteous path. The author did not have time to write about this.