Liza; Or, "A Nest of Nobles". Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

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СКАЧАТЬ of the figures whom he introduces upon his canvas, the nature of the scenes among which they move—he has other and even higher claims than these to the respect and admiration of Russian readers. For he is a thoroughly conscientious worker; one who, amid all his dealings with fiction, has never swerved from his regard for what is real and true; one to whom his own country and his own people are very dear, but who has neither timidly bowed to the prejudices of his countrymen, nor obstinately shut his eyes to their faults.

      [Footnote A: Notwithstanding the unencouraging opinion expressed by Mr. Ralston in this preface, of the probable fate of "Fathers and Children," and "Smoke," with the English public, both have been translated in America and have met with very fair success. Of course, even more may be hoped for the author's other works.]

      His first prose work, the "Notes of a Sportsman" (Zapiski Okhotnika), a collection of sketches of country life, made a deep and lasting impression upon the minds of the educated classes in Russia, so vigorous were its attacks upon the vices of that system of slavery which was then prevalent. Those attacks had all the more weight, inasmuch as the book was by no means exclusively devoted to them. It dealt with many other subjects connected with provincial life; and the humor and the pathos and the picturesqueness with which they were treated would of themselves have been sufficient to commend it to the very favorable attention of his countrymen. But the sad pictures he drew in it, occasionally and almost as it were accidentally, of the wretched position occupied by the great masses of the people, then groaning under the weight of that yoke which has since been removed, stirred the heart of Russian society with a thrill of generous horror and sympathy; and the effect thus produced was all the more permanent inasmuch as it was attained by thoroughly legitimate means. Far from exaggerating the ills of which he wrote, or describing them in sensational and declamatory language, he treated them in a style that sometimes seemed almost cold in its reticence and freedom from passion. The various sketches of which the volume was composed appeared at intervals in a Russian magazine, called the Contemporary (Sovremennik), about three-and-twenty years ago, and were read in it with avidity; but when the first edition of the collected work was exhausted, the censors refused to grant permission to the author to print a second, and so for many years the complete book was not to be obtained in Russia without great difficulty. Now that the good fight of emancipation has been fought, and the victory—thanks to the present Emperor—has been won, M. Turgénieff has every reason for looking back with pride upon that phase of the struggle; and his countrymen may well have a feeling of regard, as well as of respect, for him—the upper-classes as for one who has helped them to recognize their duty; the lower, as for a very generous supporter in their time of trouble.

      M. Turgénieff has written a great number of very charming short stories, most of them having reference to Russia and Russian life; for though he has lived in Germany for many years, his thoughts, whenever he takes up his pen, almost always seem to go back to his native land. Besides these, as well as a number of critical essays, plays, and poems, he has brought out several novels, or rather novelettes, for none of them have attained to three-volume dimensions. Of these, the most remarkable are the one I have now translated, which appeared about eleven years ago, and the two somewhat polemical stories, called "Fathers and Children" (Otsui i Dyeti) and "Smoke" (Duim). The first of the three I may leave to speak for itself, merely adding that I trust that—although it appears under all the disadvantages by which even the most conscientious of translations must always be attended—it may be looked upon by English readers with somewhat of the admiration which I have long felt for the original, on account of the artistic finish of its execution, the purity of its tone, and the delicacy and the nobleness of the sentiment by which it is pervaded.

      The story of "Fathers and Children" conveys a vigorous and excessively clever description of the change that has taken place of late years in the thoughts and feelings of the educated classes of Russian society One of the most interesting chapters in "Liza"—one which may be skipped by readers who care for nothing but incident in a story—describes a conversation which takes place between the hero and one of his old college friends. The sketch of the disinterested student, who has retained in mature life all the enthusiasm of his college days, is excellent, and is drawn in a very kindly spirit. But in "Fathers and Children" an exaggeration of this character is introduced, serving as a somewhat scare-crow-like embodiment of the excessively hard thoughts and very irreverent speculations in which the younger thinkers of the new school indulge. This character is developed in the story into dimensions which must be styled inordinate if considered from a purely artistic point of view; but the story ought not to be so regarded. Unfortunately for its proper appreciation among us, it cannot be judged aright, except by readers who possess a thorough knowledge of what was going on in Russia a few years ago, and who take a keen and lively interest in the subjects which were then being discussed there. To all others, many of its chapters will seem too unintelligible and wearisome, both linked together into interesting unity by the slender thread of its story, beautiful as many of its isolated passages are. The same objection may be made to "Smoke." Great spaces in that work are devoted to caricatures of certain persons and opinions of note in Russia, but utterly unknown in England—pictures which either delight or irritate the author's countrymen, according to the tendency of their social and political speculations, but which are as meaningless to the untutored English eye as a collection of "H.B."'s drawings would be to a Russian who had never studied English politics. Consequently neither of these stories is likely ever to be fully appreciated among us[A].

      [Footnote A: A detailed account of both of these stories, as well as of several other works by M. Turgénieff, will be found in the number of the North British Review for March, 1869.]

      The last novelette which M. Turgénieff has published, "The Unfortunate One" (Neschastnaya) is free from the drawbacks by which, as far as English readers are concerned, "Fathers and Children" and "Smoke," are attended; but it is exceedingly sad and painful. It is said to be founded on a true story, a fact which may account for an intensity of gloom in its coloring, the darkness of which would otherwise seem almost unartistically overcharged.

      Several of M. Turgénieff's works have already been translated into English. The "Notes of a Sportsman" appeared about fourteen years ago, under the title of "Russian Life in the Interior[A];" but, unfortunately, the French translation from which they were (with all due acknowledgment) rendered, was one which had been so "cooked" for the Parisian market, that M. Turgénieff himself felt bound to protest against it vigorously. It is the more unfortunate inasmuch as an admirable French translation of the work was afterwards made by M. Delaveau[B].

      [Footnote A: "Russian Life in the Interior." Edited by J.D.

       Meiklejohn. Black, Edinburg, 1855.]

      [Footnote B: "Récits d'un Chasseur." Traduits par H. Delavea, Paris, 1858.]

      Still more vigorously had M. Turgénieff to protest against an English translation of "Smoke," which appeared a few months ago.

      The story of "Fathers and Children" has also appeared in English[A]; but as the translation was published on the other side of the Atlantic, it has as yet served but little to make M. Turgénieff's name known among us.

      [Footnote A: "Fathers and Sons." Translated from the Russian by Eugene

       Schuyler. New York 1867.]

      The French and German translations of M. Turgénieff's works are excellent. From the French versions of M. Delaveau, M. Xavier Marmier, M. Prosper Mérimée, M. Viardot, and several others, a very good idea may be formed by the general reader of M. Turgénieffs merits. For my own part, I wish cordially to thank the French and the German translators of the Dvoryanskoe Gnyezdo for the assistance their versions rendered me while I was preparing the present translation of that story. The German version, by M. Paul Fuchs,[A] is wonderfully literal. The French version, by Count Sollogub and M.A. de Calonne, which originally appeared in the Revue Contemporaine, without being quite so close, is also very good indeed.[B]

      [Footnote СКАЧАТЬ