Polichinelle-Pulcinella: the Italian Ancestry of Akaky Bashmachkin

SHINEL '-POLICHINELLE-PULCINELLA: THE ITALIAN ANCESTRY OF AKAKY BASHMACHKIN

Olga Partan. College of the Holy Cross

The single most famous short story in the whole of Russian literature, "The Overcoat" is also the most widely misunderstood. Simon Karlinsky (135)

"Does anything more need to be written about 'The Overcoat'?" (295). Al- though Dmitry Chizhevsky posed this question several decades ago, the an- swer is still a resounding "yes." This article offers a new perspective on "The Overcoat," suggesting that Nikolai Gogol drew on the Italian commnedia del- l'arte character of Pulcinella while creating his quintessentially Russian civil servant, Akaky Akakievich Bashmachkin. I explore an Italianate subtext that has not been previously studied and suggest that core elements of the plot and narrative technique, as well as the name and personality of the protagonist, have strong parallels with elements of the commedia del'arte and its famous Pulcinella character, which Gogol was exposed to in Italy prior to writing "The Overcoat." The striking similarities between the Petersburgian Bash- machkin and the Italian Pulcinella illustrate Vladimir Nabokov's perceptive observation that "Rome and Russia formed a combination of a deeper kind in Gogol's unreal world" (Nabokov 1980, 44). While literary scholars have addressed the significance of Italian contexts and subtexts in Gogol's novella Rome and his essays on Italian art and archi- tecture, little attention has been paid to how Gogol's impressions of the Italian performing arts in general, and of the commedia dell'arte in particular, may have influenced his artistic imagination and the poetics of "The Overcoat."' This tendency reflects the well-established critical tradition of analyzing Gogol's oeuvre within either the Ukrainian or Russian cultural context. Despite the diversity of critical approaches to "The Overcoat"- from Boris Eikhen- baum's formalist study to Daniel Rancour-Laferriere's psychoanalytical one- existing scholarship views this story as being rooted within the Russian cultural context. My analysis of Italian themes supplements--rather than contradicts- the previous scholarship, and supports the view that "The Overcoat" is a "kaleidoscope" that is open to a "simultaneity of possible meanings" (Graffy 118, Brombert 53, Fanger 162). Many previous studies have analyzed Gogol's brilliant sense of comedy, his extensive use of grotesque imagery, his unforget-

SEEJ, Vol. 49, No. 4 (2005): p. 549-p. 569 549 550 Slavic and East EuropeanJournal table depiction of mask-like human faces, the tragicomic nature of his art, and his verbal virtuosity that heavily relied on local dialects and various puns. Yet little mention has been made of possible affinities between Gogol's oeuvre and the Italian commedia dell'arte, which exhibits similar artistic principles. Fur- thermore, Gogol's playwriting experience and talents in the performing arts made him receptive to the commedia dell'arte's artistic devices and acting techniques that he transposed into literary text. The commedia dell'arte was born in mid-sixteenth-century Italy-with roots going back to Greek and Roman comedies and medieval farces-and had a tremendous impact on the Western artistic imagination in areas such as the performing and visual arts, music, dance, circus, pantomimes, playwriting, and literature. 2 The commedia dell'arte was a unique type of theatrical performance, as it relied on improvisation and the actors' virtuosity because performances were not based on a traditional body of dramatic texts and audiences did not see the leading actors' faces. The action on stage was based on schematic scenarios that simply summarized the plot, so the performances relied on the actors' improvisation and acting skills. The commedia dell'arte was a synthetic form of the performing arts, since its actors were simultaneously mimes, acrobats, singers, and dancers who had to entertain the audience while wearing typological costumes and half-masks that left only their mouths uncovered. Therefore, physical expressiveness as well as vocal and verbal skills were essential attributes of the performances. The eighteenth-century Italian playwright Carlo Goldoni, who juxtaposed the improvisational commedia with theater based on literary texts, stated that the commedia dell'arte was purely and distinctly an Italian genre of comedy that no other nation was ever able to imitate (256). Nevertheless, starting from the sixteenth century, Europe was infatuated with the commedia dell'arte, as artists and authors sought to imitate and reinterpret the cominedia, borrowing its masks and adapting them to their national sense of comedy, and reshaping the inventive plots of the Italian scenarios. 3 The famous characters of the corn- media, also known as masks, were based on diverse personality types and were associated with specific Italian regions and cities, representing their typical attributes, speech patterns, proverbs, and sayings. For example, Harlequin was a cunning servant from Bergamo, Dottore was a learned fool from Bologna, Pantalone was an old miser from Venice, and so forth (fig. 1). The character of Pulcinella originated in Naples and was known for the duality of his personality, with one side being timid and dull while the other was aggressive and vengeful. The character of Pulcinella was adopted and adapted by different cultures, appearing as Polichinelle in France, Punch in England, and sharing 4 some of his features with the Russian Petrushka puppet. Gogol was fascinated with Italian history and culture from his youth, and his early poetic lines dating from 1829, full of clumsy exaltation, were dedicated to Italy: Shlel '-Polichihelle-PPulcihella 551

Figure 1: Commedia dell 'Arte Characters (Nineteenth-century colored lithograph by CGGallina, as reproduced from Oreglia 129. courtesy of Giacomo Oreglia)

IlTaTHIA-pocKuoMaN cTpata! I-[ HeoMayCa it cToHeTr u-OCKVeT. OHa BcS3palt, BCApaaxocTi no1:mia, 1iB Het niO6oBb pOCKOumaA BecHyer. (9: 9) Oh, Italy luxurious land, For which my moaning spirit sighs, All full ofjoy, all paradise, Where Love, luxuriant Love vernates. (Nabokov 1944, 9)

In 1836, Gogol finally reached the "luxurious land" of his dreams and pro- claimed that Italy was the real homeland of his soulI.5 Gogol lived in Italy for almost ten years between 1836 and 1848, and wrote the final version of "The Overcoat" while living in Rome in the spring of 1841 (Gogol 3: 683, Graffy 3). Gogol may have begun thinking about "The Overcoat" as early as 1834 and started dictating a first draft of the story to Pogodin in July-August of 1839 (Gogol 3: 685).6 With the plot of "The Over- coat" already on his mind, Gogol (by then quite proficient in Italian) was regularly exposed to the high and low spheres of the Italian performing arts, attending opera houses as well as street performances and carnival festivities.7 In Italy, Gogol expressed deep interest in Carlo Goldoni's playwriting and the skillful denouements of his comedies, which relied heavily on the commedia dell'arte tradition (Veresaev 301). Moreover, Mikhail Pogodin reminisces that Gogol's friends (and perhaps Gogol himself) viewed his comic talent as akin to that of Goldoni. When celebrating Gogol's birthday in Italy in 1838, his friends gave him a drawing of a theatrical mask and a poem that pro- claimed him to be a Russian Goldoni: 552 Slavic and East European Journal

