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A Comparative Study on Short Stories by

Edgar Allan Poe and Nikolai Gogol









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Hugvsindasvi










A Comparative Study on Short Stories by
Edgar Allan Poe and Nikolai Gogol







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Auur Eva Gumundsdttir
Kt.: 040580-5229

Supervisor: Martin Regal
Janar 2009
ABSTRACT
Edgar Allan Poe and Nikolai Gogol were born in the same year, however there are other
similarities and coincidences that make it interesting to compare them. This essay
comprises of a detailed comparison of three works by Gogol and two works by Poe. It is
divided into 12 sections. The first is a short introduction. The second takes a brief look
into the history of the short story. The third and fourth introduce the history of literature
in the USA and in Russia. These sections might seem like a broad introduction to many
different areas, however they cover important matters for comparing these two authors.
The fifth deals briefly with Poes and Gogols life. The sixth looks closer at the
Romantic era and the genres Gogol and Poe fall into, Fantastic and Gothic. The seventh
section gives reasons for which stories were chosen. The five stories chosen for
comparison have similarities and differences, which are explored in relation to the
authors genres. The eight is an overview of the three stories by Gogol chosen for
comparison, and has three subsections for each story. The ninth section does the same
for Poes two stories. The tenth section compares common and uncommon entities and
themes within all the stories. The eleventh section concludes the essay. These very
imaginative and wonderful stories are meant to entertain the reader, however in a
different way. Finally the twelfth section contains the bibliography.






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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 3
THE SHORT STORY ............................................................................................................. 3
LITERATURE IN THE USA .................................................................................................. 4
LITERATURE IN RUSSIA ..................................................................................................... 5
POES LIFE/GOGOLS LIFE .................................................................................................. 7
THE ROMANTIC ERA - FANTASTIC VS. GOTHIC .................................................................. 8
CHOICE OF STORIES ......................................................................................................... 11
GOGOLS STORIES ............................................................................................................ 12
THE OVERCOAT ....................................................................................................... 13
THE NOSE ................................................................................................................ 15
THE PORTRAIT ......................................................................................................... 18
POES STORIES ................................................................................................................. 20
THE TELL TALE HEART ............................................................................................ 20
THE OVAL PORTRAIT ............................................................................................... 22
COMPARISON ................................................................................................................... 24
CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 26
WORKS CITED .................................................................................................................. 29






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3
INTRODUCTION
Most critics regard Edgar Allan Poe and the Russian author Nikolai Gogol as the two
greatest and most influential writers of short fiction during the Romantic era (Charters,
p. 1732). Poe is indisputably a Gothic writer but are all his stories Gothic? How do we
classify Gogol? Is he the father of Russian realism as some have suggested? The stories
analysed here are clearly products of fantasy, which would seem to suggest that they
could not be realistic? By using realistic elements Gogol allows the readers to immerse
themselves in a completely exaggerated world of fantasy, yet with a belief that this all
could have taken place in the real world. In Vladimir Nabokovs book Nikolai Gogol he
ridicules the statement that Gogol is regarded a realist. Nabokov acknowledges that
absurdities are what make up Gogols stories and that more often than not they are not
understood by the reader. The stories that will be compared are Gogols The
Overcoat, The Nose and The Portrait and Poes The Tell Tale Heart and The
Oval Portrait. The mood, narratives, themes, settings and characterizations in the
stories will be explored in relation to the authors genres. What are the similarities in
these stories? What are the differences?

THE SHORT STORY
In the early nineteenth century, German writers were the first to develop original,
imaginative narratives that resemble what we call short stories. (Charters, 1731) A
likely forerunner is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. More famous narratives are by the
Grimm brothers, stories developed from folk tales. The first American short story writer
is almost inarguably Washington Irving, who was inspired to write Rip Van Winkle
when he translated a German folktale. Irving influenced other American writers such as
Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne who published stories in magazines.
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The development and history of the short story has always been considered in
relation to the novel. During the eighteenth century, short stories were deemed the same
as novels (Shaw, p. 4). Towards the end of the nineteenth century people began to
acknowledge that short fiction might have its own principles and be shaped by them
rather than sharing the same principles as those of the novel (Shaw, p. 3). According to
Edgar Allan Poe, the short storys distinguishing factors from the novel are that it has
aesthetic unity and can be read in one sitting (Charters, p. 1787).
The short story varies according to the time it is written in, and there are so
many possible types of short stories that it's very hard to find a phrase that summarizes
all the diversities (Shaw, p. 20). However, the glossary in Ann Charters book The Story
and its Writer: An Introduction to Short Fiction offers a good definition, where she
defines it as: [a] short fictional prose NARRATIVE, often including the YARN, the
SKETCH, the FABLE, and the TALE. The term is often applied to any work of narrative
prose FICTION shorter than a NOVEL (1787). Gogols stories are obvious fables, still it's
sometimes hard to figure out what the moral of the story is. Ann Charters explains the
fable in this way: A very short, often humorous NARRATIVE told to present a MORAL
(1783).

