Gogol as St. Petersburg. "Diary of a Madman", by Nikolai Vasilevich Gogol

Within Diary of a Madman, Gogol attempts a tale of epic proportions, if only for the schizophrenic mumblings of a character so immersed in his own psychosis that he fails to realize that the entire world does not share his own delusions. Through numerous journal entries, Aksenty Ivanovich Poprishchin leads us throughout his world, from his mediocre job and crush on his employer's daughter, to his encounters with dogs of higher intelligence, to the torments …

…side could be a figurative other side, such as complete dementia, or even autistic genius; it could also mean the other side of life: the afterlife and everything that comes with it. Which ever rejoining actually occurs, one thing is for certain: this rejoining is only possible once Sophie is out of the way, so to speak. For Poprishchin to ever have a chance at sanity, he must give up his one true, obsessive love.