Why are you dozing off? Look, in front of you There is a theater mask lying there, waiting for you. It was abandoned by your famous brother-in-arms, Who still excites Italy With his playful, free laughter: take it, Look at its humorous smile And its honest appearance: Goldoni used to wear it. It becomes you ...8 (qtd. in Veresaev 225) Living in Italy during the 1830s, Gogol must have observed the phenome- nal popularity of the commedia dell'arte character of Pulcinella in both Naples and Rome. The pervasiveness of Pulcinella in Italian popular culture and the arts during this time is vividly illustrated by contemporaneous iconography, periodicals, numerous reminiscences of European travelers, and Antonio Bra- gaglia's richly documented study of Pulcinella's genealogy (see also Oreglia). It is often suggested that the name Pulcinella came from the first performer of the mask: a witty peasant named Puccio D'Aniello. Duchartre cites the leg- end that a traveling sixteenth-century commedia dell'arte troupe was enter- taining peasants in the vicinity of Acerra, near Naples, and met Puccio D'Aniello, a peasant with a huge nose and clever tongue who was invited to join the troupe (217). Puccio D'Aniello immediately achieved great success as an actor, wearing on stage the white linen robe that was the traditional outfit for Acerra's peasants, and his name became shortened to Pulcinella. When Gogol was in Italy, Pulcinella was represented both in miniature as a popular puppet and in life size by actors. Most importantly, his ancient mask was adapted to fit the changing historical and social reality (figs. 2 and 3).9 Gogol unquestionably had multiple encounters with Pulcinella while in Italy, since this character invaded the Roman and Neapolitan cultural scenes at that time: aristocrats and simple people were dressing up in Pulcinella costumes during carnival festivities, forming crowded processions of Pulcinellas; and Roman puppet theaters gave daily performances with Pulcinella puppets in the leading role.10 In an 1834 sonnet, Giuseppe Belli, one of Gogol's favorite Italian satirical poets, mockingly defined the men of Italy as an army of aggressive Pulcinellas.n Gogol mentioned Pulcinella in a letter to Maria Balabina written in April of 1837, where he expressed his admiration for the Italian sense of comedy:12

OTo HariOMHHaeT MHie 3KcnpoMT no cniiyalo 3anpemeHRri nanoo icapHaBaaia B flpOmfJOM rogy. B,I 3HaeTe, WTOHrfiHemalero nany no upwruHe ero 6ojimboro Hoca, 3OBYr Hym,ZnRIHenoi0ii, BOT 3TOT 3KcHpoMT: "Oh, questa si ch'e bella! / Proibisce il carnevale Pulcinella!" (11: 142-43) This reminds me of an impromptu on the occasion when the Pope banned the carnival last year. You know that the current Pope is called Pulcinella due to his large nose, so here is the impromptu: "Oh, how wonderful it is! / Pulcinella is banning the carnival!" Indeed, as Gogol's own nose resembled Pulcinella's, that Italian mask may have had a special place in his artistic imagination. Shiiel '-Policliinelle-Pzulcinella 553

Figure 2: Nineteenth-century Naples Street Scene (Nineteenth-century watercolor, as reproduced from Oreglia 95, courtesy of Giacomo Oreglia)

In June and July of 1838, Gogol visited Naples, considered to be Pul- cinella's birthplace, and most likely attended the famous Neapolitan Pulcinel- late--performances in the commedia dell'arte style with Pulcinella in a leading role. While the connnedia dell'arte was no longer widespread in Italy in its purely improvisational form by that time, it continued to flourish in Naples (Bragaglia 234-63, Richards 279). The Neapolitan San Carlino Theater was presenting the Pulcinellate twice a day-morning and evening-and attracting foreign visitors as well as local inhabitants from various social strata. Gogol expressed his anticipation of attending operatic performances at San Carlo in a letter to V. N. Repnina: "BeiiHK n1 TeaTp CaH-Kapjio, B KOTOpOM, 6e3 COMHeHH31, BbI 6bull He OAiH pa3? [How large is the San Carlo theater, which you have undoubtedly visited more than once?]" (11: 155, 398). The San Carlino theater (literally: little San Carlo) was run at that time by a former San Carlo dancer, Salvatore Petito, who was a brilliant Pulcinella performer himself, and the theater was closely associated with the opera house, 554 Slavic and East European Journal

Figure 3: Nineteenth-century Puppet Theater in Naples showing the popular puppet, Pulcinella (Oreglia 98, courtesy of Giacomo Oreglia)

attracting not only the same spectators but also the same writers, who alternated between writing classical librettos for San Carlo and schematic scenarios for Pulcinellate at San Carlino. This was characteristic of the strong ties between elite and popular entertainment in nineteenth-century Neapolitan culture.13 The Pulcinellate performances focused on Pulcinella's adventures "alive or dead" that were "full of bizarre happenings" (Sand 115). In her dis- cussion of Pulcinellate in nineteenth-century Naples, Richards writes:

In short, the characteristics of the Neapolitan Commedia, which were carried into the nineteenth century, included the standard practice of improvising 'business' and dialogue and an ability to adapt and transform many 'mask' types, making of them not so much generalized, abstract figures divorced from social specifics but, rather, figures manifestly reflective of an ever changing Neapolitan society. It was perhaps this very rootedness in immediate Neapolitan realities which helps to account for their long lasting appeal. (284) Shinel '-Polichtinelle--Pulcinella 555

