Kovalev
Platon Kuzmich Kovalev is a collegiate assessor from Nikolai Gogol’s story “The Nose”. He preferred to call himself major. The author classifies this character as an idle parasite and careerist who often strolls along Nevsky. He is akin to such characters as Lieutenant Pirogov or Khlestakov, who sought to get the maximum pleasure from life without making any effort. He even came to St. Petersburg for a profitable marriage and a higher rank. Creating a portrait of this character, the author emphasized his arrogant complacency and vanity. Outwardly, he always tries to look perfect, wears starched and spotlessly clean collars, has sideburns like provincial land surveyors or architects, and regularly visits the barber. In relation to the female sex, Major Kovalev had a weakness, was often distracted by beauties and flirted with many society ladies.
He demonstrates his entire stature while facing Nevsky, and his nose is a kind of landmark for him. It is also a symbol of piety and integrity.
And then one day, Kovalev wakes up and doesn’t find his nose on his face. He rushes to the chief police chief, but on the way he meets his nose in a uniform, and even in high rank. He tries to talk to him, but he does not confess and eludes Kovalev. Plato reaches the chief police chief, but does not find him there, then decides to advertise the missing nose in the newspaper, but the advertisement is not accepted. Finally, he reaches a private bailiff, but he also refuses to take up his case. Suddenly, a policeman comes to his house and returns his nose. He doesn’t want to come back to his face for a long time, but soon he returns to his place and the story ends happily for the main character.
So, by depriving Kovalev of his nose, the author calls into question his moral merits. Even a private bailiff notes that a decent person’s nose will not be torn off. The disappearance of Kovalev’s nose could also be associated with the loss of a human face in pursuit of dubious pleasures.
Ivan Yakovlevich
Ivan Yakovlevich is a character in N.V. Gogol’s story “The Nose”, a sloppy barber. This is an ordinary Russian artisan who was a terrible drunkard and slob. Although he shaved other people's chins every day, he always left his own unshaven. He did not wear a frock coat, as expected, but had a piebald tailcoat with a shiny collar, the buttons of which barely hung on threads. By nature, Ivan Yakovlevich was a cynic. When the collegiate assessor Kovalev came to him to shave and made a remark about the barber’s unkempt hands, he took a hearty sniff of tobacco and soaped the client wherever he pleased: behind the ears, under the nose, on the cheeks, etc.
According to the story, one spring morning, instead of coffee, Ivan Yakovlevich wanted freshly baked bread. When he cut the loaf in half, he found the nose of the collegiate assessor Kovalev himself. His wife gave him a scandal, called him a drunkard who couldn’t do his job with dignity, and kicked him out onto the street so that he could get out of the house. Ivan Yakovlevich, carefully wrapping him in a rag, first decided to throw him somewhere until the police showed up. Then he decided to throw his nose into the river. Having reached the St. Isaac's Bridge, he stopped to see how many fish were swimming in the river. Unnoticed, as it seemed to him, he turned his nose down and headed towards the establishment with the sign “Food and Tea”, when he suddenly noticed the quarterly overseer. He beckoned him with his finger and began asking many questions. The nose was found and returned to the collegiate assessor, but it did not go back into place.
Nikolai Gogol - Nose
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Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol
Nose
I
On March 25th, an unusually strange incident happened in St. Petersburg. The barber Ivan Yakovlevich, who lives on Voznesensky Prospekt (his last name has been lost, and even on his sign - which depicts a gentleman with a soaped cheek and the inscription: “and the blood is opened” - nothing more is displayed), the barber Ivan Yakovlevich woke up quite early and heard the smell of hot of bread. Raising himself a little on the bed, he saw that his wife, a rather respectable lady who was very fond of drinking coffee, was taking freshly baked loaves out of the oven.
“Today, Praskovya Osipovna, I will not drink coffee,” said Ivan Yakovlevich: “but instead I want to eat hot bread with onions.” (That is, Ivan Yakovlevich would have wanted both, but he knew that it was completely impossible to demand two things at once: for Praskovya Osipovna really did not like such whims.) Let the fool eat bread; I feel better,” my wife thought to herself: “there will be an extra portion of coffee left.” And she threw one bread on the table.
