Ivan Fyodorovich Sponka and His Auntie - Nicolai Gogol's extraordinary tale of humor and imagination, not nearly as famous as The Overcoat or The Diary of a Madman or The Nose but a tale containing the most spectacular nightmare in all of Russian literature.
Nicolai Gogol is all about writing style; his humor and satire are bound up with word choice, offbeat shifting of tone, a sense of play and timing, timing, timing. As a way of capturing at least a small sense of the author’s actual language, I’ve linked my comments to nine quotes taken from the story’s introductory paragraph and five chapters.
“I put it in the drawer of a small table; I think you know it well: it stands in the corner just where you come in the door . . . But I forget, you’ve never visited me there.” --------- So relates the tale’s narrator in the brief, playful introduction, setting the frame for how his house servant used the last part of this story written down by Stepan Ivanovich Kurochka for baking pies, thus the tale is incomplete. But, please don’t be fooled: this Gogol story possess a unsurpassed completeness - it is a matter of a reader understanding the depth and beauty of Sponka’s dream in the final chapter.
I. IVAN FYODOROVICH SPONKA
“Ivan Fyodorovich, although he usually behaved properly, on this occasion was hungry and unable to resist temptation; he took the pancake, placed a book in front of him, and began eating it.” ---------- In all his years in school, Sponka was a well-behaved and diligent model student. But there was that one time when Sponka was overcome by hunger and love of pancakes. And predictably in a society condoning beating and abusing children, Sponka received a canning resulting in a lifelong psychological scar. Gogol employed satire and understatement to portray men and women as violent pigheaded brutes.
“Perhaps that very incident was the reason he never had the desire to enter government service, having learned by experience that one is not always successful in concealing one’s crimes.” ---------- Gogol’s subtle dig at government service employees – officials using their position within the government to swindle and cheat.
“To demonstrate further the cultural level of the P. regiment, we’ll add that two officers were terrible gamblers and lost their uniforms, caps, overcoats, sword knots, and even their underwear, which is more than you can say about many other regiments.” ---------- Gogol’s satire on what passes for culture in the army: dancing the mazurka and playing cards.
"He drilled his men so well that the company commander always held him up as an example. As a result, in a short time, only eleven years after becoming an ensign, he was promoted to second lieutenant." ---------- Only eleven years to receive a promotion! Then again we must acknowledge the Russian army has such high standards. What a scream.
II. THE TRIP
“You should know, kind sir, that I have the custom of plugging my ears at night since that awful time when a cockroach crawled into my left ear in one Russian inn. Those damned Russians, as I found out later, will even eat their cabbage soup with cockroaches in it. It’s impossible to describe what was going on: it tickled my ear, it really did . . . it nearly drove me mad!” ---------- So speaks fat Grigory Grigorevich, a complete self-centered lout and buffoon. Gogol pokes fun at this fatso at every opportunity. This chapter highlights Sponka's return to his farm and how he is a goodhearted, honest man in a world of dishonest gluttons and slobs.
III. AUNTIE
However, he was always out in the fields with the reapers and the mowers, and this afforded his gentle soul inexpressible enjoyment. The uniform sweep of a dozen or more shining scythes; the sound of the sheaves of grass falling in straight rows; the songs of the reapers pouring forth from time to time, now cheerful, as if greeting guests, then mournful, as if parting from them; and the peaceful clear evening, and what an evening it was! The air was so fresh and pure! How full of life everything was then: the steppe was turning red and blue and was aflame with flowers; quails, bustards, gulls, grasshoppers, and thousands of insects, and from them, whistling, buzzing, droning, and crackling at once merging into a harmonious choir; nothing was silent, even for a moment. The sun was setting and going into hiding. Oh! How fresh and fine! ---------- Pure, simple, kindhearted Sponka is keenly aware of the beauty in nature. In this sense, the high point in life for Sponka the farmer is aesthetic experience. If only people would leave him along to enjoy the natural world and take pleasure in the bountiful life surrounding him.
IV. DINNER
“My aunt had the honor of . . . she told me that a deed of gift left by the late Stepan Kuzmich . . .”
It’s difficult to depict the unpleasant expression that appeared on Storchenko’s face as soon as these words were uttered.
“So help me God, I can’t hear a thing! I must tell you that I had a cockroach in my left ear. ------------------------- This exchange between Sponka and Grigory Grigorevich underscores that author Nicolai Gogol agrees with philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer when he said: “In cannibal societies, men eat one another; in civilized societies, men deceive one another.”
V. AUNTE'S NEW SCHEME
“His wife was sitting on a chair. He felt strange; he didn’t know how to approach her, what to say; and then he noticed that his wife had the face of a goose. Inadvertently turning to one side, he saw another wife, also with the face of a goose.” ----------- This is a mere snippet from Sponka’s nightmare the night following his Auntie telling him he should get married. Auntie can even see her grandchildren running about in her kitchen. Auntie so wants to be a grandma! No matter that Sponka is not the marrying type – Auntie wants what she wants. So human but also so mulish – and so perfect for the satire and humor of Nicolai Gogol.
Russian author Nicolai Gogol, 1809-1852
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