Notes from a Dead House

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Seeing me, Varlamov grinned. I was sitting on my bunk by the stove. He stopped some distance away, facing me, pondered something, swayed, and came towards me with uneven steps, curving his whole body sideways somehow dashingly, and, lightly touching the strings, delivered a recitative, tapping his boot slightly:

  Round her face, white her face,

  Her voice has all a songbird’s grace,

  My dearest little miss;

  In her gown of satin bright

  All garnished for the eye’s delight,

  A pretty thing she is!

  This song seemed to drive Bulkin out of his wits; he waved his arms and, turning to everybody, cried:

  “It’s all lies, brothers, it’s all lies! He never says a word of truth, it’s all lies!”

  “To little old Alexander Petrovich!” said Varlamov, glancing at me with a mischievous laugh, and he almost came at me with his kisses. He was a bit drunk. The expression “To little old so-and-so …,” that is, “My respects to so-and-so,” is used by simple folk all over Siberia, though it may refer to a man of twenty. The phrase “little old” stands for something honorable, respectable, even flattering.

  “Well, Varlamov, how are you getting on?”

  “Oh, one day at a time. Whoever’s glad of the feast starts drinking bright and early; you must excuse me!” Varlamov said in a slight singsong.

  “That’s all lies, too! Again it’s all lies!” Bulkin cried, pounding his fist on the bunk in some sort of despair. But it was as if Varlamov had promised himself not to pay the slightest attention to him, and there was an extraordinary comicality in that, because Bulkin had attached himself to Varlamov since morning for no reason at all, precisely because Varlamov “kept lying,” as it somehow seemed to him. He trudged after him like a shadow, picked on his every word, wrung his hands, all but bloodied them banging on the walls and bunks, and suffered, visibly suffered, from the conviction that Varlamov “kept lying”! If he had had any hair on his head, he would probably have torn it out from grief. It was as if he had taken upon himself the duty of answering for Varlamov’s actions, as if all of Varlamov’s defects weighed on his conscience. But the thing was that the man didn’t even look at him.

  “It’s all lies, lies, lies! Not a word of it fits with anything!” shouted Bulkin.

  “What’s that to you?” the prisoners responded, laughing.

  “I must inform you, Alexander Petrovich, that I was very good-looking, and girls had a great liking for me …,” Varlamov suddenly began for no reason at all.

  “Lies! More lies!” Bulkin interrupts with a shriek.

  The prisoners guffaw.

  “And I strutted before them: I wore a red shirt, velveteen trousers; I’d lie there like Prince Bottlekin, that is, drunk as a cobbler; in short—whatever you like!”

  “Lies!” Bulkin confirms resolutely.

  “And in those days I had my father’s two-story stone house. Well, I squandered those two stories in two years; all I had left was the gate without the posts. Money’s like pigeons: flies in and flies out again!”

  “Lies!” Bulkin confirms still more resolutely.

  “So some time ago I sent my relations a tearful letter from here, on the chance they’d send me some money. Because people said I’d gone against my parents. I’d been disrespectful! It was seven years ago I sent it.”

  “And still no answer?” I asked, laughing.

  “No,” he said, suddenly laughing himself and bringing his nose closer and closer to my face. “And I’ve got a sweetheart here, Alexander Petrovich …”

  “You? A sweetheart?”

  “Onufriev says to me the other day: ‘Mine’s pockmarked and ugly, but she’s got lots of clothes; yours is pretty, but she’s a beggar, goes around with a sack.’ ”

  “And is it true?”

  “It’s true she’s a beggar!” he replied and dissolved into inaudible laughter; there was also guffawing in the barrack. In fact, everybody knew he had been carrying on with some beggar woman and in the past six months had given her all of ten kopecks.

  “Well, so what?” I asked, wishing finally to get rid of him.

  He paused, gave me a sweet look, and uttered gently:

  “So on that account won’t you deign to buy me a little drink? All I’ve drunk today is tea, Alexander Petrovich,” he added, sweetly accepting the money. “I’ve swilled so much tea I can hardly breathe, and it sloshes around in my belly like in a bottle …”

  While Varlamov was taking the money, Bulkin’s moral exasperation seemed to reach the final limits. He gesticulated like a desperate man and was all but weeping.

  “God’s people!” he shouted frenziedly, addressing the whole barrack. “Look at him! He keeps lying! Whatever he says, it’s all lies, lies, lies!”

  “What is it to you?” the prisoners shouted back, amazed at his rage. “You absurd man!”

  “I won’t let him lie!” Bulkin shouts, flashing his eyes and banging his fist on the bunk with all his might. “I don’t want him to lie!”

  Everybody guffaws. Varlamov takes the money, bows to me, and clownishly hurries out of the barrack, to the taverner, naturally. And here he seems to notice Bulkin for the first time.

