Victor Lebrun. Publicist, memoirist, one of L.N. Tolstoy's secretaries (1906). Born in 1882 in Yekaterinoslav in the family of a French engineer who worked in Russia for forty years. Fluent in Russian and French. The years of his life in Russia are covered in great detail in published memoirs. In 1926, Lebrun went to France, where he lived until his death (1979).
<Л. Н.Толстой>
Second part (continued). Start at
Tolstoy Day
The external life of the world writer was more than monotonous.
Early in the morning, when big house everything is still completely quiet, you can always see Tolstoy in the yard with a jug and a large bucket, which he carries with difficulty down the back stairs. Having poured out the slops and filled a jug with fresh water, he goes up to his room and washes himself. According to my village habit, I got up at dawn and sat down in the corner of the small living room to do my own written work. Along with the rays of the sun, rising above the centuries-old linden trees and flooding the room, the office door usually opened - and Lev Nikolaevich, fresh and cheerful, appeared on the threshold.
God help you! - he told me, smiling affectionately and vigorously nodding his head so that I would not be distracted from my work. Stealthily, so as not to be noticed by the often early visitors, so as not to interrupt the thread of his thoughts with conversation, he made his way into the garden.
In the big pocket of his blouse there was always notebook and, wandering through the lovely surrounding forests, he would suddenly stop and write down a new thought at the moment of its greatest brightness. An hour later, sometimes earlier, he returned, bringing the smell of fields and forests on his dress, and quickly walked into the office, tightly closing the doors behind him.
Sometimes, when we found ourselves alone in a small living room, he, looking at me with concentration, shared with me what he was thinking while walking.
I will never forget these amazing minutes.
I remember very well serfdom!.. Here, in Yasnaya Polyana... Here every peasant was engaged in driving. (The railroad did not exist at that time.) So, then the poorest peasant family had six horses! I remember this time well. And now?! More than half of the households are horseless! What did this railway bring them?! This civilization?!
I often remember the incident at the races in Moscow, which I described in Anna Karenina. (I lowered it so as not to interrupt the story.) It was necessary to finish off the horse that had broken its back. Do you remember? So, there were a lot of officers present. The governor himself was there. But not a single soldier had a revolver with him! They asked the policeman, but he only had an empty holster. Then they asked for a saber, a sword. But all the officers had only festive weapons. All the swords and sabers were wooden!.. Finally, one officer ran home. He lived nearby and brought a revolver. Only then was it possible to finish off the horse...
To such an extent “they” felt calm and out of any danger at that time!..
And when the teacher told me this wonderful incident, so typical of the era, - an incident from the “good” old days,” - all of Russia, from edge to edge, was already shaking with the swell of the impending revolution.
Yesterday in the hall they talked about “Resurrection”*. They praised him. Aya told them: in “Resurrection” there are rhetorical passages and artistic passages. Both of them are good individually. But combining them in one work is the most terrible thing... I decided to publish this only because I had to quickly help the Doukhobors*.
One morning, passing through the small living room, he takes me by the arm and asks in an almost stern voice:
Are you praying?
Rarely, I say, not to say rudely - no.
He sits down at the desk and, leaning over the manuscript, says thoughtfully:
Whenever I think about prayer, one incident from my life comes to mind. It was a long time ago. Even before my marriage. Here in the village I knew a woman. She was a nasty woman... - And suddenly a double, interrupted sigh escaped him, almost hysterical. - I lived my life poorly... Do you know that?..
I nod my head slightly, trying to calm him down.
She arranged dates for me with such women... And then one day, in the dead of midnight, I was making my way through the village. I look into her street. This is a very steep alley that goes down to the road. You know? Everything around is quiet, empty and dark. Not a sound is heard. There is no light in any window. Only below from her window is a sheaf of light. I went to the window. Everything is quiet. There is no one in the hut. The lamp burns in front of the icons, and she stands in front of them and prays. He crosses himself, prays, kneels down, bows to the ground, gets up, prays some more and bows again. I stayed like that for a long time, in the dark, watching her. She had many sins in her soul... I knew it. But how she prayed...
I didn’t want to bother her that evening... But what could she have been praying for so passionately?.. - he finished thoughtfully and moved the manuscript towards her.
Another time he returned from a morning walk transformed, quiet, calm, radiant. He puts both hands on my shoulders and, looking into my eyes, says with enthusiasm:
How beautiful, how amazing old age is! There are no desires, no passions, no vanity!.. Yes, however, what am I telling YOU! You yourself will soon find out all this, - and his kind, attentive eyes, looking out from under his overhanging eyebrows, say: “You can never express all the significant things that a person experiences in this life, despite this web of suffering, despite the destruction of the body. I say this not for words, but truly, truly.”
In his office, Tolstoy drank coffee and read letters. I marked on the envelopes what needed to be answered or what books to send. Then he took away the tray with the dishes and sat down to write. He got up from his desk only at two or three o'clock in the afternoon, always noticeably tired. The great hall was usually empty at this time of day, and breakfast awaited the writer there. Most often oatmeal is made with water. He always praised it, saying that he had been eating it for more than twenty years, and it didn’t get boring.
After breakfast, Lev Nikolayevich went out to the visitors, without whom a rare day passed in Yasnaya Polyana, and, after talking with them, he invited those close in views to stay, and provided the rest - some with books, some with kopecks, and fire victims with neighboring villages three rubles, sometimes more, depending on the size of the misfortune that occurred.
Tolstoy received two thousand rubles a year from the imperial theaters for productions of “The Power of Darkness” and “The Fruits of Enlightenment.” He distributed this money sparingly, often expressing fear that it would not be enough for the year. He agreed to take it only after it was explained to him that if he refused, the money would be used to increase the luxury of the theater.
As far as I know, this was the entire personal income and expense of one who could have been the richest man in the world if he wanted to exploit his pen commercially.
Having finished with the visitors, which was not always easy, Tolstoy took a long walk on foot or on horseback. He often walked six kilometers to visit Marya Alexandrovna Shmit. He sometimes rode fifteen kilometers on horseback. He loved the subtle paths in the large forests with which he was surrounded. He often visited distant villages to check on the situation of a peasant family asking for help, or to help a soldier find traces of her lost husband, or to establish the extent of losses caused by a fire, or to rescue a man illegally imprisoned. On the way, he spoke affably to those he met, but always carefully drove around behind the lines of rich dachas.
Returning home, he rested for half an hour. At six o'clock he had dinner with the whole family.
In a very large room with two lights, opposite family portraits in golden frames, a long table was set. The end of the table was occupied by Sofya Andreevna. To her left sat Lev Nikolaevich. He always showed me a place near him. And since I was a vegetarian, he himself kindly poured me soup from a small soup bowl that was served to him, or served me his special vegetarian dish.
The Countess hated the vegetarian regime.
At the other end of the table, two white-gloved footmen stood waiting for the end of the ceremony.
After exchanging a few words with his family and guests, Tolstoy again retired to his office, carefully locking the door of the small living room and his own. Now big hall it was full and noisy. They played the piano, laughed, and sometimes sang. At that time, the thinker was doing some light work in his office. He wrote letters, a diary, and at one time his memoirs.
Evening readings
At evening tea, with his hand in his belt, the teacher reappeared in the hall, and rarely did an evening pass without him reading aloud the passages that most struck him from the book he had just read.
His readings are extremely varied and always of the highest interest. I will never forget them or his reading style. Listening to him, I forgot everything, I saw only what was being discussed.
Tolstoy is inspired, he is completely imbued with the subject, and he passes it on to the listener. In each phrase he emphasizes only one word. What is of primary importance. He emphasizes it at the same time with extraordinary tenderness and softness, characteristic of him alone, and at the same time with some powerful penetration. Tolstoy does not read, he puts the word into the soul of the listener.
The great Edison sent Tolstoy a recording phonograph* as a gift. In this way, the inventor was able to preserve for the future several phrases of the thinker. About thirty years ago, in the Soviet Union, gramophone discs conveyed them perfectly. I remember one phrase and emphasize the words that are emphasized:
Man lives only by trials. It's good to know this. And lighten your cross by voluntarily putting your neck under it.
But then Tolstoy appears at the door of the small living room. He is holding a large book in his hand. This is a volume of the monumental “History of Russia” by S. M. Solovyov (1820-1879). With visible pleasure, he reads to us long passages from “The Life of Archpriest Avvakum” (1610-1682).
This tireless warrior against the king and the church was at the same time a brilliant writer. His Russian language is inimitable. For the last fourteen years of his life, the tsar kept him at the mouth of the Pechora in Pustozersk in an earthen prison. Two of his associates had their tongues cut out. From here the indomitable Old Believer sent his fiery messages and accusatory letters to the Tsar through his friends. Finally, the king ordered him to be burned along with his followers.
Before, long ago,” explains Tolstoy, “I read all of him.” For the tongue. Now I'm re-reading it. Solovyov gives many long excerpts from his writings. This is amazing!..
Another time these are the sayings of Lao-Tse *, a Chinese sage of the sixth century BC, who was later deified and served as the basis for Taoism, one of the three official religions of China.
Tolstoy apparently enjoys every phrase, emphasizing the main word in it.
True words are not pleasant.
Nice words are never true.
The wise are not learned.
Scientists are not wise.
Good people are not argumentative.
Disputants are never kind.
This is what you have to be: you have to be like water.
There is no obstacle - it flows.
Dam - she stops.
The dam burst - it flows again.
In a square vessel it is square.
In the round - she is round.
That's why it is needed most of all.
That's why she's the strongest.
There is nothing in the world that is softer than water,
Meanwhile, when she falls on the hard
And against the resisting, nothing can be stronger than it.
He who knows others is smart.
He who knows himself has wisdom.
He who defeats others is strong.
He who conquers himself is powerful.
Another time it's a newly published book about John Ruskin*.
“Very interesting,” says Tolstoy, “and I learned a lot about him from this book.” This chapter will need to be translated and published in Mediator. The quotes from his writings here are very good. It gets a little worse towards the end. He has this, you know, disadvantage common to all such people. The Bible amazes them so much that they adapt their good thoughts to various of its darkest places...
However, this sometimes gives a very special imprint, so overall it’s very good.
Another evening it new biography, Michel Angelo* or “Notes of Catherine”*, or Schopenhauer’s long dialogue* on religion, omitted by censorship and which the translator sent to the thinker as a proof. This translator was a member of the court* and a passionate admirer of Schopenhauer.
One day the teacher was very excited. He held in his hands Elzbacher's Anarchism*, which he had just received from the author.
The book on anarchism begins to enter the phase in which socialism now finds itself. What did people think of socialists just a few decades ago? These were villains, dangerous people. And now socialism is considered the most ordinary thing. And so Elzbacher introduces anarchism into this very phase. But he's German. Look: there are seven of us, and he sorts us out on twelve tables. But in general he is completely honest. Here is a table that indicates in which case the author allows violence. And, look, Tolstoy is not there. There are only six of them.
Tired of reading and talking, Tolstoy sometimes sat down to play chess. Very rarely, when there was an influx of social guests, a “pint” was arranged; but at about eleven o'clock everyone left.
In relation to the teacher, I always adhered to strict tactics. Never spoke to him first. I even tried to be unnoticed so as not to interrupt his train of thoughts. But at the same time, I always stayed close. So, in the evenings I never left the hall before him. And often, noticing me somewhere in the corner, he would come up, take my arm, and on the way to his room he would tell me his latest thought.
Nothing in the world could change this order. No Sundays, no family holidays, no “vacations” existed. If he very rarely decided to go to Pirogovo to visit his daughter Marya, he left after breakfast, finishing his work and carefully packing the necessary manuscripts and books into his suitcase, so that in the evening he could continue his usual circle of studies in a new place.
Manual labor
As far as I know, no detailed information about Tolstoy’s physical work has ever appeared in print. Romain Rolland, in his good, perhaps the best foreign work on Tolstoy*, kept silent about this side of the teacher’s life. The refined European writer with his clean suit and gentle hands was too alien to menial work, manure, and a dirty, sweaty shirt. Like many of Tolstoy's translators, he did not want to scare off salon readers. And yet, in response to his question, Tolstoy wrote a long article* about the basic moral significance of hard work.
The need for personal participation in the hardest work is one of the cornerstones of the thinker’s worldview. And before, up to sixty-five years, or even longer, great writer He worked seriously and hard at the most menial peasant work. And at that time everything was done by hand. There were no cars at all.
His working day began at dawn, and until late breakfast Tolstoy was at work, and after that it was business as usual. The hours that in my time were devoted to walking were at that time devoted to the most difficult work for the benefit of the poorest families in the village. He sawed aspens and oaks in the forest, transported beams and built huts for widows, and laid stoves. A special specialist in the stove business was a close friend of Lev Nikolaevich, the famous artist, professor at the Academy N. N. Ge*, who lived for a long time in Yasnaya and illustrated the Gospel. Every spring, Tolstoy and his daughters took out manure, plowed with the peasant's plow and sowed the widow's fields, harvested grain and threshed with a flail. Every summer, he and a team of local mowers mowed hay in the Yasnaya Polyana meadows, as described in Anna Karenina. He mowed on the same terms as the peasants: two haystacks for the “landowner,” that is, Sofya Andreevna and his sons, and one for himself. And he took this earned hay to the village to the most needy widows. As it is said in the Koran: “So that alms may then come out of your hand.”
Marya Alexandrovna told me more than once about working with Lev Nikolaevich in the field and in the forest, in which she took an active part.
It was especially difficult in the forest for peasants to cut large oak trees from their stumps into huts. Lev Nikolaevich was demanding in his work. Got excited. But little by little I adapted to this work...
Once, dear boy, there was such a drought, such a terrible drought, that I could not get a single crumb of hay for my cow. I was desperate. Hay was very expensive. But I didn’t have any money this fall. And I don’t like borrowing that much. It's always so hard to pay after. And then, one evening, I see two lovely carts of hay driving into my yard. I'm running. This is Lev Nikolaevich, all covered in dust, his shirt wringed out of sweat. I didn’t say a word to him about the hay or my need, but he guessed my situation!..
I have repeatedly asked peasants about Lev Nikolaevich’s former work. “I could work,” “I really worked,” they always answered me. You don’t often hear such an answer from them about the work of an intellectual.
Manual labor was the only occupation that completely satisfied the thinker. Everything else, including his writing service to the enslaved people, seemed insignificant and doubtful to him.
Questions and answers
I cannot find words or images to express how close Tolstoy was to me. It was not just the simple attraction of communicating with a charming, charming, beloved storyteller from childhood that attracted me to him. I was united with Tolstoy by the complete commonality of that need for research, which constituted in me the very essence of my being. Since I can remember, this has been my only need in life. Everything else was only of service importance.<нрзб>, only Tolstoy fully possessed this need.
