Eugene Onegin. A Romance of Russian Life in Verse

by Александр Пушкин

Yet satiated with success,

  In solitude or worldly din,

  He heard his soul's complaint within,

  With laughter smothered weariness:

  And thus he spent eight years of time,

  Destroyed the blossom of his prime.

  IV

  Though beauty he no more adored,

  He still made love in a queer way;

  Rebuffed—as quickly reassured,

  Jilted—glad of a holiday.

  Without enthusiasm he met

  The fair, nor parted with regret,

  Scarce mindful of their love and guile.

  Thus a guest with composure will

  To take a hand at whist oft come:

  He takes his seat, concludes his game,

  And straight returning whence he came,

  Tranquilly goes to sleep at home,

  And in the morning doth not know

  Whither that evening he will go.

  V

  However, Tania's letter reading,

  Eugene was touched with sympathy;

  The language of her girlish pleading

  Aroused in him sweet reverie.

  He called to mind Tattiana's grace,

  Pallid and melancholy face,

  And in a vision, sinless, bright,

  His spirit sank with strange delight.

  May be the empire of the sense,

  Regained authority awhile,

  But he desired not to beguile

  Such open-hearted innocence.

  But to the garden once again

  Wherein we lately left the twain.

  VI

  Two minutes they in silence spent,

  Oneguine then approached and said:

  "You have a letter to me sent.

  Do not excuse yourself. I read

  Confessions which a trusting heart

  May well in innocence impart.

  Charming is your sincerity,

  Feelings which long had ceased to be

  It wakens in my breast again.

  But I came not to adulate:

  Your frankness I shall compensate

  By an avowal just as plain.

  An ear to my confession lend;

  To thy decree my will I bend.

  VII

  "If the domestic hearth could bless—

  My sum of happiness contained;

  If wife and children to possess

  A happy destiny ordained:

  If in the scenes of home I might

  E'en for an instant find delight,

  Then, I say truly, none but thee

  I would desire my bride to be—

  I say without poetic phrase,

  Found the ideal of my youth,

  Thee only would I choose, in truth,

  As partner of my mournful days,

  Thee only, pledge of all things bright,

  And be as happy—as I might.

  VIII

  "But strange am I to happiness;

  'Tis foreign to my cast of thought;

  Me your perfections would not bless;

  I am not worthy them in aught;

  And honestly 'tis my belief

  Our union would produce but grief.

  Though now my love might be intense,

  Habit would bring indifference.

  I see you weep. Those tears of yours

  Tend not my heart to mitigate,

  But merely to exasperate;

  Judge then what roses would be ours,

  What pleasures Hymen would prepare

  For us, may be for many a year.

  IX

  "What can be drearier than the house,

  Wherein the miserable wife

  Deplores a most unworthy spouse

  And leads a solitary life?

  The tiresome man, her value knowing,

  Yet curses on his fate bestowing,

  Is full of frigid jealousy,

  Mute, solemn, frowning gloomily.

  Such am I. This did ye expect,

  When in simplicity ye wrote

  Your innocent and charming note

  With so much warmth and intellect?

  Hath fate apportioned unto thee

  This lot in life with stern decree?

  X

  "Ideas and time ne'er backward move;

  My soul I cannot renovate—

  I love you with a brother's love,

  Perchance one more affectionate.

  Listen to me without disdain.

  A maid hath oft, may yet again

  Replace the visions fancy drew;

  Thus trees in spring their leaves renew

  As in their turn the seasons roll.

  'Tis evidently Heaven's will

  You fall in love again. But still—

  Learn to possess more self-control.

  Not all will like myself proceed—

  And thoughtlessness to woe might lead."

  XI

  Thus did our friend Oneguine preach:

  Tattiana, dim with tears her eyes,

  Attentive listened to his speech,

  All breathless and without replies.

  His arm he offers. Mute and sad

  (Mechanically, let us add),

  Tattiana doth accept his aid;

  And, hanging down her head, the maid

  Around the garden homeward hies.

  Together they returned, nor word

  Of censure for the same incurred;

  The country hath its liberties

  And privileges nice allowed,

  Even as Moscow, city proud.

  XII

  Confess, O ye who this peruse,

  Oneguine acted very well

  By poor Tattiana in the blues;

  'Twas not the first time, I can tell

  You, he a noble mind disclosed,

  Though some men, evilly disposed,

  Spared him not their asperities.

  His friends and also enemies

  (One and the same thing it may be)

  Esteemed him much as the world goes.

  Yes! every one must have his foes,

  But Lord! from friends deliver me!

  The deuce take friends, my friends, amends

  I've had to make for having friends!

  XIII

  But how? Quite so. Though I dismiss

  Dark, unavailing reverie,

  I just hint, in parenthesis,

  There is no stupid calumny

  Born of a babbler in a loft

  And by the world repeated oft,

  There is no fishmarket retort

  And no ridiculous report,

  Which your true friend with a sweet smile

  Where fashionable circles meet

  A hundred times will not repeat,

  Quite inadvertently meanwhile;

  And yet he in your cause would strive

  And loves you as—a relative!

  XIV

  Ahem! Ahem! My reader noble,

  Are all your relatives quite well?

  Permit me; is it worth the trouble

  For your instruction here to tell

  What I by relatives conceive?

