8. Turkish Rushchuk: The town of Ruse, on the Danube in Bulgaria, was called “Rushchuk” (“Little Ruse”) by the Ottomans, who made it a major fortress and city. It was liberated from Ottoman control in 1878.
9. “bolyarin”: The Church Slavonic equivalent of the Russian boyarin, equivalent to the medieval “baron.”
The Voice of Nature (1883)
1. Faddeev … Baryatinsky: Field Marshal Prince Alexander Ivanovich Baryatinsky (1814–1879) was made commander of Russian forces in the Caucasus and then governor of the region, a post he held until his retirement in 1862. Rostislav Andreevich Faddeev (1824–83), a general and a writer on military subjects, was attached to the governor of the Caucasus from 1859 to 1864.
2. Temir-Khan-Shura: A settlement in what is now Dagestan, founded as a fortress in 1834 and granted the status of a town in 1866.
3. Paul de Kock: (1793–1871). A prolific French novelist, author of crude but spicy and often amusing novels about Parisian life.
A Little Mistake (1883)
1. Ivan Yakovlevich: Ivan Yakovlevich Koreisha (1780–1861) was an inmate of a Moscow psychiatric clinic for over forty years. His bizarre verbosity earned him the reputation of a seer, and people of all classes came to have him “prophesy” for them. Koreisha was Dostoevsky’s model for the holy fool Semyon Yakovlevich in Demons (1872).
2. Pismovnik: Nikolai Gavrilovich Kurganov (1726–96), mathematician, teacher, and member of the St. Petersburg Academy, published his Pismovnik, a collection of writings for self-education in Russian language and literature, in 1793.
3. a clown from Presnya: In the late eighteenth to nineteenth century, the Presnya district of Moscow was a park and picnic area with ponds and entertainments.
4. promise … head cut off: See note 14 to “The Sealed Angel.” The tetrarch Herod Antipas was so taken with his stepdaughter Salomé’s dancing that he promised to give her whatever she asked for. At the prompting of her mother, Herodias, she asked for John the Baptist’s head.
The Pearl Necklace (1885)
1. the late Pisemsky: Alexei Feofilaktovich Pisemsky (1826–81), distinguished novelist and playwright, was a realist of a dark turn of mind, skeptical of the liberal reforms of the 1860s.
2. in which … man: A slightly altered quotation from Pushkin’s Evgeny Onegin, chapter 7, stanza 22.
3. the late poet Tolstoy: See note 2 to “The Enchanted Wanderer.” The line is from stanza 35 of Tolstoy’s satirical poem “The Dream of Councilor Popov” (1873), which spread widely through Russia in handwritten copies.
4. the altar of Themis: Themis was an ancient Greek titaness, an oracle at Delphi, the goddess of divine order and justice.
5. “The joy of Rus’ is to drink”: The Primary Chronicle, compiled in Kiev around 1113, attributes these words to Prince Vladimir, who supposedly rejected Islam because it prohibits alcohol.
6. Princess Yusupov … Gorgibus: Princess Tatyana Vasilievna Yusupov (1769–1848) indeed had a famous collection of precious gems, but the “pearl of Gorgibus,” a 126-carat pear-shaped pearl, was brought from the Indies by Gorgibus of Calais and sold to King Philip IV of Spain (1605–65).
7. a prosphora: A small, round bread especially blessed for holy communion.
8. ‘Bourguignon’: The firm of Bourguignon, on the boulevard des Capucines in Paris, specialized in making imitation jewelry.
9. Rurik and Gediminas: That is, the ancient ruling dynasties of Russia and Lithuania, respectively.
The Spook (1885)
1. the kikimora: A female house spirit in Slavic folklore, sometimes married to the house demon (domovoi).
2. “of Catherine’s planting”: That is, planted in the time of Catherine the Great (see note 1 to “Singlemind”).
3. Baba Yaga: A wicked witch in Russian folklore, who lives in the forest in a hut on chicken’s legs and rides around in an enormous mortar, steering it with a broom.
4. the class of rhetoric in the seminary: Seminaries were the only educational institutions open to children of the peasant and merchant classes in Russia. Their students were not necessarily preparing for the priesthood.
5. white Nezhin roots …: That is, crude local tobacco. Nezhin, in Chernigov province to the west of Orel, was a center of the tobacco industry.
6. the Python, Cerberus, and their ilk: In Greek mythology, the Python was the gigantic serpent that guarded the oracle at Delphi and Cerberus was the three-headed hound that guarded the entrance to the underworld.
7. Varus … Teutoburg: Publius Quintilius Varus (46 BC–9 AD), a Roman patrician and general under Augustus Caesar (63 BC–19 AD), was defeated by a confederation of Germanic troops under the general Arminius at the battle of Teutoburg in Germany, where his three legions were annihilated.
8. the schismatic village of Kolchevo: That is, a village inhabited by Old Believers (see note 6 to “Lady Macbeth”).
9. the Orel priest Ostromyslenny: Father Efim Ostromyslenny (or Ostromyslensky) was a priest in Orel and taught religion in the Orel high school. Leskov was one of his grateful students and mentions him a number of times in his work.
10. because your eye was dark: See Matthew 6:22–23: “The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness” (Revised Standard Version). Also Luke 11:34.
The Man on Watch (1887)
1. Nikolai Ivanovich Miller …: Lieutenant General Nikolai Ivanovich Miller (d. 1889), after retiring from the army, was first an inspector then the director of the Alexandrovsky Lycée, founded by Alexander I for the education of the elite of the nobility.
