Overcoat and Other Short Stories

Gogol's stories are admired for their skillful mingling of fantasy and reality quiet good humor and use of mundane details -- as Gogol put it -- to extract the extraordinary from the ordinary. Imaginative and timeless they remain as fresh and significant today as they were to readers generations ago.<br>This rich selection of four short stories by the great 19th-century Russian author of Dead Souls includes The Nose a savage satire of incompetent bureaucrats and the snobbery and complacency of the Russian upper classes; Old-Fashioned Farmers a sketch depicting an elderly couple who live a happy but simple life in rustic seclusion; The Tale of How Ivan Ivanovich Quarrelled with Ivan Nikiforovich and of Gogol's most famous comic stories; and The Overcoat an exceptionally moving tale -- considered a masterpiece of the form -- about a poor and much-ridiculed St. Petersburg official. Includes a selection from the Common Core State Standards Initiative: The Nose.