“Yes, in the midst of a former desert; but now as you see all of the space from the north from that great river on the northeast has been transformed into such a land as that strip of land along the sea to the north of us which was said to be in olden days and is once more ‘a land of milk and honey.’ We are not far, as you can see, from the southern boundary of the cultivated territory, the mountain district of the peninsula is still sand, a barren steppe, which all the peninsula was in your time; every year people, you Russians, are pushing back the edge of the desert to the south. Others work in different countries: there is much room for all and work enough, and life is spacious and rich. Indeed, from the great northeastern river all the territory to the south including half of the peninsula is green and flowering, great buildings, as in the north, stand two or three miles apart, like innumerable great chessmen on an enormous board.”
“Let us visit one of them,” says the elder sister.
The same enormous crystal building, but its columns are white.
“They are made of aluminum,” says the elder sister, “because it is very hot here and the white metal becomes less heated in the sun, and thus although it is more expensive it is more convenient.”
See what else they have devised here: at some distance around the crystal palace are rows of slender, very tall columns, and from them extends a white cloth high above the palace, covering it completely and stretching for a third of a mile beyond it.
“It is constantly sprinkled with water,” says the elder sister. “You can see a little fountain rising out of every column above the cloth which sprinkles water in its vicinity so that it is cool here; you can see that they alter the temperature as they wish.”
“But what of those who like the heat and the bright local sun?”
“You can see pavilions and tents in the distance. Everyone can live as he desires; I am leading them to that and it is for this alone that I work.”
“Does this mean that there are cities for those who like them?”
“There are not many such people; there are fewer cities than formerly—they exist almost entirely as centers of communication and transportation, at the best harbors, and other central points, but they are larger, more splendid than those of old; everyone visits them for the sake of variety; the greater part of their inhabitants are constantly changing and visit them to work for short periods of time.”
“But what of those who want to live in them permanently?”
“They live as you live in your Petersburgs, Parises, or Londons—why not? Who would hinder them? Everyone lives as he wishes; but the great majority, 99 people out of 100, live as your sister and I have shown you, because it is more pleasant and advantageous. But go into the palace, it is already rather late and it is time to observe the inhabitants.”
“But first I want to know, how was this done?”
“What was done?”
“The manner in which this barren desert was transformed into a fertile land where almost all of us now spend two-thirds of our time.”
“How was it done? Is it so difficult to understand? It was not done in one year, not in ten years. I advanced the work but slowly over a long period of time. From the northeast from the banks of the great river, from the northwest from the great sea—they have many powerful machines—they brought clay to bind the sands, dug canals, introduced irrigation, and vegetation appeared and the air became more humid; they took one step after another, a few miles at a time, sometimes only a mile a year, and now they are advancing to the south, and what is so unusual about this? They have only become intelligent and begun to employ their great strength and resources which were formerly wasted and indeed were harmfully turned inward. It is not in vain that I work and teach. It was only difficult for people to understand what was useful, for in your time they were still savages, so coarse, cruel, and thoughtless but I taught and taught them; and when they began to understand it was not difficult for them to work. I make no great demands, as you know. You are doing something in my fashion, for me—is that really bad?”
“No.”
“Of course it is not. Remember your workshop, did you have many resources to build it? More than others?”
“No, and what were our resources?”
“But your seamstresses had ten times more conveniences, twenty times more pleasures in life, and only one hundredth of the pains than those who had the same resources as you. You have proved that in your time people can live very freely. One must only be judicious and be able to manage and discover how most advantageously to employ one’s resources.”
“Yes, yes. I know that.”
“Go to see the way that people will live some time after they began to understand what you understood long ago.”
10.
They entered the building. The same enormous and splendid hall. It was evening and there were great diversion and merriment, for the sun had set three hours earlier: it was the time for merriment. How brilliantly the hall was lighted, but how was it done? Neither candelabras nor chandeliers were visible—ah there it was!—in the dome was a large flat area made of opaque glass from which streamed light—as it should be: precisely like sunshine, white, bright, and soft—it was electrical lighting. There were about one thousand people in the hall, but it could easily hold three times as many.
“And it sometimes happens that guests come,” said the radiant and beautiful woman, “sometimes there are more.”
“Then what is the occasion? Isn’t this a grand ball? Is this simply an ordinary evening?”
“Certainly.”
“But by our standards this would be a royal ball, the women’s attire is so magnificent, but this is a different time as can be seen from the fashions. Several of the women are wearing our styles, but this is obviously for novelty, in jest; yes, they mock their own costumes; others are wearing the most varied apparel, of different eastern and southern styles, all of them more graceful than ours; but the most common dress resembled that worn by Greek women during the refined Athenian period—light and free, and the men are also wearing full, long robes free at the waist, something like robes: it is apparent that this is their usual domestic dress and how modest and beautiful it is! How softly and delicately it outlines the body, how it enhances the movement of the body! And what an orchestra is playing, more than one hundred men and women performing, but particularly, what a choir!”