More than fifty years of intense inner work separated me from my teacher, but Tolstoy understood what I told him, as no one understood either before or after our ten-year relationship. Tolstoy understood perfectly. Often he did not let me finish and always answered definitely and always to the essence of the question.
The first days, when I uttered a question, a charming light of playful surprise lit up in my small gray eyes with their inexpressible, somehow piercing shade of intelligence, subtlety and kindness.
It's amazing how often people don't understand the simplest things.
It seems to me like this,” the teacher answers. - They have a full vessel. Either it lies sideways, or upside down. So you can't put anything in there. In such cases, it is best to move away.
Lev Nikolaevich, what is madness? - I asked another time without any preamble. The playful expression in the eyes is stronger than usual.
I have... My own explanation... - the teacher answers. He emphasizes “is” and stops. Together with the playful enthusiasm of the piercing eyes, this means a lot. This says: “Don’t think, young man, I also noticed this contradictory phenomenon, thought about it and found an explanation.” He emphasizes “his own”, and this means - as always, I am in conflict with the generally accepted, but this is the result of my analysis. These two exclamations are a preface. The answer follows.
This is selfishness,” explains the teacher. - Focusing on yourself, and then on one such idea.
Once I risked a significant critical remark about Tolstoy’s previous works. This was at a time when, after the abolition of preliminary censorship, the new press law made it possible to print anything. Only the book had to be defended in court and lose everything and go to prison if confiscated. My favorite friends: Gorbunov, N. G. Sutkova* from Sochi, P. P. Kartushin*, a rich Don Cossack who gave away his entire fortune, and Felten* from St. Petersburg finally began to publish in Russia in a very large quantities Tolstoy's forbidden writings.
The young publishers of Obnovleniya* sent large birch bark boxes to Yasnaya full of the most combative brochures: Soldier's Memo, Officer's Memo. Ashamed! Letter to the sergeant major. Appeal to the clergy, What is my faith? A summary of the Gospel, etc., etc. Gorbunov defended book after book in court, and the other three editors successfully hid behind one another for a long time. Ultimately, Sutkova took the sin upon himself and served a year and a half in prison for this enterprise.
It’s a pity,” I once decided to remark, “that these books are now published in their previous form. They would be worth reconsidering. In some places they are completely outdated. But there are places, I must say, that are downright wrong. Tolstoy looks questioningly.
For example, in So What Should We Do?, this passage is about the factors of production. It says that you can count not three of them, but as many as you like: sunlight, warmth, humidity, etc.
Tolstoy did not let me finish:
Yes. This is all included in the term "earth". But is it really possible to redo all this now!.. This is written in different times… People will take what they need from what is available.
Tolstoy's God
I had the hardest time with Tolstoy's God.
I grew up in the most conscious atheism. As for Arago*, God for me was “a hypothesis to which I never had the slightest need to resort”! What did this word mean to Leo Tolstoy?
Just a few weeks after my first visit I had to live near Yasnaya. One day, after evening tea, Lev Nikolaevich, feeling unwell, called me to his place. He was then located downstairs, in the same room “under the arches”* in which he spoke to me for the first time.
What is occupying you now? What are you thinking? - he spoke, lying down on the oilcloth sofa and with his hand slipped under his belt, pressing his sore stomach.
About God, I say. - I'm trying to understand this concept.
In such cases, I always remember Matthew Arnold's definition*. Don't you remember him? God is the eternal, existing outside of us, leading us, demanding righteousness from us.” He studied the Old Testament books and, for that time, this was enough. But after Christ, we must also add that at the same time God is love.
Yes, however, everyone has their own idea about God. For materialists, God is matter, although this is completely wrong; for Kant it’s one thing, for a village woman it’s another,” the teacher continued, seeing that I was only perplexed at his words.
But what kind of concept is this that differs from person to person? - I ask. - After all, everyone has the same other concepts?
Why? There are many subjects about which different people have completely different ideas.
For example? - I ask in surprise.
Yes, there are as many of them as you like... Well, for example... Well, at least air: for a child it does not exist; an adult knows him - well, how can I say this? - by touch or something, he inhales it, but for a chemist this is completely different. “He spoke with the calm persuasiveness with which children answer the simplest questions.
But, if ideas about an object can be different, then why use the word “God” to indicate it? - I ask. - The peasant woman, using it, wants to say something completely different than you?
Our ideas are different, but we have something in common. For all people, this word evokes in its essence a concept common to all of them, and therefore it cannot be replaced by anything.
I didn't continue the conversation anymore. Having been exclusively occupied with studying Tolstoy’s writings for more than a year, it was only here that I first felt what he was talking about when he used the word “God.”
The words “For materialists, God is matter” were a revelation to this understanding. These words finally showed me exactly the place that the concept of “God” occupies in Tolstoy’s worldview.
Much time later, I managed to return to this topic again. This was shortly after Tolstoy was excommunicated from the Orthodox Church by the Holy Synod*. Tolstoy had just published his wonderful “Response to the Synod”*.
The Thinker was recovering from his illness, but he was very weak, so I did not dare talk to him for a long time. One day, approaching the house, I found him lying on a couch in the garden in front of the veranda. Only Marya Lvovna was with him. The large table in the garden was set for dinner, and the men were already crowding around the small table with snacks. But I wanted to take a moment to talk.
What, Lev Nikolaevich, can you philosophize a little, won’t it tire you?
It’s okay, it’s possible, it’s possible! - the teacher answers cheerfully and affably.
I've been thinking about God lately. And yesterday I thought that it is impossible to define God by positive definitions: all positive definitions are human concepts, and only negative concepts with “not” will be accurate.
Absolutely right,” the teacher answers seriously.
So it’s inaccurate, you can’t say that God is love and reason: love and reason are human properties.
Yes, yes. Absolutely right. Love and reason only connect us with God. And this, you know, when you write such things as a response to the Synod, you involuntarily fall into such a tone that is understandable to everyone, commonly used.
After this confession, there was not the slightest doubt left for me about the complete absence of absurd mysticism in Tolstoy’s views.
It is not for nothing that at the end of his article “On Religion and Morality”* he said: “Religion is the establishment of a relationship with God or the world.”
Tolstoy's God was nothing more than the world, the universe, considered in its essence, incomprehensible to our cognitive ability, in its incomprehensible infinity.
Only for Tolstoy the universe stood above our understanding, and we had only responsibilities towards it, while for scientists the universe appears as the play of some blind forces in some dead matter. And we do not have any responsibilities towards her, but on the contrary, we have the right to demand from her as much pleasure as possible.
And, as almost always, Tolstoy was right.
In fact, for human understanding of the universe there can be only two points of view: the EGO-centric view - everything exists FOR a person. (Just as in astronomy there has been a geocentric view for thousands of years.) Or a COSMO-centric view. We exist FOR the universe, for the fulfillment in it of our destiny in it. creative work, guided in this work by our highest needs: understanding and mutual assistance.
Is it necessary to prove that the first view is devoid of the slightest reasonable basis?
What could be more absurd than to assume that the vast universe exists to satisfy our desires!
We have two needs: one is to explore and understand, and the other is to help and serve each other. And we have the highest duty, guided by them, to serve to the human race in the most useful way available to us.
This was the first revelation indicated to me by Tolstoy.
There was no place for stupid mysticism here.
But I explore this basic problem of the conscious life of the individual in a separate chapter of the second part of this book.
Third part
Chapter five. WHITE BRIDE
Pioneer in the Caucasus
While I was thus absorbed in studying closely the way of thinking and life of Leo Tolstoy, chance gave my life a more definite direction.
My mother, a tireless lover of great travel, ended with railways the waste of that insignificant inheritance that her father* left her after his forty years of service as an engineer on the Russian railways.
At one of the transfer points, she met an elderly friend, whom she had long lost sight of. The latter ended up with a small plot of land on the Black Sea coast. Having learned about my desire to settle in the village, she immediately offered it to me for use so that she could live with us forever and so that I could grow vegetables there for the whole family. And I accepted this offer.
The country where I decided to settle was interesting in many ways.
Just over half a century before our arrival, it was still inhabited by a warlike tribe of mountaineers, who were conquered and expelled by the cruel Nicholas the First. These were the Circassians, those same daring and poetic Circassians who found their Homer in the author of “Cossacks” and “Hadji Murat”.
The northern coast of the Black Sea is almost entirely high and steep. In only one place in its western part it forms a large round protected bay. This bay has attracted people since ancient times. During excavations on its banks, we found glasses with Phoenician inscriptions.
In this region, under the Circassians, there was such an abundance of fruit trees in the forests and gardens that every spring seemed to cover the area with a white veil. Sensitive to beauty native nature The Circassians christened their settlement, nestled in this hospitable part of the coast, with the charming name “White Bride”, in Circassian - Gelendzhik *. Now this blooming corner gave shelter to me too.
The Black Sea region, a narrow strip stretching between the sea and the western part of the Caucasus Range, was at that time the gates of the Caucasus. The Caucasus is wild, unknown, still relatively free and alluring. Whole sections of the population then flocked to this newly annexed region. Rich people were attracted here by the wild grandeur of nature. The poor were attracted by the warmth and availability of free or cheap land for settlement. In the summer, summer residents from the capitals and even from Siberia flocked to the coast in large numbers. Every year, from large industrial centers, a whole army of wandering proletarians, “tramps,” trooped here on foot for the winter. In his first stories, Maxim Gorky masterfully described their life. Revolutionaries and political figures persecuted by the police, sectarians persecuted for their faith, and almost all “ideological intellectuals” seeking to “sit down on the ground” and thirsting for a new life also flocked here.
As always, I entered this new and most significant period of my life with a very definite plan. By working independently on the land, I wanted to develop my means of subsistence and sufficient leisure for mental work. I wanted to extract from the earth the opportunity to study, research and write, completely independent of people and institutions. No study in tsarist universities, no service in institutions could give me this freedom. This was the first reason that attracted me to farming.
Another powerful force that connected me with the earth was the deeply rooted instinct of the farmer, inherited from my ancestors. My father's parents were good farmers in Champagne*. I loved the earth with all my being. The mystery of the earth that feeds humanity, the mystery of this powerful, incalculable force of productivity of the plant and animal world, the mystery of the wise symbiosis of man with these worlds deeply worried me.
The plot of land that was supposed to feed me, according to the stupid and criminal custom of all bourgeois governments, was granted to some general for military merits. The latter, like most such owners, kept it uncultivated in anticipation of the settlement of the country and a rise in land prices. The general's heirs continued the same tactics, and when I wanted to buy from them two hectares of arable and two hectares of inconvenient land, they demanded from me an amount equal to the cost of a good residential building! I had to agree to go into debt to pay the general's heirs.
My land was located in a lovely valley in the lower reaches of a mountain river and a fifteen-minute walk from a wonderful sandy sea beach. At one end the site abutted the river, at the other it went up a hill. In its low-lying, flat and extremely fertile part, it was overgrown with dense and very tall forests.
My farming began with uprooting. A mud house with a cellar and a barn was built from the harvested timber. And then, gradually clearing the forest inch by inch and selling firewood, I paid off the debt and began to grow on the virgin black soil such watermelons that the gods of Olympus would envy them, shoulder-length winter wheat, all kinds of vegetables and fodder grasses.
Nature is like a woman of the highest dignity. To fully understand and appreciate her, you need to live with her in very long and complete proximity. Every corner of an arable land, garden or vegetable garden has its own inexplicable charm for those who know how to see it. Well, skillfully managed agriculture pays better than service in enterprises. My connection with the earth is even more intimate here than in Kikety. The land is very fertile. Thanks to the influx of summer residents, sales of vegetables, milk, and honey are ensured. I could now easily expand my farm, save money and buy field after field and house after house. But I'm interested in something else. I earn myself only the bare minimum subsistence level and devote all my leisure time to mental work. I study and read continuously, and write to Tolstoy often and at length. I’m also trying to collaborate with the book publishing house “Posrednik”, founded by Tolstoy. But here the tsarist censorship invariably blocks the way. One of my works that died from censorship was the study “A. I. Herzen and the revolution"*. While in Yasnaya, I made for her very large extracts from the complete Geneva edition of Herzen’s forbidden works. Tolstoy sometimes mentions this article in his letters, as he thought about editing it.
So, gradually I achieved what I was striving for. By the sweat of my brow I eat the bread of my field. I have absolutely no other income, and I live somewhat below the average Russian peasant. I earn about five hundred working days a year as an unskilled rural worker. In this regard, I have moved further than a teacher. I finally achieved those external forms for which he so yearned. But, as it could not be otherwise, reality turns out to be significantly lower than the dream.
I have too little leisure for mental work, and it is completely irregular. The economy suddenly cruelly and for a long time breaks the thread of what it started. It was very painful. But according to dogma, this was a personal and selfish matter, and I stoically endured this deprivation.
However, something even worse began to emerge, not of a personal, but of a general and fundamental nature. The dogma of “non-participation in the evils of the world,” one of the cornerstones of the teaching that I intended to implement, remained almost entirely unfulfilled. I sell vegetables, milk, honey to rich idle summer residents and live on this money. Where is the non-participation here? Evil in the world triumphs and will continue to triumph. And I'm participating in it. Is this aspiration really vanity? “Vanity of vanities and vexation of spirit”*?..
I have chosen better shape life as imaginable, and my outer life is normal and pleasant. It provides complete physiological and aesthetic satisfaction. But it does not provide moral satisfaction. This note of melancholy and dissatisfaction is noticeable in my letters to Tolstoy. He answers me.
Thank you, dear Lebrun, for writing such a good letter. I always think of you with love. I sympathize with your two sorrows. It would be better without them, but you can live with them. What corrects everything, you know what, is love, real, everlasting, in the present and not for a select few, but for that which is one in all.
Bow to mother. Our people remember and love you. And I.
Thank you, dear Lebrun, for informing me about yourself from time to time. You must feel that I love you more than my neighbor, and that is why you do amo. And good. Don't be discouraged, dear friend, don't change your life. If only life is not the kind you are ashamed of (like mine), then there is nothing to desire or seek except strengthening and revitalizing your inner work. She also saves in a life like mine. There is rather a danger of becoming arrogant. But you are not capable of this.
I am healthy, as can an old man who has lived a bad life be healthy. Busy with Reading Circle for children and lessons with them.
I kiss you and Kartushin* brotherly, if he is with you.
Hello to your mother. We all remember and love you.
L. Tolstoy
A small town that could teach great things
The semi-agricultural, semi-dacha town in which we live is of absolutely exceptional interest. In some respects, he was the only one of his kind in all of Russia at that time. Without exaggeration I can say that if the unfortunate rulers of nations had been able to see and learn, this little town could have taught them the tricks of municipal organization, which is of fundamental importance.
