"Dead Souls" N. V. Gogol is a legendary work. A touch of mystery has surrounded him since the publication of the first volume, and one of the legends says that one February night, the writer burned the second volume of his creation. Literary critics are still arguing about what made the genius so cruelly deal with his creation.
There are several versions of what happened. According to one of them, there really was a burning. Two reasons are usually named - that Gogol was not satisfied with the quality of what he had written, he was extremely dissatisfied with himself and decided not to publish a creation that did not suit him. This is very likely, since the first volume is actually a finished work, and such a sophisticated person in literature as N. V. Gogol could not help but feel this. Plus, the second volume should have dealt with the reincarnation of Chichikov, and this was very difficult to describe convincingly.
The second explanation for the same version is less innocuous. Some literary historians believe that the writer had an attack of mental illness, which made him commit the irreparable. The writer really suffered from mental illness, and his condition ten days before his death was by no means good.
The burned version has one major flaw. It is based on only one piece of evidence - the story of a writer's servant, who at that time was still too young to understand the events well. In addition, it is unlikely that he penetrated so deeply into the affairs of his master and realized that Gogol burned precisely "Dead Souls" and precisely the second volume. Perhaps the servant's testimony only testifies to the fact that on the night of February 11-12, 1852, Gogol burned some document. Some literary scholars believe that the manuscript of the second volume of "Dead Souls" really died in the fireplace, but got there by accident, and the writer simply could not save it.
There are also versions that there was no burning. One of the opinions - Gogol was going to write a sequel to his poem, talked a lot about it, made sketches, but did not bother to bring his plan to life. Another version is that the manuscript was there, but it was stolen.
As before, the most probable version is the burning, and the reason is that Gogol valued himself too highly and could not afford to leave a poorly written work to posterity. It is also quite likely that it was a creative failure that caused an exacerbation of mental illness and ultimately brought death closer.
