Myths about the death of N. V. Gogol: sources, genesis, poetics abstract

The article follows up the origin of the myth of the funeral of Gogol in the state of lethargy. The ideological roots of this myth, which still obscures the real history of the last days of Gogol’s life and the very content of his spiritual heritage, are studied. A wide range of problems related to the practice of professional treatment in the first half of the 19th century, including the phenomenon of mercantilism and lack of professionalism of some physicians of that time, the problem of frequent nondistincion of apparent death and lethargic state by the medicine of that time, as well as the question of the relationship between the physiological component of the disease and spiritual means of healing used by Gogol, are touched upon in the article. Attention is drawn to the unsuccessfulness of the writer’s long treatment in numerous European and domestic medical bodies. The identities of several reputable doctors who treated the writer are confirmed. The apocryphalness of some information reported in the memoirs about Gogol of the head physician A. T. Tarasenkov is noted. The distortion of Gogol’s image in these memoirs is explained by the pragmatic approach of the doctor in standing up for the corporate interests of the medical caste. The content of the last days of Gogol is put in the context of the writer’s ideas about the providential value of the ailments, regarded bu the writer as a kind of “road signs”, encouraging everyone to search for the right path, and the artist, in addition, to improve his writing. The study of biased opinions about Gogol as a religious fanatic, whose behavior before his ktydeath supposedly caused his premature death, allows us to conclude that the biographical myth has a deliberate and constructed character.