Collected here are Gogol's finest tales - from the demon-haunted 'St John's Eve' to the strange surrealism of 'The Nose', from the heart-rending trials of the copyist in 'The Overcoat' to those of the delusional clerk in 'The Diary of a Madman' - allowing readers to experience anew the unmistakable genius of a writer who paved the way for Dostoevsky and Kafka. To this superb new translation - the first in twenty-five years and destined to become the definitive edition of Gogol's short fiction - Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky bring the same clarity and fidelity to the original that they brought to their brilliant translation of Dostoevsky's works and to War and Peace.

A stranger arrives in a Russian backwater community with a bizarre proposition for the local landowners: cash for their "dead souls," the serfs who have died in their service and for whom they must continue to pay taxes until the next census. The landowner receives a payment and a relief of his tax burden, and the stranger receives--"what? Gogol's comic masterpiece offers a vast and satirical painting of the Russian panorama as it traces the path and encounters of its mysterious protagonist in pursuit of his dubious scheme. "Dead Souls, regarded as both a realistic portrait of nineteenth-century Russia and a work of great symbolism, continues to inspire twenty-first century authors and readers.

One of the most influential short stories ever written, Nikolai Gogol's ''The Overcoat'' first appeared in 1842 as part of a four-volume publication of its author's Collected Works. The story is considered not only an early masterpiece of Russian Naturalism-a movement that would dominate the country's literature for generations-but a progenitor of the modern short story form itself. "We all came out from under Gogol's 'Overcoat'" is a remark that has been variously attributed to Dostoevsky and Turgenev. That either or both might have said it is an indication of the far-reaching significance of Gogol's work.

Gogol's writings have been seen as a bridge between the genres of romanticism and realism in Russian literature. Progressive critics of his day praised Gogol for grounding his prose fictions in the everyday lives of ordinary people, and they claimed him as a pioneer of a new "naturalist" aesthetic. Yet, Gogol viewed his work in a more conservative light, and his writing seems to incorporate as much fantasy and folklore as realistic detail. "The Overcoat," which was written sporadically over several years during a self-imposed exile in Geneva and Rome, is a particularly dazzling amalgam of these seemingly disparate tendencies in Gogol's writing. The story begins by taking its readers through the mundane and alienating world of a bureaucratic office in St. Petersburg where an awkward, impoverished clerk must scrimp and save in order to afford a badly needed new winter coat. As the story progresses, we enter a fairy-tale world of supernatural revenge, where the clerk's corpse is seen wandering city streets ripping coats off the backs of passersby. Gogol's story is both comic and horrific-at once a scathing social satire, moralistic fable, and psychological study.

List of Contents:

Introduction to Nikolai Gogol
Book 1: The Overcoat
Book 2: Taras Bulba
Book 3: St. John's Eve
Book 4: The Nose
Book 5: The Mysterious Portrait
Book 6: The Calash

Nikolai Gogol was an artist who, like Rabelais, Cervantes, Swift, and Sterne, "knew how to walk upside down in our valley of sorrows so as to make it to a merry place." This two-volume edition at last brings all of Gogol's fiction (except his novel" Dead Souls") together in paperback. Volume 1 includes Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka, the early Ukrainian folktales that first brought Gogol fame, as well as "Nevsky Prospekt" and "Diary of a Madman."
"It is good to have a complete collection of Gogol's tales in paperback. . . . Professor Kent has thoroughly revised Mrs. Garnett's conscientious and skillful translation, eliminating the Victorianisms of her style, correcting mistakes and pruderies of diction, and making the whole translation sound much more contemporary and alive. But he has avoided the whimsicality and 'curliness' in which some recent translators indulged, and he has not changed or suppressed anything material. He has also supplied helpful notes which are often the first annotation in English, and he has written an introduction which steers the correct middle course between making Gogol an irresponsible artist of the grotesque and proving him a documentary historian of backward Russia."--Rene Wellek, Yale University

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION TARAS BULBA CHAPTER I CHAPTER II CHAPTER III CHAPTER IV CHAPTER V CHAPTER VI CHAPTER VII CHAPTER VIII CHAPTER IX CHAPTER X CHAPTER XI CHAPTER XII ST. JOHN'S EVE THE CLOAK HOW THE TWO IVANS QUARRELLED CHAPTER I CHAPTER II CHAPTER III CHAPTER IV CHAPTER V CHAPTER VI CHAPTER VII THE MYSTERIOUS PORTRAIT PART I PART II THE CALASH

CONTENTS PREFACE THE MANTLE THE NOSE MEMOIRS OF A MADMAN A MAY NIGHT THE VIY

This version of A Government Inspector is a Yorkshire take on Gogol's 1836 fantastical Russian satire. The setting is here transposed to a small northern town in the twenty-first century. Deborah McAndrew's version of A Government Inspector goes beyond literal translation, but is absolutely faithful to Gogol's stated intention to peel away the surface layers of ordinary people and expose the corruption beneath. It's exuberant, brilliantly witty and original, and audiences will revel in the references to government officials' expenses claims and women's beach volley ball...Northern Broadsides, one of the country's finest and best-loved touring theatre companies, breathes life and vigour into this nearly 200-year-old story.Absurdly funny, clever and strangely familiar, this feels to be the next One Man Two Guvnors. The production premieres at Harrogate Theatre from 7 - 22 September before embarking on an English national tour until December 1st.

Contents INTRODUCTION CHARACTERS OF THE PLAY DIRECTIONS FOR ACTORS THE INSPECTOR-GENERAL ACT I ACT II ACT III ACT IV ACT V LAST SCENE SILENT SCENE

According to John Cournos, "Taras Bulba" is the finest epic in Russian literature and helped Gogol to influence Russian literature for generations. Ernest Hemingway called Taras Bulba "One of the 10 greatest books of all time." Gogol has written in "Taras Bulba" his own reproach to the nineteenth century. It is sad and joyous like one of those Ukrainian songs which have helped to inspire him to write it. The story is rich in adventure, battle scenes and touches of Gogol's humor. The other 5 stories included in this book are: - St. John's Eve - The Cloak - How the Two Ivans Quarreled - The Mysterious Portrait - The Calash

Gogol was a Ukrainian writer from the early 19th century. Taras Bulba is the story of the life of the Ukrainian Cossacks who lived during the 16th century. Taras Bulba is an old warrior who takes his sons on a training mission. He becomes their leader and lays siege on the Catholic Poles. When they are about to attack a walled city his son discovers that the woman he loves is in the city. Other stories included in this collection are St John's Eve, The Cloak, How the Two Ivans Quarrelled, The Mysterious Portrait, and The Calash.

1923. Odets writes in his introduction that the brutal censorship imposed upon the great Russian Empire of Gogol's time by its feudal lords and masters is comparable in our time to only that imposed upon the peoples of certain Fascist states. Enlightenment was not then a word to utter lightly on a muddy street corner. But Gogol set out to enlighten the Russian people, and his method was curiously simple. Of his central character Tchitchikov, in Dead Souls he states, Him I have taken as a type to show forth the vices and failings, rather than the merits and virtues, of the commonplace Russian individual; and the characters which revolve around him have also been selected for the purpose of demonstrating our national weaknesses and shortcomings.