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diff --git a/600-h/600-h.htm b/600-h/600-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8f07f81 --- /dev/null +++ b/600-h/600-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,5721 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" +"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Notes from the Underground, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + +body { margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; + text-align: justify; } + +h1, h2, h3, h4, h5 {text-align: center; font-style: normal; font-weight: +normal; line-height: 1.5; margin-top: .5em; margin-bottom: .5em;} + +h1 {font-size: 300%; + margin-top: 0.6em; + margin-bottom: 0.6em; + letter-spacing: 0.12em; + word-spacing: 0.2em; + text-indent: 0em;} +h2 {font-size: 150%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} +h3 {font-size: 130%; margin-top: 1em;} +h4 {font-size: 120%;} +h5 {font-size: 110%;} + +.no-break {page-break-before: avoid;} /* for epubs */ + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always; margin-top: 4em;} + +hr {width: 80%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} + +p {text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: 0.25em; + margin-bottom: 0.25em; } + +p.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: 90%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.footnote {font-size: 90%; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +a:link {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:visited {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:hover {color:red} + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Notes from the Underground, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Notes from the Underground</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Fyodor Dostoyevsky</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Translator: Constance Garnett</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July, 1996 [eBook #600]<br /> +[Most recently updated: December 26, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND ***</div> + +<h1>Notes from the Underground</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by Fyodor Dostoyevsky</h2> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap00"><b>NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND</b></a><br /><br /></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#part01"><b>PART I Underground</b></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">I</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">II</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">III</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">IV</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05">V</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">VI</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07">VII</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">VIII</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">IX</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10">X</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">XI</a><br /><br /></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#part02"><b>PART II À Propos of the Wet Snow</b></a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12">I</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">II</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14">III</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap15">IV</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap16">V</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap17">VI</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap18">VII</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap19">VIII</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap20">IX</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap21">X</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap00"></a>NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND[*]<br/> +A NOVEL</h2> + +<p class="footnote"> +* The author of the diary and the diary itself are, of course, imaginary. +Nevertheless it is clear that such persons as the writer of these notes not +only may, but positively must, exist in our society, when we consider the +circumstances in the midst of which our society is formed. I have tried to +expose to the view of the public more distinctly than is commonly done, one of +the characters of the recent past. He is one of the representatives of a +generation still living. In this fragment, entitled “Underground,” +this person introduces himself and his views, and, as it were, tries to explain +the causes owing to which he has made his appearance and was bound to make his +appearance in our midst. In the second fragment there are added the actual +notes of this person concerning certain events in his +life.—A<small>UTHOR’S</small> N<small>OTE</small>. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="part01"></a>PART I<br/> +Underground</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>I</h2> + +<p> +I am a sick man.... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my +liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not +know for certain what ails me. I don’t consult a doctor for it, and never +have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely +superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated +enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to +consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I +understand it, though. Of course, I can’t explain who it is precisely +that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I +cannot “pay out” the doctors by not consulting them; I know better +than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But +still, if I don’t consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, +well—let it get worse! +</p> + +<p> +I have been going on like that for a long time—twenty years. Now I am +forty. I used to be in the government service, but am no longer. I was a +spiteful official. I was rude and took pleasure in being so. I did not take +bribes, you see, so I was bound to find a recompense in that, at least. (A poor +jest, but I will not scratch it out. I wrote it thinking it would sound very +witty; but now that I have seen myself that I only wanted to show off in a +despicable way, I will not scratch it out on purpose!) +</p> + +<p> +When petitioners used to come for information to the table at which I sat, I +used to grind my teeth at them, and felt intense enjoyment when I succeeded in +making anybody unhappy. I almost did succeed. For the most part they were all +timid people—of course, they were petitioners. But of the uppish ones +there was one officer in particular I could not endure. He simply would not be +humble, and clanked his sword in a disgusting way. I carried on a feud with him +for eighteen months over that sword. At last I got the better of him. He left +off clanking it. That happened in my youth, though. +</p> + +<p> +But do you know, gentlemen, what was the chief point about my spite? Why, the +whole point, the real sting of it lay in the fact that continually, even in the +moment of the acutest spleen, I was inwardly conscious with shame that I was +not only not a spiteful but not even an embittered man, that I was simply +scaring sparrows at random and amusing myself by it. I might foam at the mouth, +but bring me a doll to play with, give me a cup of tea with sugar in it, and +maybe I should be appeased. I might even be genuinely touched, though probably +I should grind my teeth at myself afterwards and lie awake at night with shame +for months after. That was my way. +</p> + +<p> +I was lying when I said just now that I was a spiteful official. I was lying +from spite. I was simply amusing myself with the petitioners and with the +officer, and in reality I never could become spiteful. I was conscious every +moment in myself of many, very many elements absolutely opposite to that. I +felt them positively swarming in me, these opposite elements. I knew that they +had been swarming in me all my life and craving some outlet from me, but I +would not let them, would not let them, purposely would not let them come out. +They tormented me till I was ashamed: they drove me to convulsions +and—sickened me, at last, how they sickened me! Now, are not you +fancying, gentlemen, that I am expressing remorse for something now, that I am +asking your forgiveness for something? I am sure you are fancying that ... +However, I assure you I do not care if you are.... +</p> + +<p> +It was not only that I could not become spiteful, I did not know how to become +anything; neither spiteful nor kind, neither a rascal nor an honest man, +neither a hero nor an insect. Now, I am living out my life in my corner, +taunting myself with the spiteful and useless consolation that an intelligent +man cannot become anything seriously, and it is only the fool who becomes +anything. Yes, a man in the nineteenth century must and morally ought to be +pre-eminently a characterless creature; a man of character, an active man is +pre-eminently a limited creature. That is my conviction of forty years. I am +forty years old now, and you know forty years is a whole lifetime; you know it +is extreme old age. To live longer than forty years is bad manners, is vulgar, +immoral. Who does live beyond forty? Answer that, sincerely and honestly I will +tell you who do: fools and worthless fellows. I tell all old men that to their +face, all these venerable old men, all these silver-haired and reverend +seniors! I tell the whole world that to its face! I have a right to say so, for +I shall go on living to sixty myself. To seventy! To eighty! ... Stay, let me +take breath ... +</p> + +<p> +You imagine no doubt, gentlemen, that I want to amuse you. You are mistaken in +that, too. I am by no means such a mirthful person as you imagine, or as you +may imagine; however, irritated by all this babble (and I feel that you are +irritated) you think fit to ask me who I am—then my answer is, I am a +collegiate assessor. I was in the service that I might have something to eat +(and solely for that reason), and when last year a distant relation left me six +thousand roubles in his will I immediately retired from the service and settled +down in my corner. I used to live in this corner before, but now I have settled +down in it. My room is a wretched, horrid one in the outskirts of the town. My +servant is an old country-woman, ill-natured from stupidity, and, moreover, +there is always a nasty smell about her. I am told that the Petersburg climate +is bad for me, and that with my small means it is very expensive to live in +Petersburg. I know all that better than all these sage and experienced +counsellors and monitors.... But I am remaining in Petersburg; I am not going +away from Petersburg! I am not going away because ... ech! Why, it is +absolutely no matter whether I am going away or not going away. +</p> + +<p> +But what can a decent man speak of with most pleasure? +</p> + +<p> +Answer: Of himself. +</p> + +<p> +Well, so I will talk about myself. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>II</h2> + +<p> +I want now to tell you, gentlemen, whether you care to hear it or not, why I +could not even become an insect. I tell you solemnly, that I have many times +tried to become an insect. But I was not equal even to that. I swear, +gentlemen, that to be too conscious is an illness—a real thorough-going +illness. For man’s everyday needs, it would have been quite enough to +have the ordinary human consciousness, that is, half or a quarter of the amount +which falls to the lot of a cultivated man of our unhappy nineteenth century, +especially one who has the fatal ill-luck to inhabit Petersburg, the most +theoretical and intentional town on the whole terrestrial globe. (There are +intentional and unintentional towns.) It would have been quite enough, for +instance, to have the consciousness by which all so-called direct persons and +men of action live. I bet you think I am writing all this from affectation, to +be witty at the expense of men of action; and what is more, that from ill-bred +affectation, I am clanking a sword like my officer. But, gentlemen, whoever can +pride himself on his diseases and even swagger over them? +</p> + +<p> +Though, after all, everyone does do that; people do pride themselves on their +diseases, and I do, may be, more than anyone. We will not dispute it; my +contention was absurd. But yet I am firmly persuaded that a great deal of +consciousness, every sort of consciousness, in fact, is a disease. I stick to +that. Let us leave that, too, for a minute. Tell me this: why does it happen +that at the very, yes, at the very moments when I am most capable of feeling +every refinement of all that is “sublime and beautiful,” as they +used to say at one time, it would, as though of design, happen to me not only +to feel but to do such ugly things, such that ... Well, in short, actions that +all, perhaps, commit; but which, as though purposely, occurred to me at the +very time when I was most conscious that they ought not to be committed. The +more conscious I was of goodness and of all that was “sublime and +beautiful,” the more deeply I sank into my mire and the more ready I was +to sink in it altogether. But the chief point was that all this was, as it +were, not accidental in me, but as though it were bound to be so. It was as +though it were my most normal condition, and not in the least disease or +depravity, so that at last all desire in me to struggle against this depravity +passed. It ended by my almost believing (perhaps actually believing) that this +was perhaps my normal condition. But at first, in the beginning, what agonies I +endured in that struggle! I did not believe it was the same with other people, +and all my life I hid this fact about myself as a secret. I was ashamed (even +now, perhaps, I am ashamed): I got to the point of feeling a sort of secret +abnormal, despicable enjoyment in returning home to my corner on some +disgusting Petersburg night, acutely conscious that that day I had committed a +loathsome action again, that what was done could never be undone, and secretly, +inwardly gnawing, gnawing at myself for it, tearing and consuming myself till +at last the bitterness turned into a sort of shameful accursed sweetness, and +at last—into positive real enjoyment! Yes, into enjoyment, into +enjoyment! I insist upon that. I have spoken of this because I keep wanting to +know for a fact whether other people feel such enjoyment? I will explain; the +enjoyment was just from the too intense consciousness of one’s own +degradation; it was from feeling oneself that one had reached the last barrier, +that it was horrible, but that it could not be otherwise; that there was no +escape for you; that you never could become a different man; that even if time +and faith were still left you to change into something different you would most +likely not wish to change; or if you did wish to, even then you would do +nothing; because perhaps in reality there was nothing for you to change into. +</p> + +<p> +And the worst of it was, and the root of it all, that it was all in accord with +the normal fundamental laws of over-acute consciousness, and with the inertia +that was the direct result of those laws, and that consequently one was not +only unable to change but could do absolutely nothing. Thus it would follow, as +the result of acute consciousness, that one is not to blame in being a +scoundrel; as though that were any consolation to the scoundrel once he has +come to realise that he actually is a scoundrel. But enough.... Ech, I have +talked a lot of nonsense, but what have I explained? How is enjoyment in this +to be explained? But I will explain it. I will get to the bottom of it! That is +why I have taken up my pen.... +</p> + +<p> +I, for instance, have a great deal of <i>amour propre</i>. I am as suspicious +and prone to take offence as a humpback or a dwarf. But upon my word I +sometimes have had moments when if I had happened to be slapped in the face I +should, perhaps, have been positively glad of it. I say, in earnest, that I +should probably have been able to discover even in that a peculiar sort of +enjoyment—the enjoyment, of course, of despair; but in despair there are +the most intense enjoyments, especially when one is very acutely conscious of +the hopelessness of one’s position. And when one is slapped in the +face—why then the consciousness of being rubbed into a pulp would +positively overwhelm one. The worst of it is, look at it which way one will, it +still turns out that I was always the most to blame in everything. And what is +most humiliating of all, to blame for no fault of my own but, so to say, +through the laws of nature. In the first place, to blame because I am cleverer +than any of the people surrounding me. (I have always considered myself +cleverer than any of the people surrounding me, and sometimes, would you +believe it, have been positively ashamed of it. At any rate, I have all my +life, as it were, turned my eyes away and never could look people straight in +the face.) To blame, finally, because even if I had had magnanimity, I should +only have had more suffering from the sense of its uselessness. I should +certainly have never been able to do anything from being +magnanimous—neither to forgive, for my assailant would perhaps have +slapped me from the laws of nature, and one cannot forgive the laws of nature; +nor to forget, for even if it were owing to the laws of nature, it is insulting +all the same. Finally, even if I had wanted to be anything but magnanimous, had +desired on the contrary to revenge myself on my assailant, I could not have +revenged myself on any one for anything because I should certainly never have +made up my mind to do anything, even if I had been able to. Why should I not +have made up my mind? About that in particular I want to say a few words. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>III</h2> + +<p> +With people who know how to revenge themselves and to stand up for themselves +in general, how is it done? Why, when they are possessed, let us suppose, by +the feeling of revenge, then for the time there is nothing else but that +feeling left in their whole being. Such a gentleman simply dashes straight for +his object like an infuriated bull with its horns down, and nothing but a wall +will stop him. (By the way: facing the wall, such gentlemen—that is, the +“direct” persons and men of action—are genuinely nonplussed. +For them a wall is not an evasion, as for us people who think and consequently +do nothing; it is not an excuse for turning aside, an excuse for which we are +always very glad, though we scarcely believe in it ourselves, as a rule. No, +they are nonplussed in all sincerity. The wall has for them something +tranquillising, morally soothing, final—maybe even something mysterious +... but of the wall later.) +</p> + +<p> +Well, such a direct person I regard as the real normal man, as his tender +mother nature wished to see him when she graciously brought him into being on +the earth. I envy such a man till I am green in the face. He is stupid. I am +not disputing that, but perhaps the normal man should be stupid, how do you +know? Perhaps it is very beautiful, in fact. And I am the more persuaded of +that suspicion, if one can call it so, by the fact that if you take, for +instance, the antithesis of the normal man, that is, the man of acute +consciousness, who has come, of course, not out of the lap of nature but out of +a retort (this is almost mysticism, gentlemen, but I suspect this, too), this +retort-made man is sometimes so nonplussed in the presence of his antithesis +that with all his exaggerated consciousness he genuinely thinks of himself as a +mouse and not a man. It may be an acutely conscious mouse, yet it is a mouse, +while the other is a man, and therefore, et caetera, et caetera. And the worst +of it is, he himself, his very own self, looks on himself as a mouse; no one +asks him to do so; and that is an important point. Now let us look at this +mouse in action. Let us suppose, for instance, that it feels insulted, too (and +it almost always does feel insulted), and wants to revenge itself, too. There +may even be a greater accumulation of spite in it than in <i>l’homme de +la nature et de la vérité</i>. The base and nasty desire to vent that spite on +its assailant rankles perhaps even more nastily in it than in <i>l’homme +de la nature et de la vérité</i>. For through his innate stupidity the latter +looks upon his revenge as justice pure and simple; while in consequence of his +acute consciousness the mouse does not believe in the justice of it. To come at +last to the deed itself, to the very act of revenge. Apart from the one +fundamental nastiness the luckless mouse succeeds in creating around it so many +other nastinesses in the form of doubts and questions, adds to the one question +so many unsettled questions that there inevitably works up around it a sort of +fatal brew, a stinking mess, made up of its doubts, emotions, and of the +contempt spat upon it by the direct men of action who stand solemnly about it +as judges and arbitrators, laughing at it till their healthy sides ache. Of +course the only thing left for it is to dismiss all that with a wave of its +paw, and, with a smile of assumed contempt in which it does not even itself +believe, creep ignominiously into its mouse-hole. There in its nasty, stinking, +underground home our insulted, crushed and ridiculed mouse promptly becomes +absorbed in cold, malignant and, above all, everlasting spite. For forty years +together it will remember its injury down to the smallest, most ignominious +details, and every time will add, of itself, details still more ignominious, +spitefully teasing and tormenting itself with its own imagination. It will +itself be ashamed of its imaginings, but yet it will recall it all, it will go +over and over every detail, it will invent unheard of things against itself, +pretending that those things might happen, and will forgive nothing. Maybe it +will begin to revenge itself, too, but, as it were, piecemeal, in trivial ways, +from behind the stove, incognito, without believing either in its own right to +vengeance, or in the success of its revenge, knowing that from all its efforts +at revenge it will suffer a hundred times more than he on whom it revenges +itself, while he, I daresay, will not even scratch himself. On its deathbed it +will recall it all over again, with interest accumulated over all the years and +... +</p> + +<p> +But it is just in that cold, abominable half despair, half belief, in that +conscious burying oneself alive for grief in the underworld for forty years, in +that acutely recognised and yet partly doubtful hopelessness of one’s +position, in that hell of unsatisfied desires turned inward, in that fever of +oscillations, of resolutions determined for ever and repented of again a minute +later—that the savour of that strange enjoyment of which I have spoken +lies. It is so subtle, so difficult of analysis, that persons who are a little +limited, or even simply persons of strong nerves, will not understand a single +atom of it. “Possibly,” you will add on your own account with a +grin, “people will not understand it either who have never received a +slap in the face,” and in that way you will politely hint to me that I, +too, perhaps, have had the experience of a slap in the face in my life, and so +I speak as one who knows. I bet that you are thinking that. But set your minds +at rest, gentlemen, I have not received a slap in the face, though it is +absolutely a matter of indifference to me what you may think about it. +Possibly, I even regret, myself, that I have given so few slaps in the face +during my life. But enough ... not another word on that subject of such extreme +interest to you. +</p> + +<p> +I will continue calmly concerning persons with strong nerves who do not +understand a certain refinement of enjoyment. Though in certain circumstances +these gentlemen bellow their loudest like bulls, though this, let us suppose, +does them the greatest credit, yet, as I have said already, confronted with the +impossible they subside at once. The impossible means the stone wall! What +stone wall? Why, of course, the laws of nature, the deductions of natural +science, mathematics. As soon as they prove to you, for instance, that you are +descended from a monkey, then it is no use scowling, accept it for a fact. When +they prove to you that in reality one drop of your own fat must be dearer to +you than a hundred thousand of your fellow-creatures, and that this conclusion +is the final solution of all so-called virtues and duties and all such +prejudices and fancies, then you have just to accept it, there is no help for +it, for twice two is a law of mathematics. Just try refuting it. +</p> + +<p> +“Upon my word, they will shout at you, it is no use protesting: it is a +case of twice two makes four! Nature does not ask your permission, she has +nothing to do with your wishes, and whether you like her laws or dislike them, +you are bound to accept her as she is, and consequently all her conclusions. A +wall, you see, is a wall ... and so on, and so on.” +</p> + +<p> +Merciful Heavens! but what do I care for the laws of nature and arithmetic, +when, for some reason I dislike those laws and the fact that twice two makes +four? Of course I cannot break through the wall by battering my head against it +if I really have not the strength to knock it down, but I am not going to be +reconciled to it simply because it is a stone wall and I have not the strength. +</p> + +<p> +As though such a stone wall really were a consolation, and really did contain +some word of conciliation, simply because it is as true as twice two makes +four. Oh, absurdity of absurdities! How much better it is to understand it all, +to recognise it all, all the impossibilities and the stone wall; not to be +reconciled to one of those impossibilities and stone walls if it disgusts you +to be reconciled to it; by the way of the most inevitable, logical combinations +to reach the most revolting conclusions on the everlasting theme, that even for +the stone wall you are yourself somehow to blame, though again it is as clear +as day you are not to blame in the least, and therefore grinding your teeth in +silent impotence to sink into luxurious inertia, brooding on the fact that +there is no one even for you to feel vindictive against, that you have not, and +perhaps never will have, an object for your spite, that it is a sleight of +hand, a bit of juggling, a card-sharper’s trick, that it is simply a +mess, no knowing what and no knowing who, but in spite of all these +uncertainties and jugglings, still there is an ache in you, and the more you do +not know, the worse the ache. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>IV</h2> + +<p> +“Ha, ha, ha! You will be finding enjoyment in toothache next,” you +cry, with a laugh. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, even in toothache there is enjoyment,” I answer. I had +toothache for a whole month and I know there is. In that case, of course, +people are not spiteful in silence, but moan; but they are not candid moans, +they are malignant moans, and the malignancy is the whole point. The enjoyment +of the sufferer finds expression in those moans; if he did not feel enjoyment +in them he would not moan. It is a good example, gentlemen, and I will develop +it. Those moans express in the first place all the aimlessness of your pain, +which is so humiliating to your consciousness; the whole legal system of nature +on which you spit disdainfully, of course, but from which you suffer all the +same while she does not. They express the consciousness that you have no enemy +to punish, but that you have pain; the consciousness that in spite of all +possible Wagenheims you are in complete slavery to your teeth; that if someone +wishes it, your teeth will leave off aching, and if he does not, they will go +on aching another three months; and that finally if you are still contumacious +and still protest, all that is left you for your own gratification is to thrash +yourself or beat your wall with your fist as hard as you can, and absolutely +nothing more. Well, these mortal insults, these jeers on the part of someone +unknown, end at last in an enjoyment which sometimes reaches the highest degree +of voluptuousness. I ask you, gentlemen, listen sometimes to the moans of an +educated man of the nineteenth century suffering from toothache, on the second +or third day of the attack, when he is beginning to moan, not as he moaned on +the first day, that is, not simply because he has toothache, not just as any +coarse peasant, but as a man affected by progress and European civilisation, a +man who is “divorced from the soil and the national elements,” as +they express it now-a-days. His moans become nasty, disgustingly malignant, and +go on for whole days and nights. And of course he knows himself that he is +doing himself no sort of good with his moans; he knows better than anyone that +he is only lacerating and harassing himself and others for nothing; he knows +that even the audience before whom he is making his efforts, and his whole +family, listen to him with loathing, do not put a ha’porth of faith in +him, and inwardly understand that he might moan differently, more simply, +without trills and flourishes, and that he is only amusing himself like that +from ill-humour, from malignancy. Well, in all these recognitions and disgraces +it is that there lies a voluptuous pleasure. As though he would say: “I +am worrying you, I am lacerating your hearts, I am keeping everyone in the +house awake. Well, stay awake then, you, too, feel every minute that I have +toothache. I am not a hero to you now, as I tried to seem before, but simply a +nasty person, an impostor. Well, so be it, then! I am very glad that you see +through me. It is nasty for you to hear my despicable moans: well, let it be +nasty; here I will let you have a nastier flourish in a minute....” You +do not understand even now, gentlemen? No, it seems our development and our +consciousness must go further to understand all the intricacies of this +pleasure. You laugh? Delighted. My jests, gentlemen, are of course in bad +taste, jerky, involved, lacking self-confidence. But of course that is because +I do not respect myself. Can a man of perception respect himself at all? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>V</h2> + +<p> +Come, can a man who attempts to find enjoyment in the very feeling of his own +degradation possibly have a spark of respect for himself? I am not saying this +now from any mawkish kind of remorse. And, indeed, I could never endure saying, +“Forgive me, Papa, I won’t do it again,” not because I am +incapable of saying that—on the contrary, perhaps just because I have +been too capable of it, and in what a way, too. As though of design I used to +get into trouble in cases when I was not to blame in any way. That was the +nastiest part of it. At the same time I was genuinely touched and penitent, I +used to shed tears and, of course, deceived myself, though I was not acting in +the least and there was a sick feeling in my heart at the time.... For that one +could not blame even the laws of nature, though the laws of nature have +continually all my life offended me more than anything. It is loathsome to +remember it all, but it was loathsome even then. Of course, a minute or so +later I would realise wrathfully that it was all a lie, a revolting lie, an +affected lie, that is, all this penitence, this emotion, these vows of reform. +You will ask why did I worry myself with such antics: answer, because it was +very dull to sit with one’s hands folded, and so one began cutting +capers. That is really it. Observe yourselves more carefully, gentlemen, then +you will understand that it is so. I invented adventures for myself and made up +a life, so as at least to live in some way. How many times it has happened to +me—well, for instance, to take offence simply on purpose, for nothing; +and one knows oneself, of course, that one is offended at nothing; that one is +putting it on, but yet one brings oneself at last to the point of being really +offended. All my life I have had an impulse to play such pranks, so that in the +end I could not control it in myself. Another time, twice, in fact, I tried +hard to be in love. I suffered, too, gentlemen, I assure you. In the depth of +my heart there was no faith in my suffering, only a faint stir of mockery, but +yet I did suffer, and in the real, orthodox way; I was jealous, beside myself +... and it was all from <i>ennui</i>, gentlemen, all from <i>ennui;</i> inertia +overcame me. You know the direct, legitimate fruit of consciousness is inertia, +that is, conscious sitting-with-the-hands-folded. I have referred to this +already. I repeat, I repeat with emphasis: all “direct” persons and +men of action are active just because they are stupid and limited. How explain +that? I will tell you: in consequence of their limitation they take immediate +and secondary causes for primary ones, and in that way persuade themselves more +quickly and easily than other people do that they have found an infallible +foundation for their activity, and their minds are at ease and you know that is +the chief thing. To begin to act, you know, you must first have your mind +completely at ease and no trace of doubt left in it. Why, how am I, for +example, to set my mind at rest? Where are the primary causes on which I am to +build? Where are my foundations? Where am I to get them from? I exercise myself +in reflection, and consequently with me every primary cause at once draws after +itself another still more primary, and so on to infinity. That is just the +essence of every sort of consciousness and reflection. It must be a case of the +laws of nature again. What is the result of it in the end? Why, just the same. +Remember I spoke just now of vengeance. (I am sure you did not take it in.) I +said that a man revenges himself because he sees justice in it. Therefore he +has found a primary cause, that is, justice. And so he is at rest on all sides, +and consequently he carries out his revenge calmly and successfully, being +persuaded that he is doing a just and honest thing. But I see no justice in it, +I find no sort of virtue in it either, and consequently if I attempt to revenge +myself, it is only out of spite. Spite, of course, might overcome everything, +all my doubts, and so might serve quite successfully in place of a primary +cause, precisely because it is not a cause. But what is to be done if I have +not even spite (I began with that just now, you know). In consequence again of +those accursed laws of consciousness, anger in me is subject to chemical +disintegration. You look into it, the object flies off into air, your reasons +evaporate, the criminal is not to be found, the wrong becomes not a wrong but a +phantom, something like the toothache, for which no one is to blame, and +consequently there is only the same outlet left again—that is, to beat +the wall as hard as you can. So you give it up with a wave of the hand because +you have not found a fundamental cause. And try letting yourself be carried +away by your feelings, blindly, without reflection, without a primary cause, +repelling consciousness at least for a time; hate or love, if only not to sit +with your hands folded. The day after tomorrow, at the latest, you will begin +despising yourself for having knowingly deceived yourself. Result: a +soap-bubble and inertia. Oh, gentlemen, do you know, perhaps I consider myself +an intelligent man, only because all my life I have been able neither to begin +nor to finish anything. Granted I am a babbler, a harmless vexatious babbler, +like all of us. But what is to be done if the direct and sole vocation of every +intelligent man is babble, that is, the intentional pouring of water through a +sieve? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>VI</h2> + +<p> +Oh, if I had done nothing simply from laziness! Heavens, how I should have +respected myself, then. I should have respected myself because I should at +least have been capable of being lazy; there would at least have been one +quality, as it were, positive in me, in which I could have believed myself. +Question: What is he? Answer: A sluggard; how very pleasant it would have been +to hear that of oneself! It would mean that I was positively defined, it would +mean that there was something to say about me. +“Sluggard”—why, it is a calling and vocation, it is a career. +Do not jest, it is so. I should then be a member of the best club by right, and +should find my occupation in continually respecting myself. I knew a gentleman +who prided himself all his life on being a connoisseur of Lafitte. He +considered this as his positive virtue, and never doubted himself. He died, not +simply with a tranquil, but with a triumphant conscience, and he was quite +right, too. Then I should have chosen a career for myself, I should have been a +sluggard and a glutton, not a simple one, but, for instance, one with +sympathies for everything sublime and beautiful. How do you like that? I have +long had visions of it. That “sublime and beautiful” weighs heavily +on my mind at forty But that is at forty; then—oh, then it would have +been different! I should have found for myself a form of activity in keeping +with it, to be precise, drinking to the health of everything “sublime and +beautiful.” I should have snatched at every opportunity to drop a tear +into my glass and then to drain it to all that is “sublime and +beautiful.” I should then have turned everything into the sublime and the +beautiful; in the nastiest, unquestionable trash, I should have sought out the +sublime and the beautiful. I should have exuded tears like a wet sponge. An +artist, for instance, paints a picture worthy of Gay. At once I drink to the +health of the artist who painted the picture worthy of Gay, because I love all +that is “sublime and beautiful.” An author has written <i>As you +will:</i> at once I drink to the health of “anyone you will” +because I love all that is “sublime and beautiful.” +</p> + +<p> +I should claim respect for doing so. I should persecute anyone who would not +show me respect. I should live at ease, I should die with dignity, why, it is +charming, perfectly charming! And what a good round belly I should have grown, +what a treble chin I should have established, what a ruby nose I should have +coloured for myself, so that everyone would have said, looking at me: +“Here is an asset! Here is something real and solid!” And, say what +you like, it is very agreeable to hear such remarks about oneself in this +negative age. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>VII</h2> + +<p> +But these are all golden dreams. Oh, tell me, who was it first announced, who +was it first proclaimed, that man only does nasty things because he does not +know his own interests; and that if he were enlightened, if his eyes were +opened to his real normal interests, man would at once cease to do nasty +things, would at once become good and noble because, being enlightened and +understanding his real advantage, he would see his own advantage in the good +and nothing else, and we all know that not one man can, consciously, act +against his own interests, consequently, so to say, through necessity, he would +begin doing good? Oh, the babe! Oh, the pure, innocent child! Why, in the first +place, when in all these thousands of years has there been a time when man has +acted only from his own interest? What is to be done with the millions of facts +that bear witness that men, <i>consciously</i>, that is fully understanding +their real interests, have left them in the background and have rushed headlong +on another path, to meet peril and danger, compelled to this course by nobody +and by nothing, but, as it were, simply disliking the beaten track, and have +obstinately, wilfully, struck out another difficult, absurd way, seeking it +almost in the darkness. So, I suppose, this obstinacy and perversity were +pleasanter to them than any advantage.... Advantage! What is advantage? And +will you take it upon yourself to define with perfect accuracy in what the +advantage of man consists? And what if it so happens that a man’s +advantage, <i>sometimes</i>, not only may, but even must, consist in his +desiring in certain cases what is harmful to himself and not advantageous. And +if so, if there can be such a case, the whole principle falls into dust. What +do you think—are there such cases? You laugh; laugh away, gentlemen, but +only answer me: have man’s advantages been reckoned up with perfect +certainty? Are there not some which not only have not been included but cannot +possibly be included under any classification? You see, you gentlemen have, to +the best of my knowledge, taken your whole register of human advantages from +the averages of statistical figures and politico-economical formulas. Your +advantages are prosperity, wealth, freedom, peace—and so on, and so on. +So that the man who should, for instance, go openly and knowingly in opposition +to all that list would to your thinking, and indeed mine, too, of course, be an +obscurantist or an absolute madman: would not he? But, you know, this is what +is surprising: why does it so happen that all these statisticians, sages and +lovers of humanity, when they reckon up human advantages invariably leave out +one? They don’t even take it into their reckoning in the form in which it +should be taken, and the whole reckoning depends upon that. It would be no +greater matter, they would simply have to take it, this advantage, and add it +to the list. But the trouble is, that this strange advantage does not fall +under any classification and is not in place in any list. I have a friend for +instance ... Ech! gentlemen, but of course he is your friend, too; and indeed +there is no one, no one to whom he is not a friend! When he prepares for any +undertaking this gentleman immediately explains to you, elegantly and clearly, +exactly how he must act in accordance with the laws of reason and truth. What +is more, he will talk to you with excitement and passion of the true normal +interests of man; with irony he will upbraid the short-sighted fools who do not +understand their own interests, nor the true significance of virtue; and, +within a quarter of an hour, without any sudden outside provocation, but simply +through something inside him which is stronger than all his interests, he will +go off on quite a different tack—that is, act in direct opposition to +what he has just been saying about himself, in opposition to the laws of +reason, in opposition to his own advantage, in fact in opposition to everything +... I warn you that my friend is a compound personality and therefore it is +difficult to blame him as an individual. The fact is, gentlemen, it seems there +must really exist something that is dearer to almost every man than his +greatest advantages, or (not to be illogical) there is a most advantageous +advantage (the very one omitted of which we spoke just now) which is more +important and more advantageous than all other advantages, for the sake of +which a man if necessary is ready to act in opposition to all laws; that is, in +opposition to reason, honour, peace, prosperity—in fact, in opposition to +all those excellent and useful things if only he can attain that fundamental, +most advantageous advantage which is dearer to him than all. “Yes, but +it’s advantage all the same,” you will retort. But excuse me, +I’ll make the point clear, and it is not a case of playing upon words. +What matters is, that this advantage is remarkable from the very fact that it +breaks down all our classifications, and continually shatters every system +constructed by lovers of mankind for the benefit of mankind. In fact, it upsets +everything. But before I mention this advantage to you, I want to compromise +myself personally, and therefore I boldly declare that all these fine systems, +all these theories for explaining to mankind their real normal interests, in +order that inevitably striving to pursue these interests they may at once +become good and noble—are, in my opinion, so far, mere logical exercises! +Yes, logical exercises. Why, to maintain this theory of the regeneration of +mankind by means of the pursuit of his own advantage is to my mind almost the +same thing ... as to affirm, for instance, following Buckle, that through +civilisation mankind becomes softer, and consequently less bloodthirsty and +less fitted for warfare. Logically it does seem to follow from his arguments. +But man has such a predilection for systems and abstract deductions that he is +ready to distort the truth intentionally, he is ready to deny the evidence of +his senses only to justify his logic. I take this example because it is the +most glaring instance of it. Only look about you: blood is being spilt in +streams, and in the merriest way, as though it were champagne. Take the whole +of the nineteenth century in which Buckle lived. Take Napoleon—the Great +and also the present one. Take North America—the eternal union. Take the +farce of Schleswig-Holstein.... And what is it that civilisation softens in us? +The only gain of civilisation for mankind is the greater capacity for variety +of sensations—and absolutely nothing more. And through the development of +this many-sidedness man may come to finding enjoyment in bloodshed. In fact, +this has already happened to him. Have you noticed that it is the most +civilised gentlemen who have been the subtlest slaughterers, to whom the +Attilas and Stenka Razins could not hold a candle, and if they are not so +conspicuous as the Attilas and Stenka Razins it is simply because they are so +often met with, are so ordinary and have become so familiar to us. In any case +civilisation has made mankind if not more bloodthirsty, at least more vilely, +more loathsomely bloodthirsty. In old days he saw justice in bloodshed and with +his conscience at peace exterminated those he thought proper. Now we do think +bloodshed abominable and yet we engage in this abomination, and with more +energy than ever. Which is worse? Decide that for yourselves. They say that +Cleopatra (excuse an instance from Roman history) was fond of sticking gold +pins into her slave-girls’ breasts and derived gratification from their +screams and writhings. You will say that that was in the comparatively +barbarous times; that these are barbarous times too, because also, +comparatively speaking, pins are stuck in even now; that though man has now +learned to see more clearly than in barbarous ages, he is still far from having +learnt to act as reason and science would dictate. But yet you are fully +convinced that he will be sure to learn when he gets rid of certain old bad +habits, and when common sense and science have completely re-educated human +nature and turned it in a normal direction. You are confident that then man +will cease from <i>intentional</i> error and will, so to say, be compelled not +to want to set his will against his normal interests. That is not all; then, +you say, science itself will teach man (though to my mind it’s a +superfluous luxury) that he never has really had any caprice or will of his +own, and that he himself is something of the nature of a piano-key or the stop +of an organ, and that there are, besides, things called the laws of nature; so +that everything he does is not done by his willing it, but is done of itself, +by the laws of nature. Consequently we have only to discover these laws of +nature, and man will no longer have to answer for his actions and life will +become exceedingly easy for him. All human actions will then, of course, be +tabulated according to these laws, mathematically, like tables of logarithms up +to 108,000, and entered in an index; or, better still, there would be published +certain edifying works of the nature of encyclopaedic lexicons, in which +everything will be so clearly calculated and explained that there will be no +more incidents or adventures in the world. +</p> + +<p> +Then—this is all what you say—new economic relations will be +established, all ready-made and worked out with mathematical exactitude, so +that every possible question will vanish in the twinkling of an eye, simply +because every possible answer to it will be provided. Then the “Palace of +Crystal” will be built. Then ... In fact, those will be halcyon days. Of +course there is no guaranteeing (this is my comment) that it will not be, for +instance, frightfully dull then (for what will one have to do when everything +will be calculated and tabulated), but on the other hand everything will be +extraordinarily rational. Of course boredom may lead you to anything. It is +boredom sets one sticking golden pins into people, but all that would not +matter. What is bad (this is my comment again) is that I dare say people will +be thankful for the gold pins then. Man is stupid, you know, phenomenally +stupid; or rather he is not at all stupid, but he is so ungrateful that you +could not find another like him in all creation. I, for instance, would not be +in the least surprised if all of a sudden, <i>à propos</i> of nothing, in the +midst of general prosperity a gentleman with an ignoble, or rather with a +reactionary and ironical, countenance were to arise and, putting his arms +akimbo, say to us all: “I say, gentleman, hadn’t we better kick +over the whole show and scatter rationalism to the winds, simply to send these +logarithms to the devil, and to enable us to live once more at our own sweet +foolish will!” That again would not matter, but what is annoying is that +he would be sure to find followers—such is the nature of man. And all +that for the most foolish reason, which, one would think, was hardly worth +mentioning: that is, that man everywhere and at all times, whoever he may be, +has preferred to act as he chose and not in the least as his reason and +advantage dictated. And one may choose what is contrary to one’s own +interests, and sometimes one <i>positively ought</i> (that is my idea). +One’s own free unfettered choice, one’s own caprice, however wild +it may be, one’s own fancy worked up at times to frenzy—is that +very “most advantageous advantage” which we have overlooked, which +comes under no classification and against which all systems and theories are +continually being shattered to atoms. And how do these wiseacres know that man +wants a normal, a virtuous choice? What has made them conceive that man must +want a rationally advantageous choice? What man wants is simply +<i>independent</i> choice, whatever that independence may cost and wherever it +may lead. And choice, of course, the devil only knows what choice. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>VIII</h2> + +<p> +“Ha! ha! ha! But you know there is no such thing as choice in reality, +say what you like,” you will interpose with a chuckle. “Science has +succeeded in so far analysing man that we know already that choice and what is +called freedom of will is nothing else than—” +</p> + +<p> +Stay, gentlemen, I meant to begin with that myself I confess, I was rather +frightened. I was just going to say that the devil only knows what choice +depends on, and that perhaps that was a very good thing, but I remembered the +teaching of science ... and pulled myself up. And here you have begun upon it. +Indeed, if there really is some day discovered a formula for all our desires +and caprices—that is, an explanation of what they depend upon, by what +laws they arise, how they develop, what they are aiming at in one case and in +another and so on, that is a real mathematical formula—then, most likely, +man will at once cease to feel desire, indeed, he will be certain to. For who +would want to choose by rule? Besides, he will at once be transformed from a +human being into an organ-stop or something of the sort; for what is a man +without desires, without free will and without choice, if not a stop in an +organ? What do you think? Let us reckon the chances—can such a thing +happen or not? +</p> + +<p> +“H’m!” you decide. “Our choice is usually mistaken from +a false view of our advantage. We sometimes choose absolute nonsense because in +our foolishness we see in that nonsense the easiest means for attaining a +supposed advantage. But when all that is explained and worked out on paper +(which is perfectly possible, for it is contemptible and senseless to suppose +that some laws of nature man will never understand), then certainly so-called +desires will no longer exist. For if a desire should come into conflict with +reason we shall then reason and not desire, because it will be impossible +retaining our reason to be <i>senseless</i> in our desires, and in that way +knowingly act against reason and desire to injure ourselves. And as all choice +and reasoning can be really calculated—because there will some day be +discovered the laws of our so-called free will—so, joking apart, there +may one day be something like a table constructed of them, so that we really +shall choose in accordance with it. If, for instance, some day they calculate +and prove to me that I made a long nose at someone because I could not help +making a long nose at him and that I had to do it in that particular way, what +<i>freedom</i> is left me, especially if I am a learned man and have taken my +degree somewhere? Then I should be able to calculate my whole life for thirty +years beforehand. In short, if this could be arranged there would be nothing +left for us to do; anyway, we should have to understand that. And, in fact, we +ought unwearyingly to repeat to ourselves that at such and such a time and in +such and such circumstances nature does not ask our leave; that we have got to +take her as she is and not fashion her to suit our fancy, and if we really +aspire to formulas and tables of rules, and well, even ... to the chemical +retort, there’s no help for it, we must accept the retort too, or else it +will be accepted without our consent....” +</p> + +<p> +Yes, but here I come to a stop! Gentlemen, you must excuse me for being +over-philosophical; it’s the result of forty years underground! Allow me +to indulge my fancy. You see, gentlemen, reason is an excellent thing, +there’s no disputing that, but reason is nothing but reason and satisfies +only the rational side of man’s nature, while will is a manifestation of +the whole life, that is, of the whole human life including reason and all the +impulses. And although our life, in this manifestation of it, is often +worthless, yet it is life and not simply extracting square roots. Here I, for +instance, quite naturally want to live, in order to satisfy all my capacities +for life, and not simply my capacity for reasoning, that is, not simply one +twentieth of my capacity for life. What does reason know? Reason only knows +what it has succeeded in learning (some things, perhaps, it will never learn; +this is a poor comfort, but why not say so frankly?) and human nature acts as a +whole, with everything that is in it, consciously or unconsciously, and, even +if it goes wrong, it lives. I suspect, gentlemen, that you are looking at me +with compassion; you tell me again that an enlightened and developed man, such, +in short, as the future man will be, cannot consciously desire anything +disadvantageous to himself, that that can be proved mathematically. I +thoroughly agree, it can—by mathematics. But I repeat for the hundredth +time, there is one case, one only, when man may consciously, purposely, desire +what is injurious to himself, what is stupid, very stupid—simply in order +to have the right to desire for himself even what is very stupid and not to be +bound by an obligation to desire only what is sensible. Of course, this very +stupid thing, this caprice of ours, may be in reality, gentlemen, more +advantageous for us than anything else on earth, especially in certain cases. +And in particular it may be more advantageous than any advantage even when it +does us obvious harm, and contradicts the soundest conclusions of our reason +concerning our advantage—for in any circumstances it preserves for us +what is most precious and most important—that is, our personality, our +individuality. Some, you see, maintain that this really is the most precious +thing for mankind; choice can, of course, if it chooses, be in agreement with +reason; and especially if this be not abused but kept within bounds. It is +profitable and sometimes even praiseworthy. But very often, and even most +often, choice is utterly and stubbornly opposed to reason ... and ... and ... +do you know that that, too, is profitable, sometimes even praiseworthy? +Gentlemen, let us suppose that man is not stupid. (Indeed one cannot refuse to +suppose that, if only from the one consideration, that, if man is stupid, then +who is wise?) But if he is not stupid, he is monstrously ungrateful! +Phenomenally ungrateful. In fact, I believe that the best definition of man is +the ungrateful biped. But that is not all, that is not his worst defect; his +worst defect is his perpetual moral obliquity, perpetual—from the days of +the Flood to the Schleswig-Holstein period. Moral obliquity and consequently +lack of good sense; for it has long been accepted that lack of good sense is +due to no other cause than moral obliquity. Put it to the test and cast your +eyes upon the history of mankind. What will you see? Is it a grand spectacle? +Grand, if you like. Take the Colossus of Rhodes, for instance, that’s +worth something. With good reason Mr. Anaevsky testifies of it that some say +that it is the work of man’s hands, while others maintain that it has +been created by nature herself. Is it many-coloured? May be it is +many-coloured, too: if one takes the dress uniforms, military and civilian, of +all peoples in all ages—that alone is worth something, and if you take +the undress uniforms you will never get to the end of it; no historian would be +equal to the job. Is it monotonous? May be it’s monotonous too: +it’s fighting and fighting; they are fighting now, they fought first and +they fought last—you will admit, that it is almost too monotonous. In +short, one may say anything about the history of the world—anything that +might enter the most disordered imagination. The only thing one can’t say +is that it’s rational. The very word sticks in one’s throat. And, +indeed, this is the odd thing that is continually happening: there are +continually turning up in life moral and rational persons, sages and lovers of +humanity who make it their object to live all their lives as morally and +rationally as possible, to be, so to speak, a light to their neighbours simply +in order to show them that it is possible to live morally and rationally in +this world. And yet we all know that those very people sooner or later have +been false to themselves, playing some queer trick, often a most unseemly one. +Now I ask you: what can be expected of man since he is a being endowed with +strange qualities? Shower upon him every earthly blessing, drown him in a sea +of happiness, so that nothing but bubbles of bliss can be seen on the surface; +give him economic prosperity, such that he should have nothing else to do but +sleep, eat cakes and busy himself with the continuation of his species, and +even then out of sheer ingratitude, sheer spite, man would play you some nasty +trick. He would even risk his cakes and would deliberately desire the most +fatal rubbish, the most uneconomical absurdity, simply to introduce into all +this positive good sense his fatal fantastic element. It is just his fantastic +dreams, his vulgar folly that he will desire to retain, simply in order to +prove to himself—as though that were so necessary—that men still +are men and not the keys of a piano, which the laws of nature threaten to +control so completely that soon one will be able to desire nothing but by the +calendar. And that is not all: even if man really were nothing but a piano-key, +even if this were proved to him by natural science and mathematics, even then +he would not become reasonable, but would purposely do something perverse out +of simple ingratitude, simply to gain his point. And if he does not find means +he will contrive destruction and chaos, will contrive sufferings of all sorts, +only to gain his point! He will launch a curse upon the world, and as only man +can curse (it is his privilege, the primary distinction between him and other +animals), may be by his curse alone he will attain his object—that is, +convince himself that he is a man and not a piano-key! If you say that all +this, too, can be calculated and tabulated—chaos and darkness and curses, +so that the mere possibility of calculating it all beforehand would stop it +all, and reason would reassert itself, then man would purposely go mad in order +to be rid of reason and gain his point! I believe in it, I answer for it, for +the whole work of man really seems to consist in nothing but proving to himself +every minute that he is a man and not a piano-key! It may be at the cost of his +skin, it may be by cannibalism! And this being so, can one help being tempted +to rejoice that it has not yet come off, and that desire still depends on +something we don’t know? +</p> + +<p> +You will scream at me (that is, if you condescend to do so) that no one is +touching my free will, that all they are concerned with is that my will should +of itself, of its own free will, coincide with my own normal interests, with +the laws of nature and arithmetic. +</p> + +<p> +Good heavens, gentlemen, what sort of free will is left when we come to +tabulation and arithmetic, when it will all be a case of twice two make four? +Twice two makes four without my will. As if free will meant that! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a>IX</h2> + +<p> +Gentlemen, I am joking, and I know myself that my jokes are not brilliant, but +you know one can take everything as a joke. I am, perhaps, jesting against the +grain. Gentlemen, I am tormented by questions; answer them for me. You, for +instance, want to cure men of their old habits and reform their will in +accordance with science and good sense. But how do you know, not only that it +is possible, but also that it is <i>desirable</i> to reform man in that way? +And what leads you to the conclusion that man’s inclinations <i>need</i> +reforming? In short, how do you know that such a reformation will be a benefit +to man? And to go to the root of the matter, why are you so positively +convinced that not to act against his real normal interests guaranteed by the +conclusions of reason and arithmetic is certainly always advantageous for man +and must always be a law for mankind? So far, you know, this is only your +supposition. It may be the law of logic, but not the law of humanity. You +think, gentlemen, perhaps that I am mad? Allow me to defend myself. I agree +that man is pre-eminently a creative animal, predestined to strive consciously +for an object and to engage in engineering—that is, incessantly and +eternally to make new roads, <i>wherever they may lead</i>. But the reason why +he wants sometimes to go off at a tangent may just be that he is +<i>predestined</i> to make the road, and perhaps, too, that however stupid the +“direct” practical man may be, the thought sometimes will occur to +him that the road almost always does lead <i>somewhere</i>, and that the +destination it leads to is less important than the process of making it, and +that the chief thing is to save the well-conducted child from despising +engineering, and so giving way to the fatal idleness, which, as we all know, is +the mother of all the vices. Man likes to make roads and to create, that is a +fact beyond dispute. But why has he such a passionate love for destruction and +chaos also? Tell me that! But on that point I want to say a couple of words +myself. May it not be that he loves chaos and destruction (there can be no +disputing that he does sometimes love it) because he is instinctively afraid of +attaining his object and completing the edifice he is constructing? Who knows, +perhaps he only loves that edifice from a distance, and is by no means in love +with it at close quarters; perhaps he only loves building it and does not want +to live in it, but will leave it, when completed, for the use of <i>les animaux +domestiques</i>—such as the ants, the sheep, and so on. Now the ants have +quite a different taste. They have a marvellous edifice of that pattern which +endures for ever—the ant-heap. +</p> + +<p> +With the ant-heap the respectable race of ants began and with the ant-heap they +will probably end, which does the greatest credit to their perseverance and +good sense. But man is a frivolous and incongruous creature, and perhaps, like +a chess player, loves the process of the game, not the end of it. And who knows +(there is no saying with certainty), perhaps the only goal on earth to which +mankind is striving lies in this incessant process of attaining, in other +words, in life itself, and not in the thing to be attained, which must always +be expressed as a formula, as positive as twice two makes four, and such +positiveness is not life, gentlemen, but is the beginning of death. Anyway, man +has always been afraid of this mathematical certainty, and I am afraid of it +now. Granted that man does nothing but seek that mathematical certainty, he +traverses oceans, sacrifices his life in the quest, but to succeed, really to +find it, dreads, I assure you. He feels that when he has found it there will be +nothing for him to look for. When workmen have finished their work they do at +least receive their pay, they go to the tavern, then they are taken to the +police-station—and there is occupation for a week. But where can man go? +Anyway, one can observe a certain awkwardness about him when he has attained +such objects. He loves the process of attaining, but does not quite like to +have attained, and that, of course, is very absurd. In fact, man is a comical +creature; there seems to be a kind of jest in it all. But yet mathematical +certainty is after all, something insufferable. Twice two makes four seems to +me simply a piece of insolence. Twice two makes four is a pert coxcomb who +stands with arms akimbo barring your path and spitting. I admit that twice two +makes four is an excellent thing, but if we are to give everything its due, +twice two makes five is sometimes a very charming thing too. +</p> + +<p> +And why are you so firmly, so triumphantly, convinced that only the normal and +the positive—in other words, only what is conducive to welfare—is +for the advantage of man? Is not reason in error as regards advantage? Does not +man, perhaps, love something besides well-being? Perhaps he is just as fond of +suffering? Perhaps suffering is just as great a benefit to him as well-being? +Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering, and +that is a fact. There is no need to appeal to universal history to prove that; +only ask yourself, if you are a man and have lived at all. As far as my +personal opinion is concerned, to care only for well-being seems to me +positively ill-bred. Whether it’s good or bad, it is sometimes very +pleasant, too, to smash things. I hold no brief for suffering nor for +well-being either. I am standing for ... my caprice, and for its being +guaranteed to me when necessary. Suffering would be out of place in +vaudevilles, for instance; I know that. In the “Palace of Crystal” +it is unthinkable; suffering means doubt, negation, and what would be the good +of a “palace of crystal” if there could be any doubt about it? And +yet I think man will never renounce real suffering, that is, destruction and +chaos. Why, suffering is the sole origin of consciousness. Though I did lay it +down at the beginning that consciousness is the greatest misfortune for man, +yet I know man prizes it and would not give it up for any satisfaction. +Consciousness, for instance, is infinitely superior to twice two makes four. +Once you have mathematical certainty there is nothing left to do or to +understand. There will be nothing left but to bottle up your five senses and +plunge into contemplation. While if you stick to consciousness, even though the +same result is attained, you can at least flog yourself at times, and that +will, at any rate, liven you up. Reactionary as it is, corporal punishment is +better than nothing. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>X</h2> + +<p> +You believe in a palace of crystal that can never be destroyed—a palace +at which one will not be able to put out one’s tongue or make a long nose +on the sly. And perhaps that is just why I am afraid of this edifice, that it +is of crystal and can never be destroyed and that one cannot put one’s +tongue out at it even on the sly. +</p> + +<p> +You see, if it were not a palace, but a hen-house, I might creep into it to +avoid getting wet, and yet I would not call the hen-house a palace out of +gratitude to it for keeping me dry. You laugh and say that in such +circumstances a hen-house is as good as a mansion. Yes, I answer, if one had to +live simply to keep out of the rain. +</p> + +<p> +But what is to be done if I have taken it into my head that that is not the +only object in life, and that if one must live one had better live in a +mansion? That is my choice, my desire. You will only eradicate it when you have +changed my preference. Well, do change it, allure me with something else, give +me another ideal. But meanwhile I will not take a hen-house for a mansion. The +palace of crystal may be an idle dream, it may be that it is inconsistent with +the laws of nature and that I have invented it only through my own stupidity, +through the old-fashioned irrational habits of my generation. But what does it +matter to me that it is inconsistent? That makes no difference since it exists +in my desires, or rather exists as long as my desires exist. Perhaps you are +laughing again? Laugh away; I will put up with any mockery rather than pretend +that I am satisfied when I am hungry. I know, anyway, that I will not be put +off with a compromise, with a recurring zero, simply because it is consistent +with the laws of nature and actually exists. I will not accept as the crown of +my desires a block of buildings with tenements for the poor on a lease of a +thousand years, and perhaps with a sign-board of a dentist hanging out. Destroy +my desires, eradicate my ideals, show me something better, and I will follow +you. You will say, perhaps, that it is not worth your trouble; but in that case +I can give you the same answer. We are discussing things seriously; but if you +won’t deign to give me your attention, I will drop your acquaintance. I +can retreat into my underground hole. +</p> + +<p> +But while I am alive and have desires I would rather my hand were withered off +than bring one brick to such a building! Don’t remind me that I have just +rejected the palace of crystal for the sole reason that one cannot put out +one’s tongue at it. I did not say because I am so fond of putting my +tongue out. Perhaps the thing I resented was, that of all your edifices there +has not been one at which one could not put out one’s tongue. On the +contrary, I would let my tongue be cut off out of gratitude if things could be +so arranged that I should lose all desire to put it out. It is not my fault +that things cannot be so arranged, and that one must be satisfied with model +flats. Then why am I made with such desires? Can I have been constructed simply +in order to come to the conclusion that all my construction is a cheat? Can +this be my whole purpose? I do not believe it. +</p> + +<p> +But do you know what: I am convinced that we underground folk ought to be kept +on a curb. Though we may sit forty years underground without speaking, when we +do come out into the light of day and break out we talk and talk and talk.... +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>XI</h2> + +<p> +The long and the short of it is, gentlemen, that it is better to do nothing! +Better conscious inertia! And so hurrah for underground! Though I have said +that I envy the normal man to the last drop of my bile, yet I should not care +to be in his place such as he is now (though I shall not cease envying him). +No, no; anyway the underground life is more advantageous. There, at any rate, +one can ... Oh, but even now I am lying! I am lying because I know myself that +it is not underground that is better, but something different, quite different, +for which I am thirsting, but which I cannot find! Damn underground! +</p> + +<p> +I will tell you another thing that would be better, and that is, if I myself +believed in anything of what I have just written. I swear to you, gentlemen, +there is not one thing, not one word of what I have written that I really +believe. That is, I believe it, perhaps, but at the same time I feel and +suspect that I am lying like a cobbler. +</p> + +<p> +“Then why have you written all this?” you will say to me. “I +ought to put you underground for forty years without anything to do and then +come to you in your cellar, to find out what stage you have reached! How can a +man be left with nothing to do for forty years?” +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t that shameful, isn’t that humiliating?” you will +say, perhaps, wagging your heads contemptuously. “You thirst for life and +try to settle the problems of life by a logical tangle. And how persistent, how +insolent are your sallies, and at the same time what a scare you are in! You +talk nonsense and are pleased with it; you say impudent things and are in +continual alarm and apologising for them. You declare that you are afraid of +nothing and at the same time try to ingratiate yourself in our good opinion. +You declare that you are gnashing your teeth and at the same time you try to be +witty so as to amuse us. You know that your witticisms are not witty, but you +are evidently well satisfied with their literary value. You may, perhaps, have +really suffered, but you have no respect for your own suffering. You may have +sincerity, but you have no modesty; out of the pettiest vanity you expose your +sincerity to publicity and ignominy. You doubtlessly mean to say something, but +hide your last word through fear, because you have not the resolution to utter +it, and only have a cowardly impudence. You boast of consciousness, but you are +not sure of your ground, for though your mind works, yet your heart is darkened +and corrupt, and you cannot have a full, genuine consciousness without a pure +heart. And how intrusive you are, how you insist and grimace! Lies, lies, +lies!” +</p> + +<p> +Of course I have myself made up all the things you say. That, too, is from +underground. I have been for forty years listening to you through a crack under +the floor. I have invented them myself, there was nothing else I could invent. +It is no wonder that I have learned it by heart and it has taken a literary +form.... +</p> + +<p> +But can you really be so credulous as to think that I will print all this and +give it to you to read too? And another problem: why do I call you +“gentlemen,” why do I address you as though you really were my +readers? Such confessions as I intend to make are never printed nor given to +other people to read. Anyway, I am not strong-minded enough for that, and I +don’t see why I should be. But you see a fancy has occurred to me and I +want to realise it at all costs. Let me explain. +</p> + +<p> +Every man has reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to +his friends. He has other matters in his mind which he would not reveal even to +his friends, but only to himself, and that in secret. But there are other +things which a man is afraid to tell even to himself, and every decent man has +a number of such things stored away in his mind. The more decent he is, the +greater the number of such things in his mind. Anyway, I have only lately +determined to remember some of my early adventures. Till now I have always +avoided them, even with a certain uneasiness. Now, when I am not only recalling +them, but have actually decided to write an account of them, I want to try the +experiment whether one can, even with oneself, be perfectly open and not take +fright at the whole truth. I will observe, in parenthesis, that Heine says that +a true autobiography is almost an impossibility, and that man is bound to lie +about himself. He considers that Rousseau certainly told lies about himself in +his confessions, and even intentionally lied, out of vanity. I am convinced +that Heine is right; I quite understand how sometimes one may, out of sheer +vanity, attribute regular crimes to oneself, and indeed I can very well +conceive that kind of vanity. But Heine judged of people who made their +confessions to the public. I write only for myself, and I wish to declare once +and for all that if I write as though I were addressing readers, that is simply +because it is easier for me to write in that form. It is a form, an empty +form—I shall never have readers. I have made this plain already ... +</p> + +<p> +I don’t wish to be hampered by any restrictions in the compilation of my +notes. I shall not attempt any system or method. I will jot things down as I +remember them. +</p> + +<p> +But here, perhaps, someone will catch at the word and ask me: if you really +don’t reckon on readers, why do you make such compacts with +yourself—and on paper too—that is, that you won’t attempt any +system or method, that you jot things down as you remember them, and so on, and +so on? Why are you explaining? Why do you apologise? +</p> + +<p> +Well, there it is, I answer. +</p> + +<p> +There is a whole psychology in all this, though. Perhaps it is simply that I am +a coward. And perhaps that I purposely imagine an audience before me in order +that I may be more dignified while I write. There are perhaps thousands of +reasons. Again, what is my object precisely in writing? If it is not for the +benefit of the public why should I not simply recall these incidents in my own +mind without putting them on paper? +</p> + +<p> +Quite so; but yet it is more imposing on paper. There is something more +impressive in it; I shall be better able to criticise myself and improve my +style. Besides, I shall perhaps obtain actual relief from writing. Today, for +instance, I am particularly oppressed by one memory of a distant past. It came +back vividly to my mind a few days ago, and has remained haunting me like an +annoying tune that one cannot get rid of. And yet I must get rid of it somehow. +I have hundreds of such reminiscences; but at times some one stands out from +the hundred and oppresses me. For some reason I believe that if I write it down +I should get rid of it. Why not try? +</p> + +<p> +Besides, I am bored, and I never have anything to do. Writing will be a sort of +work. They say work makes man kind-hearted and honest. Well, here is a chance +for me, anyway. +</p> + +<p> +Snow is falling today, yellow and dingy. It fell yesterday, too, and a few days +ago. I fancy it is the wet snow that has reminded me of that incident which I +cannot shake off now. And so let it be a story <i>à propos</i> of the falling +snow. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="part02"></a>PART II<br/> +À Propos of the Wet Snow</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +When from dark error’s subjugation<br/> +My words of passionate exhortation<br/> + Had wrenched thy fainting spirit free;<br/> +And writhing prone in thine affliction<br/> +Thou didst recall with malediction<br/> + The vice that had encompassed thee:<br/> +And when thy slumbering conscience, fretting<br/> + By recollection’s torturing flame,<br/> +Thou didst reveal the hideous setting<br/> + Of thy life’s current ere I came:<br/> +When suddenly I saw thee sicken,<br/> + And weeping, hide thine anguished face,<br/> +Revolted, maddened, horror-stricken,<br/> + At memories of foul disgrace.<br/> + N<small>EKRASSOV</small> (<i>translated by Juliet +Soskice</i>). +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>I</h2> + +<p> +At that time I was only twenty-four. My life was even then gloomy, +ill-regulated, and as solitary as that of a savage. I made friends with no one +and positively avoided talking, and buried myself more and more in my hole. At +work in the office I never looked at anyone, and was perfectly well aware that +my companions looked upon me, not only as a queer fellow, but even looked upon +me—I always fancied this—with a sort of loathing. I sometimes +wondered why it was that nobody except me fancied that he was looked upon with +aversion? One of the clerks had a most repulsive, pock-marked face, which +looked positively villainous. I believe I should not have dared to look at +anyone with such an unsightly countenance. Another had such a very dirty old +uniform that there was an unpleasant odour in his proximity. Yet not one of +these gentlemen showed the slightest self-consciousness—either about +their clothes or their countenance or their character in any way. Neither of +them ever imagined that they were looked at with repulsion; if they had +imagined it they would not have minded—so long as their superiors did not +look at them in that way. It is clear to me now that, owing to my unbounded +vanity and to the high standard I set for myself, I often looked at myself with +furious discontent, which verged on loathing, and so I inwardly attributed the +same feeling to everyone. I hated my face, for instance: I thought it +disgusting, and even suspected that there was something base in my expression, +and so every day when I turned up at the office I tried to behave as +independently as possible, and to assume a lofty expression, so that I might +not be suspected of being abject. “My face may be ugly,” I thought, +“but let it be lofty, expressive, and, above all, <i>extremely</i> +intelligent.” But I was positively and painfully certain that it was +impossible for my countenance ever to express those qualities. And what was +worst of all, I thought it actually stupid looking, and I would have been quite +satisfied if I could have looked intelligent. In fact, I would even have put up +with looking base if, at the same time, my face could have been thought +strikingly intelligent. +</p> + +<p> +Of course, I hated my fellow clerks one and all, and I despised them all, yet +at the same time I was, as it were, afraid of them. In fact, it happened at +times that I thought more highly of them than of myself. It somehow happened +quite suddenly that I alternated between despising them and thinking them +superior to myself. A cultivated and decent man cannot be vain without setting +a fearfully high standard for himself, and without despising and almost hating +himself at certain moments. But whether I despised them or thought them +superior I dropped my eyes almost every time I met anyone. I even made +experiments whether I could face so and so’s looking at me, and I was +always the first to drop my eyes. This worried me to distraction. I had a +sickly dread, too, of being ridiculous, and so had a slavish passion for the +conventional in everything external. I loved to fall into the common rut, and +had a whole-hearted terror of any kind of eccentricity in myself. But how could +I live up to it? I was morbidly sensitive as a man of our age should be. They +were all stupid, and as like one another as so many sheep. Perhaps I was the +only one in the office who fancied that I was a coward and a slave, and I +fancied it just because I was more highly developed. But it was not only that I +fancied it, it really was so. I was a coward and a slave. I say this without +the slightest embarrassment. Every decent man of our age must be a coward and a +slave. That is his normal condition. Of that I am firmly persuaded. He is made +and constructed to that very end. And not only at the present time owing to +some casual circumstances, but always, at all times, a decent man is bound to +be a coward and a slave. It is the law of nature for all decent people all over +the earth. If anyone of them happens to be valiant about something, he need not +be comforted nor carried away by that; he would show the white feather just the +same before something else. That is how it invariably and inevitably ends. Only +donkeys and mules are valiant, and they only till they are pushed up to the +wall. It is not worth while to pay attention to them for they really are of no +consequence. +</p> + +<p> +Another circumstance, too, worried me in those days: that there was no one like +me and I was unlike anyone else. “I am alone and they are +<i>everyone</i>,” I thought—and pondered. +</p> + +<p> +From that it is evident that I was still a youngster. +</p> + +<p> +The very opposite sometimes happened. It was loathsome sometimes to go to the +office; things reached such a point that I often came home ill. But all at +once, <i>à propos</i> of nothing, there would come a phase of scepticism and +indifference (everything happened in phases to me), and I would laugh myself at +my intolerance and fastidiousness, I would reproach myself with being +<i>romantic</i>. At one time I was unwilling to speak to anyone, while at other +times I would not only talk, but go to the length of contemplating making +friends with them. All my fastidiousness would suddenly, for no rhyme or +reason, vanish. Who knows, perhaps I never had really had it, and it had simply +been affected, and got out of books. I have not decided that question even now. +Once I quite made friends with them, visited their homes, played preference, +drank vodka, talked of promotions.... But here let me make a digression. +</p> + +<p> +We Russians, speaking generally, have never had those foolish transcendental +“romantics”—German, and still more French—on whom +nothing produces any effect; if there were an earthquake, if all France +perished at the barricades, they would still be the same, they would not even +have the decency to affect a change, but would still go on singing their +transcendental songs to the hour of their death, because they are fools. We, in +Russia, have no fools; that is well known. That is what distinguishes us from +foreign lands. Consequently these transcendental natures are not found amongst +us in their pure form. The idea that they are is due to our +“realistic” journalists and critics of that day, always on the look +out for Kostanzhoglos and Uncle Pyotr Ivanitchs and foolishly accepting them as +our ideal; they have slandered our romantics, taking them for the same +transcendental sort as in Germany or France. On the contrary, the +characteristics of our “romantics” are absolutely and directly +opposed to the transcendental European type, and no European standard can be +applied to them. (Allow me to make use of this word +“romantic”—an old-fashioned and much respected word which has +done good service and is familiar to all.) The characteristics of our romantic +are to understand everything, <i>to see everything and to see it often +incomparably more clearly than our most realistic minds see it;</i> to refuse +to accept anyone or anything, but at the same time not to despise anything; to +give way, to yield, from policy; never to lose sight of a useful practical +object (such as rent-free quarters at the government expense, pensions, +decorations), to keep their eye on that object through all the enthusiasms and +volumes of lyrical poems, and at the same time to preserve “the sublime +and the beautiful” inviolate within them to the hour of their death, and +to preserve themselves also, incidentally, like some precious jewel wrapped in +cotton wool if only for the benefit of “the sublime and the +beautiful.” Our “romantic” is a man of great breadth and the +greatest rogue of all our rogues, I assure you.... I can assure you from +experience, indeed. Of course, that is, if he is intelligent. But what am I +saying! The romantic is always intelligent, and I only meant to observe that +although we have had foolish romantics they don’t count, and they were +only so because in the flower of their youth they degenerated into Germans, and +to preserve their precious jewel more comfortably, settled somewhere out +there—by preference in Weimar or the Black Forest. +</p> + +<p> +I, for instance, genuinely despised my official work and did not openly abuse +it simply because I was in it myself and got a salary for it. Anyway, take +note, I did not openly abuse it. Our romantic would rather go out of his +mind—a thing, however, which very rarely happens—than take to open +abuse, unless he had some other career in view; and he is never kicked out. At +most, they would take him to the lunatic asylum as “the King of +Spain” if he should go very mad. But it is only the thin, fair people who +go out of their minds in Russia. Innumerable “romantics” attain +later in life to considerable rank in the service. Their many-sidedness is +remarkable! And what a faculty they have for the most contradictory sensations! +I was comforted by this thought even in those days, and I am of the same +opinion now. That is why there are so many “broad natures” among us +who never lose their ideal even in the depths of degradation; and though they +never stir a finger for their ideal, though they are arrant thieves and knaves, +yet they tearfully cherish their first ideal and are extraordinarily honest at +heart. Yes, it is only among us that the most incorrigible rogue can be +absolutely and loftily honest at heart without in the least ceasing to be a +rogue. I repeat, our romantics, frequently, become such accomplished rascals (I +use the term “rascals” affectionately), suddenly display such a +sense of reality and practical knowledge that their bewildered superiors and +the public generally can only ejaculate in amazement. +</p> + +<p> +Their many-sidedness is really amazing, and goodness knows what it may develop +into later on, and what the future has in store for us. It is not a poor +material! I do not say this from any foolish or boastful patriotism. But I feel +sure that you are again imagining that I am joking. Or perhaps it’s just +the contrary and you are convinced that I really think so. Anyway, gentlemen, I +shall welcome both views as an honour and a special favour. And do forgive my +digression. +</p> + +<p> +I did not, of course, maintain friendly relations with my comrades and soon was +at loggerheads with them, and in my youth and inexperience I even gave up +bowing to them, as though I had cut off all relations. That, however, only +happened to me once. As a rule, I was always alone. +</p> + +<p> +In the first place I spent most of my time at home, reading. I tried to stifle +all that was continually seething within me by means of external impressions. +And the only external means I had was reading. Reading, of course, was a great +help—exciting me, giving me pleasure and pain. But at times it bored me +fearfully. One longed for movement in spite of everything, and I plunged all at +once into dark, underground, loathsome vice of the pettiest kind. My wretched +passions were acute, smarting, from my continual, sickly irritability I had +hysterical impulses, with tears and convulsions. I had no resource except +reading, that is, there was nothing in my surroundings which I could respect +and which attracted me. I was overwhelmed with depression, too; I had an +hysterical craving for incongruity and for contrast, and so I took to vice. I +have not said all this to justify myself.... But, no! I am lying. I did want to +justify myself. I make that little observation for my own benefit, gentlemen. I +don’t want to lie. I vowed to myself I would not. +</p> + +<p> +And so, furtively, timidly, in solitude, at night, I indulged in filthy vice, +with a feeling of shame which never deserted me, even at the most loathsome +moments, and which at such moments nearly made me curse. Already even then I +had my underground world in my soul. I was fearfully afraid of being seen, of +being met, of being recognised. I visited various obscure haunts. +</p> + +<p> +One night as I was passing a tavern I saw through a lighted window some +gentlemen fighting with billiard cues, and saw one of them thrown out of the +window. At other times I should have felt very much disgusted, but I was in +such a mood at the time, that I actually envied the gentleman thrown out of the +window—and I envied him so much that I even went into the tavern and into +the billiard-room. “Perhaps,” I thought, “I’ll have a +fight, too, and they’ll throw me out of the window.” +</p> + +<p> +I was not drunk—but what is one to do—depression will drive a man +to such a pitch of hysteria? But nothing happened. It seemed that I was not +even equal to being thrown out of the window and I went away without having my +fight. +</p> + +<p> +An officer put me in my place from the first moment. +</p> + +<p> +I was standing by the billiard-table and in my ignorance blocking up the way, +and he wanted to pass; he took me by the shoulders and without a +word—without a warning or explanation—moved me from where I was +standing to another spot and passed by as though he had not noticed me. I could +have forgiven blows, but I could not forgive his having moved me without +noticing me. +</p> + +<p> +Devil knows what I would have given for a real regular quarrel—a more +decent, a more <i>literary</i> one, so to speak. I had been treated like a fly. +This officer was over six foot, while I was a spindly little fellow. But the +quarrel was in my hands. I had only to protest and I certainly would have been +thrown out of the window. But I changed my mind and preferred to beat a +resentful retreat. +</p> + +<p> +I went out of the tavern straight home, confused and troubled, and the next +night I went out again with the same lewd intentions, still more furtively, +abjectly and miserably than before, as it were, with tears in my eyes—but +still I did go out again. Don’t imagine, though, it was cowardice made me +slink away from the officer; I never have been a coward at heart, though I have +always been a coward in action. Don’t be in a hurry to laugh—I +assure you I can explain it all. +</p> + +<p> +Oh, if only that officer had been one of the sort who would consent to fight a +duel! But no, he was one of those gentlemen (alas, long extinct!) who preferred +fighting with cues or, like Gogol’s Lieutenant Pirogov, appealing to the +police. They did not fight duels and would have thought a duel with a civilian +like me an utterly unseemly procedure in any case—and they looked upon +the duel altogether as something impossible, something free-thinking and +French. But they were quite ready to bully, especially when they were over six +foot. +</p> + +<p> +I did not slink away through cowardice, but through an unbounded vanity. I was +afraid not of his six foot, not of getting a sound thrashing and being thrown +out of the window; I should have had physical courage enough, I assure you; but +I had not the moral courage. What I was afraid of was that everyone present, +from the insolent marker down to the lowest little stinking, pimply clerk in a +greasy collar, would jeer at me and fail to understand when I began to protest +and to address them in literary language. For of the point of honour—not +of honour, but of the point of honour (<i>point d’honneur</i>)—one +cannot speak among us except in literary language. You can’t allude to +the “point of honour” in ordinary language. I was fully