As an ingenious artist, Pushkin may have arrived at such concepts on his own, but then all had been formulated before. When Pushkin advocated that the Russian drama should follow the tradition of Shakespeare — was this done under the impact of Lessing? Or when he said that: "Since the time o f Lessing's aesthetic theories had been so widely and clearly expounded ... while we are still clinging to the concept o f a pedant like Gottsched."19 how well did he know Lessing's theories? He could have read the essence o f the tragedy in Lessing's letter to Nicolai, which was published in 1816 and some excerpts o f *Die Hamburgische Dramaturgie* in 1833.20 He may even have been acquainted with Lessing's refutation o f word painting, the ineffectiveness o f description and Homer's exemplary depiction through the effect, for the periodical *Litsej* (1806) had published excerpts from chapters XX and XXI from the *Laokoon.71*

Considering the overwhelming prevalence o f the descriptive methods o f the

Natural School which has to be traced back to Balzac's influence and which lasted beyond the 1850s, it is not surprising that Lessing in those decades exerted hardly any effect either on the creative process, or on the literary aesthetic theories. However, a new phase of the Lessing reception and with it a more serious preoccupation with the *Laokoon* was initiated with the publication o f Chernyshevskij's *Lessing, his Time, his Life and Work*, first published serially in *The Contemporary* (1856-57) and in 1857 in book form. It was also republished in Geneva in 1873.22 This interest was no doubt caused by the publication o f Lessing's collected works by Lachmann and the critical studies o f Danzel and Guhrauer in Germany, all o f which coincided with the urge to establish a systematic school of Russian criticism by Chemyshevskij and Dobroljubov, the two "socialist Lessings," as F. Engels had labelled them.23

However interesting this entire phenomenon, the attention which Lessing received from the progressive camp of the social democrats, the reverence accorded to him as a kindred spirit and great enlightener, Chemyshevskij found foremost in Lessing his literary guide and critical model.24 He places Lessing above Schiller and Goethe, for they have only completed what Lessing had started. Much space is devoted to Lessing's critical works and how he initiated with his *Laokoon* a new direction by correcting the prevailing Horatian theory o f "ut pietura poesis." Chemyshevskij is the first Russian critic to outline the essence o f this work and confirming thereby its lasting importance, namely provoking the reexamination o f poetic practices by each new generation, as to the validity of aesthetic principles governing fu ll detailed portrayal as opposed to mere suggestions. He stresses the essence of chapters XX and X X I o f the *Laokoon* and the effect it had on Schiller and Goethe who were totally imbued with Lessing's idea of depicting through the description o f the effect. Thus he proclaimed: "There are no literary portraits in Goethe's work, there are only accounts o f impressions created by the characters,"25 rejecting thereby the prevailing practice among Russian novelists at the time. But while Goethe, the creative genius, would have arrived at the same conclusion as Lessing, Chemyshevskij took this principle particularly to heart. In his own creative work *What is to be done* (1863), he literally adhered to Lessing's credo and consciously avoided protracted descriptions o f characters. Indeed, there is a striking absence o f any portraiture o f his protagonists.

Two years after Chemyshevskij's laudatory account o f Lessing, the *Laokoon* appeared fully on the Russian literary scene. The translation undertake by the critic E. Edel'son26 is praised as a monumental work and

as a welcome supplement to Cherny shevskij's study o f Lessing. Dobroljubov in his review (1859) concentrates once again on the central idea and admonishes the poet not to describe the object, "but relate the impression and then we are enabled to imagine the object which had created that impression." He predicted the usefulness of the *Laokoon* in the literary education o f the Russian reader.27

The publication of Edel'son's translation provoked a lengthy review article o f the *Laokoon* by P. L. Lavrov, a literary critic in his younger years and later a follower o f Chernyshevskij and theoretician o f the "to the people movement." In some forty-eight pages Lavrov reviews faithfully, in a scholarly fashion, the content of the *Laokoon*,28 adding profusely explanations, critical comments and illustrations both from contemporary Russian painting and literature. It is the most elaborate discussion o f the *Laokoon* by any Russian scholar. Viewing literature as purely aesthetic enjoyment provided by the beauty of form, Lavrov was elated to discover in this work a confirmation of his own views.

The *Laokoon* is admired as a catalyst which forces each generation to reexamine similar problems, which Lessing faced and as such its esteem w ill forever increase as time passes. But Lavrov takes issue with Lessing's rigidity of the boundaries, which he draws between painting and literature especially with regard to poetic painting of landscapes and the verbal portraiture. Indeed, a strict adherence to the Lessingian principles would have meant the death blow to any poetic description in literature and would have curtailed artistic freedom. In effect, Lavrov maintains, and echoes Diderot's dictum, that in art we recognize no prescribed laws. The fact that protracted descriptions prevailed long after the appearance of the *Laokoon* seems to support Lavrov's argument that poetic painting both of landscapes and literary portraits are not only possible, but are real and do exist, in fact "they are just as characteristic and even more complete than any plastic image."29

In support o f his argument that one cannot only draw in colour, but also in words, Lavrov provides examples from Lermontov, Fet, Gogol, Majkov, Goncharov and Turgenev. He refers to the landscape passage o f Haller's *Alpen,* which Lessing had cited as ineffectual and compares it to a protracted verbal landscape by Gogol and concludes that the passage in the *Alpen* is, indeed, ineffective, but not because it constitutes a successive description, but because it is unpoetic and created by a poor poet. Gogol's, on the other hand, is no less detailed than Haller's, but it is poetic and is created by a superior talent and therefore poetically effective and could rival any existing landscape painting. Likewise, Lavrov defends word painting in the literary portrait. He

refers to the vivid portraits created by Turgenev in *The Hunter's Sketches* and argues that if these portraits were put on canvas by the best master, they would not be more complete in our recollection.30 What is left in our memory from both the painted portraits and the verbal portraits are only characteristic features, and thus those painters and writers who lim it themselves to depicting only salient features do justice to their art. But this modified form o f portraiture, which falls between the practice o f Balzac and Homer, i.e., depicting only salient features, would have most likely been tolerated by Lessing, had he lived long enough to witness the new manner among the talented writers. He even goes so far as to say "that Lessing actually was not against description in general, but against bad descriptions."

Lavrov concludes his account by appealing to caution and moderation, when we are dealing with the judgement o f art, for much depends on talent, fashion o f ideals, cultivated taste, imagination, aesthetic concepts, psychological reflexes, all o f which vary in degree from person to person and epoch to epoch. They, as art itself, are ephemeral and part o f a continuous process o f change. Therefore, Lavrov maintains, the time has not yet arrived to write the definitive book on aesthetics, hinting thereby at the categorical conviction expressed in the *Laokoon?1*

The writer who comes closest to Lessing's ideas in actual practice and pronouncements is Turgenev. Already in 1844, in *Andrej Kolosov*, when attempting to draw the portrait o f the protagonist, he noted the aesthetic lim itation o f protracted enumeration.  The reader is, so to say, constantly invited to decipher that impressionistic texture and to complete the picture. The same is true of his nature description: "Two, three lines and all is alive," as Tolstoj once remarked.33 What Turgenev uttered about the best books, may equally refer to his art: "The best people and the best books are those where one can read between the lines."34 Similar aesthetic pronouncements are repeatedly encountered in his letters and reviews. Here are only a few examples where he criticizes the overabundance o f details and concludes: "The task o f art is not to reproduce life, and in all o f those endless small details one looses the specificity, the conciseness o f a picture which is essential in arousing the aesthetic feeling in the reader...."35 Remaining consistent in his views he rejected in 1882 the descriptive manner o f the naturalists: "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 only characteristic features."36

One could dismiss Turgenev's aesthetic perception as that o f great talent, were it not for the fact that they bear striking resemblance to those of Lessing, not to mention the reverence he displayed for him as a critic. The *Laokoon* he read and reread as late as 1873.37 While he found his dramas too pedagogical, he praised his critical work and stated in a letter to Jakob Caro: "Aber die *Hamburgische Dramaturgie —* und der *Laokoon* ... da hab' ich es mit einem Riesen zu tun, der mich packt, da singt er nicht mit der Fistel.... Da ist Leidenschaft und Leben."38 But apart from various other references to Lessing, Turgenev was asked in 1852 by the editor A. A. Krajevskij to check for him an anonymous translation of the *Laokoon.* Although Turgenev recommended publication, it never appeared in print,39 unless it was that by Edel'son. Turgenev was thus fully aware of Lessing's aesthetic norms already at the threshold o f his literary career, if not through this translation, then certainly through his literary studies in Berlin, where he hardly could have bypassed the *Laokoon.*

The problem o f detailed description versus the depiction o f impression and the effect, the very issue treated in the *Laokoon* is nowhere more apparent than in the literary portrayal o f L. N. Tolstoj's protagonists. It suffices to juxtapose the early literary attempts, particularly the protracted experimental portraits o f the 1850's which were meant for his *Trilogy* and no less those encountered in the Caucasian tales and the *Sevastopol Sketches,* with his later portraits encountered especially in *Anna Karenina.* Not that the issue was totally resolved in favour of a laconic depiction, but there was a decisive difference. Here, as well as in *War and Peace,* Tolstoj never depicts his major characters in one single detailed portrait, as was the practice among most novelists at the time. We encounter rather four to six sketches o f the characters; these are partial portraits, conveying only salient features and the impression made upon others at that particular moment.

Already during his "period o f experimentation" Tolstoj dealt with the problem of description, generalization, as opposed to minute details in the depiction of his characters in portrait form.40 From the practice o f Dickens, Sterne and others and from the reading of F. R. Weis, Tolstoj came to the conclusion that the "detailed and fullness o f exposition" was not in the least offensive.41 Yet, in the midst, when he had been creating protracted portraits, he made, as early as 1851 the startling pronouncement "that to *describe* [ital. Tolstoj] a person is actually impossible" and that "one ought rather to describe, how he affected me." "Description in words," he continues, "w ill not create greater understanding about a person, but w ill add

to the confusion."42 The same idea is uttered by Tolstoj on nature description when he entered in his diary in 1851: "I shall go and describe whatever I see. But how to write it down.... Letters w ill compose words, words — phrases; but how to convey feelings ... upon beholding nature? *Description is not adequate* [ital. Tolstoj].43

These are Lessingian pronouncements based on the practice o f Homer, which one encounters throughout Tolstoj's literary career. Yet, by 1851 he had neither read Homer's *Iliad*, nor Lessing's *Laokoon,* but one must assume a certain awareness o f their ideas. The *Iliad* he read only in 1857; a more Lessingian idea, as to the intermingling o f the arts, was expressed in *Anna Karenina,* when Levin and Pestsov discuss the Wagnerian orientation in music:

Levin maintained that the mistake of Wagner and his followers lay in trying to make music enter the domain o f another art, *just as poetry goes wrong when it tries to depict the features o f a face* [ital. mine], which is the function o f painting. As an example o f this kind o f error, he refers to the sculptor who conceived the idea o f carving into marble shades (phantasms) of poetic images rising around the statue o f a poet on a pedestal.44

This passage clearly outlines the boundaries of poetry and the plastic arts not only in pointing out that it is wrong "when poetry tries to depict the features o f a face" but also when the plastic arts attempt to *rival poetry.* It is in a nutshell Lessing's refutation o f the art critics Spence and Caylus who advocated "poetische Malerei" and "poetische Gemälde" as the subject matter for the artist, which is expounded in great detail in Chapters IX -X V o f the *Laokoon.* Assuming that Levin is the spokesman for Tolstoj, we can conclude that he, like Lessing, recognized the limitations o f the plastic arts: what the poet can achieve through a single word, the artist can achieve only by resorting to symbols or allegorical figures.

Lessing is mentioned by Tolstoj on many occasions, but mainly toward the end o f the century, when he collected "wise thoughts" by prominent thinkers. It is known also that he bought and ordered some books by Lessing, however, no other specifics are recorded. He had noted also Lessing's importance as an "educated authority" in initiating a new direction in German literature. And although he was delighted with Lessing's dramas already in his youth, later only *Nathan der Weise* is singled out for its lofty humanity and religious tolerance; he also treasured *Die Erziehung des Menschengeschlechts* as it

reflected profound thoughts.45 Tolstoj obviously also read about Lessing's aesthetic theories in various critical works when he was preparing his treatise *What is Art?* But the direct references to the object o f our major concern, the *Laokoon,* is rather sparse, even though Tolstoj was in possession o f Edel'son's translation, which is still preserved in the library at Jasnaja Poljana.

The first reference to Lessing's *Laokoon* was made by Tolstoj in his notebook o f 1870. Here he laments that the artists are not well acquainted with the theoretical works in their field, adding: "... not even with that by Lessing. The reason for this criticism is the painting by N. N. Ge (1831־ 1894) entitled "Christ in the Garden o f Gethsemane" (1869) o f which Tolstoj says further: "Ge painted very well a picture o f a secular [grazhdanskogo] Christ. But this is one subject o f all secular events which cannot be the topic for a picture. And this would have become clear, even from Lessing's *Laokoon*.и46 \*

When Tolstoj rejects the depiction of Christ with a head raised to heaven and with a sorrowful expression in the midst of his disciples, as a subject not fit for the painter, then he voices the limitation of painting as being incapable o f characterizing the complexity o f Christ and the situation in which he found himself. It is the same issue that Tolstoj had Levin express in *Anna Karenina* seven years later when he pointed out the wrongs o f the sculptor who had entered the realm o f the poet.

Tolstoj is, however, critical o f Lessing with regard to at least two aspects. He totally rejects, as could be expected, Lessing's insistence that the ultimate goal and function o f art is to depict beauty, the highest form o f which is to be encountered in the human body, indeed, an idea that permeated the entire *Laokoon.* At the height o f his nihilistic outlook (1906) on great universal art, Tolstoj rejects the actual statue o f Laokoon along with Goethe's *Faust* and Shakespeare's dramas, all o f which had been falsely glorified as great and important art.47 Indeed, according to Makovitskij, Tolstoj rejects Lessing's assertion that the Laokoon is correctly depicted at the most propitious moment, when he is not yet screaming, but is merely portrayed in a state o f suffering pain. Tolstoj maintained in 1904 that "the portrayal o f the Laokoon in a condition of suffering is a mistake. Lessing is o f a different opinion, but then, I don't value his opinion."48

It is perhaps such negative comments which also account for the absence o f any reference to Lessing by critics dealing with Tolstoj and the arts,49 indeed, a pattern already prevalent during the second half o f the nineteenth century. Even though the *Laokoon* was known among Russian critics, the

views on the boundaries o f the arts had not become part o f their theories. K. Pigarev notes the striking absence o f any Lessingian concepts, but a predominance o f the sociological aspects in the critical judgement o f both artists and critics like Kramskoj, Perov, Nekrasov, Stasov, Mikhailovskij and many others.50 It is to be hoped that the recent studies on Lessing's aesthetic views by critics like Fridlender, Grib and especially Dmitrieva51 w ill initiate a more intensive preoccupation with Lessing's direct impact on Russian criticism and eradicate the materialistic approach to which he had been largely subjugated since the study on him in 1874 by N. V. Shelgunov.52

#### NOTES

1. G. E. Lessing, *Laokoon.* Sämtliche Schriften, vol. IX , Hrsg. K. Lachmann (Stuttgart, 1893), 50-60, 75-81.

2. Lessing, IX , 91.

3. Lessing, IX , 102.

4. Lessing, IX , 129; IX , 120.

5. Homer, *The Iliad,* trans. S. Butler (Toronto, New York, 1942).

6. Lessing, IX , 125.

7. Lessing, IX , 130.

8. H. Althaus, *Laokoon: Stoff und Form* (München, 1968), 31-32.

9. F. Th. Vischer, *Aesthetik: oder Wissenschaft des Schönen* (München, 1860), ПІ, 1100.

10. A. Stahr, *G. E. Lessing: Sein Leben und seine Werke,* 9. Aufl. (Oldenburg, Leipzig, 1863), 231.

11. Compare F. Baldensperger, "Les théories de Lavater dans la littérature française," *Etudes d 'histoire littéraire* 2 (Paris, 1910), 51-91; J. Graham, "Character Description and Meaning in the Romantic Novel," *Studies in*

*Romanticism,* V (1966), 208-218; G. Tytler, *Physiognomy in the European Novel* (Princeton, 1982); E. Heier, "Lavater's System o f Physiognomy as a Mode o f Characterization in Lermontov's Prose," *Arcadia,* 6 (1971), 267־ 282.

