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^ g PROPERTY OF THB
7
Mms^
• e » 7
ARTES SCIENTIA VERITAS
Ih^
C^V^ /
• 3/3 21
POEMS
BY
ALEXANDER PUSHKIN
€vmilattb f»m t^e Stusftitt foiit Intcolitiction «nti Koi»
By IVAN PANIN
Attention Patron:
This volume is too fragile for any future repair.
Please handle with great care.
IJNIVEiSmr (X* MICHIGAN tIBRARy<X)NSERVA110N 4 1Ю(Ж n^
• 3/321
POEMS
BY
ALEXANDER PUSHKIN
€хшм\шиь from t^c Stwsftn, foiit Inicotittction sttH Kotrs
By IVAN PANIN
?
BOSTON
CUPPLES AND HURD
9i BoYLSTON Strbxt
1888
Copyright^ t888f
By Ivan Panin.
SnibffitUs фтмв:
John Wilsoh and Son, Cambrxdgb.
то
MRS. JOHN Ь GARDNER,
WHO WAS THB FIRST TO RBCOGNIZS HELPFULLY
WHATEVER MERIT THERE IS IN
THIS BOOK.
CONTENTS.
»
pacb
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL PREFACE 9
Introtmctfon.
I. PoBTic Ideal 15
II. Innbr Lipb a8
IIL Gbnbral Charactbristics 38
MoN Portrait 59
My Pbdigrbb 61
y' My Monumbmt 64
My Muss 66
My Demon 67
Regret 69
Reminiscence 70
^ Elegy 7a
Resurrection 73
^ The Prophet 74
NatrotCbe Hoems*
■~>^ The Outcast 79
The Black Shawl 83
The Roussalka 84
— The Cossak 87
The Drowned 90
Contents.
ЗЗоеп» of Nature.
pagr
тнж bxrdlbt 97
The Cloud 98
Thb North Wind 99
i^WlNTBR MORNINO lOO
ix^IHTBR EVBNING I03
j^Thb Wintbr-Road 104
фоепм ф€ ЛоЬе.
Thb Storm-Maid 109
Thb Bard , . . ixo
Spanish Lov^Song iit
LovB Ж13
Jbalousy 114
In an Album 116
Thb Awaking 117
Elbgy ЖХ9
First Lovb жж>
Elbgy uz
- Thb Burnt Lbttbx laa
"Sing not, Bbauty" Ж33
Signs 134
A Prbsbntimbnt 135
" In Vain, Dbar Frxbnd " ХЗ7
LoYB*s Dbbt жз8
-- iNVOCAnON Ж30
Elbgy 13a
Sorrow 133
Dbspaix 134
A Wish 135
Rbsignbd Lovb 136
Lovx and Frbbdom 137
: I
!)
Contents. 7
PACB
Not at All 138
Inspiring Lovs 139
Thb Gracbs 141
ftLtnulUntuvm фоепм.
Thb BntoLST 145
•« ThS NlGHTINGALB 146
«Thb Flowbrbt 147
Thb Hobsb 148
To A Babb 150
\УГнв Ровт 151
To thb Pobt 153
Thb Thrbb Springs 154
Thb Task 155
Slbbplbssnbss Ж56
qubstionings 157
Consolation 158
Fribndship 159
Famb 160
V'^HB Angbl • • 161
HoMB-sicxNBss i6a
Insanity 163
Dbath-TMoughts 165
Rights 167
Thb Gypsib» 168
Thb Dbubash 169
NOTES ,71
'»•
■♦w
Preface: Bibliographical. it
Literal : The moment wondrous I remember
Thou before me didst appear,
Like a flashing apparition,
Like a spirit of beauty ptire.
Metrical : ^ Yes I I remember well our meeting.
When first thou dawnedst on my sight.
Like some fair phantom past me fleeting.
Some nymph of purity and light
Observe, Pushkin the real does not appear before the
reader with a solemn affirmation. Yes, or No, nor that he
remembob it well. He tells the story in such a way that
the reader knows without being told that he does in-
deed remember it well I Nor does he weaken the effect
by saying that he remembers the meetings which is too
extended, but the moment^ which is concentrated. And
Pushkin's imagination was moreover too pure to let a
fleeting phantom dawn upon his sight. To have tried
for a rendering which necessitated from its very limita-
tions such falsities, would have been not only to libel poor
Pushkin, but also to give the reader poor poetry besides.
6. The translation being literal, I have been able to
retain even the punctuation of Pushkin, and especially his
dots, of which he makes such frequent use. They are part
of his art ; they express by what they withhold. I call espe-
cial attention to these, as Pushkin is as powerful in what
he indicates as in what he shows, in what he suggests
as in what he actually says. The finest example of the
highest poetry of his silence (indicated by his dots) is the
poem I have entitled " Jealousy," to which the reader is
particularly requested to turn with this commentary of
mine (p. 114 ). The poet is melted with tenderness at the
1 Blackwood's Magazine. IviiL 35, July, 1845.
12 Preface : Bibliographical.
thought of his beloved all alone, far4>ff, weeping. The
fiendish doubt suddenly overpowers him, that after all,
perhaps his beloved is at that moment not alone, weeping
for him, but in the arms of another : —
Alone ... to lips of none she is yielding
Her shoulders, nor moist lips, nor snow-white fingers.
None is worthy of her heavenly love.
Is it not so? Thou art alone. . . . Thouweepest. . . .
And I at peace ?
Butif
*
One must be all vibration in order to appreciate the
matchless power of the dots here. The poem here ends.
I know not the like of this in all literature.
7. Wherever I could ascertain the date of a poem, I have
placed it at the end. The reader will thus at a glance find
at least one of the proper relations of the poems to the
poet's souL For this purpose these two dates should be
borne constantly in mind: Pushkin was bom in 1799; he
died in 1S37.
8. To many of his poems Pushkin has given no name.
To such, for the reader's convenience I have supplied
names, but have put them in brackets, which accordingly
are to be taken as indication that the name they enclose is
not Pushkin's. Many of his most beautiful poems were
addressed to individuals, and they appear in the original
as " Lines to ." The gem of this collection, for in-
stance, to which I have supplied the title, <' Inspiring
Love " — inadequate enough, alas I — appears in the origi-
nal as ^^ To A. P. Kern." As none of these poems have
Preface : Bibliograpbical. i}
any intrinsic bood with the personages addressed, their
very greatness lying in their universality, I have supplied
«ay ovrn titles to such pieces, giving the original title in a-
note.
9. It was my original intention to make a life of the
poet part of this volume. But so varied was Pushkin's
life, and so instructive withal, that only an extended ac-
count could be of value. What is worth doing at all is-
worth doing well. A mere sketch would here, for various
reasons, be worse than useless. Critics, who always know
better what an author ought to do than he himself, must
kindly take this ass^ion of mine, for the present at least,
on trust, and assume that I, who have done some thinking
on the subject, am likely to know whereof I speak better
than those whose only claim to an opinion b that they have
done no thinking on the subject, resembling in this respect
our modest friends, the agnostics, who set themselves up
as the true, knowing solvers of the problems of life, be-
cause, forsooth, they know nothing. . . . Anyhow, even at
the risk of offending critics, I have decided to misstate my-
self by not giving the life of Pushkin rather than to mis-
state poor Pushkin by giving an attenuated, vapid thing,
which passes under the name of a ^^ Sketch." The world
judges a man by what is known of him, forgetting that
underneath the thin film of the known lies the immeasur-
able abyss of the unknown, and that the true explanation
of the man is found not in what is visible of him, but in
what is invisible of him. Unless, therefore, I could pre-
sent what is knovm of Pushkin in such a manner as to
suggest the unknown (just as a study of nature should
only help us to trust that what we do not know of God is
14 Priface: Bibliograpbical.
likewise good I) I have no business to tell of his life. But
to tell of it in such a way ^at it shall represent Pushkin,
and not misrepresent him, is possible only in an extended
life. Otherwise) I should be telling not how he was living,
but how he was starving, dying ; and this is not an edify-
ing task, either for the writer or for the reader.
10. Such a life is now well-nigh writ, but it is too long
to make part of this volume.
IntroDttttion : Critical
I. POETIC IDEAL.
I. Pushkin was emphatically a subjective
writer. 0£ intense sensibility, which isl!^
indispensable condition of creative genius, he
was first of all a feeler with an ЖоИал attach-
ment. He did not even have to take the trouble
of looking into his heart in order to write. So
full of feeling was his heart that at the slightest
vibration it poured itself out ; and so deep was
its feeling that what is poured out is already
melted, fused, shaped, and his poems come
forth, like Minerva from Jupiter's head, fully
armed. There is a perfection about them
which is self-attesting in its unstudie dness and
artless ness ; it js Jhe- perfection, of the child,
touching the hearts of its beholders all the
more tenderly because of its unconsciousness,
effortlessness ; it is the perfection which Jesus
had in mind when he uttered that sentence so
profound and so little followed because of its
1 6 Introduction : Critical.
very profundity : " Unless ye be like little chil-
dren.*' So calm and poiseful is Pushkin's poetry
that in spite of all his pathos his soul is a work
of architecture, — a piece of frozen music in
the highest sense. £ven through his bitterest
agony, — and pathos is the one chord which is
never absent from Pushkin's song, as it is ever
present in Chopin's strains, ay, as it ever must
be present in any soul that truly /ivesj — there
/ nmneth a peace, a simplicity which makes
the reader exclaim on reading him: Why, I
could have done the self-same thing myself, —
an observation which is made at the sight of
Raphael's Madonna, at the oratory of a Phil-
lips, at the reading of " The Vicar of Wakefield,"
at the acting of a Booth. Such art is of the
highest, and is reached only through one road :
.<;pnntan^^ ^y -^^«n plete abandonment of self,
'he verse I have to think over I 'had bettel
write. Man is to become only a pipe through
which the Spirit shall flow; and the Spirit хЛ<г//
flow only where the resistance is least. Ope
the door, and the god shall enter ! Seek not,
pray not 1 To pray is to will, and to will is to
obstruct. The virtue which Emerson praises
so highly in a pipe — that it is smooth and
hollow — is the very virtue which makes him
like Nature, an ever open, yet ever sealed book.
Introduction : Critical. ly
Bring to him your theories, your preconceived
notions, and Emerson, like the great soul of
which he is but a voice, becomes unintelligible,
confusing, chaotic. The words are there ; the
eyes see them. The dictionary is at hand, but
nought avails ; of understanding there is none
to be had. But once abandon will, once aban-
don self, once abandon opinion (a much harder
abandonment this than either!), and Emerson is
made of glass, just as when I abandon my logic,
God becomes transparent enough. . . . And
what is true of Emerson is true of every great
soul.
2. The highest art then is artlessness, un-
consciousness. The true artist is not the con-
ceiver, tne aesignei^ the executor, but the tool,
the recorder, the reporter. He writes because
write he must, just as he breathes because
breathe he must And here too. Nature^ a a v
elsewhere, hath indicated tfa e^true metEodZ )
The most vital proces ses of _life^are_aot th^
vol untary^ the conscious^Jbut th£ involuntary ,
the unCOnsci^^ The blood circulates, the
heart beats, the lungs fill, the nerves vibrate? .
we digest, we fall asleep, we are stirred with
love, with awe, with reverence, without our
will ; and our highest aspirations, our sweetest
memories, our cheerfullest hopes, and alas !
лЛ--
i8 Introduction : Critical.
also our bitterest self-reproaches, come ever
like friends at the feast, — uninvited. You can
be happy, blest at will ? Believe it not ! Hap-
piness, blessedness willed is not to be had in
the market at any quotation. It is not to be
got. It comes. And it comes when least
willed. He is truly rich who has nought left to
be deprived of, nought left to ask for, nought
left to will. . . .
