People outside of Russia, especially Anglo-Saxons, have one great objection to the Russian drama: it is too sad, too gloomy. It is often asked, "Why is the Russian drama so pessimistic?" The answer is: the Russian drama, like all Russian culture, has been conceived in the sorrow of the people; it was born in their woe and struggle. Anything thus conceived cannot be very joyous or amusing.
It is no exaggeration to say that in no other country are the creative artists so interwoven, so much at one with the people. This is not only true of men like Turgenev, Tolstoy and the dramatists of modern times. It applies also to Gogol, who in "The Inspector" and "Dead Souls" spoke in behalf of the people, appealing to the conscience of Russia. The same is true of Dostoyevsky, of the poets Nekrassov, Nadson, and others. In fact, all the great Russian artists have gone to the people for their inspiration, as to the source of all life. That explains the depth and the humanity of Russian literature.
The modern drama naturally suggests Henrik Ibsen as its pioneer. But prior to him, Gogol utilized the drama as a vehicle for popularizing the social issues of his time. In "The Inspector," (Revizor) he portrays the corruption, graft and extortion rampant in the governmental departments. If we were to Anglicize the names of the characters in "The Inspector," and forget for a moment that it was a Russian who wrote the play, the criticism contained therein would apply with similar force to present-day America, and to every other modern country. Gogol touched the deepest sores of social magnitude and marked the beginning of the realistic drama in Russia.
However, it is not within the scope of this work to discuss the drama of Gogol's era. I shall begin with Tolstoy, because he is closer to our own generation, and voices more definitely the social significance of the modern drama.
LEO TOLSTOY
When Leo Tolstoy died, the representatives of the Church proclaimed him as their own. "He was with us," they said. It reminds one of the Russian fable about the fly and the ox. The fly was lazily resting on the horn of the ox while he plowed the field, but when the ox returned home exhausted with toil, the fly bragged, "We have been plowing." The spokesmen of the Church are, in relation to Tolstoy, in the same position. It is true that Tolstoy based his conception of human relationships on a new interpretation of the Gospels. But he was as far removed from present-day Christianity as Jesus was alien to the institutional religion of his time.
Tolstoy was the last true Christian, and as such he undermined the stronghold of the Church with all its pernicious power of darkness, with all its injustice and cruelty.
For this he was persecuted by the Holy Synod and excommunicated from the Church; for this he was feared by the Tsar and his henchmen; for this his works have been condemned and prohibited.
The only reason Tolstoy himself escaped the fate of other great Russians was that he was mightier than the Church, mightier than the ducal clique, mightier even than the Tsar. He was the powerful conscience of Russia exposing her crimes and evils before the civilized world.
How deeply Tolstoy felt the grave problems of his time, how closely related he was to the people, he demonstrated in various works, but in none so strikingly as in "The Power of Darkness."
THE POWER OF DARKNESS
"The Power of Darkness" is the tragedy of sordid misery and dense ignorance. It deals with a group of peasants steeped in poverty and utter darkness. This appalling condition, especially in relation to the women folk, is expressed by one of the characters in the play:
Mitrich. There are millions of you women and girls, but you are all like the beasts of the forest. Just as one has been born, so she dies. She has neither seen or heard anything. A man will learn something; if nowhere else, at least in the inn, or by some chance, in prison, or in the army, as I have. But what about a woman? She does not know a thing about God,—nay, she does not know one day from another. They creep about like blind pups, and stick their heads into the manure.
Peter, a rich peasant, is in a dying condition. Yet he clings to his money and slave-drives his young wife, Anisya, his two daughters by a first marriage, and his peasant servant Nikita. He will not allow them any rest from their toil, for the greed of money is in his blood and the fear of death in his bones. Anisya hates her husband: he forces her to drudge, and he is old and ill. She loves Nikita. The latter, young and irresponsible, cannot resist women, who are his main weakness and final undoing. Before he came to old Peter's farm, he had wronged an orphan girl. When she becomes pregnant, she appeals to Nikita's father, Akim, a simple and honest peasant. He urges his son to marry the girl, because "it is a sin to wrong an orphan. Look out, Nikita! A tear of offense does not flow past, but upon a man's head. Look out, or the same will happen with you."
Akim's kindness and simplicity are opposed by the viciousness and greed of his wife Matrena. Nikita remains on the farm, and Anisya, urged and influenced by his mother, poisons old Peter and steals his money.
When her husband dies, Anisya marries Nikita and turns the money over to him. Nikita becomes the head of the house, and soon proves himself a rake and a tyrant. Idleness and affluence undermine whatever good is latent in him. Money, the destroyer of souls, together with the consciousness that he has been indirectly a party to Anisya's crime, turn Nikita's love for the woman into bitter hatred. He takes for his mistress Akulina, Peter's oldest daughter, a girl of sixteen, deaf and silly, and forces Anisya to serve them. She had strength to resist her old husband, but her love for Nikita has made her weak. "The moment I see him my heart softens. I have no courage against him."
Old Akim comes to ask for a little money from his newly rich son. He quickly senses the swamp of corruption and vice into which Nikita has sunk. He tries to save him, to bring him back to himself, to arouse the better side of his nature. But he fails.
The ways of life are too evil for Akim. He leaves, refusing even the money he needs so badly to purchase a horse.
Akim. One sin holds on to another and pulls you along. Nikita, you are stuck in sins. You are stuck, I see, in sins. You are stuck fast, so to speak. I have heard that nowadays they pull fathers' beards, so to speak,—but this leads only to ruin, to ruin, so to speak.... There is your money. I will go and beg, so to speak, but I will not, so to speak, take the money.... Let me go! I will not stay! I would rather sleep near the fence than in your nastiness.
