What are your thoughts on Nikolai Gogol so far?
Using the two chapters we have of him, and with zero knowledge of the RL author and his works:
Out of all the characters, I think Gogol is the one who is most concerned with and acutely aware of the power of performance. I feel that a character like Dazai is well-versed in the art of wearing masks and using deflection, but he’s more subtle about it, and if read carefully enough it’s possible to see when he drops his masks and what his true feelings are. With Dazai, everybody can sense the wall that he puts up, but it thins or disappears entirely depending on whom he’s with and what emotion he shows (be it positive or negative).
In contrast, Gogol is in an almost constant state of performance:
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