3. Pushkin, therefore, was incapable of giv-
ing an account of his own poetry. Pushkin
could not have given a theory of a single poem'
of his, as Рое has given of his " Raven." Poe's
account of the birth of " The Raven " is indeed
most delightful reading. " I told you so," is
not so much the voice of conceit, of " I knew
better than thou ! " but the voice of the epicu-
rean in us ; it is ever a delight to most of us to
discover after the event that we knew it all
before. . . . Delightful, then, it is indeed, to
read Poe*s theory of his own " Raven ; " but its
most delightful part is that the theory is a
greater fiction than the poem itself. It is the
poem that has created the theory, not the
theory the poem. Neither could Pushkin do
what Schiller has done.- give a theory of a
drama of his own. The theory of Don Karlos
as developed in Schiller's letters on that play
Introduction : Critical. /9
are writ not by Friedrich Schiller the poet,
the darling of the German land, the inspirer of
the youth of all lands, but by Herr von Schiller
the professor; by Von Schiller the Kantian
metaphysician ; by Von Schiller the critic ; by
another Schiller, in short. Pushkin, however,
unlike most of us, was not half a dozen ances-
tors — God, beast, sage, fool — rolled into one,
each for a time claiming him as his own. Push-
kin was essentially a unit, one voice ; he was a
lyre, on which a something, not he — God! —
invisibly played.
4. And this he unconsciously to himself ex-
presses in the piece, " My Muse."
'^ From mom till night in oak's dumb shadow
To the strange maid's teaching intent I listened;
And with sparing reward me gladdening,
Tossing back her curls from her forehead dear,
From my hands the flute herself she took.
Now filled the wood was with breath divine
And the heart with holy enchantment fiUed.''
Before these lines Byelinsky, the great Russian
critic, stands awe-struck. And well he may;
for in the Russian such softness, smoothness,,
simplicity, harmony, and^ above 'all sincerity,
had not been seen before Pushkin's day. And
though in the translation everything except the
thought is lost, t too as I now read it over on
this blessed Sunday mom (and the bell calling
20 Introduction: Critical.
men unto the worship of the great God is still
ringing !X I too feel that even before this sun,
shorn of its beams though it be, I am still in
hallowed presence. For the spirit is inde-
pendent of tongue, independent of form ; to the
god-filled soul the leaf is no less beautiful than
the fiower. Discrimination, distinction, is only
a sign that we are still detached from the
whole ; that we are still only half; that we are
still not our own selves, — that we still, in
short, miss the blessed One. To the god-filled
soul the grain of sand is no less beautiful than
the diamond ; the spirit breaks through the
crust (and words and forms are, alas, only
this !), and recognizes what is its where'er it
finds it, under whate*er disguise. The bot-
anist prizes the weed as highly as the flower,
and with justice, because he seeks not the grat-
ification of the eye, but of the spirit. The eye
is delighted with variety, the spirit with unity.
And the botanist seeks the unity, the whole,
the godful in the plant. And a fine perception
it was, — that of Emerson : that a tree is__but a
rooted man, a horse a running man, a fish a
floating man, and a bird a flying man. Logical,
practical Supreme Court Justice, with one eye
in the back of his head, declares, indeed, such
utterance insane, and scornfully laughs, *4
Introduction : Critical . 21
don't read Emerson ; my garls do ! " ^ but the
self-same decade brings a Darwin or a Heckel
with his comparative embryos ; and at the sight
of these, not even a lawyer, be he even Chief
Justice of Supreme Court, can distinguish be-
tween snake, fowl, dog, and man.
5. In time, however, Pushkin does become
objective to himself, as дпу true soul that
is obliged to reflect must sooner or later ; and
God ever sees to it that the soul de obliged to
reflect if there be aught within. For it is the
essence of man's life that the soul struggle ; it
is the essence of growth that itpusk upward; it
is the essence of progress in walking that we
/alt forward. Life is a battle, — battle with the
powers of darkness ; battle with the diseases
of doubt, despair, self-will. And reflection is
the symptom that ^e disease is on the soul,
that the battle is to go on. _
6. Pushkin then does become in time, ob-
jective, and contemplates himself. Pushkin
the man inspects Pushkin the soul, and in the
poem, " My Monument," he gives his own esti-
mate of himself: —
^ A monument not hand-made I have for me erected ;
The path to it well-trodden, will not overgrow ;
Risen higher has it with unbending head
Than the monument of Alexander.
' Jeremiah Mason.
I
22 Introduction: Critical.
No ! not all of me shall die ! my soul in hallowed lyre
Shall my dust survive, and escape destruction —
And famous be I shall, as long as on earth sublunar
One bard at least living shall remain.
^^ My name will travel over the whole of Russia great
And there pronounce my name shall every living tongue :
And long to the nation I shall be dear.''
Observe here the native nobility of the man.
i There is a heroic consciousness of his own
\ worth which puts to shame all gabble of con-
ceit and of self-consciousness being a vice,
being immodest. Here too, Emerson sets fine
example in not hesitating to speak of his own
essays on Love and Friendship as '4hose fine
lyric strains," needing some balance by coarser
tones on Prudence and the like. This is the
same heroic consciousness of one's own worth
which makes a Socrates propose as true reward
for his services to the State, free entertainment
at the Prytaneum. This is the same manli-
ness which in a Napoleon rebukes the gen-
ealogy-monger who makes him descend from
Charlemagne, with the remark, " I am my own
pedigree." This, in fine, is the same manliness
which made Jesus declare boldly, "I am the
Way, I am the Life, I am the Light," regardless
of the danger that the " Jerusalem Advertiser "
and the " Zion Nation " might brand him as " de-
Introduction: Critical. 2)
liciously conceited." This recognition of one's
own worth is at bottom the highest reverence
before God ; inasmuch as I esteem myself, not
because of my body, which I have in common
with the brutes, but because of my spirit, which
I have in common with God; and wise men
have ever sung, on hearing their own merit ex-
tolled, Not unto us, not unto us ! There is no
merit in the matter ; the God is either there or
he is not. . . .
7, Pushkin, then, even with this in view, is
not so much a conscious will, as an unconscious
voice. He is not so much an individual singer,
as a strain from the music of the spheres ; and
he is a person, an original voice, only in so far
as he has hitched 'hfs wagon to a star. In
his abandonment is his greatness ; in his self-
destruction, his strength.
^^ The bidding of God, О Muse, obey.
Fear not insult, ask not crown :
Praise and blame take with indifference
And dispute not with the fool 1 "
** And dispute not with the fool 1 " The prophet
never argues ; it is for him only to affirm. Ar-
gument is at bottom only a lack of trust in my
own truth. Ciaesar's wife must be above sus-
picion; and to bear misunderstanding in si-
lence, — this is to be great. Hence the noblest
24 Introduction : Critical.
moment in Kepler's life was not when he dis-
covered the planet, but when he discovered
that if God could wait six thousand years for
the understanding by man of one of his starlets,
he surely could wait a few brief years for his
recognition by his fellow-men. God is the great
misunderstood, and he — never argues. In
living out my truth in silence, without argument
even though misunderstood, I not only show
my faith in it, but prove it by my very strength.
If I am understood, nothing more need be said ;
if I am not understood, nothing more can be
said. Pushkin, therefore, often weeps, sobs,
groans. He at times even searches, questions,
doubts, despairs ; but he never argues. Broad
is the back of Pegasus, and strong is his wing,
but neither his back nor his wings shall enable
him to float the rhyming arguer. No sooner
does the logician mount the heavenly steed
than its wings droop, and both rider and steed
quickly drop into the limbo of inanity. Mel-
ancholy, indeed, is the sight of a dandy dressed
for a party unexpectedly drenched by the
shower; sorrowful is the sight of statesman
turned politician before election ; and pitiful is
the spectacle of the manufacturing versifier, who
grinds out of himself his daily task of one hun-
dred lines, as the milkman squeezes out his
Introduction: Critical. 2^
daily can of milk from the cow. But most
pitiful of all, immeasurably pathetic to me,
is the sight of pettifogging logician forsaking
his hair-splitting world, and betaking himself to
somersaulting verse. To much the bard is in-
deed called, but surely not to that. . . .
8. To affirm then the bard is called, and
what in "My Monument" is but hinted, be-
comes clear, emphatic utterance in Pushkin's
"Sonnet to the Poet."
•
^^ Poet, not popular applause shalt thou prize 1
Of raptured praise shall pass the momentary noise ;
The fool's judgment thou shalt hear, and the cold тоЫз
laughter —
Calm stand, and firm be, and — sober t
" Thou art king : live alone. On the free road
Walk whither draws thee thy spirit free :
Ever the fruits of beloved thoughts ripening,
Never reward for noble deeds demanding.
" In thyself reward seek. Thine own highest court thou
art;
Severest judge, thine own works canst measure.
Art thou content, О fastidious craftsman ?
Content ? Then let the mob scold,
And spit upon the altar, where blazes thy fire.
Thy tripod in childlike playfulness let it shake."
But because the bard is called to affirm, to in-
spire, to serve, he is also called to be worn. To
become the beautiful image, the marble must
be lopped and cut; the vine to bear sweeter
2б Introduction : Critical.
fruit must be trimmed, and the soul must go
through a baptism of fire. . . . Growth, prog-
ress is thus ever the casting off of an old self,
~and Scheiden thut weh. Detachment hurts. A
new birth can take place only amid throes of
agony. Hence the following lines of Pushkin
on the poet: —
'^ ... No sooner the heavenly word
His keen ear hath reached,
Then up trembles the singer's soul
Like an awakened eagle.
'^ The world's pastimes now weary him
And mortals' gossip now he shuns.
Wild and stem rushes he
Of tumult full and sound
To the shores of desert wave
Into the wildly whispering wood."
9. This is as yet only discernment that the
bard must needs suffer ; by-and-by comes also
the fulfilment, the recognition of the wisdom of
the sorrow, and with it its joyful acceptance in
the poem of " The Prophet."
** And out he tore my sinful tongue
And ope he cut with sword my breast
And out he took my trembling heart
And a coal with gleaming blaze
Into the opened breast he shoved.
Introduction: Critical. 27
Like a corpse I lay in the desert.
And God^s Voice unto me called :
Arise, О prophet, and listen, and guide.
Be thou filled with my will
And going over land and sea
Fire with the word the hearts of men t "
" Be thou filled with my will ! " His ideal
began with abandonment of self-will ; it ended
with complete surrender of self-will. When we
have done all the thinking and planning and
weighing, and pride ourselves upon our wis-
dom, we are not yet wise. One more step re-
mains to be taken, without which we only may
avoid the wrong; with which, however, we
shall surely come upon the right. We must
still say, Teach us, Thou, to merge our will
in Thine. . . .
/
/
28 Introduction: Critical.
II. INNER LIFE. ^- ♦
10. I have already stated that Pushkin is a
subjective writer. The great feelers must ever
be thus, just as the great reasoners must ever
be objective, just as the great lookers can only
be objective. For the eye looks only on the
outward thing ; the reason looks only upon the
outward effect, the consequence ; but the heart
looks not only upon the thing, but upon its re-
flection upon self, •»— upon its moral relation, in
short. Hence the subjectivity of a Tolstoy, a
Byron, a Rousseau, a Jean Paul, a Goethe, who
does not become objective until he has ceased
to be a feeler, and becomes the comprehender,
the understander, the seer, the poised Goethe.