In the spring of 1841, while working on the final version of "The Overcoat" in Rome, Gogol made three major changes in the manuscript: he revised the plot by adding the fantastic epilogue that portrays Akaky's vengeful ghost, gave the story its final title, "Shinel'," and changed the protagonist's name to Bashmachkin.14 All of these changes evoke links to Pulcinella. The revised narrative of "The Overcoat" contains textual allusions to the nineteenth-century Pulcinella's metamorphosis, when the traditionally disfigured and unpredictable comic stock character was modernized and humanized, and became a symbol of a Neapolitan everyman who, like Akaky Bashmachkin, could rebel against the uncaring authorities, seek personal justice, and sometimes unexpectedly appear on stage as a talking ghost. Perhaps the most striking similarity between the plot of "The Overcoat" and Pulcinella's character lies in the duality of Akaky's personality. "The Over- coat" is structured in two contrasting parts: one depicts Akaky's uneventful life as a timid, defenseless copying clerk, and the other shows his sudden transformation into an aggressive and vengeful ghost that terrifies the whole neighborhood as a thief and a bully. These two contrasting personality types mirror the character of Pulcinella, who was also famous for his sudden transformations and the unpredictability of his nature. According to one theory, Pulcinella's mixture of bravery and cowardice was a result of being born from two fathers, Maccus and Bucco, whose roots can be traced back to Roman antiquity. As Pierre Duchartre put it, Pulcinella "was always drawn toward opposite poles by his dual heredity. Maccus was quick, witty, impertinent, ironical, and a bit cruel; Bucco, self-sufficient, fawning, silly, timid" (208). There are indications that, in the eighteenth century, Neapolitan comedies had two Pulcinellas with contrasting natures that were based on the different personality types of the Neapolitan characters. Luigi Riccoboni, a theater historian whose influential eighteenth-century history of the Italian theater may have been familiar to Gogol, also emphasized Pulcinella's split personality: "The Neapolitan comedies, instead of a Scapin and a Harlequin, have two Polichinelles, one cunning and the other stupid" (Sand 114). Giacomo Oreglia described Pulcinella's contradictory nature as being "dull-witted or intelligent, a feigned idiot or a feigned intellectual, open-minded and yet superstitious, cowardly and reck- less, a great beater of others and much beaten himself" (93). Akaky certainly has many of Pulcinella's traits, including a contradictory nature and split personality. His transformation from a dull clerk into an aggressive ghost resembles Pulcinella's when, shortly before his death. Akaky unexpectedly reveals his temper and curses the authorities who rebuff him as he tries to meet with the police commissioner to report the theft of the overcoat:

TaK wro HaKOHellu AKaKtrii AKamieBim pa3 B HKIt3HII 3axOTen FIlOKa3aTb xapai-rep m CKa3aii HaOTpe3, qTO eMV HYWCHOJIWIHO BIIIeTI Ca.M%O1LaciaHoro, qTO OHH He CMelOT ero He Aoloy- CTHTb, LITO OH nPIIWue. H13 =enapTamelfTa 3a Ka3eHHbIM RenJIOM,a LITO BOT KaK OH HIa HRX IoI0CaJIyeTCS1, TaK Bur Tor2a OHH yBIATrr. (3: 162-63) 556 Slavic and East European Journal

[s]o that at last Akaky Akakievich for the first time in his life tried to show the strength of his character and said curtly that he must see the commissioner himself, that they dare not refuse to admit him, that he had come from the department on government business, and that if he made complaint of them they would see. (1985, 324) After realizing that he would not get any support or help from the police commissioner, Akaky decides to stay home from work in protest and curses the governmental official:

... nHaKOHea, game ciBepHoxyJ,hHHqaiI, HpOW3HOCH caNibie cTpaumraie cJIOBa, Tax nTO cTapymKa xo33iiKa Aaxce icpecTiulacb, orpo)ly He cm,ixaB OT Hero HHwIero nogto6Horo, Tem 6onee TrrocioBa 3TH cJIegoBaJIn nenocpeAcTBenHo 3a CRIOBOM <. (3: 168) ... then finally he became abusive, uttering the most awful language, so that his old landlady positively crossed herself, having never heard anything of the kind from him before, and the more horrified because these dreadful words followed immediately upon the phrase "your Ex- cellency." (1985, 328-29) The fantastic epilogue of "The Overcoat" depicts Akaky's bravery and ag- gressiveness in the afterlife, presenting a dramatically transformed protagonist who rebels against social injustice when all his attempts to find the stolen overcoat fail: Ho irTo 6bi mor Boo6paanHT, gTo 3gIecb eore He Bce o6 AKaKHe AKaKriewmre, qTO cy)xczeHo emy Ha HeCICOJIbKO gHeil npOCHrT, myMHo nocne cBoeri cMepTH, Kax 61,u B Harpazry 3a HeripiMegeH- HyIo HaReM XU(13HM.Ho Taic cHym,nocb, H 6eAHa3 IICTOpHA aama Heo>KHgaHHO npHWnmaeT FaHTrracTIlqecKoe ooHqanaHHe. Ho HIeTep6ypry npoHecjmcb BApyr cnyxH, 'To y Ka.mncHHHa MocTa H gasnexo noAanbme CTaJI noICa3blBaTbcA no Hoqam MepTBejI B Bsgie xIHHOBHH(a, Hnmy- uler)o KaKor-To yraltieHHOrH imn eiem, H nITOBHHAOM CTalueHHOK IHHHenJH cgTaparomnii co Bcex rnneq, He pa36Hrpa3 nIHHaH 3SBaHmq, BacAKe unmems... (3: 169) But who could have imagined that this was not all there was to tell about Akaky Akakievich, that he was destined for a few days to make his presence felt in the world after his death, as though to make up for his life having been unnoticed by anyone? But so it happened, and our little story unexpectedly finishes with a fantastic ending. Rumors were suddenly floating about Petersburg that in the neighborhood of the Kalinkin Bridge and for a little distance beyond, a corpse had begun appearing at night in the form of a clerk looking for a stolen overcoat, and stripping from the shoulders of all passers-by, regardless of grade and calling, overcoats of all descriptions... (1985, 329-30) This aggressive Akaky who seeks revenge against the authorities echoes Pulcinella the bully who seeks personal justice after losing his trust in governmental officials. In 1852, the French Romantic writer George Sand wrote that contemporaneous Neapolitan farces had two distinct Pulcinella (Polichi- nelle) characters, one of whom was a vengeful bully who tried to achieve social justice by attacking governmental officials: Polichinelle personifies the accomplished revolt; he is hideous but he is terrible, severe and vengeful; neither god nor devil can make him tremble when he wields his great cudgel. By means of this weapon, which he freely lays about the shoulders of his master and the heads of public officers, he exercises a sort of summnary and individual justice which avenges the weak side and the iniquities of official justice. (qtd. in Maurice Sand 112) Shinel '-Polichizelle--Pulciiella 557

Pulcinella's split personality confused Italian theatergoers, who were unable to reconcile the two sides of Pulcinella's character, and readers of "The Over- coat" experience a similar confusion as the personality of Akaky's ghost dif- fers so dramatically from that of the timid Akaky before his death. Etymological connections and punning words play an important role in Gogol's narrative, as Gogol himself suggested in one of the earlier drafts of "The Overcoat":

B1.enap-ra,ieHTe noaaTeri i c6OpOB iLln, KaK rno6xrT HHomaa Ha3blBaTb erO EI1HOBHHKHF mno6rtiiiie noocTpHTb, notnocreit It 313Op0B [...l Jua He noayNtMaicr BnpOqeM qH'lTaTenat, qTO6bt 3To Ha3BaaHe OCHOBaHo 6bUlO B Ca.MOM,tane Ha KaKofi-HH6y,Fb HCT1He1 HHCIyTHub,-3eCb BCe RienIo TOJIbKO B 3THhMOJnOHqeci,tOM noa.o6imnI CnOB. BcneacrBHe 3roro nenapawseirr FOpHbIX H COJIAHbIX AeJ1 HaWbBaeTc3i iernap. FoPbKHX n conflHLIX aen i Tro.Nly inoao6oe. (3: 450-51) In the department of tax collections and assessments or, as clerks who like to crack jokes sometimes call it, the department of baseness and nonsense [...] however, readers should not think that this title is based on some sort of truth: not at all--here the whole matter lies only in the etymological resemblance of the words. As a result, the department of mining and mineral affairs is called the department of bitter and salty affairs, and so on.

