One of the characters wants to marry the prettiest girl in town, but she keeps rebuffing him until he subverts a devil in order to fetch for her the Tzarina’s shoes. It is full of traditions-caroling, drinking, carousing, and something to do with sacks-and is wrapped around a love story of sorts. Gogol’s “Night” is a short story from one of his collections, which tells the story of a handful of colorful 1800s Ukrainian townsfolk on a snowy Christmas Eve. Nicholas” and comes in a variety of picture books). “The Night Before Christmas” is also translated “Christmas Eve,” which at least would keep it from getting confused with the even more famous “The Night Before Christmas” poem by Clement Clarke Moore (which is also called “A Visit from St. (We’re talking early 1800s.) This combo is exactly what you’ll find in “The Night Before Christmas.” He was young and suddenly famous, writing in a blend of Russian folktale and current, peasant life in the Ukrainian countryside. Petersburg and got a crappy, government job and ran into some luck with the publication of a short story collection. He ran away with stolen money to Germany.

Officially Ukrainian and surrounded by Cossacks, Gogol first succeeded in writing and drama at school, but then failed to get a government job or work as an actor or poet. Nikolai/Nikolay Gogol is the “first” of the famous Russian novelists, famous for Dead Souls and for the short “The Overcoat.” He also paved the way for the other authors mentioned above. I don’t recall if I’ve read any Nikolai Gogol, though I am certain that I have read some classic Russian literature (Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Chekov, obviously).

The night before christmas gogol