LITERATURE IN THE USA
When the United States declared independence from the British Empire in 1776, many
Americans in the new Republic were more familiar with European history and literature
than with colonial and revolutionary American writers. Much American literature was
therefore inaccessible to them in its references and allusions. By the second quarter of
the 19
th
century Americans had easy access to British literature and criticism. Books by
the English Romantics were republished in the US soon after they appeared in print in
5
Great Britain (Reidhead, p. 957). However, there was an increasing demand for an
American voice, form and style. With the War of 1812 this demand was at a peak and
some of the biggest names in American literature appeared.
One early American literary giant was Washington Irving. Among the first
American writers to be successful in Europe, some regard Irving as the most influential
of his peers and the first writer to exhibit a uniquely American style. Irving greatly
influenced writers such as Poe and Hawthorne (Reidhead, p. 959-960). Irving was 26
years older than Poe and Gogol. His most important work was published in the United
States in 1819 when Poe was a 10-year-old schoolboy with an impressionable mind.
Irving wrote The Sketch Book in Britain, using material from German folktales. He
proved that memorable fiction, such as the short stories Rip Van Winkle and The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, could be set in locations in the United States. These stories
were immediately recognized as literary treasures. Irving lived to the age of 76, which at
that time was considered a high age. Irving was unique. He had no rival in style in his
own country and decades before his death he was considered a classic writer (Reidhead,
p. 978-980).

LITERATURE IN RUSSIA
Russian literature has not had paved a road through history. During the time of Mongol
occupation in the 13
th
century almost all written literature was religious. The church
controlled everything, since the church was the only area the Mongols didnt interfere
with (Thompson, p. 45). In a lecture on the 16
th
of January 2008, in Russian Literature
History, Rebekka rinsdttir stated that literature became stagnant and a clear
difference appeared in spoken and written language. During the 15
th
and 16
th
century the
church and authorities stood together in hindering foreign influence, because they could
6
be dangerous to the monarch. However, the 17
th
century brought the Time of Troubles
in which state and church lost their grip. Worldly literature and western influences
started becoming visible in the country and spoken language found its way into written
language. By the end of the 1700s Russia had laid the foundation for flowering of
Russian literature in the 19
th
century (Thompson, p. 113). In the late 18
th
century and
early 19
th
century book censorship was successively tightened. Authors were held
responsible for what they wrote and publication of unsigned articles was forbidden in
1848 (Kelly p. 33).
There are well-known pieces of early history Russian literature, such as The Tale
of Igors Campaign and the autobiography of the archpriest Avvakum; Life of Avvakum.
However, people usually regard Pushkin as a touchstone when looking into Russian
literature, and in fact literature from all around the world. The 19
th
century is referred to
as the Golden Era of Russian literature; this era includes Pushkin and Gogol. Pushkin
was born in 1799 and died in 1837. He was only 10 years older than Gogol and Poe. In
order to look at what Gogol was writing its imperative to mention Pushkins writing.
He was probably the most influential person in Gogols life as a writer. Pushkin remains
today one of the most influential writers in Russia.
Some regard Pushkins novel in verse, Evgeni Onegin, as the greatest Russian
novel. It was first published in 1925 and was a pioneering example of the serial novel. It
was published chapter by chapter for a period of 7 years (Kelly, p. 35). Pushkin set an
example in so many genres of Russian literature, although he didnt write any theatrical
dramatic comedies, which represent the splendour of Russian theatre before and after
his death. In this area Gogol surpassed him, his play The Government Inspector is
internationally regarded a masterpiece (Kelly p. 64).
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Gogols The Government Inspector and Dead Souls were well received by most
readers of both liberal and radical mind. Many of these readers deemed Russia
backward and oppressive. Gogol was quite generally perceived as rebel or at least a
merciless critic of this uncivilized Russian social system and because of that he
received special attention from the censors and the Third Section (secret police) (Gogol,
p. 9).
Moral is recurring in Gogols works, either his stories have high moral issues or
they call attention to the fact that there is no moral. And the transition from a view of
the writer as a metatextual ironist to an emphasis upon responsibility to society can be
clearly seen in the case of Nikolai Gogol. (Kelly p. 81) In his short story "The Nose"
he mocked the idea that literature was improved with a moral. The tale ends with the
narrator trying without success to explain what possible meaning the story could have.
According to Gogol, Pushkin was the only person who understood the moral purpose of
one of Gogols most revered novels Dead Souls. He said: A writers duty is not only to
provide pleasant amusement for the mind and the taste; he will pay dearly if his works
do not disseminate something of use to the readers. (Kelly, p. 81)

POES LIFE/GOGOLS LIFE
Edgar Allan Poe was born on the 19th of January 1809 in the USA. Two months later in
Ukraine Nikolai Gogol was born on the 31
st
of March 1809 (according to the Old Style
Julian calendar he was born on the 19
th
of March, making it exactly two months later).
Poes personal life was full of tragedy. His biological parents were poor actors.
His father left the family a year after Poes birth and his mother died when he was 3
years old in 1811. Poes father disappeared completely, probably died. A wealthy
merchant by the name of John Allan, and his wife, adopted Poe. Poe began writing for a
8
living when Allan disinherited him. Poe became editor of the Southern Literary
Message, but resigned after 4 years. He then became editor of Grahams Magazine,
resigned from there and started his own magazine, which failed. Poe married his almost
fourteen-year-old cousin Virginia Clemm, who died at the age of 24. There are not a lot
of success stories in Poes personal life, and even though his collections of tales and
poetry sold well his income during his lifetime was less than impressive (Charters, p.
1186). Poe died at the age of 40.
Gogols father was an owner of a large Ukrainian estate. He wrote, directed and
acted in comedies for a rich relative in the family theatre. He died when Gogol was 16
years old. Gogols mother was kind but not very intelligent and somewhat hysterical.
She made up stories about her son, for example that he had invented railroads and the
steamship (Gogol, p. 6). Gogol was sent to boarding school as a boy, where he received
the nickname the mysterious dwarf from his fellow students, because of his physical
appearance and odd behaviour (Charters, p. 589). In school Russian students read
German Romanticism, where the same material influenced Gogol as influenced Poe
through Irving. At the age of 19 Gogol moved to St Petersburg, at that time Russias
capital, to work on his literary career. Gogol was constantly unhappy with what he had
written and used to burn his writing. Sometimes because it had received bad review,
other times because in his opinion it wasnt good enough (Gogol, p. 6-7). Gogol died 43
years old.