“Yes, in all of Europe you did not have ten voices to compare with a hundred which are in this hall alone, and there are as many in every hall: they live differently, both in good health and with refinement, and therefore their chests are better and their voices too,” said the radiant empress.
But the orchestra members and the singers change constantly: some leave while others take their place; they leave to dance, or the dancers take their place.
This is their evening, their common, ordinary evening; every evening they amuse themselves and dance; but when else have I seen such energetic merriment? But why should their merriment not be so energetic, so unknown to us? Their work was completed in the morning. He who has not worked to his satisfaction is not ready to feel the fullness of merriment. And now the merriment of simple people, when they find time to divert themselves is more joyous, lively, and unconstrained than ours; but our simple people do not have the means to amuse themselves, but here the resources are richer than with us; and the merriment of our simple people is shadowed by the recollection of inconveniences and deprivations, of poverty and suffering, shadowed by the premonition of what is to come—it is a passing moment to forget need and misery—and can need and misery be completely forgotten? Will not the sands of the desert be overwhelming? Will the miasmas of the marsh not infect the little strip of good land with its good air lying between the desert and the marsh? But here there are no recollections, no fears of need or misery; here there are only recollections of free labor granted willingly, with satisfaction, good will, and pleasure, and the anticipation of more to come in the future. Wha
t a comparison! And besides: our working people have strong nerves and therefore they are prepared for much merriment, but their nerves are crude and insensitive. But here their nerves are strong, as with our working people, and they are well developed, impressionable, as are ours; and readiness for merriment, a healthy, strong thirst for it, which we do not have, and which comes only from great health and physical labor, is united in these people with a delicacy of feelings which we possess too; they have all our moral development as well as the physical development of our working people; it is understandable that their merriment, their pleasures, their passions—are more lively, more vigorous, more expansive, more voluptuous than ours. Happy people!
No, now people do not know what authentic merriment is, because such a life is not yet possible which is essential for it, and there are not yet such people. Only such people could amuse themselves and know all the ecstasy of pleasure! How they glow with health and strength, how handsome and graceful they are, how energetic and expressive are their features! They are all happy, beautiful people leading free lives of labor and pleasure—happy people!
Half of the people are amusing themselves in the enormous hall, and where are the others?
“Where are the others?” says the radiant empress. “They are everywhere; some are in the theater, they are actors, others are musicians, others are spectators, as each wishes; some are dispersed in auditoriums, museums, and libraries; some stroll in the gardens, some are in their rooms to rest alone or with their children, but most of them, most of them—that is my secret. You saw in the hall how checks were blushing, eyes shining; you saw how some left and others arrived—it is I who drew them away, here the room of every man and woman is my refuge, in them my mysteries are inviolable, curtains on the doors, luxuriant carpets which swallow sounds, there it is quiet, there it is secret; they have returned—it is I who have recalled them from the kingdom of my mysteries to light merriment. Here rule I.”
“Here rule I. Here everything is for me! Labor prepares freshness of feeling and strength for me, merriment is to prepare for me, and rest after me. Here I am the goal of life, here I am all of life.”
11.
“My sister holds the greatest happiness in life,” said the elder sister, “but you see here any kind of happiness that anyone could need. Everyone lives here in a manner that would be impossible to better, here everyone has complete freedom, boundless freedom.”
“What we have shown you will not soon come into being as you saw it. Many generations will pass away before what you have sensed will be realized. No, not many generations: my work goes rapidly, every year more rapidly, but still you will not enter my sister’s completed kingdom; but at least you have seen it, you know the future. It is radiant, it is beautiful. Tell everyone: this is what will be in the future, the future is radiant and beautiful. Love it, strive for it, work for it, bring it nearer, bring from it what you can into the present: your life will be as radiant and good, full of happiness and pleasure, depending how much of the future you can bring into it. Strive toward it, work for it, bring it nearer, bring from it into the present all that you can.”
(1862) Translated by Leland Fetzer, edited by A.L.
B2. Three Responses to Utopian Thought by
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky
(1821–1881)
__________________________________
Bobok
This time I’m giving space to “The Notes of a Certain Individual.” It’s not myself; it’s a completely different individual. I think that no other preface is necessary.
THE NOTES OF A CERTAIN INDIVIDUAL
Semion Ardalionovich said to me all of a sudden the day before yesterday: “Will you, Ivan Ivanych, ever be sober? Be so good as to tell me that.”
A strange demand. I take no offense, I am a timid man; but all the same, here they have actually made me out to be mad. By chance an artist once painted a portrait of me: “After all, you are a literary man,” he said. I submitted, he exhibited it. Then I read: “Go and observe that pathological, almost insane, face.”
Allow for the truth of it, but all the same how can you put it so bluntly into print? In print everything ought to be put decently; there ought to be ideals, but here …
Say it indirectly, at least; that’s what you have style for. But no, he doesn’t care to do it indirectly. Nowadays humor and fine style are disappearing, and abuse is mistaken for wit. I take no offense: God knows I’m not enough of a literary man to go out of my mind. I wrote a short novel—they didn’t publish it. I wrote a feuilleton—they rejected it. I took those feuilletons about from one publisher to another; they were rejected everywhere: “You,” they said, “have no salt.”
