Others are more fortunate than Peredonov. Lyudmila Platonovna’s refined senses are capable of perceiving the realm of Platonic ideas; so are those of her “god-like youth” (otrokbog, 357). As long as these reincarnated Aphrodite and Eros do not give in to the realm of dust—as Pylnikov presumably sometime will—they may partake of the transubstantiation mysteries. They attempt to realize these mysteries in their dressing up games which have the purpose of emulating the androgynous being. Donning the garb of the opposite sex, they symbolically unite both sexes in one perfect being.19
The idea of the androgynous being is beyond Peredonov. Also in this respect he is the sly Demiurge’s victim. This usurper-deity firmly implanted lustful desires in his clay creatures (nizkii soblazn, 102) as well as other forms of greed. The crudely animalistic and purely utilitarian reproduction system serves the Demiurge’s power schemes, as it scatters the divine spirit ever more sparsely amongst an increasing number of clay creatures.20 The atomization of the spirit is counteracted by the Dionysiac ecstasies of spiritually androgynous beings who in their perfection demand nothing from one another but beautiful impressions. Such ecstasies fuse the scattered sparks of the spirit. But the majority of people continue to “wallow in lust,” thus fettering themselves to the realm of dust. Lust and dust are directly linked in the novel.
Peredonov thus has no access to Lyudmila’s aromatic world of refined love; her perfumes—symbols of the flesh “transubstantiated” into ethereal beauty—frighten Peredonov, used as he is to his stuffy cage.21 But although used to his cage, Peredonov is not happy in it. His realia world, while made up of gross, solid and heavy building material, such as mud, clay and flesh, lacks stability. It is a temporal world where change rules and where disintegration triumphs in the end, as there is no force in it which could oppose “decrepit chaos” (345). The symbol of this world of gross but fluidly vague realia is the formless and faceless (bezlikaia, 186) nedotykomka. 22 She and the reality she represents elude Peredonov’s grasp (185).
The elusive nedotykomka is described in negative terms, as she is the product of the inexpressible horrors of the realia world. Her gliding movement from form to form (zybkaia pliaska, 341), her incessant metamorphoses, demonstrate the shapelessness of the material world of phenomena. These are open to any interpretation, as the eternal ideas are but weakly reflected in them and furthermore are perceived by defective senses. All phenomena therefore dissolve into that amorphus dust where the nedotykomka likes to hide. Beauty is the only adhesive capable of binding disintegrating mattter into a lasting form. The Demiurge is however incapable of creating beauty. He is a skillful “mechanic” but only the “living God” creates a “thing of beauty.”
The Demiurge has tamed the forces of chaos, residing in matter, and is also capable of keeping them in a state of uneasy equilibrium, as the existence of the material world proves. The clay puppets “exist,” but as their compact bodies are impenetrable to light, these unillumined beings hide dark chaos within themselves. This ancient heritage they frequently express in acts of senseless destruction.
Peredonov is a destructive creature. But his criminal acts demonstrate more than the chaotic quality inherent in all “clay”: they are acts of rebellion. Peredonov realizes yet another “ancient heritage”: that of Cain’s rebellion against his own creator.
The Demiurge is often identified with the Old Testament God.23 In the Sologubian version of the Old Testament fratricide, the role of the shepherd Abel together with that of sacrifical lamb is played by sheepish Volodin.24 Volodin is so like a sheep because he in fact has renounced his human countenance by extinguishing the “spark” within himself. He therefore feels happy in the Demiurge’s world, in which he lives obedient to the “Law” (319). Peredonov attempts to be obedient, but it costs him effort and anxiety. For his attempts to please he is not rewarded, or, in terms of the Old Testament, his “sacrifical offerings” are not accepted. Like Cain’s, his heart becomes “embittered” (345), as he watches how his “brother,” the happy hypocrite Volodin, lives in harmony with his creator. Dark chaos stirs in Peredonov’s subconscious (345), which perhaps still carries the racial memory of Cain’s deed. Growing awareness of existential injustice fills Peredonov with bitterness and fury; these same feelings overwhelmed the Demiurge’s first creatures upon their discovery that they were “clay” and thus mortals. This bitterness was forgotten by the “Abel-line” of mankind, but preserve and transmitted through the line of Cain.
