Time to head off any risk of their being a Russian Reading Deficiency on the Ramblings! 😀 I’ve been lucky enough to receive these two review copies from the lovely Pushkin Press: a pair of collected short stories by a duo of favourite Russian authors – Tolstoy and Gogol. Both of them present what are described in the subtitle as “Essential Stories” and that’s a description with which I wouldn’t argue! So today I’ll look at the Gogol selection, with the rather evocative title “And the Earth will sit on the Moon”!

I have long suspected dogs of being far more intelligent than humans…

This selection of five of Gogol’s tales is translated by Oliver Ready, who provides a useful introduction which interestingly mentions the long reach of Gogol’s influence through Dostoevsky to Bulgakov. And these stories really *are* vital: “The Nose”, “Diary of a Madman” and “The Overcoat” are possibly Gogol’s best-known short works and deserve to be revisited, even if you’ve read them before, as they capture the writer’s essence quite brilliantly. “The Nose” is a surreal masterpiece in which the titular objects becomes detached from its owner and develops a life of its own; “Diary…” follows the mental collapse of a clerk who becomes obsessed with his superior’s daughter; and “The Overcoat” meditates on the fate of a poor man who invests his money and soul into a new garment.

And so, in a certain Department there served a certain clerk, a clerk whom nobody could describe as especially remarkable, who was a bit short, a bit pocked, a bit carroty and even, by the looks of him, a bit blind, with a widow’s peak, wrinkles on both cheeks, and a general complexion that was positively haemorrhoidal…

These three Petersburg-based stories have a common theme; they pick apart the horrors of a society based so much on status and rank, where those at the bottom are prey to financial and emotional crisis, excluded from the world of the haves, and have an existence rather than a life. Gogol is well aware of the poverty that exists in this world and the pernicious effect it has on those impoverished workers, and it’s clear where his sympathies lie. In particular, it’s chilling watching the gradual mental deteriorationof the clerk in “Diary…” as the entries become weirder and the dating of the writings more bizarre.

The other two stories have rural settings rather than the city; but Gogol is just as devastating with his satire. “Old-World Landowners”, while purporting to be a portrait of a much-missed world now declining, actually reflects the primitive manner of living in many Russian rural areas. The opening paragraph is just brilliant:

How I love the unassuming life of those proprietors of remote estates who are known in Little Russia as old-world landowners and who, like decrepit picturesque cottages, present such a welcome contrast in their motley garb to all the sleek new buildings whose walls have not yet been drenched in rain, whose roofs have not yet turned green with mould, and whose plastered porches still conceal their red bricks from view.

And despite the narrator’s apparent love of the ‘old world’, I don’t think many of us would want to live there…!

The final story, “The Carriage”, is a marvellous piece of satire, again focusing on the rural world but one in which a small town is disrupted by the arrival of a regiment of the military. The local landowners attempt to keep up with the status of their visitors, but one gentleman in particular is caught out by a mixture of vanity and too much alcohol…

I’ve read all of these stories at points throughout my life, but loved revisiting them in these lovely new translations from Oliver Ready (probably best known for his rendering of “Crime and Punishment”). He also provides a helpful note on the various ranks of the Russian Civil Service, notoriously complex and essential to the understanding of the anguish and status of Gogol’s protagonists. This is a fabulous new collection from Pushkin, and if you’ve never experienced the wonderful writing and satire of Gogol before, it’s the perfect place to start! Go on – you know you want to… ;D

Next up on the Ramblings – essential stories from Tolstoy! 😀