Long before me, several intelligent followers of Tolstoy* settled near Gelendzhik: a veterinarian, a paramedic, a home teacher. They were joined by several leading sectarian peasants and farm laborers. These people tried to organize an agricultural colony* on the inaccessible, but fabulously fertile neighboring mountains. They were attracted to these inaccessible peaks by the land, which could be rented from the treasury for next to nothing. On the other hand, the remoteness and inaccessibility of the area saved them from persecution by the police and the clergy. After a few years, only a few individuals, born farmers, remained from the community. But the moral educational influence on the population of these selfless people was very great.
These followers of Tolstoy were at the same time Georgists*. They understood the full social significance of that unearned income, which in science was called ground rent*. Therefore, when the rural community demarcated three hundred hectares of land for estates and the villagers began to sell these plots to summer residents, these people taught the village assembly to tax not buildings, but bare land, and, moreover, in proportion to its value.
In fact, the system has been simplified. Manor plots of five hundred square fathoms were divided into three categories, and the owners had to pay 5-7.5 and 10 rubles per year for them, regardless of whether they were built up or not. (A ruble at that time was equal to the daily wage of a good unskilled worker, and a square fathom was 4.55 square meters.)
The cement plant, which was built on peasant land, was subject to the same procedure. He paid for the surface a few kopecks per square fathom and a few kopecks per cubic fathom of mined stone. In addition, the plant was obliged to deliver cement free of charge for all public buildings and to bury quarries.
The results were most brilliant. At the expense of this tax, rural society collected three thousand rubles in annual taxes, which were extorted from each family per capita throughout Russia. The rural community built excellent schools, cement sidewalks, a church, and maintained watchmen and teachers.
Just part of the land rent from three hundred hectares of estate land and several hectares of factory, non-arable land was enough for this. And this tax was paid voluntarily and unnoticed for decades!..
Last flowers
Idealistic groups and settlements in this region arose and disintegrated constantly. One significant agricultural colony existed for more than thirty years, until the most fundamental reforms.
The colonies disintegrated, and most of the townspeople returned to the cities, but the most capable and selfless minority remained in the countryside and somehow merged with the agricultural population. As a result, by the time of my settlement, there were about thirty families in the volost, united by friendship and common ideas. We often, especially on winter evenings, got together, secretly from the tsarist police. I read a lot to the peasants. All the forbidden news that I received from Yasnaya were immediately copied and distributed. In addition, we read history, as well as Victor Hugo, Erckman-Chatrian, the publications of The Mediator, and secret revolutionary literature. The sectarians sang their hymns, and everyone loved me very much. I write to the teacher that this side of life is very pleasant.
The teacher's answer is like a delicate flower.
Thank you, dear friend, for your letter*. It’s just scary, which is very good for you. No matter how good it is, take care of a spiritual corner in your soul about a rainy day, Epictetus, into which you can go when something that outwardly pleases you is upset. And your relationship with your neighbors is excellent. Treasure them the most. I remember you and love you very much. I myself am very busy with lessons with the children. I run a Gospel and Reading Circle for children nearby. I'm not happy with what I did, but I don't despair.
I kiss you brotherly, fatherly. Hello mother.
Oh, I’m afraid for the Odessa community members. It’s terrible when people are disappointed in the most important thing, the sacred. To prevent this from happening, there must be internal spiritual work, and without it everything will probably go poorly.
The colony of Odessa residents, which is mentioned, consisted of one and a half dozen city residents of various professions. Technicians, postal officials, office and bank employees, women with and without children were united with the idea of buying land and managing things together. As usual, after a few months they quarreled, and two or three individual farmers remained on the earth.
But suddenly some strange rumor appears in the newspapers about a fire in Yasnaya Polyana. I'm worried. I telegraph Marya Lvovna* and write to Tolstoy. He answers.
I didn’t burn out, my dear young friend*, and I was very glad, as always, to receive your letter: but I was sick with influenza and was very weak, so I couldn’t do anything for three weeks. Now I come to life (for a short time). And during this time, so many letters have accumulated that today I wrote and wrote and still haven’t finished, but I don’t want to leave your letter unanswered. Although I won’t tell you anything worthwhile, at least I’ll tell you that I love you and that I feel very good in my soul, and if I lived just as long, I wouldn’t have to redo all that joyful work that I want to do, and which, of course, is the only one I won’t do the hundredth.
I kiss you. Respect and bow to Mother. Leo Tolstoy
I wanted to attribute a few more words to you, dear Lebrun, but the letter has already been sent and therefore I’m putting it in the parcel.
I wanted to say that you should not be discouraged that your life does not work out according to your program. After all, the most important thing in life is to cleanse ourselves of bodily hereditary abominations, always, under all conditions, possible and necessary, and we need one thing. This form of life must be the consequence of this work of enlightenment of ours. What confuses us is that the internal work of improvement is entirely in our power, and this makes us feel unimportant. The structure of external life is connected with the consequences of the lives of other people and seems to us the most important.
This is what I want to say. Only then can we complain about the bad conditions of external life when we put all our efforts into internal work. And as soon as we put in ALL our strength, either external life will turn out as we wish, or the fact that it is not as we wish will cease to bother us.
Vladimir Grigorievich Chertkov* was selflessly devoted to Tolstoy and the letter of his teaching. He was rich, but his mother did not give him his richest estate in the Kherson province, so that his ideological son could not give it to the peasants. She gave him only income. And Chertkov with this money provided enormous services to Tolstoy and especially to the dissemination of his writings, prohibited by censorship. When the tsarist government suppressed the “Mediator” and deprived it of the opportunity to print its motto on each book: “God is not in power, but in truth”*, Chertkov and several friends were exiled abroad. He immediately, following the example of Herzen, founded the publishing house of “Svobodnoe Slova”* in England with the same motto and most carefully published all the forbidden writings of Tolstoy and distributed them in Russia. In addition, he built Tolstoy’s “Steel Room”* to store original manuscripts. It also contained interesting materials on the history of Russian sectarianism, which was very numerous and varied.
On one of my visits to Yasnaya, Chertkov offered me a service in this institution of his. I accepted the offer in principle. Working for him would mean for me to continue the same work of spreading Tolstoy’s word, which then captured me. But circumstances beyond my control forced me to refuse this offer and remain a farmer. This was a very significant step in my life.
As is my custom, I write to the teacher about this. Marya Lvovna answers, and Tolstoy adds a few words at the end of the letter.
Dear Viktor Anatolyevich, we are very sorry that you are not going to see the Chertkovs. And they would bring him a lot of benefit and learn English themselves. Well, there’s nothing to do, you can’t go against the bullshit.
Well, what can I tell you about Yasnaya. Everyone is alive and well. I'll start by seniority. The old man is healthy, he works a lot, but the other day, when Yulia Ivanovna* asked him where the work was, he very cheerfully and playfully said that he sent her to hell, but the next day she returned from hell, and Sasha is still *chicks her on Remington*. This work: afterword to the article “On the meaning of the Russian revolution”*. Today Sasha is going to Moscow for a music lesson and must take her with her. Dad rides horseback and walks a lot. (Now I’m sitting with Yulia Ivanovna and writing, he came from riding and is talking next to Sasha about the article. And he went to bed.)
Mom has completely recovered and is already dreaming of concerts and Moscow. Sukhotin, Mikhail Sergeevich*, went abroad, and Tanya* and her family live in that house as before. We're still here, waiting to go. Now there is no road, the mud is impassable, Yulia Ivanovna took up painting very zealously. He makes screens and wants to sell them on occasion in Moscow. The girls seem to mind their own business, laugh a lot, go for walks, and rarely sing. Andrei still lives the same way, only he has no one to tickle, and therefore he is not so cheerful.
Dusan warms his feet in the evenings, and later comes out to us and writes a “Notebook”*, which he and my husband check and correct. So, you see, everything is exactly the same as before. We always remember you with love. Write how you will get settled in Gelendzhik. Everyone bows to you very much. I leave a place, dad wanted to attribute.
Maria Obolenskaya
And I regret and do not regret, dear Lebrun*, that you did not get to Chertkov YET. As always, I enjoyed reading your letter, write more often. I miss you very much. Despite your youth, you are very close to me, and therefore your fate, of course, not physical, but spiritual, interests me very much.
Gelendzhik, like any “dzhik” and whatever place you want, is good because under any conditions there, and the worse, the better, you can live there and everywhere for the soul, for God.
I kiss you. Hello mother. L. Tolstoy.
Gradually, my correspondence with the elderly teacher became more and more animated.
Thank you, dear Lebrun*, for not forgetting me. I am always glad to communicate with you, and I am also glad to see the cheerful spirit of the letter.
I live in the old way and remember and love you, as well as all of ours. Say my regards to your mother.
I’m always glad to receive your letter*, dear Lebrun, I’m glad because I love you. When I receive the article, I will treat it strictly and write to you.
Hello mother. L. T. (2/12.07)
Now I have received, dear Lebrun*, your good, good long letter and I hope to answer in detail, now I am writing only to let you know what I received and that I love you more and more.
I wanted to answer your long letter at length, dear friend Lebrun, but I don’t have time. I will only repeat what I already wrote, that your state of mind is good. The main good thing about him is humility. Don't lose this precious foundation of everything.
Today I received your other letter with an addition to Herzen*. Dusan will answer you about the business side. My marks, crossing out, are the most insignificant. I started to make serious adjustments, but there was no time, so I left it. Maybe I'll do some proofreading. Goodbye for now. I kiss you. Bow to mother.
Suddenly the newspapers bring news that Tolstoy’s secretary has been arrested and exiled to the North. Chertkov brought N. N. Gusev* as secretary. This was the first paid and excellent secretary. With his knowledge of shorthand and complete devotion he was in highest degree useful to Tolstoy. While he and Dr. Makovitsky were in Yasnaya, I could be completely calm about my beloved teacher. Gusev's expulsion alarmed me to the core. I immediately write to the teacher, offering to come immediately to replace the exiled one.
The whole amazing soul of the thinker is visible in his answer.
Yasnaya Polyana. 1909.12/5.
I am so guilty before you, dear friend Lebrun, for the fact that for so long I did not respond to your not only congenial and, as always, very smart, but also heartfelt, kind letter, that I don’t know (how) it is better to apologize to you. Well, my fault, sorry. The main thing happened because I thought I answered.
Taking advantage of your self-denial is out of the question. Sasha and her friend are doing an excellent job of recording and putting in order my senile radotage*.
Everything I could say, I said as best I could. And it is so hopeless that those people who can be stabbed on the head and heart, as you put it, would move even an inch from the position in which they stand and in the defense of which they falsely use all the intelligence given to them, that to continue to understand that , which is clear as day, seems to be the most empty activity. Some of what I wrote about law and science in general is now being translated and published. When it comes out, I'll send it to you.
Despite this, my reluctance to continue to let, as Ruskin said, undoubted truths into one long ear of the World so that it, without leaving any trace, would immediately come out of the other, I still feel very good, little by little I am doing as I know how, my personal business, I won’t say improvement, but reduction of my nastiness, which gives me not only great interest, but also joy and fills my life with the most important thing that a person can always do, even a minute before death. I wish you the same and allow me to advise you.
Bow to your wife for me. What kind of person is she?
Hello to your mother. Leo Tolstoy, who loves you very much
Tolstoy felt very painfully when others were persecuted because of his writings. He always suffered greatly in such cases and wrote letters and appeals, asking the authorities to persecute only him, since only he is the source of what the authorities consider a crime. So it was now. He wrote a long accusatory letter to the police officer who arrested Gusev and, it seems, to someone else.
My heart was breaking looking at this, and I, a young man, decided to advise the elderly teacher to remain completely calm, “even if we were all hanged” and write not such letters, but only eternal and significant ones. Tolstoy answers.
Thank you, dear, dear Lebrun*, for your good advice and your letter. The fact that I did not answer for so long does not mean that I was not very happy about your letter and did not feel the recrudescence* of my friendship for you, but only that I am very busy, passionate about my work, and old and weak; I feel close to the limits of my strength.
The proof of this is that I started writing the day before yesterday and am now finishing it at 10 in the evening.
God help you in you - just don’t drown it out, he will give you strength - to fulfill your intention in marriage. All life is only an approximation to the ideal, and it is good when you do not let go of the ideal, but, whether crawling or sideways, put all your strength into getting closer to it.
Write your long letter in moments of leisure, a letter not to me alone, but to all people close in spirit.
For the most part, I don’t advise writing, especially to myself, but I can’t resist for now. I won’t advise you against it, because you are one of the people who thinks in an original way. I kiss you.
Hello to your mother, bride.
My “big letter”, which Tolstoy mentions, remained unwritten. The “minutes of leisure” that I had were too short. And there was too much to say. The subject that occupied me was too significant and versatile.
Seeing that time is passing and I can’t write at length, I send a short letter to the teacher. It seems like the first time in ten years of our correspondence. The answer was not delayed.
Thank you, dear Lebrun*, and for your short letter.
You are one of those people with whom my connection is firm, not direct, from me to you, but through God, it would seem the most distant, but on the contrary, the closest and firmest. Not by chords or arcs, but by radii.
When people write to me about their desire to write, I mostly advise them to abstain. I advise you not to refrain and not to rush. Tout vent a point a cetuf guff aft attendee*. And you have and will have something to say and the ability to express.
Your letter is unfounded in that you express your contentment in the spiritual area, and then seem to complain about dissatisfaction in the material area, in that area that is not in our power, and therefore should not cause our disagreement and dissatisfaction, if the spiritual is in the foreground . I am very happy for you that, as I see, you live the same life with your wife. This is a great blessing.
Please convey my heartfelt greetings to your mother and her.
Your letter found me with an unhealthy liver. That’s why this letter is so wrong.
I kiss you. What about Herzen?
I still cannot come to terms with the enormous transgression associated with this letter. This letter, Tolstoy's last letter*, remained unanswered. I had many, many friends and correspondents. And as far as I remember, correspondence with everyone ended with my letters. Only the gentle, beloved Tolstoy should have remained unanswered. Why now, re-reading these yellowed leaves, can’t I atone for my guilt?!
Then, in the heat of youth, there was too much to say to my beloved teacher. It didn't fit into the letter. There was no way to write in detail in the intense work environment that I created for myself. In addition, the new horizons that began to open from the new position of an independent farmer for me were still completely vague. Needed for many years learning and experience to bring them into clarity. And then I suffered, took up the pen, threw away unfinished letters... Tolstoy was old. He had a year to live*. But I didn’t realize it. I was so caught up in the same ideas and the same ideals. Such is the blindness of youth. And the days and weeks changed with the same speed with which you leaf through a book!
In addition, events soon began in Yasnaya Polyana that radically disturbed my peace*.
Black impenetrable clouds obscured that lovely radiant horizon under which I lived these ten years of close communication with an intelligent, gentle and loving soul an unforgettable and brilliant teacher.
