Interpretations
Gogol makes much of Akaky's name in the opening passages, saying, "Perhaps it may strike the reader as a rather strange and farfetched name, but I can assure him that it was not farfetched at all, that the circumstances were such that it was quite out of the question to give him any other name..." In one way, the name Akaky Akakievich is similar to "John Johnson" and has similar comedic value; it also communicates Akaky's role as an everyman. Moreover, the name sounds strikingly similar to the word "obkakat'" in Russian, a word which means "to smear with excrement," or kaka, which means "poop", thereby rendering his name "Poop Poopson". In addition to the scatological pun, the literal meaning of the name, derived from the Greek, is "harmless" or "lacking evil", showcasing the humiliation it must have taken to drive his ghost to violence. His surname Bashmachkin, meanwhile, comes from the word 'bashmak' which is a type of shoe. It is used in an expression "быть под башмаком" which means to be "under someone's thumb" or to "be henpecked".
Akaky progresses from an introverted, hopeless but functioning non-entity with no expectations of social or material success to one whose self-esteem and thereby expectations are raised by the overcoat. Co-workers start noticing him and complimenting him on his coat and he ventures out into the social world. His hopes are quickly dashed by the theft of the coat. He attempts to enlist the police in recovery of the coat and employs some inept rank jumping by going to a very important and high ranking individual but his lack of status (perhaps lack of the coat) is obvious and he is treated with disdain. He is plunged into illness (fever) and cannot function. He dies quickly and without putting up much of a fight. The Overcoat is a philosophical tale in the tradition of a stoic philosopher or Schopenhauer.
Akaky's low position in the bureaucratic hierarchy is evident, and the extent to which he looks up the hierarchical ladder is well documented; sometimes forgotten, according to Harold McFarlin, is that he is not the lowest-ranked in the hierarchy and thus in society. He has mastered the bureaucratic language ("bureaucratese") and has internalized it to the extent that he describes and treats the non-civil servants ("only two 'civilians,' the landlady and tailor, play more than incidental roles") as if they are part of the same world—the tailor is described as sitting "like a Turkish Pasha", that is, a government official, and Akaky "treats the self-effacing old landlady just like his bosses treat him at the office ('somehow coldly and despotically')".
The story's ending has sparked great debate amongst literary scholars, who disagree about the existence, purpose, and disappearance of Akaky's ghost. Edward Proffitt theorized that the ghost did not, in fact, exist at all and that Gogol used the ghost as a means of parodying literary convention. Proponents of the view that the story is a form of social protest prefer to see the ghost's attack on the Very Important Person as a reversal of power from the oppressor to the oppressed. Yet another view states that Akaky's return from the grave is symbolic of society's collective remorse, experienced as a result of failing to treat Akaky with compassion.
The appearance of the second ghost is similarly unexplained. A logical inference, considering the time of its publication, would be that the second ghost represents Russian society and the fact that all criminals were mere responders to the mistreatment and malnourishment suffered at the hands of their leaders. Others disagree. Was it the mustachioed robbers who stole Akaky's coat originally? Does this mean that Akaky was, himself, robbed by ghosts? Was he, perhaps, not robbed at all, or possibly never had the new overcoat at all? Akaky's deteriorating mental state, brought about by fever and malnourishment, may have been responsible for many of his sufferings, including the existence of an overcoat far superior to his own.
Another interpretation is that the story is a parable. Akaky's job, as a copier, can be compared to that of a monk, whose main job is to copy the Word, as Akaky does. He is taunted much by his fellow worker, much as Jesus was, and also like Jesus tempted by the devil, or the drunk, smoky, and harsh coat maker, marked as the devil by his habit of drinking on the sabbath. However, unlike Jesus, Akaky accepts the coat and becomes popular, until he has the coat stolen. One scene that shows what the coat has done to Akaky can be seen as he leaves the party, returning to his plain district before he has his coat stolen. As he returns to this area, he looks around and very much dislikes his living area. Before he had the coat, he was completely fine with his living area and completely fine with his life. With the overcoat, he finds he wants more. And after he loses his overcoat, he cannot function and simply dies.
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