Lectures on Russian Literature Part 2

PUSHKIN.

1. I have stated in the first lecture that I should treat of Pushkin as the singer. Pushkin has indeed done much besides singing. He has written not only lyrics and ballads but also tales: tales in prose and tales in verse; he has written novels, a drama, and even a history. He has thus roamed far and wide, still he is only a singer. And even a cursory glance at his works is enough to show the place which belongs to him. I say belongs, because the place he holds has a prominence out of proportion to the merits of the writer. Among the blind the one-eyed is king, and the one-eyed Pushkin--for the moral eye is totally lacking in this man--came when there as yet was no genuine song in Russia, but mere noise, reverberation of sounding bra.s.s; and Pushkin was hailed as the voice of voices, because amidst the universal din his was at least clear. Of his most ambitious works, "Boris G.o.dunof" is not a drama, with a central idea struggling in the breast of the poet for embodiment in art, but merely a series of well-painted pictures, and painted not for the soul, but only for the eye. His "Eugene Onyegin" contains many fine verses, much wit, much biting satire, much bitter scorn, but no indignation burning out of the righteous heart. His satire makes you smile, but fails to rouse you to indignation. In his "Onyegin," Pushkin often pleases you, but he never stirs you. Pushkin is in literature what the polished club-man is in society. In society the man who can repeat the most bon-mots, tell the most amusing anecdotes, and talk most fluently, holds the ear more closely than he that speaks from the heart.

So Pushkin holds his place in literature because he is brilliant, because his verse is polished, his language chosen, his wit pointed, his p.r.i.c.k stinging. But he has no aspiration, no hope; he has none of the elements which make the writings of the truly great helpful. Pushkin, in short, has nothing to give. Since to be able to give one must have, and Pushkin was a spiritual pauper.

2. And what is true of his more sustained works, is equally true of his lesser works. They all bear the mark of having come from the surface, and not from the depths. His "Prisoner of the Caucasus," his "Fountain of Bachtshisarai," his "Gypsies," are moreover weighted down with the additional load of having been written directly under the influence of Byron. And as health is sufficient unto itself and it is only disease which is contagious, Byron, who was sick at heart himself, could only impart disease and not health. Byron moreover had besides his gift of song the element of moral indignation against corrupt surroundings.

Pushkin had not even this redeeming feature.

3. Pushkin therefore is not a poet, but only a singer; for he is not a maker, a creator. There is not a single idea any of his works can be said to stand for. His is merely a skill. No idea circulates in his blood giving him no rest until embodied in artistic form. His is merely a skill struggling for utterance because there is more of it than he can hold. Pushkin has thus nothing to give you to carry away. All he gives is pleasure, and the pleasure he gives is not that got by the hungry from a draught of nourishing milk, but that got by the satiated from a draught of intoxicating wine. He is the exponent of beauty solely, without reference to an ultimate end. Gogol uses his sense of beauty and creative impulse to protest against corruption, to give vent to his moral indignation; Turgenef uses his sense of beauty as a weapon with which to fight _his_ mortal enemy, mankind's deadly foe; and Tolstoy uses his sense of beauty to preach the ever-needed gospel of love. But Pushkin uses his sense of beauty merely to give it expression. He sings indeed like a siren, but he sings without purpose. Hence, though he is the greatest versifier of Russia,--not poet, observe!--he is among the least of its writers.

4. Towards the end of his early extinguished life he showed, indeed, signs of better things. In his "Captain's Daughter" he depicts a heroic simplicity, the sight of which is truly refreshing, and here Pushkin becomes truly n.o.ble. As a thing of purity, as a thing of calmness, as a thing of beauty, in short, the "Captain's Daughter" stands unsurpa.s.sed either in Russia or out of Russia. Only Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield," Gogol's "Taras Bulba," and the Swiss clergyman's "Broom Merchant," can be worthily placed by its side. But this n.o.bility is of the lowly, humble kind, to be indeed thankful for as all n.o.bility must be, whether it be that of the honest farmer who tills the soil in silence, or that of the gentle Longfellow who cultivates his modest muse in equal quietness. But there is the n.o.bility of the nightingale and the n.o.bility of the eagle; there is the n.o.bility of the lamb and the n.o.bility of the lion; and beside the t.i.tanesqueness of Gogol, and Turgenef, and Tolstoy, the n.o.bility of Pushkin, though high enough on its own plane, is relatively low.

5. Mere singer then that Pushkin is, he is accordingly at his best only in his lyrics. But the essence of a lyric is music, and the essence of music is harmony, and the essence of harmony is form; hence in beauty of form Pushkin is unsurpa.s.sed, and among singers he is peerless. His soul is a veritable aeolian harp. No sooner does the wind begin to blow than his soul is filled with music. His grace is only equalled by that of Heine, his ease by that of Goethe, and his melody by that of Tennyson. I have already said that Pushkin is not an eagle soaring in the heavens, but he is a nightingale perched singing on the tree. But this very perfection of form makes his lyrics well-nigh untranslatable, and their highest beauty can only be felt by those who can read them in the original.

6. In endeavoring therefore to present Pushkin to you, I shall present to you not the nine tenths of his works which were written only by his hands,--his dramas, his tales, his romances, whether in prose or verse,--but the one t.i.the of his works which was writ from his heart.

For Pushkin was essentially a lyric singer, and whatever comes from this side of his being is truly original; all else, engrafted upon him as it is from without, either from ambition or from imitation, cannot be called _his_ writing, that which he alone and none others had to deliver himself of. What message Pushkin had to deliver at all to his fellow-men is therefore found in his lyrics.

