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Gogol's "Dead Souls"
By James B. Woodward PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 1978 Princeton University Press
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-691-06360-7
CHAPTER 1
Sobakevich
In the second of his four letters on Dead Souls Gogol informs us that "the last half of the book is less finished than the first half" and that in the later chapters "the inner spirit of the whole work" is less striking than "the motley diversity of the parts."1 By the first half he plainly meant, above all, the five "portrait chapters," and it is clear that in one respect at least he experienced rather less difficulty with them than with the chapters that follow. The distinctive feature of these chapters is that each is dominated by symbolic themes related to the psychological attributes of a single personality — that of the landowner concerned. In effect, the salient characteristics of this personality provide the entire contextual basis on which the development and interaction of motifs in the given chapter take place. In the later chapters, in which individual characters, except Chichikov, are less prominent than social groups, a comparable contextual cohesion was not so easily achieved.
Even so, a first reading of chapter five would certainly convey the impression that cohesion is perhaps the last quality which might appropriately be ascribed to it, for no other "portrait chapter" is so rich in apparent digressions or in incidents that seem totally unrelated to the central figure and his dialogues with Chichikov. To check the validity of this impression, we must begin by identifying the principal features that Gogol combines in the personality of Sobakevich.
Most conspicuous of all, of course, are the bearlike attributes denoted by his name, Mikhail Semyonovich — his immense, rough-hewn frame, his lumbering gait, his gargantuan appetite, his guile, and his misanthropy. Critical comment on Sobakevich has generally not proceeded far beyond the enumeration and illustration of these features. Yet each of them is merely the center of a whole constellation of details, which add progressively to its significance and implications. Moreover, the details comprising each individual constellation are not only brought into repeated contact with those of the other constellations; they also extend outward from their center to the furthest limits of the chapter, i.e., to those parts that precede the appearance of Sobakevich and follow his exit.
The misanthropy of Sobakevich, for example, which is highlighted on his first appearance in chapter one, expresses itself most blatantly in his reactions to Chichikov's complimentary references, reminiscent of the earlier exchanges with Manilov, to the senior officials of the town. Unlike Manilov, he responds with a succession of "strong expressions": "fool" (durak), "brigand" (razboynik), "scoundrel" (moshennik), and the term moshennik rapidly develops into one of his main lexical emblems. He concludes: "They are all scoundrels. The whole town there is the same: one scoundrel sits on another and drives him on with another scoundrel" (97). It is true that he compliments the public prosecutor as "the only decent man among them" (97), but in the same breath he calls him "a swine," from which we may deduce that the compliment is prompted solely by the prosecutor's profession, of which the misanthropist could hardly disapprove; as a man, he is as contemptible as the rest.
The significance, however, of Sobakevich's hostility to the officials cannot be appreciated without due regard for the fact that they are by no means the sole beneficiaries of his summary judgments. Thus Chichikov's remarks on the quality of the governor's cuisine immediately prompt a verbal assault on the governor's chef — "the one who was taught by a Frenchman" (98) — which culminates in a remarkable outburst on the merits of the saddle of mutton, replete with buckwheat stuffing, that adorns his own table:
This is not one of those fricassees which are made in the kitchens of gentlemen out of mutton which has been lying about for four days or so in the market. That's all been invented by German and French doctors. I'd hang them for it! They are the ones who thought up dieting and the starvation cure! Just because they've got feeble German constitutions, they imagine they can cope even with a Russian stomach! (98-99)
Here we perceive perhaps the most important aspect of Sobakevich's misanthropy — its powerful nationalistic or chauvinistic overtones. The "strong expressions" of Sobakevich are chiefly motivated by a profound hostility to every manifestation of foreign influence on Russian life — above all, to the Gallic customs of St. Petersburg. And since these customs are studiously aped by the officials of the town of N., they may be plausibly identified as the principal cause of Sobakevich's contempt for these men. In an earlier version of the chapter the link with St. Petersburg was established quite explicitly. Sobakevich's remark on the measures that he would personally take to eradicate the French and German doctors was followed by the statement: "Just look at the eating habits of all these people who have visited that Petersburg" (747).