THE ROMANTIC ERA - FANTASTIC VS. GOTHIC
Gogol and Poe belong to the Romantic era, the movement originated in the second half
of the 18
th
century in Western Europe. Romanticism flourished in the 19
th
century, it
valued individuality, intuition, imagination and feeling (Charters, p. 1787).
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Romanticism emphasized strong emotion as a source of experience. Therefore some
romantics have been accused of complete irrationality. New emotions emerged in
literature, such as fear, anxiety, nervousness and horror. Nature and the experience of
meeting an awe-inspiring, untamed nature found its place and is sometimes the central
idea in a romantic piece of literature (Wikipedia).
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was an early influence on Romanticism from
Germany, with his 1774 novel The Sorrows of Young Werther and his character the very
sensitive and passionate artist. The novel is often given the honour of initiating the
Romantic Movement. The romantic gothic appeared in the United States with Irvings
Rip Van Winkle, as stated before; Irving used material from German folktales.
Gothicism is a genre related to romanticism, some critics even say they are one and the
same. It isnt all that easy to tell apart the early Gothic writing and some of the
masterpieces classified as Romantic poetry, such as Keats The Eve of Saint Agnes
(Williams, p. 3). An early example of a Gothic piece is The Castle of Otranto by Horace
Walpole, which was published in the year 1764 in Britain. In fact it is generally
considered the first Gothic novel and an initiator of the gothic genre (Williams, p. 13).
According to literary handbooks, Gothic is a matter of decor and mood-of
haunted castle, and brooding, mysterious hero/villain, of beleaguered heroines,
of ghosts (real, or only believed to be), of an ambiguously pleasurable terror,
of the nostalgic melancholy of ruins and of remote times and places. Reading
this list of elements one might surmise that Gothic is one of those rare genres
(like the pastoral or the western) defined primarily by their settings. And yet
some works may have a strong Gothic flavor while violating almost all the
handbooks criteria [] (Williams, p. 14).
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Gothic often entails a haunted castle, however that is most certainly not a requirement
and its good to keep in mind that not every castle is gothic. Gothic is a large and
diverse genre and it seems as though from the start critics have known what a
problematic category it is. They tried to divide the genre into subcategories, however in
spite of that it remained difficult to file the genre perfectly into the filing cabinet.
Montague Summers was the first to suggest that there were significant varieties, such as
historical Gothic, sentimental Gothic and terror Gothic. Later critics seemed to find
endless amounts of subcategories to fill the problematic gaps of the Gothic genre
(Williams, p. 17).
Romanticism dominated Russian prose in the 1830s. (Gogol, p 10) The
publication of Fyodor Emins Letters of Ernest and Doravra usually dates the
appearance of romanticism in Russia. Russian romanticism is what Nikolai Karamyin
called effusions of emotion. Romanticism flourished in Pushkins writing, for
example in his poem Ruslan and Liudmila which is based on a Russian folk tale.
Pushkin even died romantically in a duel over a woman (Cranston, p. 140-141).
There was an immense shift in literature during the mid 19
th
century, when the
earlier form of romanticism made room for realism. Realist writers refrain from
explaining their characters psychology, instead it's shown by the characters actions
and words (Charters, p. 1733). Gogol is often referred to as an initiator and even father
of Russian realism. How can a writer belong to the Romantic Era and nonetheless be a
Realist? Romance is literally considered unrealistic. Realism is a genre opposed to
romanticism. Could it be that Gogol is fundamentally a romantic gothic writer who used
reality to make his characters believable? Or was he not at all realistic? Was his
exaggeration mistaken for realism?
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Fantasy is very recurrent in Poes and Gogols writing. In Ann Charters book
The Story and its Writer theres a helpful glossary of literary terms. Sadly a description
of the Gothic is missing. However in this glossary Fantasy is explained in this way:
A NARRATIVE or events in a narrative that have no possible existence in reality
and could not have occurred in a real world; used sometimes to amuse or delight
readers, sometimes to comment on or illustrate by contrast some aspect of
reality, and sometimes, as in a FABLE, to present a clear moral that will not be
complicated or diminished by the untidiness or inconsistency of reality [...]
(Charters, p. 1783).
Writers of fantastic literature gave attention to the realities a character might experience
through a mental disorder, madness, dreams and drug or alcohol induced perceptions.
Theres an empty space left by the worldly explanations of reality in which a fantastic
perception of reality could easily be developed, wavering between the real and the
supernatural. Wolfe argued that [F]antasy writers take as their point of departure the
deliberate violation of norms and facts we regard as essential to our conventional
conception of reality []. Fantasy is a story based on and controlled by an over
violation of what is generally accepted as possibility []. (as cited in Blair, 2)