Peredonov’s purely negative rebellion against the Demiurge does not qualify as “Promethean.” This (true) path is taken by Lyudmila. She has understood that a “separate existence” (311) furthers the atomization of the divine spirit and her attempts to kindle the fire of exquisite ecstasies qualify as “stealing fire from the gods,” here the Demiurge and his “archons.” Her fires differ positively from Peredonov’s insane acts of pyromania. These too have the purpose of burning the prison of existence, guarded by the “wicked sorceress” of delusion (cf. the epigraph to the novel), but arson offers no solution.25 Not the burning of houses, but the melting down of the “cages of individuation” offers true liberation. By increasing chaos Peredonov remains his creator’s puppet, a devil’s miniature copy: a petty devil.
As a petty devil Peredonov is a frightened one. He fears punishment in all forms—mostly as death. His pyromania may be partly explained as a death fear. He would like to burn down houses where people have died, apparently hoping to erase death itself in this way. What Peredonov does not understand, however, is that his rebellious crimes destroy only the outer manifestations of terror while the roots of human misfortune remain untouched. It is true that Peredonov has a “counterplan” to the Demiurge’s faulty creation, but it is a poor one. A “beast” and “puppet,” Peredonov can think only of a mechanistic utopia in which machines work, while men satisfy their animality (368, 369). Those moments when Peredonov satisfies some basic need are the only ones when he feels that he truly exists. Therefore he Would like to prolong them (364) into a constant activity which would, furthermore, last for centuries. In Peredonov’s utopia (parody of the land Ojle) men will reach extreme longevity.
But the fleeting moments of reality when Peredonov, stuffing his belly, may forget his fears, are too short to maintain his sense of being. Barred from gnosis, Peredonov ever more finds himself in a phantom world where he himself is a shadow amongst shadows. Peredonov ceases to feel his own reality and in the end he becomes alienated from the very interests and goals which he so fervently pursues (293).
Whereas ignorance caused Peredonov to misinterpret the signs of reality until it eluded his grasp, his own irreality is brought home to him by his fear of observation. In spite of his apparent smugness, Peredonov senses that he is but a “ridiculous insect,” unworthy even of taking up “space” in the world. He feels that he is an “absurd” creature and therefore also an “unreal” creature, as the absurd, by defintion, contradicts the “real.” Peredonov is afraid of being exposed as unreal. The words “observation,” “ridicule” and “annihilation” are synonyms in his vocabulary. Observation to Peredonov implies the judgement of unworthiness and the punishment of annihilation. These elements are evident in is persecution mania, which is founded on his lack of ontological certainty.
Peredonov feels himself subjected to constant observation. The “eyes” (sogliadatai) which pursue him assume various forms, the most” Boschian” being the glaz-ptitsa which “consists” of one eye and two wings (317–318). At times even the sun itself, symbol of the Demiurge’s power, takes part in the “observation game” (317).26 But whatever form the spies assume, they all have one purpose: to observe Peredonov, find fault with him (pridrat’sia, 294), pronounce him to be insignificant, ridiculous and unworthy of existence and finally to push him into the void of nonbeing Peredonov’s situation is that of the rider in the poem The Devil’s Swing (1907). Precariously placed, his clumsy ride and inevitable fall are the source of great mirth to both superte
rrestrial demonic spectators as well as earthly devils. Thus Peredonov’s paranoiac visions express a complex protest against divine (in)justice. Had he possessed poetic gifts, he could have formulated his dark fears and muddled sensations in terms such as these: “Ihr[the divine powers] führt ins Leben uns hinein, / Ihr lasst den Armen schuldig werden, / Dann überlasst ihr ihn der Pein, / Denn are Schuld rächt Bich auf Erden.” 27 Peredonov was born “poor” in the sense of spiritually deficient; he was “made” ridiculous and is punished for being so. In this regard he is an innocent sufferer, pursued by “laughing furies” (318) for crimes he could not but commit, i.e., for being what he is and did not choose to be.
