White nights, and other stories
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 "good 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 appetizing sauce. That sauce was
made up of contradictions and sufferings, of agonizing 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 appetizing 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 good 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 every one; every one, of course, was in
dust and ashes, and was forced spontaneously to recognize 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 "good and beautiful," something in the Manfred
style. Every one 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 the Lake of Como,
the Lake of 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 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 stupified, 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 been in no way
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 interest. 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