Although musical performances occur at every major turning point o f the novel, we shall focus only on one. It is the rare moment o f inspiration, when Lemm is playing his own composition while, during the same hour, Lavretskij experiences the ultimate moment o f happiness, assured that his beloved Liza w ill be his. If this moment is the culmination o f love and happiness, and if Lemm's melodious music is the reflection o f Liza's and Lavretskij's feelings, then Turgenev's poetic description o f the power o f music and its emotional impact must be seen as a glorification, as a triumph o f good music. One is reminded her o f V. F. Odoevskij's novellas about music (*Beethoven's Last Quartet,* 1831 and *Sebastian Bach,* 1834) in which not the composers but the music emerges as the hero.

Here is what the elated Lavretskij could hear as he approached Lemm's house half an hour after having been reassured o f Liza's love:

Suddenly ... he heard a stream o f marvellous, triumphant sound ... the sounds pealed out still more magnificently; they poured forth in a powerful flood o f melody — and he thought that all this happiness spoke and sang in them.... As Lavretskij entered the room the old man said in poor Russian: "Sit and hear" — he himself sat down at the piano, threw a stem, proud glance all around and began to play. It was long since Lavretskij had heard anything like this: the sweet, sensual melody took the heart captive from the first note; it was radiant and languorous with the inspiration o f happiness and beauty; it swelled up and died away; it touched on all that is dear, mysterious and sacred on earth; it evoked immortal sadness and it died away among the stars. Lavretskij rose and stood cold and pale with rapture. This music pierced his very soul, so recently shaken with the happiness o f love; the music, too, was singing o f love.41

Consenting to Lavretskij's request, Lemm "played his wonderful composition once more." However, he did not respond to Lavretskij's embrace, in fact, he pushed him away with his elbow and "for a long time without moving a muscle, he sat with the same fixed, stem, almost harsh gaze." In reply to Lavretskij's fervent praise, "he first smiled a little and then burst into tears, feebly whimpering like a child."

The passage cited above is traditionally interpreted as a hymn to life and love. Indeed, Turgenev tells us this through Lavretskij's perception of the beauty o f music; being in love, he believed music was singing o f his love and happiness and in this sense it parallelled his feelings. This and similar comments are to be found in most studies on this novel.

But what was a hymn to love and happiness for Lavretskij, was for Lemm, the composer, an expression o f his miserable, tragic existence as a musician. It is a lament over his wasted talent, o f what might have been under different circumstances. O f his own composition, he says to Lavretskij: "I did this, for I am a great musician." But such moments o f inspiration were a rarity and this one was, apparently, the last one. Lemm's composition was, o f course, an expression o f love, but it is also a lament for a lost love, a cry for love. Although advanced in age, he is not indifferent to Liza, his only source of inspiration. And now he w ill be deprived even o f that. A ll this is skilfully interwoven into Turgenev's description o f Lemm's music. After playing his composition he sat there for a long time in silence. What was going on in his mind? Lavretskij embraced him -he responded by pushing him away with his elbow. Why? In reply to Lavretskij's praise he smiled and then burst into tears. Because he was so enraptured with his own music? And finally Lemm spoke and said to Lavretskij: "It is wonderful ... that you came just at this moment," adding "but I know, I know everything." And when Lavretskij was astonished at this, Lemm retorted: "You heard me ... and surely you must have understood that I know everything." What Lemm knew was that the two loved each other.  How else would he break down and "whimper like a child"?

Thus, whatever else this musical passage may reflect, it is also Turgenev's most passionate and dramatic presentation.  Turgenev simply answered in his modest manner: "Everyone does what he can.... But why should we talk about this. Let us talk

about Pushkin. Here there was a real great man ... but I did what I could.... What is there is there."42 And what was there was, indeed, not a verbal account o f dramatic, passionate scenes, but music, music which Turgenev skilfully employed whenever he desired a dramatic scene. Nowhere is this more vividly demonstrated than in the *Song o f Triumphant Love* where the powerful passionate melody of a love song overwhelms the listeners and ultimately leads to tragic violence. Turgenev's attempt to employ music to create a specific emotional atmosphere and, in particular, a dramatic situation resembles the use of music in a musical drama. We are reminded here o f the composer and music critic A. N. Serov who said: "What a great device is the musical sound in creating or emphasizing a dramatic impression. W ith its mysterious power music inspires the soul and reveals its feelings and mood in such a manner that neither words nor any depiction can express it. Music gives birth to ... poetic thoughts hitherto unknown."43

In resorting to music to express extreme emotions, both sorrow and exaltation, and to amplify his vert>al accounts o f the psychological disposition o f his characters, Turgenev remained loyal to his aesthetic norms which rested in hints and suggestion and most o f all in freedom. Moreover, he was able to employ his favourite art form not only as a literary device, as an art of suggestion, but also to present music as the ennobling factor in the education of humanity. Lastly, if literature is for Turgenev the domain o f imagination, and if the elements o f fantasy which the poet is to create do not need exact and detailed descriptions,44 then music provides the ultimate device in achieving this goal.  Man in his fleeting existence "must live in the moment and for the moment. "45

#### NOTES

1. The most comprehensive study on the topic of Turgenev and music was written by A. K. Kijukov, *Turgenev i muzyka* (Leningrad, 1963), 136 pp. Others are: M. P. Alekseev, *Turgenev i muzyka* (Kiev, 1918), 22 pp; B. V. Asaf ev, "Turgenev i muzyka," *lzbrannye trudy* (Moskva, 1955), IV , 157-58; N. D. Bemstejn, *I. S. Turgenev i muzyka* (Leningrad, 1933), 16 pp; "I.S. Turgenev — muzykal'nyj dramaturg," in: I. S. T ., *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij*

*i pisem v tridtsati tomakh*, 12 (Moskva, 1986), 583-632; See also numerous smaller articles in *Bibliogrāfijā literatury о 1. S. Turgeneve* (1918-1967) (Leningrad, 1970) under the topic "Turgenev i muzyka," p. 188. Compare also M . Ledkovsky, *The Other Turgenev: From Romanticism to Symbolism* (Würzburg, 1973), pp. 46-52.

2. Turgenev characterized the attributes o f his own voice when he describes how he was deprived o f music while confined to Spasskoe in 1853 and how occasionally playing by Mme Tjutcheva provoked him to both directing and singing: "During moments o f enthusiasm I cannot control myself, and under the pretext o f singing I exert a kind o f sound full o f horror and falsity, which produces a nervous convulsion in all o f those present. " One might add here, also, that in spite o f his musical inability, Turgenev dared even to compose several songs, one o f which he presented to Pauline Viardot with the following comments: "How much labour I have put into this, how much sweat ... cannot be described. The m otif I have found rather quickly.... W ith great difficulties I had to gather all my musical knowledge.... My head aches from all this.... Is it really that difficult to compose music." For details see: I. S. Turgenev, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij i pisem v dvadtsati tomakh* (Moskva-Leningrad, 1960-1968), *Pis'ma,* II, 155, 324.

3. G. A. Bjalyj and A. B. Muratov, *Turgenev i Peterburg* (Leningrad, 1970), pp. 68-70.

*A. I. S. Turgenev v vospominanijakh sovremennikov* (Moskva, 1969), p. 222.

5. Kijukov, p. 84.

6. For details see the two volume edition o f *I. S. Turgenev v vospominanijakh sovremennikov* (Moskva, 1969).

7. Turgenev, X III, 669.

8. Ibid., X III, 195-96, 669.

9. Turgenev, *Pis'ma*, V II, 170-71. Turgenev heard Wagner's *Meistersinger* for the first time in 1869 in Karlsruhe. Compare also *Pis'ma,* V III, 78-79, 215.

10. Ibid., V II, 170, 391.

21. V. Erlich, *Russian Formalism* (S-Gravenhage, 1955), pp. 40. 241.

22. For details o f the controversy between the schools o f the heteronomists and autonomists see E. Hanslick, *The Beautiful in Music,* trans. G. Cohen (1957).

23. *Turgenev* v *vospominanijakh.*..., p. 99; Turgenev, *Pis 'ma,* 1,448; *Pis 'ma,* II, 400.

29. E. Heier, "Principles o f Impressionism in the Aesthetics o f I. S. Turgenev," *Poetica Slavica: Studies in Honour o f Zbigniew Folejewski*

(Ottawa, 1981), pp. 53-70.

30. *Pis'ma*, X I, 31.

31. S. I. Rodzevich, *Turgenev* (Kiev, 1918), p. 74.

32. *Pis'ma,* X I, 10-11; 57. One is reminded here o f Schiller's definition of beauty: "Schönheit ist die Freiheit in der Erscheinung" (Beauty is freedom in the phenomenon), i.e., since freedom is an abstraction, it can only be presented through beauty.

33. *Pis'ma*, X I, 10-11.

34. M . Dessoir, "Anschauung und Beschreibung," *Archiv får systematische Philosophie*, X (1904), Bd. 1, p. 47f.

35. *Pis'ma,* III, 180.

36. Turgenev, X I, 156.

37. Ledkovsky, p. 47.

38. P. Lubbock, *The Craft o f Fiction* (London, 1960), pp. 119-123.

39. Turgenev, V III, 31-32.

40. Turgenev, V II, 486.

41. Turgenev, VII, 237-38.

42. *Turgenev* v *vospominanijakh....,* p. 111.

43. Compare R. Gottschall, *Poetik* (Breslau, 1858), pp. 34-48; R. Wellek & A. Warren, *Theory o f Literature* (New York, 3rd edition, pp. 125-28.

44. A. Glumov, *Muzyka* v *russkom dramaticheskom teatre* (Moskva, 1955), p. 8.

45. Turgenev, IX , 121.

#### Ѵ ІП . Impressionism in the Aesthetics of I. S. Turgenev

To deal with literary impressionism is no easy task, since critics seem to have no clear idea what literary impressionism was. Was it a school, an orientation, or merely a transient style or technique?1 In the first place, we are dealing with a concept which was transferred to literature from painting. There there was no confusion, for it was the name given to the most important artistic phenomenon of the nineteenth century, the first o f the modern movements to oppose the stale principles o f the classical tradition and its academic dogma. The common purpose was to go to nature directly and capture the fleeting impression of the moment on canvas, and thus involve the beholder in recreating the experience of the artist. Rather than precisely and explicitly reproducing the objective characteristics o f an object, the impressionist artist was interested in relating the impression or effect received from the object. The impressionist painters, with their new method of expression, with their pure spectral colours, where blurs and dabs took the place o f lines, sought to achieve a greater realism and naturalism. It is here that problems arise when the term is applied to literature, particularly since some viewed impressionism as a reaction to naturalism, while others looked upon it as a direct outgrowth of realism and naturalism. The boundaries became vague and ill-defined. In particular, German writers like Holz, Schlaf and Hauptmann who made the transition fro naturalism to impressionism, viewed impressionism as a refined form of naturalism. Hermann Bahr even spoke of impressionism as a subjective naturalism.2

The matter is further complicated if impressionism is perceived as a mere technique, for in the poetry of Symbolism and Imagism impressionist technique is continually present. Indeed, if we are dealing here only with an artistic technique, then we encounter these features even in the most realistic, objective representation that can exist in literature, for since once cannot say everything about anything, any detailed description, objective as it may appear, remains but impressionistic.3 It is a truism that impressionistic devices are to be encountered at any time and in any literature.4 Even Homer avoided, whenever aesthetically necessary, the detailed description, and presented to us only the effect. In literary criticism we can find ample theoretical pronouncements in favour of impressionistic technique. Thus Tolstoj, discussing character portrayal, concludes by saying: "It seems to me that one should not only describe a person's appearance, but also the effect it has upon us."5 Although Tolstoj here speaks as a realist, he clearly looks upon impressionism as a legitimate realist technique.6

121

I f we compare this "historical" concept o f impressionism, as a device to be encountered in all epochs, with impressionism as a phenomenon in late nineteenth and early twentieth-century European literature, then we discover that both types of impressionism have the same characteristic features. The artist aims at creating a vague, blurred, ephemeral image. A t the centre o f impressionist aesthetics is observation. Whereas the realist and naturalist have as their goal the exact, direct, *impersonal reproduction o f an object,* impressionist painters aim at *presenting their material as it is perceived and felt in a single fleeting moment.* While it is true that both the realist and the impressionist attain their truth by observation, the realist observes *longer and objectively,* while the impressionist's observation is *shorter and subjective.*  On the basis o f various aesthetic criteria, centred around visual perception and stylistic devices, critics have classified a number o f them as impressionists. Although literary impressionism has not yet been defined exactly as a system with unique and characteristic features, one has come to regard as impressionists the following writers: in France — the Goncourt brothers, Mallarmé, Baudelaire, Verlaine and Valery; in Germany and Austria, where literary impressionism was more pronounced than anywhere else, such writers as Holz, Schlaf, Liliencron, George, Schnitzler, Hoffmannsthal, Rilke and Altenberg; in the English speaking world — Oscar W ilde and Virginia W olf; and the Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun.

