Complete Works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky (865 page)

XXXVIII. To his Sister Vera, and his Brother-in-Law Alexander Pavlovitch Ivanov

GENEVA,

January
I [13], 1868.

MY DEAR AND PRECIOUS ALEXANDER PAVLOVITCH AND VERA MICHAILOVNA!

First of all, I embrace you, congratulate you on the New Year, and wish you of course most heartily everything of the best! Yesterday Anna Grigorovna surprised me with a quarter-bottle of champagne, which, at exactly half-past ten o’clock in the evening, when it was striking twelve in Moscow, she placed on our tea-table; we clinked glasses, and drank to the health of all our dear ones. Who are dearer to me (and to Anna Grigorovna, her nearest relatives excepted) than you and your children? Besides you, only Fedya and his family, and Pasha; there stand written all my precious ones, for whom I care. I have received both your letters, the last and the November one; forgive my not having answered till now. I love you always, and think of you no less than hitherto. But I have been continually in such a state of stress and dissatisfaction that I put off answering to a better period; and indeed, of late, I have (literally) not had a single free hour. I have been working all the time — writing, and then destroying what I had written; not until the end of December was I able to send the first part of my novel to the
Roussky Viestnik.
They wanted it for the January number, and I am afraid the MS. arrived too late.

And now, for me, nearly everything depends on this work: my existence, daily bread, and my whole future. I have had huge advances of money from the
Roussky Viestnik
— nearly 4,500 roubles; then, in Petersburg, I still have bills to meet to the amount of at least 3,000; and at the same time I must exist somehow or other — and at such a period! Therefore I stake all my hopes on the novel; I shall have to work incessantly, scarcely rising from my desk, for the next four months. I am so very much behindhand, because I have rejected nearly all that I’ve written up to the present. The book will, by the
Roussky Viestnik’s
rates, bring me in about 6.0 — roubles. Now I’ve had 4,500 in advance; consequently I have only 1,500 to get. If it really succeeds, I shall, in September, sell (as I am accustomed always to do) the second edition for about 3.0 — roubles. In that way I shall manage to live, pay off, in September, about 1,500 roubles of my debts, and come back to Russia. Thus everything depends on my work
now:
my whole future and my whole present; and if the book is in any way good, I shall get further credit from the
Viestnik
in September. Now I’ll tell you about our life and circumstances up to the present.

In that respect, it’s all monotonous enough; while we are in Geneva, every day resembles every other. I write, and Anna Grigorovna works at the outfit for the little person whom we are expecting, or does shorthand for me when I need her help. She bears her condition excellently (though lately she has not been quite so well); our life suits her admirably, and she only longs for her Mama. Our seclusion is to me personally of great value; without it I could not have worked at all. But, all the same, Geneva, except for the view of Mont Blanc, the lake, and the River Rhone that flows from it, is mightily tedious.

I knew that before; but circumstances arranged themselves in such a way that in our situation we could find no other abode for the winter than just this Geneva, whither we came by chance in September. In Paris, for instance, the winter is much colder, and wood ten times dearer, as everything is. We really wanted to go to Italy — that is to Milan, of course (not farther south), where the winter climate is incomparably milder; while the town, with its Cathedral, theatre, and galleries, is much more attractive. But in the first place, all Europe, and particularly Italy, was at that very time threatened with a campaign; and for a woman with child to find herself in the middle of a campaign would have been far from pleasant. Secondly, it was eminently desirable that we should be able to render ourselves intelligible to the doctor and the midwife, and we do not know Italian. Germany was out of our way, nor did we much desire to return there. Geneva is, at any rate, a cultivated town with libraries, and many doctors, etc., who all speak French. We had not, to be sure, guessed that it would be so dull here, nor that there are periodical winds (called
bises),
which come over the mountains, bringing with them the chill of the eternal ice. In our first abode we suffered much; the houses here are shockingly built; instead of stoves there are only fireplaces, and there are no double windows. So all day long one has to keep, burning wood in the fireplace (wood is very expensive here also, though Switzerland is the only land of Western Europe where wood is really abundant) — and one might as well be trying to warm the yard outside. In my room it was often only six and even five degrees above zero; in the others it sometimes happened that the water in the jug froze at night. But for the last month or so, we’ve been in a new house. Two of the rooms are very good, and one of them is so warm that one can live and work comfortably in it. With us in Geneva the temperature never fell below eight degrees; in Florence it was ten degrees
above,
and at Montpellier in France, on the Mediterranean Sea, farther south than Geneva, it was fifteen above.

