Nikolai Gogol's fascination with the human nose manifests in his works through a recurring motif of snuff-taking, smelling, sneezing, and snoring. This seemingly mundane organ becomes a symbol of absurdity and humor in his narratives. Gogol found the nose to be a paradoxical feature of the human face—prominent yet simultaneously absurd and superfluous. This preoccupation with nasal imagery reached such an extent that in another of his tales, a character becomes obsessed, insisting that the moon is inhabited by noses.

In "The Nose," Gogol employs alogisms, or illogical statements, to enhance the story’s surreal atmosphere. For instance, when a police officer returns Kovalyov's wandering nose, he notes that his glasses allowed him to discern that the gentleman was, in reality, a Nose. He further digresses, mentioning that nearsightedness is a family trait, even affecting his mother-in-law. These tangential remarks, coupled with irrelevant details, such as the elaborate description of a young girl in the cathedral, contribute to the story's mystifying tone.

The narrative embraces the bizarre with a nonchalance that further deepens the absurdity. Despite the strange incident of Kovalyov’s missing nose, the characters react with a matter-of-fact demeanor, devoid of any shock or disbelief. Gogol's technique of embedding inexplicable occurrences within a framework of normalcy forces readers to accept the illogical as part of the everyday, underscoring his unique stylistic approach that weaves the extraordinary into the fabric of the ordinary.