For the sake of decency, Ivan Yakovlevich put on a tailcoat over his shirt and, sitting down in front of the table, poured salt, prepared two onions, picked up a knife and, making a significant face, began to cut bread. “Having cut the bread into two halves, he looked into the middle and, to his surprise, saw something turning white. Ivan Yakovlevich carefully picked with a knife and felt with his finger: “Is it dense?” - he said to himself: “What would that be?”
He stuck his fingers in and pulled out - his nose!.. Ivan Yakovlevich dropped his hands; He began to rub his eyes and feel: his nose, like a nose! and it also seemed as if he was someone’s acquaintance. Horror was depicted in the face of Ivan Yakovlevich. But this horror was nothing against the indignation that took possession of his wife.
“Where are you, beast, did you cut off your nose?” she screamed with anger. - "Scammer! drunkard! I'll report you to the police myself. What a robber! I’ve heard from three people that when you shave, you pull your noses so much that you can barely hold on.”
But Ivan Yakovlevich was neither alive nor dead. He learned that this nose was none other than the collegiate assessor Kovalev, whom he shaved every Wednesday and Sunday.
“Stop, Praskovya Osipovna! I will put it, wrapped in a rag, in a corner: let it lie there for a little while; and then I’ll take it out.”
“And I don’t want to listen! So that I would allow a cut off nose to lie in my room?.. Crispy cracker! Know he only knows how to use a razor on a belt, but soon he will not be able to fulfill his duty at all, the slut, the scoundrel! So that I would answer the police for you?.. Oh, you dirty, stupid log! There he is! out! take it wherever you want! so that I don’t hear him in spirit!”
Ivan Yakovlevich stood absolutely dead. He thought and thought - and did not know what to think. “The devil knows how it happened,” he said finally, scratching his hand behind his ear. “Whether I came back drunk yesterday or not, I certainly can’t say. And by all indications, it must have been an unrealistic incident: for bread is a baked affair, but the nose is not at all like that. I can’t make out anything!..” Ivan Yakovlevich fell silent. The thought that the police would find his nose and accuse him drove him completely unconscious. Already he was imagining a scarlet collar, beautifully embroidered with silver, a sword... and he was trembling all over. Finally, he took out his underwear and boots, pulled all this rubbish on himself and, accompanied by the difficult admonitions of Praskovya Osipovna, wrapped his nose in a rag and went out into the street.
He wanted to slip it somewhere: either into a cabinet under the gate, or somehow accidentally drop it, and turn into an alley. But to his misfortune, he came across some familiar person who immediately began with the request: “Where are you going?” or “Who are you planning to shave so early?” so Ivan Yakovlevich could not find a moment. Another time, he had already completely dropped it, but the guard from afar pointed to him with a halberd, saying: “Lift up!” You dropped something!” And Ivan Yakovlevich had to raise his nose and hide it in his pocket. Despair took possession of him, especially since the people constantly multiplied on the street as shops and shops began to open.
He decided to go to the St. Isaac's Bridge: would it be possible to somehow throw him into the Neva?.. But I am somewhat guilty that I have not yet said anything about Ivan Yakovlevich, a respectable man in many respects.
Ivan Yakovlevich, like any decent Russian artisan, was a terrible drunkard. And although he shaved other people’s chins every day, his own was never shaved. Ivan Yakovlevich's tailcoat (Ivan Yakovlevich never wore a frock coat) was piebald, that is, it was black, but covered in brown-yellow and gray apples; the collar was shiny; and instead of three buttons there were only threads hanging. Ivan Yakovlevich was a great cynic, and when the collegiate assessor Kovalev usually said to him while shaving: “Your hands, Ivan Yakovlevich, always stink!”, Ivan Yakovlevich answered this with the question: “Why would they stink?” “I don’t know, brother, they just stink,” said the collegiate assessor, and Ivan Yakovlevich, having sniffed the tobacco, lathered him for it on his cheek, and under his nose, and behind his ear, and under his beard, in a word, wherever he needed it. hunting.