CHOICE OF STORIES
There are obvious similarities in the stories chosen for comparison. The stories are all
among the more famous and popular ones from each author, excluding Gogols story
The Portrait which didnt receive much fame. The Portrait however contains the
same life-after-death theme as Poes story The Oval Portrait, apart from the title being
quite alike. Gogols story The Overcoat deals with a strange obsession for an overcoat
much like Poes story The Tell Tale Heart deals with a very unhealthy obsession with
12
an old mans eye, which eventually results in his murder. Gogols story The Nose is
one that simply could not be ignored, its marvellous bizarreness is especially important
to express the importance of the Fantastic in Gogols writing. It also places the whole
attention to one body part, the nose, as Poe does for the eye in The Tell Tale Heart.

GOGOLS STORIES
The Overcoat, The Nose and The Portrait are all stories from Gogols collection
St Petersburg Tales, a collection formerly known as Arabesque. Unlike his collection
Mirgorod (1835) which contained stories concerned with the Ukraine and had historical
and geographical viewpoints, the St Petersburg Tales are stories of the present world.
They are filled with the fantastic like the stories in Mirgorod. However, the fantastic in
St Petersburg Tales is different; it is often a twisted vision of isolated characters, rather
than a rustic community infused with tradition and folklore - much like the fantastic in
Pushkins poem The Bronze Horseman. For Gogol the Ukraine is origin and Petersburg
is career. He had doubts all his life about his own worth as an artist. There is a recurrent
theme of art in the St Petersburg Tales, very apparent in Nevsky Prospekt and The
Portrait, but also in a less obvious way in The Overcoat (Peace, p. 94-95). One thing
all the St Petersburg Tales have in common is strangeness.
Passing as it were through Gogols temperment, St. Petersburg acquired a
reputation of strangeness which it kept up for almost a century, losing it when it
ceased to be the capital of an empire. The chief town in Russia had been built by
a tyrant of genius upon a swamp, and upon the bones of slaves rotting in that
swamp; this was the root of that strangeness-and the initial flaw. (Nabokov, p.
11)

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THE OVERCOAT
The Overcoat is one of Gogols masterpieces. It has been held up as a fundamentally
realistic work, however the story can hardly be called realistic. The setting of the story
is the cold city St Petersburg. The main character is a civil service employee and
everything about this character is miserable and less than average. His appearance is not
what you would call attractive: a little bit pockmarked, a little bit red haired, a little bit
blind in appearance (Peace, p. 141). Akakiy Akakiyevits is a blemished, red haired,
squinty-eyed man with a bald patch who quite often has rubbish hanging off his clothes
or his head because he manages to be walking beneath a window at the exact moment
someone throws garbage out. He doesnt seem to take much care in his appearance
since he doesnt bother to dust the rubbish off his clothing. He is poor, yet he is not at
the bottom of the civil service hierarchy. He has been at his job for a long time and is
very good at it, although he isnt driven with an ambition to advance at his job. When
given the opportunity and honour of more responsibility and a higher quality piece of
work he denies without giving it a second of thought (Peace, p 142).
The main character is in every way less than average (except being a very good
copyist), even his name is demeaning Akakiy Akakiyevits. The Russian verb
means to poop. Akakiy is so poor that he cannot afford a new winter coat without
saving for a long time. His poverty can be understood as a metaphor for his lack of
character. The coat becomes an obsession and replaces Akakiys only passion in life, his
job, copying. When he finally gets the coat it affects his character. He feels like a new
man when he wears it, and in fact he is treated like a different person, more respectfully.
His co-workers had made fun of him and harassed him when he wore his old bathrobe-
like coat. The new winter coat seems to open up possibilities in Akakiys life, it brings
the possibility of friends, drinking, love-affairs and newfound respect. Even though the
14
coat brings new possibilities, it doesnt seem as though the possibilities will be
Akakiys to grasp. When he leaves the drinking meeting at a co-workers apartment he
finds his coat lying on the floor instead of on a hanger. Noticeably his coat was the only
one on the floor. This gives the reader a hint that his newfound respect will not last
long. On his walk home that same evening two moustached men steal the coat from
Akakiy and with that his newfound respect and potential. However, Akakiy's potential
for growth as a character was never very convincing (Peace, p. 143).
Akakiy talks to the police but receives no help at all. He then goes to see a
person of significance (opposed to his own insignificance) to ask for help. The
significant person insults and badgers Akakiy, he has no interest in helping this
insignificant person. Some days after having been insulted, badgered and put in his
place at the meeting Akakiy dies. He comes back as a ghost and gets his revenge. Rather
than finding the thieves that stole his coat he takes the significant persons coat. This
event mirrors Akakiys coat and the potential it gave him. The significant person had
just come from an evening of drinking and feels very different when his coat is taken.
The coat seems to be more than mere clothing. Its ironic that during his life Akakiy
was like a living dead, leading a life of indifference but after death he is full of life and
character (Peace, p. 144-147).
The narrator of The Overcoat doesnt take a look into the psyche of the
characters, in fact he adamantly refuses to do so. He leaves it entirely up to the reader to
read into Akakiys mind and the situations he finds himself in (Peace, p. 149). This
method Gogol used is according to the realistic genre. However, the story begins
unrealistically with ambiguity about what department Akakiy works in. The story builds
up gradually until Akakiy finally receives his coat, but the reader knows that something
will happen and as a result Akakiy will lose the coat. However, most readers probably
15
dont expect a ghost in this story because of the realistic elements, such as Akakiy's job
and money problems. Gogol uses exaggerations and the overall mood of the story is
strange, most readers probably dont know whether to laugh or cry. The below average
character of Akakiy is so pitiful, alone and unlucky, most readers probably find him
highly exaggerated, unrealistic, sad and humorous.

