Summary of "In the Hospital for the Insane" by Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin

The work was created in 1873. The protagonist awakens locked in a psychiatric hospital ward, where the grotesque daily life of the patients brings the vices of modern society to the point of absurdity. The essay is part of the satirical cycle "Diary of a Provincial in St. Petersburg." Other episodes in this series were published in the journal "Otechestvennye Zapiski." This text serves as a direct continuation of the previous parts.

Waking up and meeting the doctor

A provincial man awakens in a cold, uninviting hospital room. Footsteps and shouts can be heard outside the door. Around nine o’clock in the morning, an unknown man appears. He identifies himself as the local doctor and coldly declares the hero insane. The provincial man protests vehemently. He recalls that he was brought here by the local police lieutenant, Khvatov, after some absurd political incident.

The doctor explains the strict rules. The patient is forced to acknowledge their illness. The provincial’s diagnosis is an acute attack of mania, caused by an obsession with a stolen million. The doctor describes the institution’s strict regime. Patients are strictly forbidden from reading and writing. Any disobedience is punishable by solitary confinement and a straitjacket.

The doctor describes the clinic’s structure in detail. Patients are divided into three categories. Paralytics die quickly. Chronically ill patients enjoy relative freedom, can take walks and play billiards. Acutely ill patients are condemned to the strictest rest. The right to a gourmet meal must be earned through full recovery. The judge in this process is the physician, who keeps a special observation log.

The doctor mentions other patients at the clinic. Journalist Menander Prelestnov has gone mad from a fierce hatred of gophers, who are allegedly destroying the zemstvo’s grain reserves. Lawyer Neskladin is obsessed with finding the ninety-six truths and the high-profile court case of Abbess Mitrofania.

The delusional ideals of a nephew

The doctor introduces the provincial to his second cousin, Vanya Potseluyev. Vanya was once a smug cavalryman, interested only in restaurants and horse racing. Now he’s transformed into a pale, twitchy youth. Vanya is convinced he’s simultaneously a Hungarian honved, a French zouave, and a Prussian lancer. His nephew recounts the story of his diplomatic mission.

According to him, the Austrian minister instructed him to deal a blow to the favorite of the Spanish Queen Isabella. Vanya infiltrated the Escurial Palace and found Marfori’s favorite there, but the Spanish Revolution prevented the mission. Vanya’s second obsession is the construction of a colossal international circus on the Champ de Mars. The glass-domed building would accommodate arenas of all nations.

Vanya plans to create a ministry for the development of new breeds: rhinoceros horses, leopard horses, and shark horses. Spectators will be shown battles between elephants and rhinoceroses and parades of Amazons.

Then the nephew demonstrates his financial schemes. He calls upon a patient, Goldenshwein, who dreams of reviving the Jewish nation by seizing control of the banks. Vanya forces him to hand over forty rubles in cash. In exchange, he writes a promissory note for fifty thousand rubles, with the condition of payment "whenever I please." The nephew calls this the Austrian method of lending. In politics, Vanya admits to being a conservative, willing to serve anyone as long as they pay his dues.

Fear of brute force and youthful trauma

That night, the provincial analyzes his relationship with his nephew. He realizes a terrible pattern. People with primitive but unchanging attitudes always subjugate doubting intellectuals. The hero values property, freedom, and human alliances. The ability to understand the views of others robs him of the energy for real struggle. Vanya, however, knows only brute force and is ready to strike without hesitation. The provincial clearly understands the inevitability of his subjugation.

A provincial witnesses an absurd trial of a downtrodden patient. A rude fellow threw gnawed bones into the patient’s plate. The victim silently endured the abuse. The offender filed a complaint against the insufficient response. The insane class sided with the aggressor. The patient was accused of soiling his robe — a grave crime by local standards. Vanya Potseluyev dispassionately read the verdict. The condemned man was stripped of his clothes forever, forced to wander in his underwear under the weight of universal contempt. The provincial witness, horrified, imagines this situation happening to him.

Lost in a heavy sleep, the hero finds himself in a circus arena. He gallops on a tigress mare, tearing through paper hoops. Zouaves and lancers stand around him, and Vanya beats his legs with a long whip. The dream abruptly gives way to memories of his youth at a privileged educational institution. The hero was a poor boy among wealthy generals’ sons. He wore a government-issued overcoat, secretly read books, and wrote poetry.

His peers dismissively called him "smart boy." Trying to gain their respect, the boy begged for money to buy a uniform and overcoat with a fake beaver collar. He began making up stories about the colossal wealth of his aunt, Cleopatra Aggeevna, calling her an influential lady-in-waiting. His classmates feigned gullibility and lured the teenager into drinking.

One day, they dropped by his aunt’s house. Seeing the squalid apartment and the cheap goose reeking of linseed oil, they cruelly ridiculed the boy. Later, they got him drunk to the point of unconsciousness and sent him home with the police. This bitter experience forever shattered the hero’s pride.

Moral torture and controlled rebellion

In the morning, the provincial’s fears come true. Vanya drags his uncle into an imaginary "diner" right in the hospital ward. He obediently lies down with his feet on the torn sofa and drinks cognac. The room fills with other patients, loudly discussing horse training and women. When the provincial tries to discuss real political events, the crowd reacts with hostility. They begin aggressively calling him a "scholar" and a "nihilist."

The days pass in constant moral humiliation. The madmen openly mock the hero. They pour cigar ash into his shot glass, painfully tug at his cheeks, and kick the chair out from under his feet. The hero tries to hide in another room, but Vanya tracks him down and brings him back to the aggressive crowd. The patients commit spontaneous lynching. For a supposed insult, they sentence the provincial to a shameful punishment and smear his face with sprats. The hero awakens from his own wild scream. Orderlies and the head doctor stand around, ironically questioning his sanity.

A broken provincial decides to submit to the system. He admits he’s insane and promises not to contradict his doctors. He tearfully begs for permission to write editorials. The doctor categorically forbids it, reminding him of the utter futility of his previous writings. The doctor introduces the hero to Eleonsky, a frail old teacher in a blue uniform. Eleonsky constantly makes specific hand movements that mimic the clogging of blood vessels. His sole pedagogical goal is to completely destroy any ideas in the youth.

Discontent among the patients is brewing, threatening to escalate into a mass rebellion. The crowd of madmen demands immediate change. The doctor maintains an icy calm. He orders the more conservative patients to put mittens on the most brazen of the loudmouths, Soloveychikov. The doctor then officially declares his approval of the rebellion, provided it proceeds in perfect order. To control the process, the doctor appoints Morkovkin, a patient, as the main rebel. Morkovkin was previously the leader of the nobility and is well versed in all administrative regulations. The controlled protest dissolves into bureaucratic routine.