doctrine of a revdlutionary'assOciation (tovarishchestvo) that has "not just
in words, but in deed, broken every tie with the civil order,jrafji the edu
cated world and all laws, conventions . . . ethics."47 The professional
revolutionary wa£_t‹in)e""lm^sa^^the
civil order through a coldlynulonal ???^?^?^??????^???????, manipulation, and deception. To implement his program Nechaev set up a series of "revolutionary fives," each secret from the other and connected only by a hierarchy that exercised absolute discipline over all. Nechaev evolved the extraordmary 1?‹^???„??^^
involving his fellow revolutiqr^ieiLin_ajCimmi^^inci-
dent on November 2i7j[H62› he and the three other members of a Moscow "???*~??1??1)????^ student and fellow conspinitOTj^aujse_j^i^ ???^^^^?^5?"^^^?????^?^?5^^5???? received from a (nonexistent) "central committee." The Nechaev affair became a cause celebre__ that did not leaveTnF^ubK eye for nearly five years. It took the Tsarist govSiirnernTTwo^yeMsTo™caTch ???????????'??^ 871 to try him. The
a "monstrosity," a survival of th£^gone_^ec^entric" or "metaphysical^
stagT'oTThlsTcrr^TTiey' believed in Comte's and Chaikovsky's "religion of
humanity" rather than Nechaev's religion of revolution.-
WTtn, nowever, the genejaHumJo^^ioJejc^an^the triuinphof_reac-tionary Pan-Slavism, populists were no Jonger able to scoff at the cynical coritJiitiorTof NecEaeTtEaT^o lovethepeoplejneans to lead it by grape-shot?is Tri" order to sustain its all-important vision of a dramatic social transformation in Russia, the populists were forced to OTnsjdertijgjOTg.-neglected question of a politicaldternaweJ?^tocragy. The lack of any parliamentary or legal opposition bodies through which to work and the enduring superstition of "idea-less" liberal reformers left them no anchor to prevent drifting into the whirlpool of revolution.
The siren song which lured them was that of the last great theorist of Russian Jacobinism, PeterTkacheTTHe" was a'v^teran' ????^^??^???????**-' portant conspiratorial organization of the sixties, a confirmed materialist andegalitarian who ha3 led the warofthe sons against the fathers by helping write "Young Russia" and urging at one point that mercy killing be administered to everyone over the age of twenty-five.
True to the tradition of professional revolutionaries, Tkachev was
deeply opposed to ffie~vag^Mes§^nd"o^!ifmsm(3f th^^pulisTbadition; but
urimte"pfeTiouTimeoret^^he saw in" trie
intetegefflsTy-ter^aT^FeltiFd populism the logical social grouping from which to recruit revolutionary leadership. In a correspondence with Engels in 1874-5, he foresaw the emergence of an "intelligentnaia revolutionary party" in Russia. In his Russian-language journal Nabat (The Alarm Bell) published from 1875-81 and aimed only at the intelligent, elite audience, he urged the rootless intpVJ^tnaJs_2f_Rqissin t? form n disciplined, military"* revolutionary organization out of their own ranks. He opposed relying on the popuhsHfhisjon of pej:s^m^sup_port or waiting fOT^^^nwgence of an_ urbanjaoletariat to providejnateriaHor a Marxist type of revolution. The important thing was to""aevelop a militant organization capable of over-throwing the existing regime through revolution. The nabat provided the -J signal to rally for emergency combat in Old Russia: and that was precisely what Tkachev intended that his journal should provide for Young Russia.
Tkachev did not exercise major influence on either the ideology or the
tactics which the second Land and Liberty and the People's Will adopted.
These organizations were true to thar^ojjuHsiJiejitag^to
believe in lETj^sibjih^
and""other groups; in being reluctant revolutionaries and_pooj _organi?ejs whose principal technique of political stru^gle_w^sj^dom_asjassination; and in seeking to[Represent themselves as expressions o£ "the jeQple'iwilL^ Nevertheless, the People's Will organization represents a fulfillment of (if not a response to) Tkachev's basic idea that Russia could and should produce out of its uprooted intellectual community a revolutionary organization with the conscious political objective of overthrowing tsarism.