Peredonov’s yearning for an inspector’s post is thus primarily a desire to avoid an inspection which would literally reduce him to nothing. Having a post (mesto) to Peredonov means the certainty that he takes up space (mesto), i.e., that he exists; it means having found a place (mesto), safe from inspection, as no one inspects inspectors. The acquisition of a post is indeed a matter of life and death to Peredonov, as he repeatedly states (346, 390). He can no longer suffer the “withering” glances of ridicule, which mercilessly “murder” him. There is of course ambition in Peredonov’s pursuit of a career, but is is the absurd ambition of an “insect” and “zero,” clinging to the futile hope of becoming the opposite of what he is.
Thus Peredonov is yet another “injured and insulted” petty clerk of Russian literature, one of those who “stung” by vanity, attempt to redress both social and metaphysical wrongs by aspiring to a higher post and who in these acts of “usurpation” are led to their ruin. Their limited imagination sees in the table of ranks the “ladder of being” where they discover “symbols of real value,” “a way of defining a person.”28 Peredonov, like his predecessors, believes that he will acquire a personality by becoming an “important personage.” The higher ranks to him offer the right of unquestioned being.
Peredonov’s combined career pursuit and identity quest show fatal misconceptions, as might be expected. Thus he confuses the concepts “self-knowledge” and “renown.” Seeking an identity, Peredonov does not choose the Socratic path of “knowing himself” but hopes that renown will show him who he is. He dreams of inducing reactions of awe and terror by flinging out threats, which would make other people into mirrors of his self, reflecting his grandeur and thus proving his existence. Peredonov twists the proverb “knowledge gives power” into “renown gives power over being.” The znatnye, he believes, have control over reality (335) and the nedotykomka does not plague them (343). Following the inertia inherent in all untransformed matter, Peredonov chooses “being known” instead of “knowing.” Had he broken “automatism” and chosen the active alternative, he might have reached the goal of his quest: to attain a sense of reality. Renown, the substitute of knowledge, escapes him.
To be known implies uniqueness. The identity of a “distinguished” person cannot be mistaken, and such a person’s “place” in life is safe from usurpation. An anonymous “nobody” is constantly threatened by the danger of being “replaced” by someone equally undistinguished and undistinguishable. Peredonov, the faceless nonentity, is haunted by fears of being “replaced,” i.e., having his “place” or “post” taken from him.
As a “Darwinian” Peredonov knows that “not everyone can be an inspector” (210). In the “struggle for existence” (210) there are only two alternatives: to usurp another’s place or to have one’s own usurped, to replace or be replaced. Peredonov chooses the first alternative but does not enjoy his usurpation activities. His aggression is a “flight forward,” and he sees his denunciations and murder as “defense measures” (340, 415). As a “man in a shell” Peredonov dislikes “expansion” and favors “shrinking.” Had there been a nook dark enough to hide him from “inspection,” he would have chosen to hide.
Peredonov’s persecution phobias are of course based on misconceptions, but they are not entirely unreasonable. Observing life in his town, Peredonov sees that “replacement” is eminently easy amongst “puppets” and “animals,” which have no unique and irreplaceable identity. Substitution constantly takes place.
Observing the marriage market and himself taking part in the “exchange of goods” (218), i.e., partners, Peredonov sees how easily the “merchandise” changes hands. There is no such thing as a non-eligible partner or an irreplaceable one. Anyone may be coupled with anyone else in that dance (macabre) where a change of partner merely leads to a new “tour.”
Peredonov takes an active part in the “replacement games” in town, amateurishly playing his role of usurper. For example, by punishing children who are not his own, he usurps paternal rights. Here, perhaps, he again unwittingly imitates the Demiurge, who punishes his “children” frequently under the same pretext which also Peredonov uses, i.e., that it is “for their own good.”
Peredonov also usurps marital rights, replacing Mr. Gudaevsky in Madame Gudaevskaya’s bed. But whereas the Demiurge, in his usupration acts, goes free from punishment, being on the top of the hierarchy of oppression, Peredonov is pursued by nemesis (260). Perhaps it tells him that just as easily as he replaces others, is he himself replaced. Replacement is possible anywhere—in Varvara’s bed and at school, where the director “whets his teeth” (79), obviously planning Peredonov’s “pulverization.” But “pulverization” also threatens from the “director of the universe,” from him who instituted the whole “replacement principle” by denying men a unique and irreplaceable identity.