As Boris Eikhenbaum argued, punning games are one of the dominant literary devices in "The Overcoat," and "phonic gestures" and "etymological puns are particular favorites of Gogol's, and to bring them off he often de- vises special surnames" (276). While Eikhenbaum focused exclusively on Russian verbal games and did not consider possible cross-cultural Russian- Italian puns. the text of "The Overcoat" is rich with etymological and punning connections with the commedia. These ties include the striking linguistic similarity between the Russian title of the story, "Shinel'," and the name of the French incarnation of Pul- cinella, Polichinelle. A "shinel"' is a "formal coat with a fold on the back and a half-belt sewn or buttoned to the back of the coat," or "in Russia in the sec- ond half of the nineteenth century: a man's coat with a loose-fitting free cut of garment, with a fur collar and a cape" (Ozhegov 896). In the dictionary ed- ited by D. N. Ushakov, shinel' is defined as an article of clothing having a broad collar that hangs down to the waist in the form of a cape (qtd. in Chernykh 158). This type of cape-like wide shirt was the traditional costume of the Italian Pulcinella. Indeed, in his study of the etymology of the word shinel', P. Chernykh hypothesizes that it has a direct connection with Polichi- nelle's costume (figs. 4 and 5).`s He writes:

Therefore, shinel'could have derived directly from polichinelle, as the name of a particular cut of a collar or a short coat, that was one of the attributes of the costume of Polichinelle-the comic Neapolitan conmnedia dell'arte character [...]. The name of another popular character of the Italian commedia dell'arte (known since the end of Peter the Great's era)-the Venetian Pantalone-had a similar history on Russian soil. I have in mind the word pan talony. It appears that in the eighteenth century this word could be used in the singular, as the name of a particular cut of (masquerade?) clothing. (160-61) 558 Slavic and East European Journal

I-- . Figure 4: Pulcinella / Polichinelle (Detail from picture in the Museum of the Comedie- Francaise, as reproduced from Duchartre 209, courtesy of Dover Publications)

Chernykh also provides several examples where Russian words for certain articles of clothing originated from the first or last names of real people or from theatrical characters.16 Russian masquerade culture was familiar with Pulcinella (who could not, of course, compete with the popularity of Harle- quin on Russian soil), as shown by recently exhibited eighteenth-century Ital- ian mirrors from Russian royal palaces that have etched figures of Pulcinella and Pantalone that contributed to the ambiance of the Russian royal masquerades (4 Chuvstva). The masked Russian courtiers could see their own reflec- tions in the masquerade costumes through the image of the Italian comic characters. Gogol's passion for clothing and fashion, as well as his scrupulous collect- ing of etymologically similar words and comically absurd expressions, are well documented in his notebooks and the memoirs of his friends.17 Mikhail Bakhtin observed that Gogolian language returns forgotten or forbidden meanings to words, causing them to interact with each other on entirely new levels: The ties of meaning, which exist exclusively within the context of particular utterances, within the limits of certain linguistic spheres that are inseparable from the situations that produced them, can be reborn under these conditions and acquire a new lease on life. (532-33) Gogol must have been aware of the visual and linguistic similarities between a shinel' (also known during Gogol's time as Nikolaevskaia shinel', or a Nicholas overcoat) and Pulcinella's garment. Shinel'- Polichinelle--Pulcinella 559

Figure 5: Illustration of a Mikolaevskaia shinel' [Nicholas Overcoat] (Illustration from Rancour-Laferriere, courtesy of Ardis Publishers) 560 Slavic and EastEuropean Journal

In nineteenth-century Russian culture, Pulcinella was known under his French name, Polichinelle. For example, while Gogol was living in Peters- burg in the mid-I 830s, the widely read newspaper Severnaia Pchela regularly published detailed reviews of the popular balagan-style performances, called Harlequinades. Performed on Admiralteiskaia Square by foreign entrepre- neurs, the Harlequinades relied heavily on commedia dell'arte characters and their pantomimes.18 In April of 1836, an anonymous reviewer described Polichinelle as a dancing buffoon who entertained the public in a balagan: Here is a difficult dance of Polichinelle on stilts... not a romantic dance, there is the wig, the stilts-all features of classicism. And finally here is the pantomime, the one loved by most of the spectators, which is amusing, varied and, most importantly, not too long. ("Zrelishcha") 19 Gogol wrote about these Admiralteiskaia Square festivities in his article "Pe- terburgskie zapiski 1836 goda," which depicted a socially mixed crowd waiting for balagan performances that competed in popularity with the Imperial theaters (8: 187-90). Polichinelle's unpredictability and idle talk led to the French expression "le secret de Polichinelle" that became the Russian term "sekret Polishinelia [Polichinelle's secret]," colloquially used to describe a secret known to everybody (Ozhegov 554). Polichinelle is also briefly mentioned in Dostoevsky's 1866 novel Crime and Punishment as a metaphor for a manipulative and unreliable person, when Rodion Raskolnikov verbally at- tacks his investigator, Porfiry Petrovich, calling him a "polishinel' prokliatyi [damned Polichinelle].1' 20 As illustrated by these examples, Polichinelle's name and character were quite familiar to nineteenth-century Russian writers, readers, and spectators. Akaky's last name, Bashmachkin, with its clear reference to shoes [bashmak], has possible links with Pulcinella: the French word Polichinelle was also the name of a type of comic dance of French shoemakers--"le dance comique de sabotier" (Chernykh 161). The narrator of "The Overcoat" admits his uncertainty about the real source of the last name:

