Describing his childhood travels, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Goethe's and d'Annunzio's marble footprints reverently pointed out to him by AAA (Andrey Andreevich Aksakov, Van’s Russian tutor):
After that, they tried to settle whether their ways had merged somewhere or run closely parallel for a bit that year in Europe. In the spring of 1881, Van, aged eleven, spent a few months with his Russian tutor and English valet at his grandmother’s villa near Nice, while Demon was having a much better time in Cuba than Dan was at Mocuba. In June, Van was taken to Florence, and Rome, and Capri, where his father turned up for a brief spell. They parted again, Demon sailing back to America, and Van with his tutor going first to Gardone on Lake Garda, where Aksakov reverently pointed out Goethe’s and d’Annunzio’s marble footprints, and then staying for a while in autumn at a hotel on a mountain slope above Leman Lake (where Karamzin and Count Tolstoy had roamed). Did Marina suspect that Van was somewhere in the same general area as she throughout 1881? Probably no. Both girls had scarlet fever in Cannes, while Marina was in Spain with her Grandee. After carefully matching memories, Van and Ada concluded that it was not impossible that somewhere along a winding Riviera road they passed each other in rented victorias that both remembered were green, with green-harnessed horses, or perhaps in two different trains, going perhaps the same way, the little girl at the window of one sleeping car looking at the brown sleeper of a parallel train which gradually diverged toward sparkling stretches of sea that the little boy could see on the other side of the tracks. The contingency was too mild to be romantic, nor did the possibility of their having walked or run past each other on the quay of a Swiss town afford any concrete thrill. But as Van casually directed the searchlight of backthought into that maze of the past where the mirror-lined narrow paths not only took different turns, but used different levels (as a mule-drawn cart passes under the arch of a viaduct along which a motor skims by), he found himself tackling, in still vague and idle fashion, the science that was to obsess his mature years — problems of space and time, space versus time, time-twisted space, space as time, time as space — and space breaking away from time, in the final tragic triumph of human cogitation: I am because I die. (1.24)
In VN's story Soglyadatay ("The Eye," 1930) Roman Bogdanovich (the diarist) calls the illustrious Goethe Veymarskiy lebed' ("the Swan of Weimar"). D’Annunzio is the author of La Leda senza cigno (“Leda without Swan,” 1912), a novella whose title brings to mind Les Trois Cygnes (The Three Swans, Van’s hotel in Mont Roux) and the huge memorable oil (three ample-haunched Ledas swapping lacustrine impressions) in its lounge:
The Three Swans where he had reserved rooms 508-509-510 had undergone certain changes since 1905. A portly, plum-nosed Lucien did not recognize him at once — and then remarked that Monsieur was certainly not ‘deperishing’ — although actually Van had almost reverted to his weight of seventeen years earlier, having shed several kilos in the Balkans rock-climbing with crazy little Acrazia (now dumped in a fashionable boarding school near Florence). No, Madame Vinn Landère had not called. Yes, the hall had been renovated. Swiss-German Louis Wicht now managed the hotel instead of his late father-in-law Luigi Fantini. In the lounge, as seen through its entrance, the huge memorable oil — three ample-haunched Ledas swapping lacustrine impressions — had been replaced by a neoprimitive masterpiece showing three yellow eggs and a pair of plumber’s gloves on what looked like wet bathroom tiling. As Van stepped into the ‘elevator’ followed by a black-coated receptionist, it acknowledged his footfall with a hollow clank and then, upon moving, feverishly began transmitting a fragmentary report on some competition — possibly a tricycle race. Van could not help feeling sorry that this blind functional box (even smaller than the slop-pail lift he had formerly used at the back) now substituted for the luxurious affair of yore — an ascentive hall of mirrors — whose famous operator (white whiskers, eight languages) had become a button. (Part Four)
In his poem Florentsiya (“Florence,” 1913) Gumilyov (the author of “Ode to d’Annunzio,” 1915) mentions Leonardo’s lost painting Leda and the Swan:
О сердце, ты неблагодарно!
Тебе — и розовый миндаль,
И горы, вставшие над Арно,
И запах трав, и в блесках даль.
