Eugene Oneguine [Onegin]
Its splendour and its blandishments,
In poor Moldavia cast her lot,
She visited the humble tents
Of migratory gipsy hordes—
And wild among them grew her words—
Our godlike tongue she could exchange
For savage speech, uncouth and strange,
And ditties of the steppe she loved.
But suddenly all changed around!
Lo! in my garden was she found
And as a country damsel roved,
A pensive sorrow in her glance
And in her hand a French romance.
VI
Now for the first time I my Muse
Lead into good society,
Her steppe-like beauties I peruse
With jealous fear, anxiety.
Through dense aristocratic rows
Of diplomats and warlike beaux
And supercilious dames she glides,
Sits down and gazes on all sides—
Amazed at the confusing crowd,
Variety of speech and vests,
Deliberate approach of guests
Who to the youthful hostess bowed,
And the dark fringe of men, like frames
Enclosing pictures of fair dames.
VII
Assemblies oligarchical
Please her by their decorum fixed,
The rigour of cold pride and all
Titles and ages intermixed.
But who in that choice company
With clouded brow stands silently?
Unknown to all he doth appear,
A vision desolate and drear
Doth seem to him the festal scene.
Doth his brow wretchedness declare
Or suffering pride? Why is he there?
Who may he be? Is it Eugene?
Pray is it he? It is the same.
“And is it long since back he came?
VIII
“Is he the same or grown more wise?
Still doth the misanthrope appear?
He has returned, say in what guise?
What is his latest character?
What doth he act? Is it Melmoth,(80)
Philanthropist or patriot,
Childe Harold, quaker, devotee,
Or other mask donned playfully?
Or a good fellow for the nonce,
Like you and me and all the rest?—
But this is my advice, ’twere best
Not to behave as he did once—
Society he duped enow.”
“Is he known to you?”—“Yes and No.”
[Note 80: A romance by Maturin.]
IX
Wherefore regarding him express
Perverse, unfavourable views?
Is it that human restlessness
For ever carps, condemns, pursues?
Is it that ardent souls of flame
By recklessness amuse or shame
Selfish nonentities around?
That mind which yearns for space is bound?
And that too often we receive
Professions eagerly for deeds,
That crass stupidity misleads,
That we by cant ourselves deceive,
That mediocrity alone
Without disgust we look upon?
X
Happy he who in youth was young,
Happy who timely grew mature,
He who life’s frosts which early wrung
Hath gradually learnt to endure;
By visions who was ne’er deranged
Nor from the mob polite estranged,
At twenty who was prig or swell,
At thirty who was married well,
At fifty who relief obtained
From public and from private ties,
Who glory, wealth and dignities
Hath tranquilly in turn attained,
And unto whom we all allude
As to a worthy man and good!
XI
But sad is the reflection made,
In vain was youth by us received,
That we her constantly betrayed
And she at last hath us deceived;
That our desires which noblest seemed,
The purest of the dreams we dreamed,
Have one by one all withered grown
Like rotten leaves by Autumn strown—
’Tis fearful to anticipate
Nought but of dinners a long row,
To look on life as on a show,
Eternally to imitate
The seemly crowd, partaking nought
Its passions and its modes of thought.
XII
The butt of scandal having been,
’Tis dreadful—ye agree, I hope—
To pass with reasonable men
For a fictitious misanthrope,
A visionary mortified,
Or monster of Satanic pride,
Or e’en the “Demon” of my strain.(81)
Onéguine—take him up again—
In duel having killed his friend
And reached, with nought his mind to engage,
The twenty-sixth year of his age,
Wearied of leisure in the end,
Without profession, business, wife,
He knew not how to spend his life.
[Note 81: The “Demon,” a short poem by Pushkin which at its first
appearance created some excitement in Russian society. A more
appropriate, or at any rate explanatory title, would have been
the _Tempter_. It is descriptive of the first manifestation of
doubt and cynicism in his youthful mind, allegorically as the
visits of a “demon.” Russian society was moved to embody this
imaginary demon in the person of a certain friend of Pushkin’s.
This must not be confounded with Lermontoff’s poem bearing the
same title upon which Rubinstein’s new opera, “Il Demonio,” is
founded.]
XIII
Him a disquietude did seize,
A wish from place to place to roam,
A very troublesome disease,
In some a willing martyrdom.
Abandoned he his country seat,
Of woods and fields the calm retreat,
Where every day before his eyes
A blood-bespattered shade would rise,
And aimless journeys did commence—
But still remembrance to him clings,
His travels like all other things
Inspired but weariness intense;
Returning, from his ship amid
A ball he fell as Tchatzki did.(82)
[Note 82: Tchatzki, one of the principal characters in Griboyédoff’s
celebrated comedy “Woe from Wit” (_Gore ot Ouma_).]
XIV
Behold, the crowd begins to stir,
A whisper runs along the hall,
A lady draws the hostess near,
Behind her a grave general.
Her manners were deliberate,
Reserved, but not inanimate,
Her eyes no saucy glance address,
There was no angling for success.
Her features no grimaces bleared;
Of affectation innocent,
Calm and without embarrassment,
A faithful model she appeared
Of “comme il faut.” Shishkòff, forgive!
