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diff --git a/old/notun10.txt b/old/notun10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5071cd4 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/notun10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4872 @@ +*****The Project Gutenberg Etext Notes from the Underground***** + +#1 in our series by Feodor Dostoevsky + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Association / Illinois + Benedictine College" within the 60 days following each + date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) + your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, +scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty +free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution +you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg +Association / Illinois Benedictine College". + +*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + +NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND + +FYODOR DOSTOYEVSKY + + + + +PART I + +UNDERGROUND* + +*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. --AUTHOR'S +NOTE. + + +I + +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! + +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!) +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. 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. + +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.... + +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 ... + +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. + +But what can a decent man speak of with most pleasure? + +Answer: Of himself. + +Well, so I will talk about myself. + + +II + +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? + +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. 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.... + +I, for instance, have a great deal of amour propre. 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. + + +III + +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.) 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 l'homme de la +nature et de la verite. The base and nasty desire to vent that +spite on its assailant rankles perhaps even more nastily in it +than in l'homme de la nature et de la verite. 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 ... 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. + +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. + +"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." 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. + +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. + + +IV + +"Ha, ha, ha! You will be finding enjoyment in toothache next," +you cry, with a laugh. + +"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? + + +V + +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 ennui, gentlemen, all from ennui; +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? + + +VI + +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 "As you will"; at once I drink +to the health of "anyone you will" because I love all that is +"sublime and beautiful." 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. + + +VII + +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, +_consciously_, 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, _sometimes_, 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 blood-thirsty, 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 _intentional_ 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. + +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, a propos 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 +_positively ought_ (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 _independent_ +choice, whatever that independence may cost and wherever it may +lead. And choice, of course, the devil only knows what choice. + + +VIII + +"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--" + +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? + +"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 _senseless_ 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 _freedom_ 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 ...." + +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 it if 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 some- times 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? + +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. + +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! + + +IX + +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 _desirable_ to reform man in that +way? And what leads you to the conclusion that man's +inclinations _need_ 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, _wherever they may +lead_. But the reason why he wants sometimes to go off at a +tangent may just be that he is _predestined_ 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 _somewhere_, 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 les animaux domestiques--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. + +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. + +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. + + +X + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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.... + + +XI + +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! + +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, gentle- men, 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. + +"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?" + +"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!" + +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.... + +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. + +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 ... + +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. + +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? + +"Well, there it is," I answer. + +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? + +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? + +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. + +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 a propos of the falling snow. + + +PART II + +A PROPOS OF THE WET SNOW + + When from dark error's subjugation + My words of passionate exhortation + Had wrenched thy fainting spirit free; + And writhing prone in thine affliction + Thou didst recall with malediction + The vice that had encompassed thee: + And when thy slumbering conscience, fretting + By recollection's torturing flame, + Thou didst reveal the hideous setting + Of thy life's current ere I came: + When suddenly I saw thee sicken, + And weeping, hide thine anguished face, + Revolted, maddened, horror-stricken, + At memories of foul disgrace. + +N.A.NEKRASSOV (translated by Juliet Soskice). + + +I + +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, _extremely_ 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. + +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. + +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 _everyone_," I thought--and pondered. + +From that it is evident that I was still a youngster. + +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, a propos 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 _romantic_. +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. + +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, _to +see everything and to see it often incomparably more clearly than +our most realistic minds see it_; 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. 