Like any artistic innovation, it became a source o f controversy. Not satisfied with the explanation that the sudden upsurge o f impressionism was an attempt to emulate the impressionist painters, or simply an expression of the aesthetic urge to create in a new manner, critics and the impressionist writers themselves began to search for deeper causes, and in particular a philosophical basis, or *Weltanschauung,* and with it a firm er legitimacy. Having been accused of superficiality and lack o f depth, like the impressionist painters before them, the writers found a philosophical foundation to be essential, and sought the ultimate source o f impressionism in a sceptical and disillusioned reaction to positivism. Positivistic thought, which dates back to antiquity, had rejected all metaphysical speculations in its search for absolute truth and recognized only objective perceptual experience. However, while yielding marvellous results in the natural sciences, when positivism was applied to the problem of change in the human personality, and the relation o f matter and mind, it was found that most fundamental assumptions were

either wholly erroneous or only partially true. The consequence was the emergence o f a new concept o f reality, most strongly expounded in the thought o f the Austrian physicist Ernst Mach, the chief representative o f phenomenalistic positivism, which accepts appearance as final. He denied all permanence to the world o f reality and defined matter as a complex o f sensations in perpetual flux. What is conceived as stable in appearance and permanent is in reality constantly changing. Nothing is fixed, least o f all the human personality.8

The acceptance of this view was reflected in a new moral behaviour, in tasting the fleeting pleasure o f life, in giving free reign to one's impulses living, so to say, on the surface — as it manifested itself among the decadents, both in Western Europe and in Russia. The scepticism and pessimism derived from the belief that everything is in flux were bound to determine also the aesthetic concept o f impressionism. I f there was no coherent unity and permanency in this world and one could perceive an object only as a succession o f sensations, then art could never describe life objectively and truthfully, at least not as the traditional realist saw it. Hence the controversy surrounding Chekhov's impressionism. Was it merely aestheticism or was it the expression of a philosophical scepticism rooted in the view that nothing is permanent? Critics have stressed that impressionism, as a lasting technique and device, must be distinct from the subjective, impressionistic idealism which denies objective truth, since the objective presentation of life implies a belief in the permanency o f the external world.9 The adherents of impressionism, in their attempt to describe reality, could at best pick out only momentary aspects of existence, i.e., the fleeting moment as conceived by the artist at one particular instant o f perception. The practical consequence of this artistic approach was the presentation o f series of snapshots — momentary impressions o f reality.

It is only against this philosophical background coupled with the proclamations o f Verlaine, Rimbaud and Mallarmé that suggestion and implication are superior to statement, that one can fully understand the spirit o f the Russian decadent movement after the 1880's and its impressionistic undercurrent. Only in this context can one comprehend the exaltation o f the fleeting moment, the "m ig," by such symbolists as Bal'mont. The origins of such views are to be found not only in Mach, but also in the philosophical scepticism of Plato, Kant, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and even in the mysticism o f V. Solovev.10

In Russia, impressionism, as a literary phenomenon and as a general life style, did not reach the intensity attained in Western Europe. Unlike Western

Europe, Russia could not count on the rich experience o f the impressionist school in painting, since impressionism in the works o f painters like K. Korovin, Grabar, Somov and Kuindzhi was a much later manifestation. In the 1890's Benois tells us that he did not mention the impressionists in his *History o f Russian Art* simply because he did not know about them. And Grabar states: "In the 1890's neither I nor any o f my colleagues and acquaintances had any notion o f impressionism and had not even heard the w ord."11 True, Levitan had painted in the impressionistic manner as early as the 1880's, but here we are dealing with an inspiration that derived from French landscape painting o f the Barbizon School, represented by such precursors o f impressionism as Corot, Rousseau, Diaz and Courbet, whose works were exhibited as early as 1850 in St. Petersburg.12 When impressionism did begin to manifest itself in Russian art, it was obscured by such trends as symbolism and neo-romanticism. Although this period in Russian literary history has variously been named the Age o f Modernism, Decadence, the Silver Age, the Age o f Aestheticism or the Age o f the Great Experiment, such movements as Symbolism, Acmeism, Futurism, Imagism, etc., were all effected by impressionism. Impressionism was, so to say, the starting point for the various new styles to come.

It is now generally acknowledged by critics that impressionism was an essential feature o f the poetry o f Annenskij, Bal'mont, Blok and the prose of Garshin, B. Zaitsev, Belyj and especially Chekhov, and to a lesser degree Korolenko. Critics speak further o f two main categories o f impressionism: 1) Impressionism as a natural development of Realism; this category includes Chekhov, Garshin and Korolenko; 2) impressionism in its purest form as encountered in the poetry o f the decadents. As a life style characterized by the relishing o f the fleeting moment, it is represented by writers like Annenskij, Bal'mont, young Blok and the prose writers Zaitsev, Dymov and Belyj.13

Russian impressionism, more so than its Western counterpart, was bom out o f the 1880's, a period o f stagnation and social, political and cultural discontent marked by pessimism and scepticism, despair and uncertainty.14 Chukovskij, a literary critic and himself "a typical impressionist," to use the words o f M iliukov, characterizes this period in the following manner: "Gone is the old pathos .... there is none o f that authority, w ill, force or that mode o f life which could unite and bind all together.... At the present time literature had nothing to rely upon." (The reference seems to be to writers like Turgenev and Dostoevskij who were no longer among the living, and to Tolstoj who had been silent for some time). Chukovskij concludes that during this period "literature grew urbane and consequently became imbued with the

impressionism o f ephemeral sensations."15

Out o f this ideological interregnum, new forces emerged not only political, but also religious in nature, and a new aestheticism. Merezhkovskij in his famous pamphlet *On the Causes o f the Decline, and on the New Trends in Russian Literature* (1892) heralded this new creative force, this new literary trend in modem art and characterized it by three principle elements: mystical content, symbolism and the development o f artistic susceptibility. But most o f all Merezhkovskij turned to Russia's literary past, and in particular to Turgenev, to demonstrate the existence o f a tradition behind the new aesthetic principles: "We cannot be content with the crude photographic exactness of experimental pictures. We demand and feel by hint and suggestions ... o f Turgenev ... new, hitherto undiscovered measures o f sensibility (vpechatlitel'nost).... French critics have rather cleverly called this feature impressionism."16

Although Merezhkovskij acknowledged the pioneering work o f the French, he maintains that it would be an "unforgivable mistake" to consider them the initiators o f this new artistic idealism and asserts that all this had been visible in Russian literature before the coming o f the French. He now singles out Turgenev, who along with Fet, Tjutchev, Polonskij and Majkov "has widened our Russian understanding of beauty, has conquered hitherto unknown areas o f sensibility and most clearly displays the requisites o f modem art, mysticism, symbolism and the development o f artistic apprehension [which in essence is impressionism]."17

To test Merezhkovskij's thesis that there were elements o f this new aestheticism in the Parnassians, one need look only at Fet and Tjutchev.

To his contemporaries Fet was a poet "who lived for the moment," o f which he was able to create a startling picture with a few images.18

In Tjutchev on can single out his famous poem "Silentium," written as early as 1833, the first stanza o f which reads: "Be silent, hide yourself, and conceal your feelings and your dreams. Let them rise and set in the depths of your soul, silently, like stars in the night; contemplate them with admiration and be silent. " The idea "be silent" is repeatedly stressed in each stanza and is most forcefully expressed in the line: "M ysl' izrechennaja est' lozh" — "A thought that is spoken is falsehood." This poem o f Tjutchev is not impressionistic in technique, but rather it expresses the basic philosophical thought o f impressionism — "a thought that is spoken is falsehood." It is a falsehood because the objective truth in a world of continuous flux cannot be expressed or understood.  As advocates o f pure art, they foreshadow the new trend with its symbolism, mysticism and new form o f expression, impressionism.

W hile Merezhkovskij does not analyze the elements o f impressionism in these writers, he is somewhat more explicit as to Turgenev's artistic achievements, but again does not refer specifically to impressionism. He notes the contradictory views of critics and attributes them to a basic misunderstanding o f the writer. Merezhkovskij admits that Turgenev's psychological analysis is not profound, but declares that he is "the most fascinating magician o f the world." He tells us that Turgenev has been mistakenly labelled a realist and refers his readers to "the true, original Turgenev," the author o f *Zhivye moshchi (The Living Relic,* 1874), *Bezhin Lug (Bezhin Meadow,* 1851), *Dovol'no (Enough,* 1865), *PrizraJd (Phantoms,* 1864), *Sobaka (The Dog,* 1866), *Pesnja torzhestvujushchej ljubvi (The Song o f Triumphant Love,* 1881) and *Stikhotvorenija* v *proze* (*Poems in Prose,* 1882). Tben, Merezhkovskij boldly declares: "Turgenev — velikij russkij khudozhnik — impressionist" [Turgenev, the great Russian artist, is an impressionist]. And on the strength o f this all-important and unconscious feature o f his work ... he is a true precursor o f the new idealistic art which

is emerging in Russia in place of utilitarian, vulgar realism."19

The tales which Merezhkovskij selected from Turgenev's works are all imbued with an irrational, mystic streak and an element o f the supernatural. To them one could add *Faust* (1855), *Knock-Knock-Knock* (1871), *The Dream* (1877) and *Klara Milich* (1883). These stories undoubtedly illustrate best that "other Turgenev," in whom fantasy, mysticism, symbolism and aspects o f that new idealism, o f which Merezhkovskij speaks, are most clearly visible.20 In them we encounter the typical requisites o f impressionism, in both the themes and devices. We find a subjective feeling of scepticism and disillusionment, pessimism and the sense of man's insignificance, his limitations in this infinite universe. We also find here a parallel to Mach's theory o f lack o f permanency, which characterized Western impressionism, especially in *Phantoms* (1864) and in *Enough* (1865), stories narrated in the first person, where the focus is on the idea o f the transitoriness o f beauty and o f man's existence.  We encounter them also as an underlying thought in such objective, realistic works as the novel *Smoke* (1867). Here he employs the image o f smoke and steam to express symbolically Litvinov's disenchantment with life as he rides in the train back to Russia.  'It is all smoke and vapour,' he thought. 'Everything seems to be incessantly changing, everywhere there are new pictures, phenomena speed after phenomena, but in essence everything is the same and still the same everything is hurrying, hastening somewhere — and everything vanishes without a trace, without achieving anything; another wind blows — and everything is flung to the opposite side, and there too the same incessant, anxious and unnecessary game goes on.' He recalled much that had been accomplished before his eyes, with thunders and tumults, o f recent years ... 'smoke,' he whispered, 'smoke.' "22

Turgenev's pessimism and fatalism, his doubts and his feeling o f the

ephemerality o f life were not a "passing phase" ("vzlet").23 This mood took on ever greater proportions in his later life culminating in his *Poems in Prose* (1883).24 One critic even characterized these poems as a commentary to Schopenhauer's philosophy.25 A. Batjuto convincingly shows that Turgenev's pessimism was not necessarily derived from Schopenhauer's philosophy. A t great length Batjuto shows how the idea o f the moving, shifting, restless, transitory character o f phenomena had been prevalent at all times and how this "subjective-impressionistic approach to reality" by Turgenev, Pascal, Schopenhauer and Marcus Aurelius is but a rephrasing o f Heraclit's famous statement: "You cannot step into the same river twice, for fresh waters are forever flowing in upon you. "26 With this Batjuto admits the existence o f an "impressionistic outlook" in Turgenev's philosophy, even though he denies its systematic application.

This philosophic conviction that reality is not what one conceives it to be, that man' s existence is shrouded in mystery, that there is no stability and permanency and that, consequently, the ultimate truth w ill remain forever an illusion, was bound to tinge Turgenev's realism with a quality clearly reminiscent o f impressionism, and is the source o f his great affinity to Chekhov.27 Perhaps such a philosophic conviction explains the fragmentary existence o f his heroes and their inability to achieve their goals and lasting happiness. How could they, if their own creator questioned the attainment o f lasting knowledge and fulfilment? It is also the cause o f the hints and suggestions, vague rather than authoritative, which characterize Turgenev's narrative. Turgenev's narrator, unlike Dostoevskij's, does not know everything about his character. Instead of a detailed psychological description, Turgenev, true to nature, contents himself with revealing the bare minimum o f his characters' disposition and motivation, as they are reflected in external signs only, and as they are perceived by the narrator. Such a subjectiveimpressionistic approach to reality was not a matter o f poetic inability, as Shatalov suggests.2\* Rather, it was determined, apparently, by Turgenev's philosophic outlook, his concept of man, and also by his aesthetic norms. Combined, these factors explain the decisive undercurrent o f impressionism in the realism o f Turgenev.  His best work Tolstoj considered to be *The Hunter's Notes,* since "here there was an aim." The rest he viewed as trifles.29

Aware of the aesthetic limitations of protracted descriptions, Turgenev preferred to hint and suggest, sort and select only the typical and important

from masses o f material, so as not to smother the reader's imagination. The reader is, so to say, constantly invited to take up the hint, decipher that impressionistic texture and complete the picture. What was thereby created was impressionistic in nature, yet true to life. Turgenev himself described this effect quite succinctly when he said: "The best people and the best books are those where one can read a great deal between the lines."30 Such aesthetic pronouncements are repeatedly to be encountered in his letters and reviews. As early as 1852, in a review o f Ostrovskij's *The Poor Bride*, Turgenev outlined his aesthetic principles, when he criticized the author for an overabundance o f details and concluded that "the task o f art is not to reproduce life, and that in all o f these endless small details that specificity, that conciseness o f a picture is lost, which is essential for arousing the aesthetic feeling in the reader, even in one with a playful and daring fantasy."31 Turgenev could have read a typically impressionist view o f art in 1852, when Kraevskij asked him to check a translation o f Lessing's *Laokoon,* if he had not known this work before.32 In it Lessing refutes the principle o f word painting in literature and demands portrayal through the effect. "The elements o f fantasy which the poet is to create," he asserts, "do not need exact and detailed description." Turgenev remained consistent in his concept o f art, for in 1882, in a letter to Ja. P. Polonskij, he once more rejected naturalistic representations as vulgar, adding: "In painting, and the same is true o f literature, indeed, of all art: he who transmits all details is doomed to perish; one ought to capture characteristic features. This is what is called talent and even what is called art."33

If we look in Turgenev's work for the stock o f devices which are usually associated with impressionism,34 we are not surprised to find them, but rather at the frequency o f their recurrence. In doing so, however, one ought to keep in mind several points. Ever since the romantic period, most writers aimed at reproducing life truthfully, and in that sense they were realists, the impressionists not excluded. Clearly, the concept o f reality varied from one writer to another, making it difficult to find a common denominator.  The impressionistic device was but another link in this chain o f depiction; the manner in which it was put to use was bound to colour a w riter's style.