convinced +(the sense of reality, in spite of all my romanticism!) that they would all +simply split their sides with laughter, and that the officer would not simply +beat me, that is, without insulting me, but would certainly prod me in the back +with his knee, kick me round the billiard-table, and only then perhaps have +pity and drop me out of the window. +</p> + +<p> +Of course, this trivial incident could not with me end in that. I often met +that officer afterwards in the street and noticed him very carefully. I am not +quite sure whether he recognised me, I imagine not; I judge from certain signs. +But I—I stared at him with spite and hatred and so it went on ... for +several years! My resentment grew even deeper with years. At first I began +making stealthy inquiries about this officer. It was difficult for me to do so, +for I knew no one. But one day I heard someone shout his surname in the street +as I was following him at a distance, as though I were tied to him—and so +I learnt his surname. Another time I followed him to his flat, and for ten +kopecks learned from the porter where he lived, on which storey, whether he +lived alone or with others, and so on—in fact, everything one could learn +from a porter. One morning, though I had never tried my hand with the pen, it +suddenly occurred to me to write a satire on this officer in the form of a +novel which would unmask his villainy. I wrote the novel with relish. I did +unmask his villainy, I even exaggerated it; at first I so altered his surname +that it could easily be recognised, but on second thoughts I changed it, and +sent the story to the <i>Otetchestvenniya Zapiski</i>. But at that time such +attacks were not the fashion and my story was not printed. That was a great +vexation to me. +</p> + +<p> +Sometimes I was positively choked with resentment. At last I determined to +challenge my enemy to a duel. I composed a splendid, charming letter to him, +imploring him to apologise to me, and hinting rather plainly at a duel in case +of refusal. The letter was so composed that if the officer had had the least +understanding of the sublime and the beautiful he would certainly have flung +himself on my neck and have offered me his friendship. And how fine that would +have been! How we should have got on together! “He could have shielded me +with his higher rank, while I could have improved his mind with my culture, +and, well ... my ideas, and all sorts of things might have happened.” +Only fancy, this was two years after his insult to me, and my challenge would +have been a ridiculous anachronism, in spite of all the ingenuity of my letter +in disguising and explaining away the anachronism. But, thank God (to this day +I thank the Almighty with tears in my eyes) I did not send the letter to him. +Cold shivers run down my back when I think of what might have happened if I had +sent it. +</p> + +<p> +And all at once I revenged myself in the simplest way, by a stroke of genius! A +brilliant thought suddenly dawned upon me. Sometimes on holidays I used to +stroll along the sunny side of the Nevsky about four o’clock in the +afternoon. Though it was hardly a stroll so much as a series of innumerable +miseries, humiliations and resentments; but no doubt that was just what I +wanted. I used to wriggle along in a most unseemly fashion, like an eel, +continually moving aside to make way for generals, for officers of the guards +and the hussars, or for ladies. At such minutes there used to be a convulsive +twinge at my heart, and I used to feel hot all down my back at the mere thought +of the wretchedness of my attire, of the wretchedness and abjectness of my +little scurrying figure. This was a regular martyrdom, a continual, intolerable +humiliation at the thought, which passed into an incessant and direct +sensation, that I was a mere fly in the eyes of all this world, a nasty, +disgusting fly—more intelligent, more highly developed, more refined in +feeling than any of them, of course—but a fly that was continually making +way for everyone, insulted and injured by everyone. Why I inflicted this +torture upon myself, why I went to the Nevsky, I don’t know. I felt +simply drawn there at every possible opportunity. +</p> + +<p> +Already then I began to experience a rush of the enjoyment of which I spoke in +the first chapter. After my affair with the officer I felt even more drawn +there than before: it was on the Nevsky that I met him most frequently, there I +could admire him. He, too, went there chiefly on holidays, He, too, turned out +of his path for generals and persons of high rank, and he too, wriggled between +them like an eel; but people, like me, or even better dressed than me, he +simply walked over; he made straight for them as though there was nothing but +empty space before him, and never, under any circumstances, turned aside. I +gloated over my resentment watching him and ... always resentfully made way for +him. It exasperated me that even in the street I could not be on an even +footing with him. +</p> + +<p> +“Why must you invariably be the first to move aside?” I kept asking +myself in hysterical rage, waking up sometimes at three o’clock in the +morning. “Why is it you and not he? There’s no regulation about it; +there’s no written law. Let the making way be equal as it usually is when +refined people meet; he moves half-way and you move half-way; you pass with +mutual respect.” +</p> + +<p> +But that never happened, and I always moved aside, while he did not even notice +my making way for him. And lo and behold a bright idea dawned upon me! +“What,” I thought, “if I meet him and don’t move on one +side? What if I don’t move aside on purpose, even if I knock up against +him? How would that be?” This audacious idea took such a hold on me that +it gave me no peace. I was dreaming of it continually, horribly, and I +purposely went more frequently to the Nevsky in order to picture more vividly +how I should do it when I did do it. I was delighted. This intention seemed to +me more and more practical and possible. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course I shall not really push him,” I thought, already more +good-natured in my joy. “I will simply not turn aside, will run up +against him, not very violently, but just shouldering each other—just as +much as decency permits. I will push against him just as much as he pushes +against me.” At last I made up my mind completely. But my preparations +took a great deal of time. To begin with, when I carried out my plan I should +need to be looking rather more decent, and so I had to think of my get-up. +“In case of emergency, if, for instance, there were any sort of public +scandal (and the public there is of the most <i>recherché:</i> the Countess +walks there; Prince D. walks there; all the literary world is there), I must be +well dressed; that inspires respect and of itself puts us on an equal footing +in the eyes of the society.” +</p> + +<p> +With this object I asked for some of my salary in advance, and bought at +Tchurkin’s a pair of black gloves and a decent hat. Black gloves seemed +to me both more dignified and <i>bon ton</i> than the lemon-coloured ones which +I had contemplated at first. “The colour is too gaudy, it looks as though +one were trying to be conspicuous,” and I did not take the lemon-coloured +ones. I had got ready long beforehand a good shirt, with white bone studs; my +overcoat was the only thing that held me back. The coat in itself was a very +good one, it kept me warm; but it was wadded and it had a raccoon collar which +was the height of vulgarity. I had to change the collar at any sacrifice, and +to have a beaver one like an officer’s. For this purpose I began visiting +the Gostiny Dvor and after several attempts I pitched upon a piece of cheap +German beaver. Though these German beavers soon grow shabby and look wretched, +yet at first they look exceedingly well, and I only needed it for the occasion. +I asked the price; even so, it was too expensive. After thinking it over +thoroughly I decided to sell my raccoon collar. The rest of the money—a +considerable sum for me, I decided to borrow from Anton Antonitch Syetotchkin, +my immediate superior, an unassuming person, though grave and judicious. He +never lent money to anyone, but I had, on entering the service, been specially +recommended to him by an important personage who had got me my berth. I was +horribly worried. To borrow from Anton Antonitch seemed to me monstrous and +shameful. I did not sleep for two or three nights. Indeed, I did not sleep well +at that time, I was in a fever; I had a vague sinking at my heart or else a +sudden throbbing, throbbing, throbbing! Anton Antonitch was surprised at first, +then he frowned, then he reflected, and did after all lend me the money, +receiving from me a written authorisation to take from my salary a fortnight +later the sum that he had lent me. +</p> + +<p> +In this way everything was at last ready. The handsome beaver replaced the +mean-looking raccoon, and I began by degrees to get to work. It would never +have done to act offhand, at random; the plan had to be carried out skilfully, +by degrees. But I must confess that after many efforts I began to despair: we +simply could not run into each other. I made every preparation, I was quite +determined—it seemed as though we should run into one another +directly—and before I knew what I was doing I had stepped aside for him +again and he had passed without noticing me. I even prayed as I approached him +that God would grant me determination. One time I had made up my mind +thoroughly, but it ended in my stumbling and falling at his feet because at the +very last instant when I was six inches from him my courage failed me. He very +calmly stepped over me, while I flew on one side like a ball. That night I was +ill again, feverish and delirious. +</p> + +<p> +And suddenly it ended most happily. The night before I had made up my mind not +to carry out my fatal plan and to abandon it all, and with that object I went +to the Nevsky for the last time, just to see how I would abandon it all. +Suddenly, three paces from my enemy, I unexpectedly made up my mind—I +closed my eyes, and we ran full tilt, shoulder to shoulder, against one +another! I did not budge an inch and passed him on a perfectly equal footing! +He did not even look round and pretended not to notice it; but he was only +pretending, I am convinced of that. I am convinced of that to this day! Of +course, I got the worst of it—he was stronger, but that was not the +point. The point was that I had attained my object, I had kept up my dignity, I +had not yielded a step, and had put myself publicly on an equal social footing +with him. I returned home feeling that I was fully avenged for everything. I +was delighted. I was triumphant and sang Italian arias. Of course, I will not +describe to you what happened to me three days later; if you have read my first +chapter you can guess for yourself. The officer was afterwards transferred; I +have not seen him now for fourteen years. What is the dear fellow doing now? +Whom is he walking over? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a>II</h2> + +<p> +But the period of my dissipation would end and I always felt very sick +afterwards. It was followed by remorse—I tried to drive it away; I felt +too sick. By degrees, however, I grew used to that too. I grew used to +everything, or rather I voluntarily resigned myself to enduring it. But I had a +means of escape that reconciled everything—that was to find refuge in +“the sublime and the beautiful,” in dreams, of course. I was a +terrible dreamer, I would dream for three months on end, tucked away in my +corner, and you may believe me that at those moments I had no resemblance to +the gentleman who, in the perturbation of his chicken heart, put a collar of +German beaver on his great-coat. I suddenly became a hero. I would not have +admitted my six-foot lieutenant even if he had called on me. I could not even +picture him before me then. What were my dreams and how I could satisfy myself +with them—it is hard to say now, but at the time I was satisfied with +them. Though, indeed, even now, I am to some extent satisfied with them. Dreams +were particularly sweet and vivid after a spell of dissipation; they came with +remorse and with tears, with curses and transports. There were moments of such +positive intoxication, of such happiness, that there was not the faintest trace +of irony within me, on my honour. I had faith, hope, love. I believed blindly +at such times that by some miracle, by some external circumstance, all this +would suddenly open out, expand; that suddenly a vista of suitable +activity—beneficent, good, and, above all, <i>ready made</i> (what sort +of activity I had no idea, but the great thing was that it should be all ready +for me)—would rise up before me—and I should come out into the +light of day, almost riding a white horse and crowned with laurel. Anything but +the foremost place I could not conceive for myself, and for that very reason I +quite contentedly occupied the lowest in reality. Either to be a hero or to +grovel in the mud—there was nothing between. That was my ruin, for when I +was in the mud I comforted myself with the thought that at other times I was a +hero, and the hero was a cloak for the mud: for an ordinary man it was shameful +to defile himself, but a hero was too lofty to be utterly defiled, and so he +might defile himself. It is worth noting that these attacks of the +“sublime and the beautiful” visited me even during the period of +dissipation and just at the times when I was touching the bottom. They came in +separate spurts, as though reminding me of themselves, but did not banish the +dissipation by their appearance. On the contrary, they seemed to add a zest to +it by contrast, and were only sufficiently present to serve as an appetising +sauce. That sauce was made up of contradictions and sufferings, of agonising +inward analysis, and all these pangs and pin-pricks gave a certain piquancy, +even a significance to my dissipation—in fact, completely answered the +purpose of an appetising sauce. There was a certain depth of meaning in it. And +I could hardly have resigned myself to the simple, vulgar, direct debauchery of +a clerk and have endured all the filthiness of it. What could have allured me +about it then and have drawn me at night into the street? No, I had a lofty way +of getting out of it all. +</p> + +<p> +And what loving-kindness, oh Lord, what loving-kindness I felt at times in +those dreams of mine! in those “flights into the sublime and the +beautiful”; though it was fantastic love, though it was never applied to +anything human in reality, yet there was so much of this love that one did not +feel afterwards even the impulse to apply it in reality; that would have been +superfluous. Everything, however, passed satisfactorily by a lazy and +fascinating transition into the sphere of art, that is, into the beautiful +forms of life, lying ready, largely stolen from the poets and novelists and +adapted to all sorts of needs and uses. I, for instance, was triumphant over +everyone; everyone, of course, was in dust and ashes, and was forced +spontaneously to recognise my superiority, and I forgave them all. I was a poet +and a grand gentleman, I fell in love; I came in for countless millions and +immediately devoted them to humanity, and at the same time I confessed before +all the people my shameful deeds, which, of course, were not merely shameful, +but had in them much that was “sublime and beautiful” something in +the Manfred style. Everyone would kiss me and weep (what idiots they would be +if they did not), while I should go barefoot and hungry preaching new ideas and +fighting a victorious Austerlitz against the obscurantists. Then the band would +play a march, an amnesty would be declared, the Pope would agree to retire from +Rome to Brazil; then there would be a ball for the whole of Italy at the Villa +Borghese on the shores of Lake Como, Lake Como being for that purpose +transferred to the neighbourhood of Rome; then would come a scene in the +bushes, and so on, and so on—as though you did not know all about it? You +will say that it is vulgar and contemptible to drag all this into public after +all the tears and transports which I have myself confessed. But why is it +contemptible? Can you imagine that I am ashamed of it all, and that it was +stupider than anything in your life, gentlemen? And I can assure you that some +of these fancies were by no means badly composed.... It did not all happen on +the shores of Lake Como. And yet you are right—it really is vulgar and +contemptible. And most contemptible of all it is that now I am attempting to +justify myself to you. And even more contemptible than that is my making this +remark now. But that’s enough, or there will be no end to it; each step +will be more contemptible than the last.... +</p> + +<p> +I could never stand more than three months of dreaming at a time without +feeling an irresistible desire to plunge into society. To plunge into society +meant to visit my superior at the office, Anton Antonitch Syetotchkin. He was +the only permanent acquaintance I have had in my life, and I wonder at the fact +myself now. But I only went to see him when that phase came over me, and when +my dreams had reached such a point of bliss that it became essential at once to +embrace my fellows and all mankind; and for that purpose I needed, at least, +one human being, actually existing. I had to call on Anton Antonitch, however, +on Tuesday—his at-home day; so I had always to time my passionate desire +to embrace humanity so that it might fall on a Tuesday. +</p> + +<p> +This Anton Antonitch lived on the fourth storey in a house in Five Corners, in +four low-pitched rooms, one smaller than the other, of a particularly frugal +and sallow appearance. He had two daughters and their aunt, who used to pour +out the tea. Of the daughters one was thirteen and another fourteen, they both +had snub noses, and I was awfully shy of them because they were always +whispering and giggling together. The master of the house usually sat in his +study on a leather couch in front of the table with some grey-headed gentleman, +usually a colleague from our office or some other department. I never saw more +than two or three visitors there, always the same. They talked about the excise +duty; about business in the senate, about salaries, about promotions, about His +Excellency, and the best means of pleasing him, and so on. I had the patience +to sit like a fool beside these people for four hours at a stretch, listening +to them without knowing what to say to them or venturing to say a word. I +became stupefied, several times I felt myself perspiring, I was overcome by a +sort of paralysis; but this was pleasant and good for me. On returning home I +deferred for a time my desire to embrace all mankind. +</p> + +<p> +I had however one other acquaintance of a sort, Simonov, who was an old +schoolfellow. I had a number of schoolfellows, indeed, in Petersburg, but I did +not associate with them and had even given up nodding to them in the street. I +believe I had transferred into the department I was in simply to avoid their +company and to cut off all connection with my hateful childhood. Curses on that +school and all those terrible years of penal servitude! In short, I parted from +my schoolfellows as soon as I got out into the world. There were two or three +left to whom I nodded in the street. One of them was Simonov, who had in no way +been distinguished at school, was of a quiet and equable disposition; but I +discovered in him a certain independence of character and even honesty I +don’t even suppose that he was particularly stupid. I had at one time +spent some rather soulful moments with him, but these had not lasted long and +had somehow been suddenly clouded over. He was evidently uncomfortable at these +reminiscences, and was, I fancy, always afraid that I might take up the same +tone again. I suspected that he had an aversion for me, but still I went on +going to see him, not being quite certain of it. +</p> + +<p> +And so on one occasion, unable to endure my solitude and knowing that as it was +Thursday Anton Antonitch’s door would be closed, I thought of Simonov. +Climbing up to his fourth storey I was thinking that the man disliked me and +that it was a mistake to go and see him. But as it always happened that such +reflections impelled me, as though purposely, to put myself into a false +position, I went in. It was almost a year since I had last seen Simonov. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a>III</h2> + +<p> +I found two of my old schoolfellows with him. They seemed to be discussing an +important matter. All of them took scarcely any notice of my entrance, which +was strange, for I had not met them for years. Evidently they looked upon me as +something on the level of a common fly. I had not been treated like that even +at school, though they all hated me. I knew, of course, that they must despise +me now for my lack of success in the service, and for my having let myself sink +so low, going about badly dressed and so on—which seemed to them a sign +of my incapacity and insignificance. But I had not expected such contempt. +Simonov was positively surprised at my turning up. Even in old days he had +always seemed surprised at my coming. All this disconcerted me: I sat down, +feeling rather miserable, and began listening to what they were saying. +</p> + +<p> +They were engaged in warm and earnest conversation about a farewell dinner +which they wanted to arrange for the next day to a comrade of theirs called +Zverkov, an officer in the army, who was going away to a distant province. This +Zverkov had been all the time at school with me too. I had begun to hate him +particularly in the upper forms. In the lower forms he had simply been a +pretty, playful boy whom everybody liked. I had hated him, however, even in the +lower forms, just because he was a pretty and playful boy. He was always bad at +his lessons and got worse and worse as he went on; however, he left with a good +certificate, as he had powerful interests. During his last year at school he +came in for an estate of two hundred serfs, and as almost all of us were poor +he took up a swaggering tone among us. He was vulgar in the extreme, but at the +same time he was a good-natured fellow, even in his swaggering. In spite of +superficial, fantastic and sham notions of honour and dignity, all but very few +of us positively grovelled before Zverkov, and the more so the more he +swaggered. And it was not from any interested motive that they grovelled, but +simply because he had been favoured by the gifts of nature. Moreover, it was, +as it were, an accepted idea among us that Zverkov was a specialist in regard +to tact and the social graces. This last fact particularly infuriated me. I +hated the abrupt self-confident tone of his voice, his admiration of his own +witticisms, which were often frightfully stupid, though he was bold in his +language; I hated his handsome, but stupid face (for which I would, however, +have gladly exchanged my intelligent one), and the free-and-easy military +manners in fashion in the “’forties.” I hated the way in +which he used to talk of his future conquests of women (he did not venture to +begin his attack upon women until he had the epaulettes of an officer, and was +looking forward to them with impatience), and boasted of the duels he would +constantly be fighting. I remember how I, invariably so taciturn, suddenly +fastened upon Zverkov, when one day talking at a leisure moment with his +schoolfellows of his future relations with the fair sex, and growing as +sportive as a puppy in the sun, he all at once declared that he would not leave +a single village girl on his estate unnoticed, that that was his <i>droit de +seigneur</i>, and that if the peasants dared to protest he would have them all +flogged and double the tax on them, the bearded rascals. Our servile rabble +applauded, but I attacked him, not from compassion for the girls and their +fathers, but simply because they were applauding such an insect. I got the +better of him on that occasion, but though Zverkov was stupid he was lively and +impudent, and so laughed it off, and in such a way that my victory was not +really complete; the laugh was on his side. He got the better of me on several +occasions afterwards, but without malice, jestingly, casually. I remained +angrily and contemptuously silent and would not answer him. When we left school +he made advances to me; I did not rebuff them, for I was flattered, but we soon +parted and quite naturally. Afterwards I heard of his barrack-room success as a +lieutenant, and of the fast life he was leading. Then there came other +rumours—of his successes in the service. By then he had taken to cutting +me in the street, and I suspected that he was afraid of compromising himself by +greeting a personage as insignificant as me. I saw him once in the theatre, in +the third tier of boxes. By then he was wearing shoulder-straps. He was +twisting and twirling about, ingratiating himself with the daughters of an +ancient General. In three years he had gone off considerably, though he was +still rather handsome and adroit. One could see that by the time he was thirty +he would be corpulent. So it was to this Zverkov that my schoolfellows were +going to give a dinner on his departure. They had kept up with him for those +three years, though privately they did not consider themselves on an equal +footing with him, I am convinced of that. +</p> + +<p> +Of Simonov’s two visitors, one was Ferfitchkin, a Russianised +German—a little fellow with the face of a monkey, a blockhead who was +always deriding everyone, a very bitter enemy of mine from our days in the +lower forms—a vulgar, impudent, swaggering fellow, who affected a most +sensitive feeling of personal honour, though, of course, he was a wretched +little coward at heart. He was one of those worshippers of Zverkov who made up +to the latter from interested motives, and often borrowed money from him. +Simonov’s other visitor, Trudolyubov, was a person in no way +remarkable—a tall young fellow, in the army, with a cold face, fairly +honest, though he worshipped success of every sort, and was only capable of +thinking of promotion. He was some sort of distant relation of Zverkov’s, +and this, foolish as it seems, gave him a certain importance among us. He +always thought me of no consequence whatever; his behaviour to me, though not +quite courteous, was tolerable. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, with seven roubles each,” said Trudolyubov, +“twenty-one roubles between the three of us, we ought to be able to get a +good dinner. Zverkov, of course, won’t pay.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course not, since we are inviting him,” Simonov decided. +</p> + +<p> +“Can you imagine,” Ferfitchkin interrupted hotly and conceitedly, +like some insolent flunkey boasting of his master the General’s +decorations, “can you imagine that Zverkov will let us pay alone? He will +accept from delicacy, but he will order half a dozen bottles of +champagne.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do we want half a dozen for the four of us?” observed Trudolyubov, +taking notice only of the half dozen. +</p> + +<p> +“So the three of us, with Zverkov for the fourth, twenty-one roubles, at +the Hôtel de Paris at five o’clock tomorrow,” Simonov, who had been +asked to make the arrangements, concluded finally. +</p> + +<p> +“How twenty-one roubles?” I asked in some agitation, with a show of +being offended; “if you count me it will not be twenty-one, but +twenty-eight roubles.” +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to me that to invite myself so suddenly and unexpectedly would be +positively graceful, and that they would all be conquered at once and would +look at me with respect. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you want to join, too?” Simonov observed, with no appearance of +pleasure, seeming to avoid looking at me. He knew me through and through. +</p> + +<p> +It infuriated me that he knew me so thoroughly. +</p> + +<p> +“Why not? I am an old schoolfellow of his, too, I believe, and I must own +I feel hurt that you have left me out,” I said, boiling over again. +</p> + +<p> +“And where were we to find you?” Ferfitchkin put in roughly. +</p> + +<p> +“You never were on good terms with Zverkov,” Trudolyubov added, +frowning. +</p> + +<p> +But I had already clutched at the idea and would not give it up. +</p> + +<p> +“It seems to me that no one has a right to form an opinion upon +that,” I retorted in a shaking voice, as though something tremendous had +happened. “Perhaps that is just my reason for wishing it now, that I have +not always been on good terms with him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, there’s no making you out ... with these refinements,” +Trudolyubov jeered. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ll put your name down,” Simonov decided, addressing me. +“Tomorrow at five-o’clock at the Hôtel de Paris.” +</p> + +<p> +“What about the money?” Ferfitchkin began in an undertone, +indicating me to Simonov, but he broke off, for even Simonov was embarrassed. +</p> + +<p> +“That will do,” said Trudolyubov, getting up. “If he wants to +come so much, let him.” +</p> + +<p> +“But it’s a private thing, between us friends,” Ferfitchkin +said crossly, as he, too, picked up his hat. “It’s not an official +gathering.” +</p> + +<p> +“We do not want at all, perhaps ...” +</p> + +<p> +They went away. Ferfitchkin did not greet me in any way as he went out, +Trudolyubov barely nodded. Simonov, with whom I was left <i>tête-à-tête</i>, +was in a state of vexation and perplexity, and looked at me queerly. He did not +sit down and did not ask me to. +</p> + +<p> +“H’m ... yes ... tomorrow, then. Will you pay your subscription +now? I just ask so as to know,” he muttered in embarrassment. +</p> + +<p> +I flushed crimson, as I did so I remembered that I had owed Simonov fifteen +roubles for ages—which I had, indeed, never forgotten, though I had not +paid it. +</p> + +<p> +“You will understand, Simonov, that I could have no idea when I came +here.... I am very much vexed that I have forgotten....” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, all right, that doesn’t matter. You can pay tomorrow +after the dinner. I simply wanted to know.... Please don’t...” +</p> + +<p> +He broke off and began pacing the room still more vexed. As he walked he began +to stamp with his heels. +</p> + +<p> +“Am I keeping you?” I asked, after two minutes of silence. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” he said, starting, “that is—to be +truthful—yes. I have to go and see someone ... not far from here,” +he added in an apologetic voice, somewhat abashed. +</p> + +<p> +“My goodness, why didn’t you say so?” I cried, seizing my +cap, with an astonishingly free-and-easy air, which was the last thing I should +have expected of myself. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s close by ... not two paces away,” Simonov repeated, +accompanying me to the front door with a fussy air which did not suit him at +all. “So five o’clock, punctually, tomorrow,” he called down +the stairs after me. He was very glad to get rid of me. I was in a fury. +</p> + +<p> +“What possessed me, what possessed me to force myself upon them?” I +wondered, grinding my teeth as I strode along the street, “for a +scoundrel, a pig like that Zverkov! Of course I had better not go; of course, I +must just snap my fingers at them. I am not bound in any way. I’ll send +Simonov a note by tomorrow’s post....” +</p> + +<p> +But what made me furious was that I knew for certain that I should go, that I +should make a point of going; and the more tactless, the more unseemly my going +would be, the more certainly I would go. +</p> + +<p> +And there was a positive obstacle to my going: I had no money. All I had was +nine roubles, I had to give seven of that to my servant, Apollon, for his +monthly wages. That was all I paid him—he had to keep himself. +</p> + +<p> +Not to pay him was impossible, considering his character. But I will talk about +that fellow, about that plague of mine, another time. +</p> + +<p> +However, I knew I should go and should not pay him his wages. +</p> + +<p> +That night I had the most hideous dreams. No wonder; all the evening I had been +oppressed by memories of my miserable days at school, and I could not shake +them off. I was sent to the school by distant relations, upon whom I was +dependent and of whom I have heard nothing since—they sent me there a +forlorn, silent boy, already crushed by their reproaches, already troubled by +doubt, and looking with savage distrust at everyone. My schoolfellows met me +with spiteful and merciless jibes because I was not like any of them. But I +could not endure their taunts; I could not give in to them with the ignoble +readiness with which they gave in to one another. I hated them from the first, +and shut myself away from everyone in timid, wounded and disproportionate +pride. Their coarseness revolted me. They laughed cynically at my face, at my +clumsy figure; and yet what stupid faces they had themselves. In our school the +boys’ faces seemed in a special way to degenerate and grow stupider. How +many fine-looking boys came to us! In a few years they became repulsive. Even +at sixteen I wondered at them morosely; even then I was struck by the pettiness +of their thoughts, the stupidity of their pursuits, their games, their +conversations. They had no understanding of such essential things, they took no +interest in such striking, impressive subjects, that I could not help +considering them inferior to myself. It was not wounded vanity that drove me to +it, and for God’s sake do not thrust upon me your hackneyed remarks, +repeated to nausea, that “I was only a dreamer,” while they even +then had an understanding of life. They understood nothing, they had no idea of +real life, and I swear that that was what made me most indignant with them. On +the contrary, the most obvious, striking reality they accepted with fantastic +stupidity and even at that time were accustomed to respect success. Everything +that was just, but oppressed and looked down upon, they laughed at heartlessly +and shamefully. They took rank for intelligence; even at sixteen they were +already talking about a snug berth. Of course, a great deal of it was due to +their stupidity, to the bad examples with which they had always been surrounded +in their childhood and boyhood. They were monstrously depraved. Of course a +great deal of that, too, was superficial and an assumption of cynicism; of +course there were glimpses of youth and freshness even in their depravity; but +even that freshness was not attractive, and showed itself in a certain +rakishness. I hated them horribly, though perhaps I was worse than any of them. +They repaid me in the same way, and did not conceal their aversion for me. But +by then I did not desire their affection: on the contrary, I continually longed +for their humiliation. To escape from their derision I purposely began to make +all the progress I could with my studies and forced my way to the very top. +This impressed them. Moreover, they all began by degrees to grasp that I had +already read books none of them could read, and understood things (not forming +part of our school curriculum) of which they had not even heard. They took a +savage and sarcastic view of it, but were morally impressed, especially as the +teachers began to notice me on those grounds. The mockery ceased, but the +hostility remained, and cold and strained relations became permanent between +us. In the end I could not put up with it: with years a craving for society, +for friends, developed in me. I attempted to get on friendly terms with some of +my schoolfellows; but somehow or other my intimacy with them was always +strained and soon ended of itself. Once, indeed, I did have a friend. But I was +already a tyrant at heart; I wanted to exercise unbounded sway over him; I +tried to instil into him a contempt for his surroundings; I required of him a +disdainful and complete break with those surroundings. I frightened him with my +passionate affection; I reduced him to tears, to hysterics. He was a simple and +devoted soul; but when he devoted himself to me entirely I began to hate him +immediately and repulsed him—as though all I needed him for was to win a +victory over him, to subjugate him and nothing else. But I could not subjugate +all of them; my friend was not at all like them either, he was, in fact, a rare +exception. The first thing I did on leaving school was to give up the special +job for which I had been destined so as to break all ties, to curse my past and +shake the dust from off my feet.... And goodness knows why, after all that, I +should go trudging off to Simonov’s! +</p> + +<p> +Early next morning I roused myself and jumped out of bed with excitement, as +though it were all about to happen at once. But I believed that some radical +change in my life was coming, and would inevitably come that day. Owing to its +rarity, perhaps, any external event, however trivial, always made me feel as +though some radical change in my life were at hand. I went to the office, +however, as usual, but sneaked away home two hours earlier to get ready. The +great thing, I thought, is not to be the first to arrive, or they will think I +am overjoyed at coming. But there were thousands of such great points to +consider, and they all agitated and overwhelmed me. I polished my boots a +second time with my own hands; nothing in the world would have induced Apollon +to clean them twice a day, as he considered that it was more than his duties +required of him. I stole the brushes to clean them from the passage, being +careful he should not detect it, for fear of his contempt. Then I minutely +examined my clothes and thought that everything looked old, worn and +threadbare. I had let myself get too slovenly. My uniform, perhaps, was tidy, +but I could not go out to dinner in my uniform. The worst of it was that on the +knee of my trousers was a big yellow stain. I had a foreboding that that stain +would deprive me of nine-tenths of my personal dignity. I knew, too, that it +was very poor to think so. “But this is no time for thinking: now I am in +for the real thing,” I thought, and my heart sank. I knew, too, perfectly +well even then, that I was monstrously exaggerating the facts. But how could I +help it? I could not control myself and was already shaking with fever. With +despair I pictured to myself how coldly and disdainfully that +“scoundrel” Zverkov would meet me; with what dull-witted, +invincible contempt the blockhead Trudolyubov would look at me; with what +impudent rudeness the insect Ferfitchkin would snigger at me in order to curry +favour with Zverkov; how completely Simonov would take it all in, and how he +would despise me for the abjectness of my vanity and lack of spirit—and, +worst of all, how paltry, <i>unliterary</i>, commonplace it would all be. Of +course, the best thing would be not to go at all. But that was most impossible +of all: if I feel impelled to do anything, I seem to be pitchforked into it. I +should have jeered at myself ever afterwards: “So you funked it, you +funked it, you funked the <i>real thing!</i>” On the contrary, I +passionately longed to show all that “rabble” that I was by no +means such a spiritless creature as I seemed to myself. What is more, even in +the acutest paroxysm of this cowardly fever, I dreamed of getting the upper +hand, of dominating them, carrying them away, making them like me—if only +for my “elevation of thought and unmistakable wit.” They would +abandon Zverkov, he would sit on one side, silent and ashamed, while I should +crush him. Then, perhaps, we would be reconciled and drink to our everlasting +friendship; but what was most bitter and humiliating for me was that I knew +even then, knew fully and for certain, that I needed nothing of all this +really, that I did not really want to crush, to subdue, to attract them, and +that I did not care a straw really for the result, even if I did achieve it. +Oh, how I prayed for the day to pass quickly! In unutterable anguish I went to +the window, opened the movable pane and looked out into the troubled darkness +of the thickly falling wet snow. At last my wretched little clock hissed out +five. I seized my hat and, trying not to look at Apollon, who had been all day +expecting his month’s wages, but in his foolishness was unwilling to be +the first to speak about it, I slipped between him and the door and, jumping +into a high-class sledge, on which I spent my last half rouble, I drove up in +grand style to the Hôtel de Paris. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap15"></a>IV</h2> + +<p> +I had been certain the day before that I should be the first to arrive. But it +was not a question of being the first to arrive. Not only were they not there, +but I had difficulty in finding our room. The table was not laid even. What did +it mean? After a good many questions I elicited from the waiters that the +dinner had been ordered not for five, but for six o’clock. This was +confirmed at the buffet too. I felt really ashamed to go on questioning them. +It was only twenty-five minutes past five. If they changed the dinner hour they +ought at least to have let me know—that is what the post is for, and not +to have put me in an absurd position in my own eyes and ... and even before the +waiters. I sat down; the servant began laying the table; I felt even more +humiliated when he was present. Towards six o’clock they brought in +candles, though there were lamps burning in the room. It had not occurred to +the waiter, however, to bring them in at once when I arrived. In the next room +two gloomy, angry-looking persons were eating their dinners in silence at two +different tables. There was a great deal of noise, even shouting, in a room +further away; one could hear the laughter of a crowd of people, and nasty +little shrieks in French: there were ladies at the dinner. It was sickening, in +fact. I rarely passed more unpleasant moments, so much so that when they did +arrive all together punctually at six I was overjoyed to see them, as though +they were my deliverers, and even forgot that it was incumbent upon me to show +resentment. +</p> + +<p> +Zverkov walked in at the head of them; evidently he was the leading spirit. He +and all of them were laughing; but, seeing me, Zverkov drew himself up a +little, walked up to me deliberately with a slight, rather jaunty bend from the +waist. He shook hands with me in a friendly, but not over-friendly, fashion, +with a sort of circumspect courtesy like that of a General, as though in giving +me his hand he were warding off something. I had imagined, on the contrary, +that on coming in he would at once break into his habitual thin, shrill laugh +and fall to making his insipid jokes and witticisms. I had been preparing for +them ever since the previous day, but I had not expected such condescension, +such high-official courtesy. So, then, he felt himself ineffably superior to me +in every respect! If he only meant to insult me by that high-official tone, it +would not matter, I thought—I could pay him back for it one way or +another. But what if, in reality, without the least desire to be offensive, +that sheepshead had a notion in earnest that he was superior to me and could +only look at me in a patronising way? The very supposition made me gasp. +</p> + +<p> +“I was surprised to hear of your desire to join us,” he began, +lisping and drawling, which was something new. “You and I seem to have +seen nothing of one another. You fight shy of us. You shouldn’t. We are +not such terrible people as you think. Well, anyway, I am glad to renew our +acquaintance.” +</p> + +<p> +And he turned carelessly to put down his hat on the window. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you been waiting long?” Trudolyubov inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“I arrived at five o’clock as you told me yesterday,” I +answered aloud, with an irritability that threatened an explosion. +</p> + +<p> +“Didn’t you let him know that we had changed the hour?” said +Trudolyubov to Simonov. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I didn’t. I forgot,” the latter replied, with no sign of +regret, and without even apologising to me he went off to order the <i>hors +d’œuvres</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“So you’ve been here a whole hour? Oh, poor fellow!” Zverkov +cried ironically, for to his notions this was bound to be extremely funny. That +rascal Ferfitchkin followed with his nasty little snigger like a puppy yapping. +My position struck him, too, as exquisitely ludicrous and embarrassing. +</p> + +<p> +“It isn’t funny at all!” I cried to Ferfitchkin, more and +more irritated. “It wasn’t my fault, but other people’s. They +neglected to let me know. It was ... it was ... it was simply absurd.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s not only absurd, but something else as well,” muttered +Trudolyubov, naively taking my part. “You are not hard enough upon it. It +was simply rudeness—unintentional, of course. And how could Simonov ... +h’m!” +</p> + +<p> +“If a trick like that had been played on me,” observed Ferfitchkin, +“I should ...” +</p> + +<p> +“But you should have ordered something for yourself,” Zverkov +interrupted, “or simply asked for dinner without waiting for us.” +</p> + +<p> +“You will allow that I might have done that without your +permission,” I rapped out. “If I waited, it was ...” +</p> + +<p> +“Let us sit down, gentlemen,” cried Simonov, coming in. +“Everything is ready; I can answer for the champagne; it is capitally +frozen.... You see, I did not know your address, where was I to look for +you?” he suddenly turned to me, but again he seemed to avoid looking at +me. Evidently he had something against me. It must have been what happened +yesterday. +</p> + +<p> +All sat down; I did the same. It was a round table. Trudolyubov was on my left, +Simonov on my right, Zverkov was sitting opposite, Ferfitchkin next to him, +between him and Trudolyubov. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, are you ... in a government office?” Zverkov went on +attending to me. Seeing that I was embarrassed he seriously thought that he +ought to be friendly to me, and, so to speak, cheer me up. +</p> + +<p> +“Does he want me to throw a bottle at his head?” I thought, in a +fury. In my novel surroundings I was unnaturally ready to be irritated. +</p> + +<p> +“In the N—— office,” I answered jerkily, with my eyes +on my plate. +</p> + +<p> +“And ha-ave you a go-od berth? I say, what ma-a-de you leave your +original job?” +</p> + +<p> +“What ma-a-de me was that I wanted to leave my original job,” I +drawled more than he, hardly able to control myself. Ferfitchkin went off into +a guffaw. Simonov looked at me ironically. Trudolyubov left off eating and +began looking at me with curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +Zverkov winced, but he tried not to notice it. +</p> + +<p> +“And the remuneration?” +</p> + +<p> +“What remuneration?” +</p> + +<p> +“I mean, your sa-a-lary?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why are you cross-examining me?” However, I told him at once what +my salary was. I turned horribly red. +</p> + +<p> +“It is not very handsome,” Zverkov observed majestically. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you can’t afford to dine at cafés on that,” Ferfitchkin +added insolently. +</p> + +<p> +“To my thinking it’s very poor,” Trudolyubov observed +gravely. +</p> + +<p> +“And how thin you have grown! How you have changed!” added Zverkov, +with a shade of venom in his voice, scanning me and my attire with a sort of +insolent compassion. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, spare his blushes,” cried Ferfitchkin, sniggering. +</p> + +<p> +“My dear sir, allow me to tell you I am not blushing,” I broke out +at last; “do you hear? I am dining here, at this cafe, at my own expense, +not at other people’s—note that, Mr. Ferfitchkin.” +</p> + +<p> +“Wha-at? Isn’t every one here dining at his own expense? You would +seem to be ...” Ferfitchkin flew out at me, turning as red as a lobster, +and looking me in the face with fury. +</p> + +<p> +“Tha-at,” I answered, feeling I had gone too far, “and I +imagine it would be better to talk of something more intelligent.” +</p> + +<p> +“You intend to show off your intelligence, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t disturb yourself, that would be quite out of place +here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why are you clacking away like that, my good sir, eh? Have you gone out +of your wits in your office?” +</p> + +<p> +“Enough, gentlemen, enough!” Zverkov cried, authoritatively. +</p> + +<p> +“How stupid it is!” muttered Simonov. +</p> + +<p> +“It really is stupid. We have met here, a company of friends, for a +farewell dinner to a comrade and you carry on an altercation,” said +Trudolyubov, rudely addressing himself to me alone. “You invited yourself +to join us, so don’t disturb the general harmony.” +</p> + +<p> +“Enough, enough!” cried Zverkov. “Give over, gentlemen, +it’s out of place. Better let me tell you how I nearly got married the +day before yesterday....” +</p> + +<p> +And then followed a burlesque narrative of how this gentleman had almost been +married two days before. There was not a word about the marriage, however, but +the story was adorned with generals, colonels and kammer-junkers, while Zverkov +almost took the lead among them. It was greeted with approving laughter; +Ferfitchkin positively squealed. +</p> + +<p> +No one paid any attention to me, and I sat crushed and humiliated. +</p> + +<p> +“Good Heavens, these are not the people for me!” I thought. +“And what a fool I have made of myself before them! I let Ferfitchkin go +too far, though. The brutes imagine they are doing me an honour in letting me +sit down with them. They don’t understand that it’s an honour to +them and not to me! I’ve grown thinner! My clothes! Oh, damn my trousers! +Zverkov noticed the yellow stain on the knee as soon as he came in.... But +what’s the use! I must get up at once, this very minute, take my hat and +simply go without a word ... with contempt! And tomorrow I can send a +challenge. The scoundrels! As though I cared about the seven roubles. They may +think.... Damn it! I don’t care about the seven roubles. I’ll go +this minute!” +</p> + +<p> +Of course I remained. I drank sherry and Lafitte by the glassful in my +discomfiture. Being unaccustomed to it, I was quickly affected. My annoyance +increased as the wine went to my head. I longed all at once to insult them all +in a most flagrant manner and then go away. To seize the moment and show what I +could do, so that they would say, “He’s clever, though he is +absurd,” and ... and ... in fact, damn them all! +</p> + +<p> +I scanned them all insolently with my drowsy eyes. But they seemed to have +forgotten me altogether. They were noisy, vociferous, cheerful. Zverkov was +talking all the time. I began listening. Zverkov was talking of some exuberant +lady whom he had at last led on to declaring her love (of course, he was lying +like a horse), and how he had been helped in this affair by an intimate friend +of his, a Prince Kolya, an officer in the hussars, who had three thousand +serfs. +</p> + +<p> +“And yet this Kolya, who has three thousand serfs, has not put in an +appearance here tonight to see you off,” I cut in suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +For one minute every one was silent. “You are drunk already.” +Trudolyubov deigned to notice me at last, glancing contemptuously in my +direction. Zverkov, without a word, examined me as though I were an insect. I +dropped my eyes. Simonov made haste to fill up the glasses with champagne. +</p> + +<p> +Trudolyubov raised his glass, as did everyone else but me. +</p> + +<p> +“Your health and good luck on the journey!” he cried to Zverkov. +“To old times, to our future, hurrah!” +</p> + +<p> +They all tossed off their glasses, and crowded round Zverkov to kiss him. I did +not move; my full glass stood untouched before me. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, aren’t you going to drink it?” roared Trudolyubov, +losing patience and turning menacingly to me. +</p> + +<p> +“I want to make a speech separately, on my own account ... and then +I’ll drink it, Mr. Trudolyubov.” +</p> + +<p> +“Spiteful brute!” muttered Simonov. I drew myself up in my chair +and feverishly seized my glass, prepared for something extraordinary, though I +did not know myself precisely what I was going to say. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Silence!</i>” cried Ferfitchkin. “Now for a display of +wit!” +</p> + +<p> +Zverkov waited very gravely, knowing what was coming. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Lieutenant Zverkov,” I began, “let me tell you that I +hate phrases, phrasemongers and men in corsets ... that’s the first +point, and there is a second one to follow it.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a general stir. +</p> + +<p> +“The second point is: I hate ribaldry and ribald talkers. Especially +ribald talkers! The third point: I love justice, truth and honesty.” I +went on almost mechanically, for I was beginning to shiver with horror myself +and had no idea how I came to be talking like this. “I love thought, +Monsieur Zverkov; I love true comradeship, on an equal footing and not ... +H’m ... I love ... But, however, why not? I will drink your health, too, +Mr. Zverkov. Seduce the Circassian girls, shoot the enemies of the fatherland +and ... and ... to your health, Monsieur Zverkov!” +</p> + +<p> +Zverkov got up from his seat, bowed to me and said: +</p> + +<p> +“I am very much obliged to you.” He was frightfully offended and +turned pale. +</p> + +<p> +“Damn the fellow!” roared Trudolyubov, bringing his fist down on +the table. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, he wants a punch in the face for that,” squealed +Ferfitchkin. +</p> + +<p> +“We ought to turn him out,” muttered Simonov. +</p> + +<p> +“Not a word, gentlemen, not a movement!” cried Zverkov solemnly, +checking the general indignation. “I thank you all, but I can show him +for myself how much value I attach to his words.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Ferfitchkin, you will give me satisfaction tomorrow for your words +just now!” I said aloud, turning with dignity to Ferfitchkin. +</p> + +<p> +“A duel, you mean? Certainly,” he answered. But probably I was so +ridiculous as I challenged him and it was so out of keeping with my appearance +that everyone including Ferfitchkin was prostrate with laughter. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, let him alone, of course! He is quite drunk,” Trudolyubov +said with disgust. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall never forgive myself for letting him join us,” Simonov +muttered again. +</p> + +<p> +“Now is the time to throw a bottle at their heads,” I thought to +myself. I picked up the bottle ... and filled my glass.... “No, I’d +better sit on to the end,” I went on thinking; “you would be +pleased, my friends, if I went away. Nothing will induce me to go. I’ll +go on sitting here and drinking to the end, on purpose, as a sign that I +don’t think you of the slightest consequence. I will go on sitting and +drinking, because this is a public-house and I paid my entrance money. +I’ll sit here and drink, for I look upon you as so many pawns, as +inanimate pawns. I’ll sit here and drink ... and sing if I want to, yes, +sing, for I have the right to ... to sing ... H’m!” +</p> + +<p> +But I did not sing. I simply tried not to look at any of them. I assumed most +unconcerned attitudes and waited with impatience for them to speak +<i>first</i>. But alas, they did not address me! And oh, how I wished, how I +wished at that moment to be reconciled to them! It struck eight, at last nine. +They moved from the table to the sofa. Zverkov stretched himself on a lounge +and put one foot on a round table. Wine was brought there. He did, as a fact, +order three bottles on his own account. I, of course, was not invited to join +them. They all sat round him on the sofa. They listened to him, almost with +reverence. It was evident that they were fond of him. “What for? What +for?” I wondered. From time to time they were moved to drunken enthusiasm +and kissed each other. They talked of the Caucasus, of the nature of true +passion, of snug berths in the service, of the income of an hussar called +Podharzhevsky, whom none of them knew personally, and rejoiced in the largeness +of it, of the extraordinary grace and beauty of a Princess D., whom none of +them had ever seen; then it came to Shakespeare’s being immortal. +</p> + +<p> +I smiled contemptuously and walked up and down the other side of the room, +opposite the sofa, from the table to the stove and back again. I tried my very +utmost to show them that I could do without them, and yet I purposely made a +noise with my boots, thumping with my heels. But it was all in vain. They paid +no attention. I had the patience to walk up and down in front of them from +eight o’clock till eleven, in the same place, from the table to the stove +and back again. “I walk up and down to please myself and no one can +prevent me.” The waiter who came into the room stopped, from time to +time, to look at me. I was somewhat giddy from turning round so often; at +moments it seemed to me that I was in delirium. During those three hours I was +three times soaked with sweat and dry again. At times, with an intense, acute +pang I was stabbed to the heart by the thought that ten years, twenty years, +forty years would pass, and that even in forty years I would remember with +loathing and humiliation those filthiest, most ludicrous, and most awful +moments of my life. No one could have gone out of his way to degrade himself +more shamelessly, and I fully realised it, fully, and yet I went on pacing up +and down from the table to the stove. “Oh, if you only knew what thoughts +and feelings I am capable of, how cultured I am!” I thought at moments, +mentally addressing the sofa on which my enemies were sitting. But my enemies +behaved as though I were not in the room. Once—only once—they +turned towards me, just when Zverkov was talking about Shakespeare, and I +suddenly gave a contemptuous laugh. I laughed in such an affected and +disgusting way that they all at once broke off their conversation, and silently +and gravely for two minutes watched me walking up and down from the table to +the stove, <i>taking no notice of them</i>. But nothing came of it: they said +nothing, and two minutes later they ceased to notice me again. It struck +eleven. +</p> + +<p> +“Friends,” cried Zverkov getting up from the sofa, “let us +all be off now, <i>there!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Of course, of course,” the others assented. I turned sharply to +Zverkov. I was so harassed, so exhausted, that I would have cut my throat to +put an end to it. I was in a fever; my hair, soaked with perspiration, stuck to +my forehead and temples. +</p> + +<p> +“Zverkov, I beg your pardon,” I said abruptly and resolutely. +“Ferfitchkin, yours too, and everyone’s, everyone’s: I have +insulted you all!” +</p> + +<p> +“Aha! A duel is not in your line, old man,” Ferfitchkin hissed +venomously. +</p> + +<p> +It sent a sharp pang to my heart. +</p> + +<p> +“No, it’s not the duel I am afraid of, Ferfitchkin! I am ready to +fight you tomorrow, after we are reconciled. I insist upon it, in fact, and you +cannot refuse. I want to show you that I am not afraid of a duel. You shall +fire first and I shall fire into the air.” +</p> + +<p> +“He is comforting himself,” said Simonov. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s simply raving,” said Trudolyubov. +</p> + +<p> +“But let us pass. Why are you barring our way? What do you want?” +Zverkov answered disdainfully. +</p> + +<p> +They were all flushed, their eyes were bright: they had been drinking heavily. +</p> + +<p> +“I ask for your friendship, Zverkov; I insulted you, but ...” +</p> + +<p> +“Insulted? <i>You</i> insulted <i>me?</i> Understand, sir, that you +never, under any circumstances, could possibly insult <i>me</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +“And that’s enough for you. Out of the way!” concluded +Trudolyubov. +</p> + +<p> +“Olympia is mine, friends, that’s agreed!” cried Zverkov. +</p> + +<p> +“We won’t dispute your right, we won’t dispute your +right,” the others answered, laughing. +</p> + +<p> +I stood as though spat upon. The party went noisily out of the room. +Trudolyubov struck up some stupid song. Simonov remained behind for a moment to +tip the waiters. I suddenly went up to him. +</p> + +<p> +“Simonov! give me six roubles!” I said, with desperate resolution. +</p> + +<p> +He looked at me in extreme amazement, with vacant eyes. He, too, was drunk. +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t mean you are coming with us?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve no money,” he snapped out, and with a scornful laugh he +went out of the room. +</p> + +<p> +I clutched at his overcoat. It was a nightmare. +</p> + +<p> +“Simonov, I saw you had money. Why do you refuse me? Am I a scoundrel? +Beware of refusing me: if you knew, if you knew why I am asking! My whole +future, my whole plans depend upon it!” +</p> + +<p> +Simonov pulled out the money and almost flung it at me. +</p> + +<p> +“Take it, if you have no sense of shame!” he pronounced pitilessly, +and ran to overtake them. +</p> + +<p> +I was left for a moment alone. Disorder, the remains of dinner, a broken +wine-glass on the floor, spilt wine, cigarette ends, fumes of drink and +delirium in my brain, an agonising misery in my heart and finally the waiter, +who had seen and heard all and was looking inquisitively into my face. +</p> + +<p> +“I am going there!” I cried. “Either they shall all go down +on their knees to beg for my friendship, or I will give Zverkov a slap in the +face!” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap16"></a>V</h2> + +<p> +“So this is it, this is it at last—contact with real life,” I +muttered as I ran headlong downstairs. “This is very different from the +Pope’s leaving Rome and going to Brazil, very different from the ball on +Lake Como!” +</p> + +<p> +“You are a scoundrel,” a thought flashed through my mind, “if +you laugh at this now.” +</p> + +<p> +“No matter!” I cried, answering myself. “Now everything is +lost!” +</p> + +<p> +There was no trace to be seen of them, but that made no difference—I knew +where they had gone. +</p> + +<p> +At the steps was standing a solitary night sledge-driver in a rough peasant +coat, powdered over with the still falling, wet, and as it were warm, snow. It +was hot and steamy. The little shaggy piebald horse was also covered with snow +and coughing, I remember that very well. I made a rush for the roughly made +sledge; but as soon as I raised my foot to get into it, the recollection of how +Simonov had just given me six roubles seemed to double me up and I tumbled into +the sledge like a sack. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I must do a great deal to make up for all that,” I cried. +“But I will make up for it or perish on the spot this very night. +Start!” +</p> + +<p> +We set off. There was a perfect whirl in my head. +</p> + +<p> +“They won’t go down on their knees to beg for my friendship. That +is a mirage, cheap mirage, revolting, romantic and +fantastical—that’s another ball on Lake Como. And so I am bound to +slap Zverkov’s face! It is my duty to. And so it is settled; I am flying +to give him a slap in the face. Hurry up!” +</p> + +<p> +The driver tugged at the reins. +</p> + +<p> +“As soon as I go in I’ll give it him. Ought I before giving him the +slap to say a few words by way of preface? No. I’ll simply go in and give +it him. They will all be sitting in the drawing-room, and he with Olympia on +the sofa. That damned Olympia! She laughed at my looks on one occasion and +refused me. I’ll pull Olympia’s hair, pull Zverkov’s ears! +No, better one ear, and pull him by it round the room. Maybe they will all +begin beating me and will kick me out. That’s most likely, indeed. No +matter! Anyway, I shall first slap him; the initiative will be mine; and by the +laws of honour that is everything: he will be branded and cannot wipe off the +slap by any blows, by nothing but a duel. He will be forced to fight. And let +them beat me now. Let them, the ungrateful wretches! Trudolyubov will beat me +hardest, he is so strong; Ferfitchkin will be sure to catch hold sideways and +tug at my hair. But no matter, no matter! That’s what I am going for. The +blockheads will be forced at last to see the tragedy of it all! When they drag +me to the door I shall call out to them that in reality they are not worth my +little finger. Get on, driver, get on!” I cried to the driver. He started +and flicked his whip, I shouted so savagely. +</p> + +<p> +“We shall fight at daybreak, that’s a settled thing. I’ve +done with the office. Ferfitchkin made a joke about it just now. But where can +I get pistols? Nonsense! I’ll get my salary in advance and buy them. And +powder, and bullets? That’s the second’s business. And how can it +all be done by daybreak? and where am I to get a second? I have no friends. +Nonsense!” I cried, lashing myself up more and more. “It’s of +no consequence! The first person I meet in the street is bound to be my second, +just as he would be bound to pull a drowning man out of water. The most +eccentric things may happen. Even if I were to ask the director himself to be +my second tomorrow, he would be bound to consent, if only from a feeling of +chivalry, and to keep the secret! Anton Antonitch....” +</p> + +<p> +The fact is, that at that very minute the disgusting absurdity of my plan and +the other side of the question was clearer and more vivid to my imagination +than it could be to anyone on earth. But .... +</p> + +<p> +“Get on, driver, get on, you rascal, get on!” +</p> + +<p> +“Ugh, sir!” said the son of toil. +</p> + +<p> +Cold shivers suddenly ran down me. Wouldn’t it be better ... to go +straight home? My God, my God! Why did I invite myself to this dinner +yesterday? But no, it’s impossible. And my walking up and down for three +hours from the table to the stove? No, they, they and no one else must pay for +my walking up and down! They must wipe out this dishonour! Drive on! +</p> + +<p> +And what if they give me into custody? They won’t dare! They’ll be +afraid of the scandal. And what if Zverkov is so contemptuous that he refuses +to fight a duel? He is sure to; but in that case I’ll show them ... I +will turn up at the posting station when he’s setting off tomorrow, +I’ll catch him by the leg, I’ll pull off his coat when he gets into +the carriage. I’ll get my teeth into his hand, I’ll bite him. +“See what lengths you can drive a desperate man to!” He may hit me +on the head and they may belabour me from behind. I will shout to the assembled +multitude: “Look at this young puppy who is driving off to captivate the +Circassian girls after letting me spit in his face!” +</p> + +<p> +Of course, after that everything will be over! The office will have vanished +off the face of the earth. I shall be arrested, I shall be tried, I shall be +dismissed from the service, thrown in prison, sent to Siberia. Never mind! In +fifteen years when they let me out of prison I will trudge off to him, a +beggar, in rags. I shall find him in some provincial town. He will be married +and happy. He will have a grown-up daughter.... I shall say to him: +“Look, monster, at my hollow cheeks and my rags! I’ve lost +everything—my career, my happiness, art, science, <i>the woman I +loved</i>, and all through you. Here are pistols. I have come to discharge my +pistol and ... and I ... forgive you. Then I shall fire into the air and he +will hear nothing more of me....” +</p> + +<p> +I was actually on the point of tears, though I knew perfectly well at that +moment that all this was out of Pushkin’s <i>Silvio</i> and +Lermontov’s <i>Masquerade</i>. And all at once I felt horribly ashamed, +so ashamed that I stopped the horse, got out of the sledge, and stood still in +the snow in the middle of the street. The driver gazed at me, sighing and +astonished. +</p> + +<p> +What was I to do? I could not go on there—it was evidently stupid, and I +could not leave things as they were, because that would seem as though ... +Heavens, how could I leave things! And after such insults! “No!” I +cried, throwing myself into the sledge again. “It is ordained! It is +fate! Drive on, drive on!” +</p> + +<p> +And in my impatience I punched the sledge-driver on the back of the neck. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you up to? What are you hitting me for?” the peasant +shouted, but he whipped up his nag so that it began kicking. +</p> + +<p> +The wet snow was falling in big flakes; I unbuttoned myself, regardless of it. +I forgot everything else, for I had finally decided on the slap, and felt with +horror that it was going to happen <i>now, at once</i>, and that <i>no force +could stop it</i>. The deserted street lamps gleamed sullenly in the snowy +darkness like torches at a funeral. The snow drifted under my great-coat, under +my coat, under my cravat, and melted there. I did not wrap myself up—all +was lost, anyway. +</p> + +<p> +At last we arrived. I jumped out, almost unconscious, ran up the steps and +began knocking and kicking at the door. I felt fearfully weak, particularly in +my legs and knees. The door was opened quickly as though they knew I was +coming. As a fact, Simonov had warned them that perhaps another gentleman would +arrive, and this was a place in which one had to give notice and to observe +certain precautions. It was one of those “millinery establishments” +which were abolished by the police a good time ago. By day it really was a +shop; but at night, if one had an introduction, one might visit it for other +purposes. +</p> + +<p> +I walked rapidly through the dark shop into the familiar drawing-room, where +there was only one candle burning, and stood still in amazement: there was no +one there. “Where are they?” I asked somebody. But by now, of +course, they had separated. Before me was standing a person with a stupid +smile, the “madam” herself, who had seen me before. A minute later +a door opened and another person came in. +</p> + +<p> +Taking no notice of anything I strode about the room, and, I believe, I talked +to myself. I felt as though I had been saved from death and was conscious of +this, joyfully, all over: I should have given that slap, I should certainly, +certainly have given it! But now they were not here and ... everything had +vanished and changed! I looked round. I could not realise my condition yet. I +looked mechanically at the girl who had come in: and had a glimpse of a fresh, +young, rather pale face, with straight, dark eyebrows, and with grave, as it +were wondering, eyes that attracted me at once; I should have hated her if she +had been smiling. I began looking at her more intently and, as it were, with +effort. I had not fully collected my thoughts. There was something simple and +good-natured in her face, but something strangely grave. I am sure that this +stood in her way here, and no one of those fools had noticed her. She could +not, however, have been called a beauty, though she was tall, strong-looking, +and well built. She was very simply dressed. Something loathsome stirred within +me. I went straight up to her. +</p> + +<p> +I chanced to look into the glass. My harassed face struck me as revolting in +the extreme, pale, angry, abject, with dishevelled hair. “No matter, I am +glad of it,” I thought; “I am glad that I shall seem repulsive to +her; I like that.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap17"></a>VI</h2> + +<p> +... Somewhere behind a screen a clock began wheezing, as though oppressed by +something, as though someone were strangling it. After an unnaturally prolonged +wheezing there followed a shrill, nasty, and as it were unexpectedly rapid, +chime—as though someone were suddenly jumping forward. It struck two. I +woke up, though I had indeed not been asleep but lying half-conscious. +</p> + +<p> +It was almost completely dark in the narrow, cramped, low-pitched room, +cumbered up with an enormous wardrobe and piles of cardboard boxes and all +sorts of frippery and litter. The candle end that had been burning on the table +was going out and gave a faint flicker from time to time. In a few minutes +there would be complete darkness. +</p> + +<p> +I was not long in coming to myself; everything came back to my mind at once, +without an effort, as though it had been in ambush to pounce upon me again. +And, indeed, even while I was unconscious a point seemed continually to remain +in my memory unforgotten, and round it my dreams moved drearily. But strange to +say, everything that had happened to me in that day seemed to me now, on +waking, to be in the far, far away past, as though I had long, long ago lived +all that down. +</p> + +<p> +My head was full of fumes. Something seemed to be hovering over me, rousing me, +exciting me, and making me restless. Misery and spite seemed surging up in me +again and seeking an outlet. Suddenly I saw beside me two wide open eyes +scrutinising me curiously and persistently. The look in those eyes was coldly +detached, sullen, as it were utterly remote; it weighed upon me. +</p> + +<p> +A grim idea came into my brain and passed all over my body, as a horrible +sensation, such as one feels when one goes into a damp and mouldy cellar. There +was something unnatural in those two eyes, beginning to look at me only now. I +recalled, too, that during those two hours I had not said a single word to this +creature, and had, in fact, considered it utterly superfluous; in fact, the +silence had for some reason gratified me. Now I suddenly realised vividly the +hideous idea—revolting as a spider—of vice, which, without love, +grossly and shamelessly begins with that in which true love finds its +consummation. For a long time we gazed at each other like that, but she did not +drop her eyes before mine and her expression did not change, so that at last I +felt uncomfortable. +</p> + +<p> +“What is your name?” I asked abruptly, to put an end to it. +</p> + +<p> +“Liza,” she answered almost in a whisper, but somehow far from +graciously, and she turned her eyes away. +</p> + +<p> +I was silent. +</p> + +<p> +“What weather! The snow ... it’s disgusting!” I said, almost +to myself, putting my arm under my head despondently, and gazing at the +ceiling. +</p> + +<p> +She made no answer. This was horrible. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you always lived in Petersburg?” I asked a minute later, +almost angrily, turning my head slightly towards her. +</p> + +<p> +“No.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where do you come from?” +</p> + +<p> +“From Riga,” she answered reluctantly. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you a German?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, Russian.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you been here long?” +</p> + +<p> +“Where?” +</p> + +<p> +“In this house?” +</p> + +<p> +“A fortnight.” +</p> + +<p> +She spoke more and more jerkily. The candle went out; I could no longer +distinguish her face. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you a father and mother?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes ... no ... I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“Where are they?” +</p> + +<p> +“There ... in Riga.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are they?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, nothing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing? Why, what class are they?” +</p> + +<p> +“Tradespeople.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you always lived with them?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“How old are you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why did you leave them?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, for no reason.” +</p> + +<p> +That answer meant “Let me alone; I feel sick, sad.” +</p> + +<p> +We were silent. +</p> + +<p> +God knows why I did not go away. I felt myself more and more sick and dreary. +The images of the previous day began of themselves, apart from my will, +flitting through my memory in confusion. I suddenly recalled something I had +seen that morning when, full of anxious thoughts, I was hurrying to the office. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw them carrying a coffin out yesterday and they nearly dropped +it,” I suddenly said aloud, not that I desired to open the conversation, +but as it were by accident. +</p> + +<p> +“A coffin?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, in the Haymarket; they were bringing it up out of a cellar.” +</p> + +<p> +“From a cellar?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not from a cellar, but a basement. Oh, you know ... down below ... from +a house of ill-fame. It was filthy all round ... Egg-shells, litter ... a +stench. It was loathsome.” +</p> + +<p> +Silence. +</p> + +<p> +“A nasty day to be buried,” I began, simply to avoid being silent. +</p> + +<p> +“Nasty, in what way?” +</p> + +<p> +“The snow, the wet.” (I yawned.) +</p> + +<p> +“It makes no difference,” she said suddenly, after a brief silence. +</p> + +<p> +“No, it’s horrid.” (I yawned again). “The gravediggers +must have sworn at getting drenched by the snow. And there must have been water +in the grave.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why water in the grave?” she asked, with a sort of curiosity, but +speaking even more harshly and abruptly than before. +</p> + +<p> +I suddenly began to feel provoked. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, there must have been water at the bottom a foot deep. You +can’t dig a dry grave in Volkovo Cemetery.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why? Why, the place is waterlogged. It’s a regular marsh. So they +bury them in water. I’ve seen it myself ... many times.” +</p> + +<p> +(I had never seen it once, indeed I had never been in Volkovo, and had only +heard stories of it.) +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean to say, you don’t mind how you die?” +</p> + +<p> +“But why should I die?” she answered, as though defending herself. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, some day you will die, and you will die just the same as that dead +woman. She was ... a girl like you. She died of consumption.” +</p> + +<p> +“A wench would have died in hospital ...” (She knows all about it +already: she said “wench,” not “girl.”) +</p> + +<p> +“She was in debt to her madam,” I retorted, more and more provoked +by the discussion; “and went on earning money for her up to the end, +though she was in consumption. Some sledge-drivers standing by were talking +about her to some soldiers and telling them so. No doubt they knew her. They +were laughing. They were going to meet in a pot-house to drink to her +memory.” +</p> + +<p> +A great deal of this was my invention. Silence followed, profound silence. She +did not stir. +</p> + +<p> +“And is it better to die in a hospital?” +</p> + +<p> +“Isn’t it just the same? Besides, why should I die?” she +added irritably. +</p> + +<p> +“If not now, a little later.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why a little later?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, indeed? Now you are young, pretty, fresh, you fetch a high price. +But after another year of this life you will be very different—you will +go off.” +</p> + +<p> +“In a year?” +</p> + +<p> +“Anyway, in a year you will be worth less,” I continued +malignantly. “You will go from here to something lower, another house; a +year later—to a third, lower and lower, and in seven years you will come +to a basement in the Haymarket. That will be if you were lucky. But it would be +much worse if you got some disease, consumption, say ... and caught a chill, or +something or other. It’s not easy to get over an illness in your way of +life. If you catch anything you may not get rid of it. And so you would +die.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, well, then I shall die,” she answered, quite vindictively, and +she made a quick movement. +</p> + +<p> +“But one is sorry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sorry for whom?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sorry for life.” Silence. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you been engaged to be married? Eh?” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that to you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I am not cross-examining you. It’s nothing to me. Why are you +so cross? Of course you may have had your own troubles. What is it to me? +It’s simply that I felt sorry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sorry for whom?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sorry for you.” +</p> + +<p> +“No need,” she whispered hardly audibly, and again made a faint +movement. +</p> + +<p> +That incensed me at once. What! I was so gentle with her, and she.... +</p> + +<p> +“Why, do you think that you are on the right path?” +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t think anything.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s what’s wrong, that you don’t think. Realise it +while there is still time. There still is time. You are still young, +good-looking; you might love, be married, be happy....” +</p> + +<p> +“Not all married women are happy,” she snapped out in the rude +abrupt tone she had used at first. +</p> + +<p> +“Not all, of course, but anyway it is much better than the life here. +Infinitely better. Besides, with love one can live even without happiness. Even +in sorrow life is sweet; life is sweet, however one lives. But here what is +there but ... foulness? Phew!” +</p> + +<p> +I turned away with disgust; I was no longer reasoning coldly. I began to feel +myself what I was saying and warmed to the subject. I was already longing to +expound the cherished ideas I had brooded over in my corner. Something suddenly +flared up in me. An object had appeared before me. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind my being here, I am not an example for you. I am, perhaps, +worse than you are. I was drunk when I came here, though,” I hastened, +however, to say in self-defence. “Besides, a man is no example for a +woman. It’s a different thing. I may degrade and defile myself, but I am +not anyone’s slave. I come and go, and that’s an end of it. I shake +it off, and I am a different man. But you are a slave from the start. Yes, a +slave! You give up everything, your whole freedom. If you want to break your +chains afterwards, you won’t be able to; you will be more and more fast +in the snares. It is an accursed bondage. I know it. I won’t speak of +anything else, maybe you won’t understand, but tell me: no doubt you are +in debt to your madam? There, you see,” I added, though she made no +answer, but only listened in silence, entirely absorbed, “that’s a +bondage for you! You will never buy your freedom. They will see to that. +It’s like selling your soul to the devil.... And besides ... perhaps, I +too, am just as unlucky—how do you know—and wallow in the mud on +purpose, out of misery? You know, men take to drink from grief; well, maybe I +am here from grief. Come, tell me, what is there good here? Here you and I ... +came together ... just now and did not say one word to one another all the +time, and it was only afterwards you began staring at me like a wild creature, +and I at you. Is that loving? Is that how one human being should meet another? +It’s hideous, that’s what it is!” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes!” she assented sharply and hurriedly. +</p> + +<p> +I was positively astounded by the promptitude of this “Yes.” So the +same thought may have been straying through her mind when she was staring at me +just before. So she, too, was capable of certain thoughts? “Damn it all, +this was interesting, this was a point of likeness!” I thought, almost +rubbing my hands. And indeed it’s easy to turn a young soul like that! +</p> + +<p> +It was the exercise of my power that attracted me most. +</p> + +<p> +She turned her head nearer to me, and it seemed to me in the darkness that she +propped herself on her arm. Perhaps she was scrutinising me. How I regretted +that I could not see her eyes. I heard her deep breathing. +</p> + +<p> +“Why have you come here?” I asked her, with a note of authority +already in my voice. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I don’t know.” +</p> + +<p> +“But how nice it would be to be living in your father’s house! +It’s warm and free; you have a home of your own.” +</p> + +<p> +“But what if it’s worse than this?” +</p> + +<p> +“I must take the right tone,” flashed through my mind. “I may +not get far with sentimentality.” But it was only a momentary thought. I +swear she really did interest me. Besides, I was exhausted and moody. And +cunning so easily goes hand-in-hand with feeling. +</p> + +<p> +“Who denies it!” I hastened to answer. “Anything may happen. +I am convinced that someone has wronged you, and that you are more sinned +against than sinning. Of course, I know nothing of your story, but it’s +not likely a girl like you has come here of her own inclination....” +</p> + +<p> +“A girl like me?” she whispered, hardly audibly; but I heard it. +</p> + +<p> +Damn it all, I was flattering her. That was horrid. But perhaps it was a good +thing.... She was silent. +</p> + +<p> +“See, Liza, I will tell you about myself. If I had had a home from +childhood, I shouldn’t be what I am now. I often think that. However bad +it may be at home, anyway they are your father and mother, and not enemies, +strangers. Once a year at least, they’ll show their love of you. Anyway, +you know you are at home. I grew up without a home; and perhaps that’s +why I’ve turned so ... unfeeling.” +</p> + +<p> +I waited again. “Perhaps she doesn’t understand,” I thought, +“and, indeed, it is absurd—it’s moralising.” +</p> + +<p> +“If I were a father and had a daughter, I believe I should love my +daughter more than my sons, really,” I began indirectly, as though +talking of something else, to distract her attention. I must confess I blushed. +</p> + +<p> +“Why so?” she asked. +</p> + +<p> +Ah! so she was listening! +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know, Liza. I knew a father who was a stern, austere man, +but used to go down on his knees to his daughter, used to kiss her hands, her +feet, he couldn’t make enough of her, really. When she danced at parties +he used to stand for five hours at a stretch, gazing at her. He was mad over +her: I understand that! She would fall asleep tired at night, and he would wake +to kiss her in her sleep and make the sign of the cross over her. He would go +about in a dirty old coat, he was stingy to everyone else, but would spend his +last penny for her, giving her expensive presents, and it was his greatest +delight when she was pleased with what he gave her. Fathers always love their +daughters more than the mothers do. Some girls live happily at home! And I +believe I should never let my daughters marry.” +</p> + +<p> +“What next?” she said, with a faint smile. +</p> + +<p> +“I should be jealous, I really should. To think that she should kiss +anyone else! That she should love a stranger more than her father! It’s +painful to imagine it. Of course, that’s all nonsense, of course every +father would be reasonable at last. But I believe before I should let her +marry, I should worry myself to death; I should find fault with all her +suitors. But I should end by letting her marry whom she herself loved. The one +whom the daughter loves always seems the worst to the father, you know. That is +always so. So many family troubles come from that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Some are glad to sell their daughters, rather than marrying them +honourably.” +</p> + +<p> +Ah, so that was it! +</p> + +<p> +“Such a thing, Liza, happens in those accursed families in which there is +neither love nor God,” I retorted warmly, “and where there is no +love, there is no sense either. There are such families, it’s true, but I +am not speaking of them. You must have seen wickedness in your own family, if +you talk like that. Truly, you must have been unlucky. H’m! ... that sort +of thing mostly comes about through poverty.” +</p> + +<p> +“And is it any better with the gentry? Even among the poor, honest people +who live happily?” +</p> + +<p> +“H’m ... yes. Perhaps. Another thing, Liza, man is fond of +reckoning up his troubles, but does not count his joys. If he counted them up +as he ought, he would see that every lot has enough happiness provided for it. +And what if all goes well with the family, if the blessing of God is upon it, +if the husband is a good one, loves you, cherishes you, never leaves you! There +is happiness in such a family! Even sometimes there is happiness in the midst +of sorrow; and indeed sorrow is everywhere. If you marry <i>you will find out +for yourself</i>. But think of the first years of married life with one you +love: what happiness, what happiness there sometimes is in it! And indeed +it’s the ordinary thing. In those early days even quarrels with +one’s husband end happily. Some women get up quarrels with their husbands +just because they love them. Indeed, I knew a woman like that: she seemed to +say that because she loved him, she would torment him and make him feel it. You +know that you may torment a man on purpose through love. Women are particularly +given to that, thinking to themselves ‘I will love him so, I will make so +much of him afterwards, that it’s no sin to torment him a little +now.’ And all in the house rejoice in the sight of you, and you are happy +and gay and peaceful and honourable.... Then there are some women who are +jealous. If he went off anywhere—I knew one such woman, she +couldn’t restrain herself, but would jump up at night and run off on the +sly to find out where he was, whether he was with some other woman. +That’s a pity. And the woman knows herself it’s wrong, and her +heart fails her and she suffers, but she loves—it’s all through +love. And how sweet it is to make up after quarrels, to own herself in the +wrong or to forgive him! And they both are so happy all at once—as though +they had met anew, been married over again; as though their love had begun +afresh. And no one, no one should know what passes between husband and wife if +they love one another. And whatever quarrels there may be between them they +ought not to call in their own mother to judge between them and tell tales of +one another. They are their own judges. Love is a holy mystery and ought to be +hidden from all other eyes, whatever happens. That makes it holier and better. +They respect one another more, and much is built on respect. And if once there +has been love, if they have been married for love, why should love pass away? +Surely one can keep it! It is rare that one cannot keep it. And if the husband +is kind and straightforward, why should not love last? The first phase of +married love will pass, it is true, but then there will come a love that is +better still. Then there will be the union of souls, they will have everything +in common, there will be no secrets between them. And once they have children, +the most difficult times will seem to them happy, so long as there is love and +courage. Even toil will be a joy, you may deny yourself bread for your children +and even that will be a joy, They will love you for it afterwards; so you are +laying by for your future. As the children grow up you feel that you are an +example, a support for them; that even after you die your children will always +keep your thoughts and feelings, because they have received them from you, they +will take on your semblance and likeness. So you see this is a great duty. How +can it fail to draw the father and mother nearer? People say it’s a trial +to have children. Who says that? It is heavenly happiness! Are you fond of +little children, Liza? I am awfully fond of them. You know—a little rosy +baby boy at your bosom, and what husband’s heart is not touched, seeing +his wife nursing his child! A plump little rosy baby, sprawling and snuggling, +chubby little hands and feet, clean tiny little nails, so tiny that it makes +one laugh to look at them; eyes that look as if they understand everything. And +while it sucks it clutches at your bosom with its little hand, plays. When its +father comes up, the child tears itself away from the bosom, flings itself +back, looks at its father, laughs, as though it were fearfully funny, and falls +to sucking again. Or it will bite its mother’s breast when its little +teeth are coming, while it looks sideways at her with its little eyes as though +to say, ‘Look, I am biting!’ Is not all that happiness when they +are the three together, husband, wife and child? One can forgive a great deal +for the sake of such moments. Yes, Liza, one must first learn to live oneself +before one blames others!” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s by pictures, pictures like that one must get at you,” I +thought to myself, though I did speak with real feeling, and all at once I +flushed crimson. “What if she were suddenly to burst out laughing, what +should I do then?” That idea drove me to fury. Towards the end of my +speech I really was excited, and now my vanity was somehow wounded. The silence +continued. I almost nudged her. +</p> + +<p> +“Why are you—” she began and stopped. But I understood: there +was a quiver of something different in her voice, not abrupt, harsh and +unyielding as before, but something soft and shamefaced, so shamefaced that I +suddenly felt ashamed and guilty. +</p> + +<p> +“What?” I asked, with tender curiosity. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, you...” +</p> + +<p> +“What?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, you ... speak somehow like a book,” she said, and again there +was a note of irony in her voice. +</p> + +<p> +That remark sent a pang to my heart. It was not what I was expecting. +</p> + +<p> +I did not understand that she was hiding her feelings under irony, that this is +usually the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when the privacy of +their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded, and that their pride makes them +refuse to surrender till the last moment and shrink from giving expression to +their feelings before you. I ought to have guessed the truth from the timidity +with which she had repeatedly approached her sarcasm, only bringing herself to +utter it at last with an effort. But I did not guess, and an evil feeling took +possession of me. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a bit!” I thought. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap18"></a>VII</h2> + +<p> +“Oh, hush, Liza! How can you talk about being like a book, when it makes +even me, an outsider, feel sick? Though I don’t look at it as an +outsider, for, indeed, it touches me to the heart.... Is it possible, is it +possible that you do not feel sick at being here yourself? Evidently habit does +wonders! God knows what habit can do with anyone. Can you seriously think that +you will never grow old, that you will always be good-looking, and that they +will keep you here for ever and ever? I say nothing of the loathsomeness of the +life here.... Though let me tell you this about it—about your present +life, I mean; here though you are young now, attractive, nice, with soul and +feeling, yet you know as soon as I came to myself just now I felt at once sick +at being here with you! One can only come here when one is drunk. But if you +were anywhere else, living as good people live, I should perhaps be more than +attracted by you, should fall in love with you, should be glad of a look from +you, let alone a word; I should hang about your door, should go down on my +knees to you, should look upon you as my betrothed and think it an honour to be +allowed to. I should not dare to have an impure thought about you. But here, +you see, I know that I have only to whistle and you have to come with me +whether you like it or not. I don’t consult your wishes, but you mine. +The lowest labourer hires himself as a workman, but he doesn’t make a +slave of himself altogether; besides, he knows that he will be free again +presently. But when are you free? Only think what you are giving up here? What +is it you are making a slave of? It is your soul, together with your body; you +are selling your soul which you have no right to dispose of! You give your love +to be outraged by every drunkard! Love! But that’s everything, you know, +it’s a priceless diamond, it’s a maiden’s treasure, +love—why, a man would be ready to give his soul, to face death to gain +that love. But how much is your love worth now? You are sold, all of you, body +and soul, and there is no need to strive for love when you can have everything +without love. And you know there is no greater insult to a girl than that, do +you understand? To be sure, I have heard that they comfort you, poor fools, +they let you have lovers of your own here. But you know that’s simply a +farce, that’s simply a sham, it’s just laughing at you, and you are +taken in by it! Why, do you suppose he really loves you, that lover of yours? I +don’t believe it. How can he love you when he knows you may be called +away from him any minute? He would be a low fellow if he did! Will he have a +grain of respect for you? What have you in common with him? He laughs at you +and robs you—that is all his love amounts to! You are lucky if he does +not beat you. Very likely he does beat you, too. Ask him, if you have got one, +whether he will marry you. He will laugh in your face, if he doesn’t spit +in it or give you a blow—though maybe he is not worth a bad halfpenny +himself. And for what have you ruined your life, if you come to think of it? +For the coffee they give you to drink and the plentiful meals? But with what +object are they feeding you up? An honest girl couldn’t swallow the food, +for she would know what she was being fed for. You are in debt here, and, of +course, you will always be in debt, and you will go on in debt to the end, till +the visitors here begin to scorn you. And that will soon happen, don’t +rely upon your youth—all that flies by express train here, you know. You +will be kicked out. And not simply kicked out; long before that she’ll +begin nagging at you, scolding you, abusing you, as though you had not +sacrificed your health for her, had not thrown away your youth and your soul +for her benefit, but as though you had ruined her, beggared her, robbed her. +And don’t expect anyone to take your part: the others, your companions, +will attack you, too, win her favour, for all are in slavery here, and have +lost all conscience and pity here long ago. They have become utterly vile, and +nothing on earth is viler, more loathsome, and more insulting than their abuse. +And you are laying down everything here, unconditionally, youth and health and +beauty and hope, and at twenty-two you will look like a woman of +five-and-thirty, and you will be lucky if you are not diseased, pray to God for +that! No doubt you are thinking now that you have a gay time and no work to do! +Yet there is no work harder or more dreadful in the world or ever has been. One +would think that the heart alone would be worn out with tears. And you +won’t dare to say a word, not half a word when they drive you away from +here; you will go away as though you were to blame. You will change to another +house, then to a third, then somewhere else, till you come down at last to the +Haymarket. There you will be beaten at every turn; that is good manners there, +the visitors don’t know how to be friendly without beating you. You +don’t believe that it is so hateful there? Go and look for yourself some +time, you can see with your own eyes. Once, one New Year’s Day, I saw a +woman at a door. They had turned her out as a joke, to give her a taste of the +frost because she had been crying so much, and they shut the door behind her. +At nine o’clock in the morning she was already quite drunk, dishevelled, +half-naked, covered with bruises, her face was powdered, but she had a +black-eye, blood was trickling from her nose and her teeth; some cabman had +just given her a drubbing. She was sitting on the stone steps, a salt fish of +some sort was in her hand; she was crying, wailing something about her luck and +beating with the fish on the steps, and cabmen and drunken soldiers were +crowding in the doorway taunting her. You don’t believe that you will +ever be like that? I should be sorry to believe it, too, but how do you know; +maybe ten years, eight years ago that very woman with the salt fish came here +fresh as a cherub, innocent, pure, knowing no evil, blushing at every word. +Perhaps she was like you, proud, ready to take offence, not like the others; +perhaps she looked like a queen, and knew what happiness was in store for the +man who should love her and whom she should love. Do you see how it ended? And +what if at that very minute when she was beating on the filthy steps with that +fish, drunken and dishevelled—what if at that very minute she recalled +the pure early days in her father’s house, when she used to go to school +and the neighbour’s son watched for her on the way, declaring that he +would love her as long as he lived, that he would devote his life to her, and +when they vowed to love one another for ever and be married as soon as they +were grown up! No, Liza, it would be happy for you if you were to die soon of +consumption in some corner, in some cellar like that woman just now. In the +hospital, do you say? You will be lucky if they take you, but what if you are +still of use to the madam here? Consumption is a queer disease, it is not like +fever. The patient goes on hoping till the last minute and says he is all +right. He deludes himself And that just suits your madam. Don’t doubt it, +that’s how it is; you have sold your soul, and what is more you owe +money, so you daren’t say a word. But when you are dying, all will +abandon you, all will turn away from you, for then there will be nothing to get +from you. What’s more, they will reproach you for cumbering the place, +for being so long over dying. However you beg you won’t get a drink of +water without abuse: ‘Whenever are you going off, you nasty hussy, you +won’t let us sleep with your moaning, you make the gentlemen sick.’ +That’s true, I have heard such things said myself. They will thrust you +dying into the filthiest corner in the cellar—in the damp and darkness; +what will your thoughts be, lying there alone? When you die, strange hands will +lay you out, with grumbling and impatience; no one will bless you, no one will +sigh for you, they only want to get rid of you as soon as may be; they will buy +a coffin, take you to the grave as they did that poor woman today, and +celebrate your memory at the tavern. In the grave, sleet, filth, wet +snow—no need to put themselves out for you—‘Let her down, +Vanuha; it’s just like her luck—even here, she is head-foremost, +the hussy. Shorten the cord, you rascal.’ ‘It’s all right as +it is.’ ‘All right, is it? Why, she’s on her side! She was a +fellow-creature, after all! But, never mind, throw the earth on her.’ And +they won’t care to waste much time quarrelling over you. They will +scatter the wet blue clay as quick as they can and go off to the tavern ... and +there your memory on earth will end; other women have children to go to their +graves, fathers, husbands. While for you neither tear, nor sigh, nor +remembrance; no one in the whole world will ever come to you, your name will +vanish from the face of the earth—as though you had never existed, never +been born at all! Nothing but filth and mud, however you knock at your coffin +lid at night, when the dead arise, however you cry: ‘Let me out, kind +people, to live in the light of day! My life was no life at all; my life has +been thrown away like a dish-clout; it was drunk away in the tavern at the +Haymarket; let me out, kind people, to live in the world again.’” +</p> + +<p> +And I worked myself up to such a pitch that I began to have a lump in my throat +myself, and ... and all at once I stopped, sat up in dismay and, bending over +apprehensively, began to listen with a beating heart. I had reason to be +troubled. +</p> + +<p> +I had felt for some time that I was turning her soul upside down and rending +her heart, and—and the more I was convinced of it, the more eagerly I +desired to gain my object as quickly and as effectually as possible. It was the +exercise of my skill that carried me away; yet it was not merely sport.... +</p> + +<p> +I knew I was speaking stiffly, artificially, even bookishly, in fact, I could +not speak except “like a book.” But that did not trouble me: I +knew, I felt that I should be understood and that this very bookishness might +be an assistance. But now, having attained my effect, I was suddenly +panic-stricken. Never before had I witnessed such despair! She was lying on her +face, thrusting her face into the pillow and clutching it in both hands. Her +heart was being torn. Her youthful body was shuddering all over as though in +convulsions. Suppressed sobs rent her bosom and suddenly burst out in weeping +and wailing, then she pressed closer into the pillow: she did not want anyone +here, not a living soul, to know of her anguish and her tears. She bit the +pillow, bit her hand till it bled (I saw that afterwards), or, thrusting her +fingers into her dishevelled hair, seemed rigid with the effort of restraint, +holding her breath and clenching her teeth. I began saying something, begging +her to calm herself, but felt that I did not dare; and all at once, in a sort +of cold shiver, almost in terror, began fumbling in the dark, trying hurriedly +to get dressed to go. It was dark; though I tried my best I could not finish +dressing quickly. Suddenly I felt a box of matches and a candlestick with a +whole candle in it. As soon as the room was lighted up, Liza sprang up, sat up +in bed, and with a contorted face, with a half insane smile, looked at me +almost senselessly. I sat down beside her and took her hands; she came to +herself, made an impulsive movement towards me, would have caught hold of me, +but did not dare, and slowly bowed her head before me. +</p> + +<p> +“Liza, my dear, I was wrong ... forgive me, my dear,” I began, but +she squeezed my hand in her fingers so tightly that I felt I was saying the +wrong thing and stopped. +</p> + +<p> +“This is my address, Liza, come to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will come,” she answered resolutely, her head still bowed. +</p> + +<p> +“But now I am going, good-bye ... till we meet again.” +</p> + +<p> +I got up; she, too, stood up and suddenly flushed all over, gave a shudder, +snatched up a shawl that was lying on a chair and muffled herself in it to her +chin. As she did this she gave another sickly smile, blushed and looked at me +strangely. I felt wretched; I was in haste to get away—to disappear. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a minute,” she said suddenly, in the passage just at the +doorway, stopping me with her hand on my overcoat. She put down the candle in +hot haste and ran off; evidently she had thought of something or wanted to show +me something. As she ran away she flushed, her eyes shone, and there was a +smile on her lips—what was the meaning of it? Against my will I waited: +she came back a minute later with an expression that seemed to ask forgiveness +for something. In fact, it was not the same face, not the same look as the +evening before: sullen, mistrustful and obstinate. Her eyes now were imploring, +soft, and at the same time trustful, caressing, timid. The expression with +which children look at people they are very fond of, of whom they are asking a +favour. Her eyes were a light hazel, they were lovely eyes, full of life, and +capable of expressing love as well as sullen hatred. +</p> + +<p> +Making no explanation, as though I, as a sort of higher being, must understand +everything without explanations, she held out a piece of paper to me. Her whole +face was positively beaming at that instant with naive, almost childish, +triumph. I unfolded it. It was a letter to her from a medical student or +someone of that sort—a very high-flown and flowery, but extremely +respectful, love-letter. I don’t recall the words now, but I remember +well that through the high-flown phrases there was apparent a genuine feeling, +which cannot be feigned. When I had finished reading it I met her glowing, +questioning, and childishly impatient eyes fixed upon me. She fastened her eyes +upon my face and waited impatiently for what I should say. In a few words, +hurriedly, but with a sort of joy and pride, she explained to me that she had +been to a dance somewhere in a private house, a family of “very nice +people, <i>who knew nothing</i>, absolutely nothing, for she had only come here +so lately and it had all happened ... and she hadn’t made up her mind to +stay and was certainly going away as soon as she had paid her debt...” +and at that party there had been the student who had danced with her all the +evening. He had talked to her, and it turned out that he had known her in old +days at Riga when he was a child, they had played together, but a very long +time ago—and he knew her parents, but <i>about this</i> he knew nothing, +nothing whatever, and had no suspicion! And the day after the dance (three days +ago) he had sent her that letter through the friend with whom she had gone to +the party ... and ... well, that was all. +</p> + +<p> +She dropped her shining eyes with a sort of bashfulness as she finished. +</p> + +<p> +The poor girl was keeping that student’s letter as a precious treasure, +and had run to fetch it, her only treasure, because she did not want me to go +away without knowing that she, too, was honestly and genuinely loved; that she, +too, was addressed respectfully. No doubt that letter was destined to lie in +her box and lead to nothing. But none the less, I am certain that she would +keep it all her life as a precious treasure, as her pride and justification, +and now at such a minute she had thought of that letter and brought it with +naive pride to raise herself in my eyes that I might see, that I, too, might +think well of her. I said nothing, pressed her hand and went out. I so longed +to get away ... I walked all the way home, in spite of the fact that the +melting snow was still falling in heavy flakes. I was exhausted, shattered, in +bewilderment. But behind the bewilderment the truth was already gleaming. The +loathsome truth. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap19"></a>VIII</h2> + +<p> +It was some time, however, before I consented to recognise that truth. Waking +up in the morning after some hours of heavy, leaden sleep, and immediately +realising all that had happened on the previous day, I was positively amazed at +my last night’s <i>sentimentality</i> with Liza, at all those +“outcries of horror and pity.” “To think of having such an +attack of womanish hysteria, pah!” I concluded. And what did I thrust my +address upon her for? What if she comes? Let her come, though; it doesn’t +matter.... But <i>obviously</i>, that was not now the chief and the most +important matter: I had to make haste and at all costs save my reputation in +the eyes of Zverkov and Simonov as quickly as possible; that was the chief +business. And I was so taken up that morning that I actually forgot all about +Liza. +</p> + +<p> +First of all I had at once to repay what I had borrowed the day before from +Simonov. I resolved on a desperate measure: to borrow fifteen roubles straight +off from Anton Antonitch. As luck would have it he was in the best of humours +that morning, and gave it to me at once, on the first asking. I was so +delighted at this that, as I signed the IOU with a swaggering air, I told him +casually that the night before “I had been keeping it up with some +friends at the Hôtel de Paris; we were giving a farewell party to a comrade, in +fact, I might say a friend of my childhood, and you know—a desperate +rake, fearfully spoilt—of course, he belongs to a good family, and has +considerable means, a brilliant career; he is witty, charming, a regular +Lovelace, you understand; we drank an extra ‘half-dozen’ and +...” +</p> + +<p> +And it went off all right; all this was uttered very easily, unconstrainedly +and complacently. +</p> + +<p> +On reaching home I promptly wrote to Simonov. +</p> + +<p> +To this hour I am lost in admiration when I recall the truly gentlemanly, +good-humoured, candid tone of my letter. With tact and good-breeding, and, +above all, entirely without superfluous words, I blamed myself for all that had +happened. I defended myself, “if I really may be allowed to defend +myself,” by alleging that being utterly unaccustomed to wine, I had been +intoxicated with the first glass, which I said, I had drunk before they +arrived, while I was waiting for them at the Hôtel de Paris between five and +six o’clock. I begged Simonov’s pardon especially; I asked him to +convey my explanations to all the others, especially to Zverkov, whom “I +seemed to remember as though in a dream” I had insulted. I added that I +would have called upon all of them myself, but my head ached, and besides I had +not the face to. I was particularly pleased with a certain lightness, almost +carelessness (strictly within the bounds of politeness, however), which was +apparent in my style, and better than any possible arguments, gave them at once +to understand that I took rather an independent view of “all that +unpleasantness last night”; that I was by no means so utterly crushed as +you, my friends, probably imagine; but on the contrary, looked upon it as a +gentleman serenely respecting himself should look upon it. “On a young +hero’s past no censure is cast!” +</p> + +<p> +“There is actually an aristocratic playfulness about it!” I thought +admiringly, as I read over the letter. “And it’s all because I am +an intellectual and cultivated man! Another man in my place would not have +known how to extricate himself, but here I have got out of it and am as jolly +as ever again, and all because I am ‘a cultivated and educated man of our +day.’ And, indeed, perhaps, everything was due to the wine yesterday. +H’m!” ... No, it was not the wine. I did not drink anything at all +between five and six when I was waiting for them. I had lied to Simonov; I had +lied shamelessly; and indeed I wasn’t ashamed now.... Hang it all though, +the great thing was that I was rid of it. +</p> + +<p> +I put six roubles in the letter, sealed it up, and asked Apollon to take it to +Simonov. When he learned that there was money in the letter, Apollon became +more respectful and agreed to take it. Towards evening I went out for a walk. +My head was still aching and giddy after yesterday. But as evening came on and +the twilight grew denser, my impressions and, following them, my thoughts, grew +more and more different and confused. Something was not dead within me, in the +depths of my heart and conscience it would not die, and it showed itself in +acute depression. For the most part I jostled my way through the most crowded +business streets, along Myeshtchansky Street, along Sadovy Street and in +Yusupov Garden. I always liked particularly sauntering along these streets in +the dusk, just when there were crowds of working people of all sorts going home +from their daily work, with faces looking cross with anxiety. What I liked was +just that cheap bustle, that bare prose. On this occasion the jostling of the +streets irritated me more than ever, I could not make out what was wrong with +me, I could not find the clue, something seemed rising up continually in my +soul, painfully, and refusing to be appeased. I returned home completely upset, +it was just as though some crime were lying on my conscience. +</p> + +<p> +The thought that Liza was coming worried me continually. It seemed queer to me +that of all my recollections of yesterday this tormented me, as it were, +especially, as it were, quite separately. Everything else I had quite succeeded +in forgetting by the evening; I dismissed it all and was still perfectly +satisfied with my letter to Simonov. But on this point I was not satisfied at +all. It was as though I were worried only by Liza. “What if she +comes,” I thought incessantly, “well, it doesn’t matter, let +her come! H’m! it’s horrid that she should see, for instance, how I +live. Yesterday I seemed such a hero to her, while now, h’m! It’s +horrid, though, that I have let myself go so, the room looks like a +beggar’s. And I brought myself to go out to dinner in such a suit! And my +American leather sofa with the stuffing sticking out. And my dressing-gown, +which will not cover me, such tatters, and she will see all this and she will +see Apollon. That beast is certain to insult her. He will fasten upon her in +order to be rude to me. And I, of course, shall be panic-stricken as usual, I +shall begin bowing and scraping before her and pulling my dressing-gown round +me, I shall begin smiling, telling lies. Oh, the beastliness! And it +isn’t the beastliness of it that matters most! There is something more +important, more loathsome, viler! Yes, viler! And to put on that dishonest +lying mask again! ...” +</p> + +<p> +When I reached that thought I fired up all at once. +</p> + +<p> +“Why dishonest? How dishonest? I was speaking sincerely last night. I +remember there was real feeling in me, too. What I wanted was to excite an +honourable feeling in her.... Her crying was a good thing, it will have a good +effect.” +</p> + +<p> +Yet I could not feel at ease. All that evening, even when I had come back home, +even after nine o’clock, when I calculated that Liza could not possibly +come, still she haunted me, and what was worse, she came back to my mind always +in the same position. One moment out of all that had happened last night stood +vividly before my imagination; the moment when I struck a match and saw her +pale, distorted face, with its look of torture. And what a pitiful, what an +unnatural, what a distorted smile she had at that moment! But I did not know +then, that fifteen years later I should still in my imagination see Liza, +always with the pitiful, distorted, inappropriate smile which was on her face +at that minute. +</p> + +<p> +Next day I was ready again to look upon it all as nonsense, due to over-excited +nerves, and, above all, as <i>exaggerated</i>. I was always conscious of that +weak point of mine, and sometimes very much afraid of it. “I exaggerate +everything, that is where I go wrong,” I repeated to myself every hour. +But, however, “Liza will very likely come all the same,” was the +refrain with which all my reflections ended. I was so uneasy that I sometimes +flew into a fury: “She’ll come, she is certain to come!” I +cried, running about the room, “if not today, she will come tomorrow; +she’ll find me out! The damnable romanticism of these pure hearts! Oh, +the vileness—oh, the silliness—oh, the stupidity of these +‘wretched sentimental souls!’ Why, how fail to understand? How +could one fail to understand? ...” +</p> + +<p> +But at this point I stopped short, and in great confusion, indeed. +</p> + +<p> +And how few, how few words, I thought, in passing, were needed; how little of +the idyllic (and affectedly, bookishly, artificially idyllic too) had sufficed +to turn a whole human life at once according to my will. That’s +virginity, to be sure! Freshness of soil! +</p> + +<p> +At times a thought occurred to me, to go to her, “to tell her all,” +and beg her not to come to me. But this thought stirred such wrath in me that I +believed I should have crushed that “damned” Liza if she had +chanced to be near me at the time. I should have insulted her, have spat at +her, have turned her out, have struck her! +</p> + +<p> +One day passed, however, another and another; she did not come and I began to +grow calmer. I felt particularly bold and cheerful after nine o’clock, I +even sometimes began dreaming, and rather sweetly: I, for instance, became the +salvation of Liza, simply through her coming to me and my talking to her.... I +develop her, educate her. Finally, I notice that she loves me, loves me +passionately. I pretend not to understand (I don’t know, however, why I +pretend, just for effect, perhaps). At last all confusion, transfigured, +trembling and sobbing, she flings herself at my feet and says that I am her +saviour, and that she loves me better than anything in the world. I am amazed, +but.... “Liza,” I say, “can you imagine that I have not +noticed your love? I saw it all, I divined it, but I did not dare to approach +you first, because I had an influence over you and was afraid that you would +force yourself, from gratitude, to respond to my love, would try to rouse in +your heart a feeling which was perhaps absent, and I did not wish that ... +because it would be tyranny ... it would be indelicate (in short, I launch off +at that point into European, inexplicably lofty subtleties a la George Sand), +but now, now you are mine, you are my creation, you are pure, you are good, you +are my noble wife. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +‘Into my house come bold and free,<br/> +Its rightful mistress there to be’.” +</p> + +<p> +Then we begin living together, go abroad and so on, and so on. In fact, in the +end it seemed vulgar to me myself, and I began putting out my tongue at myself. +</p> + +<p> +Besides, they won’t let her out, “the hussy!” I thought. They +don’t let them go out very readily, especially in the evening (for some +reason I fancied she would come in the evening, and at seven o’clock +precisely). Though she did say she was not altogether a slave there yet, and +had certain rights; so, h’m! Damn it all, she will come, she is sure to +come! +</p> + +<p> +It was a good thing, in fact, that Apollon distracted my attention at that time +by his rudeness. He drove me beyond all patience! He was the bane of my life, +the curse laid upon me by Providence. We had been squabbling continually for +years, and I hated him. My God, how I hated him! I believe I had never hated +anyone in my life as I hated him, especially at some moments. He was an +elderly, dignified man, who worked part of his time as a tailor. But for some +unknown reason he despised me beyond all measure, and looked down upon me +insufferably. Though, indeed, he looked down upon everyone. Simply to glance at +that flaxen, smoothly brushed head, at the tuft of hair he combed up on his +forehead and oiled with sunflower oil, at that dignified mouth, compressed into +the shape of the letter V, made one feel one was confronting a man who never +doubted of himself. He was a pedant, to the most extreme point, the greatest +pedant I had met on earth, and with that had a vanity only befitting Alexander +of Macedon. He was in love with every button on his coat, every nail on his +fingers—absolutely in love with them, and he looked it! In his behaviour +to me he was a perfect tyrant, he spoke very little to me, and if he chanced to +glance at me he gave me a firm, majestically self-confident and invariably +ironical look that drove me sometimes to fury. He did his work with the air of +doing me the greatest favour, though he did scarcely anything for me, and did +not, indeed, consider himself bound to do anything. There could be no doubt +that he looked upon me as the greatest fool on earth, and that “he did +not get rid of me” was simply that he could get wages from me every +month. He consented to do nothing for me for seven roubles a month. Many sins +should be forgiven me for what I suffered from him. My hatred reached such a +point that sometimes his very step almost threw me into convulsions. What I +loathed particularly was his lisp. His tongue must have been a little too long +or something of that sort, for he continually lisped, and seemed to be very +proud of it, imagining that it greatly added to his dignity. He spoke in a +slow, measured tone, with his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the +ground. He maddened me particularly when he read aloud the psalms to himself +behind his partition. Many a battle I waged over that reading! But he was +awfully fond of reading aloud in the evenings, in a slow, even, sing-song +voice, as though over the dead. It is interesting that that is how he has +ended: he hires himself out to read the psalms over the dead, and at the same +time he kills rats and makes blacking. But at that time I could not get rid of +him, it was as though he were chemically combined with my existence. Besides, +nothing would have induced him to consent to leave me. I could not live in +furnished lodgings: my lodging was my private solitude, my shell, my cave, in +which I concealed myself from all mankind, and Apollon seemed to me, for some +reason, an integral part of that flat, and for seven years I could not turn him +away. +</p> + +<p> +To be two or three days behind with his wages, for instance, was impossible. He +would have made such a fuss, I should not have known where to hide my head. But +I was so exasperated with everyone during those days, that I made up my mind +for some reason and with some object to <i>punish</i> Apollon and not to pay +him for a fortnight the wages that were owing him. I had for a long +time—for the last two years—been intending to do this, simply in +order to teach him not to give himself airs with me, and to show him that if I +liked I could withhold his wages. I purposed to say nothing to him about it, +and was purposely silent indeed, in order to score off his pride and force him +to be the first to speak of his wages. Then I would take the seven roubles out +of a drawer, show him I have the money put aside on purpose, but that I +won’t, I won’t, I simply won’t pay him his wages, I +won’t just because that is “what I wish,” because “I am +master, and it is for me to decide,” because he has been disrespectful, +because he has been rude; but if he were to ask respectfully I might be +softened and give it to him, otherwise he might wait another fortnight, another +three weeks, a whole month.... +</p> + +<p> +But angry as I was, yet he got the better of me. I could not hold out for four +days. He began as he always did begin in such cases, for there had been such +cases already, there had been attempts (and it may be observed I knew all this +beforehand, I knew his nasty tactics by heart). He would begin by fixing upon +me an exceedingly severe stare, keeping it up for several minutes at a time, +particularly on meeting me or seeing me out of the house. If I held out and +pretended not to notice these stares, he would, still in silence, proceed to +further tortures. All at once, <i>à propos</i> of nothing, he would walk softly +and smoothly into my room, when I was pacing up and down or reading, stand at +the door, one hand behind his back and one foot behind the other, and fix upon +me a stare more than severe, utterly contemptuous. If I suddenly asked him what +he wanted, he would make me no answer, but continue staring at me persistently +for some seconds, then, with a peculiar compression of his lips and a most +significant air, deliberately turn round and deliberately go back to his room. +Two hours later he would come out again and again present himself before me in +the same way. It had happened that in my fury I did not even ask him what he +wanted, but simply raised my head sharply and imperiously and began staring +back at him. So we stared at one another for two minutes; at last he turned +with deliberation and dignity and went back again for two hours. +</p> + +<p> +If I were still not brought to reason by all this, but persisted in my revolt, +he would suddenly begin sighing while he looked at me, long, deep sighs as +though measuring by them the depths of my moral degradation, and, of course, it +ended at last by his triumphing completely: I raged and shouted, but still was +forced to do what he wanted. +</p> + +<p> +This time the usual staring manoeuvres had scarcely begun when I lost my temper +and flew at him in a fury. I was irritated beyond endurance apart from him. +</p> + +<p> +“Stay,” I cried, in a frenzy, as he was slowly and silently +turning, with one hand behind his back, to go to his room. “Stay! Come +back, come back, I tell you!” and I must have bawled so unnaturally, that +he turned round and even looked at me with some wonder. However, he persisted +in saying nothing, and that infuriated me. +</p> + +<p> +“How dare you come and look at me like that without being sent for? +Answer!” +</p> + +<p> +After looking at me calmly for half a minute, he began turning round again. +</p> + +<p> +“Stay!” I roared, running up to him, “don’t stir! +There. Answer, now: what did you come in to look at?” +</p> + +<p> +“If you have any order to give me it’s my duty to carry it +out,” he answered, after another silent pause, with a slow, measured +lisp, raising his eyebrows and calmly twisting his head from one side to +another, all this with exasperating composure. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s not what I am asking you about, you torturer!” I +shouted, turning crimson with anger. “I’ll tell you why you came +here myself: you see, I don’t give you your wages, you are so proud you +don’t want to bow down and ask for it, and so you come to punish me with +your stupid stares, to worry me and you have no sus-pic-ion how stupid it +is—stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid! ...” +</p> + +<p> +He would have turned round again without a word, but I seized him. +</p> + +<p> +“Listen,” I shouted to him. “Here’s the money, do you +see, here it is,” (I took it out of the table drawer); +“here’s the seven roubles complete, but you are not going to have +it, you ... are ... not ... going ... to ... have it until you come +respectfully with bowed head to beg my pardon. Do you hear?” +</p> + +<p> +“That cannot be,” he answered, with the most unnatural +self-confidence. +</p> + +<p> +“It shall be so,” I said, “I give you my word of honour, it +shall be!” +</p> + +<p> +“And there’s nothing for me to beg your pardon for,” he went +on, as though he had not noticed my exclamations at all. “Why, besides, +you called me a ‘torturer,’ for which I can summon you at the +police-station at any time for insulting behaviour.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go, summon me,” I roared, “go at once, this very minute, +this very second! You are a torturer all the same! a torturer!” +</p> + +<p> +But he merely looked at me, then turned, and regardless of my loud calls to +him, he walked to his room with an even step and without looking round. +</p> + +<p> +“If it had not been for Liza nothing of this would have happened,” +I decided inwardly. Then, after waiting a minute, I went myself behind his +screen with a dignified and solemn air, though my heart was beating slowly and +violently. +</p> + +<p> +“Apollon,” I said quietly and emphatically, though I was +breathless, “go at once without a minute’s delay and fetch the +police-officer.” +</p> + +<p> +He had meanwhile settled himself at his table, put on his spectacles and taken +up some sewing. But, hearing my order, he burst into a guffaw. +</p> + +<p> +“At once, go this minute! Go on, or else you can’t imagine what +will happen.” +</p> + +<p> +“You are certainly out of your mind,” he observed, without even +raising his head, lisping as deliberately as ever and threading his needle. +“Whoever heard of a man sending for the police against himself? And as +for being frightened—you are upsetting yourself about nothing, for +nothing will come of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go!” I shrieked, clutching him by the shoulder. I felt I should +strike him in a minute. +</p> + +<p> +But I did not notice the door from the passage softly and slowly open at that +instant and a figure come in, stop short, and begin staring at us in perplexity +I glanced, nearly swooned with shame, and rushed back to my room. There, +clutching at my hair with both hands, I leaned my head against the wall and +stood motionless in that position. +</p> + +<p> +Two minutes later I heard Apollon’s deliberate footsteps. “There is +some woman asking for you,” he said, looking at me with peculiar +severity. Then he stood aside and let in Liza. He would not go away, but stared +at us sarcastically. +</p> + +<p> +“Go away, go away,” I commanded in desperation. At that moment my +clock began whirring and wheezing and struck seven. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap20"></a>IX</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +“Into my house come bold and free,<br/> +Its rightful mistress there to be.” +</p> + +<p> +I stood before her crushed, crestfallen, revoltingly confused, and I believe I +smiled as I did my utmost to wrap myself in the skirts of my ragged wadded +dressing-gown—exactly as I had imagined the scene not long before in a +fit of depression. After standing over us for a couple of minutes Apollon went +away, but that did not make me more at ease. What made it worse was that she, +too, was overwhelmed with confusion, more so, in fact, than I should have +expected. At the sight of me, of course. +</p> + +<p> +“Sit down,” I said mechanically, moving a chair up to the table, +and I sat down on the sofa. She obediently sat down at once and gazed at me +open-eyed, evidently expecting something from me at once. This naïveté of +expectation drove me to fury, but I restrained myself. +</p> + +<p> +She ought to have tried not to notice, as though everything had been as usual, +while instead of that, she ... and I dimly felt that I should make her pay +dearly for <i>all this</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“You have found me in a strange position, Liza,” I began, +stammering and knowing that this was the wrong way to begin. “No, no, +don’t imagine anything,” I cried, seeing that she had suddenly +flushed. “I am not ashamed of my poverty.... On the contrary, I look with +pride on my poverty. I am poor but honourable.... One can be poor and +honourable,” I muttered. “However ... would you like +tea?....” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” she was beginning. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a minute.” +</p> + +<p> +I leapt up and ran to Apollon. I had to get out of the room somehow. +</p> + +<p> +“Apollon,” I whispered in feverish haste, flinging down before him +the seven roubles which had remained all the time in my clenched fist, +“here are your wages, you see I give them to you; but for that you must +come to my rescue: bring me tea and a dozen rusks from the restaurant. If you +won’t go, you’ll make me a miserable man! You don’t know what +this woman is.... This is—everything! You may be imagining something.... +But you don’t know what that woman is! ...” +</p> + +<p> +Apollon, who had already sat down to his work and put on his spectacles again, +at first glanced askance at the money without speaking or putting down his +needle; then, without paying the slightest attention to me or making any +answer, he went on busying himself with his needle, which he had not yet +threaded. I waited before him for three minutes with my arms crossed <i>à la +Napoléon</i>. My temples were moist with sweat. I was pale, I felt it. But, +thank God, he must have been moved to pity, looking at me. Having threaded his +needle he deliberately got up from his seat, deliberately moved back his chair, +deliberately took off his spectacles, deliberately counted the money, and +finally asking me over his shoulder: “Shall I get a whole portion?” +deliberately walked out of the room. As I was going back to Liza, the thought +occurred to me on the way: shouldn’t I run away just as I was in my +dressing-gown, no matter where, and then let happen what would? +</p> + +<p> +I sat down again. She looked at me uneasily. For some minutes we were silent. +</p> + +<p> +“I will kill him,” I shouted suddenly, striking the table with my +fist so that the ink spurted out of the inkstand. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you saying!” she cried, starting. +</p> + +<p> +“I will kill him! kill him!” I shrieked, suddenly striking the +table in absolute frenzy, and at the same time fully understanding how stupid +it was to be in such a frenzy. “You don’t know, Liza, what that +torturer is to me. He is my torturer.... He has gone now to fetch some rusks; +he ...” +</p> + +<p> +And suddenly I burst into tears. It was an hysterical attack. How ashamed I +felt in the midst of my sobs; but still I could not restrain them. +</p> + +<p> +She was frightened. +</p> + +<p> +“What is the matter? What is wrong?” she cried, fussing about me. +</p> + +<p> +“Water, give me water, over there!” I muttered in a faint voice, +though I was inwardly conscious that I could have got on very well without +water and without muttering in a faint voice. But I was, what is called, +<i>putting it on</i>, to save appearances, though the attack was a genuine one. +</p> + +<p> +She gave me water, looking at me in bewilderment. At that moment Apollon +brought in the tea. It suddenly seemed to me that this commonplace, prosaic tea +was horribly undignified and paltry after all that had happened, and I blushed +crimson. Liza looked at Apollon with positive alarm. He went out without a +glance at either of us. +</p> + +<p> +“Liza, do you despise me?” I asked, looking at her fixedly, +trembling with impatience to know what she was thinking. +</p> + +<p> +She was confused, and did not know what to answer. +</p> + +<p> +“Drink your tea,” I said to her angrily. I was angry with myself, +but, of course, it was she who would have to pay for it. A horrible spite +against her suddenly surged up in my heart; I believe I could have killed her. +To revenge myself on her I swore inwardly not to say a word to her all the +time. “She is the cause of it all,” I thought. +</p> + +<p> +Our silence lasted for five minutes. The tea stood on the table; we did not +touch it. I had got to the point of purposely refraining from beginning in +order to embarrass her further; it was awkward for her to begin alone. Several +times she glanced at me with mournful perplexity. I was obstinately silent. I +was, of course, myself the chief sufferer, because I was fully conscious of the +disgusting meanness of my spiteful stupidity, and yet at the same time I could +not restrain myself. +</p> + +<p> +“I want to... get away ... from there altogether,” she began, to +break the silence in some way, but, poor girl, that was just what she ought not +to have spoken about at such a stupid moment to a man so stupid as I was. My +heart positively ached with pity for her tactless and unnecessary +straightforwardness. But something hideous at once stifled all compassion in +me; it even provoked me to greater venom. I did not care what happened. Another +five minutes passed. +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps I am in your way,” she began timidly, hardly audibly, and +was getting up. +</p> + +<p> +But as soon as I saw this first impulse of wounded dignity I positively +trembled with spite, and at once burst out. +</p> + +<p> +“Why have you come to me, tell me that, please?” I began, gasping +for breath and regardless of logical connection in my words. I longed to have +it all out at once, at one burst; I did not even trouble how to begin. +“Why have you come? Answer, answer,” I cried, hardly knowing what I +was doing. “I’ll tell you, my good girl, why you have come. +You’ve come because I talked sentimental stuff to you then. So now you +are soft as butter and longing for fine sentiments again. So you may as well +know that I was laughing at you then. And I am laughing at you now. Why are you +shuddering? Yes, I was laughing at you! I had been insulted just before, at +dinner, by the fellows who came that evening before me. I came to you, meaning +to thrash one of them, an officer; but I didn’t succeed, I didn’t +find him; I had to avenge the insult on someone to get back my own again; you +turned up, I vented my spleen on you and laughed at you. I had been humiliated, +so I wanted to humiliate; I had been treated like a rag, so I wanted to show my +power.... That’s what it was, and you imagined I had come there on +purpose to save you. Yes? You imagined that? You imagined that?” +</p> + +<p> +I knew that she would perhaps be muddled and not take it all in exactly, but I +knew, too, that she would grasp the gist of it, very well indeed. And so, +indeed, she did. She turned white as a handkerchief, tried to say something, +and her lips worked painfully; but she sank on a chair as though she had been +felled by an axe. And all the time afterwards she listened to me with her lips +parted and her eyes wide open, shuddering with awful terror. The cynicism, the +cynicism of my words overwhelmed her.... +</p> + +<p> +“Save you!” I went on, jumping up from my chair and running up and +down the room before her. “Save you from what? But perhaps I am worse +than you myself. Why didn’t you throw it in my teeth when I was giving +you that sermon: ‘But what did you come here yourself for? was it to read +us a sermon?’ Power, power was what I wanted then, sport was what I +wanted, I wanted to wring out your tears, your humiliation, your +hysteria—that was what I wanted then! Of course, I couldn’t keep it +up then, because I am a wretched creature, I was frightened, and, the devil +knows why, gave you my address in my folly. Afterwards, before I got home, I +was cursing and swearing at you because of that address, I hated you already +because of the lies I had told you. Because I only like playing with words, +only dreaming, but, do you know, what I really want is that you should all go +to hell. That is what I want. I want peace; yes, I’d sell the whole world +for a farthing, straight off, so long as I was left in peace. Is the world to +go to pot, or am I to go without my tea? I say that the world may go to pot for +me so long as I always get my tea. Did you know that, or not? Well, anyway, I +know that I am a blackguard, a scoundrel, an egoist, a sluggard. Here I have +been shuddering for the last three days at the thought of your coming. And do +you know what has worried me particularly for these three days? That I posed as +such a hero to you, and now you would see me in a wretched torn dressing-gown, +beggarly, loathsome. I told you just now that I was not ashamed of my poverty; +so you may as well know that I am ashamed of it; I am more ashamed of it than +of anything, more afraid of it than of being found out if I were a thief, +because I am as vain as though I had been skinned and the very air blowing on +me hurt. Surely by now you must realise that I shall never forgive you for +having found me in this wretched dressing-gown, just as I was flying at Apollon +like a spiteful cur. The saviour, the former hero, was flying like a mangy, +unkempt sheep-dog at his lackey, and the lackey was jeering at him! And I shall +never forgive you for the tears I could not help shedding before you just now, +like some silly woman put to shame! And for what I am confessing to you now, I +shall never forgive you either! Yes—you must answer for it all because +you turned up like this, because I am a blackguard, because I am the nastiest, +stupidest, absurdest and most envious of all the worms on earth, who are not a +bit better than I am, but, the devil knows why, are never put to confusion; +while I shall always be insulted by every louse, that is my doom! And what is +it to me that you don’t understand a word of this! And what do I care, +what do I care about you, and whether you go to ruin there or not? Do you +understand? How I shall hate you now after saying this, for having been here +and listening. Why, it’s not once in a lifetime a man speaks out like +this, and then it is in hysterics! ... What more do you want? Why do you still +stand confronting me, after all this? Why are you worrying me? Why don’t +you go?” +</p> + +<p> +But at this point a strange thing happened. I was so accustomed to think and +imagine everything from books, and to picture everything in the world to myself +just as I had made it up in my dreams beforehand, that I could not all at once +take in this strange circumstance. What happened was this: Liza, insulted and +crushed by me, understood a great deal more than I imagined. She understood +from all this what a woman understands first of all, if she feels genuine love, +that is, that I was myself unhappy. +</p> + +<p> +The frightened and wounded expression on her face was followed first by a look +of sorrowful perplexity. When I began calling myself a scoundrel and a +blackguard and my tears flowed (the tirade was accompanied throughout by tears) +her whole face worked convulsively. She was on the point of getting up and +stopping me; when I finished she took no notice of my shouting: “Why are +you here, why don’t you go away?” but realised only that it must +have been very bitter to me to say all this. Besides, she was so crushed, poor +girl; she considered herself infinitely beneath me; how could she feel anger or +resentment? She suddenly leapt up from her chair with an irresistible impulse +and held out her hands, yearning towards me, though still timid and not daring +to stir.... At this point there was a revulsion in my heart too. Then she +suddenly rushed to me, threw her arms round me and burst into tears. I, too, +could not restrain myself, and sobbed as I never had before. +</p> + +<p> +“They won’t let me ... I can’t be good!” I managed to +articulate; then I went to the sofa, fell on it face downwards, and sobbed on +it for a quarter of an hour in genuine hysterics. She came close to me, put her +arms round me and stayed motionless in that position. But the trouble was that +the hysterics could not go on for ever, and (I am writing the loathsome truth) +lying face downwards on the sofa with my face thrust into my nasty leather +pillow, I began by degrees to be aware of a far-away, involuntary but +irresistible feeling that it would be awkward now for me to raise my head and +look Liza straight in the face. Why was I ashamed? I don’t know, but I +was ashamed. The thought, too, came into my overwrought brain that our parts +now were completely changed, that she was now the heroine, while I was just a +crushed and humiliated creature as she had been before me that night—four +days before.... And all this came into my mind during the minutes I was lying +on my face on the sofa. +</p> + +<p> +My God! surely I was not envious of her then. +</p> + +<p> +I don’t know, to this day I cannot decide, and at the time, of course, I +was still less able to understand what I was feeling than now. I cannot get on +without domineering and tyrannising over someone, but ... there is no +explaining anything by reasoning and so it is useless to reason. +</p> + +<p> +I conquered myself, however, and raised my head; I had to do so sooner or later +... and I am convinced to this day that it was just because I was ashamed to +look at her that another feeling was suddenly kindled and flamed up in my heart +... a feeling of mastery and possession. My eyes gleamed with passion, and I +gripped her hands tightly. How I hated her and how I was drawn to her at that +minute! The one feeling intensified the other. It was almost like an act of +vengeance. At first there was a look of amazement, even of terror on her face, +but only for one instant. She warmly and rapturously embraced me. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap21"></a>X</h2> + +<p> +A quarter of an hour later I was rushing up and down the room in frenzied +impatience, from minute to minute I went up to the screen and peeped through +the crack at Liza. She was sitting on the ground with her head leaning against +the bed, and must have been crying. But she did not go away, and that irritated +me. This time she understood it all. I had insulted her finally, but ... +there’s no need to describe it. She realised that my outburst of passion +had been simply revenge, a fresh humiliation, and that to my earlier, almost +causeless hatred was added now a <i>personal hatred</i>, born of envy.... +Though I do not maintain positively that she understood all this distinctly; +but she certainly did fully understand that I was a despicable man, and what +was worse, incapable of loving her. +</p> + +<p> +I know I shall be told that this is incredible—but it is incredible to be +as spiteful and stupid as I was; it may be added that it was strange I should +not love her, or at any rate, appreciate her love. Why is it strange? In the +first place, by then I was incapable of love, for I repeat, with me loving +meant tyrannising and showing my moral superiority. I have never in my life +been able to imagine any other sort of love, and have nowadays come to the +point of sometimes thinking that love really consists in the right—freely +given by the beloved object—to tyrannise over her. +</p> + +<p> +Even in my underground dreams I did not imagine love except as a struggle. I +began it always with hatred and ended it with moral subjugation, and afterwards +I never knew what to do with the subjugated object. And what is there to wonder +at in that, since I had succeeded in so corrupting myself, since I was so out +of touch with “real life,” as to have actually thought of +reproaching her, and putting her to shame for having come to me to hear +“fine sentiments”; and did not even guess that she had come not to +hear fine sentiments, but to love me, because to a woman all reformation, all +salvation from any sort of ruin, and all moral renewal is included in love and +can only show itself in that form. +</p> + +<p> +I did not hate her so much, however, when I was running about the room and +peeping through the crack in the screen. I was only insufferably oppressed by +her being here. I wanted her to disappear. I wanted “peace,” to be +left alone in my underground world. Real life oppressed me with its novelty so +much that I could hardly breathe. +</p> + +<p> +But several minutes passed and she still remained, without stirring, as though +she were unconscious. I had the shamelessness to tap softly at the screen as +though to remind her.... She started, sprang up, and flew to seek her kerchief, +her hat, her coat, as though making her escape from me.... Two minutes later +she came from behind the screen and looked with heavy eyes at me. I gave a +spiteful grin, which was forced, however, to <i>keep up appearances</i>, and I +turned away from her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye,” she said, going towards the door. +</p> + +<p> +I ran up to her, seized her hand, opened it, thrust something in it and closed +it again. Then I turned at once and dashed away in haste to the other corner of +the room to avoid seeing, anyway.... +</p> + +<p> +I did mean a moment since to tell a lie—to write that I did this +accidentally, not knowing what I was doing through foolishness, through losing +my head. But I don’t want to lie, and so I will say straight out that I +opened her hand and put the money in it ... from spite. It came into my head to +do this while I was running up and down the room and she was sitting behind the +screen. But this I can say for certain: though I did that cruel thing +purposely, it was not an impulse from the heart, but came from my evil brain. +This cruelty was so affected, so purposely made up, so completely a product of +the brain, of books, that I could not even keep it up a minute—first I +dashed away to avoid seeing her, and then in shame and despair rushed after +Liza. I opened the door in the passage and began listening. +</p> + +<p> +“Liza! Liza!” I cried on the stairs, but in a low voice, not +boldly. There was no answer, but I fancied I heard her footsteps, lower down on +the stairs. +</p> + +<p> +“Liza!” I cried, more loudly. +</p> + +<p> +No answer. But at that minute I heard the stiff outer glass door open heavily +with a creak and slam violently; the sound echoed up the stairs. +</p> + +<p> +She had gone. I went back to my room in hesitation. I felt horribly oppressed. +</p> + +<p> +I stood still at the table, beside the chair on which she had sat and looked +aimlessly before me. A minute passed, suddenly I started; straight before me on +the table I saw.... In short, I saw a crumpled blue five-rouble note, the one I +had thrust into her hand a minute before. It was the same note; it could be no +other, there was no other in the flat. So she had managed to fling it from her +hand on the table at the moment when I had dashed into the further corner. +</p> + +<p> +Well! I might have expected that she would do that. Might I have expected it? +No, I was such an egoist, I was so lacking in respect for my fellow-creatures +that I could not even imagine she would do so. I could not endure it. A minute +later I flew like a madman to dress, flinging on what I could at random and ran +headlong after her. She could not have got two hundred paces away when I ran +out into the street. +</p> + +<p> +It was a still night and the snow was coming down in masses and falling almost +perpendicularly, covering the pavement and the empty street as though with a +pillow. There was no one in the street, no sound was to be heard. The street +lamps gave a disconsolate and useless glimmer. I ran two hundred paces to the +cross-roads and stopped short. +</p> + +<p> +Where had she gone? And why was I running after her? +</p> + +<p> +Why? To fall down before her, to sob with remorse, to kiss her feet, to entreat +her forgiveness! I longed for that, my whole breast was being rent to pieces, +and never, never shall I recall that minute with indifference. But—what +for? I thought. Should I not begin to hate her, perhaps, even tomorrow, just +because I had kissed her feet today? Should I give her happiness? Had I not +recognised that day, for the hundredth time, what I was worth? Should I not +torture her? +</p> + +<p> +I stood in the snow, gazing into the troubled darkness and pondered this. +</p> + +<p> +“And will it not be better?” I mused fantastically, afterwards at +home, stifling the living pang of my heart with fantastic dreams. “Will +it not be better that she should keep the resentment of the insult for ever? +Resentment—why, it is purification; it is a most stinging and painful +consciousness! Tomorrow I should have defiled her soul and have exhausted her +heart, while now the feeling of insult will never die in her heart, and however +loathsome the filth awaiting her—the feeling of insult will elevate and +purify her ... by hatred ... h’m! ... perhaps, too, by forgiveness.... +Will all that make things easier for her though? ...” +</p> + +<p> +And, indeed, I will ask on my own account here, an idle question: which is +better—cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better? +</p> + +<p> +So I dreamed as I sat at home that evening, almost dead with the pain in my +soul. Never had I endured such suffering and remorse, yet could there have been +the faintest doubt when I ran out from my lodging that I should turn back +half-way? I never met Liza again and I have heard nothing of her. I will add, +too, that I remained for a long time afterwards pleased with the phrase about +the benefit from resentment and hatred in spite of the fact that I almost fell +ill from misery. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +Even now, so many years later, all this is somehow a very evil memory. I have +many evil memories now, but ... hadn’t I better end my +“Notes” here? I believe I made a mistake in beginning to write +them, anyway I have felt ashamed all the time I’ve been writing this +story; so it’s hardly literature so much as a corrective punishment. Why, +to tell long stories, showing how I have spoiled my life through morally +rotting in my corner, through lack of fitting environment, through divorce from +real life, and rankling spite in my underground world, would certainly not be +interesting; a novel needs a hero, and all the traits for an anti-hero are +<i>expressly</i> gathered together here, and what matters most, it all produces +an unpleasant impression, for we are all divorced from life, we are all +cripples, every one of us, more or less. We are so divorced from it that we +feel at once a sort of loathing for real life, and so cannot bear to be +reminded of it. Why, we have come almost to looking upon real life as an +effort, almost as hard work, and we are all privately agreed that it is better +in books. And why do we fuss and fume sometimes? Why are we perverse and ask +for something else? We don’t know what ourselves. It would be the worse +for us if our petulant prayers were answered. Come, try, give any one of us, +for instance, a little more independence, untie our hands, widen the spheres of +our activity, relax the control and we ... yes, I assure you ... we should be +begging to be under control again at once. I know that you will very likely be +angry with me for that, and will begin shouting and stamping. Speak for +yourself, you will say, and for your miseries in your underground holes, and +don’t dare to say all of us—excuse me, gentlemen, I am not +justifying myself with that “all of us.” As for what concerns me in +particular I have only in my life carried to an extreme what you have not dared +to carry halfway, and what’s more, you have taken your cowardice for good +sense, and have found comfort in deceiving yourselves. So that perhaps, after +all, there is more life in me than in you. Look into it more carefully! Why, we +don’t even know what living means now, what it is, and what it is called? +Leave us alone without books and we shall be lost and in confusion at once. We +shall not know what to join on to, what to cling to, what to love and what to +hate, what to respect and what to despise. We are oppressed at being +men—men with a real individual body and blood, we are ashamed of it, we +think it a disgrace and try to contrive to be some sort of impossible +generalised man. We are stillborn, and for generations past have been begotten, +not by living fathers, and that suits us better and better. We are developing a +taste for it. Soon we shall contrive to be born somehow from an idea. But +enough; I don’t want to write more from “Underground.” +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +[The notes of this paradoxalist do not end here, however. He could not refrain +from going on with them, but it seems to us that we may stop here.] +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ +concept and trademark. 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