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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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." + +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. + +An officer put me in my place from the first moment. + +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. + +Devil knows what I would have given for a real regular quarrel--a +more decent, a more _literary_ 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. + +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. + +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. + +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 (point d'honneur)--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. +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 Otetchestvenniya +Zapiski. But at that time such attacks were not the fashion and +my story was not printed. That was a great vexation to me. +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. +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. + +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. + +"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." + +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. + +"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 recherche: +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." + +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 bon ton 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. 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. 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? + + +II + +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, _ready made_ (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. + +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.... + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + + +III + +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. + +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 droit de +seigneur, 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. + +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. + +"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." + +"Of course not, since we are inviting him," Simonov decided. + +"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." + +"Do we want half a dozen for the four of us?" observed +Trudolyubov, taking notice only of the half dozen. + +"So the three of us, with Zverkov for the fourth, twenty-one +roubles, at the Hotel de Paris at five o'clock tomorrow," +Simonov, who had been asked to make the arrangements, concluded +finally. + +"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." + +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. + +"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. + +It infuriated me that he knew me so thoroughly. + +"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. + +"And where were we to find you?" Ferfitchkin put in roughly. + +"You never were on good terms with Zverkov," Trudolyubov added, +frowning. + +But I had already clutched at the idea and would not give it up. + +"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." + +"Oh, there's no making you out...with these refinements," +Trudolyubov jeered. + +"We'll put your name down," Simonov decided, addressing me. +"Tomorrow at five-o'clock at the Hotel de Paris." + +"What about the money?" Ferfitchkin began in an undertone, +indicating me to Simonov, but he broke off, for even Simonov was +embarrassed. + +"That will do," said Trudolyubov, getting up. "If he wants to +come so much, let him." + +"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." + +"We do not want at all, perhaps..." + +They went away. Ferfitchkin did not greet me in any way as he +went out, Trudolyubov barely nodded. Simonov, with whom I was +left tete-a-tete, was in a state of vexation and perplexity, and +looked at me queerly. He did not sit down and did not ask me to. + +"H'm ... yes ... tomorrow, then. Will you pay your subscription +now? I just ask so as to know," he muttered in embarrassment. + +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. + +"You will understand, Simonov, that I could have no idea when I +came here....I am very much vexed that I have forgotten ...." + +"All right, all right, that doesn't matter. You can pay tomorrow +after the dinner. I simply wanted to know....Please don't..." + +He broke off and began pacing the room still more vexed. As he +walked he began to stamp with his heels. + +"Am I keeping you?" I asked, after two minutes of silence. + +"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. + +"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 + +"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. + +"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...." + +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. + +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. + +Not to pay him was impossible, considering his character. But I +will talk about that fellow, about that plague of mine, another +time. + +However, I knew I should go and should not pay him his wages. + +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! + +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, _unliterary_, 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 +_real thing_!" 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, lumping into a +high-class sledge, on which I spent my last half rouble, I drove +up in grand style to the Hotel de Paris. + + +IV + +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. + +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. + +"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 shy away from us. You +shouldn't. We are not such terrible people as you think. Well, +anyway, I am glad to renew our acquaintance." + +And he turned carelessly to put down his hat on the window. + +"Have you been waiting long?" Trudolyubov inquired. + +"I arrived at five o'clock as you told me yesterday," I answered +aloud, with an irritability that threatened an explosion. + +"Didn't you let him know that we had changed the hour?" said +Trudolyubov to Simonov. + +"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 hors d'oeuvre. + +"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. + +"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." + +"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!" + +"If a trick like that had been played on me," observed +Ferfitchkin, "I should..." + +"But you should have ordered something for yourself," Zverkov +interrupted, "or simply asked for dinner without waiting for us." + +"You will allow that I might have done that without your +permission," I rapped out. "If I waited, it was..." + +"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. + +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. + +"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. + +"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. + +"In the N--- office," I answered jerkily, with my eyes on my +plate. + +"And ha-ave you a go-od berth? I say, what ma-a-de you leave +your original job?" + +"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. + +Zverkov winced, but he tried not to notice it. + + "And the remuneration?" + +"What remuneration?" + +"I mean, your sa-a-lary?" + +"Why are you cross-examining me?" However, I told him at once +what my salary was. I turned horribly red. + +"It is not very handsome," Zverkov observed