The type of Akim is most vividly characterized by Tolstoy in the talk between the old peasant and the new help on the farm.
Mitrich. Let us suppose, for example, you have money, and I, for example, have my land lying fallow; it is spring, and I have no seed; or I have to pay the taxes. So I come to you, and say: "Akim, give me ten roubles! I will have the harvest in by St. Mary's Intercession and then I will give it back to you, with a tithe for the accommodation." You, for example, see that I can be flayed, having a horse or a cow, so you say: "Give me two or three roubles for the accommodation." The noose is around my neck, and I cannot get along without it. "Very well," says I, "I will take the ten roubles." In the fall I sell some things, and I bring you the money, and you skin me in addition for three roubles.
Akim. But this is, so to speak, a wrong done to a peasant. If one forgets God, so to speak, it is not good.
Mitrich. Wait a minute! So remember what you have done: you have fleeced me, so to speak, and Anisya, for example, has some money which is lying idle. She has no place to put it in and, being a woman, does not know what to do with it. So she comes to you: "Can't I," says she, "make some use of my money?" "Yes, you can," you say. And so you wait. Next summer I come to you once more. "Give me another ten roubles," says I, "and I will pay you for the accommodation." So you watch me to see whether my hide has not been turned yet, whether I can be flayed again, and if I can, you give me Anisya's money. But if I have not a blessed thing, and nothing to eat, you make your calculations, seeing that I cannot be skinned, and you say: "God be with you, my brother!" and you look out for another man to whom to give Anisya's money, and whom you can flay. Now this is called a bank. So it keeps going around. It is a very clever thing, my friend.
Akim. What is this? This is a nastiness, so to speak. If a peasant, so to speak, were to do it, the peasants would regard it as a sin, so to speak. This is not according to the Law, not according to the Law, so to speak. It is bad. How can the learned men, so to speak— ... As I look at it, so to speak, there is trouble without money, so to speak, and with money the trouble is double, so to speak. God has commanded to work. But you put the money in the bank, so to speak, and lie down to sleep, and the money will feed you, so to speak, while you are lying. This is bad,—not according to the Law, so to speak.
Mitrich. Not according to the Law? The Law does not trouble people nowadays, my friend. All they think about is how to clean out a fellow. That's what!
As long as Akulina's condition is not noticeable, the relation of Nikita with his dead master's daughter remains hidden from the neighbors. But the time comes when she is to give birth to a child. It is then that Anisya becomes mistress of the situation again. Her hatred for Akulina, her outraged love for Nikita and the evil spirit of Nikita's mother all combine to turn her into a fiend. Akulina is driven to the barn, where her terrible labor pains are stifled by the dread of her stepmother. When the innocent victim is born, Nikita's vicious mother and Anisya persuade him that the child is dead and force him to bury it in the cellar.
While Nikita is digging the grave, he discovers the deception. The child is alive! The terrible shock unnerves the man, and in temporary madness he presses a board over the little body till its bones crunch. Superstition, horror and the perfidy of the women drive Nikita to drink in an attempt to drown the baby's cries constantly ringing in his ears.
The last act deals with Akulina's wedding to the son of a neighbor. She is forced into the marriage because of her misfortune. The peasants all gather for the occasion, but Nikita is missing: he roams the place haunted by the horrible phantom of his murdered child. He attempts to hang himself but fails, and finally decides to go before the entire assembly to confess his crimes.
Nikita. Father, listen to me! First of all, Marina, look at me! I am guilty toward you: I had promised to marry you, and I seduced you. I deceived you and abandoned you; forgive me for Christ's sake!
Matrena. Oh, oh, he is bewitched. What is the matter with him? He has the evil eye upon him. Get up and stop talking nonsense!
Nikita. I killed your father, and I, dog, have ruined his daughter. I had the power over her, and I killed also her baby.... Father dear! Forgive me, sinful man! You told me, when I first started on this life of debauch: "When the claw is caught, the whole bird is lost." But, I, dog, did not pay any attention to you, and so everything turned out as you said. Forgive me, for Christ's sake.
The "Power of Darkness" is a terrible picture of poverty, ignorance and superstition. To write such a work it is not sufficient to be a creative artist: it requires a deeply sympathetic human soul. Tolstoy possessed both. He understood that the tragedy of the peasants' life is due not to any inherent viciousness but to the power of darkness which permeates their existence from the cradle to the grave. Something heavy is oppressing them—in the words of Anisya—weighing them down, something that saps all humanity out of them and drives them into the depths.
"The Power of Darkness" is a social picture at once appalling and gripping.
ANTON TCHEKHOF
When Anton Tchekhof first came to the fore, no less an authority than Tolstoy said: "Russia has given birth to another Turgenev." The estimate was not overdrawn. Tchekhof was indeed a modern Turgenev. Perhaps not as universal, because Turgenev, having lived in western Europe, in close contact with conditions outside of Russia, dealt with more variegated aspects of life. But as a creative artist Tchekhof is fitted to take his place with Turgenev.
Tchekhof is preËminently the master of short stories. Within the limits of a few pages he paints the drama of human life with its manifold tragic and comic colors, in its most intimate reflex upon the characters who pass through the panorama. He has been called a pessimist. As if one could miss the sun without feeling the torture of utter darkness!
Tchekhof wrote during the gloomiest period of Russian life, at a time when the reaction had drowned the revolution in the blood of the young generation,—when the Tsar had choked the very breath out of young Russia. The intellectuals were deprived of every outlet: all the social channels were closed to them, and they found themselves without hope or faith, not having yet learned to make common cause with the people.
