#59 The Nose- Nikolai Gogol
This is kind of a ridiculous tale, although not without its merit. Ivan the barber finds the nose of an acquaintance
has been baked in his wife’s freshly baked bread. It’s the cut-off appendage of
Kavaloff, a member of the Municipal Committee. No explanation is offered as to
how it was cut off, or how it came to be baked in a loaf of bread.
Apparently the nose can dress up in official garb, go about
town, converse with his former face and even use a stolen passport! In fact it
“can be seen walking everyday at three o’clock on the Neffsky Avenue.”
Kovaloff is eventually reacquainted with his nose but cannot
reattach it. He must live with the embarrassment. Perhaps he cut off his nose to spite his
face, or maybe he’s not himself anymore, nobody (k)nose. If you are tsk-tsking my puns, get over it,
even Gogol made light of his silliness:
“But the most incomprehensible thing of all is, how authors
can choose such subjects for their stories. That really surpasses my
understanding. In the first place, no advantage results from it for the
contrary; and in the second place, no harm results either.”
Notable Passage: “But nothing is permanent in this world.
Joy in the second moment of its arrival is already less keen than in the first,
is still fainter in the third, and finishes by coalescing with our normal
mental state, just as it circles which the fall of a pebble forms on the
surface of water, gradually die away.”
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