- Hardcover: 488 pages
- Publisher: Everyman's Library (Sep 21 2004)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1400043190
- ISBN-13: 978-1400043194
- Product Dimensions: 13.1 x 3.1 x 21.1 cm
- Shipping Weight: 612 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
#12,534 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #11 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Classics > Russian
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
A socially adept newcomer fluidly inserts himself into an unnamed Russian town, conquering first the drinkers, then the dignitaries. All find him amiable, estimable, agreeable. But what exactly is Pavel Ivanovich Chichikov up to?--something that will soon throw the town "into utter perplexity."
After more than a week of entertainment and "passing the time, as they say, very pleasantly," he gets down to business--heading off to call on some landowners. More pleasantries ensue before Chichikov reveals his bizarre plan. He'd like to buy the souls of peasants who have died since the last census. The first landowner looks carefully to see if he's mad, but spots no outward signs. In fact, the scheme is innovative but by no means bonkers. Even though Chichikov will be taxed on the supposed serfs, he will be able to count them as his property and gain the reputation of a gentleman owner. His first victim is happy to give up his souls for free--less tax burden for him. The second, however, knows Chichikov must be up to something, and the third has his servants rough him up. Nonetheless, he prospers.
Dead Souls is a feverish anatomy of Russian society (the book was first published in 1842) and human wiles. Its author tosses off thousands of sublime epigrams--including, "However stupid a fool's words may be, they are sometimes enough to confound an intelligent man," and is equally adept at yearning satire: "Where is he," Gogol interrupts the action, "who, in the native tongue of our Russian soul, could speak to us this all-powerful word: forward? who, knowing all the forces and qualities, and all the depths of our nature, could, by one magic gesture, point the Russian man towards a lofty life?" Flannery O'Connor, another writer of dark genius, declared Gogol "necessary along with the light." Though he was hardly the first to envision property as theft, his blend of comic, fantastic moralism is sui generis.--Kerry Fried --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
Review
Praise for previous translations by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, winners of the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Prize
The Brothers Karamazov
“One finally gets the musical whole of Dostoevsky’s original.” –New York Times Book Review
“It may well be that Dostoevsky’s [world], with all its resourceful energies of life and language, is only now–and through the medium of [this] new translation–beginning to come home to the English-speaking reader.” –New York Review of Books
Crime and Punishment
“The best [translation] currently available…An especially faithful re-creation…with a coiled-spring kinetic energy… Don’t miss it.” –Washington Post Book World
“Reaches as close to Dostoevsky’s Russian as is possible in English…The original’s force and frightening immediacy is captured…The Pevear and Volokhonsky translation will become the standard version.” –Chicago Tribune
Demons
“The merit in this edition of Demons resides in the technical virtuosity of the translators…They capture the feverishly intense, personal explosions of activity and emotion that manifest themselves in Russian life.” –New York Times Book Review
“[Pevear and Volokhonsky] have managed to capture and differentiate the characters’ many voices…They come into their own when faced with Dostoevsky’s wonderfully quirky use of varied speech patterns…A capital job of restoration.” –Los Angeles Times
With an Introduction by Richard Pevear
The Brothers Karamazov
“One finally gets the musical whole of Dostoevsky’s original.” –New York Times Book Review
“It may well be that Dostoevsky’s [world], with all its resourceful energies of life and language, is only now–and through the medium of [this] new translation–beginning to come home to the English-speaking reader.” –New York Review of Books
Crime and Punishment
“The best [translation] currently available…An especially faithful re-creation…with a coiled-spring kinetic energy… Don’t miss it.” –Washington Post Book World
“Reaches as close to Dostoevsky’s Russian as is possible in English…The original’s force and frightening immediacy is captured…The Pevear and Volokhonsky translation will become the standard version.” –Chicago Tribune
Demons
“The merit in this edition of Demons resides in the technical virtuosity of the translators…They capture the feverishly intense, personal explosions of activity and emotion that manifest themselves in Russian life.” –New York Times Book Review