Но, тайновидец дней минувших,
Твой взор мучительно следит
Ряды в бездонном потонувших,
Тебе завещанных обид.
Тебе нужны слова иные.
Иная, страшная пора.
…Вот грозно встала Синьория
И перед нею два костра.
Один, как шкура леопарда,
Разнообразьем вечно нов
Там гибнет «Леда» Леонардо
Средь благовоний и шелков.
Другой, зловещий и тяжёлый,
Как подобравшийся дракон,
Шипит: «Вотще Савонароллой
Мой дом державный потрясён».
Они ликуют, эти звери,
А между них, потупя взгляд,
Изгнанник бедный, Алигьери,
Стопой неспешной сходит в Ад.
Describing the torments of poor mad Aqua (the twin sister of Van’s, Ada’s and Lucette’s mother Marina), Van mentions Florence:
She developed a morbid sensitivity to the language of tap water — which echoes sometimes (much as the bloodstream does predormitarily) a fragment of human speech lingering in one’s ears while one washes one’s hands after cocktails with strangers. Upon first noticing this immediate, sustained, and in her case rather eager and mocking but really quite harmless replay of this or that recent discourse, she felt tickled at the thought that she, poor Aqua, had accidentally hit upon such a simple method of recording and transmitting speech, while technologists (the so-called Eggheads) all over the world were trying to make publicly utile and commercially rewarding the extremely elaborate and still very expensive, hydrodynamic telephones and other miserable gadgets that were to replace those that had gone k chertyam sobach’im (Russian ‘to the devil’) with the banning of an unmentionable ‘lammer.’ Soon, however, the rhythmically perfect, but verbally rather blurred volubility of faucets began to acquire too much pertinent sense. The purity of the running water’s enunciation grew in proportion to the nuisance it made of itself. It spoke soon after she had listened, or been exposed, to somebody talking — not necessarily to her — forcibly and expressively, a person with a rapid characteristic voice, and very individual or very foreign phrasal intonations, some compulsive narrator’s patter at a horrible party, or a liquid soliloquy in a tedious play, or Van’s lovely voice, or a bit of poetry heard at a lecture, my lad, my pretty, my love, take pity, but especially the more fluid and flou Italian verse, for instance that ditty recited between knee-knocking and palpebra-lifting, by a half-Russian, half-dotty old doctor, doc, toc, ditty, dotty, ballatetta, deboletta... tu, voce sbigottita... spigotty e diavoletta... de lo cor dolente... con ballatetta va... va... della strutta, destruttamente... mente... mente... stop that record, or the guide will go on demonstrating as he did this very morning in Florence a silly pillar commemorating, he said, the ‘elmo’ that broke into leaf when they carried stone-heavy-dead St Zeus by it through the gradual, gradual shade; or the Arlington harridan talking incessantly to her silent husband as the vineyards sped by, and even in the tunnel (they can’t do this to you, you tell them, Jack Black, you just tell them...). Bathwater (or shower) was too much of a Caliban to speak distinctly — or perhaps was too brutally anxious to emit the hot torrent and get rid of the infernal ardor — to bother about small talk; but the burbly flowlets grew more and more ambitious and odious, and when at her first ‘home’ she heard one of the most hateful of the visiting doctors (the Cavalcanti quoter) garrulously pour hateful instructions in Russian-lapped German into her hateful bidet, she decided to stop turning on tap water altogether. (1.3)
Darkbloom (‘Notes to Ada’): ballatetta: fragmentation and distortion of a passage in a ‘little ballad’ by the Italian poet Guido Cavalcanti (1255–1300). The relevant lines are: ‘you frightened and weak little voice that comes weeping from my woeful heart, go with my soul and that ditty, telling of a destroyed mind.’
