Dostoevsky (177 page)

He thus concludes that, with Onegin, Pushkin proved himself to be “a great national [
narodny
] writer” who had “identified the innermost essence of the upper class of our society that stood above the people” and also “identified the type of Russian wanderer, who continues his wandering even in our days.” But as well as depicting such negative images of Russian life, Pushkin also “showed us a whole series of positively beautiful Russian types he found among the Russian people.” In addition to Tatyana, Dostoevsky adduces “the type of Russian chronicler-monk” (Pimen in
Boris Godunov
) and somewhat later “The Tale of the Bear” and a peasant drinking song. Unlike other writers, who came from a different world and whose work “shows a wish to raise the people to their own level and make them happy by doing so,” there was something in Pushkin “that
truly
makes him akin to the people, something that reaches the level of simple-hearted tenderness.” From Pushkin, as a result, Russians derive “faith in our Russian individuality, our now conscious hope in the strength of our people, and with it our faith in our future independent mission in the family of European peoples” (26: 144).

The last part of the speech is devoted to “the third period” of Pushkin’s work, in which “our poet stands forth as an almost miraculous and unprecedented phenomenon,” with a universality surpassing even the greatest creators of European literature—Shakespeare, Cervantes, Schiller. In this period, Pushkin began to write works that “reflect the poetic images of other nations and incarnate their genius.” Dostoevsky expressively characterizes an array of such poems, but unlike Turgenev, who had praised such works rather halfheartedly, he gives them fundamental importance. No other poet or writer in world literature has this capacity to enter into and reproduce the spirit of other cultures to the same degree because no other people except the Russian possess such universal empathy.
“This we find only in Pushkin, and in this sense, I repeat, he is unprecedented and, in my view, prophetic.” He was “prophetic” because this feature of his work, “his ability to infuse his spirit into the spirit of other nations,” is precisely indicative of the great future mission of the Russian people (26: 145).

Dostoevsky’s messianism is here given a new power and resonance by being prefigured in Pushkin, and this linkage responded perfectly to the need for some uplifting vision felt by his agitatedly expectant audience. Russia’s mission, Dostoevsky proclaimed, was “the general unification of all people of all tribes of the great Aryan race.” (This was the first time he had employed the word “Aryan,” which reveals the influence of the anti-Semitic literature of the period, and it provoked a great deal of criticism.) He then declared that “all our Slavophilism and Westernizing” had been nothing but a great misunderstanding, because “to become a real Russian, to become completely Russian, perhaps, means just (in the final analysis—please bear that in mind) to become a brother to all peoples, a
pan-human
, if you like” (26: 147). Dostoevsky then repeats his assertion that Russian foreign policy, even in the past, had served Europe much more than Russia itself.

Admitting that “my words may seem ecstatic, exaggerated, and fantastic,” Dostoevsky is yet willing to let them stand as such. And at this point he makes his most masterly move by identifying Pushkin and Russia with the kenotic essence of Russian religious feeling, the reverence for the suffering and humiliated Christ. The claims he had made for Russia may, after all, seem merely pretentious; indeed, how could such “an impoverished, crude land” as Russia claim such an exalted destiny? “Can it be we who are ordained to utter a new word to humanity?” But he reminds his listeners that he is not making any claim to “economic prominence . . . the glory of the sword or science.” Paraphrasing and quoting a poem of Tyutchev’s, he intones: “ ‘Our Land may be impoverished, but Christ Himself in slavish garb traversed this impoverished land and gave [it] His blessing!’ Why may we not contain His ultimate word?” “If my idea is a fantasy,” he concludes, “then in Pushkin, at least, there is something on which this fantasy can be founded.” But Pushkin died young, “and unquestionably he took some great secret with him to the grave. And so we must puzzle out his secret without him”—a secret that, as Dostoevsky must have surely believed, his speech had already done a good deal to disclose (26: 148–149).

The effect of this speech on the audience was absolutely overwhelming, and the emotions it unleashed may be compared with the hysterical effusions typical of religious revival meetings. The memoirs of the period are full of its description, and we may begin with the image given by D. A. Lyubimov—the son of Dostoevsky’s editor and then still a young student—of its finale. “Dostoevsky pronounced
the last words of his speech in a sort of inspired whisper, lowered his head, and in a deathly silence, began rather hurriedly to leave the podium. The hall seemed to hold its breath, as if expecting something more. Suddenly from the back rows rang out a hysterical shriek, ‘You have solved it!’ [the secret of Pushkin], which was taken up by several feminine voices in chorus. The entire auditorium began to stir. You could hear the shrieks, ‘You solved it! You solved it!’ a storm of applause, some sort of rumbling, stamping, feminine screeches. I do not think that the walls of the Hall of the Moscow Nobility either before or since had ever resounded with such a tempest of ecstasy.”
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Dostoevsky’s account to Anna of his spectacular success cannot be equaled in communicating the excitement of the moment:

With the exception of the reconciliation of the two old enemies, every other detail of this account can be confirmed from independent sources. The young man who collapsed at his feet was the most conspicuous among those so overcome, but the
kursistka
Letkova-Sultanova, who had met Dostoevsky at the poet Polonsky’s, also refers to a female friend who lost consciousness at its conclusion.
⁵⁰
As for Annenkov, in addition to embracing Dostoevsky, he buttonholed Strakhov and said excitedly, “There, that’s an example of a literary characterization made by a genius! It settles the affair in one stroke!”
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It took an entire hour for the session to resume again. Despite Aksakov’s reluctance to take the floor, he was prevailed upon to do so by Dostoevsky and all the others. He wisely improvised some remarks, focusing on the agreement with Dostoevsky’s words manifested both by a representative of the Slavophils like himself and by the most important of the Westernizers, Turgenev. Henceforth all misunderstanding had been eliminated, and a new era of harmony in Russian culture was about to dawn. By this time, Dostoevsky “had grown weak and wished to leave, but was forcibly kept from going.”
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During the hour that had elapsed after his speech, a large laurel wreath had been procured by a group of
kursistki
, who invaded the platform (Dostoevsky said they were more than a hundred) and crowned him with this weighty tribute. It bore the inscription in gold letters, “On behalf of Russian women, about whom you said so many good things.” Again, “everyone wept, again there was enthusiasm.” The head of the Moscow Duma thanked Dostoevsky on behalf of the city, and the session then came to an end. His letter was written at eight that evening, but for him the day was not yet finished. “In an hour,” he tells Anna, “I’ll go read at the second literary celebration. I’ll read ‘The Prophet.’ ”
⁵³

At this final session, he read from “Songs of the Western Slavs” and “The Tale of the Bear” in the first part of the program; in the second, he declaimed “The Prophet.” Strakhov recalled this latter performance as “the most remarkable” of the evening, which also included readings by Turgenev. “Dostoevsky recited it twice [he was called back by the audience], and each time with such intense passion that his listeners felt uncanny. . . . His right hand, tremblingly pointing out guilt, clearly refrained from any overwrought gestures; the voice was strained to an outcry.”
⁵⁴

These events did not end the evening, which continued with a repetition of the public “apotheosis” of the bust of Pushkin that had begun the ceremonies. Wreaths were again placed there by all the writers present, and this time it was Dostoevsky, not Turgenev, who crowned Pushkin’s head; Turgenev laid his tribute at the foot of the pedestal. This arrangement could well have been made at the start to give the two most prominent writers these alternating roles, but it now seemed to be a symbolic gesture, objectifying what many in the audience had come to feel—that Dostoevsky had emerged victorious, and that it was he, not Turgenev, who had inherited the mantle of Pushkin. He was at last allowed to return to his hotel and obtain some much-needed rest, but was too excited and happy to remain quiet for very long. As Anna tells it, “late at night he went to the Pushkin monument once again. The night was warm, but there was almost no one in the street. Arriving at Strastnaya Square, he lifted with difficulty an enormous laurel wreath which had been presented to him at the morning session after his speech, laid it at the foot of the monument to his ‘great teacher,’ and bowed down to the ground before it.”
⁵⁵

Dostoevsky remained in Moscow for two more days, finding little respite from the round of activities in which he had been caught since his arrival. On the morning of the ninth, he sat for his portrait at the request of the best photographer in Moscow, M. M. Panov. He had already decided to give his Pushkin piece to Katkov, for publication in the
Moscow News
, where it would appear more rapidly and reach a larger reading public than it would in Yuriev’s journal.

Later in the afternoon, while he was making his round of obligatory visits before departing, he by chance ran into an acquaintance from Petersburg, Evgeny Opochinin, who worked in the library and museum of the Society of the Lovers of Old (Russian) Literature. The two strolled along until Dostoevsky became weary. Sitting down on a bench to continue their conversation, they suddenly heard “a cheerful voice” behind them hailing Dostoevsky—a voice that turned out to be Turgenev’s. Joining the two men, Turgenev engaged Dostoevsky in a conversation to which, regrettably (though this is difficult to believe), Opochinin paid no attention. His thoughts were interrupted when Dostoevsky suddenly rose from the bench, “his face pallid and with trembling lips.” “ ‘Moscow is very big,’ he angrily threw out at his interlocutor. ‘but there is nowhere to hide in it from you!’ And waving his arms, he strode away down the boulevard.”
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