  “Well, come on!” he says to him, pausing on the threshold as if he really needed him for something. “Knob!” he adds scornfully, letting the aggrieved Bulkin go first and again beginning to strum his balalaika …

  But why describe this muddle! The stifling day is finally over. The prisoners fall into heavy sleep on their bunks. In their sleep they talk and rave even more than on other nights. Here and there people still sit at maidans. The long-awaited feast is over. Tomorrow is an ordinary day again, and work again …

  * * *

  * “Bad, bad” in Tatar. Translator.

  XI

  The Performance

  On the third day of Christmas, in the evening, the first performance in our theater took place.1 A great deal of preliminary effort had probably gone into organizing it, but the actors took it all on themselves, so that the rest of us did not know where things were at, what precisely was being done, and did not even know very well what would be performed. For all those three days, the actors, going out to work, tried to collect as many costumes as they could. Baklushin, on meeting me, only snapped his fingers with pleasure. Apparently the major also turned out to be having a rather decent spell. However, we had no idea if he knew anything about the theater. If he knew, then had he allowed it formally, or had he only decided to say nothing, waving his hand at the prisoners’ undertaking, and insisting, of course, that everything should be as orderly as possible? I think he knew about the theater; he could hardly not have known; but he did not want to interfere, realizing that it would be worse if he forbade it: the prisoners would start playing pranks, getting drunk, so that it was much better if they were busy with something. However, I am supposing that this was the major’s reasoning, simply because it is the most natural, the most correct and sensible. You might even say that if the prisoners had not had the theater or some such occupation during the holidays, the authorities would have had to think it up themselves. But since our major was distinguished by a way of thinking completely opposite to the rest of mankind, it is very likely that I am sinning greatly in supposing he knew about the theater and allowed it. A man like the major always has a need to crush someone, to take something away, to deprive someone of his rights—in short, to restore order somewhere. In that respect he was known to the whole town. What did he care that precisely these constraints might lead to mischief in prison? There are punishments for mischief (so people like our major reason), and for these scoundrelly prisoners there is severity and an unrelenting, literal enforcement of the law—that’s all it takes! These giftless enforcers of the law decidedly do not understand, and are incapable of understanding, that its literal enforcement alone, without thought, without an understanding of its spirit, leads straight to disorder and has never led to anything else. “The law
says so; what more do you want?” they say, and are sincerely surprised that, in addition to the law, sound reasoning and a sober mind are also required of them. This last in particular seems to many of them a superfluous and outrageous luxury, an insufferable constraint.

  But, be that as it may, the senior sergeant did not contradict the prisoners, and that was all they needed. I can positively say that the theater and gratitude for its being allowed were the reasons why there was not one serious disturbance in the prison during the holidays: not a single malignant quarrel, not a single theft. I myself was witness to how they quieted down some revelers or quarrelers solely on the grounds that the theater might be forbidden. The sergeant got the prisoners’ word that everything would be quiet and they would behave well. They agreed gladly and religiously kept their promise; they were also very flattered that their word was trusted. It must be said, however, that it cost the authorities decidedly nothing to allow the theater; they made no contribution. No place was fenced off beforehand: the whole theater could be erected and dismantled in about a quarter of an hour. The performance lasted an hour and a half, and if orders came from above to end it, it could be done in a moment. The costumes were hidden in the prisoners’ trunks. But before I tell how the theater was set up and precisely what sort of costumes these were, I will tell about the theater playbill, that is, precisely what they proposed to play.