It is dangerous to claim that certain devices are typical in a writer like Turgenev, as one can always find an equal number o f opposite examples.   Mimic and gesture are favourite devices, as they best convey momentary changes o f character. The following analysis w ill examine Turgenev's character portrayal and his sketches o f landscapes in the light of impressionism.

Turgenev was very much aware that the stereotyped portrayal and the enumeration o f individual physical features o f a character could, indeed, evoke a visual image, but he was equally conscious o f the fact that such a portrait could never produce the same effect or impression as a painting. In painting everything is said simultaneously; the totality is perceived, even at one glance. In literature, this instantaneous impact can be approximated only by avoiding lengthy description and concentrating on striking qualities to relate the total impression. This principle guided Turgenev in creating his close to one hundred major characters, which are all depicted through their exterior.

As early as 1844 in *Andrej Kolosov* Turgenev raises the aesthetic problem o f detailed portrayal as opposed to mere suggestion. Kolosov, the protagonist, is described by the narrator as an unusual person: "tall, well-proportioned, adroit, and quite handsome. " But when he attempts to relate to his friends the impression his face provoked, the narrator encounters difficulties. He begins: "His face..." and then he pauses and adds: "I find it extremely difficult, gentlemen, to describe someone's face. It is easy to sort out the individual features one by one, but by what means should one convey the distinguishing property, the essence o f a particular face? What Byron calls 'the music o f the

face.'  It is this indefinite something (impressionistic in itself), this "chto-to," the portrayal o f the effect o f a face, which became an indispensable element in his portraiture. Rather than drawing a character's facial features in minute detail, the narrator depicts only the most salient features and the effect the total appearance produces. The reference to the expression o f a face is never omitted in Turgenev's portrayal; indeed, it is always the major feature o f his portraits and provides that total, instantaneous effect. In relating the expression o f a face, the narrator in actuality conveys the subjective impression which he had received.

Turgenev's major character, Bazarov in *Fathers and Sons,* is portrayed with similar economy: "Bazarov ... throwing back the collar o f his coat showed his fu ll face to Nikołaj Petrovich. It was a long thin face with a broad forehead, a nose flat at the top but tapering sharply, large greenish eyes and drooping sandy whiskers — the whole was animated by a tranquil smile betokening self-assurance and intelligence." By combining in this way realistic features with the effect they produce on the narrator, Turgenev created memorable portraits which are masterpieces o f impressionistic realism. Not only the "tranquil smile betokening self-assurance and intelligence," but also the very process o f selecting the most characteristic features is impressionistic.

One is particularly struck by Turgenev's use o f non-verbal communication. A psychological change is suggested through external physical changes in a person's behaviour, through gesture, through a pause in the dialogue or incomplete sentence. In fact, Turgenev's works are saturated with pauses concealing an unexpressed thought. In *A Nest o f Gentlefolk,* when Lavretskij visits his beloved Liza for the last time in her refuge, the monastery, she walks silently next to him with clenched fists only moving her eyelids gently when she glances at him. And the narrator asks: "What were they thinking? What were their feelings? Who knows? Who can tell?"  One can only point to them — and pass them by." Even without the narrator's comment the reader's understanding o f the scene would be the result o f conjecture.

It is gesture, however, which conveys best the momentary changes in a character, and which is a favourite device o f the impressionists. In employing this device, Turgenev is able, with a minimum narrative time, to present love, pain and disappointment without ever referring to inner feelings, simply through external phenomena, through gestures and facial expressions. In *Rudin*, Pandalevskij offers Alexandra a lovely wild flower as a love token as

they walk through the fields. She takes the flower, walks a few steps, then lets it drop on the path. The symbolic gesture is understood by both without a word being uttered. Pandalevskij's reaction to the fate o f the flower, his pain, hurt pride and disappointment is again revealed only externally, through his behaviour and facial expression. Upon parting from Alexandra, "Pandalevskij sighed and dropped his eyes expressively. 'Good-bye Aleksandra Pavlovna! ' he said after a slight pause; then he bowed and turned ... homewards. A ll softness had vanished at once from his face; a selfconfident, almost hard expression came into it. Even his walk was changed; his steps were longer and he trod more heavily." This is all that is related, because this i all the narrator can observe. The reader is left with hints and suggestions to complete the picture o f that internal struggle which takes place in the rejected lover.

In contrast to Dostoevskij and Tolstoj, Turgenev does not probe the soul o f his characters. In fact, he asks, how does Dostoevskij know so much about the psychological suffering o f his characters? In overstating their sadism and laying bare the minds o f his young men, Dostoevskij was for Turgenev just another Marquis de Sade.35 Turgenev rejected the overt presentation o f psychological detail in the novel and maintained that "the poet must be a psychologist, but a secret one." He ought to know and feel the problems but must present only their manifestation.36 His simple portraits are almost fragile in comparison to the heavy dialectic psychological manner of Dostoevskij. They are admirable not so much for what they contain, but rather for what they suggest.

Linked to Turgenev's laconic portrayal o f his characters is his desire to portray types. To do this, Turgenev had to abandon the technique o f minute detailing and resort to impressionism, for types, if described in detail, cease to exist as types. This is probably why Turgenev disliked Balzac, whose characters were described in minute detail. About them he said: "None o f them ever lived, and none ever w ill."37

Turgenev's impressionism is most vividly apparent in his landscape sketches, which invariably evoke the paintings of the impressionists. In letters to his painter-friends, he insisted that they should avoid detail and capture that first impression, painting broadly and only with blobs. He defended the impressionistic technique o f painting by stating that even if one steps away from a tree for some seventy five steps, one w ill see no distinct outlines of leaves, but only masses and blobs.38 However, he neither referred to any of the famous impressionist painters as models, nor did he ever own any o f their paintings. His favourite painters were those o f the Barbizon school, the

forerunners of the impressionists, which he proposed as a model for improving technique.39 In his advice Turgenev foreshadows what later Levitan was to teach his pupils, namely to capture a blurred impression with an emphasis on colours, avoiding lines and details.40 Turgenev in his own collection in Paris had no less than two dozen paintings o f the Barbizon school, o f which several were landscapes by Corot and Rousseau. An unfinished painting by Rousseau was his favourite, because in its incompleteness one could still feel "that poetic freshness and the vigour o f that first impression."41

Critics have found two kinds o f nature descriptions in Turgenev: the detailed description, which is most often encountered in his earlier works, and the laconic descriptions in his later works which obviously aim to capture the impression o f that first glance.42 The latter are the only feature which Tolstoj found praiseworthy in Turgenev's *Virgin Soil*: "The only aspect in which he is such a master that one does not dare to touch the subject is nature. Two, three lines and all is alive."43

From a functional point of view most o f Turgenev's landscapes are in the tradition o f Pushkin, i.e., the sketch complements the action o f the story. Nature reflects human emotion or creates a certain mood for the action to come.44 In this sense nature performs the same function as music, paralleling the feeling experienced by the heroes. Like nature, music consistently recurs in Turgenev whenever a significant emotional experience is being related. When incapable o f rendering emotions in words, he resorts to the impressionism o f music. After wandering among the ruins o f ancient Rome, he writes to Countess Lambert in 1858: "I was inspired ... by that immortal beauty as opposed to the triviality o f earthly things.... This cannot be conveyed in words.... Those impressions are musical and are best conveyed by music."45 Years later, in *Spring Torrents* the narrator is likewise incapable o f expressing verbally the feelings which had overcome Sanin after receiving a letter from the love o f his youth: "We w ill not attempt to describe the feelings experienced by Sanin while reading this letter. For such feelings there is no satisfactory expression; they are deeper, stronger and more infinite than any word. Only music could transmit them."46

Turgenev's nature descriptions do not always form the background o f events.  This type o f lyrical, pictorial digression is an innovation and a luxury of the time. Like Monet in his "Poplars" or

״Haystacks," Turgenev draws a series o f pictures o f one subject under various conditions and at different times o f the day. W ith a painter's skill he varies his colours depending on the shade and the changing light and attempts to capture that endless change, the gentle dynamics of nature as perceived at morning, noon and evening. Here are some fragmentary passages which emphasize Turgenev's use o f adjectives and the ever present movement in the heavens: *The morning* sky is described as clear, "the sunrise does not glow with fire ," it is "suffused with a soft roseate flush." The sun itself is not "redhot" nor is it "dull purple," but with a "bright and genial radiance" it rises behind a narrow cloud and "shines out freshly," and plunges again into "lilac m ist." The delicate upper edge o f the cloud "flashes in little gleaming snakes; their brilliance is like polished silver." Moments later as the mighty orb rises, the "dancing rays flash forth again." *The midday* is depicted in two layers there appear high up in the sky a multitude of "golden-grey," rounded clouds "with soft edges" bathing in the "riches o f deep transparent blue;" farther down the heavens the clouds are packing closer; now there is "no blue between them," but they are "themselves as blue as the sky, filled with light and heat." The colour o f the horizon, "a faint pale lilac," is the same all around. Only in some places do "rays o f bluish colour" stretch down from the sky. *In the evening* these clouds disappear; the last of them "blackish and undefined as smoke," like a ball, "lie streaked with pink facing the setting sun." A "crimson glow" lingers long over the "darkening earth; and, softly flashing like a candle carried carelessly, the evening star flickers in the sky. "

Turgenev concludes his picture by telling his readers that on such days "all the colours are softened, bright but not glaring; everything is suffused with a kind o f touching tenderness." Indeed, it is not only his reminder that everything is "soft" and "tender" but the very use of epithets conveying the fines nuances o f shades o f colours like "tusklo-bagrovyj," "zolotisto-seryj," "bledno-lilovatyj," "golubovatyj" and "chemovatyj," which ultimately produce a subdued impressionistic, pictorial quality. Turgenev employs only two specific images: the sun, the cause o f all light and shading of colours, and the ever-present cloud, forever wandering and gliding, a favourite impressionistic image because o f its ephemeral quality.  This sensuousness and softly glowing lyrical quality create an emotion comparable to that evoked by the preimpressionist water-colourists. While George Moore, who knew Turgenev in Paris, is able to state that his execution is "light, facile, and yet certain, even as that o f a landscape by Corot," R. Muther, the art critic and historian o f the

nineteenth century, likens Turgenev's art to that o f Rousseau.47 Like them, he does not impose ideas and details on the reader, but creates a mood by skilful suggestion, and like them he repeatedly asserts that an object suggested has far greater charm and fascination than a complete painting or a detailed account can ever achieve. Most o f all, in applying these aesthetic principles in his work, Turgenev avoided the violation o f his readers' freedom, an essential ingredient in any aesthetic experience.

Since Turgenev selected suggestions as the basis o f his aesthetics, everything in his art came to be determined by this principle. Thus, his narrator's knowledge is in most cases limited to his visual perception, and consequently whatever he relates is bound to remain incomplete and impressionistic. Coupled with this is the artistic recognition that everything cannot be related, that selection is inevitable. In the case o f Turgenev's realism, critics have noted his unique concept o f reality, the absence of utilitarianism, a strong dose o f mysterious fatalism and no less the soft subjective lyrical mood in his prose, particularly in his later period. Ultimately, the unique quality o f Turgenev's realism, which may be regarded as a new phase of critical realism and has affinities with Chekhov, is to be found in the impressionistic texture.48 The use o f artistic devices typical o f impressionism enabled him to recreate reality, or an illusion thereof, so skilfully that his illusion becomes credible and complete, like life itself.

#### NOTES

1. For the various definitions o f Impressionism see: R. Moser, *L 'Impressionnisme français...* (Geneva, 1951); В. J. Gibbs, "Impressionism as a Literary Movement," *Modem Language Journal*, 36 (1952), 175-83; H. Sommerhalder, *Zum Begriff des literarischen Impressionismus* (Zürich, 1961); W. Nehring, "Hoffmannsthal und der Wiener Impressionismus," *Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie,* 94 (1975), 481-98; M. Diersch, *Empiriokritizismus und Impressionismus: Über Beziehungen zwischen Philosophie, Ästhetik und Literatur um 1900 in Wien* (Berlin, 1973); "Impressionismus," *Reallexikon der deutschen Literaturgeschichte,* I (1958); "Impressionizm," *Literatumaja entsiklopedija* (Moskva, 1930), IV , 466-90; R. Hamann/J. Hermann, *Impressionismus* (Berlin, 1960) — the latter being a reworking o f Hamann's book *Der Impressionismus in Leben und Kunst* (1907); and M . E. Kronegger, *Literary Impressionism* (New Haven, 1973).

2. H. Bahr, *Die Überwindung des Naturalismus* (Stuttgart, 1968); M . Picard, *Das Ende des Impressionismus* (Zürich, 1920); M. Diertsch, op. cit.

3. See D. Chizhevskij, *History o f Nineteenth-Century Russian Literature,* trans. R. N. Porter (Nashville, 1974), II, 11.

4. О. Val'tsel, *lmpressionizm i ekspressionizm vsovremennoj Germanii,* trans, and introd. V. Zhirmunskij (Petrograd, 1922).

5. N. Dmitrieva, *Izobrazhenie i slovo* (Moskva, 1962), p. 49.

6. For Tolstoj's observations on Chekhov's impressionist technique, see A. Gol'denveizer, *Vblizi Tolstogo* (Moskva, 1959), p. 68; S. Sendrovich, "Chekhov and Impressionism," in *Chekhov's Art o f Writing,* ed. Debreczeny and Th. Eekman (Columbus, 1947), pp. 148-49; and *Russkie pisateli о literature* (Leningrad, 1939), II, p. 138. Tolstoj once again compares Chekhov to the impressionistic painters: "Chekhov has his own particular form, like impressionists. You watch how the man indiscriminately spreads his paints, whichever comes into his hands, and it seems as if these paints have no interrelation whatsoever. But if you stand back at some distance and look, a whole harmonious union open up before you" (ibid., p. 153).

