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The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol

Nikolai Gogol,

Richard Pevear (Translator)

Larissa Volokhonsky (Translator)

4.35 · Rating details · 12,682 ratings · 251 reviews

When Pushkin first read some of the stories in this collection, he declared himself "amazed." "Here is real gaiety," he wrote, "honest, unconstrained, without mincing, without primness. And in places what poetry! . . . I still haven't recovered."

More than a century and a half later, Nikolai Gogol's stories continue to delight readers the world over. Now a stunning new tra ...more

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Paperback, 435 pages

Published June 29th 1999 by Vintage (first published 1835)

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Oct 25, 2012 Garima rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: short-stories, favorites, my-2-cents

"We all came from Gogol's overcoat."
Fyodor Dostoevsky

During my childhood, like many other kids, I was also in the habit of listening to bedtime stories. They were usually told by my father or my grandmother. My granny stuck to stories she knew already, either related to her life in her village or some anecdotes related to Hindu Mythology where there is no dearth of tales. My father however had to come up with a new story every time in an on-the-spot manner. These stories used to be sweet, simple ...more

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Apr 03, 2015 Warwick rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russia, ukraine, fiction, short-stories, folio-society

Do you remember that bit in Through the Looking-glass where the Red Queen turns into a sheep?

‘Oh, much better!’ cried the Queen, her voice rising into a squeak as she went on. ‘Much be-etter! Be-etter! Be-e-e-etter! Be-e-ehh!’ The last word ended in a long bleat, so like a sheep that Alice quite started.

She looked at the Queen, who seemed to have suddenly wrapped herself up in wool. Alice rubbed her eyes, and looked again. She couldn't make out what had happened at all. Was she in a shop? And wa

...more

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Oct 15, 2012 MJ Nicholls rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: pre-1900s, short-stories, borscht-and-kvass

First: this is not The Complete Tales. The unlearned distinction between Collected & Complete has angered completists the world over. Collected means incomplete: a mixtape of works that constitute, critically, the best this writer has to offer. Complete means the totted-up totality, depending upon what is being completed, i.e. Complete Works is ambiguous and open to omissions, depending on what is classed as a work—prose? plays? Just assume a fuller completion when it’s Complete, not Collect ...more

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Aug 12, 2014 James rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2014-reads, russian-literature, favorites, best-translations, short-stories, horror, comedy, fantasy

Nikolai Gogol, based on the image results my Google search spat back, reminds me of that quietly excited classmate who's usually game to tag along with you for some mischief-making. Whoopee cushions and joy buzzers presumably hadn't been around then, so one shudders at the tricks his imagination must've improvised. From his eyes shines a look too knowing not to have exposed his hastily-planned cover-ups and landed him in a few or hundred detentions, spent here sweeping grounds and there copying Nikolai Gogol, based on the image results my Google search spat back, reminds me of that quietly excited classmate who's usually game to tag along with you for some mischief-making. Whoopee cushions and joy buzzers presumably hadn't been around then, so one shudders at the tricks his imagination must've improvised. From his eyes shines a look too knowing not to have exposed his hastily-planned cover-ups and landed him in a few or hundred detentions, spent here sweeping grounds and there copying lines. In short: my kinda guy. Russian literature, since books began making me feel things, has been for me that scary mountain whose lack of obvious footholds has sent me running home into the squishier bosoms of easier genres, whose peak is peopled with happy campers roasting marshmallows while animatedly discussing scenes from this Dostoevsky classic or that Tolstoy epic. What sure hand would, as soon as I attempt the climb, save me from tripping over the first loose rock and snap my neck? Gogol's, while mindful to point out where not to step, wouldn't hold mine, yet what convinced me more to turn to his works first of all was learning of the ripples they caused that soon impacted on others' in waves. "We all came out of Gogol's 'Overcoat'," some dude said, which, prisoner to that tedious no-stones-left-unturned school of thought that I am, rather finally shut the case.

No gripes to be had here about that, to be on the same page, as evident by how finding no more of the book to savor left me so restless my withdrawal dissipated only when I spent half an hour the next day at the bookstore, head-deep inside The Inspector-General a similar collection of another company included (and, along with several other shorts, this one has omitted for crimes against ~~humanity~~ convenience). Let's come back to the point: the hype? It's real. Where Gogol's praisers have stumbled is that they haven't been louder about it. Each of the stories, 13 in all (and more besides that lay scattered elsewhere), springs from a mind able to hop between moods as simply as switching socks and, more impressively, capture all that in writing that not so much reads as flows. By no means, mind, does Gogol here achieve infallibility: St. John's Eve, where the roller-coaster rolls out of the station, and The Terrible Vengeance get so twisty and turny I had to read the latter twice before heads and tails could be made of it. The Carriage, fangirled over to no end by Anton Chekhov, fell short of my hopes, which, granted, the preceding unbeatable trifecta kicking off the second half of the book set impossibly high. The Overcoat, too, didn't much measure up to those same expectations. People, at least in the earlier parts, are either regularly found with their "arms akimbo" or perennially "vexed." But for all that, any misgivings don't matter so much the more I think on them. If they're not because my attention wandered, they're a placement issue; if not that as well, then nitpicks. Where there are strike-outs, Gogol makes up for a hundredfold in home runs.