majestically + +"Yes, you can't afford to dine at cafes on that," Ferfitchkin +added insolently + +"To my thinking it's very poor," Trudolyubov observed gravely. + +"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. + +"Oh, spare his blushes," cried Ferfitchkin, sniggering. + +"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." + +"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. + +"Tha-at," I answered, feeling I had gone too far, "and I imagine +it would be better to talk of something more intelligent." + +"You intend to show off your intelligence, I suppose?" + +"Don't disturb yourself, that would be quite out of place here." + +"Why are you clacking away like that, my good sir, eh? Have you +gone out of your wits in your office?" + +"Enough, gentlemen, enough!" Zverkov cried, authoritatively. + +"How stupid it is!" muttered Simonov. + +"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." + +"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 ...." + +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. + +No one paid any attention to me, and I sat crushed and +humiliated. + +"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!" + +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! + +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. + +"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. +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. + +Trudolyubov raised his glass, as did everyone else but me. + +"Your health and good luck on the journey!" he cried to Zverkov. +"To old times, to our future, hurrah!" + +They all tossed off their glasses, and crowded round Zverkov to +kiss him. I did not move; my full glass stood untouched before +me. + +"Why, aren't you going to drink it?" roared Trudolyubov, losing +patience and turning menacingly to me. + +"I want to make a speech separately, on my own account...and then +I'll drink it, Mr. Trudolyubov." + +"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. + +"_Silence!_" cried Ferfitchkin. "Now for a display of wit!" + +Zverkov waited very gravely, knowing what was coming. + +"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." + +There was a general stir. + +"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!" + +Zverkov got up from his seat, bowed to me and said: + +"I am very much obliged to you." He was frightfully offended and +turned pale. + +"Damn the fellow!" roared Trudolyubov, bringing his fist down on +the table. + +"Well, he wants a punch in the face for that," squealed +Ferfitchkin. + +"We ought to turn him out," muttered Simonov. + +"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." + +"Mr. Ferfitchkin, you will give me satisfaction tomorrow for +your words just now!" I said aloud, turning with dignity to +Ferfitchkin. + +"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. + +"Yes, let him alone, of course! He is quite drunk," Trudolyubov +said with disgust. + +"I shall never forgive myself for letting him join us," Simonov +muttered again. + +"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!" + +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 _first_. 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. + +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, _taking no +notice of them_. But nothing came of it: they said nothing, and +two minutes later they ceased to notice me again. It struck +eleven. + +"Friends," cried Zverkov getting up from the sofa, "let us all be +off now, _there_!" + +"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. + +"Zverkov, I beg your pardon," I said abruptly and resolutely. +"Ferfitchkin, yours too, and everyone's, everyone's: I have +insulted you all!" + +"Aha! A duel is not in your line, old man," Ferfitchkin hissed +venomously. + +It sent a sharp pang to my heart. + +"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." + +"He is comforting himself," said Simonov. + +"He's simply raving," said Trudolyubov. + +"But let us pass. Why are you barring our way? What do you +want?" Zverkov answered disdainfully + +They were all flushed, their eyes were bright: they had been +drinking heavily. + +"I ask for your friendship, Zverkov; I insulted you, but..." + +"Insulted? _You_ insulted _me_? Understand, sir, that you +never, under any circumstances, could possibly insult _me_." + +"And that's enough for you. Out of the way!" concluded +Trudolyubov. + + "Olympia is mine, friends, that's agreed!" cried Zverkov. + +"We won't dispute your right, we won't dispute your right," the +others answered, laughing. + +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. + +"Simonov! give me six roubles!" I said, with desperate +resolution. + +He looked at me in extreme amazement, with vacant eyes. He, +too, was drunk. + +"You don't mean you are coming with us?" + +"Yes." + +"I've no money," he snapped out, and with a scornful laugh he +went out of the room. + +I clutched at his overcoat. It was a nightmare. + +"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!" + +Simonov pulled out the money and almost flung it at me. + +"Take it, if you have no sense of shame!" he pronounced +pitilessly, and ran to overtake them. + +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. + +"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!" + + +V + +"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!" + +"You are a scoundrel," a thought flashed through my mind, "if you +laugh at this now." + +"No matter!" I cried, answering myself. "Now everything is +lost!" + +There was no trace to be seen of them, but that made no +difference--I knew where they had gone. + +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. + +"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!" + +We set off. There was a perfect whirl in my head. + +"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!" + +The driver tugged at the reins. + +"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. + +"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...." + +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 +.... + +"Get on, driver, get on, you rascal, get on!" + +"Ugh, sir!" said the son of toil. + +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! + +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!" + +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, _the woman I +loved_, 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...." + +I was actually on the point of tears, though I knew perfectly +well at that moment that all this was out of Pushkin's Silvio and +Lermontov's Masquerade. 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. + +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!" + +And in my impatience I punched the sledge-driver on the back of +the neck. + +"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. + +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 _now, at once_, and that _no force could stop it_. The +deserted street lamps gleamed sullenly in the showy 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. + +At last we arrived. I jumped out, almost unconscious, rail 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. + +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. + +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. + +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." + + +VI + +...