Gogol - Nikolay Vasil'evich Gogol

Japanese: ゴーゴリ - ごーごり（英語表記）Николай　Васильевич　Гоголь／Nikolay Vasil'evich Gogol'

Russian novelist and playwright.

Early life

His real name was Gogol Yanovsky. He was born on March 20, 1809 (old Russian calendar, April 1 in the Gregorian calendar) in the village of Velikye Sorotyntsy, Poltava Governorate, Ukraine, to a small landowner, and grew up in the village of Vasilievka on his father's estate. During his years at high school in the city of Nezhin (1821-1828), he developed an interest in literature, published sketches in circulating magazines, and was passionate about theater, but in 1828 he moved to the capital, St. Petersburg, with the vague determination to serve "the happiness of the country and my compatriots."

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

Friendship with Pushkin and others

The following year, in 1829, as the first step in realizing his resolve, he self-published the romantic narrative poem "Ganz Küheligarten," which he had already begun while still in high school, under the pen name V. Alov, but it received such harsh criticism that the author collected the remaining copies from bookstores and burned them. After that, he barely made a living as a low-ranking official in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but in 1830, he published an anonymous novella "Bissauryuuk, or the Eve of Ivan Kupala" in the magazine "Miscellaneous Notes of the Fatherland," which led to his acquaintance with Zhukovsky and Pushkin. In 1831, he published the first volume of "Evening Tales Near Zhikanika," a collection of stories based on Ukrainian folklore and legends, including the aforementioned "Bissauryuuk...," and in 1832, the second volume. These works were well received and he quickly became a famous author. For the most part, the stories are "simple and unpretentious" (Pushkin), full of bright humor and strong romantic overtones, and their unique combination of realistic descriptions of detail and fantasy foreshadows Gogol's later qualities.

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

Explosive creativity

On the other hand, his interest in history rapidly deepened, and in 1834 he became an assistant professor in the world history department at St. Petersburg University, where he lectured on medieval history, but due to his lack of specialist knowledge he quickly reached a dead end and resigned the following year in 1835. Ironically, however, his creative talents showed an explosive growth during these two years, and he published two volumes of his critiques and collected works, Arabeski, and Mirgorot, in succession in 1835. The latter, "Biy" and "Taras Bulba," have a strong romantic tendency, like "Evenings near Zhikanika," but in "An Old-Fashioned Landlord Couple," "The Story of Ivan Ivanovich's Quarrel with Ivan Nikiforovich," and in the former, collectively known as the "Petersburg Stories," "Nevsky Prospect" (first draft, revised in 1842), "Portrait," and "Diary of a Madman," realistic descriptions of the daily lives of small Ukrainian landowners and the lower classes of Petersburg citizens, as well as the sad laughter reflecting the author's despair or fear at the vulgarity and stupidity of life, and the so-called "laughter through tears," unique to the author, are noteworthy. In 1836, he also published the short story "The Nose," which also belongs to the "Petersburg Stories."

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

The success of "The Public Prosecutor" and life abroad

In 1835, he wrote one of his major works, the comedy The Inspector General, in one go, which created a huge sensation when it was performed in April 1836 in St. Petersburg in the presence of Emperor Nicholas I. This made Gogol realize for the first time his talent as a writer and his moral mission, and in June he traveled to Western Europe to gain deeper insight into Russian reality from the outside. From then until 1848, apart from two short periods back to Russia, he stayed in Germany, France, Switzerland, and especially Rome for almost 12 years, during which time he devoted himself to writing the first part of his novel Dead Souls, and also adapted works such as Taras Bulba, The Portrait, and The Inspector General, as well as writing The Overcoat (1842), which is considered the masterpiece of his "Petersburg stories." However, after the publication of the first part of Dead Souls (1842), the author gradually fell into a religious and mystical state of mind, and in the second part of Dead Souls he attempted to allude to Russia's bright future by creating positive characters.

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

Tragic final years

This moralistic sense of mission was in complete conflict with his artistic talent, which was characterized by an morbidly developed sense of the negative aspects of life, and so Gogol ended up with a disastrous failure, burning all the manuscripts he had written up to that point in 1845. He then published Selected Letters (1847), in which he expounded on his religious and moral ideals in the form of personal letters, but the author's childish, shallow, and reactionary views on the major questions of religion and politics expressed in these letters shocked even his conservative friends, and prompted the critic Belinsky to write a scathing letter of denunciation, which included the famous phrase, "Preacher of the whip, apostle of ignorance, defender of reactionary obscurantism, admirer of Tatar customs... Look at your feet, you are standing on an abyss."

However strange the Selected Letters may have been, Belinsky's interpretation that Gogol had suddenly changed from a "friend of progress" to a "defender of reactionary obscurantism" was clearly unjustified. Belinsky, and other radical intellectuals of the time, were devoted to Gogol because they saw in The Inspector General and Dead Souls works that faithfully reproduced the reality that they considered their ideal and at the same time contributed to the fight for social change. However, Gogol only intended to write moral satire and never wanted to change the Russian system itself. Moreover, despite his superhuman creative ability, reminiscent of Shakespeare, he was probably the poorest educated and narrow-minded of all the major Russian writers of the 19th century, and at least his views on political and social issues, even after he became famous as a writer, did not go much beyond those of his mother, an ignorant, conservative, religious, provincial landowner.