Guido Cavalcanti is the main character in Gumilyov’s story Radosti zemnoy lyubvi ("The Joys of Earthly Love," 1908). In Gumilyov’s story a signor from Venice wrote a sonnet for Primavera (with whom Cavalcanti is in love) in which her looks are compared to poisoned arrows of the inhabitants of wild Tartary:
В то время вся Флоренция говорила о заезжем венецианском синьоре и о его скорее влюблённом, чем почтительном, преклонении перед красотой Примаверы. Этот венецианец одевался в костюмы, напоминающие цветом попугаев; ломаясь, пел песни, пригодные разве только для таверн или грубых солдатских попоек; и хвастливо рассказывал о путешествиях своего соотечественника Марко Поло, в которых сам и не думал участвовать. И как-то Кавальканти видел, что Примавера приняла предложенный ей сонет этого высокомерного глупца, где воспевалась её красота в выражениях напыщенных и смешных: её груди сравнивались со снеговыми вершинами Гималайских гор, взгляды с отравленными стрелами обитателей дикой Тартарии, а любовь, возбуждаемая ею, с чудовищным зверем Симлой, который живёт во владениях Великого Могола, ежедневно пожирая тысячи людей; вдобавок размер часто пропадал, и рифмы были расставлены неверно.
On Demonia (aka Antiterra, Earth’s twin planet on which Ada is set) the territory of the Soviet Russia is occupied by Tartary:
Ved’ (‘it is, isn’t it’) sidesplitting to imagine that ‘Russia,’ instead of being a quaint synonym of Estoty, the American province extending from the Arctic no longer vicious Circle to the United States proper, was on Terra the name of a country, transferred as if by some sleight of land across the ha-ha of a doubled ocean to the opposite hemisphere where it sprawled over all of today’s Tartary, from Kurland to the Kuriles! (1.3)
In his poem Otyezzhayushchemu (“To a Departing Person,” 1913) Gumilyov twice repeats the word ved’ and mentions Muza Dal’nikh Stranstviy (the Muse of Distant Travels):
Нет, я не в том тебе завидую
С такой мучительной обидою,
Что уезжаешь ты и вскоре
На Средиземном будешь море.
И Рим увидишь, и Сицилию,
Места любезные Виргилию,
В благоухающей, лимонной
Трущобе сложишь стих влюблённый.
Я это сам не раз испытывал,
Я солью моря грудь пропитывал,
Над Арно, Данта чтя обычай,
Слагал сонеты Беатриче.
Что до природы мне, до древности,
Когда я полон жгучей ревности,
Ведь ты во всём её убранстве
Увидел Музу Дальних Странствий.
Ведь для тебя в руках изменницы
В хрустальном кубке нектар пенится,
И огнедышащей беседы
Ты знаешь молнии и бреды.
А я, как некими гигантами,
Торжественными фолиантами
От вольной жизни заперт в нишу,
Её не вижу и не слышу.
In Ilf and Petrov’s novel Dvenadtsat’ stulyev (“The Twelve Chairs,” 1928) one of the chapters is entitled Muza Dal’nikh Stranstviy (“The Muse of Distant Travels”). The characters in Ilf and Petrov’s novel Zolotoy telyonok (“The Golden Calf,” 1931) include the geography teacher who went mad because one day he looked at the map of the two hemispheres and did not find on it the Bering Strait:
Географ сошёл с ума совершенно неожиданно: однажды он взглянул на карту обоих полушарий и не нашёл на ней Берингова пролива. Весь день старый учитель шарил по карте. Всё было на месте: и Нью-Фаундленд, и Суэцкий канал, и Мадагаскар, и Сандвичевы острова с главным городом Гонолулу, и даже вулкан Попокатепетль, а Берингов пролив отсутствовал. И тут же, у карты, старик тронулся.
The geographer went mad quite unexpectedly: one day he looked at the map of the two hemispheres and couldn't find the Bering Strait. The old teacher spent the whole day studying the map. Everything was where it was supposed to be: Newfoundland; the Suez Canal; Madagascar; the Sandwich Islands with their capital city, Honolulu; even the Popocatepetl volcano. But the Bering Strait was missing. The old man lost his mind right then and there, in front of the map. (chapter XVI: “Jahrbuch für Psychoanalytik”)
In “The Golden Calf” Gabriele d’Annunzio is mentioned:
Имя Севрюгова произносилось на трехстах двадцати языках и наречиях, включая сюда язык чернокожих индейцев, портреты Севрюгова в звериных шкурах появились на каждом свободном листке бумаги. В беседе с представителями печати Габриэль д'Аннунцио заявил, что только что закончил новый роман и сейчас же вылетает на поиски отважного русского.
