Dead Souls

by Nikolai Gogol

In short, all that he looked upon was sturdy, shakeless, in some strong and clumsy order.

Chichikov glanced around the room once more: everything that was in it, everything, was solid, clumsy in the highest degree, and bore some strange resemblance to the master of the house himself;

And that according to the existing regulations of this state, unequaled in glory, the souls listed in the census, once their life’s path has ended, are nevertheless counted equally with the living until the new census is taken, so as not to burden the institutions with a quantity of petty and useless documents and increase the complexity of the already quite complex state machinery

“So you think you’ll find someone fool enough to take a few kopecks for a registered soul?”

“I beg your pardon, but why do you call them registered, when the souls themselves have been dead for a long time, and all that’s left is a sensually imperceptible sound.

“No, more than two roubles I cannot give,” said Chichikov. “If you please, so that you won’t claim I’m asking too much and don’t want to do you a favor, if you please—seventy-five roubles per soul, only in banknotes, really, only for the sake of our acquaintance!”

“Well, you’re buying it, that means you need it.”

“If you please, I’ll add fifty kopecks.” “Well, if you please, I’ll also give you my final word: fifty roubles! It’s my loss, really, you won’t get such fine folk so cheaply anywhere else!”

“What indeed is this … as if it were all quite a serious matter; I can get them for nothing elsewhere. Anyone would be eager to unload them on me, just to get rid of them the sooner. Only a fool would keep them and pay taxes on them!”

“So what’s your final price?” Sobakevich said at last. “Two-fifty.” “Really, for you a human soul is the same as a stewed turnip. Give me three roubles at least!” “I can’t.”

“Oh, sure thing!” Chichikov thought to himself, getting into his britzka. “Hustled me out of two-fifty for a dead soul, the devil’s pinchfist!”

A knowledge of hearts and a wise comprehension of life resound in the word of the Briton; like a nimble fop the short-lived word of the Frenchman flashes and scatters; whimsically does the German contrive his lean, intelligent word, not accessible to all; but there is no word so sweeping, so pert, so bursting from beneath the very heart, so ebullient and vibrant with life, as an aptly spoken Russian word.

Now it is with indifference that I approach any unknown estate, and with indifference that I gaze at its trite appearance; my chilled glance finds no refuge, I do not laugh, and that which in earlier days would have awakened a lively movement in my face, laughter and unceasing talk, now flits by, and my motionless lips preserve an impassive silence. Oh, my youth! Oh, my freshness!

when, poking their sharp little snouts from their dark holes, pricking up their ears and twitching their whiskers, they spy out whether there is a cat or

And yet once upon a time he had been simply a thrifty manager! was married and had a family, and a neighbor would come to dine with him, to listen and learn from him the ways of management and wise parsimony.

But the good mistress died; part of the keys, and of the petty cares along with them, passed to him. Plyushkin grew more restless and, like all widowers, more suspicious and stingy.

Solitary life gave ample nourishment to his avarice, which, as is known, has a wolf’s appetite and grows more insatiable the more it devours; human feelings, never very deep in him anyway, became shallower every moment, and each day something more was lost in this worn-out ruin.

he sent him a paternal curse from the bottom of his heart, and was never again interested in knowing whether his son existed in the world or not.

Hence, as a precaution and at the same time wishing to test him a little, he said it would not be a bad idea to sign the deed as soon as possible, because there’s no trusting in man: today he’s alive, but tomorrow God knows.

To such worthlessness, pettiness, vileness a man can descend! So changed he can become! Does this resemble the truth? Everything resembles the truth, everything can happen to a man.

So take with you on your way, as you pass from youth’s tender years into stern, hardening manhood, take with you every humane impulse, do not leave them by the wayside, you will not pick them up later! Terrible, dreadful old age looms ahead, and nothing does it give back again! The grave is more merciful, on the grave it will be written: “Here lies a man!”—but nothing can be read in the cold, unfeeling features of inhuman old

age.

A registered soul is worth about five hundred roubles.”

But our hero, even without the watch, was in the merriest spirits. Such an unexpected acquisition was a real gift. Indeed, whatever you say, not just dead souls alone, but runaways as well, and over two hundred persons in all!

Having asked for a very light supper, consisting only of suckling pig, he straightaway got undressed and, slipping under the blanket, fell asleep soundly, deeply, fell asleep in the wondrous way that they alone sleep who are so fortunate as to know nothing of hemorrhoids, or fleas, or overly powerful mental abilities.