7. Before proceeding, however, to look at this singer Pushkin, it is necessary to establish a standard by which his attainment is to be judged. And that we may ascertain how closely Pushkin approaches the highest, I venture to read to you the following poem, as the highest flight which the human soul is capable of taking heavenward on the wings of song.

HYMN TO FORCE.

BY WM. R. THAYER.

I am eternal!

I throb through the ages; I am the Master Of each of Life's stages.

I quicken the blood Of the mate-craving lover; The age-frozen heart With daisies I cover.

Down through the ether I hurl constellations; Up from their earth-bed I wake the carnations.

I laugh in the flame As I kindle and fan it; I crawl in the worm; I leap in the planet.

Forth from its cradle I pilot the river; In lightning and earthquake I flash and I quiver.

My breath is the wind; My bosom the ocean; My form's undefined; My essence is motion.

The braggarts of science Would weigh and divide me; Their wisdom evading, I vanish and hide me.

My glances are rays From stars emanating; My voice through the spheres Is sound, undulating.

I am the monarch Uniting all matter: The atoms I gather; The atoms I scatter.

I pulse with the tides-- Now hither, now thither; I grant the tree sap; I bid the bud wither.

I always am present, Yet nothing can bind me; Like thought evanescent, They lose me who find me.

8. I consider a poem of this kind (and I regret that there are very few such in any language) to stand at the very summit of poetic aspiration.

For not only is it perfect in form, and is thus a thing of beauty made by the hands of man, but its subject is of the very highest, since it is a hymn, a praise of G.o.d, even though the name of the Most High be not there. For what is heaven? Heaven is a state where the fellowship of man with man is such as to leave no room for want to the one while there is abundance to the other. Heaven is a state where the wants of the individual are so cared for that he needs the help of none. But if there be no longer any need of toiling, neither for neighbor nor for self, what is there left for the soul to do but to praise G.o.d and glorify creation? A hymn like the above, then, is the outflow of a spirit which hath a heavenly peace. And this is precisely the occupation with which the imagination endows the angels; the highest flight of the soul is therefore that in which it is so divested of the interests of the earth as to be filled only with reverence and worship. And this hymn to Force seems to me to have come from a spirit which, at the time of its writing at least, attained such freedom from the earthly.

9. Such a poem being then at one end of the scale, the highest because it gratifies the soul's highest need, on the opposite end, on the lowest, is found that which gratifies the soul's lowest need, its need for novelty, its curiosity. And this is done by purely narrative writing, of which the following is a good example:--

THE BLACK SHAWL.

I gaze demented on the black shawl, And my cold soul is torn by grief.

When young I was and full of trust I pa.s.sionately loved a young Greek girl.

The charming maid, she fondled me, But soon I lived the black day to see.

Once as were gathered my jolly guests, A detested Jew knocked at my door.

Thou art feasting, he whispered, with friends, But betrayed thou art by thy Greek maid.

Moneys I gave him and curses, And called my servant, the faithful.

We went; I flew on the wings of my steed, And tender mercy was silent in me.

Her threshold no sooner I espied, Dark grew my eyes, and my strength departed.

The distant chamber I enter alone-- An Armenian embraces my faithless maid.

Darkness around me: flashed the dagger; To interrupt his kiss the wretch had no time.

And long I trampled the headless corpse,-- And silent and pale at the maid I stared.

I remember her prayers, her flowing blood, But perished the girl, and with her my love.

The shawl I took from the head now dead, And wiped in silence the bleeding steel.

When came the darkness of eve, my serf Threw their bodies into the billows of the Danube.

Since then I kiss no charming eyes, Since then I know no cheerful days.

I gaze demented on the black shawl, And my cold soul is torn by grief.

10. The purpose of the author here was only to tell a story; and as success is to be measured by the ability of a writer to adapt his means to his ends, it must be acknowledged that Pushkin is here eminently successful. For the story is here well told; well told because simply told; the narrative moves, uninterrupted by excursions into side-fields.

In its cla.s.s therefore this poem must stand high, but it is of the lowest cla.s.s.

11. For well told though this story be, it is after all only a story, with no higher purpose than merely to gratify curiosity, than merely to amuse. Its art has no higher purpose than to copy faithfully the event, than to be a faithful photograph; and moreover it is the story not of an emotion, but of a pa.s.sion, and an ign.o.ble pa.s.sion at that; the pa.s.sion is jealousy,--in itself an ugly thing, and the fruit of this ugly thing is a still uglier thing,--a murder. The subject therefore is not a thing of beauty, and methinks that the sole business of art is first of all to deal with things of beauty. Mediocrity, meanness, ugliness, are fit subjects for art only when they can be made to serve a higher purpose, just as the sole reason for tasting wormwood is the improvement of health. But this higher purpose is here wanting. Hence I place such a poem on the lowest plane of art.

THE OUTCAST.

On a rainy autumn evening Into desert places went a maid; And the secret fruit of unhappy love In her trembling hands she held.

All was still: the woods and the hills Asleep in the darkness of the night; And her searching glances In terror about she cast.

And on this babe, the innocent, Her glance she paused with a sigh: "Asleep thou art, my child, my grief, Thou knowest not my sadness.

Thine eyes will ope, and though with longing, To my breast shalt no more cling.

No kiss for thee to-morrow From thine unhappy mother.