'I am afraid of Tolstoy's death. If he were to die there would be a big empty place in my life. To begin with, because I have never loved any man as much as him…. Secondly3, while Tolstoy is in literature it is easy and pleasant to be a literary man; even recognising that one has done nothing and never will do anything is not so dreadful, since Tolstoy will do enough for all. His work is the justification5 of the enthusiasms and expectations built upon literature. Thirdly, Tolstoy takes a firm stand; he has an immense authority, and so long as he is alive, bad tastes in literature, vulgarity of every kind, insolent6 and lachrymose7, all the bristling8, exasperated9 vanities will be in the far background, in the shade….'—(January, 1900.)
Tchehov was aware of the gulf10 that separated him from the great men before him, and he knew that it yawned so deep that it could not be crossed. He belonged to a new generation, and he alone perhaps was fully11 conscious of it. 'We are lemonade,' he wrote in 1892.
'Tell me honestly who of my contemporaries—that is, men between thirty and forty-five—have given the world one single drop of alcohol?… Science and technical knowledge are passing through a great period now, but for our sort it is a flabby, stale, dull time…. The causes of this are not to be found in our stupidity, our lack of talent, or our insolence12, but in a disease which for the artist is worse than syphilis or sexual exhaustion13. We lack "something," that is true, and that means that, lift the robe of our muse14, and you will find within an empty void. Let me remind you that the writers who we say are for all time or are simply good, and who intoxicate15 us, have one common and very important characteristic: they are going towards something and are summoning you towards it, too, and you feel, not with your mind but with your whole being, that they have some object, just like the ghost of Hamlet's father, who did not come and disturb the imagination for nothing…. And we? We! We paint life as it is, but beyond that—nothing at all…. Flog us and we can do more! We have neither immediate16 nor remote aims, and in our soul there is a great empty space. We have no politics, we do not believe in revolution, we have no God, we are not afraid of ghosts, and I personally am not afraid even of death and blindness. One who wants nothing, hopes for nothing, and fears nothing cannot be an artist….
'… You think I am clever. Yes, I am at least so far clever as not to conceal17 from myself my disease and not to deceive myself, and not to cover up my own emptiness with other people's rags, such as the ideas of the 'sixties and so on.'
That was written in 1892. When we remember all the strange literary effort gathered round about that year in the West—Symbolism, the Yellow Book, Art for Art's sake—and the limbo18 into which it has been thrust by now, we may realise how great a precursor19 and, in his own despite, a leader, Anton Tchehov was. When Western literature was plunging20 with enthusiasm into one cul de sac after another, incapable21 of diagnosing its own disease, Tchehov in Russia, unknown to the West, had achieved a clear vision and a sense of perspective.
To-day we begin to feel how intimately Tchehov belongs to us; to-morrow we may feel how infinitely22 he is still in advance of us. A genius will always be in advance of a talent, and in so far as we are concerned with the genius of Tchehov we must accept the inevitable23. We must analyse and seek to understand it; we must, above all, make up our minds that since Tchehov has written and his writings have been made accessible to us, a vast amount of our modern literary production is simply unpardonable. Writers who would be modern and ignore Tchehov's achievement are, however much they may persuade themselves that they are devoted24 artists, merely engaged in satisfying their vanity or in the exercise of a profession like any other; for Tchehov is a standard by which modern literary effort must be measured, and the writer of prose or poetry who is not sufficiently27 single-minded to apply the standard to himself is of no particular account.
Though Tchehov's genius is, strictly28 speaking, inimitable, it deserves a much exacter study than it has yet received. The publication of this volume of his letters[8] hardly affords the occasion for that; but it does afford an opportunity for the examination of some of the chief constituents29 of his perfect art. These touch us nearly because—we insist again—the supreme30 interest of Tchehov is that he is the only great modern artist in prose. He belongs, as we have said, to us. If he is great, then he is great not least in virtue31 of qualities which we may aspire32 to possess; if he is an ideal, he is an ideal to which we can refer ourselves, He had been saturated33 in all the disillusions34 which we regard as peculiarly our own, and every quality which is distinctive35 of the epoch36 of consciousness in which we are living now is reflected in him—and yet, miracle of miracles, he was a great artist. He did not rub his cheeks to produce a spurious colour of health; he did not profess26 beliefs which he could not maintain; he did not seek a reputation for universal wisdom, nor indulge himself in self-gratifying dreams of a millennium37 which he alone had the ability to control. He was and wanted to be nothing in particular, and yet, as we read these letters of his, we feel gradually form within ourselves the conviction that he was a hero—more than that, the hero of our time.