COMMENTS
S. b ...they talked about “Resurrection”... I decided to publish this only because it was necessary to quickly help the Doukhobors. - July 14, 1898 Tolstoy wrote to Chertkov: “Since it has now become clear how much money is still missing for the resettlement of the Doukhobors, I think this is what to do: I have three stories: “Irtenev”, “Resurrection” and “O. Sergius“ (I’ve been working on it lately and wrote the end in rough). So I would like to sell them<…>and use the proceeds to resettle the Doukhobors..." (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 88. P. 106; see also: T. 33. P. 354-355; commentary by N. K. Gudzia). The novel “Resurrection” was first published in the magazine “Niva” (1899. Ha 11 -52), the entire fee was donated to the needs of the Doukhobors.
P. 8 ...The great Edison sent Tolstoy a recording phonograph as a gift. - On July 22, 1908, the American inventor Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931) turned to Tolstoy with a request to give him “one or two sessions of the phonograph in French or English, it’s best on both” (the phonograph is Edison’s invention). V. G. Chertkov, on Tolstoy’s instructions, responded to Edison on August 17, 1908: “Leo Tolstoy asked me to tell you that he considers himself not entitled to reject your proposal. He agrees to dictate something for the phonograph at any time” (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 37. P. 449). On December 23, 1908, D. P. Makovitsky wrote in his diary: “Two people arrived from Edison with a good phonograph<…>L.N. was worried a few days before the arrival of Edison’s people and today he practiced, especially in the English text. On French I translated and wrote it myself. He spoke Russian and French well. The text of “The Kingdom of God” didn’t come out well in English, he stumbled over two words. Tomorrow he will speak again”; and December 24: “L. N. spoke English text into the phonograph” (“Yasnaya Polyana Notes” by D. P. Makovitsky. Book 3. P. 286). At first, Tolstoy used the phonograph quite often to dictate letters and a number of small articles for the book “Cool Readings.” The device interested him very much and made him want to talk. Tolstoy’s daughter wrote that “the phonograph makes his work very easy” (letter from A.L. Tolstoy to A.B. Goldenweiser dated February 9, 1908 - Tolstoy’s correspondence with T. Edison / Publ. A. Sergeenko // Literary Heritage. M ., 1939. T. 37-38. Book 2. P. 331). The beginning of the pamphlet “I Can’t Be Silent” was recorded on a phonograph.
P. 9 ...Lao-Tze... - Lao Tzu, Chinese sage of the 6th-5th centuries. BC e., perhaps a legendary figure, according to legend - the author of the philosophical treatise “Tao Te Ching” (“Book of the Path and Grace”), who is considered the founder of Taoism. Tolstoy found in the teachings of Lao Tzu much that was similar to his views. In 1884, he translated some fragments from the book “Tao-te-king” (see: Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 25. P. 884). In 1893, he corrected the translation of this book made by E.I. Popov, and he himself wrote a summary of several chapters (see: Ibid. T. 40. P. 500-502). In 1909, he radically revised this translation and wrote an article about the teachings of Lao Tzu. His translation, along with this article, appeared in the Posrednik publishing house in 1909 under the title “The Sayings of the Chinese Sage Lao-Tse, Selected by L. N. Tolstoy” (see: Ibid. T. 39. pp. 352-362) . The texts of Lao Tzu were also used in “The Reading Circle”, and Tolstoy gives them in abbreviation, every now and then inserting his own fragments when quoting, designed to explain the original source. At the same time, “the modern researcher is amazed<…>accuracy of translation, L. N. Tolstoy’s intuitive ability to choose the only correct version from several European translations and, with his inherent sense of words, select the Russian equivalent.” However, accuracy is observed only “until Tolstoy begins to edit his own translation “for the reader.” Thanks to this editing, throughout the entire “Circle of Reading” we always hear the voice of Tolstoy himself behind the voices of the Chinese sages” (Lisevich I.S. Chinese sources // Tolstoy L.N. Collected works: In 20 vols. M., 1998 T. 20: Reading circle 1904-1908. November - December, pp. 308).
P. 10 ... a book about John Ruskin that had just appeared - April 6, 1895. Tolstoy wrote in his diary: “I read the wonderful book Birthday Book by Ruskin” (Ibid. T. 53. P. 19; referring to the book by E. G. Ritchie A. G. The Ruskin Birthday Book. London, 1883). John Ruskin (eng. John Ruskin) (1819-1900) - English writer, artist, poet, literary critic, art theorist who had a great influence on the development of art criticism and aesthetics of the second half of the 19th century- beginning of the 20th century. Tolstoy highly valued him and largely shared his views regarding the connection between art and morality, as well as a number of other problems: “John Ruskin is one of the most wonderful people not only England and our time, but also all countries and times. He is one of those rare people who thinks with his heart<…>and therefore he thinks and says what he himself sees and feels and what everyone in the future will think and say. Ruskin is famous in England as a writer and art critic, but as a philosopher, political economist and Christian moralist he is ignored<…>but the power of Ruskin’s thought and its expression are such that, despite all the friendly opposition that he met and meets especially among orthodox economists, even the most radical ones (and they cannot help but attack him, because he destroys everything to the ground their teaching), his fame begins to be established and his thoughts begin to penetrate the larger public” (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 31. P. 96). Approximately half of the statements of English authors included in the “Circle of Readings” belong to Ruskin (see: Zorin V.A. English sources // Tolstoy L.N. Collected works: In 20 volumes. T. 20: Circle of Readings. P. 328-331).
...a new biography, Michel Angelo... - Perhaps Lebrun is referring to the biography of Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) by R. Rolland, which he sent to Tolstoy in August 1906: “Vies des hommes illustre. La vie de Michel-Ange" (“Cahiers de la Quinzaine”, 1906, series 7-8, No. 18.2; see also: Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 76. P. 289).
…“.Notes of Catherine”… - Notes of Empress Catherine the Second / Translation from the original. St. Petersburg, 1907.
... Schopenhauer's long dialogue about religion ~ This translator was a member of the court... - Pyotr Sergeevich Porokhovshchikov, a member of the St. Petersburg District Court, on November 13, 1908 sent Tolstoy a letter along with the translation he completed (published: Schopenhauer A. On Religion: Dialogue / Trans. P. Porokhovshchikova. St. Petersburg, 1908). On November 21, Tolstoy replied: “I<…>Now I am especially happy to re-read your translation and, having started reading, I see that the translation is excellent. I very much regret that this book, which is especially useful in our time, is banned” (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 78. P. 266). On November 20 and 21, D. P. Makovitsky wrote in his diary: “At lunch, L. N. advised<…>read Schopenhauer's "Dialogue on Religion". The book in Russian translation has just appeared and is already banned. Beautifully presented. L.N. read it before and remembers”; "L. N. about the dialogue “On Religion” by Schopenhauer: “The reader will feel the depth of these two views, religion and philosophy, and not the victory of one. The defender of religion is strong." L.N. recalled that Herzen read his dialogue with someone. Belinsky to him: “Why did you argue with such a blockhead?” The same cannot be said about Schopenhauer’s dialogue” (“Yasnaya Polyana Notes” by D. P. Makovitsky. Book 3. P. 251).
“Anarchism” by Eltzbacher - We are talking about the book: Eltzbacher R. Der Anarchismus. Berlin, 1900 (Russian translation: Elzbacher P. The Essence of Anarchism / Translated under the editorship and with a preface by M. Andreev. St. Petersburg, 1906). Tolstoy received this book from the author in 1900. The book outlined the teachings of V. Godwin, P.-J. Proudhon, M. Stirner, M. A. Bakunin, P. A. Kropotkin, B. Tukker and L. N. Tolstoy. P.I. Biryukov wrote: “Western scientists are beginning to take a serious interest in Lev Nikolaevich, and in late XIX and at the beginning of the 20th century it appears a whole series monographs on Tolstoy in all kinds of languages. In 1900 it came out very interesting book on German Doctor of Laws Elzbacher entitled “Anarchism”. In this book, with the seriousness characteristic of German scientists, the teachings of the seven most famous anarchists, including Leo Tolstoy, are analyzed and presented. The author of this book sent his work to Lev Nikolaevich, and he responded with a letter of gratitude. Here are its essential parts: “Your book does for anarchism what was done for socialism 30 years ago: it introduces it into the program of political science. I liked your book extremely. It is completely objective, understandable and, as far as I can tell, has excellent sources. It only seems to me that I am not an anarchist in the sense of a political reformer. In the index of your book, under the word “coercion,” references are made to the pages of the works of all the other authors you examine, but there is not a single reference to my writings. Isn’t this proof that the teaching that you attribute to me, but which in fact is only the teaching of Christ, is not a political teaching at all, but a religious one?’” (Biryukov P.I. Biography of Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy. T. IV . M.; Pg. 1923. P. 5).
P. 11 ... Romain Rolland in his good, perhaps the best, foreign work on Tolstoy - in the book “The Life of Tolstoy” (“Vie de Tolstoï”, 1911); the book appeared in Russian in 1915.
Meanwhile, it was to him, in response to his question, that Tolstoy wrote a long article... - On April 16, 1887, R. Rolland first addressed Tolstoy with a letter in which he asked questions related to science and art (excerpts of the letter in Russian translation see: Literary heritage. M., 1937. T. 31-32. Having received no answer, Rolland wrote a second time, asking Tolstoy to resolve his doubts regarding a number of moral problems, as well as questions about mental and physical labor (see: Ibid. pp. 1008-1009). On October 3(?) 1887, Tolstoy responded in detail to this undated letter (see: Tolstoy Λ. N. PSS. T. 64. P. 84-98); Lebrun calls Tolstoy’s answer “a long article.”
...H. N. Ge... - Nikolai Nikolaevich Ge (1831-1894) - historical painter, portrait painter, landscape painter; came from a noble family. For several years he abandoned painting; Ge was actively involved in agriculture and even became an excellent stove maker.
P. 13...N. G. Sutkova from Sochi... - Nikolai Grigorievich Sutkova (1872-1932) graduated from the Faculty of Law, was engaged in agriculture in Sochi, at one time sympathized with the views of Tolstoy, and visited Yasnaya Polyana several times. In his letter sent from Sochi, Sutkova reported that he was selecting thoughts from “The Reading Circle” and “For Every Day” to present them in a popular form. In his letter dated January 9, 1910, Tolstoy answered him: “I was very glad to receive your letter, dear Sutkova. I am also pleased with the work that you have planned and are doing. To set forth the doctrine of truth, the same throughout the world from the Brahmins to Emerson,
Pascal, Kant, so that it is accessible large masses people with an unperverted mind, to present them in such a way that illiterate mothers can pass them on to their children - and this is a great task that lies ahead for all of us. Let's do it with all our might while we're alive. L. Tolstoy, who loves you” (Ibid. T. 81. P. 30).
…Π. P. Kartushin... - Pyotr Prokofyevich Kartushin (1880-1916), a rich Don Cossack, like-minded person of L. N. Tolstoy, his acquaintance and correspondent, one of the founders of the publishing house “Renewal” (1906), where Tolstoy’s unpublished works were published in Russia under censorship conditions. S. N. Durylin recalled: “A Black Sea Cossack, handsome, short, in good health, with independent and fairly significant means of living, Kartushin experienced a deep spiritual upheaval: he left everything and went to Tolstoy to seek the truth. Own funds in 1906-1907 he gave money for the cheap publication of Tolstoy’s most extreme works, which even the “Mediator” did not print for fear of government punishment: with Kartushin’s money, the “Obnovlenie” publishing house published “The Approaching of the End”, “Soldier’s” and “Officer’s Memos”, “The End of the Century”, “ Slavery of our time,” etc. Kartushin himself led the life of a voluntary poor man. In letters to friends, he often asked: “help, brother, get rid of money.” And, indeed, he was freed from them: his money went to cheap editions of beautiful books of eternal significance, to their free distribution, to supporting people who wanted to “sit down on the land,” that is, to engage in land labor, and for many other good deeds. But this man of crystalline soul did not find religious peace in Tolstoy either. In 1910-1911 he became interested in the life of Alexander Dobrolyubov. Once the founder of Russian symbolism, “the first Russian decadent,” Dobrolyubov (born 1875) became a novice in the Solovetsky Monastery, and in the end accepted the feat of a wanderer, disappearing into the Russian sea of peasants. Kartushin was attracted to Dobrolyubov by his wanderings, his participation in the hard labor of the people (Dobrolyubov worked as an unpaid farm laborer for the peasants), and his religious teaching, in which the height of moral requirements was combined with spiritual depth and poetic beauty of external expression. But, having fallen in love with Dobrolyubov, Kartushin did not stop loving Tolstoy: to stop loving anyone, and especially Tolstoy, was not in the nature of this beautiful, tender and deep loving person"(Durylin S. In Tolstoy and about Tolstoy // Ural. 2010. No. 3. P. 177-216).
...Felten from St. Petersburg... - Nikolai Evgenievich Felten (1884-1940), a descendant of the academician of architecture Yu. M. Felten (1730-1801), for several years was engaged in the illegal publication and distribution of Tolstoy’s prohibited works; in 1907 he was arrested for this and sentenced to six months in a fortress. About Felten, see: Tolstoy. N. PSS. T. 73. P. 179; Bulgakov V.F. Friends and loved ones // Bulgakov V.F. About Tolstoy: Memoirs and stories. Tula, 1978. pp. 338-342.
...Young publishers of "Renewal" ... - the above-mentioned I. I. Gorbunov, N. G. Sutkova, P. P. Kartushin and H. E. Felten (the latter served as the executive editor). Founded in 1906 by like-minded people of Tolstoy, the Obnovlenie publishing house published his uncensored works.
...As for Arago, God was a “hypothesis” for me... - May 5, 1905 Tolstoy wrote in his diary: “Someone, a mathematician, told Napoleon about God: I never needed this hypothesis. And I would say: I could never do anything good without this hypothesis” (Tolstoy Λ. N. PSS. T. 55. P. 138). Lebrun recalls the same episode, believing that Napoleon's interlocutor was the French physicist Dominique Francois
Arago (1786-1853). However, according to the memoirs of Napoleon’s physician Francesco Ritommarchi, this interlocutor was the French physicist and astronomer Pierre Simon Laplace (1749-1827), who answered the emperor’s question why there was no mention of God in his “Treatise on Celestial Mechanics” with the words: “I did not need this hypothesis" (see: Dusheiko K. Quotes from world history. M., 2006. P. 219).
...in that same room “under the vaults”... - The room “under the vaults” at different times served as Tolstoy’s study room, since it was isolated from the noise in the house. In the famous portrait of I. E. Repin, Tolstoy is depicted in a room under the vaults (see: Tolstaya S. A. Letters to L. N. Tolstoy. P. 327).
P. 14 ...I always remember Matthew Arnold's definition... - Matthew Arnold (Arnold, 1822-1888) - English poet, critic, literary historian and theologian. His “Tasks” have been translated into Russian art criticism"(M., 1901) and "What is the essence of Christianity and Judaism" (M., 1908; both books were published by the publishing house "Posrednik"). The last work in the original is called “Literaturę and Dogma”. Tolstoy found that it was “surprisingly identical” with his thoughts (diary entry dated February 20, 1889 - Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 50. P. 38; see also p. 40). Arnold gives the following Old Testament definition of God: “An eternal, infinite power outside of us, demanding from us, leading us to righteousness” (Arnold M. What is the essence of Christianity and Judaism. P. 48).