7. Gibbs, op. cit., 175-76.

8. Nehring, op. cit., 486-87; H. P. Stowell, *Literary Impressionism: James and Chekhov* (Athens: Univ. o f Georgia Press, 1980), pp. 15-30.

9. Compare: Sendrovich, "Chekhov and Impressionism," 134-151; Stowell, pp. 59-64; D. Chizhevskij, "Chekhov in the Development o f Russian Literature," in *Chekhov: A Collection of Critical Essays,* ed. R. L. Jackson (New Jersey, 1967); V. Fritshe, "Vvedenie" in A. P. Chekhov, *Sobranie sochinenij,* I (Moskva, 1929); A. A. Volkov, *Russkaja literatura XX veka* (Moskva, 1964), p. 387.

10. See V. Asmus, "Filosofija i estetika russkogo simvolizma," *Literatumoe nasledstvo,* 27-28 (Moskva, 1937); Volkov, op. cit., 380-86.

11. G. Stemin, *Khudozhestvennaja zhizn*' *Rossi i na rubezhe XIX-XX vekov* (Moskva, 1970), pp. 89-94. The exhibitions o f French impressionist painters in Russia began only in the mid 1890's. However, Zola's article on the

impressionist painters was published as early as 1876 in *Vestnik Evropy.*

12. Stemin, op. cit., pp. 26-28; K. Korovin seems to have been the first Russian painter on whom the French impressionists exerted a direct influence after he came in contact with their works in Paris in 1885.

13. "Impressionizm," *Literatumaja entsiklopedija,* pp. 466-90.

14. E. Heier, "Social and Religious Disillusionment o f the Age 1850-1900," in *Religious Schism in the Russian Aristocracy 1860-1900: Radstockism and Pashkovism* (The Hague, 1970), pp. 1-29.

15. P. M iliukov, *Outlines o f Russian Culture*, ed. M. Karpovich (New York, 1960), II, pp. 53-54.

16. D. S. Merezhkovskij, *Izbrannye stat'i,* Introd. R. Matlaw (München, 1972), pp. 249-50.

17. Merezhkovskij, op. cit., p. 251.

18. See P. P. Gromov's introduction to *A. A. Fet* (Moskva, 1962), p. 33.

19. Merezhkovskij, op. cit., p. 252.

20. Turgenev as a forerunner o f Symbolism has been dealt with by S. I. Rodzevich, *Turgenev* (Kiev, 1918), especially in the chapter on "Turgenev i simvolizm;" and by M. Ludkovsky, *The Other Turgenev: From Romanticism to Symbolism* (1973).

21. I. S. Turgenev, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij i pisem v dvadtsati vos'mi tomakh* (Moskva, 1960-68), IX , 121. (Hereafter referred to as PSS.)

22. Turgenev, *PSS,* IX , 315.

23. A. Batjuto, *Turgenev-romanist* (Leningrad, 1972), p. 158.

24. S. E. Shatalov, *Khudozhestvennyj mir I. S. Turgeneva* (Moskva, 1979), pp. 278-79. See also M . K. Kleman, *Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev* (Leningrad, 1936); I. I. Veksler, /. *S. Turgenev i politicheskaja bor'ba shestidesjatykh godov* (Leningrad, 1934); and L. V. Pumianskij, "Turgenev novelist," in I. S. Turgenev, *Sochinenija* (1929), ѴІП, pp. 6-7.

25. Ludkovsky, op. cit., 41. Compare also M. Gershenson, *Mechta i mysi' I. S. Turgeneva* (Moskva, 1919), pp. 111-23.

26. Batjuto, op. cit., pp. 103, 137, 143, 146-47, 150, 158-59, 162-63. Compare also A. Walicki, "Turgenev and Schopenhauer," *Oxford Slavonic Papers*, X (1962), 1-17.

27. Turgenev and Chekhov is a topic of continuous interest. Critics usually stress their common lyricism, poetic description and the general presentation o f ineffective, superfluous types: M. L. Semanova, "Turgenev i Chekhov," *Uchenye zapiski LGPI im. A. I. Gertsena,* 135 (1957); S. E. Shatalov, "Cherty poetiki (Chekhov i Turgenev)," in *Vtvorcheskoj laboratorii Chekhova* (Moskva, 1974), pp. 296-309; L. Nazarova, *Turgenev i russkaja literatura kontsa XIX nach. XX* v. (Leningrad, 1979).

28. Shatalov, op. cit., pp. 172-232.

29. "Tolstoj v 1880-egody: Zapiski I. M. Ivakina," *Literatumoe nasledstvo* 62 (Moskva, 1961), II, 50.

30. Turgenev, *PSS, Pis'ma,* VI, 34.

31. Turgenev, *PSS,* V, 390.

32. Turgenev, *PSS, Pis'ma,* II, pp. 84, 127, 455.

33. Turgenev, *PSS, Pis'ma,* X III, 2, 37-38.

34. This is only a selection of devices which have been listed by various critics as being typical o f impressionism. For details see the above-cited works and especially the article on Impressionism in the *Literatumaja entsiklopedija,* which names no less than thirty different devices typical of impressionism.

35. *PSS, Pis'ma,* X III, 2, p. 48.

36. *PSS,* IV , 35; on Turgenev's aesthetics compare also the chapter on "Problemy estetiki," in Batjuto, op. cit., pp. 166-239; and P. Brang, "Turgenevs aesthetisches Credo," *Festschrift jür Max Vasmer zum 70. Geburtstag* (Wiesbaden, 1956), pp. 83-90.

37. *PSS, Pis'ma,* X III, 76; Batjuto, pp. 176-78.

38. *PSS, Pis'ma,* X III, 2, pp. 24-27, p. 37-38.

39. Compare K. Pigarev, *Russkaja literatura i izobrazitel'noe iskusstvo* (Moskva, 1972), pp. 82-115.

4 0 .1.1. Levitan, *Pis'ma, dokumenty. Vospominanija* (Moskva, 1956), p. 212.

41. *PSS, Pis'ma,* X III, 2, p. 26.

42. Pigarev, op. cit., pp. 84-85.

43. L. N. Tolstoj, *Polnoe Sobranie Sochinenij,* (Moskva, 1953), L X II, 315.

44. Compare also E. M. Efrimova, "Pejzazh v *Zapiskakh okhotnika* I. S. Turgeneva," in *Zapiski okhotnika I. S. Turgeneva, Stat'i i materiały* (Orel, 1955), pp. 247-80; M. Nierle, *Die Naturschilderung und ihre Funktion in Versdichtung und Prosa von I. S. Turgenev* (Bad Homburg, 1969), pp. 114, 131.

45. *PSS, Pis'ma,* III, 180.

46. *PSS, Pis'ma,* XI, 156. For details as to the role o f music in Turgenev's life and works see A. K. Kijukov, *Turgenev i muzyka* (Leningrad, 1913).

47. G. Moore, *Impressions and Opinions* (New York, 1913), pp. 44-64; H. Muchnic, *An Introduction to Russian Literature* (New York, 1964), pp. 105- 11; Pigarev, pp. 95-102; Compare also I. S. Zilbershtein, "Vospominanija I. E. Tsvetkova, 1874;" N. N. Fonjakova, "Spasskoe-Lutovino v etjudakh Ja. P. Polonskogo," in *Literatumoe nasledstvo,* 67 (Moskva, 1967), pp. 415-22; pp. 615-16.

48. It is the impressionism in Turgenev which caused Merezhkovskij, in his enthusiasm, to proclaim him an outright impressionist. However, just as much as the use of symbols does not make a writer a symbolist, in the same manner elements o f impressionism, albeit abundant, do not make a writer an impressionist.

# IX . Schiller's *Die Räuber* in the Light of Tolstoj's Concept of A rt

In his study entitled "Schiller, the Inspirer o f Russian W riters," the academician Jurij Veselovskij, one of the foremost comparativists, stated in 1906 that Schiller meant much more to Russian society than to either the French or the English, and that there is no reason to assume that the fascination with Schiller w ill ever diminish. He concluded: "For us he w ill remain the poet o f inspiration, whose noble verse ... resounds like the bell from the towers o f ancient Russia which summoned the people in days o f joy and festivities and in days o f grief and misfortune.1״

The manner in which Veselovskij characterizes Schiller's reception in nineteenth-century Russia was subsequently substantiated with numerous studies by both Russian and Western scholars.2 The enormity o f Schiller's impact can only be fully appreciated if we keep in mind the prevailing discorded intellectual and social conditions of Imperial Russia. Throughout the nineteenth century, Schiller's ״Freiheitsdramen" received the greatest attention, as they always did wherever there was depression and oppression. Through the Storm and Stress plays, *Die Räuber, Kabale und Liebe* and *Don Carlos,* Russia's academic youth perceived Schiller as a champion o f human and social reforms. He became the spokesman of Russia's intelligentsia, who demanded not only the abolition of serfdom, but also dreamed o f the establishment of an ideal Schillerian state, full of freedom and dignity.

Indeed, the veneration o f Schiller in Russia was such that it can only be compared to Shakespeare's reception in Germany.  And although no honorary citizenship was bestowed upon him, as the French had done after the Revolution o f 1789, he remained the idol of nineteenth-century Russian intellectuals and received a degree of adulation which was never accorded to Goethe. Goethe was too classical, too restrained for the Russian spirit, which was totally attuned toward a radical change, if not revolution by violent means. Thus, it is not surprising that the enthusiasm for Schiller must ultimately rest on *Die Räuber,* generally considered the first revolutionary drama o f German literature. Indeed, if one isolates Karl's famous monologues, in which he denounces with burning eloquence the defects of state and ruler, the church and moral order, then the play could be interpreted as a dramatic statement o f a revolutionary. And although the clumsy motto "in Tirannos,"3 as H. Koopmann calls it, may express the spirit of the play and has contributed to a socio-political interpretation, the motto was not of Schillerian origin — it was attached to the second edition by the publisher.4 Schiller disdained it, as he did his honorary citizenship.

But whatever the origin of the various interpretations o f *Die Räuber,* whether the play is viewed as a *Familiendrama,* or perceived from a religiouspietistic, from a socio-political, or from a purely Marxist point o f view, it bears testimony to the fact that the play can be read on different levels and that, in the final analysis, the reader is free to resort to his own subjective interpretation and sensitivity. Indeed, the reader should have the same full freedom o f interpretation as the author had in the creation o f his work o f art. But what if the author is unwilling to leave his art to a free interpretation, as he is determined to convey a particular message, or have his work perceived in a specific spirit? Such was the case with Schiller's *Die Räuber,* which was prefixed by a four-page long commentary. Here Schiller clearly sets forth that his concern is with the innermost workings of the human soul, with characters in a crisis caused by extreme egotism and idealism, and the inability to reconcile their demands with their conscience. It is the imposition o f the moral ideal, on the one hand, and complete moral dissipation, on the other, which become the driving force of the play. In the preface, Schiller clearly spells out the demands he placed upon the dramatist and in doing so he reveals also the manner of his own intention: "Wer sich den Zweck vorgezeichnet hat, das Laster zu stürzen, und Religion, Moral und bürgerliche Gesetze an ihren Feinden zu rächen, ein solcher muß das Laster in seiner nackten Abscheulichkeit enthüllen und in seiner kolossalischen Größe vor das Auge der Menschen stellen..."5

Schiller expressed the hope that with his tragedy he has rendered no inconsiderable service to the cause of religion and morality and that he may justly claim for it a place among books of morality, for crime was met at last with the punishment it deserved and the lost one entered again the realm of the law, and virtue was triumphant. If this preface were taken into consideration more frequently, perhaps one would encounter a smaller spectrum of interpretations. But too frequently, it is not, and often the play is printed without this preface. True, Schiller himself omitted the preface from later editions, but initially it was meant to be an integral part o f the play.

 While the patriarch from Weimar dismissed it as a youthful outburst, the oracle from Jasnaja Poljana was forever an admirer o f the play. Imbued with the classical spirit o f harmony and restraint, Goethe, naturally, viewed *Die Räuber* as "Productionen genialer jugendlicher Ungeduld und

Unwillen über einen schweren Erziehungsdruck. "6 Yet, the seeming artistic weaknesses and discrepancies in the play, the exaggerated characters and implausible situations in which they find themselves, the naturalistic coarse rhetoric, which corresponds to the brutal violence of action, full o f horror and atrocities — all this brutality and bestiality was not in the least offensive to Tolstoj, the pacifist and propagator o f non-resistance to violence. On the contrary, like Schiller before him, Tolstoj at the height o f his moralizing period, violates in his art the principle o f pacifism and depicts extreme violence, only to have it serve both an aesthetic and a moral end.  It is precisely the proximity o f their thoughts and concepts, the Schillerian ideal of harmony among men and the Tolstojan sense o f brotherhood, which caused Tolstoj to postulate *Die Räuber* not merely as the highest form o f art, but as the highest form o f religious art.7

It is true that after his conversion, beginning with the publication o f his famous *Confession* (1882), not everyone accepted Tolstoj's criterion o f artistic values. Due to the religious ethical essence, which he believed was indispensable for true literature, Tolstoj's analyses and conclusions regarding certain literary works had become highly controversial. His aesthetic judgement is, o f course, bizarre when he condemns universally accepted masterpieces as bad art, including his own *War and Peace.* Goethe's *Faust II* was relegated to the realm of trifles, and in Shakespeare's plays he found no ethical tendency, only an exaltation o f kings and princes, and English ones at that.8 As to the rejection o f his own novels, it was never taken seriously. He could easily afford such a denial, especially since he continued to remain a prolific, supreme literary master, even after the 1880s. He merely added a strong dose o f ethics and morality to his otherwise purely aesthetic definition o f art.