THE NOSE
The Nose is a truly bizarre story. It starts with Yakovlevich, the drunken barber, and
his extremely annoyed wife. Yakovlevich wakes up one morning smelling his wifes
home baked bread rolls. Much to his surprise he finds a cut off nose in one of them.
Throughout the story theres strange behaviour and misplaced actions. One would
suspect Yakovlevich to criticize his wife for her lack of bread making skills, however it
somehow turns out to be a chance for Yakovlevichs wife to scold him (Peace, p. 134).
The barber speculates how the nose got into the bread but recognizes immediately
whose nose it is. It belongs to Major Kovalev, who he shaves every Wednesday and
Sunday. Yakovlevich throws the nose into the river Neva because he worries that he has
in a drunken state cut the Majors nose off while shaving him. This, like almost
everything in the story, makes no sense, how could that have happened? A barber
accidentally cuts a customers nose off and the customer doesnt notice, pays and walks
out? That's completely irrational. There is no reality possible in that scenario. The story
is complete fantasy.
Major Kovalev wakes up one morning with an itch to investigate a pimple on his
nose. He, instead, discovers that he is missing an appendage. He doesnt feel any
physical pain, however it brings him a lot of angst. Strangely he doesnt see a doctor for
this ailment, instead he goes to see the police, even though theres a doctor living in the
16
same building. Its interesting to see that both Yakovlevich and Major Kovalev woke up
due to their noses. The nose itself has an interesting and bizarre role in the story. In
Yakovlevichs case the nose has been cut off, baked in an oven and thrown into the
river, its most certainly a dead object. However in Kovalevs case the nose is alive, it
talks, wears clothes and goes about as a regular human being. In fact, the nose is a civil
servant of a higher status than Kovalev. When Yakovlevich tosses the nose into Neva an
officer confronts him, the same officer captures the nose in its form as a human being
and delivers it to Kovalev wrapped in a piece of paper in its dead form. Kovalev doesnt
blame Yakovlevich because he is sure that the nose was intact after his shave on
Wednesday, and knows he would have felt pain if it had been cut off, in addition he is
surprised that the area is healed and smooth like a pancake (Peace, p. 131-133).
Kovalevs attempts to reattach his nose prove to be unsuccessful. It takes 13
days from the finding of the nose in the bread before the nose reappears on Kovalevs
face. It doesnt seem plausible that the disappearance of the nose could have been the
barbers fault, nor does Kovalev blame the barber. In fact, almost immediately after the
miraculous reattachment of the nose the barber goes to see Kovalev, who agrees to a
shave without worry of clumsy hands, instead he worries whether the hands are clean.
Kovalev believes the disappearance of his nose is somehow the work of Podtochina, a
woman in his life. Kovalev is very concerned with position and title and is very insulted
by the fact that his own nose is walking the streets of St Petersburg with a higher rank
than he. In fact, a rank three places higher. Kovalev calls himself a major, masquerading
as a man of military status even though he is a mere civil servant. In confronting his
nose in a church he insist that the nose should know its place, meaning both that it
should be on Kovalevs face and that it surely shouldnt be of a higher rank (Peace, p.
134-137).
17
Kovalev is very concerned with women and even gets distracted by one when he
finally catches up to his nose and therefore loses it. Some have implied that this missing
appendage might as well have been his penis. After the miraculous reattachment of
Kovalevs nose he feels more confident and has no problem with pursuing women
(Peace, p. 138-139). Kovalev tries to find a reasonable explanation for his loss of an
appendage. Either he might be drunk or dreaming. The title (nose) is (dream)
backwards, nevertheless Gogol is adamant in not explaining the story to keep its unique
absurdity. The narrator seems bewildered by his own story and doesnt realize how
bizarre it is until its finished.
[] there is no attempt in The Nose to provide any logical handle by which
the reader might grasp the storys absurdity. (Peace, p. 131) The absurdities in The
Nose are not even a realistic mirroring of the absurdities one finds in the real world.
The absurdities are an imagined fantasy. The Nose and The Overcoat have
similarities one cannot look past. Both stories are about a loss and regain of an object.
In both cases the lack of the object means lack of possibilities for the owners, both in
love affairs and career. Kovalev feels uncomfortable in pursuing women without his
nose, and in much the same way Akakiy feels like opportunities arise along with his