It is significant that, in reading Tchehov's letters, we do not consider him under the aspect of an artist. We are inevitably38 fascinated by his character as a man, one who, by efforts which we have most frequently to divine for ourselves from his reticences, worked on the infinitely complex material of the modern mind and soul, and made it in himself a definite, positive, and most lovable thing. He did not throw in his hand in face of his manifold bewilderments; he did not fly for refuge to institutions in which he did not believe; he risked everything, in Russia, by having no particular faith in revolution and saying so. In every conjuncture of his life that we can trace in his letters he behaved squarely by himself and, since he is our great exemplar, by us. He refused to march under any political banner—a thing, let it be remembered, of almost inconceivable courage in his country; he submitted to savagely39 hostile attacks for his political indifference40; yet he spent more of his life and energy in doing active good to his neighbour than all the high-souled professors of liberalism and social reform. He undertook an almost superhuman journey to Sahalin in 1890 to investigate the condition of the prisoners there; in 1892 he spent the best part of a year as a doctor devising preventive measures against the cholera41 in the country district where he lived, and, although he had no time for the writing on which his living depended, he refused the government pay in order to preserve his own independence of action; in another year he was the leading spirit in organising practical measures of famine relief about Nizhni-Novgorod. From his childhood to his death, moreover, he was the sole support of his family. Measured by the standards of Christian42 morality, Tchehov was wholly a saint. His self-devotion was boundless43.
Yet we know he was speaking nothing less than the truth of himself when he wrote: 'It is essential to be indifferent.' Tchehov was indifferent; but his indifference, as a mere25 catalogue of his secret philanthropies will show, was of a curious kind. He made of it, as it were, an axiomatic44 basis of his own self-discipline. Since life is what it is and men are what they are, he seems to have argued, everything depends upon the individual. The stars are hostile, but love is kind, and love is within the compass of any man if he will work to attain45 it. In one of his earliest letters he defines true culture for the benefit of his brother Nikolay, who lacked it. Cultivated persons, he said, respect human personality; they have sympathy not for beggars and cats only; they respect the property of others, and therefore pay their debts; they are sincere and dread4 lying like fire; they do not disparage46 themselves to arouse compassion47; they have no shallow vanity; if they have a talent they respect it; they develop the ?sthetic feeling in themselves … they seek as far as possible to restrain and ennoble the sexual instinct. The letter from which these chief points are taken is tremulous with sympathy and wit. Tchehov was twenty-six when he wrote it. He concludes with the words: 'What is needed is constant work day and night, constant reading, study, will. Every hour is precious for it.'
In that letter are given all the elements of Tchehov the man. He set himself to achieve a new humanity, and he achieved it. The indifference upon which Tchehov's humanity was built was not therefore a moral indifference; it was, in the main, the recognition and acceptance of the fact that life itself is indifferent. To that he held fast to the end. But the conclusion which he drew from it was not that it made no particular difference what any one did, but that the attitude and character of the individual were all-important. There was, indeed, no panacea48, political or religious, for the ills of humanity; but there could be a mitigation in men's souls. But the new asceticism49 must not be negative. It must not cast away the goods of civilisation50 because civilisation is largely a sham51.
'Alas52! I shall never be a Tolstoyan. In women I love beauty above all things, and in the history of mankind, culture expressed in carpets, carriages with springs, and keenness of wit. Ach! To make haste and become an old man and sit at a big table!'
Not that there is a trace of the hedonist in Tchehov, who voluntarily endured every imaginable hardship if he thought he could be of service to his fellow-men, but, as he wrote elsewhere, 'we are concerned with pluses alone.' Since life is what it is, its amenities53 are doubly precious. Only they must be amenities without humbug54.
'Pharisaism, stupidity, and despotism reign55 not in bourgeois56 houses and prisons alone. I see them in science, in literature, in the younger generation…. That is why I have no preference either for gendarmes57, or for butchers, or for scientists, or for writers, or for the younger generation. I regard trade marks and labels as a superstition58. My holy of holies is the human body, health, intelligence, talent inspiration, love, and the most absolute freedom—freedom from violence and lying, whatever forms they make take. This is the programme I would follow if I were a great artist.'
What 'the most absolute freedom' meant to Tchehov his whole life is witness. It was a liberty of a purely59 moral kind, a liberty, that is, achieved at the cost of a great effort in self-discipline and self-refinement. In one letter he says he is going to write a story about the son of a serf—Tchehov was the son of a serf—who 'squeezed the slave out of himself.' Whether the story was ever written we do not know, but the process is one to which Tchehov applied60 himself all his life long. He waged a war of extermination61 against the lie in the soul in himself, and by necessary implication in others also.
He was, thus, in all things a humanist. He faced the universe, but he did not deny his own soul. There could be for him no antagonism62 between science and literature, or science and humanity. They were all pluses; it was men who quarrelled among themselves. If men would only develop a little more loving-kindness, things would be better. The first duty of the artist was to be a decent man.