I can’t translate the adjective.(83)
[Note 83: Shishkòff was a member of the literary school which
cultivated the vernacular as opposed to the _Arzamass_ or
Gallic school, to which the poet himself and his uncle Vassili
Pushkin belonged. He was admiral, author, and minister of
education.]
XV
Ladies in crowds around her close,
Her with a smile old women greet,
The men salute with lower bows
And watch her eye’s full glance to meet.
Maidens before her meekly move
Along the hall, and high above
The crowd doth head and shoulders rise
The general who accompanies.
None could her beautiful declare,
Yet viewing her from head to foot,
None could a trace of that impute,
Which in the elevated sphere
Of London life is “vulgar” called
And ruthless fashion hath blackballed.
XVI
I like this word exceedingly
Although it will not bear translation,
With us ’tis quite a novelty
Not high in general estimation;
’Twould serve ye in an epigram—
But turn we once more to our dame.
Enchanting, but unwittingly,
At table she was sitting by
The brilliant Nina Voronskoi,
The Neva’s Cleopatra, and
None the conviction could withstand
That Nina’s marble symmetry,
Though dazzling its effulgence white,
Could not eclipse her neighbour’s light.
XVII
“And is it,” meditates Eugene.
“And is it she? It must be—no—
How! from the waste of steppes unseen,”—
And the eternal lorgnette through
Frequent and rapid doth his glance
Seek the forgotten countenance
Familiar to him long ago.
“Inform me, prince, pray dost thou know
The lady in the crimson cap
Who with the Spanish envoy speaks?”—
The prince’s eye Onéguine seeks:
“Ah! long the world hath missed thy shape!
But stop! I will present thee, if
You choose.”—“But who is she?”—“My wife.”
XVIII
“So thou art wed! I did not know.
Long ago?”—“’Tis the second year.”
“To—?”—“Làrina.”—“Tattiana?”—“So.
And dost thou know her?”—“We live near.”
“Then come with me.” The prince proceeds,
His wife approaches, with him leads
His relative and friend as well.
The lady’s glance upon him fell—
And though her soul might be confused,
And vehemently though amazed
She on the apparition gazed,
No signs of trouble her accused,
A mien unaltered she preserved,
Her bow was easy, unreserved.
XIX
Ah no! no faintness her attacked
Nor sudden turned she red or white,
Her brow she did not e’en contract
Nor yet her lip compressed did bite.
Though he surveyed her at his ease,
Not the least trace Onéguine sees
Of the Tattiana of times fled.
He conversation would have led—
But could not. Then she questioned him:—
“Had he been long here, and where from?
Straight from their province had he come?”—
Cast upwards then her eyeballs dim
Unto her husband, went away—
Transfixed Onéguine mine doth stay.
XX
Is this the same Tattiana, say,
Before whom once in solitude,
In the beginning of this lay,
Deep in the distant province rude,
Impelled by zeal for moral worth,
He salutary rules poured forth?
The maid whose note he still possessed
Wherein the heart its vows expressed,
Where all upon the surface lies,—
That girl—but he must dreaming be—
That girl whom once on a time he
Could in a humble sphere despise,
Can she have been a moment gone
Thus haughty, careless in her tone?
XXI
He quits the fashionable throng
And meditative homeward goes,
Visions, now sad, now grateful, long
Do agitate his late repose.
He wakes—they with a letter come—
The Princess N. will be at home
On such a day. O Heavens, ’tis she!
Oh! I accept. And instantly
He a polite reply doth scrawl.
What hath he dreamed? What hath occurred?
In the recesses what hath stirred
Of a heart cold and cynical?
Vexation? Vanity? or strove
Again the plague of boyhood—love?
XXII
The hours once more Onéguine counts,
Impatient waits the close of day,
But ten strikes and his sledge he mounts
And gallops to her house away.
Trembling he seeks the young princess—
Tattiana finds in loneliness.
Together moments one or two
They sat, but conversation’s flow
Deserted Eugene. He, distraught,
Sits by her gloomily, desponds,
Scarce to her questions he responds,
Full of exasperating thought.
He fixedly upon her stares—
She calm and unconcerned appears.
XXIII
The husband comes and interferes
With this unpleasant _tête-à-tête_,
With Eugene pranks of former years
And jests doth recapitulate.
They talked and laughed. The guests arrived.
The conversation was revived
By the coarse wit of worldly hate;
But round the hostess scintillate
Light sallies without coxcombry,
Awhile sound conversation seems
To banish far unworthy themes
And platitudes and pedantry,
And never was the ear affright
By liberties or loose or light.
XXIV
And yet the city’s flower was there,
Noblesse and models of the mode,
Faces which we meet everywhere
And necessary fools allowed.
Behold the dames who once were fine
With roses, caps and looks malign;
Some marriageable maids behold,
Blank, unapproachable and cold.
Lo, the ambassador who speaks
Economy political,
And with gray hair ambrosial
The old man who has had his freaks,
Renowned for his acumen, wit,
But now ridiculous a bit.
XXV
Behold Sabouroff, whom the age
For baseness of the spirit scorns,
Saint Priest, who every album’s page
With blunted pencil-point adorns.
Another tribune of the ball
Hung like a print against the wall,
Pink as Palm Sunday cherubim,(84)
Motionless, mute, tight-laced and trim.
The traveller, bird of passage he,