Maxim Gorki | Page 9

a new career for himself. The weariness of a whole generation is expressed in his faint-hearted, listless words, as also in the blustering but ineffective rhodomontades of the tipsy choir-singer Teterev. All cordial relations between parents and children are lacking in this house.
It is refreshing to come upon the other characters, who are of a different breed to these shop-keepers. The vodka-loving, jolly father of Polja (Bezemenov's niece, who is exploited and maltreated in this house), is, in his contented yet sentimental egoism, a true representative of the ordinary Russian, the common man. And Polja! And Nil! . . . Here is the fresh blood of the future. How sure they both are in their love. "Ah! what a beautiful world it is, isn't it? Wondrously beautiful . . . dear friend. . . . What a glorious man you are. . . ."
Albeit this work is far from being a finished drama, it none the less has its special qualities. These men often talk as glibly as if they were essayists, they often seem to be mere vehicles for programmatic manifestoes. But as a whole they are the typical quintessence of the Russian people.
Other wild and intrepid figures are to be found in the larger works that precede "The Tradespeople"--the novels "Foma Gordeyev" and "Three Men." But Gorki's new conception of life is less clearly and broadly formulated in these than in Nil, and other subsequent characters. These people rather collapse from the superabundance of their vigour and the meanness of their surroundings.
In "Foma Gordeyev" Gorki flagellates the unscrupulous Russian wholesale dealer, who knows of nought beyond profit and the grossest sensual indulgence, and lets his own flesh and blood perish if they require of him to budge a hand-breadth from his egoistic standpoint. Foma, who is not built for a merchant, and who, while ambitious of command, is too magnanimous for the sordid business of a tradesman, has to give in. And the children of his triumphant guardian can only escape poverty by accepting their surroundings.
[Illustration: Gambling scene (Act II. of "The Doss-house")]
Despite its agonies and martyrdoms, however, there is one marvellously inspiring feature about this novel,--its gorgeous descriptions of Nature, rich in life and colour. "Foma Gordeyev" is the romance of life on the Volga.
With what intimacy, familiarity, and heart-felt emotion Gorki here describes and sees! The great River, with its diversified characteristics, its ominous events, mingles with the life of Man, and flows on past us. . . .
It is this characteristic union of the Human-All-Too-Human with his impressions of Nature in so many of Gorki's works, that makes them at the outset desirable and readable to a large proportion of his public. Much of his description of life beyond the social pale would be repulsive if it were not for this interpretative nature-painting. Especially would this be the case in "Malva." This robust, free-loving, and free-living maiden attracts us by her vigorous participation in Nature, when, for instance, she leaps into the water, and sports in the element like a fish.
Gorki's countless wanderings through the Russian Steppes, his sojourns by the southern shores of the Russian Seas, are intimately interwoven with the course of Nature, and have given him poetic insight and motives which are ignored by other authors, who have grown up in the University, the Bureau, or the Coffee-houses of large towns. His life of poverty has made him rich. He has evolved some significant prose-poems from the life of Nature, and the contest of her forces. While the sketch, "Spring Voices," is a satire, bristling with tangible darts and stings, "The Bursting of the Dam" expresses the full force that rages and battles in a stormy sea. The unemancipated workers construct steep, rocky dams that jut out into the free, unbridled sea. The waves that so long rolled on merrily, without fell intent, are now confined, and beat against the hard, cold, sullen rocks. The winds and tempests join in a colossal attack upon the unyielding barriers, and the rocks are shivered in fragments.
[Illustration: A confabulation (Act II. of "The Doss-house")]
Quite different again is the romance entitled "Three Men" (or "Three of Them"). The tales and sketches published prior to this work were merely founded on episodes, catastrophes, or descriptive passages from the author's rich store of material. They certainly conveyed the essence of the life of his characters. They disclosed the axis of these people's existence. But they are seldom free from a certain tiresome impressionism--and often make quite undue pretensions. The didactic is too obvious. Gorki is not always satisfied with saying, here is a bit of life. He tries to put in a little wisdom. His form is seldom clear and conclusive. His tales are overladen with detail and superfluity of minute description. In Germany, Gorki owes much to