Happy the writer who, passing by characters that are boring, disgusting, shocking in their mournful reality, approaches characters that manifest the lofty dignity of man, who from the great pool of daily whirling images has chosen only the rare exceptions, who has never once betrayed the exalted tuning of his lyre, nor descended from his height to his poor, insignificant brethren, and, without touching the ground, has given the whole of himself to his elevated images so far removed from it.

With entrancing smoke he has clouded people’s eyes; he has flattered them wondrously, concealing what is mournful in life, showing them a beautiful man.

But such is not the lot, and other is the destiny of the writer who has dared to call forth all that is before our eyes every moment and

which our indifferent eyes do not see—all the terrible, stupendous mire of trivia in which our life is entangled, the whole depth of cold, fragmented, everyday characters that swarm over our often bitter and boring earthly path, and with the firm strength of his implacable chisel

dares to present them roundly and vividly before the e...

for contemporary judgment does not recognize that much depth of soul is needed to light up the picture drawn from contemptible life and elevate it into a pearl of creation;

Chichikov woke up, stretched his arms and legs, and felt he had had a good sleep. After lying on his back for a minute or two, he snapped his fingers and remembered with a beaming face that he now owned nearly four hundred souls.

Elizaveta Sparrow. Pah, drat it all—a female! How did she get in there? That scoundrel Sobakevich has hoodwinked me here, too!” Chichikov was right: it was, in fact, a female. How she got there no one knows, but she was so artfully written that from a distance she could be taken for a muzhik, and her name even had a masculine ending, that is, not Elizaveta, but Elizavet. However, he did not pay her any respect, and straightaway crossed her out.

Eh, Russian folk! they don’t like dying a natural death!

but he felt in himself a desire to bring the business to a close as soon as possible; until then everything seemed uneasy and uncomfortable to him; it kept occurring to him that, after all, the souls were not quite real, and that in such cases one must hasten to get the burden off one’s shoulders.

With mutual services they finally reached the square where the offices were located: a big three-story stone house, all white as chalk, probably to represent the purity of soul of the functions located within;

However it may be, a man’s goal is never defined until he finally sets a firm foot on solid ground, and not on some freethinking chimera of youth.” Here he quite appropriately denounced all young people, and rightly so, for liberalism.

The familiar Ivan Antonovich managed quite deftly: the deeds were recorded, marked, entered in the register and wherever else necessary, with a charge of half a percent plus the notice in the Gazette, and so Chichikov had to pay the smallest sum. The magistrate even ordered that he be charged only half the tax money, while the other half, in some unknown fashion, was transferred to the account of some other petitioner.

The merchants were the first to love him, precisely because he was not haughty; in fact, he stood godfather to their children, was chummy with them, and though he occasionally fleeced them badly, he did it somehow extremely deftly: he would pat the man on the shoulder, and laugh, and stand him to tea, and promise to come for a game of checkers, asking about everything: how’s he doing, this and that.

In short, he managed to win universal popularity, and the merchants’ opinion of Alexei Ivanovich was that “though he does take, on the other hand he never gives you up.”

Chichikov had never felt himself in so merry a mood, already imagined himself a real Kherson landowner, talked of various improvements—the three-field system, the happiness and bliss of twin souls—and began reciting to Sobakevich Werther’s

letter in verse to Charlotte,

Many entered earnestly into Chichikov’s predicament, and the difficulty of relocating such an enormous number of peasants awed them exceedingly; there was great fear that a riot might even break out among such restless folk as Chichikov’s peasants.

Chichikov thanked them for the advice, saying that in the event he would not fail to make use of it, but he decidedly rejected the convoy, saying it was totally unnecessary, that the peasants he had bought were of superbly placid character, felt benevolently disposed towards resettlement themselves, and that a riot among them was in any event impossible. All this gossip and discussion produced, however, as favorable a result as Chichikov could possibly have looked for. Namely, the rumor spread that he was no more nor less than a millionaire.

But generally they were kindly folk, full of hospitality, and the man who sat down to table with them or spent an evening at whist was already an intimate, all the more so Chichikov, with his enchanting qualities and ways, who did indeed know the great secret of being liked.

But incomparably more remarkable was the impression (altogether an object of amazement!) that Chichikov made on the

ladies.

The ladies of the town of N. were what is called presentable, and in this respect they may boldly be held up as an example to all others. As for knowing how to behave themselves, keeping tone, observing etiquette, a host of proprieties of the subtlest sort, and above all following fashion down to the least detail, in this they surpassed even the ladies of Petersburg and Moscow.

only one thing could not be done: to reconcile two ladies who had quarreled over a neglected visit.

Duels, of course, did not take place between them, because they were all civil servants, but instead they tried to do each other dirt wherever possible, which, as everyone knows, can sometimes be worse than any duel.