NON-AFRICAN DRAMA NIKOLAI GOGOL: The Government Inspector Examine three comic scenes in the play.

Answer Details

Nikolai Gogol's The Government Inspector is a comic masterpiece full of ridiculous situations that satirise corruption, vanity and folly. Three scenes in particular stand out for their comic power.

1. The bribing of Khlestakov by the officials. One of the funniest sequences occurs when the corrupt town officials come, one after another, to offer Khlestakov money, believing him to be the dreaded inspector. Each nervous official, the Judge, the Postmaster, the Charity Commissioner and others, sidles in to press a "loan" upon him, while Khlestakov, at first bewildered, quickly grasps the situation and cheerfully takes all he can get. The comedy lies in the officials' terror and clumsy flattery and in Khlestakov's growing boldness as the bribes pile up. It exposes the universal corruption of the town in a stream of laughter.

2. Khlestakov's simultaneous courtship of Anna and Marya. A scene of delicious farce is Khlestakov's love-making to both the Mayor's wife, Anna Andreyevna, and her daughter, Marya, almost in the same breath. He flings extravagant compliments at the mother, then, when she steps aside, drops to his knees before the daughter, and is nearly caught switching from one to the other. The absurd speed of his flattery, and the vanity of both women in believing him, make the scene irresistibly funny while satirising social pretension and empty gallantry.

3. Khlestakov's boasting about his life in St Petersburg. Emboldened by wine and the officials' awe, Khlestakov launches into wild, self-glorifying lies, claiming intimacy with ministers, authorship of famous works and management of whole government departments. His boasts grow more and more preposterous, yet the terrified officials swallow every word. The gap between his real insignificance and his monstrous exaggerations, and the gullibility of his listeners, produces high comedy and lays bare the officials' cowardice and self-interest.

Overall effect. These scenes generate laughter not merely for its own sake but in the service of satire. Each ridiculous situation exposes the greed, cowardice, vanity and stupidity of the provincial officials and of the impostor who dupes them, so that comedy becomes a weapon of social criticism.

In conclusion, the bribing of Khlestakov, his double courtship of mother and daughter, and his grandiose boasting are three richly comic scenes through which Gogol both delights his audience and satirises the corruption and folly of society.