Nikolai Gogol

[hdw]

Not content with squabbling over gas pipelines, Russia and Ukraine are now bickering over who has the right to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Gogol's birth.

He was born in 1809 in a Cossack village near Poltava, Ukraine, which was then part of Tsarist Russia. He lived there until he was 19, and wrote about Ukrainian customs in works such as "Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka". However, he wrote in Russian, lived later in St Petersburg and is buried in Moscow.

Some quotes from an article in today's "Guardian" -

"... A part of the political elite in Kiev wants to claim Gogol as their own so they can enter civilised Europe with at least one great Ukrainian writer," said Igor Zolotussky, a Russian authority on Gogol.

"But there can be no such discussion because there is no such thing as a separate Ukrainian national identity. Gogol wrote and thought in Russian. He was a great Russian writer, full stop."

"... Vladimir Yavorivsky, a Ukrainian novelist and MP, said that if Gogol was a tree, "the crown was in Russia but the roots were in Ukraine .."

"... Meanwhile, Russian experts on Gogol have been incensed by reports that bookshops in Kiev are selling Ukrainian language versions of his novels in which nationalist-minded translators have replaced the phrase "The great Russian land" with "The great Ukrainian land".

It's interesting to compare this with the question of non-English writers in the British Isles. Sir Walter Scott and R.L. Stevenson are unquestionably Scottish writers - born there, lived there (for part of his life in RLS's case), used Scottish settings and some Scots dialogue in their books - but I couldn't argue with calling them British writers too. If anyone called them "English", I suppose I would bridle at that. Arthur Conan Doyle was every bit as Scottish as those two, born to an Irish immigrant family in Edinburgh, but he seems to be perceived as English because of the terribly English persona of Sherlock Holmes and the London settings of the stories. A recent book about modern Scottish writing called JK Rowling of Harry Potter fame a "Scottish" writer, tho' strictly speaking she is an Englishwoman domiciled in Edinburgh. As in Gogol's case, there's a lot of kudos in being able to lay claim to Joanne.

Oscar Wilde, Bernard Shaw and WB Yeats are indisputably part of Irish literature - despite being ascendancy Protestants and of ultimate English origin (I think?) - but I suppose for that part of their lives spent in pre-independence Ireland, they were British as well. And of course all of these people are part of "English literature".

Harry

[Eric]

Harry, you quote:

"... Meanwhile, Russian experts on Gogol have been incensed by reports that bookshops in Kiev are selling Ukrainian language versions of his novels in which nationalist-minded translators have replaced the phrase "The great Russian land" with "The great Ukrainian land".

This would similar to the kind of foreign interference as if Sweden were to moan at the Finnish-speakers of Finland for translating S?dergran into Finnish. Though I don't remember any translations of her poetry that changed "the Swedish city of Viborg" into "the Finnish town of Viipuri". In any case, the Russians solved the problem by taking over and calling it "Vyborg" In Finland, nowadays at least, these name shifts no longer cause G20-style riots.

I'll check out the two Ukrainian newspapers "Korespondent" and "Korrespondent" to see if there is any Gogol news.

[learna]

I'm a little surprised that there are only two posts about Gogol. He was a one-of-a-kind writer who made a massive impact on Pushkin, Dostoevsky and Bulgakov. He had a complex life and a misterious death. I studied all his famous works at school, wrote a lot of compositions about principal characters that have become appellative, a lot of his sayings are quoted everywhere.
The Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka was filmed several times.
Viy was, maybe, one of the early horror films.
This year the new film adaptation Taras Bulba has released.

There is a big article in Wikipedia that sheds light on Gogol's biography and his works.

[miercuri]

I wouldn't say he had a massive impact on Pushkin, they were more or less of the same age, Pushkin dying shortly after Gogol started publishing. It is assumed that they were friends and that Pushkin encouraged Gogol to write and offered advice at times. Stylistically, I find them very different.

