In "Dead Souls" Gogol posed the most pressing and painful questions of modern life. The very title of the poem had enormous revealing power; it carried, according to Herzen, “something terrifying”, “he could not name it otherwise; not the revisionists - dead souls, but all these Nozdryovs. Manilovs and all those like them are dead souls, and we meet them at every step..."

Alyosha Ptitsyn, a third-grader decides that he wants to improve his personality and immediately starts to act.

The positive assessment of the work of young historian Nadezhda Kovrova went to her head. Confident in her infallibility, she makes a mistake.

The local doctor Yelizaveta Maksimovna is a beautiful woman and a wonderful sympathetic person. She is lonely, although she is cared for by a confident and promising colleague. Yelizaveta Maksimovna has one patient, a manly, full-energy ship builder Yershov, chained to the bed with a paralysis of both legs. All doctors recommend him rest, and Elizaveta Maksimovna advises to work and not feel sorry for herself. Yershov with all his heart falls in love with his doctor, and she loves him, but she does not dare to say her feelings. Ershov thinks that he has no hopes, but...

This case has been under investigation for five years, it has gone through all the courts, and there are so many papers in this case that they are "carried from one court to another on a cart." The case is known as the Muromsky case. The investigation is being conducted against Lidochka. She is suspected of knowing about Krechinsky's intention to rob Muromsky, of assisting him in this, and of providing this criminal assistance because she was having an illicit love affair with him.