Considering the fact that Tolstoj selected *Die Räuber* from among world literature as the work which best expressed his concept o f art, he left us but a few meagre entries in his writings regarding both the play and its author. Most commentaries deal only with the impact, i.e., *Wirkungsgeschichte*, and the enthusiasm with which he read the play on various occasions. By his own admission, we know that he read all o f Schiller's dramas and that he disliked only *Wallenstein.* But *Die Räuber* was singled out as the drama which made the most profound impression upon him during his youth.9 On November 1, 1853, he entered in his diary: "I was reading the biography o f Schiller written

142

by his sister-in-law. One notices the superficial view o f a sentimental lady about a great human being.... Too many domestic details have overshadowed the esteem he deserves."10 The biography in question is *Schillers Leben. Verfaßt aus Erinnerungen der Familie, seinen eigenen Briefen und den Nachrichten seines Freundes Körner* (1830) by Karoline von Wolzogen, which appeared serially in Russian in 1853. A year later, in the fall o f 1854, Tolstoj complained that he was not doing what he should and entered in his diary: "Instead o f reading *Die Räuber,* I could have written something m yself."11

A renewed interest in Schiller began with Tolstoj's preoccupation with aesthetics, which resulted in a number of articles over some fifteen years, and culminated in 1898 in his famous, albeit controversial treatise *What is Art?12* Although Schiller's writings on aesthetics were available to him in his own library, both in Russian and German, Tolstoj never made any direct reference to them. He was, however rereading Schiller's dramas beginning with *Don Carlos,* in February 1890.13 On February 16, 1898, Sophia Andreevna, his wife, entered in her diary: "Lev Nikolaevich read in the evening Schiller's *Die Räuber* and was delighted with it."14 This is further substantiated by V. F. Lazurskij, a tutor to Tolstoj's children, when he recorded in his memoirs o f 1895 that Tolstoj treasured also *Maria Stuart* and *Die Jungfrau von Orleans,* but above all preferred *Die Räuber,* about which he said: "And although everything is somewhat exaggerated it w ill remain for eternity — Karl Moor und Franz M oor."15

In rereading the world's classics for the purpose o f selecting some works which would correspond to what he considered true art, Tolstoj could point to only a few writers. When it was implied to him that to undertake such a task is like "emptying the sea with a spoon," he could only reply: "But there is not much to empty."16 Nonetheless, Tolstoj initially considered several of Schiller's dramas as representative of good art.17 But in the final version of *What is Art?,* Tolstoj had only chosen *Die Räuber,* which headed the list of other acceptable examples like V. Hugo's *Les Misérables,* Dickens' *A Tale o f Two Cities,* Dostoevskij's *Memoirs from the Dead House,* George E liot's *Adam Bede* and Stowe's *Uncle Tom's Cabin.* These are the factual data of Tolstoj's preoccupation with Schiller, which tell us very little as to why he had reserved such an exclusive place for *Die Räuber* in world literature. The fu ll answer can only be deduced from his aesthetic and ethical precepts, an indication of which can be derived already from the above selected works as they all reflect a deeply rooted edifying and moral sense.

However, in 1905, the centenary o f Schiller's death, Tolstoj was directly confronted with the question: What influence did Schiller have upon him?

This question was posed by the *Berliner Tageblatt* and the Viennese newspaper *Die Zeit,* both o f which had planned a special commemorative issue. Although Tolstoj had started to refresh his impression o f the author o f *Die Räuber* by reading in Schiller's *Sämtliche Werke* (1840), the posed question was never answered. Ill health prevented him from doing so. He wished, however, that he could dispatch a telegram saying simply" Schiller is alive, he has not died."18

Like Schiller, Tolstoj conceived himself as an educator o f mankind and, like him, he felt that art should serve in the establishment o f the ideals o f humanity. Having embraced the sermon on the Mount as the formulation o f his moral code, Tolstoj was forever guided by the precepts which would replace discord and violence with free accord, truth and brotherly love. Thus it was only natural that he should allocate to art an important function in the moral and spiritual regeneration o f mankind. In his long and earnest search for clarity and the relationship between aesthetics and ethics, Tolstoj came to the conclusion that in a talented artist there is always complete harmony between aesthetics and ethics. In fact, he maintained in 1896 that "aesthetics is an expression o f ethics ... i.e., art expresses those feelings which were experienced by the artist. If his feelings are noble and good, then his art w ill be noble and good and vice-versa. If the artist is a moral person, then his art w ill be m oral...."19

When Tolstoj finally pronounced his aesthetic theory in a systematic manner in the treatise *What is Art?,* he surprised his contemporaries, for it was a formulation without the traditional concept o f beauty. In the first part o f his treatise he reviewed the various aesthetic theories up to his own time and discovered no less than seventy different definitions of beauty — this diversity in itself was already proof to him that beauty itself cannot be the essence o f art.20 It is with regard to the idea o f beauty, which is the determining element in Schiller's concept o f art, that Tolstoj necessarily had to dissociate himself from the aesthetics o f the past. He neither attempted to define the elements o f beauty not did he believe in an objective principle of beauty. As far as the formal elements were concerned, Tolstoj demanded from the artist brevity, originality, exactness, clarity and simplicity; excellence of form was a prerequisite for all the art.

Although Tolstoj did not find an ally among the traditional aestheticians, he praised Schiller's efforts and singled him out along with Jean Paul and Lessing, as possessing that rare combination o f being at once a critic, theoretician and creator, who was able to fully translate his theories into living works o f art. Needless to say, Tolstoj considered himself one o f those

endowed with that rare combination21 and legitimately entitled to deal with aesthetics.

Unable to find accord with existing concepts o f art, Tolstoj provided his own definition which was complete and categorical.  According to Tolstoj, art is a human activity which consists in that the artist transmits feelings which he, the artist, has experienced. This had to be done by accepted means, through colour, lines, movement, sound and word, in such a manner that it infects others with identical feelings. Everything else which does not infect with a specific feeling is not genuine art, for it was mechanically produced, albeit skilfully, without the original experience, the source o f inspiration.22

Art is thus a communication o f feelings, which may be either morally good or morally bad.23 Tolstoj's gradation of art is based on the degree and the kind of feelings evoked by the subject o f art. In the realm o f good art, which is infused with a morally uplifting spirit, Tolstoj permits the depiction o f two kinds of feelings, and accordingly he postulates two kinds o f art. One category is art which transmits simple feelings, joy and pity, humour and tranquillity, feelings associated with daily life. The other category is religious art, the highest form o f art — "art transmitting feelings flowing from a religious perception o f our kinship with God and o f the brotherhood of man. "24

After repeated emphasis on the depiction o f feelings, which brings about a union of people through their common aesthetic experience, Tolstoj in his final formulation added a new dimension as to the subject matter suitable for the highest form o f religious art, and thereby provides greater accommodation for Schiller's drama. This statement, which is too frequently disregarded, permits now not only the depiction o f "positive feelings o f love o f God and one's neighbour," but also "negative feelings o f indignation and horror at violation o f love, which manifests itself chiefly in the form o f words...." Immediately following this pronouncement, Tolstoj states: " If I were asked to provide examples o f the highest form o f religious art ... in literature, I would have to name Schiller's *Die Räuber."25*

In essence then, Tolstoj defines good literary art as a form of communication, as an expression o f feeling experienced by the author; the experience must be unique, original and sincere, and should arouse the same feeling in the reading public. The ultimate aim must be an expression of feeling, a feeling of universal quality which leads to the fraternal union o f all men.  The aesthetic ideal, advanced by Tolstoj, which was to replace the old concept of beauty, is in reality identical w it his moral ideal. Aware, however, o f the difficulties of achieving this ideal, he insisted that art nonetheless should depict the ideal, it should be there like a lantern, always ahead o f us, showing us the way.

In perusing Tolstoj's later works, i.e., those after his conversion one w ill discover that even before the final formulation of his concept o f art, he produced stories and dramas which were totally in harmony with his newly found ideals.26 These works, most of which are based on Tolstoj's own experience, depict profound psychological torment and despair, brutality and violence and the ensuing process of purification and conversion.

Only in *Hadji Murat* (1912), Tolstoj's last masterpiece, is different; here there is no conversion, and none of the Tolstojan precepts are extolled.  In dethroning man as never before and in denouncing church and state and modem civilization as corrupt and hypocritical, *Hadji Murat* comes to bear a striking resemblance to *Die Räuber.*

The portrayal of the "violation of love," to arouse a feeling o f indignation and horror at man's behaviour, was the aim of the story. Tolstoj overtly expounds no moralizing view and depicts only violence, deceit and butchery, and people who, like huntsmen, inflict deadly blows upon those who merely desire to live and be free. The sadism reaches its climax when "Hadji Aga [once a friend of Hadji Murat] stepped on the back o f the corpse [Hadji Murat's], cut the head o ff with two blows and carefully rolled it away with his foot, so as not to soil his boots with blood."27 The tragedy o f this act lies not so much in cutting o ff the head, as in the phrase "and carefully rolled it away with his foot, so as not to soil his boots with blood." This is equal only to the romantic barbarism of Schiller's robbers, who relate their atrocities with a callous enjoyment and sadistic humour, as when an infant is thrown alive into the blazing flames with the words: "Armes Thiergen! sagt'ich, du verfrierst ja hier, und warfs in die Flamme. "2\*

It is that tragic finality, the glaring baseness which looms over the work of Tolstoj and Schiller, which makes it possible for these stories to serve, simultaneously, a specific aesthetic and ethical purpose. The underlying idea is precisely to arouse a feeling of indignation at man's behaviour. In this sense, their work conveys a feeling of horror similar to that evoked by Picasso's *Guernica.* Only in this spirit could Tolstoj conceive *Die Räuber* and elevate it to the acme o f good religious art.

146

Like Schiller, Tolstoj considered the drama the highest literary form and the most suitable manifestation of art through which the aesthetic experience could serve the advancement of humanity.  In his essay "About Shakespeare and the Drama" (1906), which reveals striking parallels to Schiller's "Die Schaubühne als moralische Anstalt betrachtet" (1784), Tolstoj reinforces his criterion of good dramatic literature and demands from the dramatist verisimilitude of action and language, originality and sincerity, infectiousness and the presentation of an important and moving theme. In applying his own theory of art to Shakespeare's dramas, Tolstoj provides us with an additional measure in determining, albeit indirectly, his preference for *Die Räuber.*

Although Tolstoj insists on the religious essence as an indispensable element o f dramatic literature, he did not advocate morality plays. Aware, however, that with his insistence on the religious content o f the drama he would be accused o f demanding "religious teaching, didacticism and tendentiousness," all of which are incompatible with true art, Tolstoj anticipates his critics by stating: "By religious content in a rt... I do not mean the direct teaching o f some religious truth in artistic guise and not an allegorical depiction o f those truths, but an expression of a specific outlook on life ... corresponding to the highest religious understanding, an outlook which was the impelling force to create the drama and which permeates the entire work without the author being aware of it. The permeation o f that specific and important outlook on life — a plea for the restoration o f humanity without preaching it — this Tolstoj perceived most vividly in Schiller's drama.

By including Schiller's dramas in the repertoire for the theatre o f the people, Tolstoj implied their educational quality.30 It is of course not surprising that, when Tolstoj was asked in his later years which drama in world literature he considered most important, Tolstoj answered: *"Die Räuber* by Schiller," and added: "The theatre needs that which is simple and powerful without any frills. "3'

In characterizing *Die Räuber* thus, Tolstoj once again affirms that the play is a composite o f all the elements of good art. Already the fact that Tolstoj considered Schiller a great human being presupposes that he would create only true dramatic literature, which in the opinion of the Russian writer is totally imbued with the religious essence. We may recall here Tolstoj's dictum that, if the artist's "feelings are noble and good, then his art w ill be noble and good." As to the sincerity of the feelings experienced by the author, we only need to recall Goethe, who viewed *Die Räuber* as the product o f Schiller's indignation against "einen schweren Erziehungsdruck." In his biographical account in the *Rheinische Thalia* (1784), Schiller tells us how he had to spend eight years, against his w ill in the military school where his plans and love for poetry were thwarted by the spirit o f absolutism.   It is this rebelliousness o f Karl Moor against the morality o f the social order, unwarranted and unmotivated as it may be within the play, that aroused Tolstoj's feelings, since it corresponded totally to his own indignation over the corrupting influence o f an irreligious society. What may appear exaggerated in "Karl Moor's declaration," to use Tolstoj's expression, was for the Russian writer the reality o f the day. The sim ilarity becomes obvious if one recalls how Tolstoj waged war against political and religious repression by the state, the deception by the church, and the abuses o f judicial and administrative systems.

True, in this sense Tolstoj conceived *Die Räuber* as the radical revolutionaries did, however, with a major different. Tolstoj relentlessly demanded a change in society, but only through religious striving, through a moral and spiritual regeneration. Like Schiller, Tolstoj believed firm ly that morality cannot be imposed, least o f all by force, and that it must come from within, through reeducation in how to be a human being again. The fact that Karl Moor surrenders to the authorities does not imply acceptance o f the prevailing moral order. His rebelliousness, however, and his ill-fated attempt to impose an ideal is both an arrogant usurpation o f divine rights, and at the same time an indication o f the necessity of propagating a new moral ideal of justice.33 Schiller does not yet speak of the ennoblement o f men through an aesthetic education, but there are more than glimpses o f his later ideas.  This is constantly reinforced through the atrocities o f the robbers, in contrast to the depiction o f Karl's noble character and humanity, and the harmonious existence in his childhood. In moments o f despair he is forever longing for that peace and harmony and exclaims: "O, ihr Tage des Friedens," "О all ihr Elysiumszenen meiner Kindheit!"34 It is this naive, innocent, idyllic existence, where the moral and sensual are in fu ll harmony, that foreshadows an ideal and ultimate goal o f man, a higher moral order.