This was shortly after Tolstoy was excommunicated from the Orthodox Church by the Holy Synod. - Tolstoy was not officially excommunicated from the Church. The “Church Gazette” published the “Decree of the Holy Synod of February 20-23, 1901, Ha 557 with a message to the faithful children of the Greek-Russian Orthodox Church about Count Leo Tolstoy,” which, in particular, said: “The Holy Synod in its care for children Orthodox Church, about protecting them from destructive temptation and about saving the erring, having a judgment about Count Leo Tolstoy and his anti-Christian and anti-church false teaching, he considered it timely to publish as a warning to the church world<…>your message." Tolstoy was declared a false teacher, who “in the deception of his proud mind boldly rebelled against the Lord and against His Christ and against His holy property, clearly before everyone renounced the Mother who fed and raised him, the Orthodox Church, and devoted his literary activity and what was given to him from God talent for spreading among the people teachings contrary to Christ and the Church<…>. In his writings and letters, scattered in great numbers by him and his disciples all over the world, especially within our dear Fatherland, he preaches with the zeal of a fanatic the overthrow of all the dogmas of the Orthodox Church and the very essence of the Christian faith<…>. Therefore, the Church does not consider him its member and cannot consider him until he repents and restores his communion with her” (L.N. Tolstoy: Pro et contra: The personality and work of Leo Tolstoy in the assessment of Russian thinkers and researchers: Anthology. St. Petersburg ., 2000. pp. 345-346).
The “definition” of the Synod caused a stormy reaction in Russia, Europe and America. V. G. Korolenko wrote in his diary on February 25, 1901: “An act unprecedented in modern Russian history. True, the power and importance of a writer who, remaining on Russian soil, protected only by the charm of a great name and genius, would so mercilessly and boldly smash the “whales” of the Russian system: the autocratic order and the ruling Church, are also unparalleled. The gloomy anathema of the seven Russian “hierarchs”, resounding with echoes of the dark centuries of persecution, rushes towards an undoubtedly new phenomenon, marking the enormous growth of free Russian thought” (Korolenko V.G. Pol. collected works. State Publishing House of Ukraine, 1928. Diary. T. 4. P. 211). Korolenko expressed an opinion characteristic of most of Russian society. But at the same time, publications appeared in support of the Synod. Thus, on July 4, 1901, Korolenko noted in his diary an advertisement that appeared in newspapers about the exclusion of Tolstoy from honorary members of the Moscow Temperance Society. The basis was the fact that the Society includes only Orthodox Christians, and Tolstoy, after the “Definition” of the Synod, cannot be considered as such (see: Ibid. pp. 260-262). On October 1, Korolenko noted another statement that appeared in the newspapers, first published in the Tula Diocesan Gazette: “Many people, including those writing these lines, noticed an amazing phenomenon with the portraits of Count Λ. N. Tolstoy. After Tolstoy’s excommunication from the church, by the determination of the divinely established authorities, the expression on Count Tolstoy’s face took on a purely satanic appearance: it became not only angry, but ferocious and gloomy. This is not a deception of the feelings of a prejudiced, fanatical soul, but a real phenomenon that everyone can check” (Ibid. p. 272). For more information about the “Definition” of the Synod, see: Why Leo Tolstoy was excommunicated from the Church: Sat. historical documents. M., 2006; Firsov S. L. Church-legal and social-psychological aspects of the “excommunication” of Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy: (On the history of the problem) // Yasnaya Polyana collection-2008. Tula, 2008.
Tolstoy had just published his wonderful “Response to the Synod.” - According to a modern researcher, “Tolstoy reacted to the “excommunication”<…>very indifferent. Having learned about it, he only asked: was “anathema” proclaimed? And I was surprised that there was no “anathema”. Why then was it necessary to fence the garden at all? In his diary, he calls both the “definition” of the Synod and the warm expressions of sympathy that came to Yasnaya “strange”. L.N. was ill at that time...” (Basinsky P. Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise. M., 2010. P. 501). T.I. Polner, who was visiting Tolstoy at that moment, recalls: “The whole room was decorated with luxuriously smelling flowers.<…>"Marvelous! - says Tolstoy from the sofa. - The whole day is a holiday! Gifts, flowers, congratulations... here you are... Real name days! “He laughs” (Polner T.I. About Tolstoy: (Scraps of Memories) // Modern Notes. 1920. No. 1. P. 109 (Reprint commented edition: St. Petersburg. , 2010. P. 133). “Nevertheless, realizing that it is impossible to remain silent, Tolstoy writes a response to the resolution of the Synod, as usual, repeatedly reworking the text and finishing it only on April 4” (Basinsky P. Leo Tolstoy: Escape from Paradise. P. 501). In “Response to the resolution of the Synod of February 20-22 and to the letters I received on this occasion,” Tolstoy confirmed his break with the Church: “The fact that I renounced the church, which calls itself Orthodox, is absolutely fair. But I renounced. from her, not because I rebelled against the Lord, but on the contrary, only because with all the strength of my soul I wanted to serve him “But I not only do not reject God the Spirit, God - love, the only God - the beginning of everything, but I really do not recognize anything.” existing except God, and I see the whole meaning of life only in fulfilling the will of God, expressed in Christian teaching" Tolstoy objected to the charges brought against him in the “Definition” of the Synod: “Resolution of the Synod<…>illegal or deliberately ambiguous because if it wants to be excommunication, then it does not satisfy those church rules on which such excommunication can be pronounced<…>It is unfounded because the main reason for its appearance is the large spread of my false teaching seducing people, while I am well aware that there are hardly a hundred people who share my views and the spread of my writings on religion thanks to censorship is so insignificant that the majority of people who read resolution of the Synod, do not have the slightest idea of what I have written about religion, as can be seen from the letters I received” (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 34. pp. 245-253). Tolstoy's last statement does not entirely correspond to the facts. Huge number His religious and philosophical works circulated in manuscripts, were distributed in copies made on a hectograph, and came from abroad, where they were published in publishing houses organized by Tolstoy’s like-minded people, in particular, V. G. Chertkov. It was with publications received from abroad that Lebrun became acquainted while living in the Far East.
P. 15. It is not without reason that at the end of my article “On Religion and Morality”... - “So, answering your two questions, I say: “Religion is a known relationship established by man with his individual personality to the infinite world or the beginning of it. Morality is the ever-present guide of life, arising from this relationship.’” (Ibid. Vol. 39, p. 26). The exact title of the article is “Religion and Morality” (1893).
P. 16. ...father... - See about him: Russian World. No. 4. 2010. P. 30.
...“White Bride”, in Circassian Gelendzhik. - Most likely, Lebrun writes about the so-called False Gelendzhik. In a guide to the Caucasus, published in 1914, we read: “9 versts from Gelendzhik, a very poetic place with bizarre beams and hollows, “False Gelendzhik,” is quickly being built and populated.” “Once upon a time, over a hundred years ago, on the site of our village there was the Natukhai village of Mezyb. His name is preserved in the name of the river, which merges with Aderba near the seashore. In 1831, next to the village of Mezyb, on the shore of Gelendzhik Bay, the first fortification on the Black Sea coast was founded - Gelendzhik. Russian ships began to arrive in the bay, bringing provisions for the garrison of the Gelendzhik fortress. Sometimes such a ship sailed at night. The lights of the fortification burned dimly. That's where the ship headed. As he approached, the captain was puzzled: the lights he was walking towards did not belong to the Gelendzhik fortification, but to the Natukhai aul of Mezyb. This mistake was repeated several times, and gradually the name False Gelendzhik, or False Gelendzhik, was assigned to the village of Mezyb. The village is located on the low shore of the Black Sea, 12 kilometers from Gelendzhik. Among the dachas and owners of False Gelendzhik were engineer Perkun, the famous Moscow singer Navrotsskaya (her dacha was built of wood in the old Russian style), officer Turchaninov, Victor Lebrun, L. Tolstoy’s personal secretary, lived here for 18 years. On July 13, 1964, the place was renamed the village of Divnomorskoye. Information provided by the Gelendzhik Museum of History and Local Lore www.museum.sea.ru
P. 17. My father’s parents were good farmers in Champagne. - Champagne is a commune in France, located in the Limousin region. Department of the commune - Creuse. It is part of the canton of Bellegarde-en-Marche. The district of the commune is Aubusson. Champagne (French: Champagne, Latin: Campania) is a historical region in France, famous for its wine-making traditions (the word “champagne” comes from its name).
P. 18. ...research “A. I. Herzen and the revolution.” - Tolstoy’s follower Victor Lebrun in 1906 began compiling a collection of Herzen’s aphorisms and judgments with biographical sketch about him, which grew into an independent manuscript “Herzen and the Revolution”. According to Lebrun, the manuscript fell victim to censorship. In December 1907, Tolstoy received an article about Herzen by his like-minded person V. A. Lebrun, which contained a number of quotes from Herzen sympathetic to Tolstoy. On the evening of December 3, according to Makovitsky’s notes, he read aloud from this manuscript Herzen’s thoughts about the Russian community, about “the orthodoxy of democracy, the conservatism of revolutionaries and liberal journalists” and about the suppression of European revolutions by military force. Makovitsky asked Tolstoy if he would write a preface to Lebrun's article. Tolstoy replied that he would like to write. On December 22 of the same year, Tolstoy, with guests who had arrived from Moscow, again spoke about this article and said about Herzen: “How little is known about him and how useful it is to know him, especially now. So it is difficult to refrain from indignation against the government - not because it collects taxes, but because it removed Herzen from the everyday life of Russian life, eliminated the influence that he could have ... ". Despite the fact that Tolstoy again said in January 1908 that he intended to write a preface to Le Brun's article, he did not write this preface, and Le Brun's article was not published. (Literary heritage, vol. 41-42, p. 522, publishing house of the USSR Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 1941). “Continuing to admire Herzen, L.N. recalls one of his friends, a young Frenchman living in the Caucasus and who wrote a monograph about Herzen. L.N. speaks with tender sympathy about this work and says: I would very much like to write a preface to it. But I don’t know if I’ll have time. There is so little left to live..." (Sergeenko P. Herzen and Tolstoy // Russian Word. 1908. December 25 (January 7, 1909). No. 299). From the comments to Tolstoy's letters to Le Brun, it is known that Tolstoy sent his article to Posrednik, but it was not published. Most likely due to the ban on censorship.
P. 19. Vanity of vanities and vexation of spirit?... - Words of Solomon in the “Book of Ecclesiastes”, 1.1.
Thank you, dear Lebrun, for writing... - Lebrun dates this letter to November 6, 1905, which, apparently, is a mistake. The letter with the same text is dated November 6, 1908. See: Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 78. P. 249.
Thank you, dear Lebrun, for from time to time... - (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 77. P. 150).
I kiss you and Kartushin fraternally... - See note to page 13 present. ed.
P. 20. Long before me, several intelligent followers of Tolstoy settled near Gelendzhik:<…>These people tried to organize an agricultural colony. - In 1886, a group of populist intellectuals led by V.V. Eropkin, N.N. Kogan, Z. S. Sychugov and A.A. Sychugova, having purchased a plot of land (250 dessiatines in the region of the Pshady river near Gelendzhik), founded the agricultural community “Krinitsa”. The founder of “Krinitsa” was V.V. Eropkin, an aristocrat, brilliantly educated (law and mathematics faculties of Moscow University). Having become fascinated by the ideas of populism in his youth, he abandoned the environment that raised him and the means of subsistence provided by his family. He made several attempts to set up an agricultural artel in the Ufa and Poltava provinces, which ended unsuccessfully. After a long search, Eropkin bought a plot of land in the Mikhailovsky Pass area. Eropkin’s fate was tragic in its own way: in order to create a material basis for the development of Krinitsa, he was forced to live and work away from his brainchild. Only at the end of his life, seriously ill and paralyzed, was he brought to Krinitsa, where he died. The ideological inspirer of “Krinitsa” B. Ya. Orlov-Yakovlev, a student of the community, librarian, keeper of its archive, calls military doctor Joseph Mikhailovich Kogan. This anarchist and atheist composed the essay “Memo or the Idea of Common Sense as Applied to the Conscious Life of People,” in which, in addition to criticism modern conditions“recommended for the happiness of mankind to unite into communities with a complete community of ideas, land, property, labor” (Extracts from the diary of B. Ya. Orlov, a student of “Krinitsa”. 1933-1942. State Archives of the Krasnodar Territory. F. R1610. Op. 6. D. 9. L. 2-3). The work of I. M. Kogan in many ways anticipated the ideas later known as Tolstoyism. Perhaps for this reason, the Krinichians initially rejected Tolstoyism: “The cause of the Russian people is not Protestantism. Protestantism is the destiny of the German nation, where it has become a popular ideal. The business of the Russian people is creativity, the creation of new forms of life on moral principles, and therefore whoever understands this can be considered a Russian person. Protestantism also manifested itself large and brightly in the person of Tolstoy, but it is not a constructive movement, and therefore did not have and does not have practical significance. Our job is to create better social forms on religious principles. In particular, “Krinitsa” is only the forerunner of that great popular movement that should take place in the coming era...” (Krinitsa. A quarter of a century of “Krinitsa”. Kiev: Publishing of the cooperative magazine “Our Business”, 1913. P. 166). However, later, warm and even business relations developed between Tolstoy and the Krinichans, as evidenced by Tolstoy’s letters (See Tolstoy’s letter to Strakhov (PSS. T. 66. pp. 111-112) and a letter to V.V. Ivanov (Literary inheritance. T. 69. Book 1. Publishing house of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Moscow, 1941. P. 540-541). In 1910, “Krinitsa” was transformed from a religious-communist community into an agricultural production cooperative, which was called the “Intelligent Agricultural Artel Krinitsa.” In the same year, a monument to L.N. Tolstoy was erected in “Krinitsa.”
...were at the same time Georgists. - We are talking about followers of the ideas of Henry George (1839-1897), an American publicist, economist and social reformer. In his book Progress and Poverty (1879), they explored the causes of continued impoverishment in industrialized capitalist countries (despite ever-increasing levels of production), as well as the problems of sharp economic downturns and permanent stagnation. According to George, their main reason is fluctuations in the value of land (in the form of land rent), causing active speculation on the part of landowners. His proposed solution amounted to a “single tax” system, according to which the value of land was to be taxed, which effectively meant common ownership of the land (without changing the legal status of the owner). At the same time, it was necessary to eliminate taxes on income from industrial activities, thereby giving a powerful impetus to free enterprise and productive labor.