12. Compare the exhaustive study o f R. Ju. Danilevskij, "Lessing v russkoj literature X V III veka," *Epokha prosveshchenija* (Leningrad, 1967) 208-306; and the well documented study by R. Lauer, "Skizze der Lessing-Rezeption in Rußland," *Nation und Gelehrtenrepublik: Lessing im Europäischen Zusammenhang,* hrsg. W. Berner and A. M. Reh (Detroit, München, 1984), 325-343.

13. A. M. Reh, "Bericht über die Schlußdiskussion: Lessing — der erste deutsche Schriftsteller von europäischem Rang vor Goethe?", *Nation und Gelehrtenrepublik....,* 160.

14. Lauer, 325.

15. A. G. Cross, *N. M. Karamzin. A Study o f his Literary Career (1783- 1803),* (Carbondale, 1971), 18-20.

16. N. M. Karamzin, *Izbrannye sochinenija* (Moskva, 1964), I, 625-626.

17. A. S. Pushkin, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij,* 10 vols. (Moskva, 1962- 1966), V, 46. Compare also S. Solov'ev, "O nekotorykh osobennostijakh izobrazitel'nosti Pushkina," *Vmire Pushkina* (Moskva, 1974), 344-345.

18. Pushkin, V I, 122, 271.

19. *A. S. Pushkin. О literature* (Moskva, 1962), 238.

20. Compare *Vestnik Evropy,* 86 (1816), N :V, 34-40; *Molva,* 5 (1833), Pt. V, 230-232; Danilevskij, 306.

21. Danilevskij, 305.

22. N. G. Chemyshevskij, *Lessing, ego vremja, ego zhizn' iego dejatel'nost*', *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij* (Moskva, 1945), IV 5-221; E. Bograd, "Chemyshevskij v St. Peterburgskikh vedomostjakh," *Literatumoe nasledstvo,* 68 (Moskva: 1959), 80.

23. Chemyshevskij, IV , 890.

24. E. Heier, "Chemyshevskij's Lessing," *Studies in Honour o f Louis Shein* (Hamilton, 1983), 55-64. Russian critical works on Chemyshevskij consider his study o f Lessing as the best hitherto produced.

25. Chemyshevskij, IV , 153; Compare also A. v. Gronicka, "Goethe and N. G. Chemyshevskij," *The Germanic Review,* XLIX (1974), 39-40.

26. *Laokoon, iii о granitsakh zhivopisi i poezii. Soch. Lessinga.* Per. E. Edel'sona. Moskva, tip. Semena, 1859. 214 pp.

27. N. A. Dobroljubov, *Sobranie sochinenij,* IV (Moskva, 1952), 415-416.

28. P. L. Lavrov, "Laokoon, iii о granitsakh zhivopisi i poezii," *Biblioteka dija chtenija,* 158 (1860), 1-58.

29. Lavrov, 27-30.

30. Lavrov, 30-37.

31. Lavrov's second article, "Diderot i Lessing," *Otechestvennye zapiski,* 176 (1868), N: I, 154-212, written at the time when he had embraced a utilitarian concept o f literature, is critical o f Lessing's neglect of social issues in his work.

32. I. S. Turgenev, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij i pisem* v *dvadtsati vos'mi tomakh* (Moskva, 1960-68), V, 10-11.

33.  Studies in Honour o f Zbigniew Folejewski,* ed. D. Clayton (Ottawa, 1981), 53-69.

34. Turgenev, *Pis'ma,* V I, 34.

35. Turgenev, V, 390.

36. Turgenev, *Pis'ma,* X III, pt. II, 37-38.

37. Turgenev, *Pis'ma,* X, 140.

38. Turgenev, *Pis'ma,* X III, pt. II, 212; J. Caro, "Ein Brief Turgenieffs über Lessing, " *Deutsche Revue über das gesammte nationale Leben der Gegenwan,* IV (1883), 8. Jahrg., 257.

39. Turgenev, *Pis'ma,* II, 84, 127, 455.

40. В. Eikhenbaum, *The Young Tolstoj,* transi, by G. Kern (Ann Arbor, 1972), 22-34.

41. E. Kuprejanova, "Prosvetitel'skie istoki filosofii i tvorcheskogo metoda L 'va Tolstogo," *Russkaja literatura, 2* (1964), 40-54.

42. L. N. Tolstoj, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij,* 90 vols. (Moskva, 1935-64), I, 208; X LV I, 67.

43. Tolstoj, XLV I, 65.

44. Tolstoj, X IX , 262-63.

45. Compare Tolstoj, X X V II, 282, 545; XXXV, 574, 558; X L V III, 118; and other volumes. See also D. P. Makovitskij, *U Tolstogo. Jasnopoljanskie zapiski. Literatumoe nasledstvo,* 4 vols. (Moskva, 1978), I, 250; II, 576.

46. Tolstoj, X LV III, 118, 507.

47. Tolstoj, XXXV, 367; LV, 248, 562.

48. Makovitskij, II, 576.

49. Compare *L. N. Tolstoj i izobrazitel'noe iskusstvo. Sbomik statej,* ed. M. M. Rakovoj (Moskva, 1981).

50. For details see K. Pigarev, *Russkaja literatura i izobrazitel'noe iskusstvo* (Moskva, 1966), 12.

51. V. F. Grib, "Lessing i ego Laokoon," G. E. Lessing, *Laokoon* (Moskva, 1957); G. Fridlender, "Esteticheskie vzgljady Lessinga," *Voprosy filosofii,* 5 (1954); N. Dmitrieva, *Izobrazhenie i slovo* (Moskva, 1962).

52.  In gewisser Hinsicht ist Gončarovs Arbeit auch eine Widerspiegelung der literarischen und sozialen Polemik, die in den 70-80er Jahren das russische Geistesleben bewegte.2 Gončarovs Artikel ist jedoch bedeutend mehr. Die Auseinandersetzung zwischen Gončarov und den Kritikern der radikaldemokratischen Orientierung basierte nicht so sehr auf ästhetischer, als auf sozialpolitischer Ebene. In der Tat ist sie eine polemische Auseinandersetzung mit der Frage: wie soll der gesellschaftliche Fortschritt, die Erleichterung der geistigen und ökonomischen Unterdrückung der russischen Massen sich entfalten; welche Richtung soll eingeschlagen und welche M ittel sollen angewandt werden, um das gewünschte Goldene Zeitalter, den utopischen Zustand, auf der russischen Erde zu verwirklichen. Es geht nicht um das Problem, ob Kunst überhaupt an einer solchen Verwandlung teilnehmen soll, dabei einer Tendenz verfällt und somit ihren reinen künstlerischen Charakter verliert. Es geht um die Idee in der Gestaltung der russischen Kultur und des russischen Lebens schlechthin. Diese Probleme sind im gegenwärtigen Rußland genau so aktuell, wie damals in der zweiten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts.  Wie in keiner anderen Nationalliteratur wurden die russischen Dichter in der Vergangenheit immer wieder aufgerufen, an der Gestaltung der russischen Gesellschaft aktiv mitzuwirken.   In den Worten von Peter Brang: "Die Literatur übernahm die Funktion, die in anderen Ländern der Publizistik zukam; ja, sie wurde recht eigentlich zum Parlament der Russen und ist das virtuell aus einsichtigen Gründen bis heute geblieben."3 Auch Pisarev bemerkte treffend, daß viele der russischen Intellektuellen den Schriftstellerberuf wählten, weil sie am öffentlichen Gesellschaftsleben nicht teilnehmen konnten. Trotz des starken Ideengehalts wurde die künstlerische Leistung jedoch ein unverkennbares Zeichen von ihren Meisterstücken.

 Gončarov mußte zeitlebens eine Mißdeutung seiner Werke dulden, besonders von den sogenannten demokratischen Kritikern, die immer radikaler wurden und nur Verständnis für sozial engagierte Kunst zeigten.   So ist auch der oben erwähnte Aufsatz *Lučše pozdno, čem nikogda* letzten Endes geradezu eine Bekundung seiner Unzufriedenheit mit den kritischen Auffassungen seiner Werke. Die Tatsache, daß Gončarov sich in der peinlichen Lage vorfand, sein Kunstwerk durch eine detaillierte, in die Länge gezogene Erläuterung verständlich machen zu müssen, wahrlich eine Seltenheit bei einem Dichter seines Ranges, zeugte allein schon davon, daß der Dichter sowohl mit der Auffassung seines Romans *Obryv,* wie auch mit der Rezeption und Deutung aller seiner Romane unzufrieden war.  Jahrhunderts nicht nur ein ungewöhnliches Ansehen genoß, sondern zu einer wegweisenden Macht heranwuchs.  Nur die Oblomoverei, als Krankheit der russischen Gesellschaft, wird aufs genaueste analysiert mit der Entdeckung, daß Oblomov auch nichts

anderes als ein überflüssiger Mensch ist. M it außerordentlicher Geschicklichkeit gelingt es Dobroljubov, die Rezension des Romans zu einem sozialpolitischen Pamphlet zu machen. Es gelingt ihm, am Beispiel des *Oblomov* seine politische Einstellung zur russischen W irklichkeit und besonders seine Ablehnung des aristokratischen Liberalismus darzulegen: "Po svoej idejnomu značeniju ona [stat'ja] imela charakter programmnogo dokumenta, vyražajuščego literatumye i političeskie pozicii revoljucionnoj demokratii... stat'ja javilas' rešajuščim vystupleniem Dobroljubova protiv dvoijanskogo liberalizma. "5 In seiner Analyse wollte Dobroljubov vor allem betonen, daß Gončarovs objektive Schilderung des russischen Übels, d.h. der Oblomovščina, vollkommen mit der K ritik der Radikaldemokraten übereinstimmt.

 Und als Gončarov eine mögliche Kur in der Person des unternehmungslustigen, tatkräftigen und energischen Štol'c postulierte, wird dieser unter dem Vorwand, daß er noch nicht zu einem sozialbewußten Ideal herangewachsen sei, abgelehnt. Dobroljubov konnte nicht begreifen, wieso Štol'c in seiner Tätigkeit von all den sozialen Notwendigkeiten und gesellschaftlichem Streben unberührt in Ruhe allein dahinleben kann — wie konnte er mit seiner Lage zufrieden sein, "uspokoit'sja na svoem odinokom, otdel'nom, isklučitel'nom sčast'e." Er fragt: "Wer wird endlich das allmächtige W ort 'Vorwärts' aussprechen, auf welches Rußland schon so lange und mühevoll wartet?" — "Do sich por net otveta ... ni v obščestve, ni v literature. Gončarov, umevšij ponjat' i pokazat' nam našu oblomovščinu, ne mog odnako ne zaplatit' dimi obščemu zabluždeniju."6

Gončarov war nicht weniger als seine Zeitgenossen an dem Wohlergehen seines Volkes und an der ersehnten Transformation interessiert. Dieses Thema wird in allen seinen Romanen behandelt, allerdings nicht in der Form direkter Lehrsätze.   Bei Gončarov geht es um den Prozeß des

Menschwerdens, um das Streben nach einem Humanitätsideal. Dabei ist zu beachten, daß Gončarov für eine allmähliche Umgestaltung der russischen Verhältnisse eintrat.   Früh schon wurde Gončarov mit allgemeingültigen Wahrheiten vertraut gemacht, nämlich, daß man keine Brüderlichkeit der Menschen einleiten kann, während zur gleichen Zeit der Klassenkampf gefördert wird, und daß durch die Vernichtung der Reichen den Armen nicht geholfen werden kann.

 Weder Belinskij und Dobroljubov, noch Pisarev und Šelgunov haben je diesen Hauptgedanken Gončarovs erfaßt, oder vielmehr berührt. In seiner im Jahre 1869 verfaßten Einführung in seinen Roman *Obryv* wird von Gončarov behauptet, daß sein Werk nie vollkommen verstanden wurde. Hier heißt es: "Mne grustno i bol'no i to ešče, čto vo vsech trech moich romanach publika i kritika ne uvideli ničego bolee, как tol'ko odni — kartiny i tipy staroj žizni, drugie — karikatury na novuju — i tol'ko."8 Von dieser Charakterisierung seiner künstlerischen Begabung, daß er nämlich nur reale Bilder und Typen in lebhaften Farben darzustellen vermochte, konnte Gončarov kaum begeistert sein. Die Enttäuschung bewegte ihn fortzufahren: "Za čto tut chvalit'? Razve tak trudno ... nagromozdit' v kuču lica provinzial'nych staruch, učitelej ženščin, devic... i.t.p.? Čto za zasługa? Tol'ko kogda ja zakončil svoi raboty, otošel ot nich na nekotoroe rasstojanie i vremja — togda stal ponjaten mne vpolne i skrytyj v nich smysl, ich značenie — ideja. Naprasno ja ždal, čto kto-nibud' i kromę menja pročtet meždu strokami i, poljubiv obrazy, svjažet ich v odno celoe i uvidit, čto imenno govorit eto celoe? No etogo ne było."9

In diesen wenigen Zeilen w ill Gončarov den zentralen Gehalt seiner Werke

aussprechen.   Er w ill als Künstler wirken und nicht als Didaktiker. W ill man aber die Substanz seiner ethisch-ästhetischliterarischen Orientierung festlegen und zu bestimmen versuchen, welchen Zweck Gončarov in seinem Werk verfolgt, womit er auf seine Leser wirken w ill, dann entdeckt man immer wieder, verborgen oder enthüllt, das Streben nach der Wiederbelebung der Prinzipien der Humanität. Das klassische Humanitätsideal wird verkündet als neuer Wegweiser, der zurück zur Menschlichkeit und damit zur Lösung der russischen Lage führen könne.

Es muß an dieser Stelle eine kurze Erläuterung des hier gebrauchten Ausdrucks 'Humanitätsideal' eingefügt werden, zumal die Geschichte der Humanitätsidee in den mannigfaltigen philosophischen, sozialen, politischen und religiösen Strömungen starke Variationen bezüglich der Auffassung des wahrhaft Menschlichen aufweist. Tatsächlich streben auch der utopische Sozialismus, der Marxismus und schließlich der Kommunismus nach einem neuen Menschen im Sinne der humanistischen Idee. Wenn jedoch festgelegte doktrinäre Formeln als Vorschrift zum Erlangen des idealen Menschen dienen sollen, dann werden die eigentlichen Prinzipien und besonders das dem Humanitätsideal innewohnende Element des freien Willens pervertiert. Die Einführung eines humanistischen Ideals durch Gewalt war schon immer ein impertinentes, hyperbolisches Paradoxon par excellence. Dies läßt sich zum Beispiel belegen, wenn man noch bis vor kurzem in offiziellen Quellen lesen konnte: "... nur im Humanismus der sozialistischen Kunst werden die humanistischen Traditionen der Kunst der Vergangenheit fortgesetzt und bereichert."11

Die Begriffe 'Humanität1 und 'Humanitätsideal' werden hier im Sinne der deutschen Klassik verwendet, genau so wie es Belinskij tat, als er den vorherrschenden Gedanken von Herzens *Kto vinovai?* (1847) hervorheben wollte und betonte: "... eto to, čto nemcy nazyvajut gummanostiju [Humanität] ... Gumannost' est' čelovekoljubie, no razvitoe soznaniem i obrazovaniem"12, und dabei wird der deutsche Ausdruck 'Humanität' in Klammem angeführt. Wenn ich die deutsche Klassik anführe, dann wird nicht

vom deutschen Aufklärungsklassizismus gesprochen, der eher von einem römisch-französischen Barockheroismus als vom Geist der Antike inspiriert wurde, sondern von der deutschen Hochklassik oder Weimarer Klassik, wie sie vor allem von Goethe und Schiller repräsentiert wird. Das Leitbild für den schönen neuen Menschen war der Anthropos der griechischen Antike, und die Auffassung von dessen schöner Seele beruht auf dem Harmoniebestreben, das bereits bei Shaftesbury und Wieland als Ziel der menschlichen Existenz gegolten hatte.  Über allen diesen Bestrebungen schwebt der Geist Winckelmanns. Dessen Dictum von der *edlen Einfalt und stillen Größe*, womit er die griechische Kunst des Altertums charakterisierte, wurde zum ästhetisch-ethischen Ideal erhoben. Es ist das Schönheitsideal Winckelmanns, das schließlich das Humanitätsideal zum Anspruch auf Allgemeingültigkeit führte. In Winckelmanns *Gedanken über die Nachahmung der griechischen Werke in der Malerei und Bildhauerkunst* (1755) heißt es: "Das allgemeine vorzügliche Kennzeichen der griechischen Meisterstücke ist eine *edle Einfalt und stille Größe* in der Stellung, wie in dem Ausdruck. So wie die Tiefe des Meeres allzeit ruhig bleibt, die Oberfläche mag noch so wüten, ebenso zeigt der Ausdruck in den Figuren der Griechen bei aller Leidenschaft eine große Seele. " 13

Der Glaube an den idealen Menschen gipfelt vor allem in Goethes *Westöstlichem Divan*, in *Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre* und besonders in *Iphigenie auf Tauris.* Schillers Humanitätsideal dagegen äußert sich in seinen theoretischen Schriften, wie z.B. in *Über Anmut und Würde* und in den *Briefen über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen.* In beiden Fällen ist Harmonie oberstes Gebot: Einheit und Zusammenhang von Geist und Körper - — Kalokagathie, die Vollkommenheit des Menschen, bestehend aus einer ungestörten Harmonie von Neigung und Pflicht, Vernunft und Sinnlichkeit wird zum Kennzeichen des idealen Menschen. Die höchste Vollendung des Menschen sieht man in der Harmonie der schönen Seele, in der weder die eine noch die andere Eigenschaft dominierend w irkt, vielmehr physische Notwendigkeit und moralische Freiheit in ein freies Spiel miteinander treten. Die Verwirklichung dieser Ideale, sich als freier Mensch auszubilden, sah man in der pädagogischen Sendung der Kunst, d.h. als vornehmste Aufgabe der Kunst g ilt die Förderung der Humanität. Daher auch die Prägung, wahre Kunst bestehe in der Humanität. Im Geiste Schillers und Goethes hat

insbesondere Humboldt die Kunst als höchstes M ittel zur Erziehung einer vollkommenen, harmonischen Persönlichkeit postuliert.

 Es g ilt vielmehr, Mensch inmitten von Menschen zu sein. Es geht um freie Selbstbestimmung und Selbstvollendung des Individuums. Anstelle der rousseauischen Auflehnung gegen Kultur und Kunst trat eine neue Kunstverklärung: oberste Norm ist das Bekenntnis zu Ehrfurcht, Maß, Ordnung, Gesetz, Menschenliebe und praktischer Tätigkeit; es ist ein Bekenntnis zu dem goldenen Mittelweg, und das ist beispielhaft für menschliches Sein und Dasein schlechthin. Die Wandlung zum Menschenfreund, vom Individuum zum Glied der Gemeinschaft, vollzieht sich dann auf natürliche Weise.14

Gončarov gehört zu jenen Dichtem, wie Karamzin und Gogol' vor ihm und später Čechov, welche ihre Hoffnung auf Rußlands Erlösung nicht auf eine radikale Umwälzung, sondern auf einen evolutionären Prozeß der Umgestaltung setzen.  Seine Briefe, seine literatur-kritischen Skizzen, seine Romane, ja selbst Gončarovs eigenes Wesen, gekennzeichnet durch Einfalt und Gelassenheit, zeugen reichlich davon, wie sehr Gončarov an der Vervollkommnung der seelischen Empfindung und der Erziehbarkeit des Menschen als Individualität glaubte. An erster Stelle muß der Mensch wieder Mensch werden, und dann werden auch die verschiedenen Institutionen und Staatsbehörden den gewünschten Humanitätsgedanken unvermeidlich widerspiegeln.

 Glücklicherweise haben sich nicht

alle Forscher an die verhängnisvollen Vorschriften gehalten, wie z.B.: "Izučenie Gončarova možet byt' plodotvomym tol'ko na osnove marksistskoleninskogo ponimanija iskusstva."15 Obwohl inzwischen durch einige gewichtige kritische Arbeiten eine neue Richtung in der Gončarovforschung eigeleitet wurde, ist doch festzustellen, daß bisher noch keine kritische Akademie-Ausgabe seiner Werke erschienen ist. Aber trotzdem wurde der dominierenden Idee, dem Gončarovschen Humanitätsgedanken, in Rußland ebenso wie im Ausland die wohlverdiente Aufmerksamkeit geschenkt, so von A. Lyngstad, M. Ehre, V. Sečkarev, V. A. Michelson, L. S. Gejro und besonders von Peter Thiergen und V. I. Mel'nik,'6 um nur einige zu nennen. Jedoch eine allumfassende Arbeit, gestützt auf Spezialarbeiten zu den mannigfaltigen Attributen des Humanitätsideals und zu deren Wirkung in der philosophischen Auffassung Gončarovs, wie sie von Thiergen ud M el'nik vorgelegt wurden, muß noch geschrieben werden. W ir wissen, mit welchen Humanisten Gončarov vertraut war, w ir wissen auch aus den vielen Hinweisen auf Werke und Charaktere, aus direkten Aussagen und nicht minder durch Zeugnisse der Geistesverwandtschaft, daß Gončarov sich intensiv mit der Gedankenwelt der deutschen Hochklassik, der Antike und der jeweiligen Kunst beschäftigte. Dabei darf man nicht vergessen, daß Gončarov einer der wenigen russischen Dichter war, der formell drei Jahre lang (1831- 1834) humanistische Fächer wie Literatur, Ästhetik und die schönen Künste an der Moskauer Universität studierte, und daß er von den größten Wegbereitern für Schiller und Goethe unter der Moskauer akademischen Jugend, den Professoren S. P. Ševyrev und N. I. Nadeždin, in die Ideenwelt der Antike und der deutschen Klassik eingeweiht wurde.  Daß Nadeždins literarisch-ästhetische Thesen in seinen Vorlesungen auf fruchtbaren Boden fielen, bezeugen seine drei Schüler Belinskij, N. Stankevič und Gončarov, denn sie haben seine geistigen Richtlinien zu den ihren gemacht, ein Thema, welches hier nicht weiter verfolgt werden kann. Nicht minder einflußreich waren Nadeždins begeisternde Vorlesungen, in denen der Geist der antiken Kunst und Geschichte lebendig dargestellt wurde.17 Es genügt zu betonen, daß seine literarischen Studien in Moskau ihn zur Quelle der abendländischen Kultur führten und ihm damit zur Formulierung seines Humanitätsideals verhalfen.  I teper' na službe izučaju inostrannye literatury imenno po tomu metodu ... kotorye peredali nam naši ljubimye professora."19

Abgesehen von Gončarovs Hinweisen auf Dichter und Denker wie Homer, Sophokles, Aristoteles, Tasso, Voltaire, Rousseau, Wieland und Herder, um nur einige zu nennen, sind seine Bezüge auf die dem Griechentum zugewandten Humanitätsgedanken, gefördert durch Winckelmann, Goethe, Schiller und W. Humboldt, von höchster Bedeutung, um den leitenden Gedanken seines Strebens näherzurücken.  Unmittelbar und mittelbar ist hier bewußt betont, denn Gončarov war auch anderen Vorbildern und eifrigen Verkündern der schönen Menschlichkeit ausgesetzt, die nicht unbedingt in literarischer Form vermittelt wurden. Zunächst ist da Belinskij, der wiederholt Schiller und Goethe geradezu als Herolde der Humanität bewunderte. Seine eigene Humanitätsauffassung beruht auf den Lehren dieser "hohen Priester der ewigen Liebe, Wahrheit und Menschenwürde," um seine Worte zu gebrauchen. Im griechischen Charakter ihrer Dichtung erkennt er die Apotheose des eigentlichen griechischen Geistes, das poetisch-sittliche Urbild von Hellas.21 Wie sehr diese Ideen und Belinskij selbst von Gončarov geschätzt wurden, braucht nicht weiter erörtert zu werden.22

Wesentlich einflußreicher war der aus derselben Stadt (Simbirsk) stammende Historiker und Dichter Karamzin.   Wie die von Karamzin, so sind auch Gončarovs Werke zutiefst von einem Humanismus durchdrungen, und wie bei jenem, wird auch hier das Groteske und das Scharf-Satirische vermieden; nur das Schöne, Gute und Wahre findet seinen Widerhall, obwohl nicht immer in unmittelbarer Form.

Die Parallelen sind noch erstaunlicher, wenn es um das Urteil über Gesellschaftsveränderungen geht.  Auch glaubte er nicht an die von den Utopisten verkündete soziale Gleichheit der Menschen: "Ihr mögt das Unterste zuoberst kehren, aber immer wird es ein Unten und Oben, Freiheit und Unfreiheit, Reich und Arm, Zufriedenheit und Leiden geben."    Im Grunde genommen wird hier ein Wünschen und Streben ausgesprochen, welches an das Ideal der Griechen erinnert, denen allein es Vorbehalten blieb, die selbstbewußte Einzelpersönlichkeit zur höchsten Entfaltung zu bringen.

Daß Karamzin auch mit den Idealen der deutschen Klassik aufs tiefste vertraut war, ist selbstverständlich. Jedoch viel früher, schon als Jüngling, wurde Karamzin mit den Vervollkommnungsidealen der Moskauer Freimaurer bekanntgemacht. In deren Mitte wurde er erzogen und gebildet.25 Die aufklärerisch-ethischen Ideen der Freimaurer fanden sicherlich einen positiven Widerhall, denn er blieb den neuhumanistischen und philanthropischen Ideen zeitlebens treu und vermochte eben dadurch Gončarovs Verehrung zu erwecken.  Wesen und Ziel der Freimaurer war in Moskau, wie überall, das Streben nach Wahrheit, Menschenliebe und Sittlichkeit, das zum Ideal edlen Menschentums hinführt. Dieser vorherrschenden humanistischen Geistesrichtung ist es auch zuzuschreiben, daß so viele prominente Männer Mitglieder der Logen waren wie Herder, Wieland und Goethe in Weimar und Intellektuelle wie Novikov, Lopuchin, I. P. Turgenev in Moskau.   Geteilt werden ethische Gebote ohne Rücksicht auf Dogma und das Göttliche.

Diese Freimaurerischen Lehren, in die der junge Gončarov eingeführt wurde, sind insofern wichtig, als sie unmittelbar auf seine Gedankenwelt einen bestimmenden und dauerhaften Einfluß ausübten. Der Vermittler war ein Freund der Familie Gončarov, ein im Ruhestand verweilender Seekapitän in Simbirsk, der reiche Landbesitzer Nikołaj Tregubov. Nachdem Gončarovs Vater gestorben war, übernahm Tregubov die Erziehung des Sohnes, und zwar im Geiste des aufgeklärten Humanismus. Tregubov ging aus derselben Loge hervor, die einst von Ivan Petrovič Turgenev, der dann später Karamzin in den Freimaurerkreis einführte, in Simbirsk gegründet worden war. M it Ehrfurcht erinnert sich Gončarov an Tregubov, diesen ebenso liebevollen wie gebildeten Aristokraten, und dessen edle Umgangsweise. Er verkörpert in seinen Augen "Rechtschaffenheit, Würde und Adel."   Seine Zeitgenossen berichten von seiner Gelassenheit und von der Abwesenheit jeglicher Leidenschaft und Exzentrizität. Er vermied jeden Pomp und war stets bescheiden, wenn es um seine Popularität ging. Als man an ihm ein hohes Maß an Güte, Tugend und Edelmut erkannte, konnte er diese Eigenschaften nur bejahen.29 Seine dienstlichen Pflichten wurden immer mit strenger, nach Wahrheit strebender Gewissenhaftigkeit erfüllt. Man kannte ihn auch als humanen und aufgeklärten literarischen Zensor, der mehr an der künstlerischen Leistung als an der politischen Orientierung interessiert war. Von dem Triumph der Wahrheit überzeugt, akzeptierte er so manche Arbeit m it sozialistischen und materialistischen Ideen, so widerwillig sie ihm auch waren.  Man könnte hier auch hinzufügen, daß er gern im Ausland als Herr Johannes von Gončarov bekannt sein wollte. Aber wie es auch sein mag, ob nun sein Streben zu eigener Harmonie auf den Salon der Künstlerfamilie Majkov zurückzuführen ist, oder ob er auf Schillersche A rt darum kämpfen mußte, bleibt dahingestellt — immerhin geht es hier, wie auch in seinen Werken, um ein Ideal, um eine ideale menschliche Haltung. Gerade vielleicht darum, weil er selbst seine Unzulänglichkeiten erkennen konnte, strebte er umso mehr zur Vollkommenheit.  Es war gerade der von dem humanistischen Geist durchdrungene Tregubov, der dem jungen Gončarov diese Erziehung darbot, indem er dessen Sensibilität entwickelte und ihn zur behutsamen Mäßigkeit erzog. Er wurde dadurch um so besser vorbereitet, den Idealismus der Menschheit in sich aufzunehmen. Tregubov fällt immerhin das Verdienst zu, als Freimaurer der erste gewesen zu sein, der durch sein eigenes Wesen Gončarov dem idealtypischen Menschenbild nahebrachte. Sogar die Gegner der Freimaurer erkannten den ästhetisch-moralischen Wert der Forderung nach Vervollkommnung des inneren Menschen: "Masony nesomnenno prinesli pol'zu, oblagoraživaja nravy i sodejstvuja prosveščeniju. Oni propovedovali ljubov к čeloveku, poznanie samogo sebja, i ukazanie idealov, к kotorym dolžen stremit'sja ־ čelovek...." Auch religiöse und nationale Toleranz sind in ähnlich edler Gesinnung in der Verfassung der Freimaurer festgelegt: "... т у ispoveduem to i'ko vseobščuju reliģiju, a takže prinadležnost' ko vjsakim narodam."30

Aus den erwähnten humanistischen Quellen, abgesehen von seiner eigenen Neigung, kann man schließen, daß Gončarov noch auf andere Weise durch die Humanitätsideen hätte beeinflußt werden können.  Entscheidend für Gončarovs Humanitätsauffassung ist natürlich auch Winckelmanns Einfluß, von dem w ir auch nur das wissen, daß er ihn gelesen und übersetzt hat. Kritiker verweisen auf Winckelmanns Hauptwerk *Geschichte der Kunst des Altertums* (1764); in W irklichkeit geht es auch um sein erstes bedeutendes Werk *Gedanken über die Nachahmung der griechischen Werke in der Malerei und Bildhauerkunst* (1755), denn hier wird das Leitbild des neuen schönen Menschen der kommenden deutschen Klassik vorweggenommen.  Winckelmanns Ideal ist Schönheit, d.h. ein ethischer und zugleich ein ästhetischer Begriff; gemeint ist die höchstmögliche Vollkommenheit in allem, was menschlich ist.31 Und so w ill auch Gončarov sein Ideal verstanden haben.