This respectable citizen was already on the St. Isaac's Bridge. First of all, he looked around; then he bent down on the railing as if to look under the bridge to see how many fish were running, and quietly threw the rag with his nose. He felt as if ten pounds had been dropped from him at once: Ivan Yakovlevich even grinned. Instead of going to shave the bureaucratic chins, he went to an establishment with a sign: “Food and tea” to ask for a glass of punch, when he suddenly noticed at the end of the bridge a quarterly overseer of noble appearance, with wide sideburns, in a triangular hat, with a sword. He froze; and meanwhile the policeman nodded his finger at him and said: “Come here, my dear!”
Ivan Yakovlevich, knowing the uniform, took off his cap from a distance and, approaching quickly, said: “I wish your honor health!”
“No, no, brother, not the nobility; Tell me, what were you doing there, standing on the bridge?”
“By God, sir, I went to shave, but I just looked to see how fast the river was going.”
“You’re lying, you’re lying! You can't get away with this. Please answer!”
“I am ready to shave your honor twice a week, or even three, without any argument,” answered Ivan Yakovlevich.
“No, buddy, it’s nothing! Three barbers shave me, and they honor me as a great honor. But would you please tell me what you did there?”
Ivan Yakovlevich turned pale... But here the incident is completely obscured by fog, and what happened next is absolutely unknown.
II
The collegiate assessor Kovalev woke up quite early and made a “brrr...” with his lips, which he always did when he woke up, although he himself could not explain for what reason. Kovalev stretched and ordered himself to hand over the small mirror that was standing on the table. He wanted to look at the pimple that had popped up on his nose the previous evening; but to my greatest amazement I saw that instead of a nose he had a completely smooth place! Frightened, Kovalev ordered water and wiped his eyes with a towel: there was definitely no nose! He began to feel with his hand to find out if he was sleeping? doesn't seem to be sleeping. Collegiate assessor Kovalev jumped out of bed, shook himself: no nose!.. He ordered him to immediately get dressed and flew straight to the chief of police.
But meanwhile, it is necessary to say something about Kovalev so that the reader can see what kind of collegiate assessor he was. Collegiate assessors who receive this title with the help of academic certificates cannot in any way be compared with those collegiate assessors who were made in the Caucasus. These are two very special genera. Learned collegiate assessors... But Russia is such a wonderful land that if you talk about one collegiate assessor, then all the collegiate assessors, from Riga to Kamchatka, will certainly take it personally. Understand the same about all titles and ranks. – Kovalev was a Caucasian collegiate assessor. He had only been in this rank for two years and therefore could not forget it for a minute; and in order to give himself more nobility and weight, he never called himself a collegiate assessor, but always a major. “Listen, my dear,” he usually said, when he met a woman on the street selling shirt-fronts: “you come to my house; my apartment is in Sadovaya; Just ask: does Major Kovalev live here? Anyone will show you.” If he met some pretty girl, he would give her a secret order, adding: “Ask, darling, Major Kovalev’s apartment.” “That’s why we ourselves will call this collegiate assessor major in the future.”
Major Kovalev used to walk along Nevsky Prospect every day. The collar of his shirtfront was always extremely clean and starched. His sideburns were of the kind that can still be seen today on provincial and povet land surveyors, on architects and regimental doctors, also on those performing various police duties, and, in general, on all those men who have full, rosy cheeks and play very well at boston: these sideburns go down the middle of the cheek and go straight to the nose. Major Kovalev wore many carnelian signets with coats of arms, and those on which were carved: Wednesday, Thursday, Monday, etc. Major Kovalev came to St. Petersburg out of necessity, namely to look for a place decent for his rank: if possible, then a vice-governor, or else an executor in some prominent department. Major Kovalev was not averse to getting married; but only in such a case when the bride gets two hundred thousand in capital. And therefore the reader can now judge for himself: what was the position of this major when he saw, instead of a rather good and moderate nose, a stupid, even and smooth place.
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