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The major theme that runs throughout “The Nose” is the absurdity and meaninglessness of status. Kovalyov has built his entire identity around his high-ranking position, but it is a hollow identity. He has no ambitions beyond climbing the social ladder and amassing wealth, and his main personality traits—pridefulness and smugness—are based on his perception that he is a superior man due to his rank. It is no coincidence that once Kovalyov’s status is threatened, he begins to question whether he is even a human being. Without his status, he is empty and devoid of purpose.

For Gogol, status was an elusive concept that lacked any real substance, and was often the result of random chance. However, there was no doubt that the illusion of status was powerful enough to significantly affect reality. Thus, Gogol constructs in “The Nose” an absurd world in which vague titles and ambiguous positions give people concrete wealth and power. A missing nose is all it takes for this so-called power, which Kovalyov believed to be an immutable characteristic of his selfhood, to crumble away. Of course, Gogol holds a mirror to our own world of absurd systems and hierarchies, and especially to the world of 19th century Russia, when the empire enforced a bureaucratic civic hierarchy called the Table of Ranks.

Gogol begins his satire by allowing a “low-ranking” person, Ivan the barber, to discover Kovalyov’s missing nose. When Ivan finds the nose of his high-status client in his breakfast, we see immediately that a shift in the power dynamic has taken place. A prominent feature of Kovalyov’s appearance, and a symbol of his status, is now in the hands of someone he considered an inferior. When Kovalyov wakes to find his nose missing, he quickly recognizes that the lack of nose is not merely a physical deformity but a threat to his status, both professional and social. Kovalyov’s remark that it is fine for a peasant to walk around nose-less, but that someone of his rank cannot be without a nose, proves that he is consciously or subconsciously aware of the text’s most critical theory: that power and status hinge on appearance, and if one cannot effectively perform and appear as a powerful person, they will lose their power.

When Kovalyov discovers that his missing nose is posing as a gentleman and has become a state councilor, we once again see that status is a costume. It is unreasonable that a nose could become a high-ranking government official, and yet onlookers and even Kovalyov himself treat it as a respected figure because it looks the part. Kovalyov complains that the nose is an imposter, but he does not make the connection that the same criticism could be turned upon him and any other men who find themselves in powerful positions without merit. Throughout the narrative, Kovalyov must disguise his deformed face with a handkerchief, just as, in his role as collegiate assessor, he dons a costume of power that disguises his incompetence and emptiness from the world.

At the story’s conclusion, Kovalyov’s nose returns to his face, and he returns to his comfortable place in the hierarchy. Kovalyov has learned nothing from his time without a nose, which briefly exposed his powerlessness and brought on an existential crisis. He happily returns to his privileged life as a collegiate assessor, continuing to mistreat his inferiors and cover himself with military medals despite not being in the military. This latter behavior is plainly ridiculous, and yet somehow, absurdly, it works—Kovalyov dresses himself up with status symbols, and thus he is perceived as powerful. The narrator implores the reader to look past the story’s strange and surreal events, warning that there is truth to be found in the text despite its unrealistic plot. With this remark, Gogol reminds his audience that the story of Kovalyov and his nose is not a silly fantasy but a reflection of their own unjust and hierarchical world.

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