Libretto
Act 1
The morning after shaving Kovalyov, one of his regular customers, a barber finds a nose in his bread. He tries to get rid of it by throwing it in the Neva River, but he is caught by a police officer. Meanwhile Kovalyov wakes and finds his nose missing. He later sees his nose in the Kazan Cathedral, but it has acquired a higher rank than he and refuses to return to his face.
Act 2
Kovalyov visits the newspaper office to place an advertisement about the loss of his nose, but is refused. He returns to his flat, where his servant sings a love song and Kovalyov is left in despair.
Act 3
A group of policemen are at a coach station, in order to prevent the nose from escaping. The nose tries to get on the coach at the last minute: the horse is frightened and runs away, while the driver tries to shoot the nose. The nose is caught, beaten and returned to Kovalyov; however, he is unable to reattach it. He suspects that he has been enchanted by a woman called Madame Podtochina, because he would not marry her daughter. He writes to ask her to undo the spell, but she misinterprets the letter as a proposal to her daughter. She convinces him that she is innocent. In the city, crowds gather in search of the nose.
Epilogue
Kovalyov wakes up with his nose reattached. He is shaved by the barber and flirts as he walks along Nevsky Prospekt.