VILLAGE OF SHEEP'S SPRINGS, _March_ 20, 18--.
The doctor has just left me. At last I have got at something definite!
For all his cunning, he had to speak out at last. Yes, I am soon, very
soon, to die. The frozen rivers will break up, and with the last snow I
shall, most likely, swim away ... whither? God knows! To the ocean too.
Well, well, since one must die, one may as well die in the spring. But
isn't it absurd to begin a diary a fortnight, perhaps, before death?
What does it matter? And by how much are fourteen days less than
fourteen years, fourteen centuries? Beside eternity, they say, all is
nothingness--yes, but in that case eternity, too, is nothing. I see I
am letting myself drop into metaphysics; that's a bad sign--am I not
rather faint-hearted, perchance? I had better begin a description of
some sort. It's damp and windy out of doors.
I'm forbidden to go out. What can I write about, then? No decent man
talks of his maladies; to write a novel is not in my line; reflections
on elevated topics are beyond me; descriptions of the life going on
around me could not even interest me; while I am weary of doing
nothing, and too lazy to read. Ah, I have it, I will write the story of
all my life for myself. A first-rate idea! Just before death it is a
suitable thing to do, and can be of no harm to any one. I will begin.
I was born thirty years ago, the son of fairly well-to-do landowners.
My father had a passion for gambling; my mother was a woman of
character ... a very virtuous woman. Only, I have known no woman whose
moral excellence was less productive of happiness. She was crushed
beneath the weight of her own virtues, and was a source of misery to
every one, from herself upwards. In all the fifty years of her life,
she never once took rest, or sat with her hands in her lap; she was for
ever fussing and bustling about like an ant, and to absolutely no good
purpose, which cannot be said of the ant. The worm of restlessness
fretted her night and day. Only once I saw her perfectly tranquil, and
that was the day after her death, in her coffin. Looking at her, it
positively seemed to me that her face wore an expression of subdued
amazement; with the half-open lips, the sunken cheeks, and
meekly-staring eyes, it seemed expressing, all over, the words, 'How
good to be at rest!' Yes, it is good, good to be rid, at last, of the
wearing sense of life, of the persistent, restless consciousness of
existence! But that's neither here nor there.
I was brought up badly and not happily. My father and mother both loved
me; but that made things no better for me. My father was not, even in
his own house, of the slightest authority or consequence, being a man
openly abandoned to a shameful and ruinous vice; he was conscious of
his degradation, and not having the strength of will to give up his
darling passion, he tried at least, by his invariably amiable and
humble demeanour and his unswerving submissiveness, to win the
condescending consideration of his exemplary wife. My mother certainly
did bear her trial with the superb and majestic long-suffering of
virtue, in which there is so much of egoistic pride. She never
reproached my father for anything, gave him her last penny, and paid
his debts without a word. He exalted her as a paragon to her face and
behind her back, but did not like to be at home, and caressed me by
stealth, as though he were afraid of contaminating me by his presence.
But at such times his distorted features were full of such kindness,
the nervous grin on his lips was replaced by such a touching smile, and
his brown eyes, encircled by fine wrinkles, shone with such love, that
I could not help pressing my cheek to his, which was wet and warm with
tears. I wiped away those tears with my handkerchief, and they flowed
again without effort, like water from a brimming glass. I fell to
crying, too, and he comforted me, stroking my back and kissing me all
over my face with his quivering lips. Even now, more than twenty years
after his death, when I think of my poor father, dumb sobs rise into my
throat, and my heart beats as hotly and bitterly and aches with as
poignant a pity as if it had long to go on beating, as if there were
anything to be sorry for!
My mother's behaviour to me, on the contrary, was always the same,
kind, but cold. In children's books one often comes across such
mothers, sermonising and just. She loved me, but I did not love her.
Yes! I fought shy of my virtuous mother, and passionately loved my
vicious father.
But enough for to-day. It's a beginning, and as for the end, whatever
it may be, I needn't trouble my head about it. That's for my illness to
see to.
_March_ 21.
To-day it is marvellous weather. Warm, bright; the sunshine frolicking
gaily on the melting snow; everything shining, steaming, dripping; the
sparrows chattering like mad things about the drenched, dark hedges.
Sweetly and terribly, too, the moist air frets my sick chest. Spring,
spring is coming! I sit at the window and look across the river into
the open country. O nature! nature! I love thee so, but I came forth
from thy womb good for nothing--not fit even for life. There goes a
cock-sparrow, hopping along with outspread wings; he chirrups, and
every note, every ruffled feather on his little body, is breathing with
health and strength....