  These are your relatives, believe:

  Those whom we ought to love, caress,

  With spiritual tenderness;

  Whom, as the custom is of men,

  We visit about Christmas Day,

  Or by a card our homage pay,

  That until Christmas comes again

  They may forget that we exist.

  And so—God bless them, if He list.

  XV

  In this the love of the fair sex

  Beats that of friends and relatives:

  In love, although its tempests vex,

  Our liberty at least survives:

  Agreed! but then the whirl of fashion,

  The natural fickleness of passion,

  The torrent of opinion,

  And the fair sex as light as down!

  Besides the hobbies of a
spouse

  Should be respected throughout life

  By every proper-minded wife,

  And this the faithful one allows,

  When in as instant she is lost,—

  Satan will jest, and at love's cost.

  XVI

  Oh! where bestow our love? Whom trust?

  Where is he who doth not deceive?

  Who words and actions will adjust

  To standards in which we believe?

  Oh! who is not calumnious?

  Who labours hard to humour us?

  To whom are our misfortunes grief

  And who is not a tiresome thief?

  My venerated reader, oh!

  Cease the pursuit of shadows vain,

  Spare yourself unavailing pain

  And all your love on self bestow;

  A worthy object 'tis, and well

  I know there's none more amiable.

  XVII

  But from the interview what flowed?

  Alas! It is not hard to guess.

  The insensate fire of love still glowed

  Nor discontinued to distress

  A spirit which for sorrow yearned.

  Tattiana more than ever burned

  With hopeless passion: from her bed

  Sweet slumber winged its way and fled.

  Her health, life's sweetness and its bloom,

  Her smile and maidenly repose,

  All vanished as an echo goes.

  Across her youth a shade had come,

  As when the tempest's veil is drawn

  Across the smiling face of dawn.

  XVIII

  Alas! Tattiana fades away,

  Grows pale and sinks, but nothing says;

  Listless is she the livelong day

  Nor interest in aught betrays.

  Shaking with serious air the head,

  In whispers low the neighbours said:

  'Tis time she to the altar went!

  But enough! Now, 'tis my intent

  The imagination to enliven

  With love which happiness extends;

  Against my inclination, friends,

  By sympathy I have been driven.

  Forgive me! Such the love I bear

  My heroine, Tattiana dear.

  XIX

  Vladimir, hourly more a slave

  To youthful Olga's beauty bright,

  Into delicious bondage gave

  His ardent soul with full delight.

  Always together, eventide

  Found them in darkness side by side,

  At morn, hand clasped in hand, they rove

  Around the meadow and the grove.

  And what resulted? Drunk with love,

  But with confused and bashful air,

  Lenski at intervals would dare,

  If Olga smilingly approve,

  Dally with a dishevelled tress

  Or kiss the border of her dress.

  XX

  To Olga frequently he would

  Some nice instructive novel read,

  Whose author nature understood

  Better than Chateaubriand did

  Yet sometimes pages two or three

  (Nonsense and pure absurdity,

  For maiden's hearing deemed unfit),

  He somewhat blushing would omit:

  Far from the rest the pair would creep

  And (elbows on the table) they

  A game of chess would often play,

  Buried in meditation deep,

  Till absently Vladimir took

  With his own pawn alas! his rook!

  XXI

  Homeward returning, he at home

  Is occupied with Olga fair,

  An album, fly-leaf of the tome,

  He leisurely adorns for her.

  Landscapes thereon he would design,

  A tombstone, Aphrodite's shrine,

  Or, with a pen and colours fit,

  A dove which on a lyre doth sit;

  The "in memoriam" pages sought,

  Where many another hand had signed

  A tender couplet he combined,

  A register of fleeting thought,

  A flimsy trace of musings past

  Which might for many ages last.

  XXII

  Surely ye all have overhauled

  A country damsel's album trim,

  Which all her darling friends have scrawled

  From first to last page to the rim.

  Behold! orthography despising,

  Metreless verses recognizing

  By friendship how they were abused,

  Hewn, hacked, and otherwise ill-used.

  Upon the opening page ye find:

  Qu'ecrirer-vouz sur ces tablettes?

  Subscribed, toujours a vous, Annette;

  And on the last one, underlined:

  Who in thy love finds more delight

  Beyond this may attempt to write.

  XXIII

  Infallibly you there will find

  Two hearts, a torch, of flowers a wreath,

  And vows will probably be signed:

  Affectionately yours till death.

  Some army poet therein may

  Have smuggled his flagitious lay.

  In such an album with delight

  I would, my friends, inscriptions write,

  Because I should be sure, meanwhile,

  My verses, kindly meant, would earn

  Delighted glances in return;

  That afterwards with evil smile

  They would not solemnly debate

  If cleverly or not I prate.

  XXIV

  But, O ye tomes without compare,

  Which from the devil's bookcase start,

  Albums magnificent which scare

  The fashionable rhymester's heart!

  Yea! although rendered beauteous

  By Tolstoy's pencil marvellous,

  Though Baratynski verses penned,(45)

  The thunderbolt on you descend!

  Whene'er a brilliant courtly dame

  Presents her quarto amiably,

  Despair and anger seize on me,

  And a malicious epigram

  Trembles upon my lips from spite,—

  And madrigals I'm asked to write!

  [Note 45: Count Tolstoy, a celebrated artist who subsequently became Vice-President of the Academy of Arts at St. Petersburg. Baratynski, see Note 43.]