Short stories
The Nose
Нос
Nikolai Gogol · 1836
Synopsis
One March morning in Saint Petersburg, the barber Ivan Yakovlevich finds a nose in the fresh bread his wife has just baked and recognises it as that of one of his customers, Major Kovalyov. In a panic, fearing the police, he tries to get rid of it. The same morning, Kovalyov wakes up without a nose. He soon finds it in town, dressed in the gold-embroidered uniform of a state councillor and behaving like an important person.
Context
Written in 1835 and 1836, the story appeared in 1836 in “The Contemporary”, Pushkin's journal. The narrative opens at the barber's and then follows the major through the city. According to Philo-lettres, Gogol moved the date of the story from 25 April to 25 March, the day of the Annunciation. It is read as a satire of the obsession with rank, inherited from the Table instituted by Peter the Great, in St Petersburg society.
Who it is for
A short story of some thirty pages, funny and absurd, to be read in one sitting, for lovers of the fantastic.
Prizes and reception
The composer Dmitri Shostakovich drew an opera from it, premiered in 1930.