In the interim, however, in the absence o f that ideal moral order, and so as to avoid the inevitable disaster to which one is doomed without any guidance, Schiller's play ultimately becomes a plea for trust in man's individual sense o f right and wrong. In appealing to the dictates o f conscience as a morally guiding force inherent in all man, even in a criminal like Franz, Schiller approaches Kant's Categorical Imperative. The frequent references to "Gott und Gewissen," to the "innere Tribunal"35 and the final victory o f the dictates o f the moral conscience, as embodied in Franz's suicide and Karl's voluntary resignation, bear testimony to this. Like Schiller, Tolstoj believed that man is neither totally bad nor totally good and this is the redeeming factor in their concept o f man. Tolstoj embraced Kant's Categorical Imperative and, like Schiller, he appealed to the conscience as a "moral regulator" of human behaviour.

 Whether rightly or wrongly, Tolstoj considered Schiller's *Die Räuber,* and especially the ideas incorporated in Karl's monologues, not only as an expression o f the feeling and experience o f its author, but a universal expression o f the time. Tolstoj maintained in his pedagogical writings that J. J. Rousseau was able to exert an enormous influence on his century, because in reacting against formalism and artificiality he expressed the spirit and feelings o f his fellow contemporaries. Himself an ardent disciple o f Rousseau, Tolstoj asserts further: "...and if only Rousseau alone had felt this — there would have been no romantic movement in literature, there would have been no universal conceptions to regenerate mankind, the declarations o f rights o f the type of Karl M oor."36

Just like Rousseau, Karl Moor became the voice o f mankind at a crucial moment as he expressed feelings about man and society which were in full harmony with his creator, and no less so with his Russian admirer. That Schiller aimed at an emotionally effective presentation, or what Tolstoj would

call infectiousness, and that he was extremely successful in transmitting those feelings in his first dramatic venture, is recorded in the frequently cited report o f an eyewitness who attended the play's first production in Mannheim: "Das Theater glich einem Irrenhaus, rollende Augen, geballte Fäuste, stampfende Füße, heisere Aufschreie im Zuschauerraum!  Es war eine allgemeine Auflösung wie im Chaos, aus dessen Nebeln eine neue Schöpfung hervorbricht. "37

I f this is a true account of the reaction to *Die Räuber*, and there is no reason not to accept it as such, then this report is of utmost significance, as it establishes the element of infectiousness in the play, which in turn aroused the audience, but which ultimately has its origin in the author. We have no evidence o f whether Tolstoj was aware o f this report or not. Had he been, he would have discovered in it a validation of one o f his primary premises, namely, that true art must transmit and arouse genuine feelings previously experienced by its creator. "The greater the infectiousness, the better the art, as art, irrespective of the merits of its content,"38 i.e., the greater the aesthetic experience, the more art fulfils its task and unifies people through that common aesthetic experience.

That this emotionally charged reaction, full of extremes ranging from despair and indignation to the point where strangers were falling into each other's arms, turned out to be an aesthetic experience o f the Tolstojan variety, which could have originated only from the highest form of "religious" art, i.e., art imbued with the idea of brotherhood, needs no further elaboration.

 Schiller in fact demonstrates in practice what later becomes a theoretical presentation in his *Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen.* No wonder, the wise man from Jasnaja Poljana selected the drama as a practical illustration o f what he considered good religious art. He preferred *Die Räuber* over all other plays by Schiller, because it was not the product of thinking, it was an emotional release, a spontaneous outpouring of feelings full o f natural vitality, at times prim itive, impulsive savagery, qualities with which Tolstoj loved to endow the natural man in his own fiction. Above all, he admired Karl Moor, his strength and vitality, the tenacity and idealism of his action, misguided as it may have been. These aspects, coupled with a fiery, explosive and emotional language,39 were most appealing to the irrational Tolstoj. However, Tolstoj, the pacifist and rationalist, who forever kept vigilance over that other side, the

author o f *The Kingdom o f Heaven Is Within Us,* who could have used Karl M oor's declaration, "Ich bin mein Himmel und meine Hölle,"40 as the motto o f his own inner torment and conflict, also discovered in *Die Räuber* a dual confirmation o f his concept of art.

It is precisely for this reason, the depiction of violence which culminated in the mercy-killing of Amalia generating "negative feelings o f indignation and horror at man's behaviour, the violation o f love," on the one hand, and on the other, the victory o f the voice o f conscience, the "positive feelings of love o f God and one's neighbour,"41 that Tolstoj became fascinated with Schiller's play. In the free moral act of resignation by Karl, Tolstoj saw the triumph o f his highest aspiration — the triumph o f love for God and for our fellow man. (God was conceived by Tolstoj as spirit, as love, as the moral law inside us, and the man called Jesus was but the incarnation o f moral behaviour.) The entire play, and especially the fall and rise o f Karl Moor, is but the same theme of Tolstoj's own work after his conversion. It is in the eyes o f Tolstoj, as it is for Schiller, a vindication of religion and morality.42

However meagre the direct evidence offered by Tolstoj regarding the artistic merits o f *Die Räuber,* we know that he read Schiller's work several times throughout his life with an ever increasing enthusiasm; he attached timelessness and universality to the play and called it direct and powerful. Karl Moor, the embodiment of Schillerian idealism, who evoked both pity and love, was, in spite o f some exaggeration, created for posterity. However, the ultimate evidence of admiration o f the play was expressed when it was presented as exemplary of the highest form of art, and that by no lesser an artist than Tolstoj. Moreover, Tolstoj came to this conclusion not as the result o f a casual mood or superficial attitude, but through an intense sifting and repeated effort over many years, to find in world literature that work o f art which harmonized with his own aesthetic concepts.

#### NOTES

1. J. Veselovskij, "Shiller как vdokhnovitel' russkikh pisatelej," *Russ kaja mysi'* 2 (1906) 15. A ll translations from the Russian are mine.

2. Here is only a selection: Otto Peter Peterson, *Schiller in Rußland: 1785- 1805* (New York: Bruderhausen 1934); Otto Peter Peterson, *Schiller und die russischen Dichter und Denker des 19. Jahrhunderts: 1805-1881* (New York: Ebda 1939); C. E. Passage, "The Influence of Schiller in Russia, 1800-1840,"

*The American Slavic and East European Review* 5 (1946) 111-37; Rudolf Fischer, *Schillers Widerhall in der russischen Literatur* (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1958); Roman Samarin, "Schiller im Urteil der russischen K ritik ," *Weimarer Beiträge* 1 (1956) 18-31; D m itrij Tschizewskij, "Schiller in Rußland," *Ruperto Carola* 27 (1960) 111-20; Edmund K. Kostka, *Schiller in Russian Literature* (Philadelphia: University o f Pennsylvania Press 1965); Hans-Bernd Harder, *Schiller in Rußland: Materialien zu einer Wirkungsgeschichte, 1780-1814* (Bad Homburg: Verlag Gehlen 1969). Compare also: R. J. Danilevskij, "Shiller i stanovlenie russkogo romantizma," *Rannie romanticheskie vejanija* (Leningrad: 1972) 3-95.

3. Helmut Koopmann, *Friedrich Schiller, I: 1759-1794* (Stuttgart: J. B. Metzlerische Verlagsbuchhandlung 1966) 10.

4. For various interpretations o f Schiller's *Die Räuber* see: H. Koopmann, *Friedrich Schiller,* /, 4-19, and H. Koopmann, *Schiller-Forschung 1970-1980: Ein Bericht* (Marbach: Deutsche Schillergesellschaft 1982) 54-66. The degree to which Schiller is still revered in the Soviet Union can be seen from the new translations o f his works. Next to the voluminous edition o f Schiller's work edited by N. N. B il'mont and R. M. Samarin in 1955, there appeared four different translations o f *Die Räuber* between 1950 and 1975.

5. *Schillers Werke: Nationalausgabe 111* (Weimar: Hermann Böhlau Nachfolger 1953) 5; "Whosoever proposes to discourage vice and to vindicate religion, morality and social order against their enemies, must unveil crime in all its deformity and place it before the eyes o f men in its colossal magnitude. " A ll translations from the German are mine.

6. Compare Koopmann, *Friedrich Schiller, I,* 15; "a product o f ingenious youthful impatience, and as an indignation against a difficult and intense upbringing."

7. In the numerous studies dealing with Schiller in Russia, Tolstoj is hardly linked with Schiller. The reason is simply the fact that other writers like Zhukovskij, Lermontov, Gertsen, I. Turgenev, Goncharov and Dostoevskij, to mention only a few, provided much more substantial material for scholars, either through translation o f his works or through prolonged commentaries thereof, while Tolstoj was content with only a few entries in his diaries and his theoretical writings, which nevertheless were o f utmost importance.

8. L. N. Tolstoj, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij,* 90 vols. (Moskva: 1928-58) X X X , 349, 378-79. D. M. Makovitskij, "Jasnopoljanskie zapiski," *Literatumoe nasledstvo* 90 (Moskva: 1979) I, 134.

9. P. I. Biijukov, *Biogrāfijā L 'va Nikolaevicha Tolstogo* I (Petrograd: 1923) 60; Tolstoj, XXXV, 558.

10. Tolstoj, X LV I, 186, 439-40.

11. Tolstoj, X L V II, 22.

12. For details and publication o f these works see Tolstoj, XXX.

13. S. A. Tolstaja, *Dnevniki,* 2 vols. (Moskva: 1978) I, 151, 154, 551, 558.

14. Tolstaja, I, 356.

15. "Dnevnik V. F. Lazurskogo," *Literatumoe nasledstvo* 37-38 (Moskva: 1939) 487.

16. Ibid., 459.

17. Tolstoj, XXX, 413-14, 548.

18. Makovitskij, 235 , 249-50, 510. For Tolstoj's library holdings see: *Biblioteka L 'va Nikolaevicha Tolstogo v Jasno j Poljane* (Moskva: 1972).

19. K. Lomunov, *Estetika L 'va Tolstogo* (Moskva: 1972) 122; Tolstoj, LXXX, 119.

20. Tolstoj, XXX, 41-61. In preparing his treatise, especially in the part dealing with the survey o f various aesthetic views, Tolstoj relied heavily on Max Schasler, *Kritische Geschichte der Aesthetik* (1872), Eugène Véron, *L 'Esthétique* (1878), W. A. Knight, *Philosophy o f the Beautiful* (1889), John Todhunter, *Theory o f the Beautiful* (1872), R. Kralik, *Weltschönheit: Versuch einer allgemeinen Aesthetik* (1880), and Hippolyte Taine, *Philosophie de l 'art* (1865).

21. Lomunov, 11.

22. Tolstoj, XXX, 149.

23. Tolstoj, XXX, 64-68.

24. Tolstoj, XXX, 159.

25. Tolstoj, XXX, 159-60.

26.

27. Tolstoj, XXV, 117.

28. *Schillers Werke* ІП, 64.

29. Tolstoj, XXXV, 267.

30. Lomunov, 320-22.

31. V. E. Vatsuro, et. al., eds., *L. N. Tolstoj v vospominanijakh sovremennikov* II (Moskva: 1978) 92.

32. Compare the introduction (by the editor) to *Die Räuber* in *Schillers Werke* III, vii-ix.

33. F. W. Kaufmann, *Schiller: Poet o f Philosophical Idealism* (Oberlin: OH: Academy Press, 1942) 31.

34. *Schillers Werke* III, 80; "Oh, those days o f peace," "Oh, all those heavenly days o f my childhood!"

35. *Schillers Werke* III, 92-93, 122; "God and conscience," "the inner tribunal or judgement."

36. Tolstoj, V III, 329.

37. See Koopmann, *Friedrich Schiller,* I, 14. "The theatre was like a madhouse, rolling eyes, clenched fists, stamping feet, hoarse outcries from the audience. Strangers fell sobbing into one another's arms; women staggered to the door, nearly fainting. There was a general confusion like a chaos, out of whose mists a new creation was about to break forth."

154

### X. Tolstoj and the Evangelical Revival Among Russian Aristocracy

The spiritual crisis experienced by Tolstoj between 1869 and 1877 was characterized by a continuous religious search which led him to intense studies o f Western Protestantism and the Scriptures. His studies o f the works o f Protestant theologians like H. Zschokke, E. Renan, D. F. Strauss and his preoccupation with comparative religion in general caused him to emerge from this crisis with sincere and firm religious convictions which had more in common with Protestantism than Orthodoxy. The New Testament became the ethical guiding force through which mankind could arrive at a pure and true rational religion. He visualized and advocated a universal church in which cult and priest, dogma and denomination have outlived their usefulness.1

In reviewing Tolstoj's spiritual development, one is struck by its overwhelming similarity to the one culminating in the religious revival among the Russian aristocracy, which carried a distinct Evangelical expression. This revival, initiated by the English Lord Radstock in 1874 in the drawing rooms o f St. Petersburg, reached staggering proportions within a short time. Colonel o f the Guards, V. A. Pashkov, one of the wealthiest men o f Russia and an ardent follower o f Lord Radstock, became the principle leader and spokesman o f the new teaching. Thus the movement was known both as Radstockism and Pashkovism. Since the task was the revival of religion and morality, the aristocratic Evangelicals founded the Society for the Encouragement o f Spiritual and Ethical Reading. Apart from distributing the Bible and religious tracts, the Society held regular Bible readings and prayer meetings until such meetings were prohibited in 1884. Dostoevskij, who attended some o f Radstock's services, is rather critical of the English Lord, but he admitted to others that "he performs miracles over human hearts; people cling to him; many are astounded: they are looking for the poor, in order to bestow benefits upon them as quickly as possible; they are almost ready to give away their fortunes."2 Like Tolstoj, the members of the new religious revival displayed a continuous interest not only in religious and moral problems but also in social ones.  Tolstoj's view, which he expressed as early as 1857 in a letter to his aunt, A. A. Tolstaja, could have been uttered by any of the Radstock followers: "I could fast all my life and I could pray a whole day in my room, I can also read the Scriptures and come to the conclusion that all this is very important; but to attend church, stand there and listen to the misunderstood and incomprehensible prayers, to look at the priest and the mixed crowd, this is

for me absolutely impossible."3

The dissenting declaration was derived from the same rationalistic approval of religion as that of many of his predecessors of Western Europe. Both the Radstockists and Tolstoj came to recognize the superfluousness o f organized churches and the priestly hierarchy not only in Orthodoxy but also in any other denomination, whether Catholic or Protestant. But unlike the Radstockists, who believed in the atoning death of Jesus Christ, Tolstoj rejected the divinity of Christ and reduced the precept o f the Gospel to a mere ethical system.