Tchekhof could not escape the atmosphere which darkened the horizon of almost the whole of Russia. It was because he so intensely felt its oppressive weight that he longed for air, for light, for new and vital ideas. To awaken the same yearning and faith in others, he had to picture life as it was, in all its wretchedness and horror.
This he did in "The Seagull," while in "The Cherry Orchard" he holds out the hope of a new and brighter day.
THE SEAGULL
In "The Seagull" the young artist, Constantine Treplef, seeks new forms, new modes of expression. He is tired of the old academic ways, the beaten track; he is disgusted with the endless imitative methods, no one apparently capable of an original thought.
Constantine has written a play; the principal part is to be acted by Nina, a beautiful girl with whom Constantine is in love. He arranges the first performance to take place on the occasion of his mother's vacation in the country.
She herself—known as Mme. Arcadina—is a famous actress of the old school. She knows how to show off her charms to advantage, to parade her beautiful gowns, to faint and die gracefully before the footlights; but she does not know how to live her part on the stage. Mme. Arcadina is the type of artist who lacks all conception of the relation between art and life. Barren of vision and empty of heart, her only criterion is public approval and material success. Needless to say, she cannot understand her son. She considers him decadent, a foolish rebel who wants to undermine the settled canons of dramatic art. Constantine sums up his mother's personality in the following manner:
Treplef. She is a psychological curiosity, is my mother. A clever and gifted woman, who can cry over a novel, will reel you off all Nekrassov's poems by heart, and is the perfection of a sick nurse; but venture to praise Eleonora Duse before her! Oho! ho! You must praise nobody but her, write about her, shout about her, and go into ecstasies over her wonderful performance in La Dame aux CamÉlias, or The Fumes of Life; but as she cannot have these intoxicating pleasures down here in the country, she's bored and gets spiteful.... She loves the stage; she thinks that she is advancing the cause of humanity and her sacred art; but I regard the stage of to-day as mere routine and prejudice. When the curtain goes up and the gifted beings, the high priests of the sacred art, appear by electric light, in a room with three sides to it, representing how people eat, drink, love, walk and wear their jackets; when they strive to squeeze out a moral from the flat, vulgar pictures and the flat, vulgar phrases, a little tiny moral, easy to comprehend and handy for home consumption, when in a thousand variations they offer me always the same thing over and over and over again—then I take to my heels and run, as Maupassant ran from the Eiffel Tower, which crushed his brain by its overwhelming vulgarity.... We must have new formulÆ. That's what we want. And if there are none, then it's better to have nothing at all.
With Mme. Arcadina is her lover, Trigorin, a successful writer. When he began his literary career, he possessed originality and strength. But gradually writing became a habit: the publishers constantly demand new books, and he supplies them.
Oh, the slavery of being an "arrived" artist, forging new chains for oneself with every "best seller"! Such is the position of Trigorin: he hates his work as the worst drudgery. Exhausted of ideas, all life and human relations serve him only as material for copy.
Nina, innocent of the ways of the world and saturated with the false romanticism of Trigorin's works, does not see the man but the celebrated artist. She is carried away by his fame and stirred by his presence; an infatuation with him quickly replaces her affection for Constantine. To her Trigorin embodies her dream of a brilliant and interesting life.
Nina. How I envy you, if you but knew it! How different are the lots of different people! Some can hardly drag on their tedious, insignificant existence; they are all alike, all miserable; others, like you, for instance—you are one in a million—are blessed with a brilliant, interesting life, all full of meaning.... You are happy.... What a delightful life yours is!
Trigorin. What is there so fine about it? Day and night I am obsessed by the same persistent thought; I must write, I must write, I must write.... No sooner have I finished one story than I am somehow compelled to write another, then a third, and after the third a fourth.... I have no rest for myself; I feel that I am devouring my own life.... I've never satisfied myself.... I have the feeling for nature; it wakes a passion in me, an irresistible desire to write. But I am something more than a landscape painter; I'm a citizen as well; I love my country, I love the people; I feel that if I am a writer I am bound to speak of the people, of its suffering, of its future, to speak of science, of the rights of man, etc., etc.; and I speak about it all, volubly, and am attacked angrily in return by everyone; I dart from side to side like a fox run down by hounds; I see that life and science fly farther and farther ahead of me, and I fall farther and farther behind, like the countryman running after the train; and in the end I feel that the only thing I can write of is the landscape, and in everything else I am untrue to life, false to the very marrow of my bones.
Constantine realizes that Nina is slipping away from him. The situation is aggravated by the constant friction with his mother and his despair at the lack of encouragement for his art. In a fit of despondency he attempts suicide, but without success. His mother, although nursing him back to health, is infuriated at her son's "foolishness," his inability to adapt himself to conditions, his impractical ideas. She decides to leave, accompanied by Trigorin. On the day of their departure Nina and Trigorin meet once more. The girl tells him of her ambition to become an actress, and, encouraged by him, follows him to the city.
Two years later Mme. Arcadina, still full of her idle triumphs, returns to her estate. Trigorin is again with her still haunted by the need of copy.
Constantine has in the interim matured considerably. Although he has made himself heard as a writer, he nevertheless feels that life to-day has no place for such as he: that sincerity in art is not wanted. His mother is with him, but she only serves to emphasize the flatness of his surroundings. He loves her, but her ways jar him and drive him into seclusion.
Nina, too, has returned to her native place, broken in body and spirit. Partly because of the memory of her past affection for Constantine, and mainly because she learns of Trigorin's presence, she is drawn to the place where two years before she had dreamed of the beauty of an artistic career. The cruel struggle for recognition, the bitter disappointment in her relation with Trigorin, the care of a child and poor health have combined to change the romantic child into a sad woman.