With the formation of the People's Will organization in the summer of 182^1^^^^°^?^^2?^^~^^^.? ? dramatic prograrn__and^a, nationwide organization *°????_ amp;^^?^??? and organization-that reacl^onaryextre^^
Just as Muscovite Pan-Siavismhad become the policy of the once-liberal government in St. Petersburg, so Muscovite Jacobinism had become the policy of the once-moderate populist counter-government in St. Petersburg. Peaceful, reformatorial optimism in both the government and the anti-government camps" had givejCLway to extremism. Moderate populists like MikhailovsE£]and Shelgunov were carried along by the new extremist en-thusiasm of the l^Trar^moderate lfoeralsimcL.been by the_£arbSlav enthusiasms ofTfi^nght~Tlie^Serist|£^paigns and clandestin^meetnigs and prr^aiiiallOfKiithe Executive CommitteeTof theTeo^^-^Villpro-videH^ftg^mbgovemment forces with^^rm^oFco^flict as colorful and dramatic asme TurkTsTiwarTThe People's Will organization was a prophetic anticipation of and (to a greater extent than is generally realized) model for the next nationwide organization of professional revolutionaries seeking™ to"oy£rthrowtsardom, Lenin'sBolsheyikJParty. At the same time, populist journalists wwe*m^filutiOTaTrzing certain practices that anticipated those of Lenin: ritual denunciations of "enemies of the people," "careerism," and "lack of ideology" (bezideinosf), and a rigid editorial and critical insistence at art must have a realistic style and, a clear social message.
ButJhe^eople'sWillwas still far more deeply rooted in the romantic, compassionate ffioToght-world~of popim'srntnanTnTli^
of TKacEevjjn3 Lenin. Asfme TsaFlay dyingTtyjij^ananii ST^Pefersburg"" on March i, i^8l7Tu^Te^sTsliatfe7ed by alerrorist's bomb, another terrorist forfeited his chancefor escape by rushing in to prop up Alexander's headL with h^sSwripacjyjged_tffiialx The terrorists who were brought to trial
turn to terror and violence.49 Tjje_executive committee of the People's Will addressed its first action after the assassination, not to its own revolutionary affiliates or any potentially revolutionary segment of the populace^^ut^jto^ the new Tsar himself, urging him to summon a national assembly, to initiate reforms ande^^e^a3lie^eliTty!,^f%l6^a4rIEar-
TEeacceleration of the terrorist campaign which climaxed in the assassination of Alexander presents, however, one last piece of high irony. For this turn to_extrem^m_jim^ng_ttie^^u2istsoccurred at precisely the time thafAlexander had begun to turn away from extremism. Serious dis-cussionsJoT social and political reform jyere once more being^mjcUictecJx*5! among the Tsar's inner cjrpj^jjf^adviser?. On March I, the very day of his assassination, Alexander had tentatively approved a year-old project to include part of the intelligentsia and bourgeoisie in the machinery of government. The renewed interest and encouragement which the Tsar had shown the zemstvo movemenF(in an effort*to ehlisf*iTs""support"in combating terrorism) hadled to a rapid ??,??**?, in US-jjtality and political ambitions of this nationwide chain_flf_provincial administrative groups. Journalistic friends of populism, such as Mikhailovsky in St. Petersburg and Zaitsev and Sokolov in Ueneva, were actively working to encourage some kind of populist-liberal rapprochement. The objective possibilitiesjor a broadly basedjpo4£ratejreiprm movemeir£^ieejn/te4iave""bTe^ Populism ananberalism wereEoth St. Petersburg-basedmovements inherently opposed to extremism.
But the People's Will knew nothing about the secret constitutional project that the Tsar had"*approved; and tEeTsar's liberal advisers had no knowMlge"of the jnorejoderjrjsjtrends_that were still pres^mVwithin the
popijllst movemerrtJITie differencgs bj^eena populist intelligentand_a pragmatic liberal were in many ways even deeper^ than those between popu-lism and either^ of the Moscow-based extremist ideologies. Revolutionary Jacobinism, evolutionary populism, and reactionary Pan-Slav imperialism^ all developed out of the iconoclastic revolution. Each position contended that drainatic~^^Sg^^«,et^~afeaut^~raEeplace in*1ruTlrair-h1s"tdry; ancTIt was~gasier JOT-gropon5its crt oBe~SB«h-4dtiulugy tcnffiftnito anotji^tlianto. leave ideoloj›y ImSgeOlei for ? ??1?*?????