It seems hardly coincidental, therefore, that the connection between "strong expressions" and the Russian national character is not only introduced, en passant, in the first paragraph of the chapter, but also forms the basis of the famous paean to the Russian language in its last two paragraphs, the wholly personal, "literal," and digressive character of which has never been questioned. Indeed, Belinsky criticized Gogol for giving expression to such chauvinistic attitudes. Reflecting, in the opening paragraph, on his timely escape from Nozdryov, Chichikov "promised Nozdryov all kinds of grievous and fearful misfortunes; even a few strong words were said." And the narrator adds: "What can one do? He is a Russian and, what's more, a Russian in a rage" (89). The immediate pretext for the "digression" at the end of the chapter is the "strong word" applied to Plyushkin by one of Sobakevich's peasants, whose capacity for summary judgments duly reveals him to be, like everyone and everything else on Sobakevich's estate, a mirror of some aspect of his master. While Chichikov quietly chuckles to himself in his carriage, the narrator launches into his eulogy:
The Russian people express themselves strongly! ... How apt are all the sayings that have emerged from the depths of Russia where there are neither German nor Finnish nor any other tribes, but everything is indigenous, lively and ready Russian wit, which does not grope for a word or hatch it out like a broody hen, but sticks it on at once like a passport to be carried around for ever. (108–109)
And in the final paragraph the chauvinistic note rises swiftly to a crescendo as the English, French, and German "words" are successively declared inferior to the "aptly uttered Russian word."
Thus the interrelated motifs of "strong words" and the indigenous Russian element are employed as a kind of frame to the chapter, and it may reasonably be concluded even from the few statements quoted thus far that this frame is dictated less by the personal attitudes of Gogol than by a cardinal feature of the personality of the chapter's central figure. Even without additional evidence, the development of these two motifs alone would confirm that the "presence" of Sobakevich is felt even in those parts of the chapter where he does not appear. It is already apparent, therefore, that considerable caution must be exercised before any statement in Dead Souls is interpreted as an expression of Gogol's personal sentiments. It is true, of course, that the whole novel is punctuated with reflections on various aspects of Russian life and the Russian character, and it obviously cannot be argued that they are all connected in some way with Sobakevich. But the important point is that in chapter five they greatly exceed similar reflections in other chapters in both number and prominence, and the recurrently evident chauvinism of the chapter's protagonist is the only plausible explanation.
It is significant in this connection that one such reflection is prompted immediately by Sobakevich's entry in chapter one as a guest at the governor's party, where Chichikov first meets him. We read:
Sobakevich said somewhat laconically: "I invite you to visit me too," shuffling a foot which was shod in a boot of such gigantic dimensions that it would hardly be possible to find anywhere a foot of the corresponding size, especially at the present time when even in Russia men of Herculean stature [bogatyri] are becoming extinct. (17)
Thus when the zakuska at Sobakevich's becomes a pretext for contemplating the national character of this custom and when Chichikov decides to preface his request for his host's dead serfs with a verbose panegyric to the vastness of the Russian empire, there can be little doubt that Gogol is intent, as in the concluding "digression" of the chapter, on further amplification of one of Sobakevich's most distinctive characteristics. And it is noteworthy that the preparation for this process at the beginning of the chapter is by no means confined to the reference to Chichikov's "strong words." Do we not perceive, for example, an allusion to the same characteristic in Selifan's lament in the second paragraph on Nozdryov's spiteful substitution of hay for oats as the feed for Chichikov's horses? He says: "... a horse likes oats. They're his victuals. Oats are the same to him as maintenance, for example, is to us. They're his victuals" (89). Does this not anticipate Sobakevich's later insistence on the importance of Russian food for Russian stomachs and even, obliquely, the insistence at the end of the chapter on the superiority of the "Russian word"? As though to confirm the point, almost immediately afterwards in the wake of the collision between the carriages, Gogol reintroduces the "national motif" explicitly in the description of Selifan's reaction: "Selifan was conscious of his error, but since a Russian does not like to admit before others that the fault is his, he at once retorted with a dignified air" (90). Equally striking is the verbal reaction of the other coachman: "Oh, you scoundrel [moshennik]!" (90) — a summary judgment using Sobakevich's favorite term from which we may deduce, even without explicit notification of the fact, that we have already entered the domain of the "bear." On the territory of Sobakevich even those, like the eloquent coachman, who have nothing at all to do with him and are probably unaware of his existence, are obliged to express themselves in an appropriate manner. The implications of this linguistic uniformity merit particular attention.