The Night Before Christmas is hugely fun and entertaining, the vibe throughout fit for a 90's Saturday-morning cartoon, albeit one soon headed for the chopping block on account of complaints from parents outraged at their bumpkins' being exposed to such degenerate content as "a devil who had one last night to wander about the wide world and teach good people to sin." Ivan Fyodorovich Shponka and His Aunt contains the strangest dream sequence that, contrasted with the mundane goings-on its characters face in the waking world, not enough weed will ever exist to help make sense of it. Old World Landowners, even without witches and devils, is still plenty captivating with two old couple, developed masterfully, taking center stage. The second-scariest short of the lot, Viy, proves books can take years off such scaredy-cats as me as well as that closet scene The Ring have long sucker-punched unsuspecting viewers with. Wrapping up the first half of Gogol's colorful re-imagining of his country's rural life is The Quarrel, which boasts of a higher laugh-per-page rate than any other short to date—"Excuse me for appearing before you in my natural state," says the more corpulent main character called Ivanovich Nikiforovich after being barged in on by his friend, neighbor, and soon-to-be-bitter-rival. St. John's Eve, either, doesn't lack for bright spots, and even those are soon outshone into white oblivion by a passage of just astounding imagery in The Terrible Vengeance that describes the Dnieper river to musical perfection.

Gogol's genius, aimed at the then-capital, burns even hotter. While not as inventively and unapologetically fantastic and outrageous as their Ukrainian predecessors, the Petersburg Tales, far from stumbling for their lack of broomstick-riding witches, moon-stealing devils, and the odd incest, are likelier than the former to worm their way into the collective subconscious to there make a permanent home. The devil, representative in Gogol's wacky world of the ubiquitousness of bad influences whose seduction every day tempts us, lurks even in the city, but almost as an afterthought: what need have we of the ultimate troublemaker when man himself can beat the master at his own game? In the majority of the shorts, no puppet master hides behind purple curtains, pulling levers and pushing buttons to nudge events his way. The result is often spectacular. Nevsky Prospect throws a knockout from the opening bell, soaking us with ejaculations the narrator makes over what a great place Nevsky Prospect is, and then magnifies the microscope over two acquaintances, each different in their approaches, chasing after two women spotted there. Gogol, at one point, shows so powerfully what it is to fall in love that it would still be a more effective form of communication than if telepathy were possible. The Diary of a Madman, as the title gives away, takes us into the mind of an apparently healthy everyman whose mental deterioration should well satiate that morbidly curious class of gawkers-by who gravitate towards car-accident sites. Dogs exchanging letters and talking politics aren't even the weirdest things here.

Next, The Nose seems straightforward enough, almost too straightforward: someone finds someone else's nose inside his bread one morning and, after his story's more or less wrapped up, we trail the said noseless man as he tries to locate it. No other story, however, has ever so completely robbed me of my words, myself prostrate with awe at Gogol's audacity, as this one where he blindsides you with the last expectation you can think of. It's a tough act no one wants to follow, so The Carriage, with its relatively normal happenings, can be forgiven for not wowing some people. The Portrait, on the other hand, picks things up and Gogol is back where he's comfortable: keeping therapists in business by sending to their recliner chairs us traumatized readers. The story, separated into two parts, details the rags-to-riches-to-ruin life of an artist called Chartkov, whose painting skills are moderate and potential unmistakable, who happens upon a mysterious portrait of a creepy old man. His stare, which Gogol's description gives major heft, is worse to imagine than to watch the best horror has to offer cinema. In a nutshell: there's gold hidden behind the portrait's frame that Chartkov exploits to better his position in society and that in the end destroys him. The second part delves fully into the portrait's origins and is no less mesmerizing. Along the way, Gogol touches on the artist's life and their creative process, social manipulation and superficiality, competition and obsolescence. It's a meaty story with something for everyone and, as with most of his works so far, to relish anew with every reread.

The Overcoat, the last in line, continues the supernatural element The Portrait brought back, but dominated by the more down-to-earth routines of mediocre, bullied outcast Akaky Akakievich, it takes a backseat. After his tatty overcoat, a source of ridicule at work, became useless as protection against the brutal Russian winter, Akaky gets another made, which gains him confidence and popularity. His moment in the sun doesn't last, though, and from there does the story return to more familiar grounds: doom and gloom. This second bookend may have suffered from the same positional problem The Carriage did (the lesson here: short-story collections read from cover to cover are bound to favor some and hurt others), but hindsight is its friend. There's a matter-of-fact, deadpan quality to the narration that gets funnier in retrospect. A long-suffering tone there also can't be missed when the writing takes great pains to explain how Akaky Akakievich came by that name, the purpose of which section is obvious and hilarious when (Wikipedia to the rescue!) you read later that it is the Russian equivalent of "John Johnson" as well as sounds like the Russian word "obkakat" or "kaka," meaning "to smear with excrement," that makes it read as "Poop Poopson." The idea that the likes of Dostoevsky wasn't above toilet humor warms these cockles greatly. Then, on the aforementioned Russian winter, it's not generally that it's the enemy of poor people, but that it's the enemy of people "earn[ing] a salary of four hundred roubles or thereabouts." The exactitude is killer. Another: "An order was issued for the police to catch the dead man at all costs, dead or alive." Added to Gogol's in-jokes and humor is a question that, if given any consideration, is an easy road to a panic attack: what's your overcoat? Another character features in the story that goes by no other name than "the important person," and in answer, he would probably bring up his rank, which is as much smokes and mirrors as Akaky's overcoat is that masks their total ignorance about certain workings of the world. The balance between such introspective moments and the satirical asides in this story and the others is, if you ask me, not a half-bad explanation for why Gogol is ducking awesome. ...more