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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +"What is your name?" I asked abruptly, to put an end to it. + +"Liza," she answered almost in a whisper, but somehow far from +graciously, and she turned her eyes away. + +I was silent. + +"What weather! The snow...it's disgusting!" I said, almost to +myself, putting my arm under my head despondently, and gazing at +the ceiling. + +She made no answer. This was horrible. + +"Have you always lived in Petersburg?" I asked a minute later, +almost angrily, turning my head slightly towards her. + +"No." + +"Where do you come from?" + +"From Riga," she answered reluctantly. + +"Are you a German?" + +"No, Russian." + +"Have you been here long?" + +"Where?" + +"In this house?" + +"A fortnight." + +She spoke more and more jerkily. The candle went out; I could no +longer distinguish her face. + +"Have you a father and mother?" + +"Yes...no...I have." + +"Where are they?" + +"There...in Riga." + +"What are they?" + +"Oh, nothing." + +"Nothing? Why, what class are they?" + +"Tradespeople." + +"Have you always lived with them?" + +"Yes." + +"How old are you?" + +"Twenty." + +"Why did you leave them?" + +"Oh, for no reason." + +That answer meant "Let me alone; I feel sick, sad." + +We were silent. + +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. + +"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. + +"A coffin?" + +"Yes, in the Haymarket; they were bringing it up out of a +cellar." + +"From a cellar?" + +"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." + +Silence. + +"A nasty day to be buried," I began, simply to avoid being +silent. + +"Nasty, in what way?" + +"The snow, the wet." (I yawned.) + +"It makes no difference," she said suddenly, after a brief +silence. + +"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." + +"Why water in the grave?" she asked, with a sort of curiosity, +but speaking even more harshly and abruptly than before. + +I suddenly began to feel provoked. + +"Why, there must have been water at the bottom a foot deep. You +can't dig a dry grave in Volkovo Cemetery." + +"Why?" + +"Why? Why, the place is waterlogged. It's a regular marsh. So +they bury them in water. I've seen it myself...many times." + +(I had never seen it once, indeed I had never been in Volkovo, +and had only heard stories of it.) + +"Do you mean to say, you don't mind how you die?" + +"But why should I die?" she answered, as though defending +herself. + +"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." + +"A wench would have died in hospital..." (She knows all about it +already: she said "wench," not "girl.") + +"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." + +A great deal of this was my invention. Silence followed, +profound silence. She did not stir. + +"And is it better to die in a hospital?" + +"Isn't it just the same? Besides, why should I die?" she added +irritably. + +"If not now, a little later." + +"Why a little later?" + +"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." + +"In a year?" + +"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." + +"Oh, well, then I shall die," she answered, quite vindictively, +and she made a quick movement. + +"But one is sorry." + +"Sorry for whom?" + +"Sorry for life." + +Silence. + +"Have you been engaged to be married? Eh?" + +"What's that to you?" + +"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." + +"Sorry for whom?" + +"Sorry for you." + +"No need," she whispered hardly audibly, and again made a faint +movement. + +That incensed me at once. What! I was so gentle with her, and +she .... + +"Why, do you think that you are on the right path?" + +"I don't think anything." + +"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... ." + +"Not all married women are happy," she snapped out in the rude +abrupt tone she had used at first. + +"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!" + +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. + +"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!" + +"Yes!" she assented sharply and hurriedly. + +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! + +It was the exercise of my power that attracted me most. + +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. + +"Why have you come here?" I asked her, with a note of authority +already in my voice. + +"Oh, I don't know." + +"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." + +"But what if it's worse than this?" + +"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. + +"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... ." + +"A girl like me?" she whispered, hardly audibly; but I heard it. + +Damn it all, I was flattering her. That was horrid. But perhaps +it was a good thing.... She was silent. + +"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." + +I waited again. "Perhaps she doesn't understand," I thought, +"and, indeed, it is absurd--it's moralising." + +"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. + +"Why so?" she asked. + +Ah! so she was listening! + +"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." + +"What next?" she said, with a faint smile. + +"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." + +"Some are glad to sell their daughters, rather than marrying them +honourably." + +Ah, so that was it! + +"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." + +"And is it any better with the gentry? Even among the poor, +honest people who live happily?" + +"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 _you will find out for yourself_. 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 took 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!" + +"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. + +"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. + +"What?" I asked, with tender curiosity + +"Why, you ..." + +"What?" + +"Why, you ... speak somehow like a book," she said, and again +there was a note of irony in her voice. + +That remark sent a pang to my heart. It was not what I was +expecting. + +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. + +"Wait a bit!" I thought. + + +VII + +"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.'" + +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. + +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.... + +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 walling, +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. + + "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. + +"This is my address, Liza, come to me." + +"I will come," she answered resolutely, her head still bowed. + +"But now I am going, good-bye...till we meet again." + +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. + +"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. + +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, _who knew nothing_, +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 _about this_ 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." + +She dropped her shining eyes with a sort of bashfulness as she +finished. + +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. + + +VIII + +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 +_sentimentality_ 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 _obviously_, 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. + +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 Hotel 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..." And it went off all right; all this was uttered very +easily, unconstrainedly and complacently. + +On reaching home I promptly wrote to Simonov. + +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 Hotel 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!" + +"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. + +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. + +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!..." + +When I reached that thought I fired up all at once. + +"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." + +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. + +Next day I was ready again to look upon it all as nonsense, due +to over-excited nerves, and, above all, as _exaggerated_. 