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Bits of Table Talk on Pushkin

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2018

Waclaw Lednicki
Waclaw Lednicki*
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
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Extract

In my study on Pushkin, “Poetry of Marriage and the Hearth,” I attempted to show that certain motives in the many-sided, yet pre-eminently lyric and autobiographic poetry of Pushkin express, indeed ground and affirm, the poet's view of absolute truths and the laws which derive from these truths and, in the poet's opinion, govern man's life inexorably, beyond possibility of any compromise. One such law which in the poetic (and, although of less importance, also in the practical) concepts of Pushkin had just such a religious, imperative significance, admitting of no modification and no reduction, was the principle of the inviolability of marriage.

Type
Articles
Information
American Slavic and East European Review , Volume 5 , Issue 3-4 , November 1946 , pp. 72 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1946

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References

1 Cf. W. Lednicki, Aleksander Puszkin, Kraków (1926), pp. 264-360.

2 “ … But I am given to another—and shall be eternally faithful to him…”

3 Cf. The Prose Tales of Alexander Pushkin, translated from the Russian by Keane, T., London, 1916, pp. 250 and 251 Google Scholar.

4 Janina Pregerówna: “Sady Tolstoja o Puszkinie (Na marginesie estetyki Tolstoja),” Miscellanea Slawstyczne, Prace Polskiego T-wa dla Badań Europy Wsch. i Blisk. Wschodu; Kraków, 1937, cz. II , pp. 89-114.

5 Polnoe sobr. soch. I. S. Turgeneva v 12 tomakh,izd. Marksa, A. F., S.-Petersburg, 1898, XI, 335 Google Scholar.

6 Op. cit., stanza II (“ … She appeared in a simple little dress, — And with a book in her rather tanned, — But sweet little hands … Then upon a bench — She sat down … Remember Tat'yana? … ” ).

7 Ibid., stanza IV, V (“No one would call her a beauty — it is true … ” “Her face pleased me … It breathed a pensive sadness … ” “To suffering she went, tranquilly she went. .' ” ).

8 Ibid.,stanza IV (“ … Her name was Praskov'ya; that name — is not good. But I — I shall call her Parasha … ” ).

9 Gershenzon, M.: Obrazy Proshlago (Moscow, 1912), p. 145 Google Scholar.

10 Ibid.

11 I do not share the opinion that “Lermontov was the chief model for Turgenev, the poet.” Cf. Sergeĭ Orlovskiĭ, , Lirika Molodogo Turgeneva, Prague, 1926, p. 171 Google Scholar.

12 Ibid., Stanza XXVIII (“ … He fed on the minds of others all his days … Everywhere he wandered, haughty and silent; — But his mind mocking and supple — Brought from abroad a whole swarm — Of fruitless words and a multitude of doubts, — The fruits of cunning, timid observations … ” ).

13 (“ … and the heart's sorrowful remarks … ”)

14 Gershenzon, op. cit., p. 147.

15 (“ … I loved the glitter and the clash of swords, — And the faces of the proud chiefs, — and the friendly stamp of the horses, — When thundering and rising in waves, — The cavalry gleamed amid the smoke … ”)

16 Ibid.(“I met weak good fellows — And nonsensical clever boys — in a throng; — I met amiable wits, — Satisfied with their job and fate, — And governmental officials, — Satisfied with their own importance … ”)

17 (“ … respected the law — and the property of another … ”)

17a (“ ‘The beginnmg is difficult,’ I have heard many a time. — Yes, for him who lov es explanations, — But I am not such a one, — and at once my tale — I begin — without preparation … — My placid Pegasus was trotting along … ”)

18 (“Friends! I see a demon … Against the fence — He has leaned — and he is looking; after a pair —Mockingly follows his threatening gaze, — And there is heard: in the distance, by a wild storm — Torn, the pine forest sadly moans … — My soul involuntarily trembles; — It seems to me that he is not looking at them, — All Russia was spread out, like a field, — Before his eyes in that moment… ”)

19 Cf. Merezhkovskiĭ: Gogol i Chort.

20 Cf. Prof. Ivanov, Iv.: Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev— (Nezhin 1914), p. 72 Google Scholar.

21 Op. cit., p. 78.

22 Op. cit., p. 89.

23 Op. cit., p. 88.

24 Ibid., p. 111.

25 Op. cit., chap. XVII.

26 On the other hand, the story of Malan'ya — the mother of Fedor Ivanovich Lavretskiĭ — and his father's affair with one of the then-notorious “Phrynes or Laises” is an echo of Turgenev's episode with Volkova, the mother of Turgenev's daughter, and his “romance” with Pauline Viardot.

27 Cf. Tvorcheskiĭ put Turgeneva, sbornik stateĭ pod. red. Brodskogo, N. L., Petrograd 1923, pp. 126–134 Google Scholar.

28 Cf. Russkie pisateli XIX veka o Pushkine , red. Dolinina, A. S., Leningrad 1938, 312– 313; also Kleman, M. K.: Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, Leningrad, 1936 Google Scholar.

29 Op. tit., pp. 10-11.

30 However we read in Tolstoĭ's Diary (1856): “His (Turgenev's) whole life is a simulation of simplicity.” Cf. Tolstoĭ, L. N.: Polnoe Sobranie Sochineniĭ, v. 47, Moskva (1937), p. 85 Google Scholar.

31 Cf. Ivanov, op. cit., pp. 180-181. I read in the Journal des Goncourt: “He (Turgenev) tells us that when he feels sad and in a bad mood twenty lines from Pushkin bring him out of his depression, revive his spirits, stimulate him; they give him an admirative tenderness which he never feels for any great and generous action. Only literature is able to secure him this serenity which he immediately recognises by a physical thing, by a pleasant sensation in his cheeks! He adds that in a state of anger he seems to feel a great emptiness in his breast and in his stomach.” J.d. G., v, 1872-1877 (Paris, 1891), 30. Cf. Also Turgenev's comments about love intercourse, ibid., VI (Paris, 1892), 10, and his confessions about the almost decisive role of love and of woman in his life, ibid., v, 26.

32 Ibid., p. 181.

33 Cf. Ostrovskiĭ, A.: Turgenev v zapisyakh sovremennikov (Leningrad, 1929)Google Scholar.

34 The Undivine Comedy by Zygmunt Krasiński, translated by H. S. Kennedy and Z. Umińska, Preface by Chesterton, G. K., Introduction by A. Górski (London-Warsaw, 1923), p .1 Google Scholar.

35 I do not remember which composer wrote the music to Pushkin's text; — it must have been a fashionable “romance” at the time when Turgenev wrote The Nest of Gentlefolk (in 1858 — although the action of the story took place in the year 1842 — the incident with Lavretskiĭ's wife occurred earlier, in the year 1838, approximately) since Lavretskiĭ's wife, a lady precisely à la page, often sang this “romance.”

36 A House of Gentlefolk, etc. Translated from the Russian by Garnett, C. (New York, 1917), pp. 96–97 Google Scholar.

37 Garnett translation, op. cit. p. 190. I follow in general the Garnett translation, correcting it, however, here and there.

38 Ibid., pp. 208-209.

39 Ivanov, op. tit., pp. 310-312.

40 Ibid., p. 313.

41 Cf. Tolstoĭ, L. N., Polonoe Sobranie Sochineniĭ, pod red. V. G.Chertkova, LIV (Moscow: Gosizdat, 1935), 443–445 Google Scholar, and elsewhere.

42 Journal des Goncourts, v.V, Paris, 1891, p. 299.