The stories focus on the great administrative city's indifference to the plight of individuals, describing the personal narratives of people rebelling against its climate.
When the general shows off his beautiful mare to the party attendees, Chertokutsky mentions he has a splendid coach that he paid around four-thousand rubles for, hoping to impress the other guests (although in reality he owns nothing of the sort).
"The Carriage" is a prime example of efficient use of the short-story form, with small sentences conveying large amounts of detail about the story's characters and their general environment.
It is not hard for the reader to fill in the gaps between Gogol's descriptions, as the drunkenness leads to boasting on the part of all parties involved, including the now-retired officer Chertokutsky.
[6] The same mayor gives the name “Frenchmen” to the local animals, which apparently move into the streets at the slightest drop of rain, which turns the dust on the roads to mud.
As Vladimir Nabokov described Akaki Akakievich (from another Gogol story, "The Overcoat"): “Something is very wrong and all men are mild lunatics engaged in pursuits that seem to them very important while an absurdly logical force keeps them at their futile jobs.”[8] Chertokutsky, the main character, fits into this archetype well, as he obsesses over receiving some modicum of attention from the cavalry officers to the point of lying about his possession of an impressive carriage in order to lure them to his estate.
Ultimately, Gogol remarked that he had to move past the “carelessness and laziness” of his earlier work and “do something serious”, but he also burned the manuscript of the planned second volume of Dead Souls, in which Chichikov is redeemed, thus leaving the theme of redemption unexplored.