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Jun 01, 2011 Alex rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2011, reading-through-history, russia, rth-lifetime

My first reaction to Gogol was bewilderment. It's funny, and engaging to read, but...what the hell is it about? I'm not sure what the point of "Diary of a Madman" is, although I know I enjoyed it.

Pevear and Volokhonsky's intro is helpful, although it contains a number of minor spoilers. Their point is that if you try to understand Gogol, you are failing: Gogol himself didn't understand Gogol. "We still do not know what Gogol is," says some guy they quoted. P&V write that Gogol, as compared t ...more

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Sep 09, 2011 Ali rated it really liked it · review of another edition

3.8.
Many of the Ukrainian Tales are almost physically painful to read, though they contain a few moments which made me laugh out loud. Starting with "Ivan Fyodorovich Shponka and His Aunt", the stories begin to get a lot of fun. I was particularly struck by Gogol's descriptions of the titular characters' friendship and its end in "How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich", and found that it closely mirrored some of my own experiences with friendship. "Diary of a Madman" is both hilari ...more

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Jan 02, 2018 Aaron Arnold rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, read-in-2017

Even if he had published nothing but Dead Souls, Gogol would still have a claim to be one of Ukraine's all-time greatest novelists. Luckily for us, he kept writing, and these excellent short stories show that his transition to becoming a more "Russian" writer did not dampen his humor or invention one bit. This collection shows off both sides of Gogol's output: first, the strange, magical Ukrainian stories full of drunken peasants, quarreling landowners, hilarious religious bigotry, and fantastic ...more

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Nov 27, 2009 Jimmy rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russia, male, short-stories, and-a-half-stars, year-1850s

There's not a bad story in this batch! But I especially loved "Nevsky Prospect" and "The Story of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich". These are long stories, but they are cozy and full-of-life stories that I want to read out loud by a campfire. Nobody alternates between the absurdly comical and the frightfully chilling like Gogol. The first half (Ukrainian Tales) tells more stories that are mystical in nature, sounding sometimes like folktales, dealing with witches and devils. ...more

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Jul 26, 2008 will added it

Gogol's tales in this book are split into two distinct sections. The first is concerned mostly with life in Ukraine in the early 19th century and is filled with superstitious people and the demons and devils they interact with regularly. The stories are tremendously funny but also strange and dark, mysterious in the best, most inexplicable way. I was reminded at times of the short work of Hawthorne, in which dark creatures often seem to be lurking in the woods, but Gogol feels more modern someho ...more

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Apr 14, 2011 Mike rated it it was ok

A digression-free, lean review, gentlemen! exclamation points a-plenty!

The first six Ukrainian tales are a tedious, dreadful slog. "The Story of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich" has a funny premise, and funny moments, but is too bloated. Then, we hope Gogol gets better when he gets to Petersburg, and he mostly does. "The Nose" is really good; "The Overcoat" is great; and "Diary of a Madman" is awesome. The others are as clunker-ish as the first half of the entire book (though ...more

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Jul 28, 2015 Andrew added it

Shelves: russian-fiction

A few old favorites, plus a number of Gogol stories I hadn't read before, including “The Portrait,” which seems to rank among his finest works. For those of you who haven't read Gogol, please do so as soon as possible-- the great unkempt beast of Russian literature emerges from the woods in these stories, and they're as full of as much violence, absurdity, superstition, and vodka-drenched misery as you could want.

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May 27, 2018 Noah rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: russia

Mit meist großem Vergnügen habe ich nunmehr den ganzen Gogol gelesen. Was gerade bei den weniger bekannten Erzählungen ins Auge sticht: 1. Es steckt unglaublich viel E.T.A. Hoffman - mit allen guten aber auch schlechten Seiten - in Gogol. 2. Gogol ist - insbesondere im Frühwerk - erstaunlich ukrainisch, was Handlung aber auch Hintergrund der Charaktere angeht. Gerade diese Facette ist reizvoll und eröffnet interessante Einblicke.

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May 30, 2011 Gary rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: russian

Split into two sets of stories - those that take place in Ukraine and those in Russia, this is a collection that takes pride of place on my bookshelf.

