Essays on Russian Novelists | Page 3

his race and
posterity; he will bear it about with him, in service, in retreat, in
Petersburg, and to the ends of the earth; and use what cunning he will,
ennoble his career as he will thereafter, nothing is of the slightest use;
that nickname will caw of itself at the top of its crow's voice, and will
show clearly whence the bird has flown. A pointed epithet once uttered
is the same as though it were written down, and an axe will not cut it
out.
*"Russia of To-day," page 203.
"And how pointed is all that which has proceeded from the depths of

Russia, where there are neither Germans nor Finns, nor any other
strange tribes, but where all is purely aboriginal, where the bold and
lively Russian mind never dives into its pocket for a word, and never
broods over it like a sitting-hen: it sticks the word on at one blow, like a
passport, like your nose or lips on an eternal bearer, and never adds
anything afterwards. You are sketched from head to foot in one stroke.
"Innumerable as is the multitude of churches, monasteries with cupolas,
towers, and crosses, which are scattered over holy, most pious Russia,
the multitude of tribes, races, and peoples who throng and bustle and
variegate the earth is just as innumerable. And every people bearing
within itself the pledge of strength, full of active qualities of soul, of its
own sharply defined peculiarities, and other gifts of God, has
characteristically distinguished itself by its own special word, by which,
while expressing any object whatever, it also reflects in the expression
its own share of its own distinctive character. The word Briton echoes
with knowledge of the heart, and wise knowledge of life; the word
French, which is not of ancient date, glitters with a light foppery, and
flits away; the sagely artistic word German ingeniously discovers its
meaning, which is not attainable by every one; but there is no word
which is so ready, so audacious, which is torn from beneath the heart
itself, which is so burning, so full of life, as the aptly applied Russian
word."*
*"Dead Souls," translated by Isabel Hapgood.
Prosper Merimee, who knew Russian well, and was an absolute master
of the French language, remarked:--
"La langue russe, qui est, autant que j 'en puis juger, le plus riche des
idiomes de l'Europe, semble faite pour exprimer les nuances les plus
delicates. Douee d'une merveilleuse concision qui s'allie a la clarte, il
lui suffit d'un mot pour associer plusieurs idees, qui, dans une autre
langue, exigeralent des phrases entieres."
And no people are more jealous on this very point than the French. In
the last of his wonderful "Poems in Prose," Turgenev cried out: "In
these days of doubt, in these days of painful brooding over the fate of
my country, thou alone art my rod and my staff, O great, mighty, true
and free Russian language! If it were not for thee, how could one keep
from despairing at the sight of what is going on at home? But it is
inconceivable that such a language should not belong to a great

people."
It is significant that Turgenev, who was so full of sympathy for the
ideas and civilization of Western Europe, and who was so often
regarded (unjustly) by his countrymen as a traitor to Russia, should
have written all his masterpieces, not in French, of which he had a
perfect command, but in his own beloved mother-tongue.
We see by the above extracts, that Russia has an instrument of
expression as near perfection as is possible in human speech. Perhaps
one reason for the supremacy of Russian fiction may be found here.
The immense size of the country produces an element of largeness in
Russian character that one feels not only in their novels, but almost
invariably in personal contact and conversation with a more or less
educated Russian. This is not imaginary and fantastic; it is a definite
sensation, and immediately apparent. Bigness in early environment
often produces a certain comfortable largeness of mental vision. One
has only to compare in this particular a man from Russia with a man
from Holland, or still better, a man from Texas with a man from
Connecticut. The difference is easy to see, and easier to feel. It is
possible that the man from the smaller district may be more subtle, or
he may have had better educational advantages; but he is likely to be
more narrow. A Texan told me once that it was eighteen miles from his
front door to his front gate; now I was born in a city block, with no
front yard at all. I had surely missed something.
Russians are moulded on a large scale, and their novels are