Constantine still loves her. He pleads with her to go away with him, to begin a new life. But it is too late. The lure of the footlights is beckoning to Nina; she returns to the stage. Constantine, unable to stand the loneliness of his life and the mercenary demands upon his art, kills himself.
To the Anglo-Saxon mind such an ending is pessimism,—defeat. Often, however, apparent defeat is in reality the truest success. For is not success, as commonly understood, but too frequently bought at the expense of character and idealism?
"The Seagull" is not defeat. As long as there is still such material in society as the Constantines—men and women who would rather die than compromise with the sordidness of life—there is hope for humanity. If the Constantines perish, it is the social fault,—our indifference to, and lack of appreciation of, the real values that alone advance the fuller and more complete life of the race.
THE CHERRY ORCHARD
"The Cherry Orchard" is Tchekhof's prophetic song. In this play he depicts three stages of social development and their reflex in literature.
Mme. Ranevsky, the owner of the cherry orchard, an estate celebrated far and wide for its beauty and historic traditions, is deeply attached to the family place. She loves it for its romanticism: nightingales sing in the orchard, accompanying the wooing of lovers. She is devoted to it because of the memory of her ancestors and because of the many tender ties which bind her to the orchard. The same feeling and reverence is entertained by her brother Leonid Gayef. They are expressed in the Ode to an Old Family Cupboard:
Gayef. Beloved and venerable cupboard; honor and glory to your existence, which for more than a hundred years has been directed to the noble ideals of justice and virtue. Your silent summons to profitable labor has never weakened in all these hundred years. You have upheld the courage of succeeding generations of human kind; you have upheld faith in a better future and cherished in us ideals of goodness and social consciousness.
But the social consciousness of Gayef and of his sister is of a paternal nature: the attitude of the aristocracy toward its serfs. It is a paternalism that takes no account of the freedom and happiness of the people,—the romanticism of a dying class.
Mme. Ranevsky is impoverished. The cherry orchard is heavily mortgaged and as romance and sentiment cannot liquidate debts, the beautiful estate falls into the cruel hands of commercialism.
The merchant Yermolai Lopakhin buys the place. He is in ecstasy over his newly acquired possession. He the owner—he who had risen from the serfs of the former master of the orchard!
Lopakhin. Just think of it! The cherry orchard is mine! Mine! Tell me that I'm drunk; tell me that I'm off my head; tell me that it's all a dream!... If only my father and my grandfather could rise from their graces and see the whole affair, how their Yermolai, their flogged and ignorant Yermolai, who used to run about barefooted in the winter, how this same Yermolai had bought a property that hasn't its equal for beauty anywhere in the whole world! I have bought the property where my father and grandfather were slaves, where they weren't even allowed into the kitchen.
A new epoch begins in the cherry orchard. On the ruins of romanticism and aristocratic ease there rises commercialism, its iron hand yoking nature, devastating her beauty, and robbing her of all radiance.
With the greed of rich returns, Lopakhin cries, "Lay the ax to the cherry orchard, come and see the trees fall down! We'll fill the place with villas."
Materialism reigns supreme; it lords the orchard with mighty hand, and in the frenzy of its triumph believes itself in control of the bodies and souls of men. But in the madness of conquest it has discounted a stubborn obstacle—the spirit of idealism. It is symbolized in Peter Trophimof, "the perpetual student," and Anya, the young daughter of Mme. Ranevsky. The "wonderful achievements" of the materialistic age do not enthuse them; they have emancipated themselves from the Lopakhin idol as well as from their aristocratic traditions.
Anya. Why is it that I no longer love the cherry orchard as I did? I used to love it so tenderly; I thought there was no better place on earth than our garden.
Trophimof. All Russia is our garden. The earth is great and beautiful; it is full of wonderful places. Think, Anya, your grandfather, your great-grandfather and all your ancestors were serf-owners, owners of living souls. Do not human spirits look out at you from every tree in the orchard, from every leaf and every stem? Do you not hear human voices?... Oh! it is terrible. Your orchard frightens me. When I walk through it in the evening or at night, the rugged bark on the trees glows with a dim light, and the cherry trees seem to see all that happened a hundred and two hundred years ago in painful and oppressive dreams. Well, well, we have fallen at least two hundred years beyond the times. We have achieved nothing at all as yet; we have not made up our minds how we stand with the past; we only philosophize, complain of boredom, or drink vodka. It is so plain that, before we can live in the present, we must first redeem the past, and have done with it.
Anya. The house we live in has long since ceased to be our house; I shall go away.
Trophimof. If you have the household keys, throw them in the well and go away. Be free, be free as the wind.... I am hungry as the winter; I am sick, anxious, poor as a beggar. Fate has tossed me hither and thither; I have been everywhere, everywhere. But everywhere I have been, every minute, day and night, my soul has been full of mysterious anticipations. I feel the approach of happiness, Anya; I see it coming ... it is coming towards us, nearer and nearer; I can hear the sound of its footsteps.... And if we do not see it, if we do not know it, what does it matter? Others will see it.
The new generation, on the threshold of the new epoch, hears the approaching footsteps of the Future. And even if the Anyas and Trophimofs of to-day will not see it, others will.
It was not given to Anton Tchekhof to see it with his bodily eyes. But his prophetic vision beheld the coming of the New Day, and with powerful pen he proclaimed it, that others might see it. Far from being a pessimist, as charged by unintelligent critics, his faith was strong in the possibilities of liberty.
This is the inspiring message of "The Cherry Orchard."