There is no specific documentary evidence available regarding Tolstoj' s acquaintance with Radstockism in the first years after its emergence in the Russian capital. It is inconceivable, however, that the widespread news o f the religious revival among his own class escaped his attention, even though at the time he resided on his estate in the Province of Tula. Commencing with 1876, Tolstoj learned of Radstockism from his aunt A. A. Tolstaja and directly from several members of the movement. Among them was his friend Count A. P. Bobrinskij and the foreign preachers Dr. Baedeker and V. A. Ditman. An important link between Tolstoj and the Radstockists was Tolstoj's closest associate, V. A. Chertkov, whose relatives, including his mother, were ardent adherents to the new teaching. Tolstoj responded to Radstockism in several o f his literary works, including *Anna Karenina* and *Resurrection,* and on numerous occasions in his diaries and letters.

Tolstoj's first reference to the new teaching reveals the impression which Bobrinskij with his Radstockist views had made upon the great author. Bobrinskij, Colonel of the Corps of Nobles and Minister o f Transportation, a man o f colossal intellect and friend of Radstock, underwent a similar metamorphosis as Tolstoj. Having recognized in Jesus Christ the living God and the solution to men's problems, Bobrinskij devoted his life and wealth between 1874 and his death in 1894 to the cause o f the Evangelical movement. As a notable figure in this movement, he turned his estates and surrounding areas into centres not only for the spreading of the Gospel, but first and foremost for social and agricultural improvements. He became the living example of the repentant Russian nobleman, Bobrinskij's ardent nature may be gauged by his visits to Tolstoj and their ensuing religious discussions. It is said that the two men on one occasion spent eight hours on end until six in the morning absorbed in the supreme question o f the revelation o f God in Christ.4 The impressions gained after a meeting of this kind are set forth by Tolstoj in a letter to Prince S. S. Urusov dated February 1876: "Recently I was visited by Bobrinskij, Aleksej Pavlovich. He is a remarkable person, and

as if on purpose our conversation turned to religion. He is an ardent believer and his words had the same effect on me as did yours. They provoked an envy o f that greatness and peace which you possess."5 A month later, in March o f 1876, at the zenith o f his religious quest, he once more expresses his admiration o f Bobrinskij's faith and sincerity in a letter to his aunt, A. A. Tolstaja, lady in waiting to the Empress: "A t no time has anyone spoken to me so well about faith than Bobrinskij. He cannot be contradicted, because he does not set out to prove anything; he merely asserts that he believes, and one feels that he is happier than those who do not possess his faith. Moreover, one senses that his happiness o f faith cannot be acquired through the intellect but only through a miracle. "6

Intrigued by the religious revival and its impact on his friend Bobrinskij, Tolstoj wished to know more about the initiator, Lord Radstock, and asked his aunt: "Do you know Radstock? What impression did he make upon you?"7 Countess Tolstaja's answer to her nephew in March 1876 was an extensive account o f Radstock and his followers in St. Petersburg. Her characterization o f the Englishman, which contains both praise and criticism seems to be correct:

I have known Radstock quite well for the last three years, and I like him very much because of his extraordinary integrity and sincere love. He is fully devoted to a single cause and follows his path without turning left or right. The words o f Apostle Paul can almost be applied to him: "I do not wish to know anything but the crucified Christ." I say "almost" because in wisdom and thoughtfulness he is not only below Apostle Paul but also below many other less significant teachers o f the church. He is a dear and kind sectarian who does not understand everything and who in his naiveté fails to see in how many aspects he deviates from the Gospel.  But where are these sudden and total conversions? Are there many examples if we exclude Apostle Paul, the chosen working tool o f God? He talks often o f such cases ... in which the conversion took place in about an hour's time. This is his weak point. But then, what devotion to Christ, what warmth, what immeasurable sincerity! His message resounded here like a bell, and he

awakened many who before never thought o f Christ and their salvation. But out o f others he made complete spiritual caricatures, which is incidentally not his fault. Both the praise and the scorn which he received here [in St. Petersburg] were much too excessive. His public preaching I seldom attended, but I preferred to talk to him alone or in a small circle o f friends, where I comforted myself in his warm-heartedness, thereby escaping all disputes on dogmatic questions, I think I was one o f the few who judged him objectively. Bobrinskij is his disciple. Not long ago I read in a long letter to Zhemchuzhnikov the confession o f his faith. I admired it and rejoiced over his sincerity and warmth. May God grant him to stay on his path, a path which is dangerous if one deviates from its humbleness! Herein lies the danger for these gentry who immediately become teachers.\*

Countess Tolstaja's description o f Radstock is decisive in the formulation o f Tolstoj's concept of the English preacher. Having himself experienced an enormous psychological conflict before arriving at his own religious system, Tolstoj could hardly remain objective toward a preacher who believed in "instant salvation," nor could he appreciate his piety, one o f the causes o f his success.9 Here is Tolstoj's answer to the Countess in A pril 1876: "How perfectly well you have described Radstock. Without having seen the original, one feels that he resembles a comical figure...." The objectivity employed by his kind and pious aunt in the description o f Radstock vanishes; Tolstoj creates his own image — the comical preacher, if one takes only the negative parts from the Countess' description. He is in accord with Tolstaja, however, when he continues:

I was also happy about your opinion (if I understood you correctly) that instantaneous conversion does not occur at all or but rarely and that prior to it one has to undergo pain and tortures. I am happy to think about this because I myself suffered and went through agony, and deep in my heart I know that this suffering and agony is the best o f all my achievements in this world. And this achievement needs to be rewarded — and if it is not peace through faith, the consciousness o f this effort is a reward in itself. But the theory of the grace o f God which descends upon men in an English Club or in a meeting o f shareholders seems to me always not only stupid, but also immoral.10

Such was Tolstoj's reaction to Radstockism in 1876 while he was still in the process o f formulating his own religious faith. Indeed, at the time, he was still unable to tell Countess Tolstaja in what he actually believed, adding that it may seem "strange and terrifying, but it is not anything which is being taught by the church." He continues, however: "I not only despise and detest unbelief but also believe there is no possibility to live without faith and even less to die without it. And so I am gradually building my own religious system. Although my concepts are firm , they are neither very determinable nor consolatory."11

In this Faustian condition and with a dubious concept of the new religious revival in St. Petersburg, Tolstoj proceeded to portray Radstockism in the novel *Anna Karenina,* a work in which all the events described are nearly contemporary with the writing of the novel.12 The story is placed in the winter o f 1874 through the summer of 1876; the actual publication lasted from 1875 to 1877, i.e., the beginning of the religious revival in the Radstockism fashion. Although the novel contains no direct references to Radstock, it is obvious that Tolstoj had him in mind when he deals briefly with the English missionary, Sir John, in the following dialogue between Princess Betsy and Anna Karenina (Part II, Chpt. 7). Anna: "I have just been at Countess Lidija Ivanovna's. I stayed there longer than I had intended. Sir John was there. A very interesting man." Princess Betsy: "Oh, he is the missionary?" Anna: "Yes, he was telling us about life in India. It was very interesting...." Princess Betsy: "Sir John! Yes, Sir John. I have seen him. He talks well. Miss Vlaseva is completely infatuated with him." This noncommittal attitude o f Tolstoj toward the missionary may be due to lack o f specific knowledge of the Englishman, i.e., Radstock and his teaching, at the time between January and February o f 1875, when he wrote the dialogue quoted above.13

In discussing St. Petersburg high society Tolstoj refers in the novel to a variety o f unorthodox religious views. He mentions Spiritualism (Part I, Chpt. 14) and the "Little Sisters," a philanthropic, religious and patriotic society as well as "a circle o f elderly, plain, virtuous and religious women and clever, learned and ambitious men," the so-called "Conscience of the St. Petersburg Society," the leading light o f which was Countess Lidija Ivanovna (Part I, Chpt. 32; Part II, Chpt. 4). Tolstoj pays considerable attention to the pietisticmystic current represented by Madame Stahl, her niece Aline, and the adopted daughter Varenka. To this new religion even Kitty Shcherbatskaja had been temporarily converted by Varenka. In the words of the narrator,

it was revealed to her [Kitty] that besides the instinctive life to

which she had given herself up till now, there was a spiritual life. This life was disclosed in religion, but it was a religion that had nothing in common with the religion that Kitty had known since childhood and which had found its expression in morning and evening mass at the "Widow's Home," where you met everyone, and in learning Old Church Slavonic texts with the priest: this was an exalted, mystical religion connected with a series o f beautiful thoughts and feelings in which one could not only believe, because one was ordered to, but which one could love.

K itty became so strongly influenced by Varenka that she began to avoid her high society acquaintances and to imitate Varenka's activities, thus dreaming o f a future in which she would seek out those who were unhappy and needy, to distribute Gospels, and to read the Gospel to the sick, the criminals, and the dying (Part II, Chpt. 33). Although these activities are reminiscent o f those o f the Radstockists, the emphasis on the pietistic-mystical current recalls more the period o f Alexander I as presented in *War and Peace.* In describing these religious movements Tolstoj remains a mere reporter o f his time and does not yet pass judgement. It was not until Part V, Chapters 22-23, and Part V II, Chapters 21-22, that Tolstoj developed fully the Radstockist viewpoint and takes issue with it.

Beginning with Part V, Chapter 22 in the novel, the Radstockist belief is represented by Countess Lidija Ivanovna and Karenin. While the religious views of these two characters were hitherto presented ambiguously, they now begin to assume definite characteristics. Moreover, as Lidija Ivanovna and Karenin emerge as the apostles of the new teaching, Tolstoj draws them with a much more critical pen than in the previous chapters and in the earlier versions o f the novel.14 The embodiment of the worst possible manifestation o f Radstockism in the two most unpleasant figures in the novel is already an indication o f Tolstoj's negative attitude toward the Radstockist teaching. It is important to point out that Tolstoj began with his literary presentation o f Radstockism (Part V, Chpt. 22) either in November or December o f 1876, after a long interval of some eight months during which he was preoccupied with his own religious philosophical problems.15 Evidence shows further that during this period from March to November of 1876 he acquired also a detailed knowledge o f the Radstockists' teaching, which in turn found its reflection in the novel. Tolstoj's information stems in large part from Count Bobrinskij and Countess Tolstaja. There exists also the likelihood that he could have been acquainted with the works on Radstockism by Leskov and

Meshcherskij, all o f which had appeared in print by the fall o f 1876.16 It is also possible that Tolstoj had read Dostoevskij's account on Radstock, which was published in March o f 1876. Judging, however, from the similarity between the "spiritual caricatures" which Countess Tolstaja had described for her nephew and Tolstoj's Lidija Ivanovna and Karenin, one may conclude that the Countess contributed considerably to the literary creation o f Tolstoj's own "spiritual caricatures."17

Tolstoj had Karenin succumb to the Radstockist creed at the moment o f his lowest psychological ebb. Hopelessly deserted by his wife, ridiculed and despised, disgraced and in a state of isolation in his grief, he realized that he is no longer capable o f continuing the unequal struggle. At that hour o f lonely despair, when Karenin would have welcomed any consolation, Countess Lidija Ivanovna appeared and assured him of her friendship, urging him, however, to find support in love, "the love that He [Christ] has bequeathed to us.... It is in Him alone that we shall find peace, solace, salvation and love. " Though in the past Karenin rejected the new "ecstatic mystical mood," he was now carried away with it and found pleasure in listening to this exalted message. Following this scene, Tolstoj expounds on the new religion and its followers:

Lidija Ivanovna's help was extremely effective: she gave Karenin moral support by making him conscious of her love and respect... and especially by almost converting him to Christianity ... that is, she converted him from an apathetic and indifferent believer into an ardent and firm follower of the new interpretation o f the Christian doctrine, which had been spreading recently in Petersburg. It was not difficult for Karenin to be persuaded by the new views.  He saw nothing impossible or incongruous in the notion that death, which exists for the unbeliever, did not exist for him; and that, since he was in possession o f complete faith, the extent o f which he himself was the judge, there existed no sin in his soul.... He was already experiencing complete salvation here on earth (Part V, Chpt. 22).

In an earlier manuscript o f Part V, Chapter 33, Tolstoj devotes much more space to the new teaching and to its fallacy. He points out that the essence of

Russian Christianity is love, good deeds, selflessness and above all the striving to live the life o f Christ, while the essence of Radstockism is the belief in the atoning death of Jesus Christ through whom alone man can reach salvation.18 Tolstoj's rejection of such a concept is obvious. In the final version o f the novel he has even Karenin recognize the error and shallowness o f his faith. But in his humiliation it was necessary for Karenin to reach that height, even though contrived, from which he, despised by all, could despise others. Such are the reasons, Tolstoj tells us, why Karenin "clung to his pseudo-salvation as though it were true salvation." Throughout the novel Tolstoj is apprehensive lest the doctrine of justification by faith breed hypocrisy and unkindness. He illustrates this in the behaviour o f Lidija Ivanovna and Karenin toward Anna. One o f the most inhuman acts is committed by them when they refuse Anna permission to see her son. Lidija Ivanovna begs Anna in a letter to take her husband's refusal "in the spirit o f Christian love." To this the narrator merely adds: This letter achieved the secret purpose which Countess Lidija Ivanovna had concealed even from herself. It hurt Anna to the depth of her soul" (Part V, Chpt. 25).