...in science it is called ground rent. - Land rent - in exploitative socio-economic formations, part of the surplus product created by direct producers in agriculture, appropriated by land owners; the bulk of the rent paid to land owners by tenants of the land. 3. r. involves the separation of the use of land from ownership of it. In this case, land ownership turns into only a title, giving land owners the right to receive income from land used by other persons and to collect tribute from those who directly cultivate it. “Whatever the specific form of rent, all its types have in common the fact that the appropriation of rent is the economic form in which land ownership is realized...” (Marx K., Engels F. Works. 2nd ed. T. 25. Part 2 . P. 183).
P. 21. Thank you, dear friend, for your letter. - See: Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 77. P. 84.
No matter how good it is, take care of a spiritual corner in your soul about a rainy day, Epictetus is a Comrade... - Epictetus (50-138) - ancient Greek philosopher, representative of the Nikopol school of stoicism. Λ. N. Tolstoy here hints at the doctrine of Epictetus: “It is not the phenomena and objects of the surrounding world that make us unhappy, but our thoughts, desires and ideas about the world around us. Therefore, we ourselves are the creators of our own destiny and happiness.”
...Marya Lvovna... - Maria Lvovna Obolenskaya (1871-1906) - daughter of L.N. Tolstoy. Since 1897 she has been married to Nikolai Leonidovich Obolensky. See about her: Russian World. No. 8. 2013. P. 105.
P. 22. I didn’t burn out, my dear young friend... - “Letter No. 33, January 30, 1907, Ya. P. Published from copy book No. 7, pp. 248 and 249" (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 77. P. 30). See about the fire: Russian World. No. 4. 2010. P. 39.
...Vladimir Grigorievich Chertkov... - See about him: Russian World. No. 4. 2010. P. 38.
... “God is not in power, but in truth” ... - These words are attributed to Alexander Nevsky by the unknown author of his “Life”. See Monuments of literature of Ancient Rus': XIII century. M., 1981. P. 429.
...founded the publishing house of “Free Word” in England... - V. G. Chertkov founded several publishing houses: in Russia - “Posrednik”, in England in 1893 - “Free Word”, and after his exile there in 1897 - an English-language one "Free Age Press" and the magazines "Free Word" and "Free Sheets"; returned from England in 1906 and settled near Tolstoy's estate.
... "The Steel Room" by Tolstoy. - See: Russian World. No. 8. 2013. P. 103.
P. 23. ...Yulia Ivanovna... - Igumnova Yu. I. (1871-1940) - artist, friend of T. L. Tolstoy, secretary of L. N. Tolstoy.
...Sasha... - Alexandra Lvovna Tolstaya (1884-1979), daughter of L.N. Tolstoy. See about her: Russian World. No. 8. 2013. P. 105.
...on a Remington. “That’s what almost every typewriter was called at that time.” One of the first known typewriters was assembled in 1833 by the Frenchman Progrin. She was extremely imperfect. It took about forty years to perfect this device. And only in 1873 was a fairly reliable and convenient model of a typewriter created, which its inventor Scholes proposed famous factory Remington, which produced weapons, sewing and agricultural machines. In 1874, the first hundred cars were already put on sale.
... "On the meaning of the Russian revolution." - The final title of the article, which was originally called “Two Roads.” On April 17, 1906, he writes in his diaries: “...I’m still busy with “Two Roads”. I’m not moving well.” (Leo Tolstoy. Collected works in 22 volumes. T. 22. M., 1985. P. 218). Separately published by the publishing house of V. Vrublevsky in 1907. The article appeared in response to Khomyakov’s article “Autocracy, the experience of systems for constructing this concept.” The conclusion to the article grew into a separate work, “What to do?” The first edition was published by the Posrednik publishing house, it was immediately confiscated, and the publisher was brought to justice. After Tolstoy's death, it was reprinted for the third time in the Nineteenth Part of the 12th edition of the Collected Works, which was also seized by censorship.
Sukhotin Mikhail Sergeevich ... - Sukhotin M. S. (1850-1914) - Novosilsk district leader of the nobility, member of the I State Duma from Tula 1uberniya. In his first marriage, he married Maria Mikhailovna Boda-Kolycheva (1856-1897) and had six children. In 1899 he married Tatyana Lvovna Tolstoy, daughter of the writer Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy. Their only daughter Tatyana (1905-1996), married to Sukhotin-Albertini.
...Tanya... - Tatyana Lvovna (1864-1950), daughter of L.N. Tolstoy. Since 1897 she has been married to Mikhail Sergeevich Sukhotin. Artist, curator of the Yasnaya Polyana Museum, then director of the State Museum of Leo Tolstoy in Moscow. In exile since 1925.
Andrey... - son of L. N. Tolstoy - Tolstoy Andrey Lvovich (1877-1916). See about him: Russian World. No. 8. 2013. P. 104.
Dushan warms his feet in the evenings, and later comes out to us and leads the “Notebook”... - See about him: Russian World. No. 8. 2013. pp. 93-94.
And I regret and do not regret, dear Lebrun... - This postscript from Tolstoy to the letter of his daughter addressed to Lebrun is shown in the PSS as a separate letter from Tolstoy to Lebrun: “Printed from a copy by the hand of Yu. I. Igumnova in the copy book Ha 7, fol. 153. Response to a letter from Viktor Anatolyevich Lebrun dated October 20, 1906.” (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 76. P. 218).
P. 24. ...Thank you, dear Lebrun... - Lebrun mistakenly indicated 1905 instead of 1907. (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 77. P. 214).
Always glad to receive your letter... - Incorrectly dated by Lebrun: 2/12/07. “Letter Ha 301, 1907 November 27. Ya. P. Reply to V. A. Lebrun’s letter dated November 16, 1907 with a notification that the manuscript of his article about Herzen had been sent to Tolstoy for review” (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 77. P. 252).
Now I have received it, dear Lebrun... - See: Tolstoy K. N. PSS. T. 77. P. 257.
I wanted to answer at length... - See: Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 77. P. 261.
...a letter with an addition to Herzen. - This letter, concerning V. A. Lebrun’s article about Herzen, was not found in the archive. Tolstoy sent the article to the publisher of Posrednik, I. I. Gorbunov-Posadov. As far as is known, the article was not published (Tolstoy L. N. PSS. T. 77. P. 261).
...N. Gusev... - Gusev Nikolai Nikolaevich (1882-1967), Soviet literary critic. In 1907-1909 he was L. N. Tolstoy’s personal secretary and accepted his moral teachings. In 1925-1931, director of the Tolstoy Museum in Moscow. Participated in editing the anniversary Full meeting works of Tolstoy in 90 volumes (1928-1958). Author of works on the life and work of L. N. Tolstoy.
P. 25. I am so. guilty before you... - “Letter No. 193, October 12, 1909. Ya.P.” In Tolstoy's date, the month is incorrectly written in Roman numerals. An excerpt published in the journal Vegetarian Review, 1911, 1, p. 6. Reply to letter
V. A. Lebrun dated August 30, 1909 (mail, pcs.), in which Lebrun offered Tolstoy his services as a secretary in return for the expelled N. N. Gusev. In connection with information that had reached him about Tolstoy’s work on an article on science, he asked him to at least briefly express his attitude “not to the imaginary science prostituted in the service of the rich, but to true science.” On the envelope of this letter, received in Yasnaya Polyana in early September, Tolstoy wrote a note for the secretary’s response: “Answer: I’m so busy with false science that I don’t highlight the real one. And she is.” Then no one answered, probably in view of Tolstoy’s departure to Krekshino. In a reply letter dated November 22, V. A. Lebrun wrote in detail about his life and experiences. On the envelope is Tolstoy’s note: “A lovely letter...” (Tolstoy A.N. PSS. T. 80. P. 139).
…radotage - fr. nonsense.
...as Ruskin said it... - This thought by J. Ruskin is placed in “The Reading Circle” (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 41. P. 494). About John Ruskin, see note on page 10 present. ed.
P. 26. Thank you, dear, dear Lebrun... - “Letter to Ha, July 15, 1909, 8-10. Ya. P. Printed from a typewritten copy. Reply to Lebrun's letter dated May 30, 1909." (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 80. P. 12-13).
...recrudescence... - fr. strengthening, increase.
...Thank you, dear Lebrun... - Lebrun was probably mistaken in the date. He dates this letter to October 12, 1909. A letter with the specified date exists (Tolstoy A.N. PSS. T. 80. P. 139), but it contains a completely different text. This is a significant mistake, because further in the text of the book Lebrun calls this letter the last letter from Tolstoy and deeply regrets that he did not have time to answer it. A letter that matches the text: “Letter No. 111 1910. July 24-28.Ya. P. Printed from a copy. The date July 24 is determined by the copy, July 28 - by the notes of D. P. Makovits - who is on the envelope of Le Brun's letter and in the registration book of letters. Envelope without postmark; Apparently, the letter was brought and handed over to Tolstoy by someone personally. ...Response to Lebrun’s letter dated June 15, in which Lebrun described his life, full of economic worries that prevented him from writing, and greeted Tolstoy on behalf of his wife and mother” (Tolstoy L.N. PSS. T. 82. P. 88 ).
Tout vent a point a cetuf guff aft attendee. - The text of the original source is distorted by typewriting. Translation from French: Everything comes on time for those who know how to wait.
P. 27. ...Tolstoy's last letter... - This is really Tolstoy's last letter to Lebrun. But it was written not in 1909 (as Lebrun noted), but in 1910, which significantly changes the course of events (according to Lebrun) recent years Tolstoy's life.
He had a year to live. - Lebrun insists that Tolstoy’s last letter was written to him in 1909, that is, a year before Tolstoy’s death. This is a mistake, because Tolstoy’s last letter was written in July 1910, that is, the year of Tolstoy’s death, if you trust the book of Tolstoy’s letters.
In addition, events soon began in Yasnaya Polyana that radically disturbed my peace. - There were plenty of events in Yasnaya Polyana in 1909. However, the truly dramatic events there began not in 1909, but precisely in July 1910, when Tolstoy’s last letter was written.
Lesson objectives: learn to use different types of reading (introductory, search); cultivate interest in reading; develop the ability to work independently with text, the ability to listen to your friends; cultivate emotional responsiveness to what you read.
Equipment: computer, book exhibition.
Progress of the lesson.
1. Introduction to the topic of the lesson.
Guys, look at the exhibition of books. Who is the author of all these works?
Today in class we will get acquainted with an excerpt from L.N. Tolstoy’s autobiographical story “Childhood”.
2. Acquaintance with the biography of the writer.
1. The biography of the writer is told by a previously prepared student.
Listen to a story about the writer's life.
Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy was born in Yasnaya Polyana, near the city of Tula, in 1828.
His mother, born Princess Maria Nikolaevna Volkonskaya, died when Tolstoy was not yet two years old. Tolstoy wrote about her in “Memoirs of Childhood”: “My mother was not good-looking, but very well educated for her time”; she knew French, English, German, played the piano beautifully, and was an expert at composing fairy tales. Tolstoy learned all this from others - after all, he himself did not remember his mother.
His father, Count Nikolai Ilyich Tolstoy, died when the boy was less than nine years old. A distant relative of the Tolstoys, Tatyana Aleksandrovna Ergolskaya, became the teacher of himself, his three older brothers and his younger sister.
Tolstoy spent most of his life in Yasnaya Polyana, from where he left ten days before his death.
In Yasnaya Polyana, Tolstoy organized a school for peasant children. For the school, he created the “ABC”, consisting of 3 books for primary education. The first book of the “ABC” contains “an image of letters”, the second – “an exercise in connecting warehouses”, the third – a book for reading: it includes fables, epics, sayings, proverbs.
Tolstoy lived long life. In 1908, Tolstoy abandoned the celebration of his anniversary, held a final meeting, and on November 28, 1910, left home forever...
The great writer died at the Astapovo railway station from pneumonia; he was buried in Yasnaya Polyana.
2. Sightseeing tour of the house-museum of Leo Tolstoy.
Now we will take a tour of the house where Leo Tolstoy used to live. Now there is a museum there.
This is Leo Tolstoy's house from the south side.
This is the front room of Leo Tolstoy's house.
Hall in the house.
Leo Tolstoy at the dinner table. 1908
Leo Tolstoy's bedroom. A washbasin that belonged to Leo Tolstoy’s father. Hospital chair of Leo Tolstoy.
The grave of Leo Tolstoy in Stary Zakaz.
Thousands of people flocked to Yasnaya Polyana for the funeral. The old man, who tried to live according to his conscience, turned out to be dear and necessary to all good people.
Many were crying. People knew that they were orphaned...
3. Work on the text.
1. Introductory reading of the text out loud.
The text is given in the textbook.
Children read.
2. Exchange of views.
What new things have you learned about the writer’s childhood from his memoirs?
(We learned that L.N. Tolstoy was a younger brother. As a child, Tolstoy and his brothers dreamed that all people would be happy.)
What did he like to play with his brothers?
(He loved to play ant brotherhood.)
What did you find particularly interesting about the memories?
(The children loved to play and fantasize; they loved to draw, sculpt, and write stories.)
Do you think Leo Tolstoy’s childhood can be called happy?
4. Physical exercise.
“And now everyone has stood up together...”
We raise our hands up,
And then we lower them,
And then we'll separate them
And we’ll quickly press you to us.
And then faster, faster,
Clap, clap more cheerfully!
5. Work in notebooks.
Find the answers in the text and write them down.
- How many brothers did Leo Tolstoy have? List their names.
(L.N. Tolstoy had 3 brothers: Nikolai, Mitenka, Seryozha.) - What was your older brother like?
(He was an amazing boy and then amazing person... His imagination was such that he could tell fairy tales and ghost stories or humorous stories ...) - What was the main secret of the ant brotherhood?
(The main secret is how to make sure that all people do not know any misfortunes, never quarrel or get angry, but are constantly happy.)
6. Exercise in the ability to ask questions.
Select an episode from the text as desired and formulate the correct question for it. Children must answer the question by reading this episode.
(Who did Nikolai like to draw in his drawings?) The second paragraph is read out as an answer.
(How did the brothers arrange the game of ant brothers?) Read out the episode from the third paragraph.
(What wishes did the brothers make?)
7. Determination of the genre of the work.
Remember from the beginning of the lesson what genre does this work belong to?
(Tale.)
If children cannot remember, turn to the cover again.
Why is it called an autobiographical story?
8. Lesson summary.
What did Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy believe in all his life?
(He believed that it was possible to reveal the secret that would help destroy all evil in people and teach them to live in peace.)
In the next lessons we will get acquainted with other works of Leo Tolstoy.
And I would like to end the lesson with the words of the writer himself:
“...We must try, first of all, to read and get to know the best writers of all centuries and peoples.”
Thanks for the work.
Tolstoy Lev Nikolaevich
Memories
L.N. Tolstoy
MEMORIES
INTRODUCTION
My friend P[avel] I[vanovich] B[iryukov], who undertook to write my biography for the French edition of the complete work, asked me to tell him some biographical information.