Marcus Aurelius, Pascal, Amiel, look into their
hearts and write ; and Carlyle and Ruskin,
even though the former use "Thou" instead
of " I," travel they never so far, still find their
old " I " smiling by their side. But the subjec-
tivity of Pushkin, unlike that of Walt Whitman,
is not only not intrusive, but it is even delight-
giving, — ^or it paints not the Pushkin that is
\
Introduction: Critical. 2g
different from all other men, but the Pushkin
that is in fellowship with all other men; he
therefore, in reporting himself, voices the very
experience of his fellows, who, though feeling
it d^ly, were yet unable to give it tongue.- It
is this which makes Pushkin the poet in its
original sense, — the maker, the sayer, the
oamer. And her^ip is his greafi^ss.— in ex-
£ressing^ no t what is his, in so far that it is dif-
fere nt from what is ot her men's, but what i s
bi§^%^^^f,it Js.Qthei; m^n's likewise. Herein
he is what makes him a man of gen ius. For
what does a genius do?
II. What is it that makes the water, when
spouting forth in a smooth stream from the
hose, such a power? What is it that makes
the beauty of the stem and curve of the body
of water, as it leaps out of the fountain ? It is
the same water which a few yards back we can
see flowing aimless in stream or pond. Yes,
but it is the concentration of the loose elements
into harmonious shape, whether for utility, as
in the case of the hose-spout, or for beauty,
as in the case of the fountain. Nought new is
added to the mass existing before. This is prt
cisely the case of genius. He adds nought to
what has gone before him. He merely arranges,
formulates. A vast unorganized mass of inr-
ЗО Introduction: Critical.
telligence, of aspiration, of feeling, becomes
diffused over mankind. Soon it seeks organ-
ization. The poet, the prophet, the seer, com-
eth, and lo, he becomes the magnet round
which all spiritual force of the time groups it-
self in visible shape, in formulated language.
12. Pushkin, then, is self4:entred ; but it is
the self that is not Pusbkin, but man. His mood
is others^ mood ; and in singing of his life, he
sings of the life of all men. The demoin be
sings of in the poem called " My Demon " is
not so much his demon alone as also yours,
mine, ours. It is his demon because it is all
men^s demon.
*' A certain evil spirit then
Began in secret me to visit.
Grievous were our meetings,
His smile, and his wonderful glance,
His speeches, these so stinging,
Cold poison poured into my soul.
Providence with slander
Inexhaustible he tempted ;
Of Beauty as a dream he spake
And inspiration he despised ;
Nor love, nor freedom trusted he,
On life with scorn he looked —
And nought in all nature
To bless he ever wished.'*
And this demon — "the Spirit of Denial, the
Spirit of Doubt" — of which he sings after-
•*■,;
Introduction: Critical. ji
wards so pathetically tormented him long. He
began with " Questionings : " —
" Useless gift, accidental gift,
Life, why art thou given me ?
Or, why by fate mysterious
To torture art thou doomed ?
" Who with hostile power me
Out has called from the nought ?
Who my soul with passion thrilled,
Who my spirit with doubt has filled? . . .*'
And he continues with " Sleeplessness : " —
'* I cannot sleep, I have no light ;
Darkness 'bout me, and sleep is slow ;
The beat monotonous alone
Near me of the clock is heard
Of the Fates the womanish babble,
Of sleeping night the trembling,
Of life the mice-like running-about, —
Why disturbing me art thou ?
What art thou, О tedious whisper ?
The reproaches, or the murmur
Of the day by me misspent ?
What from me wilt thou have ?
Art thou calling or prophesying ?
Thee I wish to understand.
Thy tongue obscure I study now."
13. And this demon gives him no rest,
even long after he had found the answer, —
that the meaning of Life is in Work, Solve
the problem of life? Live^ and you solve ri i •
it; and to live means to do. But that work ^^- ' V-''^
;
JO Poems : Autobiograpbical.
• REMINISCENCE.
IV. 96.
When noisy day to mortals quiet grows,
And upon the city's silent walls
Night's shadow half-transparent lies,
And Sleep, of daily toils reward, —
Then for me are dragging in the silence
Of wearying wakefulness the hours.
In the sloth of night more scorching bum
My heart's serpents' gnawing fangs ;
Boil my thoughts ; my soul with grief oppressed
Full of reveries sad is thronged.
Before me memory in silence
Its lengthy roll unfolds.
And with disgust my life I reading
Tremble I and curse it.
Bitterly I moan, and bitterly my tears I shed,
But wash away the lines of grief I cannot.
In laziness, in senseless feasts
In the craziness of ruinous license.
In thraldom, poverty, and homeless deserts
My wasted years there I behold.
Reminiscence. 7/
Of friends again I hear the treacherous greeting
Games amid of love and wine.
To the heart again insults brings
Irrepressible the cold world.
No joy for me, — and calmly before me
Of visions young two now rise :
Two tender shades, two angels me
Given by fate in the days of yore.
But both have wings and flaming swords,
And they watch — ... and both are vengeant,
And both to me speak with death tongue
Of Eternity's mysteries, and of the grave.
1828.
N
)4 Introduction: Critical.
prevented from contaminating with its corpse
the life of the future. And his regret is bitter
enough. In the first of the two poems, " Re-
gret" and "Reminiscence," the feeling again
is as yet only discernment ; but in the second,
the poison has already entered his soul, and
accordingly it no longer is a song, but a cry
of agony. . . .
At first it is is only —
'' But where are ye, О moments tender
Of young my hopes, of heartfelt peace ?
The former heat and grace of inspiration ?
Come again, О ye, of spring my years 1 '*
But later it becomes —
^* Before me memory in silence
Its lengthy roll unfolds,
And with disgust my life I reading
Tremble I and curse it.
Bitterly I moan, and bitterly my tears I shed
But wash away the lines of grief I cannot.
In laziness, in senseless feasts.
In the madness of ruinous license,
In thraldom, poverty, and homeless deserts
My wasted years there I behold. . . ."
17. Regret, in itself a disease, but only of
the intellect, soon changes into a more violent
disease: into a disease of the constitution,
which is fear, fear of insanity. In ordinary
minds such disease takes the form of fear for
Introduction : Critical. ^5
the future, of worry for existence ; in extraordi-
nary minds it takes more ghastly shapes, — dis-
trust of friends, and dread of the close embrace
of what is already stretching forth its claws
after the soul, — insanity.
Hence, —
^^ God grant I grow not insane :
No, better the stick and beggar's bag ;
No, better toil and hunger bear.
If crazy once,
A fright thou art like pestilence.
And locked up now shalt thou be.
" To a chain thee, fool, they '11 fasten
And through the gate, a circus beast.
Thee to nettle the people come.
*' And at night not hear shall I
Clear the voice of nightingale
Nor the forest's hollow sound,
'' But cries alone of companions mine
And the scolding guards of night
And a whizzing, of chains a ringing."
1 8. That thoughts of death should now be
his companions is only to be expected. But
here again his muse plainly sings itself out in
both stages, — the stage of discernment and
the stage of fulfilment. In the first of the two
poems, « Elegy " and " Death-Thoughts," he
only thinks of death ; in the second he already
longs for it.
5б Introduction : Critical.
In the first it is only —
** Mj wishes I have survived,
My ambition 1 have outgrown I
Left only is my smart,
The fruit of emptiness of heart.
" Under the storm of cruel Fate
Faded has my blooming crown I
Sad I live and lonely,
And wait : Is nigh my end ? "
But in the second it already becomes —
** Whether I roam along the noisy streets
Whether I enter the peopled temple,
Whether I sit by thoughtless youth,
Haunt my thoughts me everywhere.
** I say, Swiftly go the years by :
However great our number now,
Must all descend the eternal vaults,—
Already struck has some one's hour.
** Every year thus, every day
With death my thought I join
Of coming death the day
I seek among them to divine."
19. Pushkin died young ; that he would have
conquered his demon in time there is every
reason to believe, though the fact that he had
not yet conquered him at the age of thirty-eight
must show the tremendous force of bad blood,
and still worse circumstance, which combined
made the demon of Pushkin. But already he
shows signs of having seen the promised land.
Introduction : Critical. yj
In the three poems, "Resurrection," "The
Birdlet " (iv. 133), and " Consolation," the first
shows that he conquered his regret-disease ;
the second, that he already found m Love some
consolation for sorrow. And the third shows
that he already felt his way at least to some
peace, even though it be notytt/ai /Л in the fu-
ture, but only hope. For hope is not yet knowl-
edge ; it only trusts that, the future will be good.
Faith knows that the future must be good, be-
cause it is in the hands of God, the Good.
In the first it is —
** Thus my failings vanish too
From my wearied soul
And again within it visions rise
Of my early purer days."
In the second, —
** And now I too have consolation :
Wherefore murmur against my God
When at least to one living being
I could of freedom make a gift ? "
And in the last, —
^* In the future lives the heart :
Is the present sad indeed ?
'T is but a moment, all will pass. . . .''
This ts consoling utterance, but not yet of
the highest; and the loftiest spiritual song,
the song of the Psalmist, was not given unto
Pushkin to sing.
•«•д
}8 Introduction : CriticaL
III. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.
20. I have translated the poems of Pushkin
not so much because they are masterpieces in
the literature of Russia, as because I think the
English reading-public has much to learn from
him. English literature is already blessed with
masterpieces, which, if readers would only be
content to study them for the sake of what they
have to impart (not amuse with 1), would give
enough employment as well as amusement (or
all the time an ordinary reader can give to liter-
ature. So that merely for the sake of making
new beauty accessible to English readers, it is
hardly worth while to go out of English litera-
ture, and drag over from beyond the Atlantic
poor Pushkin as a new beast in a circus for
admiration. The craze for novelty has its place
in human nature but not as an end in itself. As
a literary method, it might be found commend-
able in a magazine editor, whose highest ambi-
tion is to follow the standard of a public even
he does not respect. It might be found com-
mendable in a gifted author to whom bread is
dearer than his genius, so that he is ready to
Introduction: Critical. jg
sacrifice the one to the other ; but an inexperi-
enced author, who has not yet learned wisdom
(or is it prudence merely ?) from the bitter lit-
erary disappointments which are surely in store
for every earnest, aspiring soul, — such an au-
thor, I say, — must not be expected to make mere
novelty his motive for serious work. Nay, the
conclusion at which Pascal arrived, at the age
of twenty-six, that there is really only one book
that to an earnest soul is sufficient for a life-
time to read, — namely, the Bible, — extravagant
though this sound, I am ready, after many years
of reflection on this saying of Pascal, to sub-
scribe to, even at an age when I have six years
of experience additional to his. ... To read
much, but not many books, is old wisdom, yet
ever new. A literary masterpiece is to be read,
not once, nor twice, nor thrice, but scores of
times. A literary masterpiece should, like
love,jgw^ dearerj5fithj5tercou|>e^ A literary
masterpiece should be read and re-read until
it has become part of our flesh and circulates
in our blood, until its purity, its loftiness, its
wisdom, utter itself in our every deed. It is
this devotion to one book that has made the
Puritans of such heroic mould; they fed on
one book until they talked and walked and
lived out their spiritual food. If any one think
40 Introduction: Critical*
this estimate of the influence of one great
book exaggerated, let him try to live for one
week in succession wholly in the spirit of the
one book that to him is the book (I will not
quarrel with him if it be Smiles instead of
St. Matthew, or Malthus's Essay on Population
instead of the Gospel of St. John, or even our
modem realistic Gospel of dirt), and let him
see what will come of it.
21. Shakespeare, Milton, Carlyle, Ruskin,
Emerson, Scott, Goldsmith, Irving, Johnson,
Addison, furnish a library which is really
enough for the life-time of any on e who takes_
life seriously^ and comes to these masters, not
as a conceited lord waiting for amusement, — as
a judge, in short, — but as a beggar, an humble
learner, hoping to carry away from them not
the tickle of pleasure, but the life-giving sus-
tenance. To make letters a source of amuse-
ment is but to dig for iron with a spade of gold.
