Liza | Page 2

poems, he has brought out several novels, or rather novelettes, for none of them have attained to three-volume dimensions. Of these, the most remarkable are the one I have now translated, which appeared about eleven years ago, and the two somewhat polemical stories, called "Fathers and Children" (Otsui i Dyeti) and "Smoke" (Duim). The first of the three I may leave to speak for itself, merely adding that I trust that--although it appears under all the disadvantages by which even the most conscientious of translations must always be attended--it may be looked upon by English readers with somewhat of the admiration which I have long felt for the original, on account of the artistic finish of its execution, the purity of its tone, and the delicacy and the nobleness of the sentiment by which it is pervaded.
The story of "Fathers and Children" conveys a vigorous and excessively clever description of the change that has taken place of late years in the thoughts and feelings of the educated classes of Russian society One of the most interesting chapters in "Liza"--one which may be skipped by readers who care for nothing but incident in a story--describes a conversation which takes place between the hero and one of his old college friends. The sketch of the disinterested student, who has retained in mature life all the enthusiasm of his college days, is excellent, and is drawn in a very kindly spirit. But in "Fathers and Children" an exaggeration of this character is introduced, serving as a somewhat scare-crow-like embodiment of the excessively hard thoughts and very irreverent speculations in which the younger thinkers of the new school indulge. This character is developed in the story into dimensions which must be styled inordinate if considered from a purely artistic point of view; but the story ought not to be so regarded. Unfortunately for its proper appreciation among us, it cannot be judged aright, except by readers who possess a thorough knowledge of what was going on in Russia a few years ago, and who take a keen and lively interest in the subjects which were then being discussed there. To all others, many of its chapters will seem too unintelligible and wearisome, both linked together into interesting unity by the slender thread of its story, beautiful as many of its isolated passages are. The same objection may be made to "Smoke." Great spaces in that work are devoted to caricatures of certain persons and opinions of note in Russia, but utterly unknown in England--pictures which either delight or irritate the author's countrymen, according to the tendency of their social and political speculations, but which are as meaningless to the untutored English eye as a collection of "H.B."'s drawings would be to a Russian who had never studied English politics. Consequently neither of these stories is likely ever to be fully appreciated among us[A].
[Footnote A: A detailed account of both of these stories, as well as of several other works by M. Turg��nieff, will be found in the number of the North British Review for March, 1869.]
The last novelette which M. Turg��nieff has published, "The Unfortunate One" (Neschastnaya) is free from the drawbacks by which, as far as English readers are concerned, "Fathers and Children" and "Smoke," are attended; but it is exceedingly sad and painful. It is said to be founded on a true story, a fact which may account for an intensity of gloom in its coloring, the darkness of which would otherwise seem almost unartistically overcharged.
Several of M. Turg��nieff's works have already been translated into English. The "Notes of a Sportsman" appeared about fourteen years ago, under the title of "Russian Life in the Interior[A];" but, unfortunately, the French translation from which they were (with all due acknowledgment) rendered, was one which had been so "cooked" for the Parisian market, that M. Turg��nieff himself felt bound to protest against it vigorously. It is the more unfortunate inasmuch as an admirable French translation of the work was afterwards made by M. Delaveau[B].
[Footnote A: "Russian Life in the Interior." Edited by J.D. Meiklejohn. Black, Edinburg, 1855.]
[Footnote B: "R��cits d'un Chasseur." Traduits par H. Delavea, Paris, 1858.]
Still more vigorously had M. Turg��nieff to protest against an English translation of "Smoke," which appeared a few months ago.
The story of "Fathers and Children" has also appeared in English[A]; but as the translation was published on the other side of the Atlantic, it has as yet served but little to make M. Turg��nieff's name known among us.
[Footnote A: "Fathers and Sons." Translated from the Russian by Eugene Schuyler. New York 1867.]
The French and German translations of M. Turg��nieff's works are excellent. From the French versions of M. Delaveau, M. Xavier Marmier, M. Prosper M��rim��e, M. Viardot, and several others, a very good idea may be formed by the