I haven’t written to Petersburg for a long time, and I scarcely ever hear from them. I am much perturbed by the thought that Fedya and Pasha need money, which must be sent them as soon as may be. But I can’t possibly expect any large sum from the
Roussky Viestnik
until I deliver the second part of the novel, which won’t be, at earliest, for three weeks; for I have already had too much money in advance, and have only worked off about 1,000 roubles; this worries me so that I often can’t sleep at night. Fedya can’t manage without extra help, and Pasha must have his money regularly. I live on the hundred roubles that the
Viestnik
sends me monthly. And soon I too shall need much more than that. At the end of February (by the Style here) Anna Grigorovna will be a mother, and for that occasion I must absolutely have money, and
a margin
— for one can’t calculate with any certainty beforehand how much one will need. How goes it with you? Your letters are real treats to me, and I wish I could go to Moscow just to see you all. But, once more, my future depends on my work. I beg you to write me most fully about yourselves and the children. By-the-bye, I was greatly vexed, Veryotchka, by your letter in November, saying that you want to get a Frenchwoman for your children. Why? To what end? On account of the accent? From a Frenchwoman and even from a French tutor, one can’t possibly (I know it by my own experience) acquire the French tongue in all its subtleties. One can acquire it only by firmly resolving to do so; and even then,
perfectly
to obtain the accent, one needs an extraordinarily strong will. I consider the “accent” superfluous. Believe me, dear Veryotchlca, by the time your children are grown-up, French will no longer be spoken in our drawing-rooms. Even to-day, it has often a most absurd effect. It is a different matter to be able to understand and read a language. Then, if one’s travelling, and it’s necessary, one can make shift to speak it; but otherwise it’s quite enough to understand and read it. What is the Frenchwoman going to talk to the children about? Nothing but tomfoolery; and affected as she is, and powerful as she’ll be, she’ll infect them with her vulgar, corrupt, ridiculous, and imbecile code of manners, and her distorted notions about religion and society. It’s a pleasure now to observe your children. The tone in your house is unconstrained and frank; everything bears the stamp of happy, tranquil family-life. The Frenchwoman will introduce a new and evil French element. While of the expense I need not speak.

Yet another remark: If people want to acquire a correct French accent nowadays, they must adopt the guttural Parisian mode, which is very ugly and offensive to the ear. This accent is modern, and has been fashionable in Paris only within the last twenty-five years at most. Our tutors and governesses don’t yet dare to introduce it among us. Therefore your children would
not
acquire this “correct pronunciation.” But I have written too much about the governess. I am now about to take a rest of two days, and then set to work again. The state of my health has remarkably improved since the autumn. Sometimes I don’t have a single attack for seven weeks at a stretch. And yet I am occupied in most exacting brain-work. I can’t understand how it has come to pass, but I’m very glad of it.

Till next time, my dear and precious ones. I kiss and embrace you, wish you heartily, as brother and friend, all that is best, and beg you too not to forget us. My address is still Geneva. Perhaps at the end of April we may go over Mont Cenis into Italy, to Milan and Lake Como. That will be a real Paradise! Everything depends, however, on my work. Wish me success.

Your

FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY.

XXXIX. To his Niece Sofia Alexandrovna

GENEVA,

January
I [13], 1868.

