The characters in VN's novel Bend Sinister (1947) include Krug's friend Ember (a Shakespeare specialist). Three months of the year, September, November and December, end in ember. In Krylov's fable Lzhets ("The Liar," 1811) the Liar uses the phrase kruglyi bozhiy god (the whole God's year):
Из дальних странствий возвратясь,
Какой-то дворянин (а может быть, и князь),
С приятелем своим пешком гуляя в поле,
Расхвастался о том, где он бывал,
И к былям небылиц без счету прилыгал.
«Нет», говорит: «что я видал,
Того уж не увижу боле.
Что́ здесь у вас за край?
То холодно, то очень жарко,
То солнце спрячется, то светит слишком ярко.
Вот там-то прямо рай!
И вспомнишь, так душе отрада!
Ни шуб, ни свеч совсем не надо:
Не знаешь век, что есть ночная тень,
И круглый божий год все видишь майский день.
Никто там ни садит, ни сеет:
А если б посмотрел, что́ там растет и зреет!
Вот в Риме, например, я видел огурец:
Ах, мой творец!
И по сию не вспомнюсь пору!
Поверишь ли? ну, право, был он с гору».—
«Что за диковина!» приятель отвечал:
«На свете чудеса рассеяны повсюду;
Да не везде их всякий примечал.
Мы сами, вот, теперь подходим к чуду,
Какого ты нигде, конечно, не встречал,
И я в том спорить буду.
Вон, видишь ли через реку тот мост,
Куда нам путь лежит? Он с виду хоть и прост,
А свойство чудное имеет:
Лжец ни один у нас по нем пройти не смеет:
До половины не дойдет —
Провалится и в воду упадет;
Но кто не лжет,
Ступай по нем, пожалуй, хоть в карете».—
«А какова у вас река?» —
«Да не мелка.
Так видишь ли, мой друг, чего-то нет на свете!
Хоть римский огурец велик, нет спору в том,
Ведь с гору, кажется, ты так сказал о нем?» —
«Гора хоть не гора, но, право, будет с дом». —
«Поверить трудно!
Однако ж как ни чудно,
А всё чудён и мост, по коем мы пойдем,
Что он Лжеца никак не подымает;
И нынешней еще весной
С него обрушились (весь город это знает)
Два журналиста, да портной.
Бесспорно, огурец и с дом величиной
Диковинка, коль это справедливо».—
«Ну, не такое еще диво;
Ведь надо знать, как вещи есть:
Не думай, что везде по-нашему хоромы;
Что там за домы:
В один двоим за нужду влезть,
И то ни стать, ни сесть!» —
«Пусть так, но всё признаться должно,
Что огурец не грех за диво счесть,
В котором двум усесться можно.
Однако ж, мост-ат наш каков,
Что Лгун не сделает на нем пяти шагов,
Как тотчас в воду!
Хоть римский твой и чуден огурец...» —
«Послушай-ка», тут перервал мой Лжец:
«Чем на мост нам итти, поищем лучше броду».
From distant travelling on his return to home,
One nobleman (perhaps, he was a Prince) ,
While walking through the field, was bragging over
The places, where he had been,
and alternated truth with lie.
'Wow! - he said, - What I had seen there,
I'll never see again. Look at your land!
It has the cold winter and hot summer,
Your sun always hides, or shines so bright to dazzle.
But if you take the place,
where I was feeling a delight,
That was the real Paradise!
You have no any need to wear fur-coat,
And it is so bright, you need not any candle in the night,
The whole year you are fond of weather,
Which here is only in spring.
And no one is sowing a seed - but everywhere
You'll see the fields with crops and greens.
For example, I had seen in Rome such great a cucumber,
That was like a huge mountain! '
His freind said: 'Oh, this miracle
Is not peculiar, surprises are scattered everywhere,
It's only a work of noticing, rather.
Look, we are getting closer to one of them,
Which, I dare say, you haven't seen before. I shan't
Discuss the matter,
But do you see the bridge in front?
It looks so simple in the view,
But has a miraculous quality: no any
Of liars could cross a river,
At middle he is falling through or down the bridge into the water.
But if you're not a liar - you are free
To step on it whether by feet, or a coach'.
'But is it deep? ' 'Of course. You see
That miracles are not so mere in the sight!
Though the roman cocumber is large,
Is as a mountain, as you
have said, ain't so? '
'Yes! But not so large as a mountain, perhaps, as a house.'
'It's hard to believe in that.
But here is the magic bridge, which we shall cross.
It is not worth for liars, in this spring
Two journalists and the tailor had fallen from it,
All the town was talking all about this.
So, cucumber with size as a house may be strange,
But bridge is also.' 'Oh, no.
Don't think that houses there are giant so.
If you try getting there inside, it only two like me will hold,
And it is hard here even to stand or seat! '
'Oh, let it be so. But taking matter this,
The cucumber, which two of men contains, is not so strange,
But if you take this bridge...
Where you even coudn't make five steps forward,
Then suddenly - you'll fall in water!
Oh, may be cucumber so queer, but...'
'Oh, please, stop', - thus the liar said, -
'Instead of going on bridge,
It's better looking for a ford! '
(tr. L. Purgina)
Gurke being German for "cucumber," the huge ogurets (cucumber) in Krylov's fable brings to mind Gurk, the soldier whose name the grocer puts on Krug's pass as they cross the Kur river that flows in Padukgrad:
'It is the man who knows Gurk's cousin,' cried one of the soldiers in a burst of recognition.