MAXIM GORKI
A NIGHT'S LODGING
We in America are conversant with tramp literature. A number of writers of considerable note have described what is commonly called the underworld, among them Josiah Flynt and Jack London, who have ably interpreted the life and psychology of the outcast. But with all due respect for their ability, it must be said that, after all, they wrote only as onlookers, as observers. They were not tramps themselves, in the real sense of the word. In "The Children of the Abyss" Jack London relates that when he stood in the breadline, he had money, a room in a good hotel, and a change of linen at hand. He was therefore not an integral part of the underworld, of the homeless and hopeless.
Never before has anyone given such a true, realistic picture of the social depths as Maxim Gorki, himself a denizen of the underworld from his early childhood. At the age of eight he ran away from his poverty-stricken, dismal home, and for many years thereafter he lived the life of the bosyaki. He tramped through the length and breadth of Russia; he lived with the peasant, the factory worker and the outcast. He knew them intimately; he understood their psychology, for he was not only with them, but of them. Therefore Gorki has been able to present such a vivid picture of the underworld.
"A Night's Lodging" portrays a lodging house, hideous and foul, where gather the social derelicts,—the thief, the gambler, the ex-artist, the ex-aristocrat, the prostitute. All of them had at one time an ambition, a goal, but because of their lack of will and the injustice and cruelty of the world, they were forced into the depths and cast back whenever they attempted to rise. They are the superfluous ones, dehumanized and brutalized.
In this poisonous air, where everything withers and dies, we nevertheless find character. Natasha, a young girl, still retains her wholesome instincts. She had never known love or sympathy, had gone hungry all her days, and had tasted nothing but abuse from her brutal sister, on whom she was dependent. Vaska Pepel, the young thief, a lodger in the house, strikes a responsive chord in her the moment he makes her feel that he cares for her and that she might be of spiritual and moral help to him. Vaska, like Natasha, is a product of his social environment.
Vaska. From childhood, I have been—only a thief.... Always I was called Vaska the pickpocket, Vaska the son of a thief! See, it was of no consequence to me, as long as they would have it so ... so they would have it.... I was a thief, perhaps, only out of spite ... because nobody came along to call me anything—thief.... You call me something else, Natasha.... It is no easy life that I lead—friendless; pursued like a wolf.... I sink like a man in a swamp ... whatever I touch is slimy and rotten ... nothing is firm ... but you are like a young fir-tree; you are prickly, but you give support.
There is another humane figure illuminating the dark picture in "A Night's Lodging",—Luka. He is the type of an old pilgrim, a man whom the experiences of life have taught wisdom. He has tramped through Russia and Siberia, and consorted with all sorts of people; but disappointment and grief have not robbed him of his faith in beauty, in idealism. He believes that every man, however low, degraded, or demoralized can yet be reached, if we but know how to touch his soul. Luka inspires courage and hope in everyone he meets, urging each to begin life anew. To the former actor, now steeped in drink, he says:
Luka. The drunkard, I have heard, can now be cured, without charge. They realize now, you see, that the drunkard is also a man. You must begin to make ready. Begin a new life!
Luka tries also to imbue Natasha and Vaska with new faith. They marvel at his goodness. In simplicity of heart Luka gives his philosophy of life.
Luka. I am good, you say. But you see, there must be some one to be good.... We must have pity on mankind.... Have pity while there is still time, believe me, it is very good. I was once, for example, employed as a watchman, at a country place which belonged to an engineer, not far from the city of Tomsk, in Siberia. The house stood in the middle of the forest, an out-of-the-way location ... and it was winter and I was all alone in the country house. It was beautiful there ... magnificent! And once ... I heard them scrambling up!...
Natasha. Thieves!
Luka. Yes. They crept higher and I took my rifle and went outside. I looked up: two men ... as they were opening a window and so busy that they did not see anything of me at all. I cried to them: "Heh there ... get out of that" ... and would you think it, they fell on me with a hand ax.... I warned them—"Halt," I cried, "or else I fire" ... then I aimed first at one and then at the other. They fell on their knees, saying, "Pardon us." I was pretty hot ... on account of the hand ax, you remember. "You devils," I cried, "I told you to clear out and you didn't ... and now," I said, "one of you go into the brash and get a switch." It was done. "And now," I commanded, "one of you stretch out on the ground, and the other thrash him" ... and so they whipped each other at my command. And when they had each had a sound beating, they said to me: "Grandfather," said they, "for the sake of Christ give us a piece of bread. We haven't a bite in our bodies." They were the thieves, who had fallen upon me with the hand ax. Yes ... they were a pair of splendid fellows.... I said to them, "If you had asked for bread." Then they answered: "We had gotten past that.... We had asked and asked and nobody would give us anything ... endurance was worn out," ... and so they remained with me the whole winter. One of them, Stephen by name, liked to take the rifle and go into the woods ... and the other, Jakoff, was constantly ill, always coughing ... the three of us watched the place, and when spring came, they said, "Farewell, grandfather," and went away—to Russia....
Natasha. Were they convicts, escaping?
Luka. They were ... fugitives ... they had left their colony ... a pair of splendid fellows.... If I had not had pity on them—who knows what would have happened. They might have killed me.... Then they would be taken to court again, put in prison, sent back to Siberia.... Why all that? You learn nothing good in prison, nor in Siberia ... but a man, what can he not learn. Man may teach his fellowman something good ... very simply.
