The Overcoat by Gogol

 The Overcoat and Other Stories by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol http://realini.blogspot.com/2015/01/short-stories-by-nikolai-vasilievich.html

10 out of 10

 

 

I have to express my gratitude for Gogol – this is a happiness exercise,  Happiness Activity No 1: Expressing  Gratitude –counting your blessings for what you have either to a close other or privately, maybe in a journal, conveying gratitude to one or more individuals you haven’t properly thanked as listed in the phenomenal The How of Happiness http://realini.blogspot.com/2014/07/the-how-of-happiness-by-sonja.html by Sonja Lyubomirsky - aside from this felicity endeavor, he proves I am not a Russophobe

 

We have arguments at the sauna Downtown (not for long, I have  just opened an email telling clients that they will close for three whole months, these people are god damn crazy, a few weeks, we can understand for a quarter of the year, and they say nothing about the subscription fees, giving something back or anything along these lines) and there is a feeling that I may be against Russia (which I am, if we mean that part of it that embraces Putin and the monstrosity he has for ‘values’) because I support Ukraine.

My penchant for Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoyevsky, Chekhov and other magicians from there is testimony that I can and do admire giants from that realm, Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol in particular is an author that I read again with immense pleasure, the short stories http://realini.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-marriage-by-nikolai-gogol.html The Overcoat, have helped me I was going to say understand Russians, but if this is not the word, then at least make some sense out of what they do

 

Then there is the help that Gogol offers in deciphering some of what is going on in Russia http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-card-players-and-other-stories-by.html these days, when an ‘armed mutiny’ was launched by the cruel Proghozin, a creation of the present day czar, the one that had been sent to various places to kill multitudes, and then have the Kremlin deny involvement, just as they did when they had sent the ‘little green men’ to occupy Crimea, an Ukrainian territory which they have annexed in 2014

In The Overcoat we have the possibility to see dignitaries ‘in action’, when the main character comes to see such an important person, he is rejected, that fellow is too pompous to take any notice, and this is the way they handle things these days, when they have a despot that kills opponents, he even used Plutonium to eliminate the poor Litvinenko, a former agent that died in excruciating pain, to be an example for others

 

If you upset the tyrant, you do not just die, but there is immense pain, there is the Magnitsky act, Magnitsky was a lawyer and he alerted the authorities to tell them about corruption, but the ‘law enforcement’ there is in fact part of the mafia, and thus they killed him, and not just that, but they had put him on trial, and then continued with it, even when the victim was dead, to send this other message, that the Russian mob aka the state will go after you after you are in the grave, they are that vengeful

 

The character in The Overcoat is thus representative in his humility, the tragic fate that he has to face for the people of Russia…they are better off today, especially when set against the personage that cannot afford to get a new overcoat – he has an old one, and thinks of having the tailor patch it, but the latter is moody, when he drinks, he is easy going, but in Hangover state, there is little you can get from him…

The tailor insists that there is nothing he can do with the old Overcoat, when his client says patch it, he retorts that the patches have nothing to be attached to, and therefore, he needs a new Overcoat, and they set on the task of getting material, negotiating for the best price, and this becomes such a serious task, that we can think that it is like buying a home these days, however impossible that seems in places…

 

When he finally has the new Overcoat, this becomes a sort of symbol for ‘beware what you wish for’ and there are other nuances, and symbols we can find there, the example of the Zen Master story comes to mind, told at the end of Charlie Wilson’s War http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/06/charlie-wilsons-war-written-by-aaron.html by the CIA agent played by the late, regretted Philip Seymour Hoffman to the senator portrayed by Tom Hanks, wherein this Master has a horse that runs away from the farm

Villagers come to express their compassion, only to be told ‘we shall see’, and indeed, the horse returns with a group of wild companions, and neighbors are now glad for the master, who tells them the same thing, ‘we shall see’, after this incident, the son of the master falls from one of the wild horses, as he tries to domesticate it, and now is the time for another show of solidarity, met with…’we shall see’ – which proves the correct attitude however, for when the army recruiters come to the village, they do not take the injured young man with them…this was used to predict what could happen in Afghanistan

 

In the case of The Overcoat – spoiler alert – after a brief period of exhilaration, there is a Reversal of Fortune – more about how this works you get from Stumbling on Happiness http://realini.blogspot.com/2013/06/stumbling-on-happiness-by-david-gilbert.html by Harvard Professor Daniel Gilbert – and we have  disaster, which is explained by Aristotle in his writings on tragedy

 

Now for a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world  – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html