Wiederholt stoßen w ir auf Gončarovs Aussagen über sein Ideal, in denen er sein Humanitätsbestreben auf verschiedene Weise ausdrückt. Es ist aber nicht der Zweck, jegliche Aussage nachzuweisen, um dann festzustellen, daß sie aus unterschiedlichen Quellen stammen könnte, obwohl für spezifische Parallelen und Lektüren Beweise erbracht werden können.  Diese Ideen bewegten Gončarovs Dasein, sein Streben, sie bestimmten die Prinzipien der Darstellung in seinem literarischen Schaffen, u.a. der Mäßigung und der Zügelung.

Schon Merežkovskij vermerkt die Ablehnung der Beschreibungen von tiefer Leidenschaft und sprunghaften Gewalttätigkeiten; er vernimmt vielmehr eine ruhige, erdgebundene Einfalt, ja zum Teil eine an Homer erinnernde Haltung. Trübe dunkle Ecken voll Kälte, Entsetzen und Schrecken, wie sie im Text eines Dostoevskij erscheinen, oder grotesken Humor wie bei Gogol' gibt es bei Gončarov nicht. Ohne Berauschung, mit klassischer Gelassenheit und ruhigem, nüchternen Blick, wie bei den Alten, wird das Leben geschildert. Das Grandiose und Wilde in der Natur möchte er, in den Worten Merežkovskijs, "m it Zügen der menschlichen Zivilization verschönern."32 Dieser Haltung ist es zuzuschreiben, daß man Gončarov auch einer gewissen Apathie gegenüber seinen Helden beschuldigt. Totale Objektivität ohne Stellungnahme des Dichters, ohne Gefühl und Kommentar des Autors zu verspüren, waren in einem Zeitalter, wo es um die Veränderung der ganzen Gesellschaft ging, nicht gerade anregend. Daher konnten Pisarev und Grigorovič auch

behaupten, daß in Gončarovs Romanen etwas Unausgesprochenes, eine gewisse Zurückhaltung, seine Gedanken mutig auszusprechen ("... umyšlennaja ili nečajannaja nedogovorennost' ... bojas' smelo vyskazat' svoe mnenie"33), zu vermerken sei. Tatsächlich sollten seine Ideen, der herrschende Grundgedanke, zwischen den Zeilen gelesen werden, womit er aber nicht immer erfolgreich war. Er konnte eben wirklich nicht immer über die einzelnen Tannenbäume hinwegsehen, um ein russisches Sprichwort zu modifizieren; dadurch wurde auch der gewünschte Effekt des Leitmotivs verringert. Er gesteht, daß es ihm leicht gelinge, einzelne Bilder und Szenen zu malen: "... no provodit' smysl, vyjasnjat' cel' sozdanija, *neobchodimost*', po kotoroj dolžno deržat'sja vse sozdanie, eto skučno i nevyrazimo trudno ... ja ... strādāju ot bogatstva materiala i ot neumenj'a raspoijadit'sja im ."  Er selbst behauptet" "Iskusstvo dlja iskusstva — bessmyslennaja fraza."34 Wenn aber der Leser auf die Humanitätsidee eingestellt ist, so ist das Streben nach dem ersehnten Ideal bei Gončarov unverkennbar, nicht durch Predigt, sondern in der rein künstlerischen Gestaltung.

In seiner extensiven und aufschlußreichen Korrespondenz mit S ofja Nikitenko in den 1860er Jahren gesteht Gončarov zum ersten Mal, daß seine literarische Tätigkeit stets durch ein Ideal bestimmt sei: "Skažu Vam, vot čto, čego nikomu ne govoril: s toj minuty, kogda načal pisat' dlja pečati ... и menja byl odin artističeskij ideal: eto — izobraženie čestnoj, dobroj, simpatičnoj natury, v vysSej stepeni idealista."35 Aber auch schon früher, als er an seinem *Oblomov* arbeitete, zweifelte er, ob er nicht allzu viele Ideale darstelle, und dazu unvollendete. Er beruhigt sich aber, indem er auf die Einbildungskraft des Lesers rechnet: "Wozu ist denn der Leser da?" wird gefragt.36 Aber gerade diese Arbeitsweise hat zu manchen kontroversen Deutungen seiner Helden geführt. Ist das Ideale in Oblomov zu suchen, oder etwa in Štol'c oder gar in O l'ga? Aber auch Rajskij, Vera und die babuška sind mit gewissen idealen Zügen ausgestattet. Gončarov spricht ferner von dem Ideal der Vervollkommnung (ideal usoveršenstvovanija), vom Schönen und Guten, als einem notwendigen Ziel der Menschheit.37

Als man ihn auf seine literarischen Pflichten als Dichter und Erzieher seiner Nation aufmerksam machte, betonte Gončarov wiederum das Streben nach dem Ideal und dessen Verkündung, das ihn allein von den alltäglichen Enttäuschungen gerettet habe; so viele Male habe er ausrufen müssen: "Bože moj! о poēzija, о voobraženie, о ideal: kuda oni zavodili menja." M it der

kantisch-schillerschen Auseinandersetzung über Pflicht und Neigung erläutert Gončarov seine Auffassung des Idealen, indem er eine unaufhebbare Dualität im menschlichen Dasein postuliert. Daher begegnen w ir auch immer entgegengesetzten Kräften: das Alte und das Neue, der rationale und der Gefühlsmensch, das Praktische und das Ideale. Den idealen Zustand des Menschen sieht er in der Verschmelzung dieser Kräfte zu einem harmonischen Ganzen. Seiner puritanischen, pflichtbewußten S ofja Nikitenko erwidert er, daß eine asketische Betonung der Pflicht den Menschen daran hindere, Mensch zu sein, und etwas anderes auf dieser Erde darf er nicht und soll er nicht sein. Der Mensch hat Gefühle, ein Herz, Verstand und Vernunft, und seine Aufgabe ist zu vermeiden, daß weder das eine noch das andere das • » Übergewicht gewinnt. Die Hinweise auf Schillers Konzeption von der schönen Seele sind unverkennbar. Aber davon abgesehen, vertritt Gončarov hier die Idee des goldenen Mittelwegs, denn gute wie schlechte Eigenschaften in extremer Form führen zu tragischer Verstrickung.

 Er glaubt an eine allumfassende Liebe, und nur diese Kraft vermag die Welt zu bewegen und den menschlichen W illen zur fruchtbaren Tätigkeit hinzulenken.   Schönheit und Sittlichkeit gehören zusammen; sie bedingen sich gegenseitig. Die Idee der Sittlichkeit offenbart sich in der Form der Schönheit, oder vielmehr, das Ideal der Kunst harmonisiert m it der Sittlichkeit des Menschen.   Aber sein Humanitätsstreben, die ethisch-moralische Forderungen sind den Geboten der Nächstenliebe sehr nahe.  Weder Gončarov noch seine Helden suchen je Erlösung im Gebet — nur Vera nach dem Erlebnis in der Schlucht wendet sich der Bibel zu. Menschliche Güte offenbart sich immer in Nächstenliebe, als persönliche moralische Handlung eines liebenden Menschen einem anderen gegenüber. Daher kann Gončarov auch nicht den vielgepriesenen russischen heiligen Mönch billigen. Es ist zwar leichter, in einem isolierten Dasein ein Heiliger zu werden, als im Strome der Welt, aber in dieser Isolierung ist der Mönch ein reiner Egoist, weil er nur an seine eigene Erlösung denkt und an der Verbesserung der anderen Menschen nicht beteiligt ist. In W irklichkeit ist der Mönch auf diese A rt "unfähig, sich selbst zusammen mit anderen zu retten. "43 In dieser Einstellung zeigt sich aufs genaueste Gončarovs Verhältnis zur Religion, insbesondere zur Orthodoxie.

Gončarovs Auffassung von der Kunst im Prozess der Humanisierung trifft sich in vielem mit deijenigen bei anderen Repräsentanten der Humanitätsidee. Kunst ist der höchste Ausdruck der schöpferischen Kräfte des Menschen; sie ist ein Bedürfnis der menschlichen Existenz, des Geistes wie des Sinnlichen. Die wahre Kunst, geschaffen vom Genius, bereitet Wohlgefallen, ist aber auch ein bestimmter Ausdruck des sittlichen Daseins.  Schon früh erkannte Gončarov die Kraft der Kunst und deren Leistung bei der Verwirklichung der höchsten Werte. Darum ist das höchste Ziel der Kunst, durch das Schöne den Menschen zu veredeln. Die Kunst macht dem Menschen die Wahrheit in der Form der Schönheit offenbar.   Aleksandr Aduev hat sich der Poesie verschrieben, Štol'c und Oblomov, besonders der letztere, sind schon von Jugend auf von der Kunst begeistert, und die Werke von Byron, Rousseau, Schiller und Goethe sind ihnen geläufig. O l'ga ist der Musik ergeben, und in Rajskij und K irillov begegnen w ir Künstlerpersönlichkeiten, deren Schaffensmethode aufs genaueste analysiert wird. Bedeutsam ist Rajskijs immerwährendes Suchen nach dem Schönen — in Literatur und Musik, in Malerei und endlich in der Bildhauerei.   Es war eine Flucht in das Reich des Ideals, das Zentrum der Kunst der Antike. Aber w ir wissen, daß Rajskij auch in Rom als Künstler versagen wird.   Rajskij selbst erkennt seine Schwächen, bezeichnet sich selbst als Mißgeburt und kann daher einem vollkommenen Menschen kaum entsprechen. Besonders seine extreme Besessenheit durch das Schöne widerspricht der Gončarovschen Auffassung von der Harmonie des goldenen Mittelwegs. Und doch verkörpert Rajskij gewisse humanistische Ideen, oder vielmehr, er wird häufig zum Sprecher des Autors erhoben, z.B. als Rajskij sein Romanprojekt den Frauen widmet.   Auch Gončarov mußte entdecken, daß reine Schönheit nicht alleiniger Gegenstand der Kunst sein kann. Gončarov selbst wollte Rajskij in all seiner Häßlichkeit darstellen — "predstavit' ego vo vsej urodlivosti.. no ne otnošus' ja к nemu odobritel'no, a s ironiej ... i cel' moja imenno čtob predstavit' russkuju darovituju naturu, propadajuščuju darom bez tolku ... Eto svoego roda artističeskaja oblomovščina. " Die Tatsache, daß Rajskij gleichwohl zu einer sympathischen Figur wurde, ist darauf zurückzuführen, so betont Gončarov, daß er ihm mit Mitgefühl und nicht mit kalter Bosheit malen konnte.46 Und so, behauptet Gončarov, behandle er sogar seinen ärgsten Feind: mit Mitgefühl und M itleid.  Die Antwort ist dieselbe — die Mürbheit, Plumpheit, Trägheit, Schlaffheit und liederliche Melancholie Oblomovs47 wird in hyperbolischer Form dargestellt, denn solch hoffnungslose Gestalten gibt es kaum in der W irklichkeit. Aber abgesehen von seiner übertriebenen Faulheit und Apathie, ist Oblomov auch Humanist im höchsten Sinne, und er glaubt ein Leben zu führen, nach dem sich jeder Mensch sehnt. Dabei kommt es ihm aber nicht in den Sinn zu fragen, wieso es möglich war, daß er solch eine Lebensart führen konnte. Seine Leibeigenen und das System der Leibeigenschaft werden von diesem "Humanisten" nicht in Frage gestellt.

Und trotzdem erreicht Gončarov sein Ziel, eine Art Ideal eines Menschen darzustellen, nicht direkt, sondern indirekt; nicht im Werk, sondern in dem Leser selbst, der nicht darum herumkommt darüber nachzudenken, wie eine Veränderung erzielt werden könnte. P.  In der Debatte über den Charakter Oblomovs ist der Hinweis auf den idealen Menschen unvermeidlich.

  Das extreme Negative erweckt unwillkürlich das Gegenteil und somit wenigstens eine Ahnung vom Idealen. Als Gogol' von seiner Freundin Smimova beschuldigt wurde, daß er keine Menschenliebe zeige und nur negative Charaktere zeichne, erwiderte er: "V urode vy skol'ko nibud' počuvstvuete ideal togo že, čego karikaturoj stal urod."52 Genau dasselbe Verfahren beobachten w ir auch bei Gončarov: die Andeutung von Ideen und Idealen, ausgedrückt in indirekter Form.

 Es sind kontroverse, idealähnliche Gestalten in seinen drei Romanen: Peter Aduev, Štol'c und Tušin.  Es sind keine realen Typen, sondern vielmehr Typen der Zukunft, daher sind sie auch nicht vollkommen entwickelt und repräsentieren etwas, was noch im Werden ist. Gončarov selbst gibt zu, daß er Schwierigkeiten hatte, Charaktere wie Štol'c und Tušin vollkommen darzustellen, weil sie sich eben noch nicht zu einem vollen Typus entwickelt hatten, denn ein Typus ist für Gončarov etwas tie f Verwurzeltes, das sich jahrelang, über mehrere Generationen festgelegt hat.53 Peter Aduev, Štol'c und Tušin sind unmittelbar mit Gončarovs Fortschrittsgedanken verbunden und erinnern uns an einen Zukunftstypus, einen tugendhaften und

humanen Kulaken, der sich erst in der Reformzeit Stolypins zur vollen Blüte hätte entfalten können.  Hierin sah Gončarov seinen Beitrag zum russischen Fortschritt. Sie erscheinen als Personifikation sozialer Ideale, als Träger der Idee der Zukunft, aber als ideale Menschen erscheinen sie dem russischen Leser zweifelhaft.54

Verfolgt man chronologisch die Erscheinung dieser positiven Helden, ohne auf eine nähere detaillierte Untersuchung einzugehen, so entdeckt man im ersten Roman, daß Peter Aduev, einst ein Idealist, vor der Realität des Lebens zu einem rationalistisch gestimmten, positivistischen Geschäftsmann erzogen wurde. Dieser praktische Mann der Tat ist aber auch in kulturellen und wissenschaftlichen Aspekten bewandert. Obwohl die Sympathie des Autors auf der Seite dieses positiven Charakters liegt, konnte er ihn nicht zu einem idealen Menschen erheben — er war am Ende in seiner Lebensauffassung doch zu rationalistisch. Durchweg wird der Grundkonflikt des Lebens — Gefühl und Vernunft, das Ideale und die Praxis vorgeführt. Nur am Ende des Romans, als Peter Aduev selbst zugibt, daß er ein allzu einseitig rationales Leben führte, wobei das Gefühl unkultiviert blieb, wird ideale Menschlichkeit, der harmonische Einklang von Gefühl und Vernunft, im Hinblick auf Schiller indirekt angedeutet.

