Pavel Ivanovitch Chichikov—Plushkin relationship

The relationship between Paul Ivanovitch Chichikov and Plushkin is a transaction disguised as sympathy. Chichikov offers to take on the taxes due for dead serfs still recorded in Plushkin’s household, and in return obtains their names for a purchase deed that treats them as alive. The bargain grows beyond the dead: it also places the estate’s fugitive peasants within Chichikov’s reach. Their encounter shows how a census and its continuing tax obligations can be turned into an instrument of private gain, while the two men’s manners make generosity and avarice difficult to distinguish from calculation.

The System Behind the Bargain

Under serfdom, the government’s periodic revision lists fixed the population on which owners paid tax. A peasant who died between censuses could remain registered, leaving the landowner liable for a tax on someone no longer alive. The same official fiction had a financial use: Chichikov’s plan was to acquire names of dead serfs and present them as a list of living dependents that could support a loan. The owners, relieved of further tax payments, supplied the names; Chichikov hoped to use the supposed population to raise capital and begin a fortune.

The scheme had occurred to Chichikov during his earlier work as an attorney. When officials accepted the logic that a dead person on a revision list could be replaced by a person born later, he recognized the interval before a new census as an opportunity. He reasoned that impoverished landowners burdened by poll taxes might gladly surrender dead serfs, and that he could claim to be transferring the people to land in Kherson. Plushkin’s sale is one practical enactment of that idea: the documents are to present the dead as living, and the tax burden becomes the price of Chichikov’s acquisition.

Sympathy as a Negotiating Instrument

Plushkin initially treats expressions of sympathy with suspicion. He recalls a military captain who calls him dear uncle, kisses his hand, and professes concern, but has squandered his own money and asks for food. For Plushkin, sympathy that does not benefit him is empty talk. Chichikov answers by distinguishing his own offer from the captain’s: he proposes not merely to feel for Plushkin but to assume the taxes owed on the dead peasants. The offer astonishes the old landowner, who asks whether Chichikov has served in the military; Chichikov warily replies that he has been in the civil service.

Chichikov’s proposal is careful in both substance and presentation. When Plushkin asks whether the annual tax will be paid to him or to the Treasury, Chichikov agrees to draw up a deed of purchase as though the serfs remained alive and Plushkin had sold them. He also offers to cover the transfer expenses, anticipating Plushkin’s complaint that lawyers charge excessively. Plushkin’s suspicion gives way to delight. He blesses Chichikov and even his children, although he has not asked whether Chichikov has a family. The mismatch is revealing: a calculated transaction is received as extraordinary kindness because it relieves an immediate financial burden.

The Names and the Additional Purchase

The decisive object in the exchange is Plushkin’s list. He says that he has prepared it for the next revision, then searches among stored papers until he finds a heavily scribbled document. Its names are packed closely together, and it contains 120 deceased peasants. Chichikov grins at the number and puts the list in his pocket. To complete the transaction, he says, they must return to town, where the deed can be arranged.

Plushkin’s records also include roughly seventy peasants who have run away. He complains that they abscond year after year, and says he will accept whatever price Chichikov offers. A living serf on the census list, he notes, is worth 500 roubles; if acquaintances could locate even twenty fugitives, the search would repay them. Chichikov privately decides not to let anyone else take part. Rather than involve a third party, he tells Plushkin that legal costs would make such an arrangement impractical, then offers an advance of his own. The exchange thus extends the original purchase: the dead names provide the basis of the tax-saving transaction, while the fugitive serfs offer a further prospective asset.

The Parting Gesture and Its Irony

Plushkin’s response to the completed business remains governed by thrift. He objects that Chichikov is leaving just as the samovar has been ordered, complains about the price of sugar, and tells his servant first to return the sugar and then to bring it so that he can put it back himself. Yet he gives Chichikov a letter for the President of the Council, describing the recipient as an old schoolfellow. The gesture links their private bargain to the local official world in which the paperwork must be handled.

After escorting Chichikov to the courtyard gates, Plushkin closes them and resumes his usual inspection of the estate. He checks the watchmen and kitchen, eats a little cabbage soup and gruel under the pretext of ensuring that his servants are fed, and berates them for theft. Alone afterward, he thinks about rewarding his visitor. His imagined gift is a silver watch, damaged but repairable, which he decides would suit a young man to give his betrothed. This private fantasy complicates the scene without undoing its material logic: Plushkin has accepted a deal that saves him money, yet recasts the encounter in his mind as benevolence deserving a personal token.

Transactional Affinities and Contrasts

The relationship is not one of friendship or shared purpose. Chichikov’s outward sympathy is a method of negotiation, and Plushkin’s gratitude follows directly from the prospect of escaping taxes and receiving money. Each man interprets the other through his own immediate concerns: Plushkin tests the offer against the empty solicitations of his needy captain, while Chichikov manages the conversation so that no outside associate can share the business. The result is a practical alliance whose warmth is largely theatrical.

The contrast is also economic. Plushkin guards sugar, food, household goods, and the costs of paperwork, yet his estate contains a mass of dead names and a population of fugitives that can be converted into a deal. Chichikov recognizes the value hidden in those records. Where Plushkin sees an annual liability and the expense of lawyers, Chichikov sees a document that can support his broader plan. Their bargain makes the census list more than a record of people: it becomes a transferable financial instrument, while the human lives and deaths behind its entries recede beneath the mechanics of tax, deed, and price.