•DaMHuIIlt 'IHHOBHHKa 6bijia baimMaqxIcHH. Ywe no camomy 9MeHH BRA,HO, 'ITO OHa Korza-TO HpoMaouma OT 6ammaKa, no Korga, B Kaioe BpemA M KaKIIM o6pa3oM npo•Ioaia ona OT 6amMaKa, HMler'o :TOrO He113BeCTHO. (3: 142) This clerk's surname was Bashmachkin. From the very name it is clear that it must have been derived from a shoe (bashmak); but when and under what circumstances it was derived from a shoe, it is impossible to say. (1985, 305) Akaky's clothing is also suggestive: he is presented as always wearing an old shapeless overcoat, which his colleagues ridicule as being a kapot (a loose robe), and pantaloons -these were quintessential parts of his wardrobe both before and after his brief role as the owner of the new overcoat. This visual imagery mirrors Pulcinella's traditional wardrobe, which also consisted of a loose blouse of white linen and flowing pantaloons (Duchartre 220). Histori- cally, Pulcinella's loose robe was not significantly modified over time, but Shilne!'-Polichihelle--Pulciiella 561 various details of contemporaneous costumes were sometimes worn on top of the blouse to indicate Pulcinella's social status. For instance, late-nineteenth- century photographs of Antonio Petito in Pulcinella's role reflect this tendency as he wears a military uniform, a frock, or a long nineteenth-century coat over Pulcinella's blouse (Bragaglia 263-90). The improvisational nature of the narrator's chatter in "The Overcoat," defined by Boris Eikhenbaum as skaz, resembles the improvisational commedia dell'arte acting technique of creating a new artistic world during each per- formnance within the framework of a commedia scenario, without knowing where the actors' artistic fantasy would take them. Readers of "The Overcoat" share the sensations felt by coinmedia dell'arte audiences, who followed the actors' spontaneous and unpredictable stage improvisations. The narrator cre- ates the impression that he is having difficulty recollecting events and ex- plaining why those events are occurring--suggesting that the story is being told in retrospect and that the narrator is no longer in St. Petersburg:

F1ife iwMeHOi(XKGiJI iipritaacHBitHit iriHOBHtK, K CO=aniieHIIIO, He Mo,ieM cKa3aTb: iiaMATb Hait- HaeT HaM CIU1]L,1HOJ13MeHATb, HIBee, 'TO Hi ecTb B IeTep6ypre, Bce ynuiffb if ltOra C!imiuiCb it c?.iemuanJIcb Tax B rOnOBe, qTo Becb•ia Tpy!Ho ,qocTaTm orryta qro-ini6yab, B nopRSIoLt'H,OM B11,ae. (3: 158) Where precisely the clerk who had invited him lived we regret to say we cannot tell; our mem- ory is beginning to fail sadly, and everything there in Petersburg, all the streets and houses, are so blurred and muddled in our head that it is a very difficult business to put anything in orderly fashion. (1985, 320) While the story is set in a Russian context and is filled with imagery of a snowy Petersburg with wind coming from the Gulf of Finland, the narrator's apparent remoteness from that setting raises the question of his actual loca- tion. Furthermore, there are elements within the narrative that become clearer when set in an Italian context. For example, an Italian context can shed light on the narrator's mysterious remark when he describes Petrovich as taking Akaky's new overcoat out from his handkerchief:

OH BbIHyn LUIIHCJIb 113HOCOBOrO iLiaTKa, B KOTOpOm ee ripimec; rUIaTOK 61U] TO!ibKO OT npaB'Kn, OH vy-ce noTo?,i cBepHyn cro it ino.'o)Icm B Kap,tfaBH X ynoTpeOneHiuA. (3: 156) He took the coat out of the [hugel handkerchief in which he had brought it (the handkerchief bad just come home from the wash); he then folded it up and put it in his pocket for future use. (1985, 318) How large, then, is Bashmachkin if his overcoat can fit in Petrovich's handkerchief? This passage has even been mistakenly translated into English as involving either a "huge" or "gigantic" handkerchief, obscuring the meaning in the original Russian that seems to be irrational, yet is logical within the Italianate context of the story. Italian puppeteers historically used pocket- sized commedia dell'arte marionettes in street performances that sometimes harshly criticized political or religious leaders. The puppeteers could quickly 562 Slavic and East EuropeanJournal make these marionettes disappear into their pockets if the police or other officials appeared on the scene (Clavilier 17). In Italy, Gogol was surrounded by a variety of Pulcinellas, ranging from street actors to marionettes that could easily be hidden in the puppeteer's pocket. The narrator's confusing remark may reflect Gogol's exposure to these Pulcinellas and may explain the miniature size of Akaky's overcoat. In discussing the nature and use of the grotesque in "The Overcoat," Boris Eikhenbaum writes that "the comic skaz is suddenly interrupted by a sentimental and melodramatic digression, which contains the characteristic devices of the sentimental style. With this device, Gogol succeeds in raising 'The Overcoat' from the level of a simple anecdote to that of grotesque" (286). Such melodramatic digression from the comic to the sentimental or even tragic is vividly represented in the passage where Akaky's colleagues tease him and he begs them to leave him alone, while an unknown young man observes the scene:

Monogbie HHBOBHtHKH no)cMeHBauIHcb H OCTpIum Han HHM, BO CKOJnbKOxBaTaniO KaHugeJmq- pcKoro ocTpoymHa, paccKas3IBaaIH TyT ae Rpen HH4Mpa3Hbie cocraBneHHbIe HpO Hero rCTopwi; nIpo xo3RfAKy, ceMHfeC31THineTHIOIO cTapyxy, rOBOpIMHn,qTO OHa 6ber eCr, cnpamflBaIH, Korna 6y)leT HX cBaAb6a, cbinaJMn Ha ronouy emy 6yMaxKH, Ha3bIBa3i 3TO CHeFoM. Ho HH OIHOrO CJIOBa He OTBeCIaJI Ha 3To AxaKIIA, iam 6y•To 6bi HHIKorO H He a•imornepen HHM; 3TO He HMen1o na)xe BJIHRIHHX Ha 3aHmTHrq ero cpe)nH Bcex 3TRX AOKyK OH He neiiaJI1HI! OAHOr oaIH6ICM B rHcbMe. Tojiico ecni y)K CYiHanKOM 6ui.a HeBbiHocHMa nyrTKa: Korna Toixasim er noni pyKy, Memaai 3aHHMaTbCA cBOHM neJIOM, OH npOH3HOCnIH: <> Ii qTO-TO cTpaHHoe 3aKJOMqa.locb B ciioBax H B ronoce, C KaIaM OHH 6bum HpOH3p1eceibi. B Hem CJbnmmaJIOCb -ITO-TO Taxoe npeKrnomunomuee Ha )KaijIOCTb, 'TO OAHH MOJIOAOr4 qenlOBeiK. HenaBHO onpenejiHBnIHHRic, KoTopbiri, no IIpHmepy npylrHX, IIBOnojmI 6runo ce6e nocMeaTbCA naR HHM, BApyr OCTaHBomiuicA, Kai 6yATo InpOH3eHIRml, H C TeX Hop xaK 6ynTO Bce rnepemeHILnIOCb nepeA HUM i1 HoKasanocb B npyrom mine. (3: 143-44) The young clerks jeered and made jokes at him to the best of their clerky wit, and told before his face all sorts of stories of their own invention about him: they would say of his landlady, an old woman of seventy, that she beat him, would ask when the wedding was to take place, and would scatter bits of paper on his head, calling them snow. Akaky Akakievich never answered a word, however, but behaved as though there were no one there. It had no influence on his work, in the midst of all this teasing, he never made a single mistake in his copying. It was only when the jokes became too unbearable, when they jolted his arm, and prevented him from going on with his work, that he would say, "Leave me alone! Why do you insult me?" and there was something touching in the words and in the voice in which they were uttered. There was a note in it of something that aroused compassion, so that one young man, new to the office, who, following the example of the rest, had allowed himself to tease him, suddenly stopped as though cut to the heart, and from that time on, everything was, as it were, changed and appeared in a different light to him. (1985, 306-7) This passage exhibits striking parallels with the commedia dell'arte performing technique: first, we hear the erotic, if not obscene, jokes suggesting that the protagonist is sexually involved with his seventy-year-old landlady and is beaten by her, and we see physical slapstick comedy with beating, pinching, and pieces of paper thrown on Akaky's head. Such physical ele- Shinel'-Polichinelle--Pulcinella 563 ments and erotic innuendos were indispensable sources of inspiration for the Italian comedians, who used them as material for their legendary comic inter- ludes, or lazzi. What follows is the dramatically unexpected response of a stock character who begs for mercy instead of continuing a physical fight--a grotesque combination of comic and melodramatic elements. Finally, the whole episode is presented as the universal tragedy of a humiliated and lonely human being: the episode becomes a metaphor for the human condition and provokes a religious and philosophical revelation in the unknown observer:

H jRonro noTo,M, cpeaii caMbIX BeceJibix MHHyT, npezcTaBrmmcA e,iy Hn3eHbWIAIH qHHOBH1tK C m.icamuomf Ha n6v, C CBOMLMMHIpOHuKaIONHHMH cJIOBaMui: (.1>> 3aKpbui ce6q pyKoio 6enHbIri sionoinofi xiejwoBeK, it MHOro pa3 coapar-aJic OH iOTOM Ha BeKy CBOeM, BHaHt: KaK MHorO B qenJoBeKe 6ecle.ifoBeqbS,, Kax .Nioro CKpLITO CB11penOr1 rpy6ocTii B yroHqeHHOrl, o6pa3oBaHHiorf CBeTCKOCTI, I Bmoe! qawe B TOM xe.JoB0eKe, KoToporo CBeT npIIHaeT 6naropoanmNi f xiecTiibi.Ti. (3: 144) And long afterward, during moments of the greatest gaiety, the figure of the humble little clerk with a bald patch on his head appeared before him with his heart-rending words: "Leave me alone! Why do you insult me?" and within those moving words he heard others: "I am your brother." And the poor young man hid his face in his hands, and many times afterward in his life he shuddered, seeing how much inhumanity there is in man, how much savage brutality lies hidden under refined, cultured politeness, and, my God! Even in a man whom the world accepts as a gentleman and a man of honor. (1985, 307) The most prominent performers of commedia dell'arte stock characters raised philosophical issues and intermixed them with their buffoonery. For instance, according to Carlo Goldoni, the legendary Italian comic actor Anto- nio Sacchi cited Seneca, Cicero, and other Classical philosophers while wearing conmnedia dell'arte masks (44). The actors performing stock characters were expected to maintain a centuries-old comic tradition while relating it to the contemporaneous socio-historical context. This fusion of traditional and modem elements was a predominant aspect of the Neapolitan San Carlino Theater when Gogol lived in Italy. The Pulcinellate reflected the disillusion- ment and hardship of the everyday lives of contemporary Neapolitans. A Nea- politan periodical of 1838 stated that Pulcinella was a voice of the Neapoli- tan people, expressing the ideas of an everyman (Bragaglia 242). By the time Gogol visited Naples, Pulcinella had been gradually transformed from a traditional grotesque buffoon into a contemporary Neapolitan. In his various roles, Pulcinella represented different social classes and professions--from a simpleton to a governmental clerk or a nobleman. Pulcinella performers of that time, such as Salvadore Petito and his son Antonio Petito, cleverly added a sentimental and melancholic tone to the traditional comic expressiveness of their performances, and combined realistic parts of the plots with fantastic and supernatural elements (Bragaglia 186). Akaky Bashmachkin represents the myriad of Petersburgian clerks, just as Pulcinella was an incarnation of the Neapolitan character. According to an anonymous mid-nineteenth-century 564 Slavic and East EuropeanJournal witness, "there was not a single individual in Naples who had not in himself something of Pulcinella" (Sand 115). The physical appearance of Pulcinella and other commedia dell'arte stock characters had grotesque overtones due to the bizarre combination of lifeless half-masks (that could be black, brown, or white) that covered the upper part of the face, with expressive uncovered mouths and agile acrobatic bodies. This juxtaposition of symbols of death and life presents a philosophical mes- sage that forces spectators to simultaneously mourn the inescapable approach of death while celebrating life's endless joy. The musicality of the Italian language and its extensive use of vowels helped the masked actors articulate using their mouths as an emotional and artistic apparatus that replaced the barely visible eyes and total lack of facial expressions. The final words of Akaky's ghost represent a masterful transposition of this acting technique into literary production. The narration focuses on the screaming mouth, which is the only expressive part of the ghost's dead, white, and mask-like face. The abundance of open vowels and exclamation marks in the ghost's speech con- tribute to the powerful expressiveness of the ghost's mouth:

JIHUO 914HOBHiHiKa 6&i.o 6iieAHO, xaK cier, 11rMrrzeno CoBepmIIeHHb1M MepTBenoM. Ho yxcac 3Ha- qHTe.ibHOrO mmIa rnpeB3omeIJ Bce rpaHHnB4i, orga OH yBHAeji, qTO pOT mepTBeua noKpnmBHcA, s naxHyBaIIH Ha Hero CTpamao MOrFIMO0o, npOH3HeC Taine pe'i: (3: 172) The clerk's face was white as snow and looked like that of a corpse, but the horror of the Per- son of Consequence was beyond all bounds when he saw the mouth of the corpse distorted into speech, and breathing upon him the chill of the grave, it uttered the following words: "Ah, so here you are at last! At last I've... er... caught you by the collar. It's your overcoat I want; you refused to help me and abused me into the bargain! So now give me yours!" (1985, 332) Early drafts of "The Overcoat" included the theatrical appearance of an ig- norant doctor who visits the dying Akaky--a possible allusion to the commedia dell'arte Dottore character who spent his life studying everything without learning anything. Suggesting a theatrical context, the doctor announces that Akaky is about to make his final bow: "ArenapTaMeHTcKFn AOKTOp ripHmien 6o0Jbue ARJiA Toro TOJIbKO rro6BI BHAeTb xog 6ojie3HH H o6sb3BHTb, WTOB ABa gHma 6OJIbHOAi 6ygeT CoBepmeHHO FOTOB oTimaHaT,ci [The departmental doctor came simply to announce that within two days the patient would be com- pletely ready to make a final bow]" (3: 455). In the nineteenth-century Russian literary context, such phrasing was not characteristic of Russian doctors an- nouncing terminal diagnoses (typical phrases would be "6o0bHOrlO cKopo IIpHKaxReT AOJIFO )KHTb, HCrIyCTHT Ayx, oTAaCT KOHiUbI, npHCTaBHTC31. oTrpa- BiTCA Ha TOT cBeT," all roughly translating as "the patient is about to die"). This announcement of Akaky's final bow echoes the famous phrase "Finitala commedia! [The comedy is finished]" that was traditionally pronounced at the end of commedia dell'arteperformances right before the final bow and is still Shlel '-Polichiielle--Pulciiella 565 widely used in an ironic fashion within the Russian cultural context.21 Gogol changed the text in the final version of "The Overcoat" so the Doctor no longer announced any final bow, but simply stated: "o6-bzBiL e,,v ýpe3 nOJropa cyroK HerpeMeHHbIr1 Kamrr [informed him that his end was at hand]" (168). Does anything else need to be written about Gogol and the conmiedia del- l'arte tradition? Yes indeed. This article focuses exclusively on "The Over- coat" and Gogol's Italian theatrical surroundings, and does not address the broader impact of the commedia dell'arte on Gogol's oeuvre or Gogol's possible exposure to the aesthetics of the commedia dell'arte in Ukraine and Rus- sia prior to his trip to Italy. The Petersburg clerk Akaky Bashmachkin is not the only Gogolian character whose status within the Russian cultural tradition is akin to that of the Neapolitan Pulcinella in Italy. Personality types such as Khlestakov, Chichikov, Nozdrev, and Pliushkin-to name just a few-reflect various sides of the Russian national character in the way that Harlequin, Pul- cinella, Pantalone, and others are quintessential representatives of the Italian national character. Pavel Annenkov recalled that while in Italy, Gogol once said: If I were a painter, I would invent a special kind of landscape painting. What trees and land- scapes are painted nowadays! Everything is clear, defined, and interpreted by the artist, and the viewer follows right along! I would intertwine one tree with another, would mix up the branches, and throw the light where nobody expects it: these are the kinds of landscape paint- ings that one should create! -and he [Gogol] accompanied his words with energetic, indescrib- able gestures. (qtd. in Veresaev 299) Gogol realized this artistic vision in "The Overcoat." interweaving branches of the Neapolitan Pulcinella's genealogical tree with those of the Petersbur- gian clerk Akaky Bashmachkin in a fashion that continues to puzzle and de- light twenty-first-century critics and readers.

NOTES

A previous version of this article was presented at the AATSEEL Annual Conference, New York, December 2002. I would like to thank everyone who helped me at the various stages of this project: Alexan- der Levitsky, Patricia Arant, and Svetlana Evdokimova for their support and guidance; Maxim Shrayer and Alexandra Smith for their comments and friendly encouragement; the anonymous readers at SEEJ for their suggestions, Giacomo Oreglia for his gracious permission to reprint images from his personal collection: Chiara Tedaldi for her assistance; and Matthew Partan for his patience and sense of humor. I Without mentioning the coniniedin per se, a number of scholars such as Saprykina, Tyn- ianov, Nabokov, Bakhtin, Shapiro, and others have discussed features of Gogol's poetics that, in my opinion, reflect the impact of the conunedia. For instance, Saprykina discusses the influences of Italian satirical literature on Gogol's oeuvre of his Italian period but does not explore the possible impacts of contemporaneous Italian theatrical traditions. Yury Tynianov noted Gogol's use of masks as the main artistic device used to depict his charac- 566 Slavic and East European Journal

ters (10-15), and in his analysis of "The Overcoat," Vladimir Nabokov paid special attention to Akaky's mask-like face: "We did not expect that amid the whirling masks, one mask would turn out to be a real face, or at least the place where that face ought to be" (Nabokov 1944, 141). Mikhail Bakhtin saw Gogol's poetics as the most significant phenomenon of the modem period and suggested that the root of Gogol's laughter lies in the medieval carnival culture. It appears that Bakhtin is the only scholar who previously established a connection between Gogol's fiction and the mask of Pulcinella, but Bakhtin noted this link with "The Nose," and not "The Overcoat"-he wrote that the theme of a nose living sepa- rated from its owner's face was taken by Gogol from the Russian Pulcinella-Petrushka (529). Gavriel Shapiro sees the roots of Gogol's poetics as lying outside the mainstream of nineteenth-century realism and has investigated Gogol's indebtedness to Baroque culture, which Shapiro argues Gogol absorbed first in Ukraine, and then in Russia and Italy, but does not discuss possible impacts of the comn7edia. Graffy provides a summary of information about critical receptions, readings, and interpretations of "The Overcoat." 2 My characterization of the commedia dell'arte is based on studies by Bragaglia, Molinari, Mic [Mildashevsky], Duchartre, Oreglia, and others. Heck also provides valuable information on primary and secondary sources about the commedia. 3 Unlike other European countries, where Italian comedians had been performing since the early sixteenth century, Russia did not see the first original performances in the commedia dell'arte style until 1731, when the Empress Anna Ioanovna hosted the Tomaso Ristori troupe that had sensational success. However, by 1731 the Russian public was already familiar with some Italian masks -especially that of Harlequin--from foreign puppeteers who toured Russia and German acting troupes that used commedia techniques. After Ris- tori's departure, new troupes were regularly recruited in Italy to travel to Russia to perform for the Russian court, providing a powerful impetus for the development of the Russian performing arts and stimulating the beginning of literary and cultural criticism in Russia. During the reign of Elizaveta Petrovna and Catherine the Great, the masks and iconography of the commedia became inseparable from the Russian royal masquerades, gradually migrating by the end of the eighteenth century into the reaim of popular entertainment. For the latest studies on this topic, see Ferrazzi, Partan, Pesenti, and Starikova. 4 While Petrushka's physical features, including his large nose, suggest an Italian ancestry, scholarly opinions about his genealogy are divided. One view is that the prototype for this marionette was Anna Ioanovna's legendary jester, the Italian violinist Pietro Miro, also known as Pedrillo, whose images on Russian hiboks (cheap popular prints) are strongly reminiscent of Petrushka. In her influential 1990 study Petrushka: The Russian Carnival Puppet Theater, Catriona Kelly argues that Petrushka shows were influenced by nineteenth-century Italian puppeteers touring the Russian empire: "it was a text performed at the Russian fairground or in Russian streets from about 1840 onwards, apparently inspired by Italian puppeteers' shows" (59). There are other sources that affirm that Petrushka shows existed in Russia much earlier than the nineteenth century, and recent archival re- search by Ludmila Starikova illustrates that Italian puppeteers were touring the Russian empire as early as the eighteenth century. 5 In an 1837 letter to Balabina, Gogol wrote: "I saw [in Rome] not only my own native land, but the native land of my soul, where my soul lived even before me, before I was born into the world" (qtd. in Veresaev 214). 6 According to Annenkov, Gogol based the plot of "The Overcoat" on an anecdote that he heard at a soiree in 1834 about a poor official who, being a passionate hunter, dreamt for a long time about an expensive hunting shotgun, finally purchased it, but then accidentally dropped it in some reeds during his first hunting trip to the Gulf of Finland (qtd. in Vere- saev 143). 7 While it is difficult to know precisely how well Gogol spoke Italian, there are strong indi- Shinel -Polichinelle-PPulcinella 567