Impressed and strengthened by Luka's wonderful faith and vision, the unfortunates make an attempt to rise from the social swamp. But he has come too late into their lives. They have been robbed of energy and will; and conditions always conspire to thrust them back into the depths. When Natasha and Vaska are about to start out on the road to a new life, fate overtakes them. The girl, during a scene with her heartless sister, is terribly scalded by the latter, and Vaska, rushing to the defense of his sweetheart, encounters her brutal brother-in-law, whom he accidentally kills. Thus these "superfluous ones" go down in the struggle. Not because of their vicious or degrading tendencies; on the contrary, it is their better instincts that cause them to be swept back into the abyss. But though they perish, the inspiration of Luka is not entirely lost. It is epitomized in the words of one of the victims.
Sahtin. The old man—he lived from within.... He saw everything with his own eyes.... I asked him once: "Grandfather, why do men really live?" ... "Man lives ever to give birth to strength. There live, for example, the carpenters, noisy, miserable people ... and suddenly in their midst is a carpenter born ... such a carpenter as the world has never seen: he is above all, no other carpenter can be compared to him. He gives a new face to the whole trade ... his own face, so to speak ... and with that simple impulse it has advanced twenty years ... and so the others live ... the locksmiths and the shoemakers, and all the rest of the working people ... and the same is true of other classes—all to give birth to strength. Everyone thinks that he for himself takes up room in the world, but it turns out that he is here for another's benefit—for someone better ... a hundred years ... or perhaps longer ... if we live so long ... for the sake of genius.... All, my children, all, live only to give birth to strength. For that reason we must respect everybody. We cannot know who he is, for what purpose born, or what he may yet fulfill ... perhaps he has been born for our good fortune ... or great benefit."
No stronger indictment than "A Night's Lodging" is to be found in contemporary literature of our perverse civilization that condemns thousands—often the very best men and women—to the fate of the Vaskas and Anyas, doomed as superfluous and unnecessary in society. And yet they are necessary, aye, they are vital, could we but see beneath the veil of cold indifference and stupidity to discover the deep humanity, the latent possibilities in these lowliest of the low. If within our social conditions they are useless material, often vicious and detrimental to the general good, it is because they have been denied opportunity and forced into conditions that kill their faith in themselves and all that is best in their natures.
The so-called depravity and crimes of these derelicts are fundamentally the depravity and criminal anti-social attitude of Society itself that first creates the underworld and, having created it, wastes much energy and effort in suppressing and destroying the menacing phantom of its own making,—forgetful of the elemental brotherhood of man, blind to the value of the individual, and ignorant of the beautiful possibilities inherent in even the most despised children of the depths.
LEONID ANDREYEV
KING-HUNGER
Leonid Andreyev is the youngest and at the present time the most powerful dramatist of Russia. Like Tchekhof and Gorki, he is very versatile: his sketches and stories possess as fine a literary quality and stirring social appeal as his plays.
No one who has read his terrible picture of war, "The Red Laugh," or his unsurpassed arraignment of capital punishment, "The Seven Who Were Hanged," can erase from memory the effect of Leonid Andreyev's forceful pen.
The drama "King-Hunger" deals with most powerful king on earth,—King-Hunger. In the presence of Time and Death he pleads with Time to ring the alarm, to call the people to rebellion, because the earth is replete with suffering: cities, shops, mines, factories and fields resound with the moans and groans of the people. Their agony is unbearable.
King-Hunger. Strike the bell, old man; rend to ears its copper mouth. Let no one slumber!
But Time has no faith in King-Hunger. He knows that Hunger had deceived the people on many occasions: "You will deceive again, King-Hunger. You have many a time deluded your children and me." Yet Time is weary with waiting. He consents to strike the bell.
King-Hunger calls upon the workingmen to rebel. The scene is in a machine shop; the place is filled with deafening noises as of men's groans. Every machine, every tool, every screw, holds its human forms fettered to it and all keep pace with the maddening speed of their tormentors. And through the thunder and clatter of iron there rises the terrible plaint of the toilers.
---- We are starving.
---- We are crushed by machines.
---- Their weight smothers us.
---- The iron crushes.
---- The steel oppresses.
---- Oh, what a furious weight! As a mountain upon me!
---- The whole earth is upon me.
---- The iron hammer flattens me. It crushes the blood out of my veins, it fractures my bones, it makes me flat as sheet iron.
---- Through the rollers my body is pressed and drawn thin as wire. Where is my body? Where is my blood? Where is my soul?
---- The wheel is twirling me.
---- Day and night screaks the saw cutting steel. Day and night in my ears the screeching of the saw cutting steel. All the dreams that I see, all the sounds and songs that I hear, is the screeching of the saw cutting steel. What is the earth? It is the screeching of the saw. What is the sky? it is the screeching of the saw cutting steel. Day and night.
---- Day and night.
---- We are crushed by the machines.
---- We ourselves are parts of the machines.
---- Brothers! We forge our own chains!
The crushed call upon King-Hunger to help them, to save them from the horror of their life. Is he not the most powerful king on earth?
King-Hunger comes and exhorts them to rebel. All follow his call except three. One of these is huge of body, of Herculean built, large of muscle but with small, flat head upon his massive shoulders. The second workingman is young, but with the mark of death already upon his brow. He is constantly coughing and the hectic flush on his cheeks betrays the wasting disease of his class. The third workingman is a worn-out old man. Everything about him, even his voice, is deathlike, colorless, as if in his person a thousand lives had been robbed of their bloom.
First Workingman. I am as old as the earth. I have performed all the twelve labors, cleansed stables, cut off the hydra's heads, dug and vexed the earth, built cities, and have so altered its face, that the Creator himself would not readily recognize her. But I can't say why I did all this. Whose will did I shape? To what end did I aspire? My head is dull. I am dead tired. My strength oppresses me. Explain it to me, O King! Or I'll clutch this hammer and crack the earth as a hollow nut.
