Dead Souls - Criticism

By nebulatower

The Pevear bit that hooked me is the “inverted realism” line—like the words basically build the whole world of Dead Souls, not just describe it. I’m not sure I fully buy it, though. Is he saying Gogol’s just having fun with language? What made me think of it was how Chichikov reacts to stuff—especially in chapter 5 when he’s pretty thrilled about that gross nickname, and then later on with his whole obsession with what happens “in the future.” For example, in chapter 11 the narrator basically acts like the poem/novel only exists because Chichikov had that thought first. And in chapter 5, when he gets away from Nozdryov, he’s thinking about not getting killed and how that would’ve wrecked his chances to leave anything behind—no posterity, no honest name, nothing. At first these feel a little like logic tricks, but I kind of like what they do: they make you feel that the “real” world is tied up with the story being told, and also that the world we’re in could’ve been totally different if certain events hadn’t happened. Like, you can mourn all the versions that never get made, but at the same time it’s kind of exciting that language can create the ones that actually do exist. I haven’t read the Nabokov essay yet, but I really want to—so if anyone has, I’m curious how you connect his ideas to Dead Souls. Also, if there are other essays/books about Dead Souls (or general writing theory) that you like, I’d love suggestions.