Dead Souls

Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol (1809 - 1852)
Translated by D. J. Hogarth

Dead Souls (Russian: Мёртвые души) by Nikolai Gogol, Russian writer, was first published in 1842, and is one of the most prominent works of 19th-century Russian literature. Gogol himself saw it as an "epic poem in prose", and within the book as a "novel in verse". Despite supposedly completing the trilogy's second part, Gogol destroyed it shortly before his death. Although the novel ends in mid-sentence (like Sterne's Sentimental Journey), it is usually regarded as complete in the extant form.

In Russia before the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, landowners were entitled to own serfs to farm their land. Serfs were for most purposes considered the property of the landowner, and could be bought, sold, or mortgaged against, as any other chattel. To count serfs (and people in general), the measure word "soul" was used: e.g., "six souls of serfs". The plot of the novel relies on "dead souls" (i.e., "dead serfs") which are still accounted for in property registers. On another level, the title refers to the "dead souls" of Gogol's characters, all of which visualise different aspects of poshlost (an untranslatable Russian word which is perhaps best rendered as "self-satisfied inferiority", moral and spiritual, with overtones of middle-class pretentiousness, fake significance, and philistinism). (Summary from Wikipedia)

Genre(s): Historical Fiction

Language: English

Section Chapter Reader Time
Play 00 Introduction by John Cournos, and Author's Preface David Barnes
00:25:39
Play 01 Part I, Chapter I Figura
00:37:00
Play 02 Part I, Chapter II - Section 1 Topaz
00:25:07
Play 03 Part I, Chapter II - Section 2 Tysto
00:38:10
Play 04 Part I, Chapter III - Section 1 hefyd
00:29:38
Play 05 Part I, Chapter III - Section 2 hefyd
00:28:19
Play 06 Part I, Chapter IV - Section 1 Julie Levi
00:29:05
Play 07 Part I, Chapter IV - Section 2 Julie Levi
00:39:52
Play 08 Part I, Chapter V - Section 1 Euan Bayliss
00:23:49
Play 09 Part I, Chapter V - Section 2 Euan Bayliss
00:38:33
Play 10 Part I, Chapter VI gmiteva
00:34:54
Play 11 Part I, Chapter VII - Section 1 Anna Simon
00:17:37
Play 12 Part I, Chapter VII - Section 2 Great Plains
00:30:18
Play 13 Part I, Chapter VIII Michael Macedonia
00:42:55
Play 14 Part I, Chapter IX Availle
00:26:13
Play 15 Part I, Chapter X Diogenes Dog
00:29:22
Play 16 Part I, Chapter XI - Section 1 Anna Simon
00:44:28
Play 17 Part I, Chapter XI - Section 2 Anna Simon
00:40:04
Play 18 Part II, Chapter I - Section 1 Anna Simon
00:38:12
Play 19 Part II, Chapter I - Section 2 Anna Simon
00:33:05
Play 20 Part II, Chapter II Gesine
00:13:57
Play 21 Part II, Chapter III - Section 1 Euan Bayliss
00:52:09
Play 22 Part II, Chapter III - Section 2 Anna Simon
00:43:23
Play 23 Part II, Chapter IV - Section 1 Anna Simon
00:41:31
Play 24 Part II, Chapter IV - Section 2 Kalynda
00:33:36
Play 25 Part II, Chapter IV - Section 3 Kalynda
00:22:28
Play 26 Part II, Chapter IV - Section 4 Kalynda
00:24:39