[filoleg]

Feels like an odd choice to imply that Gogol was subtle in any way about being subversive and unsympathetic to the state.

I haven't read that many of his works, but the two that almost any Russian adult would know about are "The Government Inspector" and "Dead Souls". Both of which are almost 100% about satirizing government corruption and awful local politicking in the most grotesque ways possible. The intent and overall theme of those stories was as obvious as it can get, though both pack plenty of great less obvious nuance as well.

Not disagreeing with you overall though, Gogol had so many massively impactful works, it is hard to neatly pack his work as "here are his 2-3 monumental pieces everyone knows", he has way too many of those. "Taras Bulba", as you've mentioned, is extremely different from the two i listed above, but there are just as many people who know Gogol exclusively for that. And that can be said about half of his works imo. Then "Viy"? That one was a whole different genre completely (supernatural horror with some subtle themes under), and there is a whole swath of people who would know him just for that as well.