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Captain Kopeikin
Kopeikin
also: капитан Копейкин, Kopeikin
A maimed war veteran turned outlaw from the embedded "Tale of Captain Kopeikin" in Gogol's Dead Souls, invoked here by Pavel Ivanych as a stock byword for a petty, undistinguished superior officer -- part of his sarcastic complaint that Gusev was dragged fifteen thousand versts from home only to serve as batman to "some Captain Kopeikin or midshipman Dyrka."
Reading notes
- Gusev §33 Captain Kopeikin or midshipman Dyrka
Pavel Ivanych's sarcastic pairing invokes Captain Kopeikin, the maimed veteran-turned-bandit of the embedded tale in Gogol's Dead Souls (1842), as a stock byword for a petty, undistinguished superior officer; "мичман Дырка" (Midshipman Dyrka, from дырка, "little hole") appears to be Pavel Ivanych's own invented mocking name rather than a citation of a specific literary source, continuing the joke in the same register.