Gončarov versucht auch in seinem zweiten Roman, *Oblomov,* die Frage der russischen Gesellschaftsentwicklung zu behandeln, indem er der hoffnungslosen Gestalt Oblomovs den Halb-Russen und Halb-Deutschen Štol'c gegenüberstellt. M it wenigen Ausnahmen wird Štol'c von de Kritikern als Streber und Spießer bezeichnet, in W irklichkeit aber sind im eigentlichen Text dafür keine Belege zu finden. Ihm werden egozentrische Züge zugeschrieben: in seinem ganzen Wesen sei er nur ein vom Verstand gelenkter Unternehmer. Ohne weiter zu versuchen, diese Anklagen zu widerlegen, sollte man zunächst zwei Frage beantworten. Was wollte Gončarov mit der Gestalt des Štol'c erzielen; und inwiefern ist es ihm gelungen, eine überzeugende Romanfigur zu gestalten?  Daß Gončarov in der Gestalt des Štol'c eine weitere Entwicklung seines Peter Aduev zeigen wollte, daran wird nicht gezweifelt. Daß er ihm Klugheit, Umsicht, Pflichttreue, Würde und Tüchtigkeit zuschreibt und ihn zum Muster eines harmonischen menschlichen Ideals machen w ill, daran ist auch nicht zu zweifeln. W ir müssen allerdings zugeben, daß diese Perfektibilität ein Produkt der Gončarovschen Einbildungskraft ist und daß sie auf die Zukunft gerichtet ist. Štol'c ist ein

Ideal der Zukunft, und daher kann Gončarov ihn auch nicht ganz in der eigentlichen Handlung darstellen. In großen Zügen wird Štorcens Erziehung geschildert im Vergleich zu Oblomovs, und nur durch diese Erziehung kann ein Wesen wie Štol'c existieren und die Harmonie seiner Seele aufrechterhalten. Er war stets Beherrscher seiner Leidenschaften und war sich bewußt, daß diese Harmonie stets erkämpft werden muß. Diese Beherrschung des Unwillkürlichen verweist deutlich auf Schillers Begriff der Würde. Warum machte Gončarov ihn halb zu einem Russen und halb zu einem Deutschen?    Štol'c ist ein Zögling zweier Nationen, verschiedener sozialer Herkunft, Sohn einer russischen adligen Mutter und eines deutschen Bürgers. In ihm wird das östliche und westliche Kulturgut vereint, das Rationale und Gefühlvolle werden zu einer harmonischen Synthese verschmolzen, und daher sah Gončarov in ihm ein soziales, kulturelles und menschliches Ideal. Gončarov selbst deutet auf diese übernationale, universelle Kulturvereinigung am Ende seiner eigenen Besprechung von Štol'c hin: "I samoe slavjanofil'stvo ... budet iskrennee protjagivat' ruku к vseobščej, to est' evropejskoj, kulturę ibo esli čuvstva i ubeždenija nacional'ny, to znanie odno dija vsech i и vsech."55

Štol'c besitzt tatsächlich alle Attribute eines Humanitätsideals, aber nur in abstrakter Form.  Um zu zeigen, daß Gončarov wirklich nur eine Idee darstelle, wird häufig seine eigene Aussage angeführt: "...čto obraz Štol'ca bleden, ne realen, ne živoj, a prosto ideja."  Der Gründe, warum man Štol'c ablehnt, oder warum es Gončarov nicht gelungen ist, ihn als Ideal lebendig gemacht zu haben, sind mehrere.    Und wenn es ihm auch nicht gelang, ein Ideal darzustellen, so wird zumindest der Leser und K ritiker dazu bewogen, darüber nachzudenken. Somit hat er dann auch diesmal sein Ziel erreicht.

  Der Idealismus eines politischen Systems, welches Ideale mit fertigen Formen predigt, ohne sie geprüft oder erlebt zu haben, wird genau so abgelehnt, wie in Dostoevskij's *Zapiski iz podpolja*.5י Wiederum wird ein Ideal postuliert in dem aufrichtigen, ehrlichen, von Natur aus harmonischen Charakter, dem tatkräftigen Gutsbesitzer und Geschäftsmann Tušin. Gončarov vermeidet es, einen zweiten Štol'c zu gestalten, indem er Tušin als reines Produkt der russischen Verhältnisse erscheinen läßt und ihn zudem nicht mit einem ausländischen Namen belastet.  Abgesehen von seinem edlen, hilfreichen Charakter, wird Tušins Tatkraft und seine natürliche Lust zur Arbeit besonders unterstrichen.  Somit wird er zum Retter in der Notlage der Familie, aber auch zum Retter Rußlands. Er wird zum Symbol der vereinten russischen Kräfte, wie sie von ihm, Vera und der babuška ausgehen.   Diese traditionellen Werte sind vor allem in der Ehrlichkeit, Gerechtigkeit und im starken Charakter der babuška verkörpert. Sie symbolisiert die Idee der Ordnung, das stabile patriarchalische alte System Rußlands. Veras Rückkehr zur patriarchalischen Welt bedeutet aber nicht deren volle Annahme; sie ist nur als transitorisches Stadium zu betrachten, bis das Ideale verwirklicht werden kann.

Das Versagen seiner eigenen Ideale, oder vielmehr die Ablehnung derselben, haben Gončarovs Glauben an das Ideal zeitweilig erschüttert, • • besonders in einer Übergangsperiode, in der das Alte noch nicht verwittert ist und das Neue noch keine festen Wurzeln geschlagen hat. Daher auch die Darstellung der Idee des Idealen in der Form von Helden der Zukunft. Tatsächlich entdeckt man bei Gončarov eine ambivalente Einstellung dem Idealen und der Idealisierung gegenüber.     Die Geschichte hat uns zu Genüge gezeigt, daß gewisse Systeme den Menschen nicht verändert haben und daß die Möglichkeit dafür nur auf der Erziehung des Menschen, auf der Grundlage des Humanitätsideals, beruhen könnte.  Wer weiß aber, und dies können w ir nie ermessen, wie viel schlechter es der Menschheit erginge, wenn sie dem erzieherischen Humanitätsgedanken keine Folge geleistet hätte. Uns so können w ir nur dem Gedanken Thomas Manns zustimmen, wenn er von der Versöhnung der Menschheit in der Nachkriegszeit spricht und von der großen Botschaft, die das Klassische Humanitätsideal der Nachwelt vermittelte — und die heute noch ihre wahre Gültigkeit bewahrt habe.62

#### NOTES

1. I. A. Gončarov: *Sobranie sočinenij* v *vos'mi tomach,* Moskva 1955, Bd. V III, S. 64-113. 141-169, 208-220.

2. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 54.

3. P. Brang, "Von den Rechten und Pflichten der russischen Dichter," *Schweizer Monatshefte,* 49. Jg., Heft 4 (1969), S. 383.

4. Ebd., S. 385.

5. N. A. Dobroljubov, *Sobranie sočinenij v devjati tomach,* Moskva 1982, Bd. IV , S. 473.

6. Ebd., S. 338, 341.

7. D. Tschiźewskij, *Zwischen Ost und West. Russische Geistesgeschichte II, 18. - 20. Jahrhundert,* Hamburg 1961, S. 84.

8. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 162.

9. Ebd., S. 67.

10. E. Heier, "Elements o f Physiognomy and Pathognomy in the Works o f I. S. Turgenev," *Slavistische Beitrüge,* Bd. 116, München 1977, S. 51-52.

11. *Kratkij slovar'po estetike,* M. F. Ovsjannikov, Moskva 1963, S. 66-70.

12. V. G. Belinskij, *Polnoe sobranie sočinenij,* Moskva 1956, Bd. X, S. 323.

13. J. J. Winckelmann, *Gedanken über die Nachahmung der griechischen Werke in der Malerei und Bildhauerkunst* (1755), *Sämtliche Werke,* Nachdruck der Ausgabe von 1825, Osnabrück 1965, Bd. I, S. 30.

14. Eine detaillierte Darstellung des klassischen Humanitätsideals ist in folgenden Werken zu verfolgen: A. Raabe, *Schillers Idealistischer Realismus,* Bonn 1962; F. Gundolf, *Goethe,* Berlin 1922; A. Heusler, *Klassik und Klassizismus,* Bern 1952; W. Leifer, *Hellas im Deutschen Geistesleben,* Herrenalb 1963; W. Rehm, *Griechentum und Goethezeit,* München 1952; J. W. Dyck, "Goethes Humanitätsidee und Grillparzers ,Sappho' ," *Jahrbuch der Grillparzer-Gesellschaft,* IV , Wien 1965, S. 65-79.

15. *I. A. Gončarov v russkoj kritike,* Moskva 1958, S. 25.

16. Vgl. hierzu: A. Lyngstad, *Ivan Goncharov,* New York 1971; M . Ehre, *Oblomov and his Creator,* Princeton 1973; V. Setchkarev, *Ivan Goncharov. His Life and his Works,* Würzburg 1974; V. A. Michelson, *Gumanizm I. A. Gončarova: Kolonial'nyj vopros,* Krasnodar 1965; L. S. Gejro, "Kommentar" in I. A. Gončarov, *Oblomov,* Leningrad 1967, S. 527-692; P. Thiergen, "Oblomovals Bruchstück-Mensch: Präliminarien zum Problem 'Gončarov und Schiller' ," *I. A. Gončarov. Beitrüge zu Werk und Wirkung,* hrsg. v. P. Thiergen, Köln/Wien 1989, S. 163-191; V. M el'nik, *Realizm I. A. Gončarova,* Vladivostok 1985.

17. О.  Jahrhunderts,* 1805-1881, New York 1945, S. 93-98; Gončarov, Bd. V II, S. <sup>211</sup>.

18. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 229,469-472. Vgl. hierzu auch Thiergen, S. 172.

19. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 223, 435.

88

20. *I. A. Gončarov v vospominanijach sovremennikov,* ed. A. D. Alekseev, Leningrad 1939, S. 31.

21. Belinskij, Bd. Ill, S. 385-419; Peterson, S. 21-35.

22. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 41-63, 461-468.

23. Ebd., S. 222.

24. H. Graßhoff, "Parteinahme und gesellschaftlicher Auftrag des Schriftstellers...," *Humanistische Tradition der russischen Aufklärung*, Berlin 1973, S. 63; L. I. Kulakova, *Očerki istorii russkoj estetičeskoj mysli XVJ1I veka,* Leningrad 1968, S. 207-234.

25. A. G. Cross, *N. M. Karamzin. A Study o f His Literary Career 1783-1803,* Carbondale 1971; H. Rothe, *N. M. Karamzins europäische Reise: Der Beginn des russischen Romans,* Bad Homburg v.d.H./Berlin/Zürich 1968; Ju. M. Lotman, *Evoljucija mirovozzrenija Karamzina (1789-1803),* Uč. zap. Tartuskogo gos. univ., 51, 1957.

26. Gončarov, Bd. V II, S. 233-253; Ehre, S. 11 ff.

27. *Frank-masonstvo, Enciklopdedičeskij slovar'* (1902), X X X V I, S. 513.

28. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 333.

29. Ehre, S. 48-49; *Gončarov* v *vospominanijach...,* S. 48, 56-57, 70, 243.

30. *Frank-masonstvo,* S. 504.

31. J. J. Winckelmann, *Geschichte der Kunst des Altertums,* Weimar 1964, S. 364-367, 428-433.

32. D. S. Merežkovskij, *Gončarov, Polnoe sobranie sočinenij,* Hildesheim/New York 1973, Bd. V, Teil 8, S. 34.

33. *Gončarov v russkoj kritike,* S. 124; *Gončarov v vospominanijach...,* S. 57.

34. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 162, 341.

89

47. So bezeichnet bei Thomas Mann, *Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen. Gesammelte Werke in Einzelbänden,* Frankfurt 1983, S. 299.

48. P. Kropotkin, *Ideals and Realities in Russian Literature,* New York 1919, S. 159.

49. Gončarov, Bd. V II, S. 366.

50. *Russkie pisateli о literature,* ed. S. Baluchatyj, Leningrad 1939, Bd. I, S. 317.

51. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 212.

52. A. A. Elistratova, *Gogol' i problemy zapadnoevropejskogo romana,* Moskva 1972, S. 133-134.

53. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 113; A. G. Cejtlin, *I. A. Gončarov,* Moskva 1950, S. 358-370; M. Russell, *Untersuchungen zur Theorie und Praxis der Typisierung bei* /. *A. Gončarov,* Slavistische Beiträge, Bd. 118, München 1978, S. 30-33.

54. Vgl. hierzu auch Lyngstad, S. 53-54, 161; Setchkarev, S. 127-161; ders. "Andrej Štol'c in Gončarovs 'Oblomov:' Versuch einer Reinterpretation," *1. A. Gončarov. Beiträge zu Werk und Wirkung,* S. 154-155.

55. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 82; Lyngstad, S. 100-102.

56. Dyck, S. 78.

57. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 149-152; Ehre, S. 44-49. Vgl. auch R. Neuhäuser, "Gončarovs Roman 'Obryv' und der russische Roman des Realismus," *1. A. Gončarov. Beiträge zu Werk und Wirkung,* S. 103-104.

58. Gončarov, Bd. V II, S. 103.

59. Gončarov, Bd. V III, S. 367.

60. M el'nik, S. 43.

61. Vgl. die Argumente des Professors in *Literaturnyj večer,* Gončarov, Bd. V II, S. 147 ff.

62. Dyck, S. 76-77.

# V I. Duty and Inclination in Turgenev's *Faust*

Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren. Goethe, *Faust,* I.

In spite o f Turgenev's thorough knowledge o f philosophers like Pascal, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, Feuerbach and Schopenhauer, he at no time became the propagator o f anyone's specific thoughts. There is, however, one common idea among these philosophers, an idea which permeates most of Turgenev's works, particularly those after the 1850's: that reality is not what one conceives it to be, that man's existence is shrouded in mystery, and that there is no permanency and consequently the tragic recognition that man is unable to achieve lasting happiness. This questioning o f man's fleeting existence in this infinite universe and the ensuing pessimism and ephemeral concept o f life has frequently been attributed to Schopenhauer.1 However, the Turgenev scholar A. Batjuto convincingly argues that the Russian novelist's pessimism could have been nourished by most philosophers dating back to Marcus Aurelius, and even to Heraclitus.2 But whatever the reason for Turgenev's disillusionment, whether it is caused by some philosophical influence, or by his psychological make-up and his own unsettled situation, or the social problems o f his native Russia, an underlying tone o f disenchantment and gentle frustration is unmistakably apparent in our w riter's thinking. In that sense he is not unique, as the whole of Europe during the second half o f the nineteenth century was plagued with a pessimistic outlook. It was a transitionary period where the old was beginning to crumble and the new had not yet taken firm roots. Life was conceived as a struggle with destiny and was seen through a veil o f resignation. Turgenev with his pessimism resembles many a contemporary Russian and European author of his time, like Thomas Hardy, Theodor Storm and especially Franz Grillparzer, whose ultimate message "trage, dulde und busse" could serve as the motto to the works o f the Russian novelist.

