The Nose and Other Stories - by Nikolai Gogol (Paperback)

About the Book

The tales collected in The Nose and Other Stories are among the greatest achievements of world literature. They showcase Nikolai Gogol's vivid, haunting imagination: an encounter with evil in a darkened church, a downtrodden clerk who dreams only of a new overcoat, a nose that falls off a face and reappears around town on its own.

Book Synopsis

Nikolai Gogol's novel Dead Souls and play The Government Inspector revolutionized Russian literature and continue to entertain generations of readers around the world. Yet Gogol's peculiar genius comes through most powerfully in his short stories. By turns--or at once--funny, terrifying, and profound, the tales collected in The Nose and Other Stories are among the greatest achievements of world literature.

These stories showcase Gogol's vivid, haunting imagination: an encounter with evil in a darkened church, a downtrodden clerk who dreams only of a new overcoat, a nose that falls off a face and reappears around town on its own, outranking its former owner. Written between 1831 and 1842, they span the colorful setting of rural Ukraine to the unforgiving urban landscape of St. Petersburg to the ancient labyrinth of Rome. Yet they share Gogol's characteristic obsessions--city crowds, bureaucratic hierarchy and irrationality, the devil in disguise--and a constant undercurrent of the absurd. Susanne Fusso's translations pay careful attention to the strangeness and wonder of Gogol's style, preserving the inimitable humor and oddity of his language. The Nose and Other Stories reveals why Russian writers from Dostoevsky to Nabokov have returned to Gogol as the cornerstone of their unparalleled literary tradition.

Review Quotes

[A] first-rate collection . . . Admirers of Gogol and his odd sensibilities will devour this excellent gathering.-- "Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review"

[A] really wonderful collection of Gogol's writings, and essential for any lover of his work.-- "Kaggsy's Bookish Ramblings"

[Fusso's] translation captures all of Gogol's magic.-- "Evilcyclist's Bookshelf"

An erudite, modern translation of [Gogol's] work that shows clearly how this strange writer became a defining influence on Russian literature and beyond.-- "Paperback Paris"

In a move that preserves a sense of foreignness in the English translation, Fusso employs something closer to a literal translation than the more idiomatic one used by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky in their 2011 rendering of Gogol's stories. Fusso maintains the pacing and eeriness of Gogol's narrative flow while also stretching out some of the language . . . Such choices in translation create a subtle nod to the linguistic distance Russian readers would have experienced reading Gogol's prose.-- "The Nation"

Since much of Gogol's humor depends on linguistic play, he has proven resistant to adequate translation. . . Fusso's ear for humor makes all the difference.-- "New York Review of Books"

Susanne Fusso does excellent work making the Russian-to-English prose accessible, readable, and unfussily poetic.-- "Jason Half's Blog"

While they deal in subjects including witchcraft, demonic influence, and madness, Gogol's stories are as humorous as they are bizarre . . . The Nose and Other Stories is filled with ill-fated characters, strange happenings, and satirical commentary.-- "Foreword Reviews"

The first major English translation of Gogol's stories in more than twenty years, The Nose and Other Stories captures his humor and complexity brilliantly. This volume will prove to be a great read for students and Russian literature enthusiasts alike.--Bruce Holl, Trinity University

Crazy, colorful, delightful, and sad, Gogol's short stories are among the great gems of Russian literature. Susanne Fusso's scholarly and stylish new translations bring them alive once again and make this selection a pleasure to read.--David Bellos, author of Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: Translation and the Meaning of Everything

About the Author

Nikolai Gogol (1809-1852) was born in Ukraine and achieved literary success in St. Petersburg. Among his most famous works are Dead Souls and The Government Inspector, as well as short stories set in the Ukrainian countryside and tales of St. Petersburg. He spent some of his most productive years in Rome. Upon his return to Russia, he struggled unsuccessfully to write a sequel to Dead Souls, burning the manuscripts not long before his death.

Susanne Fusso is Marcus L. Taft Professor of Modern Languages and professor of Russian, East European, and Eurasian studies at Wesleyan University. Her many books include Designing Dead Souls: An Anatomy of Disorder in Gogol (1993), and she has translated Russian writers including Sergey Gandlevsky.