It has long been the practice, of course, in studies of Gogol's technique in the novel to refer to the harmony he establishes in chapters two through six between the personalities of the five landowners and their surroundings, but it has not been observed that in this respect also the portrait of Sobakevich is exceptional. In none of the other four "portrait chapters" is this harmony so pronounced or all-embracing. The props that surround Manilov, Korobochka, Nozdryov, and Plyushkin certainly provide the most revealing insights into their personalities, but they are never actually cast in their image like the table, chairs, and armchairs of Sobakevich, which even seem to say: "I'm also a Sobakevich! ... I, too, am very like Sobakevich!" (96). Similarly, every other physical object in his domain (the asymmetrical house, for example, the sturdily constructed well, the portraits of the Greek generals and Bobelina, and even his pet thrush) reflects one or more of his most distinctive qualities — above all, bulk, strength, crudity, durability. There can be little doubt that this enhanced degree of harmony between the protagonist of the chapter and the array of props Gogol assembles around him is quite as meaningful as the qualities themselves. Like the "strong words" of Chichikov and the coachman, it expresses a degree of control over his surroundings that is as comprehensive as his "control" over the chapter. Everything in the realm of Sobakevich bears the mark of his personality; everything is held tightly in his fist, and it is primarily in relation to this central feature of his portrait that we should understand both the term kulak ("fist"), which Chichikov contemptuously applies to him, and also his surname (derived from the nounsobaka, "dog"), which alludes to the canine habit of imposing rigid territorial boundaries and repelling all invaders. Certainly, as Proffer observes, the name "sometimes gives rise to odd and humorous effects," but the desire for such effects may hardly be considered the major reason for its selection. The name "Sobakevich" illustrates the general point that the names of Gogol's landowners allude to the fundamental symbolic themes which are developed in their portraits.
In connection with this "canine" aspect of Sobakevich we should note the symbolic associations of physical bulk that emerge from the contrast in chapter one between the fat men and the thin men at the governor's party. Of the former, the narrator observes:
Their faces were plump and rounded. ... The fat men ... never occupy ancillary posts but always the main ones, and if they sit down anywhere, they sit squarely and securely, so that the seat is more likely to start creaking and bending beneath them than they are to be dislodged from it. (15)
The imposing physique of Sobakevich denotes the same canine tenacity. Moreover, it is already apparent that his control is by no means limited to his inanimate surroundings; far more significantly, it extends, as the reproach of the coachman and the "strong words" of Chichikov testify, to the people who enter and inhabit his domain.
Gogol's chief method of conveying this point is to endow them with the physical attributes of Sobakevich himself, with the result that they present themselves, like the peasant who so "aptly" summarizes the character of Plyushkin, as extensions of their master's personality. Hence the immense size and crude physical strength of the dead serfs whose praises Sobakevich sings in such emotional terms. Still more revealing, however, are their names: Mikheyev (which suggests "belonging to Mikhail"); Stepan Probka ("Stephen the Cork", i.e. a "lightweight" despite his "enormous strength"); Milushkin ("dear fellow"); Maksim Telyatnikov ("Maksim the Calf"); and Yeremey Sorokoplyokhin ("Jeremiah of the Forty Slaps"). The names clearly suggest passivity, a degree of subservience to the lord and master, which contrasts ironically with the serfs' physical might. The five hundred roubles provided by Yeremey Sorokoplyokhin in labor-exemption tax (obrok) were plainly not accumulated without Sobakevich's vigorous encouragement. It might be objected, of course, that the sturdy structure of his serfs' huts is evidence of a concern for their well-being, and this concern undeniably exists, but it would be an error to assume that it is motivated by anything other than a desire to maximize their productive capacity. Proffer's contention that he "respects the serfs as human souls" is conclusively invalidated, as we shall see, by the main symbolic theme of the chapter, and it will become apparent that his lack of respect is in no way contradicted by the posthumous praise that he bestows on them. These former subjects of Sobakevich were held in the vicelike grip of his fist, and it is entirely appropriate that his list of their names should include notes on their conduct and sobriety. His control, we may deduce, had extended to every aspect of their lives.
Similarly, the living Uncle Minyay bears both nominal and physical imprints of his master's authority, sporting a name that is a diminutive of Mikhail, the same broad shoulders (which inflict such a punishing burden on Chichikov's shaft-horse and which seem to allude to the shoulders of his master, whose back is later described as "as broad as that of a sturdy Vyatka horse" [106]), and a stomach that resembles the national utensil for boiling water (a samovar) (91), just as the face of Sobakevich resembles the kind of pumpkin that may allegedly be adapted to form a variant of the national instrument (the balalaika) (94). Here, too, the "national motif" is detectable, and as the complex pattern of details is slowly unfurled, it becomes increasingly clear that between the chauvinism of Sobakevich, his authoritarian control of his realm, and his rhapsodic delight in the qualities of physical might and crudity, which Shevyryov found irreconcilable with the dominant traits of his character, Gogol is intent on establishing a subtle correlation, in the light of which the name "Mikhail Semyonovich" acquires a hitherto unnoticed significance.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Gogol's "Dead Souls" by James B. Woodward. Copyright © 1978 Princeton University Press. Excerpted by permission of PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS.
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