 Thus, also the depiction of the fleeting existence o f his heroes, who bloom only for a moment, "who appear like a bird from darkness and disappear as quickly into darkness" *(Rudin).* Turgenev's heroes experience only despair and disappointment; from the very

beginning they seem to be doomed to oblivion. The major characters in his novels simply vanish or perish without having accomplished anything or having reached any o f their goals — one is killed senselessly, the other dies prematurely, another commits suicide, and the next simply resigns himself to fate by saying: "Welcome lonely old age! Burn out, useless life ." There is, o f course, periodically escape in his tales o f mystery, but it is only a momentary escape.  It is thus not surprising that the theme o f resignation reverberates through the prose o f Turgenev, who as a solution can only offer a mode of life which is marked by endurance, tolerance and atonement. If one can speak o f a predominance o f certain themes in Turgenev then one would have to single out gloom, melancholy, death, loneliness, exhaustion from life and especially love, but most often unrequited love. Love as an exalted feeling is never lasting; most often it is depicted as painful and destructive. That bliss o f love and the entailing lasting happiness is hardly ever attained, and if it is, it is only for one fleeting moment, but mostly it remains an illusion.  Ib a t irrational feeling, that spiritual power o f love is forever in conflict with the rational side of man, which guides his duty and obligation. It is the inevitable conflict o f duty and inclination that prevents man from attaining lasting fulfilm ent in love as it is depicted in Turgenev's *Faust* (1856) which shall be elucidated in this paper. Without unduly speculating to what extent Turgenev's love stories are based on biographical aspects, one has to stress, nonetheless, the conditions under which he produced *Faust*, for in many respects the story echoes the author's own psychological state o f mind. It is equally reminiscent o f Turgenev's relation to Tolstoj's sister with whom Turgenev seemed to have been infatuated at the beginning of the 1850's. It is thus likely that the prototype of the heroine of the story, Vera, has been derived from M. N. Tolstaja.  Soon after the publication of *Faust,* he writes in December o f 1856 to M . N. Tolstaja:

I am very happy that you like *Faust*, and that what you are saying about the duality in me is fully justified, but you may not know the reason for this dichotomy.... You see, I was extremely bitter to grow old and not having experienced full happiness — and not having built yet for myself a peaceful nest. My soul was young, hopeful and longing; but my mind sobered from experience at times triumphed ..., but when the soul in turn asked my mind as to its achievement, whether it guided my life wisely in the right path — it was inclined to be silent... and then both the mind and the soul began to chase each other.... When you knew me at that time, I still dreamed o f happiness and I did not wish to part with my hope; now I have abandoned all that. Everything is quiet and paralysed.... Why all this has come about is a long story.... *Faust* was written during this transition, at the turn o f my life — my whole soul flashed with its last fire o f memory, hope, youth....4

In essence Turgenev relates in this letter the spiritual crisis o f his story, namely the inability to achieve happiness in life. A balance between reason and feeling is impossible. From this it would seem that Turgenev did not believe in the realization o f the Schillerian concept o f the "beautiful soul" in which reason and feeling are in total harmonious interplay. In any case, Turgenev never portrayed such an ideal in any o f his works, and if he did, it was but a mere illusion, and at that a fleeting one.

It is, o f course, no accident that Turgenev took both the title o f his story and its epigraph, "Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren," from Goethe's masterpiece. This is, indeed, an indication that Turgenev fully concurred with the ultimate message set forth in Goethe's *Faust.* What both works depict is the recognition that life is a difficult task, it is a series o f sacrifices and renunciations, and that death alone could disperse all problems. While such thoughts and Turgenev's lament on the laws o f nature, the individual's limitations, his brief existence in comparison to the infinity o f nature, is frequently associated with the novelist's reading o f philosophers like Pascal and Schopenhauer, he was actually exposed to such ideas much earlier, namely when he wa a student in Berlin in the 1830's. At the time he was fascinated with Goethe and especially with his *Faust.* To Granovskij he wrote in 1839 that he cannot stop reading Goethe: "What treasures I constantly discover in his works!"5 In 1844 he translated several scenes from Goethe's work and a year later he produced a lengthy review o f Vronchenko's *Faust* translation.6

In Goethe's *Faust* Turgenev found the tragic mirroring o f human life. As Faust passes through life, it brings home to Goethe's hero the tragedy o f his own existence, his inner struggle, the feud o f "the two souls in him ," and the realization that life is unable to give total fulfilm ent, and that he is but a dwarf in comparison to the infinity o f nature with its incessant mystery and creativity.  Yet, looking upon his life 's work, he is still not satisfied; total fulfilm ent was unattainable. Faust's titanic urge to live and his longing for action, all o f which caused him to conclude a pact with Mephistopheles, did not bring him to the stage where he could say: "Verweile doch! du bist so schön." That moment never came. And it should not, according to Goethe, for this would mean the end o f life itself — desire and longing must exist, as this is the essence o f life. And thus, the ultimate message o f Goethe is to strive, and whosoever strives, he can be redeemed. But the striving and longing necessarily have to encounter obstacles. Thus also the constant polarity in Goethe's tragedy, a play o f power and counterpower, the opposition o f light and darkness, spirit and matter, personal desire and the welfare of mankind. No single sphere can be comprehended by itself polarity must exist; only through the existence o f darkness does man become aware o f light. Thus, evil has a specific function in human life.7 However, such a reconciliatory note is absent in Turgenev's *Faust.*

Turgenev's *Faust* is written in the epistolary form, consisting o f nine letters. Pavel Aleksandrovich's letters are addressed to a friend in which he relates how after nine years' absence he returns to his estate and discovers that the love o f his youth, Vera Nikolaevna, now twenty-eight years old, married and a mother, has become his neighbour. Their renewed acquaintance leads to frequent visits during which Pavel discovers that Vera has been subjugated by her mother E l'tsova to a stern one-sided upbringing. Her education consisted o f geography and the sciences; novels and poetry, capable o f arousing the young woman's sensibilities and possibly an excess o f emotions, were to be read only after her marriage, i.e., after having securely established a home and stability. Pavel discovers, however, that even after her marriage and long after her mother's death, Vera displays complete apathy toward literature. Turgenev raises here the problem o f aesthetics versus practical usefulness, a topical issue of the Russia o f the 1850's and 1860's, which brought forth typical slogans by the "thinking realists," like: "a pair o f

boots is worth more than a drama by Shakespeare. "

However, Vera's indifference to belles-lettres is in no way caused by any thought current o f the time but solely by her mother. Vera says herself: "I am not against poetry; from childhood on I became accustomed not to read these invented works; my mother wished it that way, and I, the longer I live, the more I become convinced that everything my mother had done, everything she said, was the truth, the divine truth."8 Indeed, E l'tsova, Vera's mother, had good reason to shelter her daughter from anything that could inflame her passion.  Pavel, the narrator, describes E l'tsova as an unusual person, solemn, reserved and guarded; she had suffered a great deal in life but eventually had taught herself to control her feelings to such an extent that she never betrayed the deep love even for her own daughter. In later life she never smiled and never shared her grief with anyone, "as if she had locked herself in and had thrown away the key." The experience o f life had brought her to the conviction that "one ought to choose quite early in life — either the useful *[poleznoe*] or the pleasant [*prijatnoe*] and then adhere to it forever." To this E l'tsova added: "I too, at one time, wanted to combine the two .... But this is impossible for it either leads to destruction or to debasement."9

In the limitation o f this choice and the impossibility o f combining the "useful" and the "pleasant" Turgenev saw the tragedy o f man's existence. Indeed, he looked upon it like a law of nature from which there is no escape. Turgenev demonstrates this view through the relationship between Vera and Pavel, whereby Goethe's *Faust* becomes the moving force o f the story. But while Goethe's work constitutes a history o f man's cultural and spiritual development, his longing and striving, in short, the whole range o f human experience, Turgenev's *Faust* is, in comparison, but a miniature. Turgenev deals only with one problem, the tragic aspect o f love, and consequently the inability to achieve lasting personal happiness.

In his attempt to correct Vera's flaw in her upbringing, i.e., the lack of appreciation o f literature, Pavel resorts to Goethe's *Faust* as the work most likely to produce the desired effect and convince her o f the beauty in literature. Pavel was himself aware that perhaps he should have chosen one o f Schiller's works, who was after all the author o f *The Aesthetic Education o f Man,* but at the time he was so imbued with *Faust* that he could not have read any other work to her. Goethe's *Faust* had its effect, especially the scenes between Faust and Gretchen.

In his usual manner o f depiction, Turgenev does not reveal the specific

impact which the work had upon Vera. We learn o f her changing disposition and psychological conflict only to the extent that these manifest themselves in Vera' s reaction. Thus, Turgenev tells us that, after Pavel's reading o f the scenes in which Faust and Gretchen meet for the first time, Vera leans forward with folded hands, remaining motionless in that position. Upon the conclusion o f Pavel's reading o f *Faust I* Vera was visibly affected. With uncertain steps she left the room, halted for a moment at the door, and slowly walked into the garden. When Pavel caught up with her, she merely asked him to leave the book with her. What specifically had made such an impact on her is not revealed, but o f course, Turgenev expected from his readers a thorough knowledge o f Goethe's *Faust*, and thus an understanding o f Vera's position when the next day she confessed to Pavel that because o f *Faust* she could not sleep all night, and she added: "In this book there are things from which I simply cannot escape." Here again the reader is, so to say, invited by the narrator to complete the idea which is merely suggested. Indeed, Vera could easily identify with Gretchens extremeties in character. She is virtuous and religious, yet endowed with a sensuality which eventually becomes aroused when Faust makes his advances.  Vera was aware o f that mysterious streak in her character as she constantly sought her mother's protective wings. When Pavel asked her whether she would not wish to be free, she remains silent. But in this enigmatic silence one can read Vera's thoughts, her scepticism as to the achievement of freedom and with it happiness. Indeed, at one time she maintained that there is no point in talking about happiness, for "it w ill never come; why chase it! It is like one's health — if you don't notice it, it is there." This inability to achieve freedome, from whatever it may be, is another Goethean thought expressed in the words "Der Mensch ist nicht geboren, frei zu sein," a statement to be encountered in Turgenev's letters and an idea which undoubtedly nourished the elements o f fatalism in his works.

By contrast, Pavel was pleased with his sources and felt triumphant over E l'tsova, who had stifled Vera's development. Like Mephistopheles he promised Vera ever greater enjoyment as he intended to introduce her to other great writers like Shakespeare, Schiller and Pushkin. To his friends he writes: "How many untouched treasures are still hidden in her. She does not know herself." But most o f all he was pleasantly surprised to discover behind Vera's hitherto stoic behaviour a sensitive being and he adds "and who can fault me for arousing this soul...." But in the process o f this aesthetic reeducation o f Vera, Pavel himself becomes the victim o f love. For the first

time he discovers what it means to love a woman.  Love is after all a form o f egoism; and at my age o f thirty-seven one should not live only for oneself; one should live for the public benefit, with an aim on this earth, to fu lfil one's duty, one's task. I had started to do this but again it was dispersed as if by a whirlwind.

Pavel's juxtaposition o f satisfying one's personal desires and one's public obligation, and the inability to combine the two is reminiscent o f the teachings o f Vera's mother, with the difference that Turgenev, through his narrator, emphasizes the element o f duty and obligation as the only inevitable way of life if the individual wishes to survive.10

In the meantime, under the impact o f *Faust* and the ensuing discussions on literature, Vera undergoes a transformation. Pavel speaks o f her childlike innocence, of a balance between a healthy common sense and her sensitivity for beauty. The narrator's depiction of Vera approaches the ideal concept of feminine beauty, particularly when he relates her reaction to the beauty in a work o f art. Then she displays that "tikhaja, zhenskaja prelest' " — a concept close to the classical ideal o f "noble simplicity and quiet grandeur" distinguished by Winckelmann. However, this harmonious state o f perfect balance o f human attributes was but to last for one fleeting moment. Within a month a hitherto unknown sensitivity and passion, a sensuous smile, and a mysterious power began to surface in Vera. The reading o f Goethe's *Faust,* and no less the intimacy with Pavel, who in contrast to her husband was able to introduce her to a world o f sensitivity and feeling, initiated a final stage in Vera's transformation. Goethe's *Faust* was conceived by Vera prim arily as a tragedy o f love and as such it aided her in realizing the inadequacy and narrowness of her own life. After having once more asked Pavel to read to her the scene between Faust and Gretchen, in which Faust declares that "feeling is everything," and Gretchen in turn succumbs to her own passion, Vera boldly declares her love for Pavel. Disregarding her duty as a mother and wife, and above all her mother's admonition, and giving vent to her feeling and passion, Vera steps onto the path o f her own destruction.

What her mother had feared and against which she had guarded her daughter comes to pass. Feeling triumphs over reason.   And the dwindling into nothingness comes true as Vera is unable to cope and restrain the ensuing internal chaos and psychological conflict which has arisen in her.

Contrary to Turgenev's usual practice o f hinting and suggesting, he now spells out the conclusion to be drawn from this tale. Indeed, if Turgenev was ever didactic, it is here in his *Faust*, for through Pavel, his mouthpiece, he lectures his readers and proposes a specific way o f life. In closing the lines o f his last letter to his friend, Pavel writes:

One conviction I have acquired from the experience o f these last years: life is not a joke and no amusement, life is ... a difficult task. Resignation, a constant resignation — this is its secret meaning, its riddle: a sequence o f unfulfilled thoughts and dreams, no matter how lofty they are; the fulfilm ent o f one's duty — with this man should be concerned. Not having put on the iron chains, the chains of duty, man w ill be unable to go through life without stumbling. In our youth we think, the freer we are, the better, the more w ill be achieved.

The ultimate message expressed here is resignation, resignation from personal dreams and desires, and in reality from freedom which in essence means resignation from being an individual, from being oneself. This tragic concept o f man's existence, as expressed by the hero, most certainly coincides with Turgenev's own conviction, a conviction derived from his own pessimism and his own experiences, those of a man who, at the age of thirty-eight, convinced himself o f having passed the prime o f his life. To E. E. Lambert he expressed the low ebb of his own psychological condition when he wrote at the completion o f *Faust*:

I no longer count on any happiness for myself, i.e., a happiness in a sense of anxiety as it is perceived by younger hearts; it is senseless to think o f flowers when the season o f blooming has past.... One ought to learn from nature and acquire its correct, balanced, regular course, its humbleness....11

In postulating resignation as the only sensible way o f life, as a safety net against unhappiness and destruction, Turgenev adheres to the Goethean epigraph, "Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren." But while both authors called for resignation, Turgenev proceeded with a rigidity which goes beyond the Goethean appeal. Goethe's appeal for resignation is within the classical tradition, within the norms of the Golden Mean.  But in his wisdom he also says: "Es irrt der Mensch, solang er strebt." In his striving, whereby man is bound to err and never to achieve his ultimate goal, lies the solution to man's dilemma. Goethe conceives the act of striving as the essence of life, as a necessity; it is a reward in itself, even though the goal w ill remain unattainable, a thought expressed poetically by R. Browning in the verse: "Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,/ Or what's a heaven for?"