The theme of each story tends to deal with the darker aspects of human nature – depravity, poverty, the squandering of talent and opportunity, groupthink and malice. However, the narrative never dips into over-sincerity or narcissistic exposition. There is a sharp, honest, knowing quality to the writing that is evident from the surface level aesth Split into two sets of stories - those that take place in Ukraine and those in Russia, this is a collection that takes pride of place on my bookshelf.

The theme of each story tends to deal with the darker aspects of human nature – depravity, poverty, the squandering of talent and opportunity, groupthink and malice. However, the narrative never dips into over-sincerity or narcissistic exposition. There is a sharp, honest, knowing quality to the writing that is evident from the surface level aesthetics down to the very core of each story.

There are some writers who are good storytellers and some who are known because of their penmanship skills. Even translated, Gogol is clearly both. The 13 stories in this collection, while undeniably Gogol’s, play with a range of styles and rhythms. He describes states of being and situations from the disintegration of one’s mind to the excitement a young girl can feel for her booties; From the combat of a warrior to a human nose on legs with prose that is completely fitting to each situation. He is not scared of playing with a reader’s expectations in this arena. Yet somehow the writing is never inconsistent, either.

Pathos and menace are nearly always present, but somehow you feel comfortable in his hands. He plays and teases with you, drawing you in one direction before shoving you into another. Gogol paints his pictures with deep colours and complex textures, yet communicates all of this with a simple stroke, a glance in one direction that is fleeting but piercing, unapologetic, maybe dangerous in its unwavering loyalty to honesty. One scene (this does not spoil any of the stories), briefly shows a wizard flying past the moon in a magic saucepan. Written here this is sugar and twee. From the pen of Gogol it is delightful and energetic, entirely suited to the scene and, rather than squeezed in like a square peg into a pre-thought squarish hole, is in fact inevitable. It was reading this moment for the first time that I felt that rising excitement in my chest that tells me I’m reading genius. For me it’s a standout moment and one I return to again and again.

But as I said, it’s not just the writing (and of course this is translated! Gogol is famous for the sophistication of his literary techniques but I shall never read his poetry as he intended me to) but the content of the stories, too. In the grand Russian tradition they tackle the very worst of humanity in a way that is rescued from cynicism with a tinge of optimism for the future, but Gogol’s inimitable - slightly mad, and obviously completely at odds with the world around him - mind doesn’t just twist some old formulas around but instead smashes them into each other and creates something brand new and rude in their originality. In each story you can see the germination of ideas explored by Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Kafka… and these ideas are spat out and dispensed with almost immediately. Most writers could spend a career delving into each one. The rate at which Gogol sprays them across the page is staggering and beautiful. It’s ‘The Mysterious Portrait’, however, that stands out as the true achievement. Anybody - anybody - who has ever had even an inclination towards art in the smallest bone in their body (in the ear, right?) needs to read it. Gogol lacerates through every affectation and whimsy in order to get to the truth in brutal fashion, executed with such style, with such sureness and swiftness and with such power that I find it difficult to type about right now without running downstairs to reread it.

While dealing with lofty ideas and rich characters, the stories are also compelling and - importantly - fun. You want to see what happens. Not with dread or fear for the worst, but with excitement. It helps that even at his most morose, Gogol is funny. As with his writing style, he has it all - wit, sarcasm, slapstick and punch lines. He has his heroes and his villains, self-discovery, transcendence of thought and all-out action, the scenes of which put the imagination of Hollywood’s directors to shame. There is more packed into these 13 short stories than the entire careers of many giants of literature. If you read the stories in one sitting you’re left reeling, dizzy with ideas, unsure of which one to contemplate first.

And the best thing about this collection is that this isn’t even Gogol’s best stuff. That would be Dead Souls Part I and II, which I’ll write about at some point in the near future. ...more

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Feb 24, 2017 Graham Wilhauk rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-in-february-2017

I was wanting to get back into classics, so I picked up 2 books from the library. This collection and Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice." I DESPISED "Pride and Prejudice" and was worried about going into this collection thinking I was just not into classics anymore. However, people say "you can always rely on the Russians for a good book" for a reason. This is the best collection of stories I have read besides Ted Chiang's masterful "Stories of Your Life." This collection ranges from tragic to ...more

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May 26, 2015 Carol Storm rated it liked it

Worth reading for the classic St. Petersburg stories, "The Overcoat," "The Nose," and "Diary Of A Madman."