“What sort of salt do you want?” I asked with a sneer. “Attic salt?”
That they did not even understand. More often I translate from the French for the booksellers. I write advertisements for shopkeepers too: “A rarity! The very finest tea, from our own plantations …” I made quite a tidy sum for a eulogy on his deceased excellency, Piotr Matveevich. “The Art of Pleasing the Ladies” I compiled as a commission for a bookseller. I’ve brought out some six little works of this kind in the course of my life. I’d like to do a collection of Voltaire’s bon mots, but fear it might seem a little flat to our public. What good is Voltaire now? Nowadays we want a cudgel, not Voltaire. We’ve already knocked each other’s teeth out—to the last tooth. Well, so that’s the extent of my literary activity. Though indeed I do send letters around to the editors, gratis and fully signed. I give them all sorts of admonitions and advice, I critique their work and point out the true path. The letter I dispatched last week to an editor’s office was the fortieth in the last two years. Four roubles wasted on stamps alone. I’ve got a nasty disposition, that’s the thing.
I think that the artist painted me not for the sake of literature, but for the sake of the two symmetrical warts on my forehead, a natural phenomenon, he would say. They have no ideas, so now they’re out for phenomena. And he certainly managed to get my warts down in his portrait—to the life! That’s what they call realism.
And as to madness, a great number of people were written up as mad among us last year. And in what language! “With such an original talent … and yet in the end it appeared … however, one ought to have foreseen it long ago.” That is rather clever; so that from the point of view of pure art one might even commend it. Well but then these so-called madmen turn out to be more intelligent than ever. So, we can drive people mad all right, but we can’t produce anyone more intelligent.
The most intelligent man of all, in my opinion, is the one who, if only once a month, can admit himself to be a fool—an ability unheard of nowadays. It used to be that, once a year at any rate, a fool would recognize that he was a fool, but nowadays no such thing. And they’ve tangled everything up so that there’s no telling a fool from a wise man. This they did on purpose.
I remember a Spanish wit who, two hundred and fifty years ago when the French built their first madhouses, observed: “They have shut up all their fools in a house apart, to make sure that they are wise men themselves.” Indeed: you don’t show your own wisdom by shutting someone else in a madhouse. “K. has gone out of his mind, which means that we are now the sane ones.” No that’s not what it means.
But what the devil … why have I taken leave of my own senses? I grumble on and on. Even the maid is sick of me. Yesterday a friend stopped by. “Your style is changing,” he said; “it’s choppy: you chop and chop—and then a parenthesis, then a parenthesis in the parenthesis, then you stick in something else in brackets, then you begin chopping and chopping all over again …”
My friend is right. Something strange is happening to me. My disposition is changing and my head aches. I am beginning to see and hear strange things. Not voices exactly, but it’s as though someone beside me were muttering, “Bobok, bobok, bobok!”
What’s the meaning of this bobok? I must divert my mind.
I wen
t out in search of diversion, I hit upon a funeral. A distant relation—but he was a collegiate counselor. A widow, five daughters—all pure as a driven snow. What must it come to, even to keep them in slippers? Their father managed it, but now there is only a pittance for a pension. They’ll have to beg like dogs. They have always received me ungraciously. And indeed I should not have gone to the funeral now had it not been for a peculiar circumstance. I followed the procession to the cemetery with the rest; they were proud and held aloof from me. My uniform was certainly rather shabby. It must be some twenty-five years, I believe, since I was at the cemetery; what a wretched place!
To begin with, there’s the smell. About fifteen corpses had been brought there already. Palls of varying prices; there were even two catafalques: one for a general and one for some fine lady or other. Many mourners, a great deal of feigned mourning and a great deal of open buoyancy. The clergy have nothing to complain of; it brings them a good income. But the smell, the smell. I wouldn’t care to serve with the clergy here, even allowing for the odor of sanctity.
I kept stealing cautious glances at the faces of the dead, distrusting my impressions. Some had a mild expression, some looked unpleasant. As a rule the smiles were disagreeable, and in some cases very much so. I don’t like them; they haunt one’s dreams.
During the service I went out of the church into the air: it was a gray day, but dry. It was cold too, but then it was October. I walked about among the tombs. They are of different grades. The third grade costs thirty roubles; decent yet inexpensive. The first two grades are tombs inside the church and under the porch; they cost a pretty penny. On this occasion they were burying six persons in tombs of the third grade, among them the general and the lady.
I glanced into the graves—it was horrible: water everywhere, and such water! Absolutely green, and … but why go on about that! The gravedigger kept bailing it out by the bucketful every few moments. I went out while the service was going on and strolled about beyond the gates. Close by was an almshouse, and a little further off there was a restaurant. It was not a bad little restaurant: you could lunch and be done with it. It was crowded, even a good number of the mourners had shown up. I noticed a great deal of gaiety and genuine animation. I had something to eat and drink.
Worlds Apart Page 36