Sevryugov’s name was uttered in 320 different languages and dialects, including the language of the Blackfoot. Pictures of Sevryugov, clad in animal skins, were printed on every available sheet of paper. Meeting with the press, Gabriele d’Annunzio announced that he had just finished his new novel and was immediately embarking on a search for the brave Russian. (Chapter 13 “Basilius Lokankin and his Role in the Russian Revolution”)
One of the inhabitants of Voronya slobodka (the Crow’s Nest), Hygienishvili proposes to throw out the things of the pilot Sevryugov to the stairwell, k chertyam sobach’im:
-- Да вы поймите, -- кипятилась Варвара, поднося к носу камергера газетный лист. - Вот статья. Видите? "Среди торосов и айсбергов".
-- Айсберги! - говорил Митрич насмешливо. - Это мы понять можем. Десять лет как жизни нет. Все Айсберги, Вайсберги, Айзенберги, всякие там Рабиновичи. Верно Пряхин говорит. Отобрать -- и всё. Тем более, что вот и Люция Францевна
подтверждает насчет закона.
-- А вещи на лестницу выкинуть, к чертям собачьим! -- грудным голосом воскликнул бывший князь, а ныне трудящийся Востока, гражданин Гигиенишвили.
"Look here," argued Varvara, putting the newspaper right in front of the Chamberlain's nose.
“Here is the article. See? Amid ice ridges and icebergs."
“Icebergs!” Sneered Mitrich. “Yes, we can understand that. Ten long years of nothing but tears. Icebergs, Weisbergs, Eisenbergs, all those Rabinovichs. Pryakhin is right. Let's just stake it, end of story. Especially since Lucia Franzevna here agrees about the law."
"And his stuff can go into the stairwell, to the devil!" exclaimed the former Prince, lately a proletarian from the East, Citizen Hygienishvili, in his throaty voice. (ibid.)
Describing the first occasion on which Ada had glimpsed him, Van mentions Rose’s purloined lipstick that Marina tossed out k chertyam sobach’im (to hell’s hounds):
Of course, of course, because that was the first time, Ada recalled, she had glimpsed him. In his little white sailor suit and blue sailor cap. (Un régulier angelochek, commented Van in the Raduga jargon.) He was eight, she was six. Uncle Dan had unexpectedly expressed the desire to revisit the old estate. At the last moment Marina had said she’d come too, despite Dan’s protests, and had lifted little Ada, hopla, with her hoop, into the calèche. They took, she imagined, the train from Ladoga to Raduga, for she remembered the way the station man with the whistle around his neck went along the platform, past the coaches of the stopped local, banging shut door after door, all six doors of every carriage, each of which consisted of six one-window carrosses of pumpkin origin, fused together. It was, Van suggested, a ‘tower in the mist’ (as she called any good recollection), and then a conductor walked on the running board of every coach with the train also running and opened doors all over again to give, punch, collect tickets, and lick his thumb, and change money, a hell of a job, but another ‘mauve tower.’ Did they hire a motor landaulet to Radugalet? Ten miles, she guessed. Ten versts, said Van. She stood corrected. He was out, he imagined, na progulke (promenading) in the gloomy firwood with Aksakov, his tutor, and Bagrov’s grandson, a neighbor’s boy, whom he teased and pinched and made horrible fun of, a nice quiet little fellow who quietly massacred moles and anything else with fur on, probably pathological. However, when they arrived, it became instantly clear that Demon had not expected ladies. He was on the terrace drinking goldwine (sweet whisky) with an orphan he had adopted, he said, a lovely Irish wild rose in whom Marina at once recognized an impudent scullery maid who had briefly worked at Ardis Hall, and had been ravished by an unknown gentleman — who was now well-known. In those days Uncle Dan wore a monocle in gay-dog copy of his cousin, and this he screwed in to view Rose, whom perhaps he had also been promised (here Van interrupted his interlocutor telling her to mind her vocabulary). The party was a disaster. The orphan languidly took off her pearl earrings for Marina’s appraisal. Grandpa Bagrov hobbled in from a nap in the boudoir