“[Pevear and Volokhonsky] have managed to capture and differentiate the characters’ many voices…They come into their own when faced with Dostoevsky’s wonderfully quirky use of varied speech patterns…A capital job of restoration.” –Los Angeles Times
With an Introduction by Richard Pevear
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Most helpful customer reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A distinctively Russian classic,
By James Rogers (Norfolk, NE USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Dead Souls (Hardcover)
One of the finest works of Russian literature, Gogol's DEAD SOUL epitomizes Russian soul at its purest, funniest, finest, richest, dreaririest, most charming and most hopeless state. Gogol utterly ridicules the Russian gentry in the middle of the 19th century in this story, centering on some dreadfully banal people who are trying to pull off a fraud. Exemplified by Chichikov who may be dividedly considered a scoundrel and a hero, Gogol portrayed to what length people can go to secure interests or benefits against over fellow humans considered to be of a lesser class. It is unfortunate that Gogol never finished this story. Overall, this amazingly entertaining classical novel deserves the highest of respects. In addition to UNION MOUJIK, TARAS BULBA, I also recommend classic Russian Stories like DEMONS, FATHERS AND SONS, and THE CHERRY ORCHARD. Once you get into Russian literature, you get to appreciate its supremacy.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Timeless and hilarious,
By Bill M (Subtropical USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Dead Souls: A Novel (Paperback)
Nobody captured black hearted greed better than N. Gogol in this book. The characters and the events resonate just as strongly in 21st century America. Remarkably fast read for a 19th century novel, and in light of the current corporate scandals, this is a good time to read this book. I read Dead Souls about 5 months ago and I still find myself going back to it in my mind and laughing. It would make a great movie.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Foundational Russian Novel,
By
This review is from: Dead Souls: A Novel (Paperback)
After failing as an actor and a poet, Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol (1809-52) turned to writing short stories. Only in 1834, however, after his dismal failure as professor of history at the Univ. of St. Petersburg, did he decide that his real career lay in fictional literature. He thereafter lived for a dozen years in Western Europe and visited Russia only occasionally.Meanwhile he worked at his masterpiece Dead Souls (Mėrtvye dushi, 1842). The novel met with acclaim, for the public readership saw it as an attack on the cruel institution of serfdom. Gogol hoped to carry the novel further --to take the second part a picture of all Russia, and to effect the country''s spiritual rebirth. Sadly, while working on this continuation, he began manifesting signs of religious obsession. In 1848, after a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, he felt confirmed in his belief that he was eternally damned! Convinced of the thorough sinfulness of his creative work, he destroyed the manuscripts for the second part of Dead Souls. This great novel is a minutely detailed narrative bearing a humorous, satirical account of a huge hoax. Ironically, one cannot be sure whether Gogol saw his literary creation as basically comic or tragic. The chief character, Tchitchikov, navigates about the country buying up serfs who have died since the last census, but who must be carried on the tax lists until the next census survey. Mystified owners are willing to part with the useless tax burdens for virtually nothing. Tchitchikov''s motive is to raise money by mortgaging his post- mortem holdings as living property! At first, Tchitchikov appears shrewdly consistent in purpose. Later, as his scheme seems to be succeeding, he vacillates between carrying out his original swindle and trying to secure a legitimate estate-and respectability, to boot. His arrest, trial, and subsequent release give the author an opportunity to satirize gov't officials & legal procedures. Dead Souls ends without a definite conclusion; it lies on the literary autopsy table as a torso. But the travels of Tchitchikov, and the assembled confusions in Tchitchikov's own personality and aims, show Gogol's skill in developing a real, complex character. The overall value of the novel is perceived in its humor, the rich characterizations, and the keen insight into Russian life. Indeed, to explicate concisely the title of this review, we should recognize Dead Souls as the first novel from which readers worldwide began to conceptualize their ideas of 19th-century Russia.
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