I really wanted to fulfill his wish, and I began to compose my biography in my imagination. At first, imperceptibly for myself, in the most natural way, I began to remember only one good thing in my life, only like shadows in a picture, adding to this good the dark, bad sides and actions of my life. But, thinking more seriously about the events of my life, I saw that such a biography would be, although not an outright lie, but a lie due to incorrect coverage and exposure of the good and suppression or smoothing out of everything bad. When I thought about writing the whole true truth, without hiding anything bad in my life, I was horrified at the impression that such a biography would have to make.
At this time I got sick. And during the involuntary idleness of my illness, my thoughts constantly turned to memories, and these memories were terrible. I'm with greatest power experienced what Pushkin says in his poem:
MEMORY
When the noisy day ceases for a mortal
And on the silent hailstorms
Translucent will cast a shadow on the night
And sleep, the reward of the day's work,
At that time for me they languish in silence
Hours of languid vigil:
In the inactivity of the night they burn more alive in me
Snakes of heart's remorse;
Dreams are boiling; in a mind overwhelmed by melancholy,
There is an excess of heavy thoughts;
The memory is silent before me
The scroll develops its long one:
And, reading my life with disgust,
I tremble and curse
And I complain bitterly, and I shed bitter tears,
But I don’t wash away the sad lines.
In the last line I would just change it like this, instead of: sad lines... I would put: I don’t wash away the shameful lines.
Under this impression, I wrote the following in my diary:
I am now experiencing the torments of hell: I remember all the abomination of my former life, and these memories do not leave me and poison my life. It is common to regret that a person does not retain memories after death. What a blessing that this is not the case. What a torment it would be if in this life I remembered everything bad, painful for my conscience, that I did in my previous life. And if you remember the good, then you must remember all the bad. What happiness that memory disappears with death and only consciousness remains - consciousness, which represents, as it were, a general conclusion from good and bad, as if complex equation, reduced to its simplest expression: x = positive or negative, large or small value. Yes, great happiness is the destruction of memories; it would be impossible to live joyfully with it. Now, with the destruction of memory, we enter life with a clean, white page on which we can write again the good and the bad.”
It is true that not my whole life was so terribly bad - only one 20-year period of it was like that; It is also true that even during this period my life was not completely evil, as it seemed to me during my illness, and that even during this period, impulses towards good awoke in me, although they did not last long and were soon drowned out by unrestrained passions. But still, this work of thought of mine, especially during my illness, clearly showed me that my biography, as biographies are usually written, with silence about all the nastiness and criminality of my life, would be a lie, and that if you write a biography, then you need to write the whole real truth. Only such a biography, no matter how ashamed I may be to write it, can be of real and fruitful interest to readers. Remembering my life in this way, that is, considering it from the point of view of the good and evil that I did, I saw that my life falls into four periods: 1) that wonderful, especially in comparison with the subsequent, innocent, joyful, poetic period of childhood up to 14 years old; then a second, terrible 20-year period of gross debauchery, serving ambition, vanity and, most importantly, lust; then the third, 18-year period from marriage to my spiritual birth, which, from a worldly point of view, could be called moral, since during these 18 years I lived a correct, honest family life, without indulging in any vices condemned by public opinion, but all whose interests were limited to selfish concerns about the family, about increasing wealth, about acquiring literary success and all kinds of pleasures.
And finally, the fourth, 20-year period in which I now live and in which I hope to die and from the point of view of which I see the whole meaning of the past life and which I would not want to change in anything, except in those habits of evil, which I have learned in past periods.
I would like to write such a story of life from all these four periods, completely, completely truthful, if God gives me strength and life. I think that such a biography written by me, even with great shortcomings, will be more useful for people than all that artistic chatter with which my 12 volumes of works are filled and to which people of our time attribute an undeserved significance.
Now I want to do this. I will first tell you about the first joyful period of childhood, which especially attracts me; Then, ashamed as I may be, I will tell you, without hiding anything, the terrible 20 years of the next period. Then the third period, which may be least interesting, in, finally, last period my awakening to the truth, which gave me the highest blessing of life and joyful peace in view of approaching death.
In order not to repeat myself in the description of childhood, I re-read my writing under this title and regretted that I wrote it: it was so bad, literary, and insincerely written. It could not have been otherwise: firstly, because my idea was to describe the story not of my own, but of my childhood friends, and therefore there was an awkward confusion of the events of their and my childhood, and secondly, because at the time of writing this I was far from independent in forms of expression, but was influenced by two writers, Stern (his "Sentimental Journey") and Topfer ("Bibliotheque de mon oncle"), who had a strong influence on me at that time [Stern ("Sentimental Journey") and Töpfer ("My Uncle's Library") (English and French)].
In particular, I now did not like the last two parts: adolescence and youth, in which, in addition to the awkward mixing of truth with fiction, there is insincerity: the desire to present as good and important what I did not consider then good and important - my democratic direction . I hope that what I write now will be better, most importantly, more useful to other people.
I was born and spent my first childhood in the village of Yasnaya Polyana. I don’t remember my mother at all. I was 1 1/2 years old when she passed away. By a strange coincidence, not a single portrait of her remains, so I cannot imagine her as a real physical being. I am partly glad of this, because in my idea of her there is only her spiritual appearance, and everything that I know about her is wonderful, and I think - not only because everyone who told me about my mother tried to talk about There was only good in her, but because there really was a lot of this good in her.
However, not only my mother, but also all the people surrounding my childhood - from my father to the coachmen - seem to me exclusively good people. Probably, my pure childhood feeling of love, like a bright ray, revealed to me the best qualities in people (they always exist), and the fact that all these people seemed to me exceptionally good was much more true than when I saw them alone flaws. My mother was not good-looking and very well educated for her time. She knew, in addition to Russian - which she, contrary to the then accepted Russian illiteracy, wrote correctly - four languages: French, German, English and Italian - and should have been sensitive to art, she played the piano well, and her peers told I knew that she was a great master at telling enticing tales, inventing them as she told them. Her most valuable quality was that, according to the servants’ stories, she was, although quick-tempered, restrained. “She will blush all over, even cry,” her maid told me, “but she will never say a rude word.” She didn't even know them.
I still have several letters from her to my father and other aunts and a diary of the behavior of Nikolenka (elder brother), who was 6 years old when she died, and who, I think, was most like her. They both had a character trait that was very endearing to me, which I assume from my mother’s letters, but which I knew from my brother - indifference to people’s judgments and modesty, going so far as to try to hide the mental, educational and moral advantages that they had in front of other people. They seemed to be ashamed of these advantages.
Current page: 1 (book has 5 pages in total) [available reading passage: 1 pages]
Tolstoy Lev Nikolaevich
Memories
L.N. Tolstoy
MEMORIES
INTRODUCTION
My friend P[avel] I[vanovich] B[iryukov], who undertook to write my biography for the French edition of the complete work, asked me to tell him some biographical information.
I really wanted to fulfill his wish, and I began to compose my biography in my imagination. At first, imperceptibly for myself, in the most natural way, I began to remember only one good thing in my life, only like shadows in a picture, adding to this good the dark, bad sides and actions of my life. But, thinking more seriously about the events of my life, I saw that such a biography would be, although not an outright lie, but a lie due to incorrect coverage and exposure of the good and suppression or smoothing out of everything bad. When I thought about writing the whole true truth, without hiding anything bad in my life, I was horrified at the impression that such a biography would have to make.
At this time I got sick. And during the involuntary idleness of my illness, my thoughts constantly turned to memories, and these memories were terrible. I experienced with the greatest strength what Pushkin says in his poem:
MEMORY
When the noisy day ceases for a mortal
And on the silent hailstorms
Translucent will cast a shadow on the night
And sleep, the reward of the day's work,
At that time for me they languish in silence
Hours of languid vigil:
In the inactivity of the night they burn more alive in me
Snakes of heart's remorse;
Dreams are boiling; in a mind overwhelmed by melancholy,
There is an excess of heavy thoughts;
The memory is silent before me
The scroll develops its long one:
And, reading my life with disgust,
I tremble and curse
And I complain bitterly, and I shed bitter tears,
But I don’t wash away the sad lines.
In the last line I would just change it like this, instead of: sad lines... I would put: I don’t wash away the shameful lines.
Under this impression, I wrote the following in my diary:
I am now experiencing the torments of hell: I remember all the abomination of my former life, and these memories do not leave me and poison my life. It is common to regret that a person does not retain memories after death. What a blessing that this is not the case. What a torment it would be if in this life I remembered everything bad, painful for my conscience, that I did in my previous life. And if you remember the good, then you must remember all the bad. What a blessing that memory disappears with death and only consciousness remains - consciousness, which represents, as it were, a general conclusion from good and bad, as if a complex equation reduced to its simplest expression: x = positive or negative, large or small value. Yes, great happiness is the destruction of memories; it would be impossible to live joyfully with it. Now, with the destruction of memory, we enter life with a clean, white page on which we can write again the good and the bad.”
It is true that not my whole life was so terribly bad - only one 20-year period of it was like that; It is also true that even during this period my life was not completely evil, as it seemed to me during my illness, and that even during this period, impulses towards good awoke in me, although they did not last long and were soon drowned out by unrestrained passions. But still, this work of thought of mine, especially during my illness, clearly showed me that my biography, as biographies are usually written, with silence about all the nastiness and criminality of my life, would be a lie, and that if you write a biography, then you need to write the whole real truth. Only such a biography, no matter how ashamed I may be to write it, can be of real and fruitful interest to readers. Remembering my life in this way, that is, considering it from the point of view of the good and evil that I did, I saw that my life falls into four periods: 1) that wonderful, especially in comparison with the subsequent, innocent, joyful, poetic period of childhood up to 14 years old; then a second, terrible 20-year period of gross debauchery, serving ambition, vanity and, most importantly, lust; then the third, 18-year period from marriage to my spiritual birth, which, from a worldly point of view, could be called moral, since during these 18 years I lived a correct, honest family life, without indulging in any vices condemned by public opinion, but all whose interests were limited to selfish concerns about the family, about increasing his fortune, about acquiring literary success and all kinds of pleasures.
And finally, the fourth, 20-year period in which I now live and in which I hope to die and from the point of view of which I see the whole meaning of the past life and which I would not want to change in anything, except in those habits of evil, which I have learned in past periods.
I would like to write such a story of life from all these four periods, completely, completely truthful, if God gives me strength and life. I think that such a biography written by me, even with great shortcomings, will be more useful for people than all that artistic chatter with which my 12 volumes of works are filled and to which people of our time attribute an undeserved significance.
Now I want to do this. I will first tell you about the first joyful period of childhood, which especially attracts me; Then, ashamed as I may be, I will tell you, without hiding anything, the terrible 20 years of the next period. Then the third period, which may be the least interesting of all, in, finally, the last period of my awakening to the truth, which gave me the highest blessing of life and joyful peace in view of approaching death.
In order not to repeat myself in the description of childhood, I re-read my writing under this title and regretted that I wrote it: it was so bad, literary, and insincerely written. It could not have been otherwise: firstly, because my idea was to describe the story not of my own, but of my childhood friends, and therefore there was an awkward confusion of the events of their and my childhood, and secondly, because at the time of writing this I was far from independent in forms of expression, but was influenced by two writers, Stern (his "Sentimental Journey") and Topfer ("Bibliotheque de mon oncle"), who had a strong influence on me at that time [Stern ("Sentimental Journey") and Töpfer ("My Uncle's Library") (English and French)].
In particular, I now did not like the last two parts: adolescence and youth, in which, in addition to the awkward mixing of truth with fiction, there is insincerity: the desire to present as good and important what I did not consider then good and important - my democratic direction . I hope that what I write now will be better, most importantly, more useful to other people.
I
I was born and spent my first childhood in the village of Yasnaya Polyana. I don’t remember my mother at all. I was 1 1/2 years old when she passed away. By a strange coincidence, not a single portrait of her remains, so I cannot imagine her as a real physical being. I am partly glad of this, because in my idea of her there is only her spiritual appearance, and everything that I know about her is wonderful, and I think - not only because everyone who told me about my mother tried to talk about There was only good in her, but because there really was a lot of this good in her.
However, not only my mother, but also all the people surrounding my childhood - from my father to the coachmen - seem to me to be exceptionally good people. Probably, my pure childhood feeling of love, like a bright ray, revealed to me the best qualities in people (they always exist), and the fact that all these people seemed to me exceptionally good was much more true than when I saw them alone flaws. My mother was not good-looking and very well educated for her time. She knew, in addition to Russian - which she, contrary to the then accepted Russian illiteracy, wrote correctly - four languages: French, German, English and Italian - and should have been sensitive to art, she played the piano well, and her peers told her me that she was a great master at telling enticing tales, inventing them as she told them. Her most valuable quality was that, according to the servants’ stories, she was, although quick-tempered, restrained. “She will blush all over, even cry,” her maid told me, “but she will never say a rude word.” She didn't even know them.
I still have several letters from her to my father and other aunts and a diary of the behavior of Nikolenka (elder brother), who was 6 years old when she died, and who, I think, was most like her. They both had a character trait that was very endearing to me, which I assume from my mother’s letters, but which I knew from my brother - indifference to people’s judgments and modesty, going so far as to try to hide the mental, educational and moral advantages that they had in front of other people. They seemed to be ashamed of these advantages.
In my brother, about whom Turgenev very correctly said that he did not have those shortcomings that are needed to be a great writer, I knew this well.
I remember once how a very stupid and bad man, the governor’s adjutant, who was hunting with him, laughed at him in front of me, and how my brother, looking at me, smiled good-naturedly, obviously finding great pleasure in this.
I notice the same feature in letters to my mother. She was obviously spiritually superior to her father and his family, with the exception of Tat. Alex. Ergolskaya, with whom I lived half my life and who was a woman of remarkable moral qualities.
In addition, both had another trait that, I think, determined their indifference to the judgment of people - this is the fact that they never, precisely never, anyone - I already know this for sure about the brother with whom I lived half my life - no one was ever judged. The sharpest expression of a negative attitude towards a person was expressed by his brother with subtle, good-natured humor and the same smile. I see the same thing in my mother’s letters and heard from those who knew her.
In the lives of Dmitry of Rostov there is one thing that has always touched me very much - this is the short life of one monk, who, known to all the brethren, had many shortcomings and, despite this, appeared in a dream to an elder among the saints in the very best place heaven. The surprised elder asked: what did this monk, intemperate in many ways, deserve such an award? They answered him: “He never condemned anyone.”
If there were such awards, I think my brother and my mother would have received them.
Another third feature that set my mother apart from her environment was the truthfulness and simplicity of her tone in her letters. At that time, expressions of exaggerated feelings were especially common in letters: incomparable, adored, the joy of my life, invaluable, etc. - these were the most common epithets between loved ones, and the more pompous, the more insincere they were.