What follows from that? Nothing. He is well and has a right to chirrup
and ruffle his wings; but I am ill and must die--that's all. It's not
worth while to say more about it. And tearful invocations to nature are
mortally absurd. Let us get back to my story.
I was brought up, as I have said, very badly and not happily. I had no
brothers or sisters. I was educated at home. And, indeed, what would my
mother have had to occupy her, if I had been sent to a boarding-school
or a government college? That's what children are for--that their
parents may not be bored. We lived for the most part in the country,
and sometimes went to Moscow. I had tutors and teachers, as a matter of
course; one, in particular, has remained in my memory, a dried-up,
tearful German, Rickmann, an exceptionally mournful creature, cruelly
maltreated by destiny, and fruitlessly consumed by an intense pining
for his far-off fatherland. Sometimes, near the stove, in the fearful
stuffiness of the close ante-room, full of the sour smell of stale
kvas, my unshaved man-nurse, Vassily, nicknamed Goose, would sit,
playing cards with the coachman, Potap, in a new sheepskin, white as
foam, and superb tarred boots, while in the next room Rickmann would
sing, behind the partition--
Herz, mein Herz, warum so traurig?
Was bekümmert dich so sehr?
'Sist ja schön im fremden Lande--
Herz, mein Herz--was willst du mehr?'
After my father's death we moved to Moscow for good. I was twelve years
old. My father died in the night from a stroke. I shall never forget
that night. I was sleeping soundly, as children generally do; but I
remember, even in my sleep, I was aware of a heavy gasping noise at
regular intervals. Suddenly I felt some one taking hold of my shoulder
and poking me. I opened my eyes and saw my nurse. 'What is it?' 'Come
along, come along, Alexey Mihalitch is dying.' ... I was out of bed and
away like a mad thing into his bedroom. I looked: my father was lying
with his head thrown back, all red, and gasping fearfully. The servants
were crowding round the door with terrified faces; in the hall some one
was asking in a thick voice: 'Have they sent for the doctor?' In the
yard outside, a horse was being led from the stable, the gates were
creaking, a tallow candle was burning in the room on the floor, my
mother was there, terribly upset, but not oblivious of the proprieties,
nor of her own dignity. I flung myself on my father's bosom, and hugged
him, faltering: 'Papa, papa...' He lay motionless, screwing up his eyes
in a strange way. I looked into his face--an unendurable horror caught
my breath; I shrieked with terror, like a roughly captured bird--they
picked me up and carried me away. Only the day before, as though aware
his death was at hand, he had caressed me so passionately and
despondently.
A sleepy, unkempt doctor, smelling strongly of spirits, was brought. My
father died under his lancet, and the next day, utterly stupefied by
grief, I stood with a candle in my hands before a table, on which lay
the dead man, and listened senselessly to the bass sing-song of the
deacon, interrupted from time to time by the weak voice of the priest.
The tears kept streaming over my cheeks, my lips, my collar, my
shirt-front. I was dissolved in tears; I watched persistently, I
watched intently, my father's rigid face, as though I expected
something of him; while my mother slowly bowed down to the ground,
slowly rose again, and pressed her fingers firmly to her forehead, her
shoulders, and her chest, as she crossed herself. I had not a single
idea in my head; I was utterly numb, but I felt something terrible was
happening to me.... Death looked me in the face that day and took note
of me.
We moved to Moscow after my father's death for a very simple cause: all
our estate was sold up by auction for debts--that is, absolutely all,
except one little village, the one in which I am at this moment living
out my magnificent existence. I must admit that, in spite of my youth
at the time, I grieved over the sale of our home, or rather, in
reality, I grieved over our garden. Almost my only bright memories are
associated with our garden. It was there that one mild spring evening I
buried my best friend, an old bob-tailed, crook-pawed dog, Trix. It was
there that, hidden in the long grass, I used to eat stolen
apples--sweet, red, Novgorod apples they were. There, too, I saw for
the first time, among the ripe raspberry bushes, the housemaid Klavdia,
who, in spite of her turned-up nose and habit of giggling in her
kerchief, aroused such a tender passion in me that I could hardly
breathe, and stood faint and tongue-tied in her presence; and once at
Easter, when it came to her turn to kiss my seignorial hand, I almost
flung myself at her feet to kiss her down-trodden goat-skin slippers.
My God! Can all that be twenty years ago? It seems not long ago that I
used to ride on my shaggy chestnut pony along the old fence of our
garden, and, standing up in the stirrups, used to pick the two-coloured
poplar leaves. While a man is living he is not conscious of his own
life; it becomes audible to him, like a sound, after the lapse of time.