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 fall to understand?..." + +But at this point I stopped short, and in great confusion, +indeed. + +"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!" + +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! + +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. + +'Into my house come bold and free, +Its rightful mistress there to be'. + +"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. + +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! + +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. + +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 _punish_ 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.... + +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, a propos 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. + +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. + +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. + +"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. + +"How dare you come and look at me like that without being sent +for? Answer!" + +After looking at me calmly for half a minute, he began turning +round again. + +"Stay!" I roared, running up to him, "don't stir! There. +Answer, now: what did you come in to look at?" + +"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. + +"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! +..." + +He would have turned round again without a word, but I seized +him. + +"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?" + +"That cannot be," he answered, with the most unnatural +self-confidence. + +"It shall be so," I said, "I give you my word of honour, it shall +be!" + +"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." + +"Go, summon me," I roared, "go at once, this very minute, this +very second! You are a torturer all the same! a torturer!" + +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. + +"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. + +"Apollon," I said quietly and emphatically, though I was +breathless, "go at once without a minute's delay and fetch the +police-officer." + +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. + +"At once, go this minute! Go on, or else you can't imagine what +will happen." + +"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." + +"Go!" I shrieked, clutching him by the shoulder. I felt I should +strike him in a minute. + +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. + +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. + +"Go away, go away," I commanded in desperation. At that moment +my clock began whirring and wheezing and struck seven. + + +IX + +"Into my house come bold and free, +Its rightful mistress there to be." + +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. + +"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 naivete of expectation drove me to fury, but I +restrained myself. + +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 _all this_. + +"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?...." + +"No," she was beginning. + +"Wait a minute." + +I leapt up and ran to Apollon. I had to get out of the room +somehow. + +"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! ..." + +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 a la +Napoleon. 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? + +I sat down again. She looked at me uneasily. For some minutes +we were silent. + +"I will kill him," I shouted suddenly, striking the table with my +fist so that the ink spurted out of the inkstand. + +"What are you saying!" she cried, starting. + +"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 ..." + +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. + +She was frightened. + +"What is the matter? What is wrong?" she cried, fussing about +me. + +"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, _putting it on_, to save appearances, though +the attack was a genuine one. + +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. + +"Liza, do you despise me?" I asked, looking at her fixedly, +trembling with impatience to know what she was thinking. + +She was confused, and did not know what to answer. + +"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. + +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. + +"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. + +"Perhaps I am in your way," she began timidly, hardly audibly, +and was getting up. + +But as soon as I saw this first impulse of wounded dignity I +positively trembled with spite, and at once burst out. + +"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.... hat's what it was, and you +imagined I had come there on purpose to save you. Yes? You +imagined that? You imagined that?" + +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.... + +"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?" + +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. + +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... + +"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. + +My God! surely I was not envious of her then. + +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. + +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 +became 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. + + +X + +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 floor 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 +_personal hatred_, 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. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +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 +_keep up appearances_, and I turned away from her eyes. + +"Good-bye," she said, going towards the door. + +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.... + +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. + +"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. + +"Liza!" I cried, more loudly. + +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. + +She had gone. I went back to my room in hesitation. I felt +horribly oppressed. + +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. + +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. + +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. + +Where had she gone? And why was I running after her? + +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? + +I stood in the snow, gazing into the troubled darkness and +pondered this. + +"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? +..." + +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? + +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. + +. . . . . + +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 _expressly_ 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"... + +[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.] + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Notes from the Underground + |