new winter coat. Kovalev sees his loss of a nose will directly affect his career chances
as Akakiy with the new coat immediately receives respect and friendship from his
colleagues who had been in the habit of harassing him. The difference is that Akakiy
worked hard to be able to afford a new coat, it gets stolen and as a result he dies, comes
back as a ghost and steals another coat. Whereas Kovalev always had his nose, loses it
mysteriously for 13 days, regains it and continues his life. It's also according to the
fantastic genre that in both cases the object is returned by supernatural means (Peace, p.
140).
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THE PORTRAIT
In The Portrait Gogols topic is life after death. Its a very unrealistic story and its
not a comic story like The Nose or The Overcoat. A young artist, Chertkov, buys a
portrait with the last of his money. The portrait is of an old man with noticeable eyes.
Chertkov hangs the portrait up on a wall and studies it. The portrait seems to be no
longer a piece of art, but a living thing. The eyes especially seem to be human eyes
carved out of the head of a person and placed into the portrait. This is so disturbing that
Chertkov covers the portrait before going to sleep. He, in a state of being neither asleep
nor awake, sees that the portrait is no longer covered and the old man is looking at him.
Actually he seems to be looking straight through him, not only at him but also into him.
The old man jumps out of the frame, pushing himself out by placing his hands on the
frame. He pulls bags of money from under his sleeves. Chertkov steals one because of
his money troubles, but the old man notices and takes it back. The old man advises
Chertkov to stop trying to deepen his understanding of art and rather paint portraits
himself.
The artist wakes up, standing in front of the portrait still seeing the old man
moving within it. The artist then wakes up again, this time lying in bed looking at the
portrait, seeing the old man struggling to get the cover off. And once more the artist
wakes up. The reader really never knows if the story is a dream or some supernatural
event, dream and reality fuse together in a frightening way. The artist himself questions
his perceptions of the events of the night when he finally wakes up in the morning. He
thinks the expression on the old mans face is saying that he did in fact visit the artist
during the night. When the police and landlord are about to evict Chertkov, he is
miraculously provided with money. The policeman unknowingly releases a bag of
money from the portrait and Chertkov grabs it. He is then without explanation provided
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with clients who want a portrait painted and therefore follows the advice of the old man.
Gogol explores the superficial in this story. Chertkov becomes a society painter,
portraying people without knowing anything about them, their habits, passions or heart.
He becomes richer yet begins his own ruin.
Chertkov realizes that he cannot paint as well as a contemporary who has
studied Italian art for a living, he realizes the boundaries he has set himself. His name
gives a clue to this as well (cherta) can mean line, boundary or feature, although
Gogol later revised the name to Chartkov. Chertkov cant cross the boundaries of the
superficial, he cant redeem himself from his own shallow art. He uses the money he
has earned and buys and destroys all genius pieces of art he can get his hands on. This is
probably a reference to Gogols own insecurities with his own work; he repeatedly
burnt his own work.
Chertkov dies with nightmares of a room filled with portraits of eyes. The idea
of eyes in this story seems to be both too natural and supernatural. After Chertkov's
death the portrait goes to auction. The portrait itself is a bringer of death and the
description of the auction is full of funeral-like imagery. The auctioneer has a
melancholic tone of voice and refers to the bidders as rapacious birds. Another artist
stops the bidding on the portrait, telling everyone that the old man portrayed was a
usurer who lent people money even though they had no possible means to repay him.
He tells everyone that the usurer was possessed by the devil and that the money was
evil. This second artists father had been the one to portray the usurer. The usurer had
wanted to live after his death, he didnt want to die completely and asked for a portrait
which was accurate and life like. The artists father achieved remarkable lifelikeness,
especially in the eyes and became afraid of finishing his work. The usurer convinced
him to finish so that he would be able to live on in a supernatural way. The painter later
20
asked his son (the second artist) to find the portrait and destroy it. When the artist
finished telling everyone at the auction his story he realizes that the portrait has been
stolen. And so the mystery remains.

