The Nose
I
A most peculiar thing happened in St Petersburg on March 25th. The barber Ivan
Yakovlevich (only his first name and patronymic have been preserved: even his shop
sign, which depicts a gentleman with a lathered cheek and the words We Also Let Blood,
says nothing about his surname), the barber Ivan Yakovlevich, who lives on
Voznesensky Prospect, woke quite early and caught the smell of hot bread. Lifting
himself up a little in bed, he saw his spouse, quite a worthy lady who was very fond of
coffee, taking some freshly baked loaves out of the stove.
“I won’t have any coffee today, Praskovya Osipovna,” Ivan Yakovlevich said.
“Today I’m in the mood for some warm bread and onion.”
(In fact, Ivan Yakovlevich would have liked both coffee and bread, but he knew
that demanding two things at once was out of the question: Praskovya Osipovna
strongly disapproved of all such whims.)
“More fool him,” his spouse thought to herself. “Means an extra cup for me.” And
she chucked a loaf onto the table.
Donning his tailcoat over his nightshirt to make himself decent, Ivan Yakovlevich
sat down at the table, sprinkled some salt, peeled two onions, picked up a knife and,
making a serious face, addressed the loaf. After cutting it in two equal halves, he was
surprised to spot something white inside. Ivan Yakovlevich poked about gingerly with
the knife and had a feel with his finger. “Pretty firm!” he said to himself. “What could it
be?”
He stuck his fingers in and pulled out… a nose! Ivan Yakovlevich froze; he began
rubbing his eyes and feeling the thing: a nose, most definitely a nose! And not just any
old nose, but a nose he knew. Ivan Yakovlevich’s face was a picture of horror. But this
horror was nothing compared to the rage that had overcome his spouse.
Copyright © 2020 by Nikolai Gogol. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