King-Hunger. Patience, my son! Save your powers for the last great revolt. Then you'll know all.
First Workingman. I shall wait.
Second Workingman. He cannot comprehend it, O King. He thinks that we must crack the earth. It is a gross falsehood, O King! The earth is fair as the garden of God. We must guard and caress her as a little girl. Many that stand there in the darkness say, there is no sky, no sun, as if eternal night is upon the earth. Just think: eternal night!
King-Hunger. Why, coughing blood, do you smile and gaze to heaven?
Second Workingman. Because flowers will blossom on my blood, and I see them now. On the breast of a beautiful rich lady I saw a red rose—she didn't know it was my blood.
King-Hunger. You are a poet, my son. I suppose you write verses, as they do.
Second Workingman. King, O King, sneer not at me. In darkness I learned to worship fire. Dying I understood that life is enchanting. Oh, how enchanting! King, it shall become a great garden, and there shall walk in peace, unmolested, men and animals. Dare not ruffle the animals! Wrong not any man! Let them play, embrace, caress one another—let them! But where is the path? Where is the path? Explain, King-Hunger.
King-Hunger. Revolt.
Second Workingman. Through violence to freedom? Through blood to love and kisses?
King-Hunger. There is no other way.
Third Workingman. You lie, King-Hunger. Then you have killed my father and grandfather and great-grandfather, and would'st thou kill us? Where do you lead us, unarmed? Don't you see how ignorant we are, how blind and impotent. You are a traitor. Only here you are a king, but there you lackey upon their tables. Only here you wear a crown, but there you walk about with a napkin.
King-Hunger will not listen to their protest. He gives them the alternative of rebellion or starvation for themselves and their children. They decide to rebel, for King-Hunger is the most powerful king on earth.
The subjects of King-Hunger, the people of the underworld, gather to devise ways and means of rebellion. A gruesome assembly this, held in the cellar. Above is the palace ringing with music and laughter, the fine ladies in gorgeous splendor, bedecked with flowers and costly jewels, the tables laden with rich food and delicious wines. Everything is most exquisite there, joyous and happy. And underneath, in the cellar, the underworld is gathered, all the dregs of society: the robber and the murderer, the thief and the prostitute, the gambler and the drunkard. They have come to consult with each other how poverty is to rebel, how to throw off the yoke, and what to do with the rich.
Various suggestions are made. One advises poisoning the supply of water. But this is condemned on the ground that the people also have to drink from the same source.
Another suggests that all books should be burned for they teach the rich how to oppress. But the motion fails. What is the use of burning the books? The wealthy have money; they will buy writers, poets and scientists to make new books.
A third proposes that the children of the rich be killed. From the darkest, most dismal corner of the cellar comes the protest of an old woman: "Oh, not the children. Don't touch the children. I have buried many of them myself. I know the pain of the mother. Besides, the children are not to blame for the crimes of their parents. Don't touch the children! The child is pure and sacred. Don't hurt the child!"
A little girl rises, a child of twelve with the face of the aged. She announces that for the last four years she has given her body for money. She had been sold by her mother because they needed bread for the smaller children. During the four years of her terrible life, she has consorted with all kinds of men, influential men, rich men, pious men. They infected her. Therefore she proposes that the rich should be infected.
The underworld plans and plots, and the gruesome meeting is closed with a frenzied dance between King-Hunger and Death, to the music of the dance above.
King-Hunger is at the trial of the Starving. He is the most powerful king on earth: he is at home everywhere, but nowhere more so than at the trial of the Starving. On high chairs sit the judges, in all their bloated importance. The courtroom is filled with curiosity seekers, idle ladies dressed as if for a ball; college professors and students looking for object lessons in criminal depravity; rich young girls are there, to satisfy a perverted craving for excitement.
The first starveling is brought in muzzled.
King-Hunger. What is your offense, starveling?
Old Man. I stole a five-pound loaf, but it was wrested from me. I had only time to bite a small piece of it. Forgive me, I will never again—
He is condemned in the name of the Law and King-Hunger, the most powerful king on earth.
Another starveling is brought before the bar of justice. It is a woman, young and beautiful, but pale and sad. She is charged with killing her child.
Young Woman. One night my baby and I crossed the long bridge over the river. And since I had long before decided, so then approaching the middle, where the river is deep and swift, I said: "Look, baby dear, how the water is a-roaring below." She said, "I can't reach, mamma, the railing is so high." I said, "Come, let me lift you, baby dear." And when she was gazing down into the black deep, I threw her over. That's all.
The Law and King-Hunger condemn the woman to "blackest hell," there to be "tormented and burned in everlasting, slackless fires."
The heavy responsibility of meting out justice has fatigued the judges. The excitement of the trial has sharpened the appetite of the spectators. King-Hunger, at home with all people, proposes that the court adjourn for luncheon.
The scene in the restaurant represents Hunger devouring like a wild beast the produce of toil, ravenous, famished, the victim of his own gluttonous greed.
The monster fed, his hunger and thirst appeased, he now returns to sit in self-satisfied judgment over the Starving. The judges are more bloated than before, the ladies more eager to bask in the misery of their fellows. The college professors and students, mentally heavy with food, are still anxious to add data to the study of human criminality.
A lean boy is brought in, muzzled; he is followed by a ragged woman.
Woman. Have mercy! He stole an apple for me, your Honor. I was sick, thought he. "Let me bring her a little apple." Pity him! Tell them that you won't any more. Well! Speak!
Starveling. I won't any more.
Woman. I've already punished him myself. Pity his youth, cut not at the root his bright little days!
Voices. Indeed, pity one and then the next. Cut the evil at its roots.