The Ukraine stories are not really as good. They have some beautiful nature descriptions but Gogol is much too sentimental about the daily realties of serfdom to capture the times he lived in. And the Cossack stories are absolutely putrid. The way Gogol tells it, those poor Cossacks just can't murder, rape, steal and drink in peace because they're always being hassled by armies of invading P ...more

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Nov 02, 2015 Juan Jiménez García rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Nikolái Gógol. La invención de la escritura rusa

Escribe Jesús Palacios en su apasionado prólogo a estos Cuentos completos, que Gógol es el más grande escritor ruso. Uno, que es chejoviano desde siempre, se permite dudar de esta afirmación (en el hipotético caso de que tuvieran importancia estas medallas a la grandeza nacional), pero lo cierto es que tras acabar con su lectura hay algo que no podemos pasar por alto. Gógol tal vez sea el más grande porque sin él todos los que vinieron hubieran sid ...more

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Jun 09, 2012 Inderjit Sanghera rated it it was amazing

Gogol’s wild and wonderful fantasies expose the phantasmagoria of his imagination-from the lowly civil servant who haunts to streets of St Petersburg in search of his overcoat, to the man who one days wakes up to find his nose has disappeared and is walking the streets disguised as a titular councillor, Gogol’s tales are by turns whimsical and melancholy, exposing the irrationality and absurdities of life.
Some people, shockingly, call Gogol a “realist”-whilst he may have intermittently dabbled i Gogol’s wild and wonderful fantasies expose the phantasmagoria of his imagination-from the lowly civil servant who haunts to streets of St Petersburg in search of his overcoat, to the man who one days wakes up to find his nose has disappeared and is walking the streets disguised as a titular councillor, Gogol’s tales are by turns whimsical and melancholy, exposing the irrationality and absurdities of life.
Some people, shockingly, call Gogol a “realist”-whilst he may have intermittently dabbled in what he deemed “realistic” fiction, none of his characters are remotely real, instead they exist as vague shadows who exist upon the fringes of Gogol’s outlandish mind, so although Nevsky Prospect is essentially a tediously told story about a morosely idiotic and inattentive artist falling in love with a papier-mâché girl, it is saved from the brink and banality by Gogol’s wonderful and unique long, rambling metaphors, like a thief is able to steal a pumpkin from a field at night, when the moon is as round as the button on a soldier’s uniform. (A very Gogolian metaphor!)

“Both the muddy, clumsy boot of the discharged soldier, under whose very weight the granite appears to crack, and the miniature shoes, as light as a puff of smoke, of the young lady who, like a sunflower to the sun, turns her head towards the glittering shop windows, the rattling sable of the ambitious ensign that leaves a sharp scratch-everyone displays his own strength or weakness…”

Gogol as a realist is tedious, but as a fantasist when he gives free reign to his imagination like a master who frees his horse to gallop in the sallow, sodden fields (another Gogolian metaphor) he is unmatchable; never read grotesque Gogol to learn about people, but read Gogol to be enchanted and entranced, ‘Gogolized’ as Nabokov put it; his works are like the cool remnants of wax from the burned out candle of his mind; strange and surreal, they will drip constantly through the readers mind even long after they read them.
None of Gogol’s stories are as profound as ‘The Overcoat’ the story of Akaky, a pathetic and snivelling civil servant, who dreams of one day owning an overcoat, only to have it stolen from him. Gogol is able to capture the lowliest and most vulnerable members of society, not due to promote any social or political message, but to demonstrate the dignity of every human being, even those as pathetic as Akaky and their constant struggle to find happiness in a world which only offers them pain. Gogol is able to capture these awkward and weird characters, because he was essentially one of them himself, an outside from birth onwards, Gogol was sensitive to the plight of the outsider in society and was able to give them a voice without sounding tendentious or sentimental. Gogol is also able to capture the absurdity of human behaviour, in this case that of civil servants and our often illogical social conventions-such as the bellicose yet ultimately pathetic director, whose dressing down of Akaky inadvertently leads to his death and yet Akaky is able to avenge his mistreatment by the director by haunting him and stealing his overcoat after he dies; showing the director up to be the weak and weasely man that he is.

The Nose is off-set with more humour than ‘The Overcoat’, as the protagonist, Major Kovalyov, wakes up to one day to find his nose has disappeared (we learn that the disappearance may have something to do with the nose tweaking habits of his barber, Ivan) and to run into him in the streets, only to greeted in haughty and supercilious manner and to find out later that his nose has attempted to flee the city under the guise of a state councillor, only to be stopped by some eagle eyed official. Although the absurdity of the tale was not lost on Gogol, it was no absurd in his mind, than the asinine social conventions which his plastic characters go through on a daily basis-for Gogol if a man can spend so much time worrying about the cut of his waistcoat, then it is really so absurd that a man can one day wake up to find his nose has disappeared; finishing Gogol is like waking from a long, deep and absurd dream (or nightmare).
...more

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Feb 03, 2008 Sabrina added it

I was in an airport in Nottingham, England with Ben filling out those "welcome to the country, now who are you?!" cards.

We get up to th police clerk and I give him my card and move off to the side. Ben hands over his card. Trouble. Police clerk (sherrif of nottingham perhaps??) says "do you think you are funny?" and proceeds to berate Ben with such ditties as "Do you want to make y our girlfriend cry, I'll send you back to France!). Turns out that Ben put "rockstar" with the a as a star symbol f ...more

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Jan 30, 2016 Kelly rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 20, 2012 Jean-marcel rated it it was amazing

This anthology is so achingly good that I read it slowly over a period of abouta year, and when I was through I was extremely sad that there weren't any more tales for me to come to afresh. But I can still re-read these many a time and always gain once again that feeling of a glorious, unfettered sort of artistic madness that teeters on so many precipices but never falls nor falters. Here we have wild humour, sincere and touching expressions of humanity, carousing, feasting, absurdity, and threa This anthology is so achingly good that I read it slowly over a period of abouta year, and when I was through I was extremely sad that there weren't any more tales for me to come to afresh. But I can still re-read these many a time and always gain once again that feeling of a glorious, unfettered sort of artistic madness that teeters on so many precipices but never falls nor falters. Here we have wild humour, sincere and touching expressions of humanity, carousing, feasting, absurdity, and threatening darkness touched with a hint of irreverent levity even at the worst of times.