2. Nikolai Pavlovich: See note 8 to “Lefty.” The emperor Nicholas I was known for the military strictness of his rule.
3. the Jordan entrance: The entrance to the imperial palace from the Neva embankment, where the “Jordan” ice hole was located, cut in the ice for the blessing of the waters on the feast of Theophany (see note 19 to “Singlemind”).
4. Kokoshkin … Svinyin: Sergei Alexandrovich Kokoshkin (1795–1861), formerly an infantry general, served as superintendent of police in Petersburg from 1830 to 1847. He was a favorite of Nicholas I. By 1839 Nikita Petrovich Svinyin had already been a lieutenant colonel in the Izmailovsky Regiment for six years.
5. the grand duke Mikhail Pavlovich: Mikhail Pavlovich Romanov (1798–1849), the fourth son of the emperor Paul I (see note 23 to “Singlemind”), was at that time a colonel of the guards.
6. in Gogol’s comedy: See note 9 to “Singlemind.” The reference is to act 3, scene 6, where the number of messengers is actually thirty-five thousand.
7. Peter’s Little House: The oldest building in Petersburg, a small wooden house on the Petrovskaya Embankment, built for Peter the Great in 1703 and now a museum. During the reign of Nicholas I, the dining room was turned into a chapel and the icon of the Savior that Peter the Great used to take with him on campaign was placed in it.
8. the Peter-and-Paul Fortress: See note 14 to “Lefty.”
9. a certain bishop …: The bishop in question is thought to be Metropolitan Filaret Drozdov (see note 3 to “The Enchanted Wanderer”).
10. of the earth, earthy: See 1 Corinthians 15:47 (“The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven”).
A Robbery (1887)
1. “With the pure … froward”: Psalm 18:26.
2. the famous fires … Trubetskoy: Pyotr Ivanovich Trubetskoy (1798–1871), governor of Orel province, is mentioned frequently in Leskov’s work. For the “famous fires,” see note 1 to “Deathless Golovan.”
3. churchly faith … Father Efim … Old Believers: For “churchly faith” and Old Believers, see note 6 to “Lady Macbeth.” For Father Efim, see note 9 to “The Spook.”
4. Kamensky … Turchaninov … Molotkovsky: For Kamensky, see note 4 to “The Toupee Artist.” After Kamensky’s death, the theater was taken over by the entrepreneurs Turchaninov and Molotkovsky.
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5. rebaptized girls: See note 13 to “Deathless Golovan.”
6. the great martyr Barbara …: Little is known about the third-century St. Barbara, known as “the Great Martyr Barbara” in the Orthodox Church. An akathist is a special prayer service.
7. our deliverance from the Gauls: That is, from the Grande Armée of Napoleon, which was driven out of Russia in 1812.
8. Tula … samovarniks …: See note 12 to “Lefty.”
9. ‘Many Years’ … ‘Memory Eternal’: Well-known Orthodox hymns wishing long life for the living and peace and God’s memory for the dead.
10. ‘Except the Lord … but in vain’: A conflated variant of Psalm 127:1 (“Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it; except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain”).
11. Alfred … in people’s houses: The reference is probably to the eighteenth-century folk drama Of King Maximilian and His Disobedient Son Adolph. Either Misha or Leskov has mistaken the name.
12. “It is meet and right” … “Rest Eternal”: Various phrases from the preparation of communion, the reading of the Gospel, and the commemoration of the dead.
13. wailing woefully: An imprecise quotation from the seventeenth-century “Tale of Woe and Grief and How Woeful-Grief Drove a Young Man to Monkhood.”
14. “Lord, save us … Arid”: See Psalm 59:2 (“Deliver me from the workers of iniquity, and save me from bloody men”). It is not clear whom the aunt means by Arid. It has been suggested that she means Jared, a fifth-generation descendant of Adam, but he is distinguished only by his longevity. She may mean Herod.
15. the marshal of the nobility: See note 34 to “The Enchanted Wanderer.”
16. zertsalo: See note 16 to “Singlemind.”
A Note About the Author
Nikolai Leskov was born in 1831 in the village of Gorokhovo in Russia. He began his writing career as a journalist living in Kiev, and later settled in St. Petersburg, where he published many short stories and novellas, including The Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (1865), The Sealed Angel (1873), The Enchanted Wanderer (1873), and Lefty (1882). He died in February 1895.
Together, Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky have translated works by Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov, Gogol, Bulgakov, and Pasternak. They were twice awarded the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize (for their versions of Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov and Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina), and their translation of Dostoevsky’s Demons was one of three nominees for the same prize. They are married and live in France.
Other titles available in eBook format by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky:
The Adolescent • 978-0-307-42811-0
The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol • 978-0-307-80336-8
Crime and Punishment • 978-0-307-82960-3
Dead Souls • 978-0-307-79781-0
The Death of Ivan llyich and Other Stories • 978-0-307-27332-1
Demons • 978-0-307-43486-9
Doctor Zhivago • 978-0-307-37996-2
The Double and The Gambler • 978-0-307-27971-2
The Duel • 978-0-307-74296-4
The Idiot • 978-0-553-90189-4
Notes from Underground • 978-0-307-78464-3
War and Peace • 978-0-307-80658-1
For more information, please visit www.aaknopf.com
Also Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
The Eternal Husband and Other Stories by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
The Collected Tales of Nikolai Gogol
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Selected Stories by Anton Chekhov
The Complete Short Novels of Anton Chekhov
The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Adolescent by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Double and The Gambler by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Other Stories by Leo Tolstoy
Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
The Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories Page 71