Hello From Gary;
This may not be the “quintessential” statement of Russian culture, but it sure “rang my bell.” It’s a quote from Nikolai Gogol’s novel “Dead Souls.” It’s from Part 1, Chapter XI of the book where the hero is making a hasty retreat from an “uncomfortable” situation.
Bear in mind that Gogol was a Russian that wrote about Russian people for Russian people. As you study this quote, you may begin to wonder if even Russians don’t understand Russia. But for certain they are entranced by their homeland and prideful of its scope and potential.
So here is the quote. It speaks volumes. Hopefully, this particular translation does justice to Gogol’s intent. I’ve copied it precisely, right down to the punctuation EXCEPT that I’ve highlighted key phrases that are, to me, significant break points in the text.
Beginning of quote:
“Ah, Russia, Russia, from my beautiful home in a strange land I can still see you! In you everything is poor and disordered and unhomely;in you the eye is neither cheered nor dismayed by temerities of nature which a yet more temerarious art has conquered; in you one beholds no cities with lofty, many-windowed mansions, lofty as crags, no picturesque trees, no ivy-clad ruins,no waterfalls with their everlasting spray and roar, no beetling precipices which confuse the brain with their stony immensity, no vistas of vines and millions of wild roses and ageless lines of blue hills which look almost unreal against the clear, silvery background of the sky. In you everything is flat and open; your towns project like points or signals from smooth levels of plain, and nothing whatsoever enchants or deludes the eye. Yet what secret, what invincible force draws me to you? Why does there ceaselessly echo and re-echo in my ears the sad song which hovers throughout the length and breadth of your borders? What is the burden of that song? Why does it wail and sob and catch at my heart? What say the notes which thus painfully caress and embrace my soul, and flit, uttering their lamentations, around me? What is it you seek of me, O Russia? What is the hidden bond which subsists between us? Why do you regard me as you do? Why does everything within you turn upon me eyes full of yearning? Even at this moment, as I stand dumbly, fixedly, perplexedly contemplating your vastness, a menacing cloud, charged with gathering rain, seems to overshadow my head. What is it that your boundless expanses presage? Do they not presage that one day there will arise in you ideas as boundless as yourself? Do they not presage that one day you too will know no limits? Do they not presage that one day, when again you shall have room for their exploits, there will spring to life the heroes of old? How the power of your immensity enfolds me, and reverberates through all my being with a wild, strange spell, and flashes in my eyes with an almost supernatural radiance! Yes, a strange, brilliant, unearthly vista do you disclose, O Russia, country of mine!”
End of quote.
Interesting, yes? This is not a madman speaking to us. This is a man perplexed as he struggles with the grandeur, mystery, and pathos of his native land.
Do all Russians feel thusly?
That’s all for now. Next up, more about the fiancee visa.
Gary.
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