  There was no written playbill as such. One appeared, however, for the second and third performances, in Baklushin’s hand, for the gentlemen officers and noble visitors in general, who honored our theater by their attendance even at the first performance. Namely, from among the gentlemen, the guards officer usually came, and once the commander of the guards himself came. One time the engineers officer also came. It was in case of such visitors that the playbill was produced. It was assumed that the fame of the prison theater would resound all through the fortress and even in town, the more so as it had no theater. It was rumored that some amateurs got up one performance, but that was all. The prisoners were glad as children of the smallest success; they even became vainglorious. “Who knows,” they thought and even said to themselves and to each other, “maybe the highest authorities will find out; they’ll come and watch; then they’ll see what sort of prisoners there are. This is no simple soldiers’ performance, with some kind of dummies, with boats floating, with bears and goats walking around. We’ve got actors, real actors, who are playing in gentlemen’s comedies. There’s no such theater in town. They say there was a performance once at General Abrosimov’s, and there’ll be more; well, maybe they’ll only outdo us with their costumes, but as for dialogue, maybe ours will do better! Maybe it’ll get as far as the governor, and—devil knows!—he may want to come and see for himself. Since there’s no theater in town …” In short, the prisoners’ fantasy, especially after the first success, went to the ultimate degree during the holidays, all but to the giving of prizes or the shortening of their term at hard labor, though at the same time they began almost at once to laugh good-naturedly at themselves. In short, they were children, perfect children, though some of these children were forty years old. But even without the playbill, I knew the general content of the future performance. The first play was Filatka and Miroshka, or The Rivals.2 A week before the performance, Baklushin boasted to me that the role of Filatka, which he had taken upon himself, would be performed as it had never been seen even in a Saint Petersburg theater. He strutted about the barracks, boasted mercilessly and shamelessly, but at the same time quite good-naturedly, and sometimes would suddenly go off into something “theaytrical,” that is, from his role—and everybody would laugh, whether it was funny or not. Though it must be admitted that here, too, the prisoners were able to restrain themselves and keep their dignity: only the youngest folk, greenhorns with no control, went into raptures over Baklushin’s antics and stories of the coming theater, or else the most important prisoners, whose authority was firmly established, so that they no longer had any fear of expressing their feelings directly, whatever they might be, even of the most naïve (that is, in prison terms, the most improper) nature. The rest listened to the talk and rumors silently, without disapproving, without contradicting, true, but trying their best to treat the talk of the theater with indifference and even in part with condescension. Only at the last moment, almost on the very day of the performance, did everybody begin to get interested: What’s going to happen? How are our boys doing? What about the major? Will it turn out like the year before last? and so on. Baklushin assured me that the actors had been excellently chosen, each “suited to his place.” That there would even be a curtain. That Filatka’s bride would be played by Sirotkin—“and you’ll see for yourself how he looks in a woman’s dress!” he said, screwing up his eyes and clucking his tongue. The benevolent lady would have a dress with a falbala and a little pelerine, and a parasol in her hand, and the benevolent squire would come out in an officer’s tunic with aiguillettes and with a cane. This play would be followed by another, a drama: Kedril the Glutton. The title intrigued me greatly; but though I kept asking about the play, I could not find out anything beforehand. All I found out was that it had been taken not from a book, but “from a manuscript”; that it had been obtained from some retired sergeant, who lived on the edge of town and probably once took part in its performance himself on some army stage. In our remote towns and provinces there indeed exist such theater plays, which nobody seems to know, which may never have been published anywhere, but which appeared of themselves from somewhere and constitute an indispensable part of every popular theater in certain regions of Russia. Incidentally, I have said “popular theater.” It would be very good, very good indeed, if one of our researchers would undertake a new investigation, more thorough than previously, into popular theater, which is there, exists, and even may not be entirely insignificant. I refuse to believe that everything I saw later in our prison theater was invented by our own prisoners. There is a need here for a continuity of tradition, for methods and notions established once and for all, which are transmitted from generation to generation and through old memory. They must be sought among the soldiers, among factory workers in factory towns, and even among tradesmen in some poor, unknown little towns. They have also been preserved on estates and in provincial capitals among the house serfs in big landowners’ houses. I even think that many old plays spread in manuscript all over Russia not otherwise than through house serfs. In the old days, landowners and the Moscow nobility had their own theaters with serf actors. And it was those theaters that saw the beginnings of our popular dramatic art, the signs of which are unmistakable. As for Kedril the Glutton, much as I wanted to, I could find out nothing before the performance except that evil spirits appear onstage and carry Kedril off to hell. But what does Kedril mean, and, finally, why Kedril and not Kiril? Was it a Russian or a foreign episode?—that I simply could not find out. It was announced that at the conclusion there would be a “pantermine with music.” Of course, all this was very intriguing. There were some fifteen actors, all of them glib and gallant fellows. They banded together, held rehearsals, sometimes behind the barracks, in secret, in hiding. In short, they wanted to astonish us all with something extraordinary and unexpected.

  On workdays the prison was locked up early, as soon as night fell. For Christmas an exception was made: it was not locked up until the evening drum. This privilege was granted strictly on account of the theater. During the holidays, a request was ordinarily sent each day, towards evening, from the prison to the guards officer, humbly begging him “to allow the theater and not lock up the prison until later,” adding that there had been theater yesterday and they had locked up very late, but there had been no disorders. The guards officer reasoned like this: “There were in fact no disorders yesterday, and since they’ve given their word that there will be none today, it means they’ll look after it themselves, and that’s the surest of all. Besides, if the performance is not allowed, then most likely (who knows these convict
folk!) they’ll pull some dirty tricks on purpose out of spite and get the guards in trouble.” Finally, there was this: standing guard was boring, and here was this theater, not just with soldiers, but with prisoners, and prisoners are interesting folk; it will be amusing to watch. And the guards officer always has the right to watch.

  The duty officer will come: “Where’s the guards officer?” “He went to the prison to count the prisoners and lock up the barracks”—a straight answer and a straight explanation. And so every evening during the holidays the guards officers allowed the theater and did not lock up the barracks until the evening drum. The prisoners knew beforehand that there would be no hindrance from the guards, and they were at ease.