Amusement is indeed often necessary, just as
roasting eggs is often necessary ; but who would
travel to a volcano for the sake of roasting his
eggs ? No, the masters in letters are not sent
to us for our amusement ; they are sent to us
to give the one answer to each of us, which at
the peril of our lives we must sooner or later
receive, — the answer to the question: How
Introduction: Critical. 41
shall we ?^YfjY ^f worthy nf thnt gparli frnm
'Heaven wHidi is given us in tr ust to keep
alive for the brief yrnra frHlffffn fjrrth ? Thr
great flgCsters, tfigB, affe the iri spirers ; and God
ever sees to it that there be enough Inspir-
ers, if men but see to it that there be enough
inspired.
22. But of the millions of the English-speak-
ing readers, who t04iay assimilates the mas-
terpieces of English literature ? Generations
come, and generations go. The classic writers
keep their reputation; but do they hold their
readers ? Do the readers hold to the masters ?
Not the masters sway the public taste, not the
writers of the first rank, not the giants; but
the pygmies, the minions, the men of the second,
fifth, twentieth rank. If any one think me ex-
travagant, let him cast a glance of his open
eyes at our monthly reviews and magazines,
both here and in England, especially those
whose circulation reaches into the hundreds of
thousands. . . .
23. Not, then, because additional master-
pieces are needed for rousing our degenerate
literary taste have I translated Pushkin. As
long as the literary editors (who, from the
very fact of once having the ear of the public,
become the stewards of the hungry) insist on
/
42 Introduction: Critical. ^
• ^
feeding it with the Roes and the Crawfords and
the Haggards and the Stevensons and the rest
of them, not only new masterpieces, but even
the old ones will remain unread. The Bible
lies on parlor table (if it ever get there !) un-
read ; Milton lies indeed beautifully bound, but
has to be dusted once a week; and Emerson
need not even be dusted, — he has not yet got
as far as to be the ornament of parlor table.
But I have translated Pushkin because I
believe that even the masters of English lit-
erature have defects which are part of the
English character ; and as such they must re-
appear in its literature. And it is against
these that Pushkin's poems o£Eer a healthy
remedy.
24. For the first characteristic of the Angl o-
Saxon race is that it is a race of talkers ; and
the destinies of the two most advanced nations
oFlhat race are to-day governed almost wholly
by m en whos e strength is neither in the head
I nor i n the will nor i n the heart, but in th e
tongue. But the talker cares only for the
V effect of the moment. With the great hereafter
he has but little to do ; hence he becomes, first
of all, a resounder, a thunderer, a sky-rockety
dazzler. And once that, the orator need not
even care whether he persuade or not; if he
Introduction : Critical. 4)
merely astound the ear, dazzle the eye, and over-
whelm the hearer himself for the moment, — if,
in short, he but produce an effec t, even if it
be not the effect desired, — it is well with him
in his own estimation. The orator thus soon
becomes the mere rhetorician. And this rhetor- 1 | 1
ical qualit y^ appealing as it does only to the
su perficial ijL jnan, and comings as Jt_dues_ only
from the surface of the man, is found nowhere
in such excess as in the poetry of the Anglo-
Saxon race. Ornament, metaphor, must be
had, and if it cann ot be had spontaneously
' from a f ervid imagination, which alone is the
legitimate producer of metaphor, recourse must
be had to manufactured sound. Hence th^re
is scarcely a sing le poet in the^ English tongtt<^
w hosestyle is not(^tlated > teйj^ fglooj m^t aphorV
this is true of the greatest as well as of the
least. The member of Parliament who smelt a
I - *" — — ■ — I
rat, a nd saw it brewi n g in the air until it was J n
danger of becoming an apple of discord to th e
honorable members of the House, could hay^
been born onl y on British soil . To take up
arms against a sea of trouble, and to discover
footprints in the sands of time while sailing
over life's solemn main (no less than five false
metaphors in this example from the Psalm of
Life !) are feats that can be accomplished by the
^
•si
44 Introduction : Critical.
imagination of even a Shakespeare or a Long-
fellow ,fiolfily bec ause these are Anglo-Saxon s,
And I am yet to see five consecutive pages of
any Anglo-Saxon poet free from this literary
vice of false metaphor! I call this a vice
because it is at bottom an insincerity of im-
agination. The false metaphors are not pic-
tures seen, ^but jBictures _ madfi^up ; they are
the spontaneous out bursts of an overflowv
ing ima^nation , but the "gFmlHa^urprodSct
of pictureless will for the sake of effect. And
this I do not hesitate to call literary insin-
cerity _ gven though the process oi making
them up be unconscious at the time to the
poet himself.
2C. Now it is Pushkin's great virtue that his
imagination 1бГ eminently j spontaneous. He
seldom uses adjfectiycg fHbut when he does use
them, he uses such only as do actually describe
something. He seldom uses similes or meta-
phors, — he prefers to sing of the subjects them-
selves, not of what they resemble ; but when he
does use them, the reader's imagination is able
to see the picture the poet had in mind, which
is not often true of the English bards. Exam-
ples for comparison are innumerable ; let a few
suffice. Turn to Pushkin's lines, "Regret."
He there regrets the days of his youth, but
Introduction: Critical. 45.
first tells by way of contrast what he does not
regret ; and his poem is simple, straightforward.
Byron, however, in his " Stanzas for Music/* of
which Canon Farrar thought well enough to
insert them in his " With the Poets," and Mr.
Palgrave thinks good enough to be admitted
into his " Treasury of English Poetry " finds it
necessary to preface it with something like
philosophical remarks, and then proceeds in
this fashion: —
'* Then the few whose spirits float above ihs wreck of
happiness
Are driven <Per the shoals of guilt or ocean of excess :
The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in
vain
The shore to which their shivered sail shall never
stretch again,
** Then the mortal coldness of the soul till death itself
comes down ;
It cannot feel for other's woes, it dare not dream its own.
Thai heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our
tears.
And though the eye may sparkle still, Ч is where the ice
appears.
*' Oh, could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been,
Or weep as I could once have wept o'er many a vanished
scene,
As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish
though they be,
So midst the withered waste of life, those tetrs would
flow to me."
4б Introduction : Critical.
One must go to Shakespeare's Sonnets for
poetry as false as this. Among writers with
the true poetic feeling, such as Byron truly had,
I know not the like of this except these. Of
these twelve lines only the first two of the last
stanza are true, are felt; the rest are made.
How are we, not Arabs but English-talking folk,
to know the springs which in deserts found seem
{do they?) sweet, brackish though they be?
And Byron was a poet! But even a Byron
cannot make a shivered sail or a coldness of
a soul which is mortal, or a chill that freezes
over a fountain of tears anything but mere ver-
biage, and verbiage moreover which instead
of the intended sadness is dangerously nigh
raising laughter. . . .
26. Again, take Longfellow's " Hymn to
Night : " —
^^ I heard the trailing garments of the night
Sweep through her marble halls 1
I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light
From the celestial walls.
From the cool cisterns of the midnight air,
My spirit drank repose."
For the like of this one can no longer go even
to Shakespeare's Sonnets. For Shakespeare
was still a poet. One must now go to Mrs.
Deland, who is not even that. For observe:
Introduction: Critical. 4у
Night has halls, and these halls are marble
halls; and this marble-hailed Night is unable
to stay at home, and must go forth, and accord-
ingly she does go in full dress with her gar-
ments trailing with a right gracious sweep. And
the bard not only sees the sable skirts which
dangle about in fringes made phosphorescent by
contact with the celestial walls of such pecu-
liar marble, but he even hears the rustle. . . .
And these halls with accommodating grace are
changed into cool, deep cisterns from which
accordingly the bard's spirit with due solemnity
draws into his spirit's wide-opened mouth a
draught of repose.
27. Turn from this "Hymn to Night" of
thirty lines to the three lines of Pushkin in his
"Reminiscence," which alone he devotes to
Night: —
^ When noisy day to mortals quiet grows,
And upon the city^ silent walls
Nights shadow half-transparent lies."
The marble halls and the trailing garments
were ground out from the writer's fingers ; the
half-transparent shadow of the poet came to
thej)oet. . . .
28. After such examples of wretchedness
from real giants such as Byron and Longfellow
indisputably are, I do not hesitate to ask the
4S Introduction: Critical.
reader for a last example to turn first to Push-
kin's " Cloud," and then read Shelley's poem
on the same subject : —
^^ I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams, [Just how are leaves thus
laid?]
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,
When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about in the sun»"
(Oh, good, my Shelley! one dances to and
fro; one cannot dance in a uniform, straight-
forward motion. Thy imagination never saw
THAT picture 1 Spin, whirl, rush, — yes, but
dance ?)
" That orbed maiden with white fire laden
Whom mortals call the Moon
Glides glimmering cPer my fieece4ike fioor,
By the midnight breezes strewn ;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet
Which only the angels hear
May have broken the woof of my tent's roof,
The stars peep behind her and peer."
Who has not been stirred by the sight of the
fleece-like, broken clouds on a moonlight night ?
But who on looking up to that noble arch over-
head at such a moment could see it as a
floor? . . .
29. I call this wretched poetry, even though
other critics vociferously declare Shelley's
Introduction: Critical.
49
" Cloud " to be one of the masterpieces of the
English language. De gustibus поп disputan-
dum. The Chinese have a liking, it is said,
for black teeth, and a bulb of a nose is consid-
ered a great beauty in some parts of Africa, and
a human leg is considered a great delicacy by
some Islanders ; but . . .
30. And the second characteristic of the
Anglo-Saxon race, which, however valuable it
may prove in practical life, is reflected disas-
trously in its poetry, is its incapacity to appre-
ciate true sentiment. An Anglo-Saxon knows
sentimentality when he sees it, he knows mor-
bidness when he sees it; but the healthy senti-
ment of which these are but the diseases he
is incapable of appreciating to a depth where
it would become part of his life. Hence, though
a Malthus might have written his Essay on
Population anywhere, since it is a truly cosmo-
politan book, a Malthusian doctrine with all
that it means and stands for could have grown
up only on British soil ; and though the warn-
ing voice against the dangers of sentimental
charity {if there really be such a thing, and if
such a thing, supposing it to exist, be really
dangerous!) might be lifted in any land, the
hard, frigid, almost brutal doctrine of scientific
-charity could strike root only in London, and
4
50 Introduction: Critical.
blossom out in full array only in a city like
Boston. The reader will please observe that I
do not here undertake to judge. Malthusian
doctrine, scientific charity, brutality of any
kind may be necessary, for aught I know. A
great many well-meaning and kind-hearted
people have in sober thought decided that it
often is necessary. I am only stating what
seems to me to be a fact. To me this is a most
melancholy fact ; to others it may be a joyful
fact. But whether joyful or melancholy, this
fact explains why so little sentiment is found
among the Anglo-Saxon poets even when they
feel their passions, and do not, as is usually the
case with them, reason about them, or what is
worse, compose far-fetched similes about them.
Glimpses of sentiment are of course found
now and then, but only now and then. It is
not often that Wordsworth sings in such pure
strains as that of the lines, —
"^ My heart leaps up when I behold
A Rainbow in the sky."
It is not often that Byron strikes a chord as
deep as that of the lines " In an Album : " —
'^ As o*er the cold, sepulchral stone,
Some name arrests the passer-by."
It is here, however, that Pushkin is unsur-
passed. One must go to Heine, one must go
Introduction: Critical. 5/
to Uhland, to Goethe, to find the like of him.
And what makes him master here is the fact
that his sentiment comes out pure, that it
comes forth fused. And it comes thus because
it comes from the depths ; and as such it must
find response even in an Anglo-Saxon heart,
provided it has not yet been eaten into by
Malthusian law and scientific charity. Push-
kin's sentiment extorts respect even where it
finds no longer any response ; and as the sight
of nobility stirs a healthy soul to noble deeds,
as the sight of beauty refines the eye, so the
presence of true sentiment can only awaken
whatever sentiment already sleeps within us.