and mistook Marina for a grande cocotte as the enraged lady conjectured later when she had a chance to get at poor Dan. Instead of staying for the night, Marina stalked off and called Ada who, having been told to ‘play in the garden,’ was mumbling and numbering in raw-flesh red the white trunks of a row of young birches with Rose’s purloined lipstick in the preamble to a game she now could not remember — what a pity, said Van — when her mother swept her back straight to Ardis in the same taxi leaving Dan — to his devices and vices, inserted Van — and arriving home at sunrise. But, added Ada, just before being whisked away and deprived of her crayon (tossed out by Marina k chertyam sobach’im, to hell’s hounds — and it did remind one of Rose’s terrier that had kept trying to hug Dan’s leg) the charming glimpse was granted her of tiny Van, with another sweet boy, and blond-bearded, white-bloused Aksakov, walking up to the house, and, oh yes, she had forgotten her hoop — no, it was still in the taxi. But, personally, Van had not the slightest recollection of that visit or indeed of that particular summer, because his father’s life, anyway, was a rose garden all the time, and he had been caressed by ungloved lovely hands more than once himself, which did not interest Ada. (1.24)
Darkbloom (‘Notes to Ada’): Bagrov’s grandson: allusion to Childhood Years of Bagrov’s Grandson by the minor writer Sergey Aksakov (A.D. 1791-1859).
Van’s and Ada’s father, Demon Veen finds out about his children’s affair because of Uncle Dan’s Boschean death. Describing it, Van uses the phrase k chertyam sobach’im for the third (and last) time:
Was he perhaps under the influence of some bright Chilean drug? That torrent was simply unstoppable, a crazy spectrum, a talking palette —
‘— no really, I don’t think we should bother Ada in her Agavia. He is — I mean, Vinelander is — the scion, s,c,i,o,n, of one of those great Varangians who had conquered the Copper Tartars or Red Mongols — or whoever they were — who had conquered some earlier Bronze Riders — before we introduced our Russian roulette and Irish loo at a lucky moment in the history of Western casinos.’
‘I am extremely, I am hideously sorry,’ said Van, ‘what with Uncle Dan’s death and your state of excitement, sir, but my girl friend’s coffee is getting cold, and I can’t very well stumble into our bedroom with all that infernal paraphernalia.’
‘I’m leaving, I’m leaving. After all we haven’t seen each other — since when, August? At any rate, I hope she’s prettier than the Cordula you had here before, volatile boy!’
Volatina, perhaps? Or dragonara? He definitely smelled of ether. Please, please, please go.
‘My gloves! Cloak! Thank you. Can I use your W.C.? No? All right. I’ll find one elsewhere. Come over as soon as you can, and we’ll meet Marina at the airport around four and then whizz to the wake, and —’
And here Ada entered. Not naked — oh no; in a pink peignoir so as not to shock Valerio — comfortably combing her hair, sweet and sleepy. She made the mistake of crying out ‘Bozhe moy!’ and darting back into the dusk of the bedroom. All was lost in that one chink of a second.
‘Or better — come at once, both of you, because I’ll cancel my appointment and go home right now.’ He spoke, or thought he spoke, with the self-control and the clarity of enunciation which so frightened and mesmerized blunderers, blusterers, a voluble broker, a guilty schoolboy. Especially so now — when everything had gone to the hell curs, k chertyam sobach’im, of Jeroen Anthniszoon van Äken and the molti aspetti affascinati of his enigmatica arte, as Dan explained with a last sigh to Dr Nikulin and to nurse Bellabestia (‘Bess’) to whom he bequeathed a trunkful of museum catalogues and his second-best catheter. (2.10)
In Chekhov’s story Chelovek v futlyare (“The Man in a Case,” 1898) Kovalenko tells Belikov that anyone who meddles in his private affairs may go k chertyam sobach’im (to the devils):
Что я и сестра катаемся на велосипеде, никому нет до этого дела! -- сказал Коваленко и побагровел. -- А кто будет вмешиваться в мои домашние и семейные дела, того я пошлю к чертям собачьим. Беликов побледнел и встал.
