Gogol's Crime and Punishment

This monograph is nothing less than a bold attempt at solving the riddle of Gogols novel Dead Souls that even inspired a staging of Dead Souls at Schauspiel Stuttgart. Heftrich gives a comprehensive, coherent answer to the question of the novels meaning by meticulously laying bare its structure. The first part of the monograph is dedicated to one section of Gogols novel that has been neglected by virtually all critics - a clue that leads to a strictly ethical reading of Gogols epic. Gogol, as it emerges, constructed Dead Souls strictly according to a moral pattern. It is amazing to discover how flawlessly Dead Souls is built in this regard. The novel thus proves to be a true descendant of medieval romance with its inseparable interrelation between ethics and epics.