??1?????1~???????^?. Once begun, * the search for truth could not'beabandoried ioF~the ptrrsuirof pleasure or the consolation of half-truths. Fragmentary ideas of aristocratic intellectuals were becoming programs for action and articles ot taith in the hands of the new intelligentsia! Wllalevei It mlgMfcrvglMgn, the'Triteffigentsia was to become what katkov feared and" Tkachev hoped it would be: the herald
essel!re~oi4beT5a8^^s offgSus ChriST'. . . was my primary moral incentive" and was at pains to porn? outlibw reluctant all the populists were to
2. The Agony of Populist Art
1 he central fact of the populist era, which haunted the imagination of its creative artists, was that all of Russian life was being materially transformed by modernizing forces from the West. Even in its initial stages under Alexander II, this process had gone far deeper than the massive Westernization of aristocratic thought under Catherine and the extensive administrative and technological changes under Peter. The only previous confrontation comparable in psychological effect was that of the seventeenth century. Like that century, the populist era was distinguished by profound schism and search that affected all of society and culture. Just as the most dynamic and original movement of the seventeenth century was that of the schismatics and other defenders of the old ways, so the most arresting movement of the Alexandrian age was the heroic populist effort to defend the old patterns of life and culture. This similarity helps explain the peculiar fascination of the Russian populists with the Old Believers and the period of Russian history that stretched from the Time of Troubles to the advent of Peter the Great.
Both the Old Believers and the populists were defending a partially imagined and idealized past along with very real forms and practices of Old Russian life. Each was basically a peaceful, non-revolutionary movement which was, however, sometimes allied with violent insurrectionaries: the peasant rebels and student terrorists respectively. But there was a critical difference between the late seventeenth and the late nineteenth century. For the Old Believers and peasant rebels who defended Old Muscovy all had a clear religious faith and a clear idea of the enemy-whether it was the rituals and priests of the new church or the administrators and bureaucrats of the new state. The St. Petersburg populists, on the other hand, had no such clear faith and no agreed conception of what or who was the enemy. They were, for the most part, "repentant noblemen" projecting the anguish of earlier aristocratic thought onto Russian society as a whole. They were determined to overcome their own "superfluousness" by becoming active
agents of a new communal form of social life, anxious to overcome their alienation from the real world by establishing direct personal contact with Russia as it really was.
The desire for realism, for the remorseless honesty of the natural scientist, produced a sense of despair among the young intelligentsia as they went forth to discover the long-forgotten masses. But the certainty that Russia was somehow destined to produce a new kind of society, perhaps even a "new Christianity," rescued most of them from the total Welt-schmerz of the aristocratic century. Indeed, whereas suicide was the besetting moral illness of creative thinkers in the "romantic" first half of the nineteenth century, insanity tended to be the curse of the "realistic" second half. Many of the most original and imaginative figures of the populist age -revolutionaries like Khudiakov and Tkachev, writers like Garshin and Uspensky-went completely insane long before they died. The "mad summer" of the mid-seventies seems at times like part of a confused dream sequence in which the main characters suffer from nervous tics, alcoholic addictions, aimless wanderings, epileptic fits, or neurotic oscillations between extreme exaltation and bleak depression. All of these disorders were widespread among the "cultural pioneers" of the populist age.
One disturbing factor was the fact that the urban intellectuals were looking to the simple people at precisely the time when they were losing their sense of purpose and identity. The peasantry had been confused by the emancipation and was tending to lose confidence, not just in the Church, but in the entire animistic cosmology of Russian rural life. For the primitive peasant imagination of pre-industrial Russia, the world was saturated with religious meaning. God came to man not just through the icons and holy men of the Church but also through the spirit-hosts of mountains, rivers, and, above all, the forests. Each animal, each tree had religious significance like the details in a medieval painting. Belief in the magic power of words and names persisted; the fear of naklikanie, or bringing something upon oneself merely by mentioning its name, was widespread, and one always referred to the devil by such euphemisms as "he," "the unclean," or "not
ours."
