THE SOUL OF RUSSIA.
EVERY page of this remarkable book breathes the spirit of Russia, the Russia which so vividly and unforgettably builds itself up in the mind out of the works of such great writers as Dostoievski, Tolstoi, Turgeniev, and Tchekov. In its passages of natural description there is the same realism and melan- choly ; in the conversations recorded the same groping philosophy, the mental ferment, the sense of fatality ; and in the character studies (in which the book is especially rich)
the same simplicity, brutality, and that subjection to a fixed idea which, with the strangely primitive actions and gestures in which these folk express their emotions, seems to the more repressed European of the West not far from madness. In each character, too, however simple and however brutal, there is a sharp individuality ; all are true to type, but they re not, as we tend to become in the West, the almost undiffer- entiated products of a system. " However foreign," says Gorki truly, at the end of the book, " all nationalism, patriot- ism and other diseases of the spirit may be to me, my vision of the Russian people as exceptionally, fantastically gifted and uncommon does not fail me. Even the fools in Russia are peculiarly foolish, foolish in a way of their own, just as the sluggards have a genius of their own." " It seems to me," he says in another chapter, " that the Russian mind is sick with the fear of its own self ; in its attempt to stand outside all reason it resents reason and is afraid of it."
In one of the conversations recorded, someone says of the revolution :—
" Maybe I, like many others, do not know how to triumph. All my energy went in the struggle, the expectation ; the capacity for enjoying possession is stunted, killed. Perhaps it is merely weak- ness, lack of strength. But the point is that I see iota of ferocity and revenge about me, but never any joy—the joy that transfigures a man. And I do not see any faith in victory."
Elsewhere in the book Gorki again returns to the Russian character, quoting the remarks of a certain priest, Feodor Vladimirski, made in 1901, and other remarks made five years later by William James. " Every nation," said the priest, " possesses spiritual eyesight—the eyesight of purpose. Some great thinkers call this capacity the instinct of the nation,' but to my mind instinct raises the question : How should one live ? ' whereas I have in mind the vague anguish of the reason and of the spirit concerning the question : What should one live for ? ' And I say that we Russians have an undeveloped eyesight for practical purposes, because we have not reached that height of culture which would enable us to view the road which the history of humanity ordains that we shall follow. I am of opinion, however, that we, more than others, are doomed to be tormented by the question : What should we live for ?' Meanwhile we live blindly, groping in the dark, and clamouring somewhat ; but we are, all the same, a people with a history, with a future . . ."
Speaking of Resurrection and The Brothers Karama.zoo, William James said :—
" To me the characters exhibited in them seem to come from another planet, where everything is different, and better. They have landed on earth by accident and arc irritated at this, almost insulted. There is something childish, ingenuous in them, and one is reminded of the obstinacy of an honest alchemist who believes that he is capable of discovering the Cause of all causes.' " The most striking element of the book is, however, as I have said, its studies of individual characters ; some of these, artistically complete as they are, form admirable short stories. One of the most remarkable is called " The Sorceress." She is an old woman, Ivanikha, daughter of an tmehristened Mordovian, himself a sorcerer and a hunter of bears. She married a forester, and when he died, leaving her childless, the lived in the but by herself, hunting and killing bears. She lerself was christened, but her Christianity always remained mixed with the old Mordovian mythology. Gorki describes a night passed in her but :— " In the middle of the night I was awakened by the wail of the chid in the chimney and a heavy, spluttering whisper. Glancing Iowa from the shelf, I saw Ivanikha on her knees, praying. She 'wined just a shapeless heap, a something grey and uncouth, something resembling a stone. Her dull voice bubbled curiously ; it sounded like water boiling fiercely, or a throat being gargled. Gradually out of that effervescence emerged strangely connected words. ' Oh Christ, how wrong ! . . . What a shame ! Christ . . . Elijah is angry, you are angry. Keremet, too. You are strong and many people follow you. You should be kind. Who will be kind to the people if God is unkind ? Oh, Christ ! you must listen to me ! You must ! I know a lot. Your women are tormented, your men are tormented. Why It's wrong. . .
Then there is Sasha Vinokurov, the assistant-surgeon, who had travelled all over the world. " Travelling is a very simple matter," he said ; " you simply go on board a ship and leave the rest to the captain. The captains are all drunkards, all of them, swearers and bullies, too—such is the law of nature." And there is old Ermolai Makov, the antique dealer, whose stories were always of the falling to pieces of princes' houses and the breaking up of great estates. He would talk fiercely of the uselessness and thoughtlessness of the nobles. " They just roll balls about," he would say. " They like rolling balls about with wooden hammers—that's a game of some kind they've got. And they've become just like those balls them- selves—rolling aimlessly here and there on the earth." Makov was haunted by two obsessions ; one that a strange soul, the soul of his mistress's dead husband, had taken possession of his body ; the other thit he was always accompanied by a familiar spirit, " a six-footed spider that walks on its hind legs, as large as a small goat, bearded and horned, with the breasts of a woman, and three eyes . . ."
Bodriagin, the one-eyed grave-digger, is a more sympathetic figure. He was a great lover of music, so great that if he heard music in the street he stood entranced so that twice he was knocked down by horses. " Don't you fret, my friend," he said to Gorki, trying to console him for the death of a little girl, " perhaps in that other world they speak another, a better, a more cheerful language than ours. Or maybe, they don't use any words at all, but just play on the violin." " When I hear music," he said, " it's as though I had dived to the bottom of a river."
There is also the deacon who used to carry in his pocket " a tin box in which he kept frogs in the summer and mice in the winter. At an opportune moment he would throw the little beasts down ladies' necks." And there is Merkouloff, the murderer, obsessed by the thought of man's defenceless- ness : " . . . prayer could not still my fear ; even during prayer I went on thinking : ' Dear God, why is it ? Here I can cause the death of any man at any moment, and any man can kill me at any moment he wants to ! ' " His friends advised him to take the cowl. " What should I want to take the cowl for ? " he says : " There are men in cloisters as well as outside them—and wherever there are men there is fear. I looked at people and thought : God help you Uncertain are your lives and you have no protection against me, just as I have none against you Just think, sir, how hard it was for me to live with such a weight on my heart." The book also contains brief but vivid glimpses of Tolstoi, Tchekov and others, and for vividness of descriptive writing it is difficult to recall anything equal to the chapter called " Fires." It tells of incendiaries, fire-worshippers, the strange, ecstatic effect of fire on human beings, of house-burnings and forest-fires. Most Wonderful of all, perhal5s, is the account of a forest-fire beyond the Volga, opposite Nijni Novgorod. Here is a passage from it :—
" At the roots of the trees merry little flames ran along like squirrels, flourishing their red tails, while a low blue smoke crept over the ground. One could see well how the playful fire climbed on to the bark of the trunks, twined itself around them, hiding away somewhere ; and then, behind it, the golden ants came crawling, while the green lichen became first grey, then black. Now the fire appeared again from somewhere and began to gnaw at the rusty grass and low shrubs, then hid again, and suddenly a whole crowd of quick red little beasts appeared scurrying and bustling among the roots."
It is tantalizing to have no introduction to the book. Was the book published as it stands in Russia, or is it a selection from published or unpublished works, and if so, by whom was the selection made ? It is a pity, too, that the name of the translator is not given, for the work, so far as I. can judge with no knowledge of the original, seems to be exceptionally
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