MY DEAR PRECIOUS SONETCHKA,

Despite your request I have not even yet answered your letter, and give you herewith my
word of honour
that henceforth I will write regularly every month. In my letter to Alexander Pavlovitch I explained, as well as I could, the reason for my silence. All the time I was in such a bad temper and such continuous anxiety, that I felt I needed to shut myself into myself, and bear my woe in solitude. In those days I should have found it hard to write to you — what could I have said? Should I have talked of my bad temper? (It would certainly have found expression, anyhow, in my letter.) But this nonsense is irrelevant. My position was most difficult. On my work hangs my whole future. I have not only had an advance of 4,500 roubles from the
Viestnik,
but have also promised on my word of honour, and reiterated that promise in every letter, that the novel should really be written. But directly before dispatching the finished MS. to the office, I found myself obliged to destroy the greater part of it, for I was no longer pleased with it — and if one is displeased with one’s work, it can’t possibly be good. So I destroyed the greater part of what I had written. Yet on this novel, and on the payment of my debts, depended my whole present and future. Three weeks ago (December 18 by the Style here) I attacked another novel, and am now working day and night. The idea of the book is the old one which I always have so greatly liked; but it is so difficult that hitherto I never have had the courage to carry it out; and if I’m setting to work at it now, it’s only because I’m in a desperate plight. The basic idea is the representation of a truly perfect and noble man. And this is more difficult than anything else in the world, particularly nowadays. All writers, not ours alone but foreigners also, who have sought to represent Absolute Beauty, were unequal to the task, for it is an infinitely difficult one. The beautiful is the ideal; but ideals, with us as in civilized Europe, have long been wavering. There is in the world only one figure of absolute beauty: Christ. That infinitely lovely figure is, as a matter of course, an infinite marvel (the whole Gospel of St. John is full of this thought: John sees the wonder of the Incarnation, the visible apparition of the Beautiful). I have gone too far in my explanation. I will only say further that of all the noble figures in Christian literature, I reckon Don Quixote as the most perfect. But Don Quixote is noble only by being at the same time comic. And Dickens’s Pickwickians (they were certainly much weaker than Don Quixote, but still it’s a powerful work) are comic, and this it is which gives them their great value. The reader feels sympathy and compassion with the Beautiful, derided and unconscious of its own worth. The secret of humour consists precisely in this art of wakening the reader’s sympathy. Jean Valjean is likewise a remarkable attempt, but he awakens sympathy only by his terrible fate and the injustice of society towards him. I have not yet found anything similar to that, anything so
positive,
and therefore I fear that the book may be a “positive” failure. Single details will perhaps come out not badly. But I fear that the novel may be tiresome. It is to be very extensive. The first part I wrote in twenty-three days, and have lately sent off. This first part has no action at all. It is confessedly only a prologue. It is right that it should not compromise the whole work in any way, but it illuminates nothing, and poses no problem. My sole aim is to awake at least such interest in the reader as will make him read the second part. That second part I am beginning to-day, and shall finish in a month. (I have always worked as quickly as that.)

I believe that it will be stronger and more significant than the first part. Well, dear, wish me luck! The novel is called “The Idiot,” and is dedicated to you, Sofia Alexandrovna. My dear, I wish that the book may turn out worthy of that dedication. At any rate, I am not called upon to judge my own work, least of all in the excited state in which I now am.

My health is most satisfactory, and I can bear well even the hardest work; but with regard to Anna Grigorovna’s condition, I am now anticipating a difficult time. I shall work for four months longer, and hope then to be able to go to Italy. Solitude is essential to me just now. Fedya and Pasha make me really sad. I am writing to Fedya by this post. Life abroad is on the whole very troublesome, and I long terribly for Russia. Anna Grigorovna and I live quite solitary here. My life passes thus: I get up late, light the fire (it is fearfully cold), we drink coffee, and then I go to work. About four, I go to a restaurant, where I dine for two francs (with wine). Anna Grigorovna prefers to dine at home. After dinner I go to a café, drink coffee, and read the
Moskovskoie Viedomosti (Moscow News)
and the
Golos
from A to Z. For exercise I walk half-an-hour in the streets, and then betake myself to home and work. I light the fire, we drink coffee, and I set to again. Anna Grigorovna declares that she’s immensely happy.