The Overcoat and Other Tales of Good and Evil includes six of Gogol’s most well-known stories, all of which fall under the theme of good vs. evil. Gogol caught the attention of Alexander Pushkin in 1831 when his Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka. That collection of stories included “The Terrible Vengeance” and “Ivan Fyodorovich Shponka and His Aunt,” which would later be collected in Tales of Good and Evil. It also established him as a literary genius.
Gogol published another set of short stories and essays in 1835 called Arabesques. This collection included the stories “The Portrait” and “Nevsky Avenue,” both of which appear in Tales of Good and Evil. The original version of “The...