I studied Gogol last year quite extensively. Out of his short fiction, I enjoyed Dikanka least, but loved the Mirgorod and Petersburg stories. I also loved the first part of Dead Souls and it is a pity that he never got to finish the project. However, I feel that it would have been better if the remaining chapters of the second part wouldn't have been published together with the first one, which is complete, the way Gogol had wanted it to be. The second part is very uneven and in my opion spoils the ensemble.

There is one other thing which has always left me thinking. Judging from his works and the way Gogol lived, does anyone else suspect he might have been secretly gay? Or gay and not at terms with it? Reading about him gave me the impression that he was a very unhappy individual and this unhappiness sprang from a deep frustration. He was anti-social, seemed to hate himself, wanting to punish himself, which was ultimately reflected in the way he died. I know there is a book which explores this aspect further and it felt reassuring to see that I wasn't the only one who thought of this. I would like to read it one day, but I would rather get myself acquainted with Nabokov's criticism on Gogol first.

As for the feud over Gogol between Russia and Ukraine, I would argue that the greater part of his work is focused on aspects of Russian life, from Russian landowners and their laws of the land, to smalltown monotony and the sophisticated debauchery of the capital - Petersburg. Gogol is a Russian author.

[learna]

I wouldn't say he had a massive impact on Pushkin, they were more or less of the same age, Pushkin dying shortly after Gogol started publishing. It is assumed that they were friends and that Pushkin encouraged Gogol to write and offered advice at times. Stylistically, I find them very different.

Miercuri, there is a misprint: instead of impact read - impression.
Pushkin wrote: `Сейчас прочел `Вечера на хуторе близ Диканьки`. Они изумили меня. Вот настоящая веселость, искренняя, непринужденная, без жеманства, без чопорности. А местами, какая поэзия. Какая чувственность! Все это так необыкновенно в нашей литературе, что я доселе не образумился...`
'I've just read the "Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka". It amazed me. This's a real gaiety, sincere, easy, without affectation, without primness. And what a poetry! What a sensibility! All that is so unusual in our contemporary literature, that I have hitherto not come to senses."

[miercuri]

Thank you, Learna, that is very well chosen quote. It is great to find out what Pushkin's words actually were. I had to check with the dictionary a bit so I guess it it was good excercise too.

[learna]

Thank you, Learna, that is very well chosen quote. It is great to find out what Pushkin's words actually were. I had to check with the dictionary a bit so I guess it it was good excercise too.

I'm sure that you will enjoy reading Pushkin in Russian. Good luck!

[miercuri]

I'm sure that you will enjoy reading Pushkin in Russian. Good luck!

Thank you! I am definitely looking forward to that day!

[Heteronym]

I read several of St. Petersburg stories and found them marvellous, especially "The Nose" and "The Overcoat". He had a wonderful sense of humor, and the way he narrated was quite unpredictable, constantly addressing the reader and always reiterating the fact that his stories are pure fiction.

Cannot wait to tackle Dead Souls one day.

[lenz]

I read several of St. Petersburg stories and found them marvellous, especially "The Nose" and "The Overcoat". He had a wonderful sense of humor, and the way he narrated was quite unpredictable, constantly addressing the reader and always reiterating the fact that his stories are pure fiction.

Cannot wait to tackle Dead Souls one day.

Reading The Town of N by Leonid Dobychin (1935). The town referred to is the one in Dead Souls which the boy narrator of Town mistakenly believes is an ideal community. I think I have to read DS again after many many years to get what Gogol meant to the early Soviet writers. It's a wonderful novel, meant to be the first of a trilogy, the other two parts of which G. was unable to finish, for several reasons.

[adaorardor]

Miercuri or anyone else -- what secondary lit on Gogol would you recommend? It looks like the obvious stuff is Nabokov's book, Bely's book, perhaps the Gogol in the 20th Century essay compilation, and maybe Karlinsky's Sexual Labyrinth book (altho this type of criticism I'm somewhat wary of)? Any thoughts on those sources or suggestions about others?