About the work
Der Revisor (The Government Inspector, Ревизор) is a five-act comedy by Nikolai Gogol, written in 1835 and first performed on 19 April 1836 at the Alexandrinsky Theatre in St Petersburg, followed shortly afterwards by its Moscow premiere at the Maly Theatre. Tsar Nicholas I personally approved the controversial production after reading it as a cheerful mockery of corrupt provincial officials.
Plot
Word spreads through a Russian provincial town that a government inspector is travelling incognito, and the town's corrupt officials mistake Khlestakov, a penniless clerk from St Petersburg stranded there by chance, for the feared official. Khlestakov exploits the confusion, accepting bribes and even getting engaged to the mayor's daughter before leaving town; only an intercepted letter reveals his true identity as an impostor, just as news arrives that the real inspector has arrived.
Cultural significance
Gogol described the play as gathering together every conceivable human shortcoming, aiming his satire less at individuals than at the administration of contemporary Russia as a whole. The Government Inspector is regarded as one of the most influential comedies in Russian literature and remains part of the international repertoire, not least for its famous silent final scene.