It is for supplying this glaring defect in the
English poets that a reading of Pushkin be-
comes invaluable. I almost fear to quote or
compare. Sentiment cannot be argued about ;
like all else of the highest, deepest, like God,
like love, it must be felt. Wh^re it is under-
stood, nothing need be said; where it is not
understood, nothing can be said. . . .
31. And yet a single example I venture to
give. Pushkin's " Inspiring Love " and Words-
worth's "Phantom of Delight" treat of the
same theme. Pushkin sees his beloved again,
and after years —
52 Introduction: Critical.
^^ Enraptured beats again my heart,
And risen are for it again
Both reverence and Inspiration
And life, and tears, and love."
Wordsworth also gets now a nearer view of
his ^^ Phantom of Delight ; " and the sight rouses
him to this pitch of enthusiastic sentiment :
'^ And now I see with eye serene,
The very pulse of the mackimJ*
.In the presence of such bungling, I am almost
ashamed to call attention, not to the machine
that has a pulse, but to that noble woman
who, purified, clarified in the imagination by
the heat of a melted heart, can only become
to the poet, a — machine. And this is the
poet (whose very essence should be sensitive-
ness, delicacy, sentimenfi who is ranked by
Matthew Arnold as the greatest poet since
Shakespeare. . . .
32. I have given only one example, though
there is hardly a volume of English poetry,
with the possible exception of those of Bums,
which does not furnish dozens of examples.
If I give only one, it is because I have in mind
iEsop's lioness, who gave such smart reply
when chided for giving birth to only one
young.
.. • • •
Introduction: Critical. $j
33. There is, indeed, one poet in the Eng-
lish language whose pages throb with sentiment,
and who is moreover singularly free from that
literary vice which I have called insincerity
of imagination ; in purity of pictures, in simpli-
city of sentiment, Goldsmith is unsurpassed in
any tongue, but Goldsmith was not an Anglo-
Saxon. And even Macaulay's great praise of
" The Traveller " has not been sufficient to give
it a place of authority among readers. The
persons that read " The Traveller " once a year,
as such a possession for all times should be
read by rational readers, are very few.
34* From what I have designated as the
first characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon race — its
rhetorical quality — springs the second, which I
have designated as the superficiality of senti-
ment; since the rhetorician needs no depth,
and when he does need it, he needs it only for
the moment. And from this same rhetorical
quality springs the third characteristic of Eng-
lish writers which appears in literature as a
vice. I mean their comparative lack of the
sense of form, of measuredness, literary tem-
perance, — the want, in short, of the artistic
sense. For architectural proportion, with be-
ginning, middle, and end in proper relation,
English poets have but little respect, and it is
54 Introduction : Critical.
here that Pushkin is again master. It is the
essence of poetry, that which makes it noi-
prose^ that it is intense ; but intensity to pro-
duce its effect must be short-lived. Prolonged,
like a stimulant, it ceases to act. Hence, one
of the first laws of poetry is that the presenta-
tion of its scenes, emotions, episodes, be brief.
Against this law the sins in English literature
among its masters are innumerable. Take, for
instance, the manner in which Pushkin, on the
one hand, and English poets, on the other,
treat an object which has ever affected men
with poetic emotion.
35, Many are the English poets who have
tried their voices in singing of birds ; Words-
worth's lines to the Skylark, the Green Linnet,
the Cuckoo, Shelley's piece ."To a Skylark,"
Keats's " Ode to a Nightingale," Bryant's " Lines
to a Waterfowl," attest sufficiently the inspira-
tion which tender birdie hath for the soul of
man. Now read these in the light of Pushkin's
twenty lines called "The Birdlet." Bryant
alone, it seems to me, holds his own by the
side of Pushkin. Shelley and Keats are
lengthy to weariness ; and Wordsworth is
almost painfully tame. What thoughtlet or
emotionlet these are stirred with at the sight
of birdie is like a babe in the swaddling-clothes
Introduction: Critical. ^^
of fond, but inexperienced parents, suffocated ^
in its wrappage.
36. This measuredness Pushkin displays
best in his narrative poems. His story moves.
His " Delibash " is the finest example of rapidity
of execution combined with fidelity of skill.
And the vi vidness of his stories in " The
Drowned," "The Roussalka," and «The Cos-
sak," is due not so much to the dramatic talent
Pushkin doubtless possessed as to the sense of
proportion which saved him from loading his
narrative with needless detail. Gray*s " Elegy,"
for instance, matchless in its beauty, is marred
by the needless appendage of the youth him-
self. This part of the poem seems patched on,
Wordsworth's " Lucy Gray " seems to justify
Goldsmith's bold metaphor, — for it does drag
a lengthening chain at each remove. Long-
fellow's " Prelude " has like " Sartor Resar-
tus" a most unwieldy apparatus for getting
ready. The poet there is ever ready to say
something, but hardly says it even at the end.
And even Tennyson, who at one time did know
what it was to keep fine poise in such matters,
is frequently guilty of this merely getting ready
to say his say.
37, These, then, are the three great virtues
of Pushkin's poems : iThey have sincere imag-
ШгоЛШйт: Critical,
inatioii, whicb means pure taste; Ibey bave
true sentiment, wbicb means pare depth ; tbey
have tme measnre, which means pure art.
Pushkin has many тенге wtnes which are
common to aU great poets ; bat of these three
I thoQ|^t necessary to speak in detaiL
$ОШ0: ^uto&io0rapf)ical«
^'
Щтяг 9tttobio0ra})l|ical
MON PORTRAIT.
Vous me demandez mon portrait,
Mais peint d'apres nature :
Mon cher, il sera bient6t fait,
Quoique en miniature.
Je sais un jeune polisson
Encore dans les classes :
Point sot, je le dis sans fagon
£t sans fades grimaces.
One, il ne fut de babiUard,
Ni docteur de Sorbonne
Plus ennuyeux et plus braillard
Que moi-meme en personne.
^ See Preface, $ z.
бо Poems : Autobiographical.
Ma taille к celle des plus longs
Los n'est point egalee ;
J*ai le teint frais, les cheveux blonds,
£t la tete bouclee.
J'aime et le monde, et son fracas,
Je hais la solitude ;
J'abborre et noises et debats,
£t tant soit peu Tetude.
Spectacles, bab me plaisent fort,
£t d'apres ma pensee
Je dirais ce que j'aime encore,
Si je nMtais au lycee.
Apres cela, mon cher ami,
L'on peut me reconnoitre :
Oui 1 tel que le bon Dieu me fit,
Je veux toujours pariitre.
Vrai demon pour Pespieglerie,
Vrai singe par sa mine,
Beaucoup et trop d'etourderie, —
Ma foi — voilk Poushkine.
1814.
My Pedigree. 6r
•MY PEDIGREE.
IV. 66.
With scorning laughter at a fellow writer,
In a chorus the Russian scribes
With name of aristocrat me chide :
Just look, if please you . . . nonsense what !
Court Coachman not I, nor assessor,
Nor am I nobleman by cross ;
No academician, nor professor,
I 'm simply of Russia a citizen.
Well I know the times' corruption.
And, surely, not gainsay it shall I :
Our nobility but recent is :
The more recent it, the more noble 't is.
But of humbled races a chip.
And, God be thanked, not alone
Of ancient Lords am scion I ;
Citizen I am, a citizen !
Not in cakes my grandsire traded.
Not a prince was newly-baked he ;
Nor at church sang he in choir.
Nor polished he the boots of Tsar ;
б2 Poems : Autobiograpbiccd.
Was not escaped a soldier he
From the German powdered ranks ;
How then aristocrat am I to be ?
God be thanked, I am but a citizen.
My grandsire Radsha in warlike service
To Alexander Nefsky was attached.
The Crowned Wrathful, Fourth Ivan,
His descendants in his ire had spared.
About the Tsars the Pushkins moved ;
And more than one acquired renown,
When against the Poles battling was
Of Nizhny Novgorod the citizen plain.
When treason conquered was and falsehood,
And the rage of storm of war,
When the Romanoffs upon the throne
The nation called by its Chart —
We upon it laid our hands ;
The martyr's son then favored us ;
Time was, our race was prized,
But I ... am but a citizen obscure.
Our stubborn spirit us tricks has played ;
Most irrepressible of his race,
With Peter my sire could not get on ;
And for this was hung by him.
My Pedigree. 6)
Let his example a lesson be :
Not contradiction loves a ruler,
Not all can be Prince Dolgorukys,
Happy only is the simple citizen.
My grandfather, when the rebels rose
In the palace of Peterhof,
Like Munich, faithful he remained
To the fallen Peter Third ;
To honor came then the Orloffs,
But my sire into fortress, prison —
Quiet now was our stem race.
And I was born merely — citizen.
Beneath my crested seal
The roll of family charts I Ve kept ;
Not running after magnates new.
My pride of blood I have subdued ;
I 'm but an unknown singer
Simply Pushkin, not Moussin,
My strength is mine, not from court :
I am a writer, a citizen.
1830.
б4 Poems : Autobiographical.
' MY MONUMENT.
IV. аз.
A MONUMENT not hand-made I have for me
erected ;
The path to it well-trodden will not overgrow ;
Risen higher has it with unbending head
Than the monument of Alexander.
No! not all of me shall die! my soul in hal-
lowed lyre
Shall my dust survive, and escape destruction —
And famous be I shall, as long as on earth sub-
lunar
One bard at least living shall remain.
My name will travel over the whole of Russia
great,
And there pronounce my name shall every liv-
ing tongue :
The Slav's proud scion, and the Finn, and the
savage yet
Tungus, and the Calmuck, lover of the steppe.
My Monument. бу\
/ And long to the nation I shall be dear :
For rousing with my lyre its noble feelings,
For extolling freedom in a cruel age,
For calling mercy upon the fallen.
The bidding of God, О Muse, obey.
Fear not insult, ask not crown :
Praise and blame take with indifference
And dispute not with the fool !
August^ 1836.
66 Poems: Autobiograpbical.
^ MY MUSE.
IV. X.
In the days of my youth she was fond of me,
And the seven-stemmed flute she handed me.
To me with smile she listened; and already
gently
Along the openings echoing of the woods
Was playing I with fingers tender :
Both hymns solemn, god-inspired
And peaceful song of Phrygian shepherd.
From morn till night in oak's dumb shadow
To the strange maid's teaching intent I listened ;
And with sparing reward me gladdening
Tossing back her curls from her forehead dear,
From my hands the flute herself she took.
Now filled the wood was with breath divine
And the heart with holy enchantment filled.
X823.
My Demon. 6y
* MY DEMON.
IV. 107.
In those days when new to me were
Of existence all impressions : —
The maiden's glances, the forests' whisper,
The song of nightingale at night ;
When the sentiments elevated
Of Freedom, glory and of love,
And of art the inspiration
Stirred deeply so my blood : —
My hopeful hours and joyful
With melancholy sudden dark'ning
A certain evil spirit then
Began in secret me to visit.
Grievous were our meetings.
His smile, and his wonderful glance.
His speeches, these so stinging
Cold poison poured into my soul.
Providence with slander
Inexhaustible he tempted ;
Of Beauty as a dream he spake
And inspiration he despised ;
Щот» of %оЬе,
J$otm of %bbt*
■*o—
THE STORM-{MAID].
IV. 146.
Hast thou seen on the rock the maid,
In robe of white above the waves, *
When seething in the storm dark
Played the sea with Its shores, —
I
When the glare of lightning hourly
With rosy glimmer her lighted up.