Christianity had melted into and enriched this world of primitive nature worship without supplanting it. Religious rites, particularly the ever-repeated sign of the cross and the "Christ have mercy" prayer in the orthodox liturgy, were often little more than an animistic effort at naklikanie-at summoning up God's power and force by endless repetitions of His name. Trees and birds were thought to have derived their present characteristics from their imagined relationship to the events of Christ's life and death. And the revered intermediaries of the gods of nature-swans or mountain
birds-were often brought in for the cure of a dying man when a "wonderworking icon" had failed.
As the mentality of the Russian intelligentsia sought to enter into the plight of the masses, it tended to feel even more keenly than the peasants themselves the waning of these naive and superstitious but beautiful and ennobling beliefs. The vague pantheism of the peasantry was easier to accept than the doctrines of the Church, and it appealed to the romantic imagination of the populists. But they were forced to recognize at the same time that these beliefs were powerless to relieve the dislocations and suffering of peasant life.
The basic cause of the madness and near madness of the populist age was the unresolved (and largely unacknowledged) conflict that existed within the intelligentsia between its relentless determination to see things as they really are and its passionate desire to have them better. It was the old conflict between harsh facts and high ideals-lifted, however, to a new level of intensity by the conviction that facts and ideals were but two aspects of one Truth. The populists followed Mikhailovsky in contending that both objective and subjective truth were contained in the Russian word pravda and that both must be realized by those "servants of truth," the Russian intelligentsia. The optimistic Comtian belief that there was no contradiction between the truths of science and those of morality was particularly hard to sustain in Russia, where analysis tended to lead to revulsion and ideals to utopianism.
The agony of populist art resulted essentially from its unique sense of tension between things as they are and as they should be. The tension between the limpid realism of Tolstoy's novels and the muddled moralism of his religious tracts is a classic illustration. But this conflict is illustrated even more dramatically in the brief career of Vsevolod Garshin, one of the greatest short-story writers of modern Russia.
Garshin was born in the first year of Alexander's reign, and he had an early brush with the "new men of the sixties" when his mother eloped with a revolutionary, taking the four-year-old Garshin with her. He read Chernyshevsky's What Is To Be Done? at the age of eight and developed a life-long interest in the natural sciences while at the gymnasium. With his first short story, "Four Days," in 1877, he proved himself a master of clipped realism. It is a compelling, semi-autobiographical account of a Russian volunteer lying wounded for four days on the battlefield, driven almost to madness not so much by his own suffering as by his inability to explain why he killed a poor Egyptian peasant fighting for the Turks.
When a Pole made an unsuccessful attempt on the life of a Tsarist minister in February, 1880, Garshin suddenly became possessed with the
idea that he must save the life of the young would-be assassin. Garshin wrote and visited the minister, but all to no avail, as the Pole was led through the streets, humiliated, and publicly hanged, in an obvious effort to discourage further terrorism
. Garshin had never been a terrorist, but this action and the general reaction that set in in the 1880's demonstrated to him the illusion of the populist belief that there could ever be an alternative to the horror and cruelty of the real world. Uspensky had already reached that conclusion in his mammoth study of the Russian countryside, The Power of the Earth, which proved the prelude to insanity. Garshin, just before he too went insane, suggested in the manner of Dostoevsky's Idiot that perhaps insanity was the form that sainthood must now assume in the world. His masterpiece of 1883, "The Red Flower," tells of a man committed to an insane asylum because of his neurotic preoccupation with ridding the world of evil. Removed from the real world, he clearly does go mad-imagining that all the evil in the world is concentrated in one red flower in the courtyard. Plucking the red flower becomes in a sense the dying gesture of the modern Don Quixote, for whom there is no longer any place in the real world. He is found dead in the garden.
When they placed him on the stretcher, they tried to loosen his hand and take out the red flower. But the hand stiffened, and he took his trophy down into the grave.1
The dark thought that those within asylums are more complete human beings than those who commit them became a recurrent theme of Russian literature-from Chekhov's uncharacteristically terrifying tale Ward No. 6 to the cri de coeur of the 1960's by the dissident writer whom Soviet authorities had sent to a mental institution: Ward 7 by Valery Tarsis.
The Icon and the Axe Page 60