Turgenev's tragic portrayal of man, the impossibility of achieving personal happiness and his emphasis on public duty, did not remain without criticism. In reviewing a biography of N. V. Stankevich in 1858, N. A. Dobroljubov notes that self-denial had become a fad in Russian society and adds:

Not long ago one o f our most gifted writers expressed this thought quite bluntly, saying that the aim of life is not amusement, on the contrary, it is a continuous chore, a continuous sacrifice, and that we constantly have to counteract our desire for the sake o f ethical and moral duty. In this there is, on one hand, a praiseworthy element, namely, the appreciation of moral duty.  He merely recorded the tragedy of life and how in this situation the adherence to duty is the only way out. In fact, in Turgenev's message there is a pronounced protest, precisely against the nature of man's creation, which does not permit him to be an independent, free individual. But at no time did he propagate the adherence to duty as the ideal way o f life; it

becomes the only way of life, because there is no other choice, an aspect which is once more demonstrated in *A Nest of Gentlefolk.*

Dobroljubov concludes his criticism by defining a true moral being and in doing so comes astonishingly close to the Goethean concept o f voluntary resignation:

It seems to me that a person who endures only the dictates o f duty like a kind of a heavy torture, like a moral chain, cannot be called a true moral person. A moral being is one who is trying to fuse the demands o f duty with one's inner desires, who attempts to incorporate these forces into one's inner process o f selfdevelopment and self-recognition in such a manner, that they become not only instinctively unavoidable *[instinktivno neobkhodimymi*], but provide also an inner enjoyment.14

Like Goethe, Dobroljubov speaks of the possibility of a voluntary, instinctive behaviour, indeed a recipe for an ideal harmonious interplay o f duty and inclination. But this, it would seem, is precisely the problem which Turgenev faced. At what time does a conscious resignation or renunciation become unconscious or voluntary? The dilemma is that in either case, whether forced or voluntary, the call is for resignation and thus the curtailment o f one's desires and feelings. This problem of having been endowed with certain attributes and the ensuing problem of giving vent to the same was no less a puzzle for Tolstoj. In any case, at the time o f writing his own *Faust,* Turgenev was unable to reconcile the two forces in man and thus opted for the Kantian concept o f strict adherence to duty as the only means of survival. In perusing, however, Turgenev's actual life, his disappointments and joys, his relation to his contemporaries and his ever-present fear of death, he seemed to have made the best of a bad situation and emerged as a model o f the Goethean concept of renunciation, although he never ceased to consider man's existence as tragic. The laws of nature, from which there was no escape, were simply prejudiced against man.15

#### NOTES

1. A. W alicki, "Turgenev and Schopenhauer," *Oxford Slavonic Papers,* X (1962), 1-17.

2. A. Batjuto, *Turgenev-romanist* (Leningrad: Nauka, 1972), p. 146-63.

3. Compare I. S. Turgenev, *Polnoe sobranie sochinenij i pisem* (Moskva-Leningrad: Akad. nauk, 1960-68), V II, 398-99.

4. Turgenev.... *Pis'ma,* III, 64-65.

5. Ibid., I, 176.

6. Turgenev, I, 214-256; for details see V. Zhirmunskij, *Gete* v *russkoj literature* (Leningrad: Khudozh. lit., 1937), pp. 357-667; M . K. Kleeman, "Pometki I. S. Turgeneva na perevode *Fausta* M . Vronchenko," *Literatumoe nasledstvo* (1932); K. Schütz, *Das Goethebild Turgenevs,* in *Sprache und Dichtung* (Bem: P. Haupt, 1952); E. Rosenkranz, "Turgenev und Goethe," *Germanoslavica,* 2 (1932-33), 76-91.

7. *Goethes Faust,* Hrsg. E. Trunz (Hamburg: C. Wegner, 1954), pp. 473-77.

8. Turgenev, V II, 20.

9. Ibid., V II, 16.

10. Compare M. Gershenson, *Turgenev* (Moskva; T-vo knigi, 1919), pp. 57- 59; D. N. Ovsjaniko-Kulikovskij, *Etjudy о tvorchestve I. S. Turgeneva* (St. Peterburg: Izd. dop. i ispr., 1904), pp. 146-184.

11. Turgenev.... *Pis'ma,* II, 365.

12. Compare Schütz, p. 107; Turgenev, V II, 402.

13. N. A. Dobroljubov, *Sobranie sochinenij* (Moskva: Gos. izd. khud. lit., 1962), II, 387.

14. Ibid., II, 390.

15. When this paper was published in *Crisis and Commitment: Studies in German and Russian Literature in Honour o f J. W. Dyck* (Waterloo, 1983), the collection o f 15 articles on the topic o f the *Faust-Rezeption in Rußland und in der Sowjetunion,* Editor G. Mahal (Knittlingen, 1983), was not available to me.

## ѴП. The Function of Music in I. S. Turgenev's Aesthetics

The extent to which Turgenev was preoccupied with music, both in his private life and in his literary works, is phenomenal,1 particularly if we keep in mind that he was not exposed to the traditional musical education befitting a young Russian nobleman o f his time. One is even more surprised when one discovers that this great lover o f music never learned to play a single instrument and that he was incapable o f singing a melody. Yet, nature had endowed him with a keen, sensitive ear, a quality which stood him well subsequently in acquiring a fine musical taste and no less in becoming a discerning critic o f classical music, and opera in particular.2

We need not repeat here that almost all o f his works contain some musical scenes or a discussion o f music, and that many o f his characters are engaged in musical performances. But why the introduction o f music, another fine art, in order to amplify his own art, i.e., his own writing? What is music conveying that could not be expressed in words? What are the properties of music? What is its substance and its subject? What does it mean when Turgenev implies that only music can express a particular heightened and intense feeling? And finally, why the recourse to that most intangible art form, music, when he wished to relate a significant emotional experience?

The immediate answer to these questions is simple. Turgenev loved and was a connoisseur o f music, it preoccupied him a great deal and thus it is only logical that music, which he ranked first among the fine arts and which played such an important role in his life, should play a considerable role in his literary creation and, even more so, should occupy a primary position in his aesthetics. From this it should follow that music is conceived here as another poetic device which nevertheless more than any other incorporates the essence o f Turgenev's aesthetics. Aesthetics is used here not only in the narrow sense, as a theory o f taste or as a perception o f the beautiful, but rather in a wider sense to include primarily the devices, the poetic means which trigger or initiate the aesthetic response in the reader. In short, aesthetics is here interpreted somewhat as conceived by John Dewey, who stated in his *Art as Experience* (1934) that "To be truly artistic, a work must also be aesthetic."

Turgenev's fascination with — and love for — music ultimately determined his entire destiny. It was music that linked him forever to Pauline Viardot, the famous mezzo-soprano who was the incarnation o f music in the eyes o f Turgenev, and eventually shaped his future. It was not so much Mme Viardot's passionate personality, and definitely not her beauty, but rather the

grace and beauty o f her music which overwhelmed him in 1843 when Turgenev listened to her first performance in St. Petersburg.3 The magic and spell which Mme Viardot cast upon her listeners never deserted her. In 1879, after attending one o f her famous matinees, A. Lukanina notes: "When Mme Viardot sings, she becomes life itself, passion itself, indeed, she becomes the embodiment o f art.... Everything creates the impression as if she conveys her own feelings, her own suffering."4

In his letters Turgenev repeatedly laments when he has been unable to attend Mme Viardot י s performances. Whenever he did attend, he invariably spoke enthusiastically o f the profound effect that such an event had upon him. After one performance o f excerpts from Gluck's *Alceste*, Turgenev wrote "Mme Viardot was singing in the role o f Alceste." Then he simply added, without commentary, "and I cried like a woman" (a ja как baba plakai).5 Turgenev's contemporaries and memoirists have left us a protracted and convincing record o f the emotional effect which Mme Viardot's music evoked in him.6 Here is only one example . I. Pavlovskij, an eyewitness o f Turgenev's reaction at a concert given by Mme Viardot in 1879, writes this: "Turgenev, having been a spectator of many a triumph o f this great artist, seemed as if he was under the spell o f his reminiscences. He experienced the most genuine delight. His eyes were sparkling.... He applauded louder and longer than anyone present."7

It was, perhaps, a moment like this, o f total enrapture and enchantment with music, and no less with the image o f the ingenious interpreter o f this music, which created the ultimate moment o f happiness, fleeting as it may have been, that Turgenev attempted to capture in his prose-poem "Stoj" (1879). It is to such a moment that Turgenev readily exclaimed "stoj" (linger on), a paraphrasing o f Faust's words: "Verweile doch! Du bist so schön!" But while Faust was destined never to experience such a moment o f total fulfilm ent to which he could say "linger on," Turgenev, with his gloomy outlook on man's ephemeral existence, found reconciliation and jo y in moments which only music was able to conjure up through its magic and beauty.8

Turgenev' s process o f musical education, which started in the salons o f N. V ie l'gorskij and V. F. Odoevskij back in St. Petersburg, reached its acme in the musical circle o f the Viardots. He emerged from this process not only as one totally devoted to good music but with a thorough knowledge o f the music o f composers like Glinka, Mozart, Beethoven, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Bellini, Weber, Gounod, Gluck, Schubert and Schumann and a host o f others. That Mme Viardot bears a great responsibility in shaping Turgenev's musical taste

needs not further elaboration. Both appreciated the same kind o f music and preferred the music o f Mozart, Beethoven, Gluck and Schumann more than that o f any other composers. When later in the century, Tchajkovskij had made his mark on the world o f music, he too was included in this illustrious group o f preferred musicians. It was, however, over Wagner that their sensibilities diverged. While Mme Viardot became an ardent admirer o f Wagner in the 1860's, Turgenev remained loyal to his composers of pure and absolute music. To Viardot,s new enthusiasm for Wagner Turgenev responded in 1868 in a rather sad note, saying:

And so Wagner triumphed. But what can one do, I am delighted, and since you discovered in the score great beauty, the public must exclaim bravo! — here we have the beginning o f a new art. A similar phenomenon I noticed even in our literature (in L. Tolstoj's last novel there is something Wagneresque). I have a feeling that this could be very beautiful, but it is not at all that, which I loved and still love; and I have to make a considerable effort to tear myself away from my point o f view ....9

And this point of view is made clear by Turgenev through a reference to the Laokoon statue which depicts an old man and two boys being crushed by the serpent. Although their looks and gestures express the agonies o f approaching death, they do not scream and their facial features are not distorted. Their suffering is depicted with classical restraint, according to the classical ideal, i.e., "noble simplicity and quiet grandeur."  In Wagner, however, this classical ideal is absent. Indeed, Turgenev called him the founder o f the "school o f moaning and groaning" (osnovatel' shkoly stenanija).10 But apart from this, Wagner was, for Turgenev, the type o f artist whose ideas and purposes were frequently too transparent in their creation. To such artists Turgenev always reacted with a Goethean expression: "Man fühlt die Absicht — und man ist verstimmt" (One feels the intention, and one becomes irritated).

Turgenev's attitude toward the musical life o f the second half o f nineteenth century Russia was also, on the whole, rather negative. He singles out Glinka and Tchajkovskij and has some kind words for Rimskij-Korsakov, but the rest o f the composers, those who thought they had initiated a new epoch in Russian music, be believed, would be forgotten within ten to twenty years.11 Rubinstein's *Demon* and his *Merchant Kalashnikov* were dismissed as operas

devoid o f inspiration, poetry and originality, in short, to use Turgenev's expression, as "Kapellmeistermusik." They lacked the Mozartian purity and the lyrical-melodious qualities. However, ironically, he attributes to the composer a thorough knowledge o f the "grammar o f music."12 W ith equal severity, Turgenev attacked Dargomyzhskij's *Kammenyj gost\* in which he found nothing but colourless, powerless and sluggish recitatives when compared with Mozart's *Don Juan*.13

Turgenev's approval and disapproval o f Russian culture is most vividly revealed in the correspondence between V. V. Stasov and Turgenev, and in Stasov's reminiscences o f Turgenev. From the very beginning o f their association, which lasted some fifteen years, they systematically opposed each other in their concepts o f art and, especially, regarding the direction which Russian painting and music was to take. In the opinion o f Stasov, "Turgenev, in his taste and outlook, was a classicist and idealist." O f himself, Stasov says: "and I was neither this nor that."14 In the heat o f their discussions, Stasov called Turgenev "an enemy o f all innovation in music" and "an enemy o f realism and verisimilitude in life ," who, in the final analysis, was unable to appreciate the new Russian music.15 Stasov, one o f Russia's prominent music critics o f the nineteenth century, was an ardent propagator o f the new school o f Russian national music, which found its expression in a group of composers known as the "Mighty Five" (Moguchaja kuchka). This new movement in music, represented by Balakirev, Mussorgskij, Cui, Rimskij-Korsakov and Borodin, concentrated on Russian folk melodies and strove for novelty in melody, harmonization and orchestral effect. In this new national, realistic movement, Turgenev was unable to find anyone who was equal in talent to Glinka. In 1872, when Stasov lamented the fact that Turgenev showed no patriotic enthusiasm for this emerging art, he retorted by saying that he would be the first to rejoice over the new Russian art, but that he feared the ensuing disappointment. His searching and digging, he was sure, would yield far less than the treasure which he had hoped to find.16

According to Stasov, Turgenev was, indeed, anxious to learn about the latest in the field o f Russian music, and he recalls how ironically Turgenev reacted to some o f the concerts which he attended during the 1870's in St. Petersburg:

One does not have to go very far to find out what goes on here.... Take tonight's concert. During the first part ... we listen to Dargomyzhskij's *Rogdan* ... what horrible music. The lowest and the most ordinary.... But you have now a new, original Russian

School.... And then there was *King Lear* by M r. Balakirev. Balakirev — and Shakespeare: what do they have in common? A colossus of poetry and a pygmy o f music.... There was also that chorus o f Sennakherib [Porazhenie Sennakhriba] by M r. Mussorgskij.... What a delusion, what blindness, what ignorance, what a disregard and ignoring o f Europe.17

Stasov's attempt to convert Turgenev to greater tolerance toward the new Russian music remained without positive results. Turgenev was introduced into the musical society o f St. Petersburg where frequently the latest symphony or excerpt from operas were performed. But as Stasov recalls:

Our composers for a long time refused to perform for Turgenev. They all admired his novels and novellas ... but they were astonished at his contempt for our new musical school; they were convinced that there was no point in enlightening a person who himself by nature was not musically inclined and who in addition was steeped in the old classical prejudice.18

Indeed, having lived abroad most o f his adult years and having been educated on the music o f Mozart, Gluck, Beethoven and Schumann, Turgenev could not fully appreciate the new style and innovation and thus his negative reaction to the new Russian school. By the same criterion one can explain Turgenev's rejection o f any modem musical movement, especially that represented by Wagner and Liszt. Stasov appropriately states: "Turgenev did not know them, in fact, he had no desire to know them; he was entranced with Beethoven and Schumann and recognized no others in music."19 Nonetheless, Stasov was delighted that someone with as much talent as Turgenev was as fascinated with Schumann's music as he himself was along with the entire St. Petersburg musical society. And he added: "It is unlikely that anyone o f all our writers knew anything about Schumann at that time [1865], let alone had the ability to understand him ."20

Whether Turgenev's intolerance toward a certain kind o f music was justified or not is, for our purposes, less important than the fact that he had his own musical preferences and that he passed severe judgement upon those who did not measure up to his ideals — Gluck, Beethoven, Mozart and Schumann, i.e., composers who in his opinion produced pure and absolute music. While a survey o f his likes and dislikes brings us closer to Turgenev's

understanding o f music, or at least to the type o f music he liked, it does not give us insight into how he understood music, particularly if one attempts to determine the function o f music within the realm o f his aesthetics.