And the wind beating and flapping
Struggled with her flying robe ?
Beautiful 's the sea in the storm dark.
Glorious is the sky even without its blue ;
But trust me : on the rock the maid
Excels both wave, and sky, and storm.
1825.
//о Poems of Loroe.
THE BARD.
III. 43.
Have ye heard in the woods the nightly voice
Of the bard of love, of the bard of his grief ?
When the fields in the morning hour were still.
The flute's sad sound and simple
Have ye heard ?
Have ye met in the desert darkness of the
forest
The bard of love, the bard of his grief ?
Was it a track of tears, was it a smile.
Or a quiet glance filled with melancholy.
Have ye met?"
Have ye sighed, listening to the calm voice
Of the bard of love, of the bard of grief?
When in the woods the youth ye saw
And met the glance of his dulled eyes,
Have ye sighed ?
1816.
Spatdsb Love-Song. iii
SPANISH LOVE-SONG.
IV. 136.
Evening Zephyr
Waves the ether.
Murmurs,
Rushes
The Guadalquivir.
Now the golden moon has risen,
Quiet, . . . Tshoo . . . guitar *s now heard. . . .
Now the Spanish girl young
0*er the balcony has leaned.
Evening Zephyr
Waves the ether.
Murmurs,
Rushes
The Guadalquivir.
r
Drop thy mantle, angel gentle,
And appear as fair as day !
Thro' the iron balustrade
Put thy wondrous tender foot !
112 Poems of Love.
Evening Zephyr
Waves the ether.
Murmurs,
Rushes
The Guadalquivir.
1824.
/
Love. I!)
[LOVE.]
IV. 152.
Bitterly groaning, jealous maid the youth was
scolding;
He, on her shoulder leaning, suddenly was in
slumber lost.
Silent forthwith is the maid; his light sleep
now fondles she
Now she smiles upon him, and is shedding
gentle tears.
8
у
114 Poems of Love.
[JEALOUSY.l
IV. 8s.
Damp day's light is quenched : damp night's
darkness
Stretches over the sky its leaden garment.
Like a ghost, from behind the pine wood
Foggy moon has risen. . . .
"All brings upon my soul darkness grievous.
Far, far away rises the shining moon,
There the earth is Шled with evening warmth
There the sea moveth with luxuriant wave
Under the heavens blue. . . .
Now is the time. On the hillside now she
walks
To the shore washed by noisy waves.
There, under the billowed cliffs
Alone she sits now melancholy. . . .
Alone . . . none before her weeping, grieves
not,
Her knees none kisses in ecstasy.
Alone ... to lips of none she is yielding
я
J
Jealousy. n^
Her shoulders, nor moist lips, nor snow-white
fingers.
None is worthy of her heavenly love.
Is it not so? Thou art alone. . . . Thou
And I at peace ?
But if
1823.
ii6 Poems of Love.
• IN AN ALBUM.
IV. 99.
The name of me, what is it to thee
Die it shall like the grievous sound
Of wave, playing on distant shore.
As sound of night in forest dark.
Upon the sheet of memory
Its traces dead leave it shall
Inscriptions-like of grave-yard
In some foreign tongue.
What is in it? Long ago forgotten
In tumultuous waves and fresh
To thy soul not give it shall
Pure memories and tender.
>
But on sad days, in calmness
Do pronounce it sadly ;
Say then : I do remember thee —
On earth one heart is where yet I live !
1829.
The Awaking. //7
' THE AWAKING.
III. 43.
Ye dreams, ye dreams,
Where is your sweetness ?
Where thou, where thou
joy of night ?
Disappeared has it,
The joyous dream ;
And solitary
In darkness deep
1 awaken.
Round my bed
Is silent night.
At once are cooled,
At once are fled,
All in a crowd
The dreams of Love —
Still with longing
The soul is filled
And grasps of sleep
The memory.
О Love, О Love,
О hear my prayer :
ji8 Poems of Love.
Again send me
Those visions thine,
And on the morrow
Raptured anew
Let me die
Without awaking I
1816.
)
Begy. iig
• ELEGY.
III. 39-
Happy who to himself confess
His passion dares without terror ;
Happy who in fate uncertain
By modest hope is fondled ;
Happy who by foggy moonbeams
Is led to midnight joyful
And with faithful key who gently
The door unlocks of his beloved.
But for me in sad my life
No joy there is of secret pleasure ;
Hope's early flower faded is,
By struggle withered is life's flower.
Youth away flies melancholy,
And droop with me life's roses ;
But by Love tho' long forgot,
Forget Love's tears I cannot.
1816.
i
120 Poems of Love.
^ [FIRST LOVE.]
I. 112.
Not at once our youth is faded,
Not at once our joys forsake us,
And happiness we unexpected
Yet embrace shall more than once ;
But ye, impressions never-d3ring
Of newly trepidating Love,
And thou, first flame of Intoxication,
Not flying back are coming ye !
Elegy. 121
' ELEGY.
III. 99-
Hushed I soon shall be. But if on sorrow^s
day
My songs to me with pensive play replied ;
But if the youths to me, in silence listening
At my love's long torture were marvelling ;
But if thou thyself, to tenderness yielding
Repeated in quiet my melancholy verses
And didst love my heart's passionate language ;
But if I am loved : — grant then, О dearest friend,
That my beautiful beloved's coveted name
Breathe life into my lyre's farewell.
When for aye embraced I am by sleep of Death,
Over my urn do with tenderness pronounce :
'* By me he loved was, to me he owed
Of his love and song his last inspiration."
1821.
122 Poems of Lome.
THE BURNT LETTER.
IV. 87.
Good-bye, love-letter, good-bye! 'Tis her
command. . . .
How long I waited, how long my hand
To the fire my joys to yield was loath I . . .
But eno', the hour has come: bum, letter of
my love I
I am ready : listens more my soul to nought.
Now the greedy flame thy sheets shall lick . . .
A minute ! . . . they crackle, they blaze ... a
light smoke
Curls and is lost with prayer mine.
Now the finger's faithful imprint losing
Bums the melted wax. ... О Heavens !
Done it is ! curled in are the dark sheets ;
Upon their ashes light the lines adored
Are gleaming. . . . My breast is heavy. Ashes
dear,
In my sorrowful lot but poor consolation.
Remain for aye with me on my weary
breast. . • •
1825.
Sing Not, Beauty. i2)
[SING NOT, BEAUTY.]
IV. us.
Sing not, Beauty, in my presence,
Of Transcaucasia sad the songs.
Of distant shore, another life.
The memory to me they bring.
Alas, alas, remind they do,
These cruel strains of thine,
Of steppes, and night, and of the moon
And of distant, poor maid's features.
The vision loved, tender, fated,
Forget can I, when thee I see
But when thou singest, then before me
Up again it rises.
Sing not. Beauty, in my presence
Of Transcaucasia sad the songs,
Of distant shore, another life
The memory to me they bring.
•to
1828.
124 Poems of Love.
SIGNS.
IV. 115.
To thee I rode : living dreams then
Behind me winding in pla3rful crowd ;
My sportive trot my shoulder over
The moon upon my right was chasing.
From thee I rode : other dreams now.
My loving soul now sad was,
And the moon at left my side
Companion mine now sad was.
To dreaming thus in quiet ever
Singers we are given over ;
Marks thus of superstition
SouPs feeling with are in accord 1
1829.
A Presentiment. /25
A PRESENTIMENT.
IV. 97.
The clouds again are o'er me,
Have gathered in the stilhiess ;
Again me with misfortune
Envious fate now threatens.
Will I keep my defiance ?
Will I bring against her
The firmness and patience
Of my youthful pride ?
Wearied by a stormy life
I await the storm fretless
Perhaps once more safe again
A harbor shall I find. . . .
•
But I feel the parting nigh,
Unavoidable, fearful hour.
To press thy hand for the last timfl|> ,
I haste to thee, my angel.
126 Poems of Love.
Angel gentle, angel calm,
Gently tell me : fare thee well.
Be thou grieved : thy tender gaze
Either drop or to me raise.
The memory of thee now shall
To my soul replace
The strength, the pride and the hope,
The daring of my former days I
1828.
i
In Vain, Dear Friend. i2y
[IN VAIN, DEAR FRIEND.]
III. a2i.
In vain, dear friend, to conceal I tried
The turmoil cold of my grieving soul ;
Now me thou knowest; goes by the intoxi-
cation.
And no longer thee I love. . . .
Vanished for aye the bewitching hours.
The beautiful time has passed.
Youthful desires extinguished are
And lifeless hope is in my heart. . . .
f *
%
128 Poems of Love.
[LOVE'S DEBT.]
IV. xoi.
For the shores of thy distant home
Thou hast forsaken the foreign land ;
In a memorable, sad hour
I before thee cried long.
Tho' cold my hands were growing
Thee back to hold they tried ;
And begged of thee my parting groan
The gnawing weariness not to break.
But from my bitter kisses thou
«
Thy lips away hast torn ;
From the land of exile dreary
Calling me to another land.
Thou saidst : on the day of meeting
Beneath a sky forever blue
Olives' shade beneath, love's kisses
Again, my friend, we shall unite.
9at where, alas ! the vaults of sky
Shining are with glimmer blue,
N
Lome's Debt. i2g
Where 'neath the rocks the waters slumber —
With last sleep art sleeping thou.
And beauty thine and sufferings
In the urnal grave have disappeared —
But the kiss of meeting is also gone. . . .
But still I wait : thou art my debtor ! . .. .
I JO Poems of Lorve.
INVOCATION.
III. 146.
Oh, if true it is that by night
When resting are the living
And from the sky the rays of moon
Along the stones of church-yard glide ;
O, if true it is that emptied then
Are the quiet graves,
I call thy shade, I wait my Lila
Come hither, come hither, my friend, to me !
Appear, О shade of my beloved
As thou before our parting wert :
Pale, cold, like a wintry day
Disfigured by thy struggle of death,
Come like unto a distant star.
Or like a fearful apparition,
'T is all the same : Come hither, come hither
And I call thee, not in order
To reproach him whose wickedness
My friend hath slain.
Imocation. i)i
Nor to fathom the grave's mysteries,
Nor because at times I 'm worn
With gnawing doubt . . . but I sadly
Wish to say that still I love thee,
That wholly thine I am: hither come, О
hither !
1828.
1^2 Poems of Love.
ELEGY.
IV. xoo.
The extinguished joy of crazy years
On me rests heavy, like dull debauch.
But of by-gone days the grief, like wine
In my soul the older, the stronger Ч grows.
Dark my path. Toil and pain promised are me
By the Future's roughened sea.
But not Death, О friends, I wish !
But life I wish : to think and suffer ;
Well I know, for me are joys in store
'Mid struggles, toils, and sorrows :
Yet 'gain at times shall harmony drink in
And tears I' 11 shed over Fancy's fruit, —
Yet mayhap at my saddened sunset
Love will beam with farewell and smile.
1830.
Sorrow. 13)
SORROW.
III. 69.
Ask not why with sad reflection
'Mid gayety I oft am darkened,
Why ever cheerless eyes I raise,
Why sweet life's dream not dear to me is ;
Ask not why with frigid soul
I joyous love no longer crave,
And longer none I call dear :
Who once has loved, not again can love ;
Who bliss has known, ne'er again shall know ;
For one brief moment to us 't is given :
Of youth, of joy, of tenderness
Is left alone the sadness.
1817.
134 Poems of Love.
DESPAIR.
III. 41.
Dear my friend, we are now parted,
My soul 's asleep ; I grieve in silence.
Gleams the day behind the mountain blue,
Or rises the night with moon autumnal, —
Still thee I seek, my far off friend.
Thee alone remember I everywhere,
Thee alone in restless sleep I see.