The Radstockist doctrine of justification by faith is once more debated in Part V II, Chapters 21-22. This time Tolstoj abandoned the descriptive method in favour o f the more dramatic presentation whereby Count Bezzubov (Landau), Lidija Ivanovna, and Karenin represent the new teaching, while Oblonskij, the outsider, is used to express the adverse view o f Tolstoj: The conversation on religion in Lidija Ivanovna's drawing-room grows more intense when the Countess ascertains that a true believer has no sin — the sin has already been expiated. Remembering his catechism, Oblonskij was provoked to state: "Yes, but faith without works is dead." This notion is immediately rejected: "There it is, from the Epistle of St. James," Karenin said to the Countess, reproachfully implying that this topic had been discussed more than once. "How much harm had been done by a false interpretation o f that passage! Nothing repels people more from faith than such a fallacious interpretation. '1 have no good works and therefore I cannot believe,' and yet there is no place where this is said. It is just the reverse." "To labour for God with works, to save one's soul by fasting," the Countess added with an expression of contempt, "those are the notions of our monks...." "We are saved by Christ who suffered for us. We are saved by faith," Karenin added approvingly. In support o f her views Lidija Ivanovna produced an English book, *Safe and Happy or Under the Wing* (seemingly invented by the author), in which is described how joy and bliss are derived from faith (Part V II, Chpt. 22).

The practical result o f this "true faith" is illustrated by Lidija Ivanovna when she relates the misfortune o f Marie Sanin, who had lost her only child ־ — "She was in despair. And what do you think?  Here is the happiness given by faith." The thought that Marie Sanin is glad her child is dead left Oblonskij stunned and disgusted, no doubt a feeling shared by Tolstoj and by the reader o f the novel.

In presenting this final episode, without any polemical discussion or counter argument, Tolstoj the artist masterfully discredits the doctrine of justification by faith, that is, if the strange behaviour o f the Radstockists was indeed the result o f the new teaching.  The acceptance o f the doctrine o f "easy salvation" could not induce good works nor any striving toward an ethical and moral life; instead, it deprives one o f all perspective on human feelings.  It is unfortunate, however, that the uninformed reader o f the novel is left with the impression o f Karenin and Lidija Ivanovna as true representatives of the entire new religious movement. Tolstoj does not portray the noble spirit of Radstockism, o f which Countess Tolstaja spoke and which was recognized even by the Orthodox Dostoevskij. Where are their philanthropic activities and their sincere help to the needy? Where is Lord Radstock himself or Count Bobrinskij, about whose faith even Tolstoj had marvelled? It would seem that Tolstoj was not concerned with all the phases o f Radstockism. He had set out to portray the worst possible features o f the new teaching, and consequently it is neither a true nor a complete picture o f the religious revival in the Capital. It is, however, a true portrayal o f those followers who did not understand the essence of Radstockism and who, with their distorted concepts, proceeded to convert others. The confirmation o f this we find in a letter by Countess Tolstaja. After reading Part V II o f the novel, she wrote to Tolstoj in May of 1877:

... and yesterday evening at the Empress's we read the April issue o f *The Russian Messenger,* i.e., the text to the last part o f *Anna Karenina,* and everyone admired it and marvelled, *how well and true you have depicted the type o f those followers and adorers o f Radstock, who without understanding the essence o f his teaching* (which is not even fully formulated), *have distorted themselves and*

164

# *religion to the highest degree* [italics mine].19

This letter has two-fold importance. It shows that Tolstoj's representatives o f the new teaching constitute only a fraction o f the entire religious movement, namely, those who misunderstood and distorted Radstock's original message, and second, that what Oblonskij witnessed and heard in the home o f Lidija Ivanovna (Part V II, Chpt. 21-22) had nothing to do with a "spiritual séance," as is frequently assumed,20 but was, as Countess Tolstaja observed, simply a gathering o f Radstock followers. Tolstoj referred to Radstockism in the novel only as the "new teaching," without ever mentioning its actual name.

Tolstoj's criticism o f the doctrine o f justification by faith is entirely within the Orthodox tradition. His deliberate and severe slander o f the Radstockist teaching in the novel may have been the result o f Tolstoj's temporary return to the church o f his forefathers. It was precisely in 1877, the year in which he completed *Anna Karenina*, that he, as never before, had attempted to accept the Orthodox teaching; he prayed, attended mass every day, observed a rigid fast and was a frequent visitor to Russia's Holy Centres, the monasteries. The forceful attempt, however, to find peace and the meaning o f life in the organized church was soon abandoned. Subsequently, as he returned to the Gospel and to its ethics in the formulation o f his religious system, he did not select the Epistle o f St. Paul with its teaching o f salvation by faith as the basis o f his creed, but proceeded from the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 7,21) and the Epistle o f St. James (2, 14-18). Herein lies the essence of Tolstoj's departure not only from Radstockism, but from any other creed which was based on St. Paul's epistle, which meant Protestantism as a whole, even though the great writer himself was permeated with the Protestant spirit.21 The *sola fide* teaching o f Radstockism had no place in his religious system, for with Tolstoj there existed only one path to God: the ethical consciousness. Mankind needs post signs and teachers to reach God and live the life o f God; Christ, however, is only the most exalted teacher, neither an intermediary nor a bestower o f free grace as conceived by the Radstockists.22 The doctrine o f free grace continued to preoccupy Tolstoj also after the 1880's. We find it mostly in his religious writings, which reveal a critical attitude. Only once does he show an appreciation o f the Pauline teaching o f salvation by faith as a prerequisite to the doing o f good work, and as a g ift which provides the freedom and capacity to perform the good.23 In May 1884 he entered in his diary: "I am reading St. Augustine.... I thought a great deal about the teaching o f atonement o f Paul, Augustine, Luther, Radstock the consciousness of one's own weakness and absence o f struggle — and came

to the conclusion that it has great significance."24 Nonetheless, Tolstoj the rationalist could not reconcile the concept o f salvation by faith with his own views. Repeatedly, he emphasized that the new teaching demanded no moral and ethical change in the individual; it creates no incentive to do good work in people who are already saved through the atoning death o f Jesus Christ. Radstock's success among the aristocrats, he believes, is due to the teaching o f the concept of free grace, which in reality permitted them to continue their former way o f life, frivolous though it may have been. The question why Radstock had such success in high society is answered in a notebook entry in 1891: "They agree to everything. They attend church and visit the poor, but they do not change their life ...." We find a revised answer to the same question in the diary entry o f July 1891: "Because one does not demand a change o f their [the Radstockists'] own life, the falseness o f which is not admitted and because one does not demand the renunciation of force, of property and o f the Princes o f this world."25 This statement is not only a simplification o f the teaching o f Radstockism, but also demonstrably utterly incorrect, for it mentions neither the prevailing Christian spirit which it provoked, nor its practical consequences. Seemingly, the great humanitarian, the defender o f freedom o f conscience, could not overcome the prejudice that any serious benevolent movement which emanated from his own class could be more than a fashion. In this respect, Tolstoj, who never observed the Radstockists in action, is o f a different opinion from his contemporary Dostoevskij, who associated closely with the revivalists in the Capital and was able to state that Radstock "produced extraordinary transformations and inspired in the hearts o f his followers magnanimous feelings."26

During the 1800's, Tolstoj's experienced an increasingly direct contact with followers o f the new teaching both from among the aristocracy and from the common people, especially the so-called "Bible distributors." He even attended a prayer meeting in Moscow which was presided over by the foreign preacher Ditman.27 Here is what he stated in his diary in May 1884: "In the afternoon Orlov arrived. With him I went to the Somovs. Ditman was preaching.... Some o f it was good. But hypocritical. I left the meeting."28 Nevertheless, this experience was to serve him later in the description o f the Radstockist meeting in his novel *Resurrection.*  Among the revivalists whom Tolstoj met were such prominent personalities as E. I. Shuvalova, wife of the Chief of Gendarmes,

M . V. Sergeevskaja, a descendant of the poet Pushkin, and A. I. Peuker, editor o f the *Russian Workman,* a religious-ethical journal in the spirit o f Radstockism.29 Tolstoj,s acquaintance with Chertkov in 1883 was o f monumental importance in the dissemination of Tolstojism both abroad and in Russia. He translated and published Tolstoj's works an together they founded "The Intermediary" in 1885, a publishing concern which provided inexpensive, moralizing reading material for the people, a venture which had been carried on since 1876 by the Radstockist Society for the Encouragement o f Spiritual and Ethical Reading. Chertkov became Tolstoj's most trusted friend and loyal disciple. An aristocrat, whose family had intimate connection at court, Chertkov grew up in an intense Radstockist atmosphere, the spirit o f which he retained as an officer o f the Guard as demonstrated by his Gospel reading to sick and wounded soldiers. Inspired by the philanthropic activities o f the followers o f Radstock and the desire to be o f greater help to the needy, the twenty-seven-year-old Chertkov abandoned his m ilitary career and with it the potential post o f adjutant to the Emperor, and in 1881 settled at his parents' estate, in a village of some 5000 inhabitants. Here he began to alleviate the plight o f the peasants. On a non-profit basis he built stores, schools, a library, a tea-room, and set up a professional training-school. In all these undertakings he himself was actively engaged, living a life o f privation and displaying a contempt for material riches to the point that he invited the displeasure of the neighbouring gentry.30 We are reminded of Tolstoj's renunciation of possessions and his teaching o f "Christian Communism," a teaching at which Chertkov arrived independently of Tolstoj. Indeed, it was not difficult for Chertkov to take the road toward Tolstojism as the principle o f Radstockism had led to the same practical expression.

Although Chertkov became a dogmatic follower o f Tolstojism and was bemoaned by his Radstockist relatives for having left Christianity, he never severed his contact with the movement and always came to its defence, as he did, indeed, in any case of religious persecution. Chertkov's letters to Tolstoj contain numerous references to the religious revival; he supplied the "grand old man" from Jasnaja Poljana with detailed information regarding the condition of the movement, particularly during the period o f severe persecution in the 1880's. Horrified at the expulsion o f the two principal Radstockists, Pashkov and K orff from Russia in 1884 for their unorthodox activities, Chertkov writes to Tolstoj:

Having returned to St. Petersburg, I became disgusted at the news that Pashkov and his coreligionist K orff are being expelled from

Russia.... I am not upset at the government's behaviour which always applies the principle o f force, but I am disgusted that the Church, which considers itself the representative o f Christ's teaching, approves such an act. I feel that this is the last drop for me. I do not share Pashkov's views, but at this moment, if I were asked to what religious affiliation I belong, I would say — to the Church o f Christ, without mentioning any o f the recognized denominations.31

(It was Lord Radstock who always maintained that he belonged to no other church but to that o f Christ, an assertion shared by all Radstockists. In essence, this meant a return to Proto-Christianity before the emergence o f various denominations with their diverse religious dogmas.)

In another letter from London, whither Chertkov had accompanied his mother, he reports on the "London Pashkovites," who attended an Evangelical conference in May o f 1885. During her year-long residence in London, Chertkov's mother was a constant visitor in London's East End, where she became known for her charitable work among the poor. The impressions gained from such visits were discussed with Chertkov, who in turned expressed his astonishment to Tolstoj that "rich people who sing hymns, who solemnly read the Gospel with their household can silently enjoy luxury when they are aware that in London's East End thousands of workers, without income, are near starvation."32 Chertkov's report could only confirm Tolstoj's suspicion, namely, that this new religious movement among the aristocracy was a mere fashion, allowing its members to remain rich and entirely selfish with no trace of true Christian brotherhood.

In spite o f Chertkov's frequent references to the followers o f Radstock, Tolstoj, unable to share the beliefs of the new Christianity, remained markedly restrained in his comments about the movement in which his best friend's mother and uncle played such a prominent role. In fact, Tolstoj claimed to be the offended one. He writes to Chertkov in July o f 1884: "It is strange.... Your mother, Pashkov, the Orthodox Catholics and atheists judge me and reject me ... but I not only do not judge them (and this I say not only 'for argument's sake'), but in all sincerity, I welcome them and rejoice with them about their success...."33 Indeed, although he did not share the convictions of Chertkov's relatives, he seems to have respected their dedication and admired them as human beings. After receiving the assurance that Chertkov's mother was really no longer negatively inclined toward Tolstoj, the great author seldom failed to pay his respect both to her and to

Pashkov. The closing lines from a letter by him to his friend dated June 1885 are typical: "Give my regards and best wishes of peace for her soul to your mother and extend greeting to the Pashkovs, of whom I always think with respect and love."34 On one occasion he even envies the followers o f the new revival. At the time, Tolstoj suffered from severe depression and loneliness owing to the dim prospect of ever fully practising what he preached and to the obstinate opposition of his wife to give up her possessions.35 "In moments of this kind," he wrote to Chertkov in July 1884, "I feel the absence of intimate human contact — of that community, of that church which is possessed by the Pashkovites and the Orthodox. How pleasant it would be now to pass on my problems for judgement to those people of the same faith and to do what they tell me.... But all this w ill pass.... I feel God has not forsaken me."36

Tolstoj's moral and religious non-narrative writings during the 1880's were followed by a series of edifying short stories with the express purpose of popularizing his ideas via the literary media among the common people. In their content and manner of presentation they resemble the moralizing tales employed by the Radstockists in the dissemination of their teaching. We may also assume, particularly since Chertkov was a moving force behind Tolstoj's recent venture, that the inexpensive literature published by the Radstockist Society for the Encouragement of Spiritual and Ethical Reading was another stimulating factor in the publication of Tolstoj's own inexpensive literature, i.e., short stories with their ever present moral. These stories, admirably narrated, without any violent satire on state or church were not always particularly Tolstojan in their message. They are enlarged parables usually portraying a member of the lower classes in ideal Christian behaviour; consequently these tales received universal approval, the ecclesiastical censors not excluded. In the selection of his material for these stories, Tolstoj was hardly original; he reworked old subject matter familiar to the people, borrowed, translated and adapted to suit his purpose.37 In this manner Tolstoj became indebted to the Radstockists for the theme o f his short story, "Where there is love, there is God" (1885) and for the short play *The First Distiller* (1886).