Dead Souls

A deeply satiric and funny book by one of Russia's great authors. The premise is that a con man, Chichikov, is going around the contryside buying "dead souls" or dead serfs' names from small provicial landowners. The 'dead souls" are serfs who have died but have not yet been registered as dead thus taxes must still be paid on them the same as if they were still alive. A good deal of the novel is taken up describing the "wacky" negotiations that occur as Chichikov gathers his souls to him. His purpose is revealed about midway, that he intends to pass his "dead souls" off as living collateral and borrow a large amount of money. The book abounds with instances of how stupid, petty, and self-serving the landowners and government representatives behave. Apparently, this book inspired a fair amount of controversy at the time. Many people found the title offensive to religious teaching. Gogol had intended to write 3 parts to "Dead Souls" but only published the first part. A second part that he spent a number of years writing he destroyed just before he died supposedly on the advice of his spiritual adviser. The aim of the book is of course to expose the corruption at the heart of a slave society, but it's done in an almost lighthearted way so it doesn't bear down on the reader as heavily as other 19th century Russian writers. I was surprised at the mix of language in the book. Slang, cursing, and poetry all coexist together comfortably. There's some very beautiful language even as the author describes the most unbeautiful things. I definitely recommend this especially to someone who has not read very much Russian literature. Gogol has a different take on life!