'It's no business of anybody else if my sister and I do bicycle!' said Kovalenko, and he turned crimson. 'And damnation take any one who meddles in my private affairs!' Belikov turned pale and got up.
In a letter of May 15, 1889, to Suvorin Chekhov mentions Goethe:
Если Вы еще не уехали за границу, отвечаю на Ваше письмо о Бурже. Буду краток. Вы пишете между прочим: «Пускай наука о материи идет своим чередом, но пусть также остается что-нибудь такое, где можно укрыться от этой сплошной материи». Наука о материи идет своим чередом, и те места, где можно укрыться от сплошной материи, тоже существуют своим чередом, и, кажется, никто не посягает на них. Если кому и достается, то только естественным наукам, но не святым местам, куда прячутся от этих наук. В моем письме вопрос поставлен правильнее и безобиднее, чем в Вашем, и я ближе к «жизни духа», чем Вы. Вы говорите о праве тех или других знаний на существование, я же говорю не о праве, а о мире. Я хочу, чтобы люди не видели войны там, где ее нет. Знания всегда пребывали в мире. И анатомия, и изящная словесность имеют одинаково знатное происхождение, одни и те же цели, одного и того же врага — чёрта, и воевать им положительно не из-за чего. Борьбы за существование у них нет. Если человек знает учение о кровообращении, то он богат; если к тому же выучивает еще историю религии и романс «Я помню чудное мгновение», то становится не беднее, а богаче, — стало быть, мы имеем дело только с плюсами. Потому-то гении никогда не воевали, и в Гёте рядом с поэтом прекрасно уживался естественник.
If you have not gone abroad yet, I will answer your letter about Bourget.... You are speaking of the “right to live” of this or that branch of knowledge; I am speaking of peace, not of rights. I want people not to see war where there is none. Different branches of knowledge have always lived together in peace. Anatomy and belles-lettres are of equally noble descent; they have the same purpose and the same enemy—the devil—and there is absolutely nothing for them to fight about. There is no struggle for existence between them. If a man knows about the circulation of the blood, he is rich; if he also learns the history of religion and the song “I recollect a wondrous moment,” he becomes richer, not poorer—that is to say, we are concerned with pluses alone. This is why geniuses have never fought, and in Goethe the poet lived amicably side by side with the scientist.
In the second part of Goethe’s Faust (1808-32) Faust marries Helen of Troy (the daughter of Zeus and Leda, who was born from a swan’s egg). As he implores Ada to leave her sick husband, Van mentions Helen of Troy:
As had been peculiar to his nature even in the days of his youth, Van was apt to relieve a passion of anger and disappointment by means of bombastic and arcane utterances which hurt like a jagged fingernail caught in satin, the lining of Hell.
‘Castle True, Castle Bright!’ he now cried, ‘Helen of Troy, Ada of Ardis! You have betrayed the Tree and the Moth!’
Perestagne (stop, cesse)!’
‘Ardis the First, Ardis the Second, Tanned Man in a Hat, and now Mount Russet —’
‘Perestagne!’ repeated Ada (like a fool dealing with an epileptic).
‘Oh! Qui me rendra mon Hélène —’
‘Ach, perestagne!’
‘— et le phalène.’
‘Je t’emplie ("prie" and "supplie"), stop, Van. Tu sais que j’en vais mourir.’
‘But, but, but’ — (slapping every time his forehead) — ‘to be on the very brink of, of, of — and then have that idiot turn Keats!’
‘Bozhe moy, I must be going. Say something to me, my darling, my only one, something that might help!’
There was a narrow chasm of silence broken only by the rain drumming on the eaves.
‘Stay with me, girl,’ said Van, forgetting everything — pride, rage, the convention of everyday pity.
For an instant she seemed to waver — or at least to consider wavering; but a resonant voice reached them from the drive and there stood Dorothy, gray-caped and mannish-hatted, energetically beckoning with her unfurled umbrella.
‘I can’t, I can’t, I’ll write you,’ murmured my poor love in tears. (3.8)
Pushkin’s poem “I recollect a wondrous moment” (1825) is addressed to Anna Kern. In her Vospominaniya o Pushkine (“Reminiscences of Pushkin,” 1859) Anna Kern describes a scene that took place in Delvig’s St. Petersburg flat:
Живо воспринимая добро, Пушкин, однако, как мне кажется, не увлекался им в женщинах; его гораздо более очаровывало в них остроумие, блеск и внешняя красота. Кокетливое желание ему понравиться не раз привлекало внимание поэта гораздо более, чем истинное и глубокое чувство, им внушенное. Сам он почти никогда не выражал чувств; он как бы стыдился их и в этом был сыном своего века. Острое, красное словцо, la repartie vive, – вот что несказанно тешило его. Впрочем, Пушкин увлекался, не одними остротами: ему, напр., очень понравилось однажды, когда я на его резкую выходку отвечала выговором: «Pourquoi vous attaquer à moi, qui suis si inoffensive?» И он повторял: «Comme c’est réelle-ment celà; si inoffensive!» Продолжая далее, он заметил: «Да, с вами невесело и ссориться: voila votre cousine, avec elle on trouve à qui s’en prendre». Причина того, что Пушкин скорее очаровывался блеском, нежели достоинством и простотой в характере женщин, заключалась, конечно, в его невысоком о них мнении, бывшем совершенно в духе того времени. При этом мне пришла на память ещё одна забавная сцена, разыгранная Пушкиным в квартире Дельвига, занимаемой мною с семейством по случаю отсутствия хозяев. Сестра его и я сидели у окна, читая книгу. Пушкин подсел ко мне и между прочими нежностями сказал: «Дайте ручку, c’est si satin!» Я отвечала: «Satan!» Тогда сестра поэта заметила, что не понимает, как можно отказывать просьбам Пушкина, и это так понравилось поэту, что он бросился перед нею на колени; в эту минуту входит Алексей Ник. Вульф и хлопает в ладоши… Сюда же можно отнести и отзыв поэта о постоянстве в любви, которою он, казалось, всегда шутил, как и поцелуем руки; но это, по всей вероятности, было притворною данью веку… Однажды, говоря о женщине, которая его страстно любила, он сказал: «Et puis, vous savez qu’il n’y a rien de si insipide que la patience et la résignation».
Pushkin’s sister Olga Sergeevna and Anna Kern were sitting at the window reading a book. Pushkin sat down near Anna Kern, took her hand and said: “c’est si satin!” Anna Kern replied: “Satan!”
Pushkin’s poem “I recollect a wondrous moment” was set to music by Glinka (who was in love with Anna Kern’s daughter). According to Van, the composer visited Ardis:
Then Banoffsky launched into Glinka's great amphibrachs (Mihail Ivanovich had been a summer guest at Ardis when their uncle was still alive - a green bench existed where the composer was said to have sat under the pseudoacacias especially often, mopping his ample brow):
Subside, agitation of passion! (2.8)
Uymites', volneniya strasti! ("Subside, agitation of passion!") is the opening line of Kukolnik's poem Somnenie ("Uncertainty," 1838) set to music by Glinka. Tearful Van listens to this romance in 'Ursus' (the best Franco-Estotian restaurant in Manhattan Major where he dines with Ada and Lucette) and recalls it when he wakes up next morning:
'Mne snitsa saPERnik SHCHASTLEEVOY!' (Mihail Ivanovich arcating the sand with his cane, humped on his bench under the creamy racemes).
'I dream of a fortunate rival!' (ibid.)
Van’s “fortunate rival,” Andrey Andreevich Vinelander (Ada’s future husband), has the same name and patronymic as Van’s Russian tutor Aksakov and Nadya Shumin’s fiancé in Chekhov’s last story Nevesta (“The Betrothed,” 1903). In a letter of June 5, 1903, to Veresaev Chekhov says that he is reading S. T. Aksakov's Childhood Years of Bagrov Grandson and in a letter of June 12, 1903, to Mirolyubov that he is reading Aksakov's The Family Chronicle.