---- One needs courage to be ruthless.
---- It is better for them.
---- Now he is only a boy, but when he grows up—
King-Hunger. Starveling, you are condemned.
A starveling, heavily muzzled, is dragged in. He is big and strong. He protests to the court: he has always been a faithful slave. But King-Hunger announces that the man is dangerous, because the faithful slave, being strong and honest, is "obnoxious to people of refined culture and less brawny." The slave is faithful to-day, King-Hunger warns the judges, but "who can trust the to-morrow? Then in his strength and integrity we will encounter a violent and dangerous enemy."
In the name of justice the faithful slave is condemned. Finally the last starveling appears. He looks half human, half beast.
King-Hunger. Who are you, starveling? Answer. Do you understand human speech?
Starveling. We are the peasants.
King-Hunger. What's your offense?
Starveling. We killed the devil.
King-Hunger. It was a man whom you burnt.
Starveling. No, it was the devil. The priest told us so, and then we burnt him.
The peasant is condemned. The session of the Court closes with a brief speech by King-Hunger:
King-Hunger. To-day you witnessed a highly instructive spectacle. Divine, eternal justice has found in us, as judges and your retainers, its brilliant reflection on earth. Subject only to the laws of immortal equity, unknown to culpable compassion, indifferent to cursing and entreating prayers, obeying the voice of our conscience alone—we illumed this earth with the light of human wisdom and sublime, sacred truth. Not for a single moment forgetting that justice is the foundation of life, we have crucified the Christ in days gone by and since, to this very day, we cease not to grace Golgotha with new crosses. But, certainly, only ruffians, only ruffians are hanged. We showed no mercy to God himself, in the name of the laws of immortal justice—would we be now disconcerted by the howling of this impotent, starving rabble, by their cursing and raging? Let them curse! Life herself blesses us, the great sacred truth will screen us with her veil, and the very decree of history will not be more just than our own. What have they gained by cursing? What? They are there, we're here. They are in dungeons, in galleys, on crosses, but we will go to the theater. They perish, but we will devour them—devour—devour.
The court has fulfilled its mission. King-Hunger is the most powerful king on earth.
The starvelings break out in revolt. The bells peal with deafening thunder; all is confusion and chaos. The city is immersed in the blackness of despair, and all is dark. Now and then gusts of fire sweep the sky illuminating the scene of battle. The air is filled with cries and groans; there is the thud of falling bodies, and still the fight goes on.
In a secluded part of the town stands the castle. In its most magnificent ballroom the rich and their lackeys—scientists, teachers and artists—are gathered. They tremble with fear at the ominous sounds outside. To silence the loud beat of their terror they command the musicians to strike up the liveliest tunes, and the guests whirl about in a mad dance.
From time to time the door is forced open and someone drops exhausted to the floor. An artist rushes in, crying out that the art gallery is in flames.
"Murillo is burning! Velasquez is burning! Giorgione is burning!"
He is not in the least concerned with living values; he dwells in the past and he wildly bewails the dead weight of the past.
One after another men rush in to report the burning of libraries, the breaking of statues, and the destruction of monuments. No one among the wealthy mob regrets the slaughter of human life.
Panic-stricken the mighty fall from their thrones. The Starving, infuriated and vengeful, are marching on the masters! They must not see the craven fear of the huddled figures in the mansions,—the lights are turned off. But darkness is even more terrible to the frightened palace mob. In the madness of terror they begin to accuse and denounce each other. They feel as helpless as children before the approaching avalanche of vengeance.
At this critical moment a man appears. He is small, dirty, and unwashed; he smells of cheap whisky and bad tobacco; he blows his nose with a red handkerchief and his manners are disgusting. He is the engineer. He looks calmly about him, presses a button, and the place is flooded with light. He brings the comforting news that the revolt is crushed.
Engineer. On Sunny Hill we planted a line of immense machine guns of enormous power.... A few projectiles of a specially destructive power ... A public square filled with people ... Enough one or two such shells.... And should the revolt still continue, we'll shower the city.
The revolt is over. All is quiet—the peace of death. The ground is strewn with bodies, the streets are soaked with blood. Fine ladies flit about. They lift their children and bid them kiss the mouth of the cannon, for the cannon have saved the rich from destruction. Prayers and hymns are offered up to the cannon, for they have saved the masters and punished the starvelings. And all is quiet, with the stillness of the graveyard where sleep the dead.
King-Hunger, with hollow cheeks and sunken eyes, makes a desperate last appeal to his children.
King-Hunger. Oh, my son, my son! You clamored so loud—why are you mute? Oh, my daughter, my daughter, you hated so profoundly, so intensely, you most miserable on earth—arise. Arise from the dust! Rend the shadowy bonds of death! Arise! I conjure you in the name of Life! You're silent?
For a brief moment all remains silent and immovable. Suddenly a sound is heard, distant at first, then nearer and nearer, till a thousand-throated roar breaks forth like thunder:
---- We shall yet come!
---- We shall yet come!
---- Woe unto the victorious!
The Victors pale at the ghostly cry. Seized with terror, they run, wildly howling:
---- The dead arise!
---- The dead arise!
"We shall yet come!" cry the dead. For they who died for an ideal never die in vain. They must come back, they shall come back. And then—woe be to the victorious! King-Hunger is indeed the most terrible king on earth, but only for those who are driven by blind forces alone.
But they who can turn on the light, know the power of the things they have created. They will come, and take possession,—no longer the wretched scum, but the masters of the world.
A message revolutionary, deeply social in its scope, illumining with glorious hope the dismal horizon of the disinherited of the earth.
[Pg 326]
[Pg 327]
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