W hile Turgenev repeatedly spoke o f the beauty in music, attributing to it an infinite power o f association, and using it in relating hitherto unexpressed feelings and emotions, he himself left us no succinct account as to his concept o f music. One, so to say, has to deduce his concept from a variety o f commentaries and no less from accounts o f Turgenev's own musical experiences. This as all the more surprising as he moved within musical circles where the feud between the two prevailing schools o f music, the heteronomists and the autonomists, could not have passed unnoticed. In essence, the controversy raged over major problems o f musical aesthetics, the aim o f music and its intrinsic nature.

The heteronomists with their chief exponent, Wagner, argued that music functions to denote or connote certain ideas, things, emotions and, consequently, is a language similar to any ordinary language. The autonomists, and their chief exponent, Professor E. Hanslick, conceived music as the Russian formalists conceived literariness (literatumost'). Indeed, they are indebted to Hanslick for many o f their basic concepts, as he set them forth in his book *Vom Musikalisch-Schönen* (1854) .2l The autonomists held that music, a symphony for example, with its basic elements, melody, rhythm and harmony, was a non-imitative art, the models o f which were not to be found in nature but had to be invented; it is a self-sufficient realm of organized sound, which expresses nothing but music. As a medium, music is incapable o f specific, concrete representation because, to put it simply, it does not possess the means for doing so. There is no fixed relationship between certain things and certain sounds, other than onomatopoeic exceptions.22

I f one applies these two concepts to Turgenev's musical convictions, one w ill discover that Turgenev oscillates between these two extremes, or, rather, that he occupies a modified position which contains features o f both schools. Although Turgenev is quite specific about his aesthetic experience related to painting, sculpture and literature, he is vague and indecisive when it pertains to his musical experience. He is vague and indefinite because the musical expression in itself yields nothing concrete, because it is subjective and inarticulate, but mainly because, like any other art form, it implies still more than it displays, and in music, indeed, infinitely more. Although Turgenev's comments are sparse, they always convey, however, vague, some hint or suggest something about the effect a particular piece o f music has produced. O f his most exalted musical experience he could only say: "Oh God, how

beautiful is this music," "Oh, what a magnificent piece," "I was touched to tears," "M y soul is on fire ."23 These vague comments confirm once again that an experience o f absolute and pure music is devoid o f any preconceived association with any object or idea. Thus it cannot be contained in words. Only music can capture the essence o f such an experience. Music has neither specific content nor object. If it did it would admit to a description in words. Its subject is intangible, as it is a succession o f sounds which can only be felt, not translated into words. Thus, music cannot be grasped by the intellect or by an aesthetic experience in the manner as we do in all other art forms, which are invariably both definite and recognizable, the prototype o f which is connected with an object.

In Turgenev's long musical evolution there emerge inconsistencies and diverse views regarding certain composers and his understanding o f music. When Turgenev became acquainted with Schumann's music, he was not fully enraptured with it. In 1862 he wrote to Botkin: "I must admit that his music does not totally correspond to my taste. Sometimes it is brilliant, a great deal o f fantasy and mysticism, but it has no form, there is no picture (net risunka) — and at my age this is difficult to endure.... In truth, this is the music o f the future; there is no present in it, everything is indefinite and fu ll o f hints, etc."24 Yet, it is precisely that vague and indefinite element in music which he later came to appreciate and which became the principle o f his own creation. Although conscious o f the popularity of programme music and sound painting, and how through association music could approach an idea or become objectivized, Turgenev was always aware that music speaks only in sounds and nothing but sounds. And so his dissociated himself, at certain times, from those who perceived in the effect o f music a specific linguistic feature. A case in point is the critic N. N. Tjutchev, and Turgenev's estate manager, about whom he said in 1852 that he did not grasp the essence of music:

.... he does not love music very much, or rather, he loves it like many others, not for what it is, i.e., music. There are, for example, painters who equate a musical experience with feelings o f colours, harmony o f lines, etc. Writers, to a large extent, seek in music only literary impressions; they are, generally speaking, poor listeners and bad judges. Tjutchev, who has no profession, loves in music only that which vaguely arouses in him well-known feelings, well-known thoughts, etc. In reality ... he could do without music and he prefers in it that which he already knows.25 In essence, Turgenev tells us that these sentiments were imported into music and that these linguistic features had no part o f the beauty o f music which consisted entirely o f tones in their musical relation. This seems to contradict what he said above about Schumann's music.

From the evidence hitherto cited, it would seem that Turgenev's understanding o f music moved from pure music to sound painting and back to pure music. Thus, if one had to draw a general conclusion which best approximates Turgenev's concept o f music, one would have to say that, while music cannot represent a specific feeling, like love, for example, it can represent its dynamic element o f movement, its waxing and waning character which it has in common with all emotional states. In a limited sense then, music is a language o f the dynamic properties o f emotion. And it is because o f its dynamic element o f movement, its waxing character, however indecisive, which it shares with the human emotional state, that Turgenev was able to use music to intensify any feeling or emotional experience o f his characters and thus have it function as another poetic device in his aesthetics.

Whereas language could present but a verbal account, a description or an impression o f the effect of a given emotional state, music by its very nature could become a vehicle for embodying inward feelings. Because o f its mathematical relation which determines the intensity o f vibration and creates melody, rhythm and harmony, it permits the composer to impose a specific character upon his music, which can approximate human passion and emotions like joy and sorrow. In this respect music approaches the poetic language and, even more so, the emotional exclamation o f the human voice, the human cry, and its singing quality.26

It is also in this interrelation o f music and human emotions that one must seek the answer to why Turgenev valued vocal music above instrumental music. While he could appreciate the technical perfection produced mechanically by the instrument, it was the human voice with its imperfection which alone could express the depth of the soul's feeling.27 Such convictions resulted also in comments like: "She has a beautiful voice, but she cannot sing." To be able to feel music, to interpret it as if one expresses one's own emotions, was to Turgenev the epitome o f achievement. On one occasion, when defining beauty for Mme Viardot in the 1850's, he said: "But as far as I am concerned I w ill always prefer the enormous musical power o f an imperfect voice to a beautiful voice which is silly, the beauty o f which is in its mere material substance."28

On numerous occasions Turgenev outlines his aesthetic principles in which he repeatedly emphasizes that the essence o f a work o f art is not the details,

but the hints, the suggestions, the effect and the impression, which do not smother imagination. In adhering to these principles in his own work, he produced not only an impressionistic texture but, at the same time, granted freedom to his readers in their aesthetic experience.29 Total freedom in every respect was to him the essence o f life. Indeed, together with Schiller who equated freedom with beauty, Turgenev could have exclaimed: "Schone fremde Freiheit" (Spare the freedom o f others). In 1875 he declared to M . A. M iljutina that he believed in no absolutes and no systems and that most o f all he loved freedom beyond anything.30 His adamant adherence to artistic freedom, freedom in the creative process, accounts for the absence o f a unique, distinct aesthetic system. A system in itself would have placed limitations upon him and would have violated his own principle o f freedom.31 "True artistic freedom" (nastojashchaja khudozhnicheskaja svoboda) and a "feeling o f inner freedom" are essential to Turgenev in both appreciating and creating beauty.32 Turgenev expressed these sentiments in a letter to Stasov in 1875 when the latter accused him o f not being free from authoritative opinions in his judgement o f art and o f not following his own convictions and feelings. In a rather irritated manner, Turgenev retorted by saying:

Why the devil, I, an old man who all his life treasured his own personal independence, would bow or hesitate to speak my opinion??! ... Perhaps, in my life time I have sent more o f those famous authorities o f yours through the yellow gate (zheltye vorota) than you can imagine.... But that very feeling o f inner freedom, of which I am always conscious — every moment ... does not permit me to call something beautiful which does not appeal to my heart (ne po serdtsu).... In short, believe me, when I consider Mozart's *Don Juan* as an ingenious work — and Dargomyzhskij's *Don Juan* clumsy rubbish — then it is not because Mozart is an authority and because others think so ... but simply because I like Mozart and dislike Dargomyzhskij.33

Thus if one were to reduce Turgenev's aesthetics to a single designation, it would have to be freedom. And what other art form is better suited than music to grant almost absolute freedom in an aesthetic experience? Being devoid o f any subject and not specific in its expression, the musical idiom is the most subjective and also the artistic medium which allows for the greatest

freedom o f interpretation. In the plastic arts we are guided by a specific optical image; in the verbal arts we are placed between the plastic arts and music, because o f the vagueness o f the word; but when we are confronted with the sound o f music the possibilities are unlimited: music gives wings to the imagination and can elevate us into the sphere o f infin ity.34 Precisely because o f this Turgenev resorted to music when he tried to express a feeling which, seemingly, he could not express in words because o f the poverty o f language.

In 1858, after roaming among the ruins o f his beloved classical antiquity, he wrote from Rome to Countess Lambert that he had been overcome by "a kind o f epic feeling; this immortal beauty all around, and then the insignificance o f all earthly things, and in this very insignificance there is a grandeur — a kind of profound sadness which both conciliates and uplifts the soul." Having given a kind o f vague, indefinite, impressionistic account o f his feelings to start with, he paused, as if not satisfied with what he had conveyed, and added: "This cannot be rendered in words.... These impressions are musical and could best be conveyed by music."35 In short, one impressionistic description is amplified by just one single word, "music," which is even more indefinite. In evoking music Turgenev does not confront the reader with just another image but with a symbol o f an entire new art form, that o f tone and sound, which offers unlimited associations.

In this passage, Turgenev at least attempts to spell out the kind o f feeling he experienced — epic grandeur and profound sadness — uplifting and conciliatory, and thus indicates the kind of feeling music is supposed to express and intensify. But in his literary fiction, at times, he lets only music speak. The reference her is neither to *The Singers* (1852) nor to *The Song o f Triumphant Love* (1881) or *Klara Milich* (1883), for here the entire theme is based on music and the magic power o f music reverberates throughout these stories. However, in *Spring Torrents* (1871), the narrator, like Turgenev in his letter to Countess Lambert seems incapable o f expressing in words the feeling experienced by Sanin while reading a letter from the love o f his youth. Here is what the narrator tells us: "We w ill not attempt to describe Sanin's emotions which he experienced while reading this letter. There are not satisfactory words for the expression o f such emotions; they are deeper, stronger, and more indefinite than any word. Only music is capable of rendering them."36 Although the reader receives no hint as to the feelings experienced by Sanin, he knows from the events o f the story that some twenty years ago Sanin deceived Gemma; he also knows that she is happily married and that Sanin is still in love with her. And when the reader is told that words

are incapable of expressing his emotion, he knows that it is an emotion full of sorrow and despair. The introduction o f music, as the only medium which could express the ultimate degree o f sorrow, further intensifies the emotions experienced by Sanin. Music, then, becomes another vehicle for stimulating the imagination. It initiates the aesthetic process whereby the reader is invited to augment, quite subjectively, freely and independently, the artistic form with a new reality, guided only by his concept o f music and his power of imagination.

In avoiding a verbal account of Sanin's feelings, and by not even attempting to do so, and then simply referring to music, it seems, on the surface at least, as if Turgenev has failed to communicate emotion and feeling in an intelligible artistic form. And indeed, for the most part, whenever an intense emotional feeling has to be conveyed, it is supplemented through a reference to music. However, this is not evidence o f the "impotence o f the word,"37 nor of a "cop-out," and least o f all is it a lack of talent on Turgenev's part. If he had spelled out Sanin's pain and suffering in words, he would have destroyed at once the uniqueness o f the imagination and he would have violated the principles of his own aesthetics. The limitation usually inherent in a verbal description o f emotions in particular was removed through the evocation o f music. The old axiom is still valid: To be able to express how much one loves or suffers is to say how little one loves or suffers.

The varied use of music in Turgenev's fiction, be it an entire theme, a musical performance and the reaction o f the characters to it, or a mere reference to music, is always performing a specific purpose; it is never there just for the sake o f decor. Though Turgenev is classified under the category o f pictorial writers, rather than their dramatic counterparts,38 music is always there to convey, never to depict. It is there like an ever-present undercurrent to the main text, forever creating a mood through skilful suggestion; it is there to serve the plot o f the story, to convey thought and feelings, to support the introduction to a scene, to intensify the degree o f despair or happiness, to characterize the setting or the background o f an epoch, to sharpen the image o f a literary character and to function as a mode o f characterization. Invariably, those characters who display a superficial attitude towards music are o f the negative variety. Turgenev's sympathetic characters love classical music and Turgenev does not fail to refer to or describe performances by his own favourite composers. The aesthetic value o f "serious classical music" as an ennobling factor is always present. But most o f all, music is there to supplement that meagre verbal suggestion o f an emotional state in which a character finds himself. In the case of Lavretskij *(A Nest o f Gentlefolk,* 1859)

and Bersenev *(On the Eve,* 1860) music functions like in an opera, or like Turgenev's extensive, lyrical nature descriptions, paralleling the emotional state o f his characters. In both instances, music is used as a metaphor to convey and intensify diametrically opposed feelings already present in the psychological make-up o f the individual o f which the reader is aware. One is despair caused by an unrequited love, the other is joy from fulfilled love. W ith the premonition that the beautiful evening which he, Bersenev, had spent in the company o f Elena, was but a fleeting incident and would never return again and the thought that she might have made a fool o f him deeply saddened Bersenev and provoked him to find consolation in music. Turgenev does not describe the details o f Bersenev's suffering — the reader learns that Bersenev started to play the piano, repeated the same piece several times and was touched to tears. A ll this suffices to trigger the reader's imagination to complement Turgenev's hints and suggestions, provided, o f course, that the reader is capable o f such an aesthetic experience. But then, Turgenev was writing for an enlightened reader. Here is the passage:

Bersenev set down to it [the piano], began to strike some chords. Like all Russian noblemen he studied music in his youth, and like almost all Russian noblemen, he played very badly. Strictly speaking, in it [music] he did not love its art, its forms, in which music is expressed (symphonies and sonatas, even operas wearied him), but he loved the spontaneity, the basic elements in it: he loved those vague, sweet and all-embracing emotions which are without a subject and which are aroused in the soul by the combinations and successions of sounds. For more than an hour he did not move from the piano; he repeated many times the same accords, awkwardly picking out new ones, pausing and m elting.... His heart ached, and his eyes more than once were filled with tears. He was not ashamed o f them; he let them flow in the darkness.39

On the basis o f this musical passage alone, introduced by Turgenev at the moment o f profound crisis, one could illustrate his varied use o f music.  There, as here, Turgenev allows for a dual concept o f music, music for music's sake and music as an awakener o f feelings.

In *A Nest o f Gentlefolk* music permeates the entire work, indeed, it is its

leitm otif, and in the words o f A. I. Beletskij, "it is more musical than any other work o f Turgenev."40 It is also the only work which portrays a professional musician. Lemm was destined to become a music teacher in the provinces o f Russia where his talent was appreciated only by a few, but especially by his loyal pupil Liza. He is depicted in a most sympathetic manner. Indeed, he is a symbol of Turgenev's favourite art form and emerges as the personification o f music itself. Apart from Lemm, music occupies a major aspect in the cultural life of several of the characters and accordingly aids in the delineation o f their personalities.