Oh, my garden, oh, the tangled paths by the tiny pond! Oh, the little
sandy spot below the tumbledown dike, where I used to catch gudgeons!
And you tall birch-trees, with long hanging branches, from beyond which
came floating a peasant's mournful song, broken by the uneven jolting
of the cart, I send you my last farewell!... On parting with life, to
you alone I stretch out my hands. Would I might once more inhale the
fresh, bitter fragrance of the wormwood, the sweet scent of the mown
buckwheat in the fields of my native place! Would I might once more
hear far away the modest tinkle of the cracked bell of our parish
church; once more lie in the cool shade under the oak sapling on the
slope of the familiar ravine; once more watch the moving track of the
wind, flitting, a dark wave over the golden grass of our meadow!... Ah,
what's the good of all this? But I can't go on to-day. Enough till
to-morrow.
_March_ 22.
To-day it's cold and overcast again. Such weather is a great deal more
suitable. It's more in harmony with my task. Yesterday, quite
inappropriately, stirred up a multitude of useless emotions and
memories within me. This shall not occur again. Sentimental out-breaks
are like liquorice; when first you suck it, it's not bad, but
afterwards it leaves a very nasty taste in the mouth. I will set to
work simply and serenely to tell the story of my life. And so, we moved
to Moscow....
But it occurs to me, is it really worth while to tell the story of my
life?
No, it certainly is not.... My life has not been different in any
respect from the lives of numbers of other people. The parental home,
the university, the government service in the lower grades, retirement,
a little circle of friends, decent poverty, modest pleasures,
unambitious pursuits, moderate desires--kindly tell me, is that new to
any one? And so I will not tell the story of my life, especially as I
am writing for my own pleasure; and if my past does not afford even me
any sensation of great pleasure or great pain, it must be that there is
nothing in it deserving of attention. I had better try to describe my
own character to myself. What manner of man am I?... It may be observed
that no one asks me that question--admitted. But there, I'm dying, by
Jove!--I'm dying, and at the point of death I really think one may be
excused a desire to find out what sort of a queer fish one really was
after all.
Thinking over this important question, and having, moreover, no need
whatever to be too bitter in my expressions in regard to myself, as
people are apt to be who have a strong conviction of their valuable
qualities, I must admit one thing. I was a man, or perhaps I should say
a fish, utterly superfluous in this world. And that I propose to show
to-morrow, as I keep coughing to-day like an old sheep, and my nurse,
Terentyevna, gives me no peace: 'Lie down, my good sir,' she says, 'and
drink a little tea.'... I know why she keeps on at me: she wants some
tea herself. Well! she's welcome! Why not let the poor old woman
extract the utmost benefit she can from her master at the last ... as
long as there is still the chance?
_March_ 23.
Winter again. The snow is falling in flakes. Superfluous,
superfluous.... That's a capital word I have hit on. The more deeply I
probe into myself, the more intently I review all my past life, the
more I am convinced of the strict truth of this expression.
Superfluous--that's just it. To other people that term is not
applicable.... People are bad, or good, clever, stupid, pleasant, and
disagreeable; but superfluous ... no. Understand me, though: the
universe could get on without those people too... no doubt; but
uselessness is not their prime characteristic, their most distinctive
attribute, and when you speak of them, the word 'superfluous' is not
the first to rise to your lips. But I ... there's nothing else one can
say about me; I'm superfluous and nothing more. A supernumerary, and
that's all. Nature, apparently, did not reckon on my appearance, and
consequently treated me as an unexpected and uninvited guest. A
facetious gentleman, a great devotee of preference, said very happily
about me that I was the forfeit my mother had paid at the game of life.
I am speaking about myself calmly now, without any bitterness.... It's
all over and done with! Throughout my whole life I was constantly
finding my place taken, perhaps because I did not look for my place
where I should have done. I was apprehensive, reserved, and irritable,
like all sickly people. Moreover, probably owing to excessive
self-consciousness, perhaps as the result of the generally unfortunate
cast of my personality, there existed between my thoughts and feelings,
and the expression of those feelings and thoughts, a sort of
inexplicable, irrational, and utterly insuperable barrier; and whenever
I made up my mind to overcome this obstacle by force, to break down
this barrier, my gestures, the expression of my face, my whole being,
took on an appearance of painful constraint. I not only seemed, I
positively became unnatural and affected. I was conscious of this
myself, and hastened to shrink back into myself. Then a terrible
commotion was set up within me. I analysed myself to the last thread,
compared myself with others, recalled the slightest glances, smiles,
words of the people to whom I had tried to open myself out, put the
worst construction on everything, laughed vindictively at my own
pretensions to 'be like every one else,'--and suddenly, in the midst of
my laughter, collapsed utterly into gloom, sank into absurd dejection,
and then began again as before--went round and round, in fact, like a
squirrel on its wheel. Whole days were spent in this harassing,
fruitless exercise. Well now, tell me, if you please, to whom and for
what is such a man of use? Why did this happen to me? what was the
reason of this trivial fretting at myself?--who knows? who can tell?
