Gogol 101

Our youth spends hours on the internet and reads nothing, not even newspapers. Still, sometimes you have to force yourself. So I recently made my son read Nikolai Gogol’s Мертвые души (Dead Souls). For, unless you have read Gogol, you might miss the countless idioms and expressions that Nikolai Vassiliyevich bequeathed us.

The proof is all around us.

In a recent article about municipal elections in Leningrad region, the headline read: Выборы в Ломоносове (Ленинградская область): опять голосовали «мёртвые души». In the elections, numerous dead voters were used as dead souls, registered as if they were alive and then someone signed the electoral list in their stead.

Another essential Dead Souls term is маниловщина, from the hero Манилов, a schemer with countless unrealistic projects. In a recent interview, Konstantin Astafiev, general director of the media company Ural Press, explained why he never plans more than a year ahead. “Any plans for a longer term,” he said, “would be прожектёрство, маниловщина, фантастика, но не планирование” (wishful thinking, manilovschina, science fiction – anything but not planning).

Another key character from Dead Souls – Плюшкин – has also become an idiom. Here is the entry in Ushakov’s dictionary: Плюшкин –  (П прописное) – человек, у которого скупость доходит до мании, до крайности; вообще скряга. (Plyushkin – lowercase “p” – a man whose miserliness becomes a mania, who pushes his miserliness to the extreme, a miser in general.) And so, in an article criticizing Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin for piling up too many gold and currency reserves, we read: Золотовалютный Плюшкин. Впервые в отечественной истории золотовалютные резервы Банка России превысили $100 млрд. “GoldenCurrency Plyushkin. The gold and currency reserves of the Bank of Russia have exceeded $100 bn for the first time in Russian history.”

After my son is finished with Dead Souls, I will, of course, give him Ревизор (The Inspector General) to read. In that seminal work, the phrase, “К нам едет ревизор” (“an inspector general is coming”) sent shivers down the characters’ spines. The крылатая фраза (literally, “winged phrase,” meaning it has worked its way into common usage) appears in numerous variations. Recently a paper in Ukraine (Gogol’s homeland, though it should be noted that his recent bicentenary passed virtually unnoticed there, as nationalists apparently despise him for being “too Russian”) published a story under the headline, К нам едет ревизор по Евро! It was an article about a delegation from the Organizing Committee of the 2012 European Soccer Championships. They were coming to the Donetsk region for an onsite inspection (Ukraine will host Euro-2012 along with Poland).

One of the corrupt characters of Ревизор  – the judge Lyapkin-Tyapkin – was shamelessly open about taking bribes. But he excused himself by saying he did not take bribes in money, but борзыми щенками (literally “in Borzoi puppies,” or in kind). So it is, jumping from Ukraine to Kazakhstan, that we read on the web-site compromat.ru: Назарбаев борзыми щенками не берёт ([President Nursultan] Nazarbayev doesn’t take bribes in Borzoi puppies – i.e. he doesn’t take bribes in kind and prefers cash). The author of the article ascertains that South Korean businessman Tsoy Sun-Yu (sentenced to a five-year prison term) confessed in court that he offered Nazarbayev $10 million to give preference to a South Korean company interested in prospecting for Kazakh diamonds.

This episode made me think of another Ревизор character: the policeman Держиморда (literally “hold the muzzle”). It too has become idiomatic, inducted into Ushakov’s dictionary: Держиморда – держиморды, ж. (разг.). Человек с грубо-полицейскими наклонностями. (A man with the rude and brutal manners of a policeman.)

Of course, Nursultan Nazarbayev was never questioned in the dollars for diamonds case, nor was he summoned to appear in court. No chance. Because the Kazakh leader, like all oriental rulers, is rumored to be a real держимордa, quick to quash the least sign of dissent in his fiefdom, holding the local press and opposition on a tight leash (not unlike a Borzoi puppy).

An independent investigation of the case? Nothing but manilovschina.