In 1848, after returning to Russia from his long-desired pilgrimage to Palestine, Gogol never left the country again and continued writing the second part of Dead Souls, which he had once burned, and was apparently nearing completion by the end of 1851. However, influenced by Matvey Konstantinovsky, a priest with whom he had corresponded as a spiritual mentor during his time abroad, Gogol began to feel guilty about remaining a writer "without divine revelation." In February 1852, he again burned the manuscript of the second part of Dead Souls, which was almost complete, and shortly thereafter, in a semi-delirious state, he went on a fast, and died on the morning of February 21 (March 4 in the Gregorian calendar). The surviving fragments of the unfinished second part of Dead Souls generally show a good performance that does not disgrace the author's name, which shows that Gogol's artistic talent did not abandon him until the end, despite his fervent desire for "spiritual self-education."

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

A genius who is difficult to evaluate

In the Soviet Union, Gogol is considered one of the founders of Russian realism, but he certainly differs from other realists (such as Turgenev, Goncharov, and Leo Tolstoy) in many ways. His method of depicting the events of the outside world not as a dispassionate observer, but always through the author's so-called "laughter" and "invisible tears" (Belinsky called this his "subjectivity"); his creation of caricatures by deformation of precisely observed external features; his satire that appears social but is in fact solely from a moral point of view; his brilliant and rhythmic writing style. However, on the other hand, it cannot be denied that his caricatures are always supported by a strong sense of reality, and that they give the impression of being more lively than real people. In short, Gogol is too unique and too great a genius to be given the category of "realist".

[Shoichi Kimura July 20, 2018]

"Complete Works of Gogol, translated by Mizuho Yokota, Hideo Nozaki, et al., 7 volumes (1976-1977, Kawade Shobo Shinsha)"

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

Japanese:

ロシアの小説家、劇作家。

生い立ち

本名ゴーゴリ・ヤノフスキー。1809年3月20日（旧ロシア暦。新暦では4月1日）、ウクライナのポルタワ県、ベリーキエ・ソローチンツィ村に小地主の子として生まれ、父の領地ワシーリエフカ村で育った。ネージン市の高等学校時代（1821～1828）には文学に興味をもち、回覧雑誌に習作を載せたり、演劇活動に熱中したりしたが、1828年、「国家と同胞の幸福」に奉仕するという漠然たる決意を抱いて首都ペテルブルグへ出た。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

プーシキンらとの交遊

翌1829年、決意実現の第一歩として、すでに高校在学中に書き始めていたロマン的な物語詩『ガンツ・キューヘリガルテン』をV・アロフの筆名で自費出版したが、さんざんの酷評を受け、作者は残部を書店から回収して焼却した。その後、内務省の下級官吏としてかろうじて生計をたてていたが、1830年、雑誌『祖国雑記』に中編『ビサウリューク、あるいはイワン・クパーラの前夜』を無署名で発表したのが機縁となってジュコフスキーやプーシキンらと相知るようになり、1831年にはウクライナの民俗や伝説に取材した、前記『ビサウリューク……』を含む物語集『ジカニカ近郷夜話』第1集、1832年には第2集を刊行、好評を博して一躍有名作家の仲間入りをした。大部分は「気取りもけれんもない」（プーシキン）、明るいユーモアに満ちたロマン的色彩の強い物語で、細部のリアルな描写と幻想性の独特な結合は、後のゴーゴリの特質を早くも予告している。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

爆発する創作力

他方、歴史に対する関心が急速に深まり、1834年にはペテルブルグ大学世界史講座の助教授になり、中世史を講じたが、専門的知識を欠いていたためたちまち行き詰まって翌1835年辞職。だが皮肉なことに創作力のほうはこの2年間に爆発的な高まりをみせ、評論・作品集『アラベスキ』2巻、作品集『ミールゴロト』を1835年に相次いで上梓(じょうし)した。後者の『ビイ』や『タラス・ブーリバ』は『ジカニカ近郷夜話』同様ロマン的な傾向が強いが、『昔かたぎの地主夫婦』『イワン・イワーノビチがイワン・ニキーフォロビチと喧嘩(けんか)をした話』、さらに「ペテルブルグもの」と総称される前者の『ネフスキー通り』（初稿、1842年改作）、『肖像画』『狂人日記』には、ウクライナの小地主やペテルブルグの下層市民の日常生活のリアルな描写や、人生の卑俗さや愚かしさに対する作者の絶望ないし恐怖を反映する悲しい笑い、この作者独特のいわゆる「涙を通しての笑い」が現れ始めていることが注目される。なお1836年には、同じく「ペテルブルグもの」に属する短編『鼻』を発表した。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