Pursued by nemesis, Peredonov develops into a Golyadkin senior, yet another petty clerk “bitten by the bug of desire to be somebody.”29 He acquires his rival and double in Volodin who as amorphous as the nedotykomka and, therefore, like her capable of metamorphosis. Volodin is so devoid of inner content (his chest rings hollow when he beats his fist against it) that he can absorb foreign content into himself, which, in fact, he does in regard to Peredonov, whose speech and gestures he imitates (the scene of the proposal to the Adamenko girl). Even Peredonov has his “ape.”
Whilst waiting for the usurped identity, Peredonov guards his own. Worthless as it is, there are even more worthless ones (Volodin’s). For the purpose of identification he paints the letter P all over his body, an idea which is not entirely absurd.
Peredonov lives in a world where all personal value may be read from similar signs as the letter P. Uniform buttons, cockades, pins, epaulettes and collars determine who you are and what you are “worth.” The dead souls of Peredonov’s town prop up their hollowness by insignia of rank and thus indicate who they are. Peredonov accept the conventional meaning of these signs which to him are as incomprehensible as any others. All of reality is to him a system of signs which he cannot decipher. He merely imitates established patterns and models, e.g., the example of the town official Veriga.
Before his wedding Peredonov rouges himself, because he believes that ruddy Veriga does; he plans to put on a corset—an item which props up a disintegrating form—for the same reason. He chooses Veriga as the idol of his fetishistic cult because he recognizes him to be what he himself would like to be: a successful usurper. Veriga will presumably reach his goal, a governor’s post (132, 157), whereas Peredonov does not reach his, the inspector’s post (178). This difference between Peredonov and Veriga applies generally. Peredonov is a singularly unfortunate “devil” in a world where many a “man” realizes his dreams.
Amongst the genuine philistines, the Verigas and Volodins, these “darlings of the gods,” Peredonov is not an innocent child, but a weeping devil thrown into a world where he is as lost as the purest child. Like any innocent child, Peredonov interprets reality (and language) literally and is therefore lost in a world of conventional form and hypocritical lies. Peredonov is victimized by the Demiurge’s true accomplices: the race of human adults, the liars and hypocrites, the descendents of Abel. These are so evil that even “devils” of Cain’s lineage compare favorably. “There’s so much evil among men that oft
en old Satan suddenly will cry like an offended child.”30 Peredonov is no worse than a “wicked child.”
To sum up: Peredonov’s concept of identity as well as his “model of the world” are reflected in the hierarchy of cards in those games he likes to play but always loses. Some cards have a “face”; knaves, queens and kings are the “big-eyed inspectors” (281). The majority of cards lack a face and are marked only by conventional signs and numbers. These are the “inspected” ones which lose all value when confronted by a “face card.” People are to Peredonov “cards” (342).31 Schoolboys, e.g., are neglible quantities, recognizable only by their coat buttons. Peredonov aspires to becoming a “face card.” Above these there is only the ace, so important that his face cannot even be imagined, as is the case also with the Demiurge. But the Ace needs no face. As a “walking belly” it represents to Peredonov the pinnacle of being—existence as constant feeding (141). This ability remains, after all, the only criterion for reality and identity which Peredonov can wholeheartedly embrace. But is he to be blamed for his pitiful conclusions, or his Saturnine creator who devours his own children? Is he, to repeat the public prosecutor’s, Avinovitsky’s, question—“a criminal or a victim? (143).
Naturally a sympathetic or antipathetic view of Peredonov must remain a matter of personal attitudes. Within the context of the novel it would appear however that the reader is not asked to castigate Peredonov but rather to feel pity for him, as well as all mankind, humiliated by the “human condition.” The reader is perhaps also encouraged to experience fear—not at the grandeur of Peredonov’s misfortunes, but at their humiliating pettiness, which increases their horror. In other words: the reader is offered the opportunity to experience the catharsis which is denied Peredonov himself. Pity and fear would save the reader from sharing in “peredonovism” rather than “laughter” which, presupposing the distance of superiority, precludes identification.
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