I love the Ukrainian tales, with their lyrical style and descriptions of tiny hamlets and provincial revelry. But, these are not cozy tales; in fact, there is a real grimness leaning over your shoulder in many of these. "Viy" utterly surprised and thrilled me with its depiction of the macabre and the horrific, especially as I didn't imagine at the time any writers in Gogol's time addressing the supernatural with such plain, open language and without a hint of repentence or avoidance of the "bloody details". "Viy" even became the basis for Mario Bava's classic film Black Sunday, one of the ultimate gothic revenge movies, but believe it or not, the Gogol story is even darker. It's also kind of funny, though, especially with all of Gogol's descriptions of the young priest and his fruitless efforts to get away from the village so he wouldn't have to perform an exorcism. Then there's "A Terrible Vengeance", which is probably the dreariest, grimmest thing in this anthology and makes you feel bitter toward everything. But, Gogol seems to be saying, "you need this! You simply must be reminded!"

I notice a certain sad wistfulness in the Petersburg tales. I get the feeling that Gogol, while kind of set afire by the cosmopolitan glories of Petersburg, missed his homeland terribly. Of course I could be misapprehending here, but the character of the stories in the second half of the anthology is different....the pain more introspective, the appeals to human nature touched by genuine sad experience. I was particularly moved by "Nevsky Prospekt", which is a story so modern in its apprehensions and depictions of urban life that its quite startling and eye-opening. I wonder if Dickens ever read Gogol?

The style of Gogol, whether told (and these stories really do all feel as though they were told, and not written) in Petersburg or Kiev and the surrounding villages, is steady and assured throughout the book. And lest you think that in Petersburg Gogol gave up his provincialism and love of the fantastic and strange, think again....all this stuff is very much still alive in the big city. There's nothing that Gogol can see that can't, at some point, be touched by the supernatural and eerie. This is in fact one of the things that I love most about him. He tells his stories as though they were folk knowledge, but the introduction in this book stresses that in fact they weren't and that he really made most of this stuff up himself. I've a feeling he would have been a strange, compelling man to meet. The translation by Pevear and Belakhovsky is excellent, and although I don't know Russian, I always look for their translations of Russian classics because they feel very genuine somehow, very natural and alive with their attempt to communicate the lyrical power of the writers whose work they bring to the english-speaking world. ...more

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Sep 13, 2010 Jeff Scott rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, short-stories, russian-literature, favorites

This version of Gogol's Collected Tales includes his Ukranian and Petersburg Tales of which, now Tales can be complete without The Nose and The Overcoat (the story that Dostoyevsky's credits as the beginning of modern Russian Literature, "we all came from Gogol's Cloak"). If you have never read any Gogol, you need to read those two stories, it explains all his other stories. There is something about them a mystical quality along with folktales that all dovetails into criticism of human nature an This version of Gogol's Collected Tales includes his Ukranian and Petersburg Tales of which, now Tales can be complete without The Nose and The Overcoat (the story that Dostoyevsky's credits as the beginning of modern Russian Literature, "we all came from Gogol's Cloak"). If you have never read any Gogol, you need to read those two stories, it explains all his other stories. There is something about them a mystical quality along with folktales that all dovetails into criticism of human nature and politics. There are morality tales that damn Russian Beauracracy.

I first became fascinated with Gogol in College. He wasn't assigned reading for a literature class, but brought up during a 19th Century European History Class. The one thing I loved about that class was the literature references and how they defined and impacted the time. He focused on Gogol's Dead Souls which is a wonderful book that details the Russian character as Huckleberry Finn defines the American character. However, Dead Souls doesn't even touch his short stories. They are simply amazing and I read them, incredulous that someone could have that vivid of an imagination. I loved all these stories!

Gogol has the Devil pluck the moon from the sky, wrestle with his characters, and is tricked himself in one story. In others, fantastic images and hilarious incidents punctuate Russian life and exposes our own human nature. Our need to be recognized, to be important, to pull ourselves up by pushing others down, all combined in these wonderful and imaginative tales. I've always been a fan of Nathaniel Hawthorne, but Gogol's stories certain surpass him. What Hawthorne implies, Gogol implements, these are simply amazing stories.