Pauses my mind, unwittingly thee I call ;
Listens mine ear, then thy voice I hear.
And thou my 1зпге, my despair dost share,
Of sick my soul companion thou !
Hollow is and sad the sound of thy string,
Griefs sound alone hast not forgot. . . .
Faithful Ijrre, with me grieve thou !
Let thine easy note and careless
Sing of love mine and despair.
And while listening to thy singing
May thoughtfully the maidens sigh !
18x6.
JL^
A Wisb. /^5
A WISH.
III. 38.
Slowly my days are dragging
And in my faded heart each moment doubles
All the sorrows of hopeless love
And heavy craze upsets me.
But I am silent. Heard not is my murmur.
Tears I shed . . . they are my consolation ;
My soul in sorrow steeped
Finds enjoyment bitter in them.
О flee, life's dream, thee not regret I !
In darkness vanish, empty vision I
Dear to me is of love my pain,
Let me die, but let me die still loving !
1816.
1)6 Poems of Love.
[RESIGNED LOVE.]
IV. 99.
Thee I loved ; not yet love perhaps is
In my heart entirely quenched
But trouble let it thee no more ;
Thee to grieve with nought I wish.
Silent, hopeless thee I loved,
By fear tormented, now by jealousy;
So sincere my love, so tender,
May God the like thee grant from another.
Uroe and Freedom. 137
[LOVE AND FREEDOM.]
III. 157.
Child of Nature and simple,
Thus to sing was wont I
Sweet the dream of freedom —
With tenderness my breast it filled.
But thee I see, thee I hear —
And now ? Weak become I.
With freedom lost forever
With all my heart I bondage prize.
1)8 Poems of Love.
[NOT AT ALL.]
IV. xi8.
I THOUGHT forgotten has the heart
Of suffering the easy art ;
Not again can be, said I
Not again what once has been.
Of Love the sorrows gone were,
Now calm were my airy dreams. . .
But behold ! again they tremble
Beauty^s mighty power before I . •
Inspiring Love. ijg
[INSPIRING LOVE.]
IV. 117.
The moment wondrous I remember
Thou before me didst appear
Like a flashing apparition,
Like a spirit of beauty pure.
'Mid sorrows of hopeless grief,
'Mid tumults of noiseful bustle,
Rang long to me thy tender voice,
Came dreams to me of thy lovely features.
Went by the years. The storm's rebellious
rush
The former dreams had scattered
And I forgot thy tender voice,
I forgot thy heavenly features.
In the desert, in prison's darkness.
Quietly my days were dragging ;
No reverence, nor inspiration.
Nor tears, nor life, nor love.
ti40 Poems of Love.
But at last awakes my soul :
And again didst thou appear :
Like a flashing apparition,
Like a spirit of beauty pure*
And enraptured beats my heart,
And risen are for it again
Both reverence, and inspiration
And life, and tears, and love.
1825.
Tbe Graus. 141
[THE GRACES.]
III. 160.
Till now no faith I had in Graces :
Seemed strange to me their triple sight;
Thee I see, and with faith am filled
Adoring now in one the three !
/
Щтя г {ШяаШхшт*
Щш»х iniecellaneeusf.
THE BIRDLET.
IV. X33.
In exile I sacredly observe
The custom of my fatherland :
I freedom to a birdlet give
On Spring's holiday serene.
And now I too have consolation :
Wherefore murmur against my God
When at least to one living being
I could of freedom make a gift ?
1823.
146 Poems : Miscellaneous.
THE NIGHTINGALE.
IV. 145.
In silent gardens, in the spring, in the darkness
of the night
Sings above the rose from the east the nightin-
gale;
But dear rose neither feeling has, nor listens it,
But under its lover's hymn waveth it and
slumbers.
Dost thou not sing thus to beauty cold ?
Reflect, О bard, whither art thou striding ?
She neither listens, nor the bard she feels.
Thou gazes t ? Bloom she does ; thou callest? —
Answer none she gives 1
1827.
The Floweret. 14У
THE FLOWERET.
IV. 95.
A FLOWERET, withered, odorless
In a book forgot I find ;
And already strange reflection
Cometh into my mind.
Bloomed, where ? when ? In what spring ?
And how long ago ? And plucked by whom ?
Was it by a strange hand ? Was it by a dear
hand?
And wherefore left thus here ?
Was it in memory of a tender meeting?
Was it in memory of a fated parting ?
Was it in memory of a lonely walk ?
In the peaceful fields or in the shady woods ?
Lives he still ? Lives she still ?
And where their nook this very day ?
Or are they too withered
Like unto this imknown floweret ?
1828.
148 Poems : Miscellaneous.
THE HORSE,
IV. 27X.
Why dost thou neigh, О spirited steed,
Why thy neck so low,
Why thy mane unshaken
Why thy bit not gnawed ?
Do I then not fondle thee ?
Thy grain to eat art thou not free?
Is not thy harness ornamented.
Is not thy rein of silk.
Is not thy shoe of silver.
Thy stirrup not of gold ?
*
The steed in sorrow answer gives :
Hence am I quiet
Because the distant tramp I hear.
The trumpet's blow and the arrow's whizz ;
And hence I neigh, since in the field
No longer feed I shall.
Nor in beauty live and fondling.
Neither shine with harness bright.
/
Tbe Horse. 149
For soon the stem enemy
My harness whole shall take
And the shoes of silver
Tear he shall from feet mine light.
Hence it is that grieves my spirit:
That in place of my chaprak
With thy skin shall cover he
My perspiring sides.
1833.
i^ Poems : Miscellaneous.
TO A BABE.
IV. 144.
Child, I dare not over thee
Pronounce a blessing;
Thou art of consolation a quiet angel
May then happy be thy lot . . •
Tbe Poet. i$i
THE POET.
(IV. aX
Ere the poet summoned is
To Apollo's holy sacrifice
In the world's empty cares
Engrossed is half-hearted he.
His holy lyre silent is
And cold sleep his soul locks in ;
And of the world's puny children,
Of all puniest perhaps is he. ^
Yet no sooner the heavenly word
His keen ear hath reached,
Than up trembles the singer's soul
Like unto an awakened eagle.
The world's pastimes him now weary
And mortals' gossip now he shuns
To the feet of popular idol
His lofty head bends not he.
I $2 Poems : Miscellaneous.
Wild and stem, rushes he,
Of tumxilt full and sound,
To the shores of desert wave.
Into the widely-whispering wood.
1827.
7
To the Poet. /5^
TO THE POET.
SONNET.
(IV. 9).
Poet, not popular applause shalt thou prize !
Of raptured praise shall pass the momentary
noise ;
The fool's judgment hear thou shalt, and the
cold mob's laughter —
Calm stand, and firm be, and — sober !
Thou art king: live alone. On the free road
Walk, whither draws thee thy spirit free :
Ever the fruits of beloved thoughts ripening,
Never reward for noble deeds demanding.
In thyself reward seek. Thine own highest
court thou art ;
Severest judge, thine own works canst measure.
Art thou content, О fastidious craftsman ?
Content ? Then let the mob scold.
And spit upon the altar, where blazes thy fire.
Thy tripod in childlike playfulness let it shake.
1830.
I $4 Poems : Miscellaneous.
THE THREE SPRINGS.
IV. 134.
In the world's desert, sombre and shoreless
Mysteriously three springs have broken thro* :
Of youth the sprmg, a boisterous spring and
rapid;
It boils, it runs, it sparkles, and it murmurs.
The Castalian Spring, with wave of inspiration
In the world's deserts its exiles waters ;
The last spring — the cold spring of f orgetful-
ness.
Of all sweetest, quench it does the heart's fire.
1827.
/
Tbe Task. i$^
THE TASK.
IV. X5X.
The longed-for moment here is. Ended is my
long-yeared task.
Why then sadness strange me troubles secretly ?
My task done, like needless hireling am I to
stand,
My wage in hand, to other task a stranger ?
Or my task regret I, of night companion silent
mine,
Gold Aurora's friend, the friend of my sacred
household gods?
1830.
1^6 Poems : Miscellaneous.
SLEEPLESSNESS.
IV. lox.
I CANNOT sleep, I have no light ;
Darkness 'bout me, and sleep is slow;
The beat monotonous alone
Near me of the clock is heard.
Of the Fates the womanish babble,
Of sleeping night the trembling,
Of life the mice-like running-about, —
Why disturbing me art thou ?
What art thou, О tedious whisper?
The reproaches, or the murmur
Of the day by me misspent ?
What from me wilt thou have ?
Art thou calling or prophesying ?
Thee I wish to understand.
Thy tongue obscure I study now.
1830.
I
Questionings. i^y
[QUESTIONINGS.]
IV. 98.
Useless gift, accidental gift,
Life, why given art thou me ?
Or, why by fate mysterious
To torture art thou doomed ?
Who with hostile power me
Out has called from the nought ?
Who my soul with passion thrilled.
Who my spirit with doubt has filled ?
Goal before me there is none,
My heart is hollow, vain my mind
And with sadness wearies me
Noisy life's monotony.
1828.
1^8 Poems : Miscellaneous.
[CONSOLATION.]
rV. X43.
Life, — does it disappoint thee ?
Grieve not, nor be angry thou !
In days of sorrow gentle be :
Come shall, believe, the joyful day.
In the future lives the heart :
Is the present sad indeed ?
'T is but a moment, all will pass ;
Once in the past, it shall be dear.
1825.
Friendship. 1 59
[FRIENDSHIP.]
III. 201.
Thus it ever was and ever will be,
Such of old is the world wide :
The learned are many, the sages few,
Acquaintance many, but not a friend !
i6o
Poems : Miscellaneous.
[FAME.]
III. X02.
Blessed who to himself has kept
His creation highest of the soul.
And from his fellows as from the graves
Expected not appreciation !
Blessed he who in silence sang
And the crown of fame not wearing,
By mob despised and forgotten,
Forsaken nameless has the world !
Deceiver greater than dreams of hope.
What is fame ? Thejadprer's whisper ?
1824.
The Angel. i6j
THE ANGEL.
IV. 108.
At the gates of Eden a tender angel
With drooping head was shining ;
A demon gloomy and rebellious
Over hell's abyss was flying.
The Spirit of Denial, the Spirit of Doubt
The Spirit of Purity espied;
And a tender warmth unwittingly
Now first to know it learned he.
Adieu, he spake, thee I saw :
Not in vain hast thou shone before me ;
Not all in the world have I hated,
Not all in the world have I scorned.
1827.
II
1б2 Poems : Miscellaneous.
[HOME-SICKNESS.]
III. X3X.
Mayhap not long am destined I
In exile peaceful to remain,
Of dear days of yore to sigb,
And rustic muse in quiet
With spirit calm to follow.
But even far, in foreign land.
In thought forever roam I shall
Around Trimountain mine :
By meadows, river, by its hills,
By garden, linden nigh the house.
Thus when darkens day the clear.
Alone from depths of grave,
Spirit home-longing
Into the native hall flies
To espy the loved ones with tender glance.
1825.
/
Insanity. i6)
[INSANITY.]
III. 149.
God grant I grow not insane :
No, better the stick and beggar's bag ;
No, better toil and hunger bear.
Not that I upon my reason
Such value place ; not that I
Would fain not lose it.
If freedom to me they would leave
How I would lasciviously
For the gloomy forest rush I
In hot delirium I would sing
And unconscious would remain
With ravings wondrous and chaotic.
And listen would I to the waves
And gaze I would full of bliss
Into the empty heavens.
!б4 Poems : Miscellaneous.
And free and strong then would I be
Like a storm the fields updigging,
Forest-trees uprooting.
But here 's the trouble : if crazy once,
A fright thou art like pestilence,
And locked up now shalt thou be.