'Solidarity63 among young writers is impossible and unnecessary…. We cannot feel and think in the same way, our aims are different, or we have no aims whatever, we know each other little or not at all, and so there is nothing on to which this solidarity could be securely hooked…. And is there any need for it? No, in order to help a colleague, to respect his personality and work, to refrain from gossiping about him, envying him, telling him lies and being hypocritical, one does not need so much to be a young writer as simply a man…. Let us be ordinary people, let us treat everybody alike, and then we shall not need any artificially worked-up solidarity.'
It seems a simple discipline, this moral and intellectual honesty of Tchehov's, yet in these days of conceit64 and coterie65 his letters strike us as more than strange. One predominant impression remains66: it is that of Tchehov's candour of soul. Somehow he has achieved with open eyes the mystery of pureness of heart; and in that, though we dare not analyse it further, lies the secret of his greatness as a writer and of his present importance to ourselves.
[MARCH, 1920.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
hardy
|
|
| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
simplicity
|
|
| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
secondly
|
|
| adv.第二，其次 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
dread
|
|
| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
justification
|
|
| n.正当的理由；辩解的理由 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
insolent
|
|
| adj.傲慢的，无理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
lachrymose
|
|
| adj.好流泪的，引人落泪的；adv.眼泪地，哭泣地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
bristling
|
|
| a.竖立的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
exasperated
|
|
| adj.恼怒的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
gulf
|
|
| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
fully
|
|
| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
insolence
|
|
| n.傲慢；无礼；厚颜；傲慢的态度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
exhaustion
|
|
| n.耗尽枯竭，疲惫，筋疲力尽，竭尽，详尽无遗的论述 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
muse
|
|
| n.缪斯（希腊神话中的女神），创作灵感 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
intoxicate
|
|
| vt.使喝醉，使陶醉，使欣喜若狂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
immediate
|
|
| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
conceal
|
|
| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
limbo
|
|
| n.地狱的边缘；监狱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
precursor
|
|
| n.先驱者；前辈；前任；预兆；先兆 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
plunging
|
|
| adj.跳进的，突进的v.颠簸( plunge的现在分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
incapable
|
|
| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
infinitely
|
|
| adv.无限地，无穷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
inevitable
|
|
| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
devoted
|
|
| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
mere
|
|
| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
profess
|
|
| v.声称，冒称，以...为业，正式接受入教，表明信仰 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
sufficiently
|
|
| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
strictly
|
|
| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
constituents
|
|
| n.选民( constituent的名词复数 )；成分；构成部分；要素 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
supreme
|
|
| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
virtue
|
|
| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
aspire
|
|
| vi.(to，after)渴望，追求，有志于 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
saturated
|
|
| a.饱和的，充满的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
disillusions
|
|
| 使不再抱幻想，使理想破灭( disillusion的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
distinctive
|
|
| adj.特别的，有特色的，与众不同的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
epoch
|
|
| n.(新)时代；历元 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
millennium
|
|
| n.一千年，千禧年；太平盛世 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
inevitably
|
|
| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
savagely
|
|
| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
indifference
|
|
| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
cholera
|
|
| n.霍乱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
Christian
|
|
| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
boundless
|
|
| adj.无限的；无边无际的；巨大的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
axiomatic
|
|
| adj.不需证明的，不言自明的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
attain
|
|
| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
disparage
|
|
| v.贬抑，轻蔑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
compassion
|
|
| n.同情，怜悯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
panacea
|
|
| n.万灵药；治百病的灵药 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
asceticism
|
|
| n.禁欲主义 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
civilisation
|
|
| n.文明，文化，开化，教化 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
sham
|
|
| n./adj.假冒(的)，虚伪(的) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
alas
|
|
| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
amenities
|
|
| n.令人愉快的事物；礼仪；礼节；便利设施；礼仪( amenity的名词复数 )；便利设施；（环境等的）舒适；（性情等的）愉快 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
humbug
|
|
| n.花招，谎话，欺骗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
reign
|
|
| n.统治时期，统治，支配，盛行；v.占优势 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
bourgeois
|
|
| adj./n.追求物质享受的(人)；中产阶级分子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
gendarmes
|
|
| n.宪兵，警官( gendarme的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
superstition
|
|
| n.迷信，迷信行为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
purely
|
|
| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
applied
|
|
| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
extermination
|
|
| n.消灭，根绝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
antagonism
|
|
| n.对抗，敌对，对立 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
solidarity
|
|
| n.团结；休戚相关 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
conceit
|
|
| n.自负，自高自大 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
coterie
|
|
| n.(有共同兴趣的)小团体，小圈子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
remains
|
|
| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |