Dead Souls

The title itself is a censorship point and the first thing to check: the Moscow censor refused the book, and after Gogol sent the manuscript to St Petersburg it was passed in March 1842 by the liberal censor Aleksandr Nikitenko subject to roughly thirty wording alterations and to the retitling that pushes 'The Adventures of Chichikov' forward and 'Dead Souls' back — the half-title and title leaf duly give visual precedence to the picaresque half of the title over the satirical half