Some Passges:

"My God! My God! Why this misfortune? If I lacked an arm or a leg, it would still be better; if I lacked ears, it would be bad, but still more bearable; but lacking a nose, a man is devil knows what: not a bird, not a citizen--just take him and chuck him out the window!" p. 308 of the story The Nose

"But nothing in this world lasts long, and therefore joy, in the minute that follows the first, is less lively; in the third minute it becomes still weaker, and finally, it merges imperceptibly with one's usual state of mind, as a ring i the water, born of a stone's fall, finally merges with the smooth surface." p. 311 of The Nose

I imagined the story The Overcoat was part lesson, part ghost story that reminded me of the La Llorona. It's a class Russian tale that exposes how we treat our fellow man, corrupt and insensitive bureaucracy, and revenge.

"Let me be. Why do you offend me?" -- and in these penetrating words rang other words: "I am your brother." and the poor young man would bury his face in his hands, and many a time in his life he shuddered to see how much inhumanity there is in man, how much savage coarseness is concealed in refined, cultivated manners, and God! even in man the world regards as noble and honorable..." p. 386 from story The Overcoat

"Thus everything in holy Russia is infected with imitation, and each one mimics and apes his superior...His usual conversation with subordinates rang with strictness and consisted almost entirely of three phrases: "How dare you? Do you know with whom you are speaking? Do you realize who is standing before you?" p. 405 from story The Overcoat.

...more

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Feb 12, 2009 Frankie rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: russian

Like the PV translation of Dead Souls, this collection highlights Gogol's wordplay and "nameology" as only Pevear and Volokhonsky can. I've read The Overcoat before, mainly due to Dostoevsky's influence. He once said that "We all come out of Gogol's Overcoat."

This collection shows Gogol's dual writing careers in his homeland Ukraine, and later in Petersburg. The duality is best defined by his subject matter. Much of the Ukrainian tales deal with folk superstitions, pastoral scenery and Cossack f ...more

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Aug 14, 2011 Tony rated it really liked it

Shelves: fiction-short-stories

Gogol, Nikolai. (1809-1852). COLLECTED STORIES. (this ed. 2009). ****.
Gogol was a relatively prolific writer in a variety of literary forms. My contact with his works thus far has been limited to “Taras Bulba,” and “Dead Souls.” It turns out, however, that I had read two of the stories in this collection, published by The Folio Society in a translation by Constance Garnett and illustrations by Peter Suart. There is also an an introduction by Philip Hensher which mostly provides ramblings as opp ...more

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Aug 26, 2007 Vanessa rated it really liked it

Recommends it for: People with an interest in short fiction

I was spurred to read this book because I had heard so much about how Gogol was a master of the short story. The book is in chronological order and is divided into two sections - Ukrainian Tales (his earlier works) and Petersberg Tales ( later works). I read the book in chronological order and almost abandoned it because I was having such a hard time choking down the Ukrainian stories, finding them rough, superstitous and tedious. But I'm glad that I soldiered on, because my persistence was rich ...more

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Nov 27, 2010 Dachaublues rated it it was amazing

Gogol is simply a master of social literature; I don't think I've ever had a better time reading short stories that the time I spent reading this. His stories may sometimes be simply folk tales, but they are told with such skill that the world of 19th century Ukraine almost feels real.
The stories may have been light and airy diversions in the hands of another author but Gogol makes them so convincing that I'd not hesitate to believe him if he told me that the fantasy and absurdity that all his ...more

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Aug 14, 2007 Barrett rated it liked it

i read a mess of these in college for one of my (many) Russian lit courses... but not all of them. after running into a Russian speaker on the metro the other day, methinks it's time to revisit the college obsessions.

edit: finally finished! this collection of Gogol's works is divided up into two bits: his earlier Ukrainian and later Petersburg tales. the former read more like old folk tales, stories spun tightly around superstition and lore, faith in God and fear of (the) devil-trickster. Gogol ...more

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Aug 10, 2011 Joseph Pinchback rated it really liked it

Gogol is a fun writer. Let's face it, most Russian novels and stories do not tend to make one crap one's pants with laughter, to use a common phrase. But Gogol writes with a certain lightness that makes his stories go down easy. I'd swear that some of the stories are satirical, but I don't know enough about Russia in the 1830s to be sure. The best known stories in this collection are The Overcoat, a heartbreaking story about a copyist who saves up to buy a new coat, and The Nose, a wonderfully i ...more

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Jul 02, 2007 Simon A. rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, classics, experimental, assigned-in-college, short-fiction

"The Overcoat" is one of the greatest short stories ever written and is included in tons of "Best Short Story" collections. The amazing thing is that these pieces were written in the early 19th century. Some scholars consider Gogol to be the "father of the modern short story," especially around Russia. When you also understand that they were written in Russia during this time, you realize how brave and marvelous this man really was. "The Nose" is one of the most brilliant things I have ever read ...more

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Nov 18, 2008 Brandie rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: anyone who wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all

Recommended to Brandie by: my mom

What is it about this insane Russian fiction that I love so much? I don't know. But all of a sudden I have the urge to eat stale bread, bad cheese and red wine.
And laugh like a fool.
My favorite, is "The Story of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarreled with Ivan Nikiforovich."
It's got chapter titles such as "From Which Can be Learned What Ivan Ivanovich took a liking to, what the Conversation Between Ivan Ivanovich and Ivan Nikforovich was About and How it Ended," and as is to be expected, lots of prostitut ...more

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Jul 30, 2011 Meri added it

Stunning collection. This man set the bar so very high for all Russian writers, and, centuries later, influenced some of the best American short story writers as well. "The Government Inspector" and "The Overcoat" are stand-outs, but there's not one bland story here. Gogol engages you, and his stories sustain over time--what else could you ask for? Oh, and he illustrates the joys and pains of everyday life. Amazing.

