Christmas Eve (Gogol)

"Christmas Eve" (Russian: Ночь пе́ред Рождество́м, Noch pered Rozhdestvom, which literally translates as "The Night Before Christmas") is the first story in the second volume of the collection Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka by Nikolai Gogol.

The story opens with a description of the winter scenery of Dikanka, Ukraine, a witch flying across the night sky and the devil stealing the moon and hiding it in his pocket, first playing with it in the sky, which no one in the village notices. Since it is the night before Christmas, the devil is free to roam around and torment people as he pleases, so he decides to find a way to get back at the village blacksmith, Vakula, because he paints religious art in the church.

In the village lives a Cossack named Choub, whose daughter Oksana, an exceptionally beautiful village girl loved by all the young boys, is the object of the blacksmith Vakula’s affection. Choub goes out in the night with his cousin Panas to the sexton’s home gathering, suddenly noticing that the moon is not in the sky. Meanwhile, Vakula is trying to win over Oksana, who mentions that his mother, Solokha, is a witch. Choub and his cousin are suddenly engulfed in a snowstorm started by the devil and lose each other. While his cousin finds his way to the tavern, Choub comes upon his home, but the blacksmith, who is visiting Oksana, answers him. Choub cannot believe that the blacksmith would be in his own house, and concludes it is someone else's house. The blacksmith then sends him away.

When Vakula goes back to Oksana, she tells him she will not marry him unless he can get for her the slippers off the Tsaritsa’s feet. While their discussion is happening, Solokha is with the devil in her home, when someone knocks at the door. She hides the devil in a coal sack and admits her guest but more of her admirers continue to arrive, and when her son Vakula returns she has the Mayor, the sexton and Choub himself hidden in sacks; the latter two were accidentally placed in the same one but remained oblivious to one another. Vakula spots the sacks and carries them to his forge, taking them for coal; their excessive weight makes him think he must have lost his strength, and concludes it had to do with Oksana not loving him. He comes upon Oksana, who again belittles him, and runs off saying goodbye to her, threatening to kill himself.

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