August Book Club Discussion - Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol

ilovenerds

So how did everyone find 'Dead Souls'??:D

Any favourite characters, quotes, scenes and themes?

Anyone not like the book?

How did everyone find reading a translation of a 150 year of Russian Novel, and the fact it was so fragmented??? Did it detract from your enjoyment?

raah!

I lorved it!

Right at this moment one of my favourite characters would have to be selifan. Many selifan scenes had me loling my face off in my sitting room like a fool.

I don't think it suffered too much from its fragmentary or unfinished nature, Part 1 on its could be a classic. There are scenes in there that could be read in isolation and the descriptions and extended metaphors and things of this nature would be just as impressive as when read as a part of the story. Right I'll finish this when I'm more sober

turgon

Indeed. I think the book is good as a satire of society in the Russian countryside at the time. Some of the characters really stuck out in my brain. In particular the old woman who wouldn't sell Chichikov the Deal Souls because the deal was too good for her - she felt she must be getting used in some way.

A scenes I liked was the one where some members of the town begin suspecting Chichikov of attempting to woo the women. Without any basis the rumor starts spreading around the town so that eventually everyone believes it.


As regard the linguistics I found my translation (Robert A. Maguire; Penguin Classics) very good if a little tedious. He held true to the spirit of the Russian text, so that in his words it is obvious "a foreign text underlies the English." Some Russian sayings, I think, are present in this translation such as "in a word." And example is to be seen in the first paragraph of the book.

MissRibena

This book was much more my cup of tea. I loved the pace, the characters and the language. That said, I haven't actually finished it but am 70% through and will get back to it.

loismustdie

hey guys is there a september book?

MissRibena

There was a vote here and Heart of Darkness came tops but there hasn't been any discussion yet.