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About Nikolai Gogol

Nikolai Gogol

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Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol (Николай Васильевич Гоголь) was born in the Ukrainian Cossack village of Sorochyntsi, in Poltava Governorate of the Russian Empire, present-day Ukraine. His mother was a descendant of Polish nobility. His father Vasily Gogol-Yanovsky, a descendant of Ukrainian Cossacks, belonged to the petty gentry, wrote poetry in Russian and Ukrainian, and was an amateur Ukrainian-langu Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol (Николай Васильевич Гоголь) was born in the Ukrainian Cossack village of Sorochyntsi, in Poltava Governorate of the Russian Empire, present-day Ukraine. His mother was a descendant of Polish nobility. His father Vasily Gogol-Yanovsky, a descendant of Ukrainian Cossacks, belonged to the petty gentry, wrote poetry in Russian and Ukrainian, and was an amateur Ukrainian-language playwright who died when Gogol was 15 years old.

In 1820 Gogol went to a school of higher art in Nizhyn and remained there until 1828. It was there that he began writing. Very early he developed a dark and secretive disposition, marked by a painful self-consciousness and boundless ambition. Equally early he developed an extraordinary talent for mimicry which later on made him a matchless reader of his own works.

In 1828, on leaving school, Gogol came to Petersburg. He had hoped for literary fame and brought with him a Romantic poem of German idyllic life – Ganz Küchelgarten. He had it published, at his own expense, under the name of "V. Alov." The magazines he sent it to almost universally derided it. He bought all the copies and destroyed them, swearing never to write poetry again.

Gogol was one of the first masters of the short story, alongside Alexander Pushkin, Prosper Mérimée, E. T. A. Hoffmann, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. He was in touch with the "literary aristocracy", and was taken up by Vasily Zhukovsky and Pyotr Pletnyov, and (in 1831) was introduced to Pushkin.

In 1831, he brought out the first volume of his Ukrainian stories (Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka), which met with immediate success. He followed it in 1832 with a second volume, and in 1835 by two volumes of stories entitled Mirgorod, as well as by two volumes of miscellaneous prose entitled Arabesques. At this time, Gogol developed a passion for Ukrainian history and tried to obtain an appointment to the history department at Kiev University. His fictional story Taras Bulba, based on the history of Ukrainian cossacks, was the result of this phase in his interests.

Between 1832 and 1836 Gogol worked with great energy, though almost all his work has in one way or another its sources in his four years of contact with Pushkin. Only after the presentation, on 19 April 1836, of his comedy The Government Inspector (Revizor) that he finally came to believe in his literary vocation.

From 1836 to 1848 he lived abroad, travelling throughout Germany and Switzerland, as well as spending the winter of 1836–1837 in Paris.

Pushkin's death produced a strong impression on Gogol. His principal work during years following Pushkin's death was the satirical epic Dead Souls. Concurrently, he worked at other tasks – recast Taras Bulba and The Portrait, completed his second comedy, Marriage (Zhenitba), wrote the fragment Rome and his most famous short story, The Overcoat.

After the triumph of Dead Souls, Gogol came to be regarded as a great satirist who lampooned the unseemly sides of Imperial Russia. However, Dead Souls was but the first part of a counterpart to The Divine Comedy. The first part represented the Inferno; the second part was to depict the gradual purification and transformation of the rogue Chichikov under the influence of virtuous publicans and governors – Purgatory.

His last years were spent in restless movement throughout the country. He intensified his relationship with a church elder, Matvey Konstantinovsky. He seems to have strengthened in Gogol the fear of perdition by insisting on the sinfulness of all his imaginative work. His health was undermined by exaggerated ascetic practices and he fell into a state of deep depression. On the night of 24 February 1852, he burned some of his manuscripts, which contained most of the second part of Dead Souls. He explained this as a mistake, a practical joke played on him by the Devil. Soon thereafter, he took to bed, refused all food, and died in great pain nine days later. ...more

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Village Evenings Near Dikanka and Mirgorod

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Quotes from The Collected Tales

“He who has talent in him must be purer in soul than anyone else. Another will be forgiven much, but to him it will not be forgiven. A man who leaves the house in bright, festive clothes needs only one drop of mud splashed from under a wheel, and people all surround him, point their fingers at him, and talk about his slovenliness, while the same people ignore many spots on other passers-by who are wearing everyday clothes. For on everyday clothes the spots do not show.” — 39 likes

“Man is such a wondrous being that it is never possible to count up all his merits at once. The more you study him, the more new particulars appear, and their description would be endless.” — 27 likes

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