  Before seven Petrov came for me, and we went to the performance together. Almost everybody from our barrack went, except for the Old Believer from Chernigov and the Poles. Only for the very last performance, on the fourth of January, did the Poles get themselves to visit the theater, and that after many assurances that it was good, and amusing, and safe. The Poles’ squeamishness did not bother the convicts in the least, and they were met very politely on the fourth. They were even shown to the best places. As for our Circassians, and for Isai Fomich in particular, they found the theater a sheer delight. Isai Fomich donated three kopecks each time, and the last time he put ten kopecks in the plate, and his face was a picture of bliss. The actors decided to collect whatever was donated, for theater expenses and for their own fortification. Petrov assured me that I would be shown to one of the best places, however packed the theater was, on the grounds that, being richer than the others, I would probably give more, and, besides, I was more of an expert than the rest. And so it happened. But first of all I’ll describe the house and the way the theater was set up.

  Our military barrack, in which the theater was set up, was about fifteen paces long. From the yard you went up to the porch, from the porch into the front hall, and from there into the barrack. This long barrack, as I’ve said, was arranged in a special way: the bunks stood along the walls, so that the middle of the room remained free. The half of the room closer to the entrance from the porch was allotted to the spectators; the other half, which communicated with another barrack, was allotted to the stage. First of all I was struck by the curtain. It stretched for about ten paces across the whole barrack. This curtain was such a luxury that it really was something to marvel at. Besides that, it was painted in oils: trees, arbors, ponds, and stars were depicted on it. It was a patchwork of linen, old and new, whatever people could give and sacrifice; of prisoners’ old foot cloths and shirts, sewn together anyhow into one big sheet; and, finally, part of it, when they ran out of cloth, was simply made from paper, also begged sheet by sheet from various offices and departments. The painters—our “Briullov,” A—v, outstanding among them—took care of painting and decorating it. The effect was astonishing. Such luxury delighted even the most sullen and fastidious of the prisoners, who, when it came to the performance, all turned out without exception to be as much children as the most fervent and impatient of them. Everybody was very pleased, even boastfully pleased. The lighting consisted of several tallow candles cut into pieces. In front of the curtain stood two benches from the kitchen, and in front of the benches three or four chairs found in the sergeants’ room. The chairs were there just in case, for persons of the highest officer’s ranks. The benches were for sergeants and engineering clerks, foremen and other folk who were superiors, though not of officer’s rank, in case they dropped in on the prison. And so it happened: we were never lacking in visitors from outside all through the holidays; on some evenings there were more, on some less, and at the last performance there was not a single place on the benches left unoccupied. And, finally, behind the benches, came the prisoners, standing out of respect for the other visitors, caps off, in jackets or sheepskins, despite the stifling, steamy atmosphere of the room. Of course, the space intended for the prisoners was too small. Not only were some literally sitting on each other, especially in the back rows, but the bunks and wings were also occupied, and, finally, theater lovers turned up, who kept coming from the back, through the other barrack, and watched the performance behind the wings. The crowding in the front half of the barrack was unnatural and could have rivaled the crowding and crush I had seen not long before in the bathhouse. The door to the front hall was open; the temperature in the front hall was well below zero, but people were packed in there, too. For us, Petrov and me, they made way at once, almost right to the benches, where we could see much better than in the back rows. They saw me as something of a judge, a connoisseur, who had been in quite different theaters; they saw that Baklushin kept consulting me all the time and treated me with respect; so now I was well honored and well placed. Suppose the prisoners were vain and light-minded people in the highest degree, but that was all affectation. They could laugh at me, seeing that I was a bad helper to them at work. Almazov could look upon us gentlemen with contempt, flaunting before us his skill at baking alabaster. But mixed with their persecution and mockery of us there was something else: we had once been gentlemen; we belonged to the same estate as their former masters, of whom they could not have preserved a very good memory. But now, in the theater, they made way for me. They recognized that in this I was the better judge, that I had seen and knew more than they. Those who were least disposed towards me (this I know) now wished for my praise of their theater and without any self-abasement let me have the best place. I am judging now, recalling my impression then. It seemed to me then—I remember this—that in their just judgment of themselves there was no abasement at all, but a sense of their own dignity. The highest and most sharply characteristic feature of our people is this sense of justice and the thirst for it. There is no cocky habit in the people of being in the forefront everywhere and at all costs, whether a man is worthy of it or not. You need only peel off the external, superficial husk and look at the kernel more closely, attentively, without prejudice, and you will see such things in the people as you never anticipated. There is not much our wise men can teach the people. I will even say positively—on the contrary, they themselves ought to learn from them.