YASNAYA POLYANA,
STATION ZASSYEKA,
21 AUGUST, 1913.
MUCH-RESPECTED SEMEN AFANASEVICH: This is a difficult task which
you have set me, writing my autobiography, and, although I have
already begun it, I am continually wondering whether I am doing it
properly. The chief thing which I have decided to ask you is to
tell me what length my article should be. If, for instance, you
take a page of the magazine _Vyestnik Europa_ as a measure, how
many full pages, approximately, ought I to write? To-morrow I shall
be sixty-nine years old, a long life; well, _what_ out of that life
would be of interest to people? I have been trying to find some
woman's autobiography for a model, but have not found one anywhere.
Pardon me for troubling you; I want to do the work you have charged
me with as well as possible, but I have so little capacity and no
experience at all.