This trait, although not to a strong degree, is visible in my father’s letters. He writes: “Ma bien douce amie, je ne pense qu”au bonheur d”etre aupres de toi...” [My most tender friend, I only think about the happiness of being near you (French)], etc. n. It was hardly entirely sincere. She always writes the same thing in her address: “mon bon ami” [my good friend(French)], and in one of the letters he directly says: “Le temps me parait long sans toi, quoiqu"a dire vrai, nous ne jouissons pas beaucoup de ta societe quand tu es ici" [Time drags on for me for a long time without you , although, to tell the truth, we enjoy your company little when you are here (French)], and it is always signed the same way: “ta devouee Marie” [Mary devoted to you (French)].
My mother lived her childhood partly in Moscow, partly in the village with an intelligent, proud and gifted man, my grandfather Volkonsky.
II
What I know about my grandfather is that, having reached the high ranks of chief general under Catherine, he suddenly lost his position due to his refusal to marry Potemkin’s niece and mistress Varenka Engelhardt. To Potemkin’s proposal, he replied: “Why did he think that I would marry his b....”.
For this answer, he not only stopped in his career, but was appointed governor of Arkhangelsk, where he remained, it seems, until the accession of Paul, when he retired and, having married Princess Ekaterina Dmitrievna Trubetskoy, settled on the estate received from his father Sergei Fedorovich Yasnaya Polyana.
Princess Ekaterina Dmitrievna died early, leaving my grandfather only daughter Maryu. It was with this much-loved daughter and her French companion that my grandfather lived until his death around 1816.
My grandfather was considered a very strict master, but I had never heard stories about his cruelties and punishments, so common at that time. I think that they were, but the enthusiastic respect for importance and rationality was so great among the serfs and peasants of his time, whom I often asked about him, that although I heard condemnations of my father, I heard only praise for his intelligence, thriftiness in caring for peasants and, in particular, my grandfather’s huge servants. He built wonderful rooms for the courtyard servants and made sure that they were always not only well-fed, but also well dressed and having fun. On holidays, he organized entertainment for them, swings, and round dances. He cared even more, like any smart landowner of that time, about the welfare of the peasants, and they prospered, especially since high position grandfather, inspiring respect for police officers, police officers and assessors, freed them from the oppression of their superiors.
He probably had a very fine aesthetic feeling. All his buildings are not only durable and comfortable, but extremely elegant. The park he laid out in front of the house is the same. He probably also loved music very much, because he kept his good small orchestra only for himself and his mother. I also found a huge elm tree, three girths wide, growing into the wedge of a linden alley and around which benches and music stands were made for musicians. In the mornings he walked in the alley, listening to music. He hated hunting, but loved flowers and greenhouse plants.
A strange fate brought him together in the strangest way with the same Varenka Engelhardt, for whose abandonment he suffered during his service. This Varenka married Prince Sergei Fedorovich Golitsyn, who as a result received all kinds of ranks, orders and awards. It was with this Sergei Fedorovich and his family, and therefore with Varvara Vasilievna, that my grandfather became close to such an extent that my mother was betrothed from childhood to one of Golitsyn’s ten sons and that both old princes exchanged portrait galleries (of course, copies painted by serfs painters). All these portraits of the Golitsyns are now in our house, with Prince Sergei Fedorovich in St. Andrew’s ribbon and the fat red-haired Varvara Vasilievna, a cavalry lady. However, this rapprochement was not destined to happen: my mother’s fiancé, Lev Golitsyn, died of fever before the wedding, whose name was given to me, the 4th son, in memory of this Lev. I was told that my mother loved me very much and called me: mon petit Benjamin [my little Benjamin (French)].
I think that love for the deceased groom, precisely because it ended in death, was that poetic love that girls experience only once. Her marriage to my father was arranged by her and my father's relatives. She was rich, no longer in her early youth, an orphan, but her father was a cheerful, brilliant young man, with a name and connections, but with my grandfather Tolstoy’s very upset (to such an extent that his father even refused the inheritance). I think that my mother loved my father, but more as a husband and, most importantly, the father of her children, but she was not in love with him. Her real loves, as I understand it, were three or maybe four: love for her deceased fiancé, then a passionate friendship with her French companion m-elle Henissienne, about whom I heard from my aunts and which ended, it seems, in disappointment. This M-elle Henissienne married her mother’s cousin, Prince Mikhail Volkhonsky, the grandfather of the current writer Volkhonsky. This is what my mother writes about her friendship with this m-elle Henissienne. She writes about her friendship on the occasion of the friendship of two girls who lived in her house: “Je m”arrange tres bien avec toutes les deux: je fais de la musique, je ris et je folatre avec l”une et je parle sentiment, ou je medis du monde frivole avec l"autre, je suis aimee a la folie par toutes les deux, je suis la confidente de chacune, je les concilie, quand elles sont brouillees, car il n"y eut jamais d"amitie plus querelleuse et plus drole a voir que la leur: ce sont des bouderies, des pleurs, des reconciliations, des injures, et puis des transports d"amitie exaltee et romanesque. Enfin j"y vois comme dans un miroir l"amitie qui a anime et trouble ma vie pendant quelques années. -il les charmantes illusions de la jeunesse, ou tout est embelli par la toute puissance de l"imagination? Et quelquefois je souris de leur enfantillage" [I feel good with both, I make music, I laugh and fool around with one, I talk about feelings, I share frivolous light with the other, I am madly loved by both, I enjoy the trust of each, I reconcile them when they quarrel, since there was no friendship more abusive and more funny in appearance than their friendship. Constant displeasure, crying, consolation, scolding and then outbursts of friendship, enthusiastic and sensitive. So I see, as if in a mirror, the friendship that animated and confused me for several years. I look at them with an inexpressible feeling, sometimes I envy their illusions, which I no longer have, but whose sweetness I know. Frankly speaking, the lasting and real happiness of mature age, is it worth the charming illusions of youth, when everything is decorated with the omnipotence of the imagination? And sometimes I grin at their childishness (French)].
The third strong, perhaps the most passionate, feeling was her love for her older brother Coco, a journal of whose behavior she kept in Russian, in which she wrote down his misdeeds and read to him. This journal shows a passionate desire to do everything possible to raise Coco in the best possible way, and at the same time a very unclear idea of what it takes to do this. For example, she reprimands him for being too sensitive and crying when he sees animals suffering. A man, according to her concepts, needs to be firm. Another shortcoming that she tries to correct in him is that he “thinks” and instead of bonsoir [good evening (French)] or bonjour [hello (French)] he says to his grandmother: “Je vous remercie” [Thank you (French)].
The fourth strong feeling, which perhaps existed, as the aunties told me, and which I so wished to exist, was love for me, which replaced the love for Coco, who at the time of my birth had already become unstuck from my mother and entered the hands of men.
She needed to love someone other than herself, and one love was replaced by another. This was the spiritual appearance of my mother in my mind.
She seemed to me to be such a high, pure, spiritual being that often in the middle period of my life, during the struggle with the temptations that beset me, I prayed to her soul, asking her to help me, and this prayer always helped me.
My mother’s life in my father’s family, as I can conclude from letters and stories, was very happy and good. My father's family consisted of an old grandmother, his mother, her daughter, my aunt, Countess Alexandra Ilyinichna Osten-Sacken, and her pupil Pashenka; another aunt, as we called her, although she was a very distant relative to us, Tatyana Alexandrovna Ergolskaya, who was brought up in my grandfather’s house and lived all her life in my father’s house; teacher Fyodor Ivanovich Ressel, whom I described quite correctly in “Childhood.”
There were five of us children: Nikolai, Sergei, Dmitry, me, the youngest, and my younger sister Mashenka, as a result of whose birth my mother died. My mother’s very short married life—it seems no more than 9 years—was happy and good. This life was very full and decorated with the love of everyone for her and her for everyone who lived with her. Judging by the letters, I see that she lived very secluded then. Almost no one except the Ogarevs’ close neighbors and relatives who happened to be passing through high road and those who came to us without visiting Yasnaya Polyana. The mother's life was spent in classes with children, in evening reading aloud novels for grandmother and serious reading, like "Emile" by Rousseau, for herself and reasoning about what she read, in playing the piano, in teaching Italian to one of her aunts, in walks and household. In all families there are periods when illness and death are still absent and family members live calmly, carefree, without reminders of the end. Such a period, I think, was experienced by the mother in her husband’s family before her death. No one died, no one became seriously ill, and my father’s upset affairs were getting better. Everyone was healthy, cheerful, and friendly. Father amused everyone with his stories and jokes. I didn't find this time. When I began to remember myself, my mother’s death had already left its mark on the life of our family.
First memories
Lev Nikolaevich remembered his father and mother differently, although he seemed to love them equally; weighing his love on the scales, he surrounded his mother, whom he hardly knew or saw, with a poetic halo.
Lev Nikolaevich wrote: “However, not only my mother, but also all the people surrounding my childhood - from my father to the coachmen - seem to me to be exceptionally good people. Probably, my pure childhood feeling of love, like a bright ray, revealed to me the best qualities in people (they always exist), and the fact that all these people seemed to me exceptionally good was much more true than when I saw them alone flaws".
This is what Lev Nikolaevich wrote in 1903 in his memoirs. He started them several times and gave up without finishing them.
People seemed to contradict themselves, memories argued, because they lived in the present.
Memories turned into remorse. But Tolstoy loved Pushkin’s poem “Memories”:
And reading my life with disgust,
I tremble and curse
And I complain bitterly, and I shed bitter tears,
But I don’t wash away the sad lines.
“In the last line,” he writes, “I would only change this: instead of “lines sad..." would put: " lines shameful I don’t wash it off.”
He wanted to repent and repented of ambition, of gross licentiousness; in his youth he glorified his childhood. He said that the eighteen-year period from marriage to spiritual birth could be called moral from a worldly point of view. But immediately, speaking about an honest family life, he repents of selfish concerns about the family and increasing his fortune.
How difficult it is to know what to cry about, how difficult it is to know what to reproach yourself for!
Tolstoy had a merciless, all-restoring memory; remembered what none of us can remember.
He began his memoirs like this:
“These are my first memories, ones that I don’t know how to put in order, not knowing what happened before and after. I don’t even know about some of them, whether it was in a dream or in reality. Here they are. I'm tied up, I want to free my hands, but I can't do it. I scream and cry, and I myself hate my screaming, but I can’t stop. Someone is standing over me, bent over, I don’t remember who, and all this is in semi-darkness, but I remember that there are two, and my scream affects them: they are alarmed by my scream, but they do not untie me, what I want, and I scream even louder. It seems to them that this is necessary (that is, for me to be tied up), whereas I know that this is not necessary, and I want to prove it to them, and I burst into screams, disgusting to myself, but uncontrollable. I feel the injustice and cruelty not of people, because they pity me, but of fate and pity for myself. I don’t know and will never know what it was: whether they swaddled me when I was an infant, and I tore out my arms, or whether they swaddled me when I was over a year old so that I would not scratch the lichen; Whether I collected many impressions into this one memory, as happens in a dream, it is true that this was my first and strongest impression of life. And what I remember is not my cry, not my suffering, but the complexity, the contradictory nature of the impression. I want freedom, it doesn’t bother anyone, and they torture me. They feel sorry for me and they tie me up. And I, who needs everything, I am weak, and they are strong.”
In the old life of humanity, in its long pre-dawn sleep, people bound each other with property, fences, bills of sale, inheritances and swags.
Tolstoy wanted to free himself all his life; he needed freedom.
The people who loved him - his wife, sons, other relatives, acquaintances, loved ones - swaddled him.
He wriggled out of the swaddles.
People pitied Tolstoy, honored him, but did not free him. They were strong as the past, and he strived for the future.
Nowadays people are already forgetting what a baby once looked like, wrapped in a swaddling cloth, like a mummy in a tarred shroud.
The current infant with bent legs raised up is a different fate of the baby.
The memory of a needless imprisonment is Tolstoy’s first memory.
Another memory is a joyful one.
“I am sitting in a trough, and I am surrounded by a strange, new, not unpleasant sour smell of some substance that is being rubbed on my naked body. It was probably bran, and probably they washed me in water and a trough every day, but the novelty of the impression of bran woke me up, and for the first time I noticed and fell in love with my little body with the ribs visible to me on the chest, and the smooth dark trough, and rolled up the nanny’s hands, and the warm steamy water, and the sound of it, and especially the feeling of the smoothness of the wet edges of the trough when I ran my little hands along them.”
Memories of swimming are a trace of the first pleasure.
These two memories are the beginning of the human dismemberment of the world.
Tolstoy notes that in the first years he “lived and lived blissfully,” but the world around him was not dissected, and therefore there were no memories. Tolstoy writes: “Not only that space, and time, and reason are forms of thinking and that the essence of life is outside these forms, but our whole life is more and more subordination of ourselves to these forms and then again liberation from them.”
Outside of form there is no memory. Something that can be touched is formed: “Everything that I remember, everything happens in bed, in the upper room, no grass, no leaves, no sky, no sun exists for me.”
I don’t remember this – it’s as if nature doesn’t exist. “You probably have to get away from her to see her, but I was nature.”
It is important not only what surrounds a person, but also what and how he distinguishes from his surroundings.
Often what a person does not seem to notice actually determines his consciousness.
When we are interested in the work of a writer, what is important to us is the way in which he isolated parts from the general, so that we can then perceive this general anew.
Tolstoy spent his entire life isolating from the general flow that which was part of his system of understanding the world; changed the methods of selection, thereby changing what he chose.
Let's look at the laws of dismemberment.
The boy is transferred down to Fyodor Ivanovich - to his brothers.
The child leaves what Tolstoy calls “habitual from eternity.” Life has just begun, and since there is no other eternity, what is experienced is eternal.
The boy parts with primary tangible eternity - “not so much with people, with a sister, with a nanny, with an aunt, but with a crib, a bed, a pillow...”.
The aunt is named, but does not yet live in a dismembered world.
The boy is taken from her. They put a robe on him with a suspender sewn to the back - it’s as if he is cut off “forever from the top.”
“And here for the first time I noticed not all those with whom I lived upstairs, but the main person with whom I lived and whom I did not remember before. It was Aunt Tatyana Alexandrovna.”
The aunt has a first name and patronymic, then she is described as short, thick-set, and black-haired.
Life begins as a difficult task, not a toy.
"First Memoirs" was begun on May 5, 1878, and abandoned. In 1903, Tolstoy, helping Biryukov, who undertook to write his biography for the French edition of his works, again wrote his childhood memories. They begin with a conversation about repentance and a story about ancestors and brothers.
Lev Nikolaevich, returning to childhood, now analyzes not only the emergence of consciousness, but also the difficulty of storytelling.
“The further I go in my memoirs, the more hesitant I become about how to write them. Describe events and your own in a coherent manner states of mind I can’t because I don’t remember this connection and sequence of mental states.”
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