To a chain thee, fool, they 11 fasten
And through the gate, a circus beast,
Thee to nettle the people come.
And at night not hear shall I
Clear the voice of nightingale
Nor the forest's hollow sound,
But cries alone of companions mine
And the scolding guards of night
And a whizzing, of chains a ringing.
1833.
/
Death Thoughts. i6^
[DEATH-THOUGHTS.]
IV. 93.
Whether I roam along the noisy streets
Whether I enter the peopled temple,
Whether I sit by thoughtless youth,
Haunt my thoughts me everywhere.
I say, Swiftly go the years by :
However great our number now,
Must all descend the eternal vaults, —
Already struck has some one's hour.
And if I gaze upon the lonely oak
I think : the patriarch of the woods
Will survive my passing age
As he survived my father's age.
And if a tender babe I fondle
Already I mutter. Fare thee well I
I yield my place to thee. For me
'T is time to decay, to bloom for thee
i66 Poems : Miscellaneous.
Every year thus, every day
With death my thought I join
Of coming death the day
I seek among them to divine.
Where will Fortune send me death ?
In battle ? In wanderings, or on the waves ?
Or shall the valley neighboring
Receive my chilled dust ?
But tho' the unfeeling body
Can everywhere alike decay,
Still I, my birthland nigh
Would have my body lie.
Let near the entrance to my grave
Cheerful youth be in play engaged,
And let indifferent creation
With beauty shine there eternally.
1839.
Rights. 167
[RIGHTS.]
IV. 10.
Not dear I prize high-sounding rights
By which is turned more head than one ;
Not murmur I that not granted the Gods to me
The blessed lot of discussing fates,
Of hindering kings from fighting one another ;
And little care I whether free the press is.
All this you see are words^ words, wards /
Other, better rights, dear to me are ;
Other, better freedom is my need. . . .
To depend on rulers, or the mob —
Is not all the same it ? God be with them !
To give account to none ; to thyself alone
To serve and please ; for power, for a livery
Nor soul, nor mind, nor neck to bend :
Now here, now there to roam in freedom
Nature's beauties divine admiring,
And before creations of art and inspiration
Melt silently in tender ecstasy —
This is bliss, these are rights I . . . •
1 68 Poems : Miscellaneous.
THE GYPSIES.
IV. 157.
Over the wooded banks,
In the hour of evening quiet,
Under the tents are song and bustle
And the fires are scattered.
Thee I greet, О happy race !
I recognize thy blazes,
I myself at other times
These tents would have followed.
With the early rays to-morrow
Shall disappear your freedom^s trace.
Go you will — but not with you
Longer go shall the bard of you.
He alas, the changing lodgings,
And the pranks of days of yore
Has forgot for rural comforts
And for the quiet of a home.
ты Delibash. 169
THE DELIBASH.
IV. 155.
Cross-firing behind the hills :
Both camps watch, theirs and ours ;
In front of Cossaks on the hill
Dashes 'long brave Delibash
О Delibash, not to the line come nigh,
Do have mercy on thy life ;
Quick 4 is over with thy frolic bold,
Pierced thou by the spear shalt be
Hey, Cossak, not to battle rush
The Delibash is swift as wind ;
Cut he will with crooked sabre
From thy shoulders thy fearless head.
They rush with yell : are hand to hand ;
And behold now what each befalls :
Already speared the Delibash is
Already headless the Cossak is !
V f
Kote8«
Wotee.
MY PEDIGREE. (Page 6i.)
These lines owe their origin to a public attack on Push-
kin by Bulgarin, a literary magnate of those days. Bui-
garin disliked Pushkin and, therefore, saw no merit in his
poetry. But imable to argue against his poetry, he argued
against Pushkin's person, and abused the poet for his
fondness to refer to his ancient ancestry. Stung to the
quick by a childish paragraph in Bulgarin's organ, " The
Northern Bee," Pushkin wrote these lines. But on their
publication which, I think, took place some time after they
were written, though they went into circulation imme-
diately, they made much bad blood. The Menshchikofs
did not like to be reminded of the cakes their ancestor
sold, nor the Rasumofskys of the fact that their countship
was earned by the good voice of the first of that name.
And the Kutaissoffs did not like to be told that Count
Kutaissoff was originally Paul's shoe-black. The very pride
in his ancestors, which made Pushkin ridiculous in the
eyes of his enemies, made him forget the fact that selling
cakes and blacking shoes, even though they be an em-
peror's, is by no means a thing to be ashamed of ; and
that, even if it were a thing to be ashamed of, the de-
scendants of evil-doers are by no means responsible for
the deeds of their ancestors. . . . The poem, therefore, is
an excellent document, not only for the history of the
nobility of Russia, but also for that of poor Pushkin's
soul.
174 Notes.
Nobleman by cross. There are two kinds of noblemen
in Russia : those who inherit their title, and those who ac-
quire it Whoever attains a certain cross as a reward for
his service under the government (not, alas, the cross of
true nobility, Christ's cross t) becomes thereby a ** noble-
man/'
Our nobility but recent is: the more recent it^ the nobler
4is. This was written fifty years ago, and thousands of
miles away from here. But one would almost believe these
lines written in our day, and at no great distance from Com-
monwealth Avenue, — so true is it that man remains, after
all, the same in all climes, at all times. . . .
Of Nithny Novgorod the citizen plain. The butcher
Minin is here meant, who, with Prince Pozharslcy, delivered
Moscow from the Poles just before the Romanoffs were
called to the throne.
We upon it laid our hands. Six Pushkins signed this
call, and two had to lay their hand to the paper, because
they could not write their own names.
Simply Pushkin^ тЛ Moussin, The Moussin-Push-
•kins of that day were a very rich and influential family.
MY MONUMENT. (Page 64.)
In its present form, this poem did not appear till 1881. ^
After Pushkin's death it appeared only when altered by
2niukofsky in several places. The Alexander Column
being the tallest monument in Russia, Pushkin, writing for
Russians, used that as an illustration ; but the govern-
ment could not let the sacrilege pass, — of a poefs monu-
ment ever being taller, even figuratively, than a Russian
emperor's. In 1837, therefore, the poet was made to say,
*' Napoleon's column." The line in the fourth stanza,
which speaks of Freedom, was altered to *^ That I was
useful by the living charm of verse," and in this mutilated
Notes. ly^
form this stanza is engraved on the poet's monument in
Moscow, unveiled in 1880.
MY MUSE. (Page 66.)
I originally passed over this poem as unworthy of trans-
lation, because I thought it not universal enough ; because
it seemed to me to express not the human heart, but the
individual heart, — Pushkin's heart. But the great Byelin-
sky taught me better. He quotes these lines as a marvel
of classic, of Greek art. " See," he exclaims, " the Hel-
lenic, the artistic manner (and this is saying the same
thing) in which Pushkin has told us of his call, h^^rd by
him even in the days of his youth. Yes, maugre the
happy attempts of Batushkof in this direction before
Pushkin's day, such verses had not been seen till Push-
kin in the Russian land I " And Byelinsky is right He
j»w. The great critic is thus an eye-opener, because he
sees his author, and because seeing him he cannot help
loving him. For if men truly knew one another (assuming
them to be unselfish), they would love one another. . . .
A hater is blind though he sees ; a lover sees though he be
blind. See, also, about this piece, Introduction, § 4.
MY DEMON. (Page 67.)
To this poem Pushkin added a note, which he intended
to send to the periodical press, as if it were the comment of
a third person. Referring to the report that the poet had
a friend of his in mind when he wrote this poem, and used
Rayefsky as a model, he says : " It seems to me those who
believe this report are in error ; at least, I see in ^ The
Demon' a higher aim, a moral aim. Perhaps the bard
wished to typify Doubt. In life's best period, the hearty
not as yet chilled by experience, is open to everything
beautifuL It then is trustful and tender. But by-and-by
iy6 Notes.
the eternal contradictions of reality give birth to doubt in
the heart ; this feeling is indeed agonizing, but it lasts not
long. ... It disappears, but it carries away with it our
best and poetic prejudices of the spirit." [Are they best,
if they are prejudices ? Is illusion truly poetic ? — L P.]
Not, therefore, in vain has Goethe the Great given the
name the Spirit of Denial to man's eternal enemy. And
Pushkin wished to typify the Spirit of Denial.
REGRET. (Page 69.)
See Introduction, §§ 16, 25.
THE BIRDLET. (Page 97.)
This piece is not found aa[юng Piuhkin's Lyrical Poems.
It is a song taken from a longer Narrative Poem, called
« The Gypsies.'»
LOVE. (P^genj.)
This poem is Pushkin all over. In four lines he has
given a whole drama with a world of pathos and tender-
ness in it. These four lines give more instruction in the
art of story-telling than volumes on the " Art of Action."
A magazine writer, who of the same incidents would have
woven out some twenty pages (of which no fewer than
nineteen and three-quarters would have been writ for the
approval of check-book critic, rather than of the art critic),
would have really told less than Pushkin has here told, —
so true is the preacher's criticism on his own sermon:
" Madame, if it had been shorter by half, it would have
been twice as long i "
JEALOUSY. (Page 114.)
Of this piece I have already spdcen in the Ргебюе, § 7.
^
Notes. 177
IN AN ALBUM. (Page 116.)
This is an excellent example of Pushkin's sentimsntf of
which I spoke in the Introduction, Chapter III. It is all
the more entitled to the consideration of Anglo-Saxon a
priori sentimenthaters (it is so easy to keep to a priori
judgments, they are so convenient ; they save discussion I)
because Pushkin wrote this piece when fully matured, at
the age of thirty, when his severe classic taste was already
formed.
HRST LOVE. (Page 120.)
These lines are taken from the Narrative Poem, ^ The
Prisoner of the Caucasus."
SIGNS. (Page 124.)
Of the more-than-Egyptian number of plagues with which
poor Pushkin's soul was afflicted, superstition was one. He
believed in signs, and sometimes gave up a journey when
a hare ran across his road. Owing to this superstition
he once gave up a trip to St. Petersburg, which probably
would have cost him his life, had he made it. For on hear-
ing of the December rebellion, in which many of his friends
took part, he started for the capital, but the hare. . . .
ELEGY. (Page 132.)
The fourth volume of Pushkin's Works, in which this
poem was first published, struck Byelinsky with the pov-
erty of its contents. " But in the fourth volume of Push-
kin's Poems," says he, " there is one precious pearl which
reminds us of the song of yore, of the bard of yore. It
is the elegy, ' The extinguished joy of crazy years.' Yes t
12
1
ij8 Notes.
such an elegy can redeem not only a few tales, but even
the entire volume of poetry t " . . . (Byelinsky's Works,
ii. 194.)
LOVE AND FREEDOM. (Page 137.)
In the original this poem is called, ^^ To Countess N. V.
Kotshubey."
INSPIRING LOVE. (Page 139.)
In the original this piece is headed, " To A. P. Kern."
THE GRACES. (Page 141.)
Addressed to Princess S. A. Urussov.
TO THE POET. (Page 153.)
This is the only poem Turgenef quotes in his speech at
the imveiling of the Pushkin monument in 1880. <* Of
course/' he said« " you all know it, but I cannot withstand
the temptation to adorn my slim, meagre ртову speech
with this poetic gold."
THE TASK. (Page 155.)
Byelinsky, who has taught me to appreciate much in
Pushkin which I otherwise would not have appreciated,
speaks of this little piece as ** especially excellent " among
Pushkin's anthological poems, written in hexameter, and
says, that a breath antique blows from them. Well, I
cannot agree with Byelinsky. There is, doubtless, a se»-
timentlet in the piece, — a germ ; but it is only a germ,
incomplete, immature. I would not have translated it
(since its beauty, whatever that be, it owes entirely to its
form, which is untranslatable), but for the sake of the
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