cations that he was quite proficient in wvriting and reading Italian by the late I 830s. For example, Gogol's use of lively and expressive Italian in his March 1838 letter to Maria Bal- abina (Gogol 11: 127-28) demonstrates his written Italian skills, despite the minor gram- matical errors in the letter. In his article "Gogol'-perevodchik?", Yury Rylov expresses a similar opinion about Gogol's advanced proficiency in Italian, and argues that Gogol most likely translated G. Gimud's play "L'ajo nell'imbarazzo" from Italian into Russian himself. In an 1838 letter to Danilevsky (Veresaev 218), Gogol mentioned studying with an Italian tutor, and in 1840 he applied for ajob that apparently required proficiency in Italian (Rylov 228). 8 Unless otherwise noted, all translations from Russian and Italian are by the author. 9 Numerous studies address the genealogy of Pulcinella and the Italian and cross-cultural transformation of this mask. Among them are Sand, Bragaglia, Oreglia, and Croce. 10 Bragaglia provides more detailed information on Pulcinella in nineteenth-century Rome and Naples. 11 Gogol expressed his admiration of Guiseppe Belli's poetic craft in his letter to Maria Bal- abina (11: 142-43). In Belli's 1834 sonnet "L'omo e la donna [Mvfan and woman]," men are defined as "purcinelli" (colloquial for Pulcinellal- aggressive bullies who initiate wars and rule the world (71). 12 In the same letter, Gogol writes that he wants to learn the Italian national character in its very depth by observing it from all possible perspectives, and proclaims that Italians are gifted with an aesthetic sense that no other Europeans possess. 13 Laura Richards writes that Neapolitan society was "much less culturally divided than else- where in Italy" and that it was fashionable for the upper classes to attend the popular performances together with the middle classes and the masses (281). 14 It is generally believed that Gogol began writing the story in Marienbad in 1839 with the tentative title "The Tale of a Clerk Who Stole Overcoats." He continued his work on the story in 1839 in Vienna and St. Petersburg, and then finished "The Overcoat" in Rome in early 1841 (Gogol 3: 675-88, Graffy 3). 15 In the 1973 edition of Max Vasmer's Etniologiclieskii.slovar-'russkogoiaz'ka, Chemykh's 1959 study is cited as an alternative source for etymological links containing more detailed information on the etymology of shinel'. In French, a chenille is a man's morning outfit. 16 Chemykh described several examples of articles of clothing named after historical or theatrical characters, including aftench (named after General French, commander-in-chief of the English troops at the beginning of World War I), a galifý (named after the French Cav- alry General Gallifet), and afigaro (an article of women's clothing named after the protagonist of Beaumarchais's comedy) (159-60). 17 Annenkov's memoirs describe Gogol as a skillful tailor who altered his own wardrobe and discuss Gogol's scrutiny of the foreign roots and etymology of Russian words in his dicta- tion of "The Dead Souls" (qtd. in Veresaev 292). 18 Gogol may have been exposed to the comiiedia dell'arte masks and acting technique from childhood. His father was an amateur comic plavwright, theater director, and performer. Neighboring Poland was toured by Italian troupes two centuries earlier than Russia, inspir- ing numerous imitators to adopt this acting technique into the Polish theatrical tradition. The comnitedia also flourished in Polish religious schools where Gogol's ancestors, the Janovskis (who were of Polish origin), were educated (Kadulska 73-89). 19 It is interesting to note that in its section "Zrelishcha," dedicated to the St. Petersburg cultural scene, the newspaper alternated its ecstatic reviews of Harlequinades on Admiral- teiskaia Square with reserved or negative reviews of Nikolai Gogol's fiction and plays, crit- icizing him for the farcical nature of his plays, poor literary taste, and a shaky knowledge of the Russian language. 20 0rimne and Punishment reads: " TiTbTm, BCe!--3aBaolri PacKoJibHHKiioB, V-,Ke He yie- 568 Slavic and East European Journal

p•KHBaAIcb,-Jj)Kemb, 1noiIMUHHeRb flpo0KlJTb19!-H 6pocKncn Ha peTtpoBaamerocA K ABep3M, HO HmcKojibKO He cTpyCHB1HeFo floplrnpHA" (Dostoevsky 1982, 5: 339; pt. IV, ch. 5). Polichinelle here is often translated into English as "clown": "You lie, you damned clown!" (Dostoevsky 1989, 295; pt. IV, ch. 5 in the Coulsen translation). 21 The phrase Finita la commedia! is used in the nineteenth-century Russian literary context to convey a tragicomic mood. For instance, in Lermontov's A Hero of Our Time, Pechorin uses this Italian expression to announce Grushnitsky's death in a duel: "Finita la comme- dial--I said to the doctor" (171). In Chekhov's Uncle Vania, Astrov uses the same phrase to admit that his love affair with Elena Andreevna is over: "Well, you'd better be on your way. Finita la commedia." (92).

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TITLE: Shinel´—Polichinelle—Pulcinella: the Italian Ancestry of Akaky Bashmachkin SOURCE: Slavic East Eur J 49 no4 Wint 2005 WN: 0534900671004

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