POES STORIES
Poe has often been called the father of the short story, though that might just be because
he was among its first theorists. Poe was, during his life, mostly known as a critic. He
criticised the work of his contemporary and rival, Hawthorne. Hawthorne and Poe are
easily comparable, they both wrote dark Gothic tales. Poe was always concerned with
the acquiring of unity, however painfully []. (Poe, p. XIV)
Germany seems to pop up regularly when looking into writings of gothic or
fantastic genre. In Poes preface to Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (1840) he
claimed that terror is not of Germany, but of the soul (Poe, p. XV). Poes stories
almost always look into the psyche of its characters, showing either signs of madness,
melancholy or strange behaviour caused by drug or alcohol use. Poes popular themes
are death, life after death, love, pride and beauty.

THE TELL TALE HEART
The narrator plays an important role in The Tell Tale Heart. He is unnamed and
begins his story by telling the reader he is nervous but not mad. He confesses to the
reader that he killed an old man, however he wants to tell the story to support that he is
in fact not mad. Because of the narrators constant reassurance that he is not mad, more
often than not the reader will suspect that he is indeed mad. His main reasoning is that
the murder was committed in such a cool, relaxed and planned way that his actions
cannot be considered mad. He spent time and care in preparing his criminal act by
21
observing the old man in his sleep every night for a week before he chose the right
moment. Strangely enough he committed the murder because he feared so the old mans
pale blue eye. This again suggests to the reader that he is indeed mad, for such a reason
is quite crazy. On one of these sleep-observing nights, the narrator fears that the
neighbours have heard the loud terrified heartbeat of the old man so somewhat
carelessly he decides to commit the deed. He mutilates the corpse and hides it below the
floorboards of the old mans bedroom, leaving not one blood drop in the room.
The police arrives, because a neighbour heard the old mans shriek, not
heartbeat. The narrator welcomes the policemen inside and tries to appear normal. He
even takes the policemen on a tour of the whole house without acting suspiciously,
ending the tour in the old mans room, where he takes a chair to the exact spot of the
dismembered-limbs-filled floorboards. The policemen do not suspect any ill-doing at
this point as they sit and talk. Again the narrator starts to hear a heartbeat and is certain
it must be the beat of the old mans heart. He panics, believing that the policemen must
also hear the sound and thereby know his guilt. Driven mad by the idea that they are
mocking his agony with their pleasant chatter, he confesses to the crime and shrieks at
the men to rip up the floorboards.
The Tell Tale Heart is a story of paranoia and mental decline. The narrators
obsession with the old mans eye, heartbeat and his own sanity is central to the paranoia
illustrated in the story. The narrator sees his nervousness and sensitivity as a
confirmation of sanity rather than a sign of madness. The narrator is able to tell the story
with accuracy, which could be a basis for believing his sanity, however his story is
about a murder, which completely undermines the control he has on the narration itself.
The story explores a psychological issue later developed into theory by Sigmund Freud.
The issue of people harming the ones they love. The narrator loves the old man, yet
22
hates his vulture eye. He doesnt have a common motive for killing the old man, his
motive is his compulsive fear of the old mans eye.
In the narrators imagination he can separate the physical eye from the person of
the old man, and wants to rid the old man of the evil eye and the burden it brings. By
murdering the old man he shows how much he saw the eye as a separate part from the
old man himself. When the narrator mutilates the old man he again imagines that the
heart is still working and in fact working against him as the evil eye had done before.
He is completely unable to distinguish between real and imagined sounds. The narrator
is completely irrational when he is more concerned about the low sounding beating of
the old mans heart when still alive than his shrieking when being killed. The police
dont have a traditional role in the story. They are nice and courteous and dont
represent authority or external power. Poe is more interested in the powers of the mind.
As is to be anticipated the narrators guilt and paranoia make him give himself away
after having acted more and more innocent and at ease. He loses control and mistakes
his own heartbeat for that of the old mans. The fact that he still doesnt recognize his
own madness or himself as a villain is made clear in the end when he calls the
policemen villains. The moral of the story might be that everyone feels guilt, even those
who are mad and dont recognize that they're guilty.

THE OVAL PORTRAIT
In Poes Philosophy of Composition he wrote that the death of a beautiful woman was
the most poetic topic (Richards, 308). This is Poes topic in The Oval Portrait. An
essential element for the fantastic in this story is the ambiguity of narration. The story is
a framed narrative and in this very short tale Poe uses two unnamed narrators. First the
initial narrator of the tale and second the narrator of the book he reads.
23
The first narrator is vague since he is injured and confesses that he may have
inaccurate perception of events. He may be delirious from pain and can simply not be
trusted to give an accurate narration. He finds an abandoned mansion in which he
spends the night. Theres no explanation of how he has come to be wounded or why he
is wandering around seeking refuge. The setting is as ambiguous as the narration. The
mansion is at the same time magnificent and gloomy. The narrator admires the antique
decorations of the mansion and decides that it has recently been abandoned and
probably only temporarily, there is no explanation or reason given for the seemingly
sudden abandonment.
The narrator discovers a book on the pillow in the room he has chosen to rest,
perhaps it supernaturally got to this exact place. He reads the book until the position of
the candlelight annoys him and he decides to move it. In doing so the light brings his
attention to a portrait he hadnt noticed before. Strangely enough he only glances at the
portrait of a young, ripening woman. He closes his eyes as if to rid himself of the
delirium to be able to appreciate the portrait and examine it more carefully. He wonders
if his delirium deceived him for but a moment in thinking that the girl was real, because
the portrait moves him so. He remains fixated on it for an hour or so. Finally the
narrator falls back into the bed in awe of the life-likeness of the portrait and looks up the
portraits number in the book to read about it.
Here Poe uses the second narrator to tell the story of the maiden of the rarest
beauty. As soon as with the second sentence Poe gives the reader an idea that something
bad will happen, perhaps by the hands of the painter. And evil was the hour when she
saw, and loved, and wedded the painter. (Poe, p. 209) She was married to a painter
who was already in a manner of speaking married to art. Here art is supernaturally
personified as another woman, a rival for the young beautiful woman. The young
24
woman was described as loving and gleeful, however hating her rival the art. She hates
it when her husband ask to portray her, all the same obediently agrees to it and goes
through the tediousness of sitting for hours on end for weeks until the portrait is
finished. The painter was moody and passionate about his work, oblivious to the pain it
brought his wife, however obvious it was to everyone else. She grew weaker and
weaker as he grew wilder and wilder with passion for the portrait. It was as if he pulled
colour from her cheeks to the canvas. With this the young woman is de-personified into
the artists palette (Richards, 309). When he finished the work he himself was pale and
unsteady, maybe somewhat insane, probably from working without any meal breaks for
weeks. He screams that the painting is Life itself, looks at his wife and realizes she is
dead. The representation of the woman has become more real than the actual woman.
The portrait then lives on while the woman is dead; the portrait is life after death. The
story has a very abrupt ending, without elaborate explanations.