I remember I was driving once from Moscow in the diligence. It was a
good road, but the driver, though he had four horses harnessed abreast,
hitched on another, alongside of them. Such an unfortunate, utterly
useless, fifth horse--fastened somehow on to the front of the shaft by
a short stout cord, which mercilessly cuts his shoulder, forces him to
go with the most unnatural action, and gives his whole body the shape
of a comma--always arouses my deepest pity. I remarked to the driver
that I thought we might on this occasion have got on without the fifth
horse.... He was silent a moment, shook his head, lashed the horse a
dozen times across his thin back and under his distended belly, and
with a grin responded: 'Ay, to be sure; why do we drag him along with
us? What the devil's he for?' And here am I too dragged along. But,
thank goodness, the station is not far off.
Superfluous.... I promised to show the justice of my opinion, and I
will carry out my promise. I don't think it necessary to mention the
thousand trifles, everyday incidents and events, which would, however,
in the eyes of any thinking man, serve as irrefutable evidence in my
support--I mean, in support of my contention. I had better begin
straight away with one rather important incident, after which probably
there will be no doubt left of the accuracy of the term superfluous. I
repeat: I do not intend to indulge in minute details, but I cannot pass
over in silence one rather serious and significant fact, that is, the
strange behaviour of my friends (I too used to have friends) whenever I
met them, or even called on them. They used to seem ill at ease; as
they came to meet me, they would give a not quite natural smile, look,
not into my eyes nor at my feet, as some people do, but rather at my
cheeks, articulate hurriedly, 'Ah! how are you, Tchulkaturin!' (such is
the surname fate has burdened me with) or 'Ah! here's Tchulkaturin!'
turn away at once and positively remain stockstill for a little while
after, as though trying to recollect something. I used to notice all
this, as I am not devoid of penetration and the faculty of observation;
on the whole I am not a fool; I sometimes even have ideas come into my
head that are amusing, not absolutely commonplace. But as I am a
superfluous man with a padlock on my inner self, it is very painful for
me to express my idea, the more so as I know beforehand that I shall
express it badly. It positively sometimes strikes me as extraordinary
the way people manage to talk, and so simply and freely.... It's
marvellous, really, when you think of it. Though, to tell the truth, I
too, in spite of my padlock, sometimes have an itch to talk. But I did
actually utter words only in my youth; in riper years I almost always
pulled myself up. I would murmur to myself: 'Come, we'd better hold our
tongue.' And I was still. We are all good hands at being silent; our
women especially are great in that line. Many an exalted Russian young
lady keeps silent so strenuously that the spectacle is calculated to
produce a faint shudder and cold sweat even in any one prepared to face
it. But that's not the point, and it's not for me to criticise others.
I proceed to my promised narrative.
A few years back, owing to a combination of circumstances, very
insignificant in themselves, but very important for me, it was my lot
to spend six months in the district town O----. This town is all built
on a slope, and very uncomfortably built, too. There are reckoned to be
about eight hundred inhabitants in it, of exceptional poverty; the
houses are hardly worthy of the name; in the chief street, by way of an
apology for a pavement, there are here and there some huge white slabs
of rough-hewn limestone, in consequence of which even carts drive round
it instead of through it. In the very middle of an astoundingly dirty
square rises a diminutive yellowish edifice with black holes in it, and
in these holes sit men in big caps making a pretence of buying and
selling. In this place there is an extraordinarily high striped post
sticking up into the air, and near the post, in the interests of public
order, by command of the authorities, there is kept a cartload of
yellow hay, and one government hen struts to and fro. In short,
existence in the town of O---- is truly delightful. During the first
days of my stay in this town, I almost went out of my mind with
boredom. I ought to say of myself that, though I am, no doubt, a
superfluous man, I am not so of my own seeking; I'm morbid myself, but
I can't bear anything morbid.... I'm not even averse to happiness--
indeed, I've tried to approach it right and left.... And so it is no
wonder that I too can be bored like any other mortal. I was staying in
the town of O---- on official business.
Terentyevna has certainly sworn to make an end of me. Here's a specimen
of our conversation:--
TERENTYEVNA. Oh--oh, my good sir! what are you for ever writing for?
it's bad for you, keeping all on writing.