『検察官』の成功と外国生活

1835年には、代表作の一つである喜劇『検察官』も一気呵成(かせい)に書き上げられたが、これが翌1836年4月、ペテルブルグで皇帝ニコライ1世臨席のもとに上演されるや一大センセーションを巻き起こした。これによって初めて自己の作家としての才能と道徳的使命をはっきり自覚したゴーゴリは、外部からロシアの現実をより深く洞察する目的で6月西欧へ赴き、以降1848年まで、二度の短期間の帰国を除けばほぼ12年間、ドイツ、フランス、スイス、とくにローマに滞在しつつ、長編『死せる魂』第1部の執筆に没頭するとともに、『タラス・ブーリバ』『肖像画』『検察官』などの改作に従い、また「ペテルブルグもの」の最高傑作とされる『外套(がいとう)』（1842）を書いた。しかし『死せる魂』第1部公刊（1842）後、作者はしだいに宗教的、神秘的精神状態に陥り、『死せる魂』第2部においては、肯定的な人物形象の創造によってロシアの輝かしい未来を暗示しようと企てるに至った。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

悲劇的な晩年

こうしたモラリスト的使命感は、人生の否定的な面に対する感覚が病的なまでに発達した彼の芸術的才能と完全に背馳(はいち)するものであったために、結果は惨憺(さんたん)たる失敗に終わらざるをえず、1845年、ゴーゴリはそれまでに書いた原稿を焼却した。ついで自己の宗教的・道徳的理想を私信の形で説いた『交友書簡選』（1847）を出したが、ここに示された宗教や政治の大問題に関する作者の幼稚、浅薄、かつ反動的な見解は、彼の保守的な友人たちをすら驚かせ、批評家ベリンスキーに、「笞(むち)の伝道者、無知の使徒、反動的蒙昧(もうまい)主義の擁護者、タタール的習俗の賛美者……足もとを御覧なさい。あなたは深淵(しんえん)の上に立っているのです」という有名な一句を含む痛烈な弾劾の手紙を書かせる機縁ともなった。

　とはいえ、『交友書簡選』がどのように奇妙な作品であったにせよ、彼が突如として「進歩の友」から「反動的蒙昧主義の擁護者」に変貌(へんぼう)したというベリンスキーの解釈は明らかに不当であった。ベリンスキー、ないし当時の急進的知識人たちがゴーゴリに傾倒したのは、『検察官』や『死せる魂』を、彼ら自身の理想とする、現実を忠実に再現すると同時に社会変革のための戦いに役だつ作品とみたからにほかならない。ところがゴーゴリは純粋に道徳的な風刺を意図していたにすぎず、ロシアの体制そのものの変革はかつて望んだことがないばかりか、シェークスピアを思わせるような、超人的ともいうべきたくましい創作力にもかかわらず、教養はおそらく19世紀ロシアの主要作家のなかでももっとも貧しく、視野は狭く、少なくとも、政治問題や社会問題に対する見解は、彼が作家として有名になったのちも、片田舎(いなか)の無知な保守的な信心家の女地主であった母親のそれの域をたいして出てはいなかったのである。

　1848年、宿願のパレスチナへの巡礼旅行を終えてロシアへ帰ってからは、もはや国外へ出ることなく、いったん焼き捨てた『死せる魂』第2部の執筆を続け、1851年末には完成に近づいていたらしいが、他方、在外時代から霊的指導者として文通していた神父マトベイ・コンスタンチーノフスキーMatvey Konstantinovskyの影響も手伝って、「神の啓示なしに」作家としてとどまることに罪悪感を抱くようになり、1852年2月、完成直前の『死せる魂』第2部の原稿をふたたび焼却、その後まもなくなかば錯乱した状態で断食に入り、2月21日（新暦では3月4日）朝、絶命した。なお『死せる魂』第2部未定稿の現存する断片は、概して作者の名を辱めぬできばえを示しており、これによってゴーゴリの芸術的才能が、「霊的自己教育」への熱烈な希求にもかかわらず、最後まで彼を見捨てなかったことがわかる。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

評価のむずかしい異才

作家としてのゴーゴリは、ソ連ではロシア・リアリズム小説の創始者の一人とされるが、彼が種々の点で他のリアリストたち（たとえばツルゲーネフ、ゴンチャロフ、レフ・トルストイ）と違っていることも確かである。外界の事象を、冷静な観察者としてでなく、つねに作者のいわゆる「笑い」と「目に見えぬ涙」を通して描く手法（ベリンスキーはこれを彼の「主観性」とよんだ）。精密に観察された外面的特徴のデフォルマシオンによる戯画的人物形象の創造。社会的とみえながら、実はもっぱら道徳的見地からなされる風刺。華麗でリズミカルな文体。とはいえ、他方において、彼の描く戯画的人物がつねに強固な現実感覚に支えられていて、むしろ現実の人間以上に生き生きした印象を与えることも否定できない。要するにゴーゴリは「リアリスト」というような規定を与えるにはあまりに特異な、かつ偉大な天才の一人であったというほかはないようである。

［木村彰一　2018年7月20日］

『横田瑞穂・野崎韶夫他訳『ゴーゴリ全集』全7巻（1976～1977・河出書房新社）』

出典　小学館　日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)日本大百科全書(ニッポニカ)について　情報 | 凡例

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