COMPARISON
Stories by Gogol and Poe are meant to entertain, and so they do. However, Poes stories
contain more horror and murder whereas Gogols stories are more absurd and bizarre,
and often go misunderstood. The differences are more obvious than the similarities.
There are huge differences in the stories, however there also are many things that are
very much alike. Both writers were greatly influenced by German folk tales and their
stories bear witness to that. Folktales were usually mythical stories that generally didnt
have much to do with reality. All the stories compared here dont have much to do with
reality, except for The Tell Tale Heart, which unfortunately could very well have
happened.
25
The stories compared here have common entities or themes, such as policemen,
ambiguous narrators, loss and gain, obsessions, art, attention to specific body parts.
Vampirism is apparent in The Portrait and The Oval Portrait. The Overcoat and
The Tell Tale Heart deal with obsessions, with either a winter coat or an evil eye.
Eyes are a central idea in both The Portrait and The Tell Tale Heart, even more the
eyes seem to have a life on their own and seem to somehow be evil. The eyes are dead
objects that have come alive, similar to Major Kovalevs nose (though not quite as
literally). Madness plays a big part in Poes stories whereas dreams are more important
in these stories by Gogol, however, Gogol has used the serious theme of madness in his
stories, for example in his short story The Diary of a Madman. [] it bears the
recognisable Gogolian stamp of laughter through tears. Laughter, which treats
madness as comic [] (Peace, p. 125). Gogol evokes the same feeling when reading
about poor Akakiy as the reader often does not know whether to weep or laugh.
The mood of the stories is quite different, most readers get a feeling of
overwhelming strangeness when reading these stories by Gogol, but get a feeling of
something horrifying in Poes stories. Choice of words matters most to set the mood,
Poe uses such words as evil, nervous, mad, moody, hideous, gloomy, making the mood
very dark and horrifying. Instead Gogol for instance repeats his characters name in
The Overcoat which is the word children use for excrement, Gogols description of
Akakiys physical appearance also gives a comical, exaggerated mood. The mood in
Gogols story The Portrait is more dark and gloomy like the Poes stories than The
Overcoat or The Nose.
Character creation is handled differently in these stories. Gogol realistically
describes his characters physical appearance, gives them names, jobs and wives. This
doesnt mean that the stories are realistic, the fantastic plot and supernatural events
26
completely take over. The realistic description is indeed realistic yet exaggerated. Poe
on the other hand doesnt give his characters names or physical descriptions. He
however follows romanticism in looking into the characters psychology, or at least
giving it attention. Gogol completely refrains from peeking into his characters
psychology.
Its important to look at the narrator when establishing into which genre a story
fits. Fantastic narrators are usually those we cannot trust to be telling the truth or those
who may have perceived events differently due to alcohol or other interferences with
the sober mind. The Tell Tale Heart has a first person ambiguous narrator, he so
adamantly tries to prove that he is not mad, that its impossible to think he is sane. The
Oval Portrait has two narrators; the first one is delirious from an injury that is not
explained at all. The second one is unidentified, he could have been the young girl's
father, mother or someone secretly in love with her, angered by the fact that she was
dead and therefore his narration is coloured by the anger. In The Overcoat theres an
omniscience third person narrator who is very ambiguous about which town and in
which department the story took place. He seems to know the details, but is unwilling to
give them. Other details he willingly gives, e.g. the name and status of the protagonist.
The narrator in The Nose is also an omniscience third person narrator. The setting is
the same in all the stories by Gogol, St Petersburg. Poe doesnt reveal any city, town or
even country for his setting and in both stories the whole plot unfolds in a single
building.

CONCLUSION
The five stories compared here have similar elements such as life after death,
policemen, ambiguous narrators, loss and gain, obsessions, art and attention to specific
27
body parts. The differences, however, are mostly in the mood of the stories, narration
and the fact that one uses realistic elements and the other doesnt. The narration is
usually an omniscient third person in the stories chosen by Gogol, whereas in the stories
by Poe there is usually a first person narrator.
All of the stories are meant to entertain, though in a different way, Poes stories
are more horrifying and Gogols more comical. The mood is therefore usually darker in
Poes stories, though The Portrait by Gogol does have a similar feeling of evil and
horror as The Tell Tale Heart and The Oval Portrait. Gogol gives his characters
names and jobs and a seemingly real life, in his stories there is a definite critique on
society, although it is quite possible to enjoy reading them without reading into the
social critique.
These two contemporary writers from very different countries were born in the
same year and were both influenced by German folktales. They didnt have similar
upbringings or family situations. Life in Russia and in the United States must have been
very different at that time, as different as it is today. However, the fact is that both these
authors lived for a period of time in Western Europe and they were influenced by the
same mythical folk stories and both belong to the Romantic era.
As stated before Poe is indisputably regarded a Gothic writer, however, maybe
thats a far too general categorization for his stories. The Tell Tale Heart and The
Oval Portrait are short stories that can easily be described as Fantasy writing. The
ambiguous narrator is either pain induced or mad. The Tell Tale Heart has an eye that
seems alive and evil and The Oval Portrait has a girl whose life is drawn from her to a
portrait. The difference in Poes fantastic stories and Gogols is mainly the fact that
Gogol uses realistic descriptions of work, wives etc. Even though Poes The Tell Tale
Heart could possibly have happened in real life he doesnt use any realistic
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descriptions in the story. Both authors trademarks are entertainment and mystification,
which is apparent in all these wonderfully imaginative stories.
29
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