'Ah, excellent,' said Krug much relieved. 'I was forgetting the gentle gardener. So one point is settled. Now, come on, do something.'
The pale grocer stepped forward and said:
'I have a suggestion to make. I sign his, he signs mine, and we both cross,'
Somebody was about to cuff him, but the fat soldier, who seemed to be the leader of the group, intervened and remarked that it was a sensible idea.
'Lend me your back,' said the grocer to Krug; and hastily unscrewing his fountain pen, he proceeded to press the paper against Krug's left shoulder blade. 'What name shall I put, brothers?' he asked of the soldiers.
They shuffled and nudged each other, none of them willing to disclose a cherished incognito.
'Put Gurk,' said the bravest at last, pointing to the fat soldier.
'Shall I?' asked the grocer, turning nimbly to Gurk.
They got his consent after a little coaxing. Having dealt with Krug's pass, the grocer in his turn stood before Krug. Leapfrog, or the admiral in his cocked hat resting the telescope on the young sailor's shoulder (the grey horizon going seesaw, a white gull veering, but no land in sight).
'I hope,' said Krug, 'that I will be able to do it as nicely as I would if I had my glasses.'
On the dotted line it will not be. Your pen is hard. Your back is soft. Cucumber. Blot it with a branding iron.
Both papers were passed around and bashfully approved of.
Krug and the grocer started walking across the bridge; at least Krug walked: his little companion expressed his delirious joy by running in circles around Krug, he ran in widening circles and imitated a railway engine: chug-chug, his elbows pressed to his ribs, his feet moving almost together, taking small firm staccato steps with knees slightly bent. Parody of a child — my child.
'Stoy, chort [stop, curse you],' cried Krug, for the first time that night using his real voice.
The grocer ended his gyrations by a spiral that brought him back into Krug's orbit whereupon he fell in with the latter's stride and walked beside him, chatting airily. (Chapter 2)
The Kur River brings to mind Krylov's fable Oryol i kury ("The Eagle and the Hens," 1808):
Желая светлым днём вполне налюбоваться,
Орёл поднебесью летал
И там гулял,
Где молнии родятся.
Спустившись, наконец, из облачных вышин,
Царь-птица отдыхать садится на овин.
Хоть это для Орла насесток незавидный,
Но у Царей свои причуды есть:
Быть может, он хотел овину сделать честь,
Иль не было вблизи, ему по чину сесть,
Ни дуба, ни скалы гранитной;
Не знаю, что за мысль, но только что Орел
Не много посидел
И тут же на другой овин перелетел.
Увидя то, хохлатая наседка
Толкует так с своей кумой:
«За что Орлы в чести такой?
Неужли за полет, голубушка соседка?
Ну, право, если захочу,
С овина на овин и я перелечу.
Не будем же вперед такие дуры,
Чтоб почитать Орлов знатнее нас.
Не больше нашего у них ни ног, ни глаз;
Да ты же видела сейчас,
Что понизу они летают так, как куры».
Орел ответствует, наскуча вздором тем:
«Ты права, только не совсем.
Орлам случается и ниже кур спускаться;
Но курам никогда до облак не подняться!»
____
Когда таланты судишь ты, —
Считать их слабости трудов не трать напрасно;
Но, чувствуя, что в них и сильно, и прекрасно,
Умей различны их постигнуть высоты.
An Eagle was once flying in the sky
But suddenly (I don't know why)
He landed on a barn to rest.
Although the barn is not
A proper roost
For an eagle, but it
Might be, I don't know what...
Perhaps, he wanted just to boost
This farm, or there was no other seat,
Like an oak,
Or a rock
Made of granite.
Well, anyway, he rested there a bit
And then flew over the yard
To sit
Just on another barn.
Looking at this, a Hen
Said to her friend,
"My dear, tell me then,
What for all they
So much esteem and
Tribute pay
To eagles. Why?!
From a barn to barn,
That far,
I often fly
Myself. 'Tis such
A stupid thing
To honor this Eagle that much;
He has two legs, two wings,
Two eyes,
Like us,
And even he flies
Like us.
And you just witness that
Eagle's flight
It is not any better
Than hen's.
And, thus,
And hence,
As the fact of a matter,
Indeed,...
The Eagle listen to it
And finally said,
"In general, you're right
Sometimes the eagle's flight
Is even lower than
That of a hen,
And yet,
(Please notice that)
A Hen, however hard she tries,
Still cannot reach the skies".
____
Dear reader, remember this:
When talents you've to judge,
It would be amiss,
To count their weak sides
And grudge.
Instead, an'expert discovers
Their gifts and powers
And after that decides
About their different heights.
(tr. V. Gurvich)
The title of Krylov's fable reminds one of the Russian cities Oryol and Kursk. The latter city was named after the Kur, a rivulet that flows in Kursk. The first line of Chapter One of Pushkin's Eugene Onegin, Moy dyadya samykh chestnykh pravil ("My uncle has most honest principles"), is an allusion to Line 4 of Krylov's fable Osyol i muzhik ("The Donkey and the Boor," 1819), Osyol byl samykh chestnykh pravil ("The donkey had most honest principles"). Like Pushkin's Onegin, VN was born upon the Neva's banks. Padukgrad hints at Leningrad (the name of St. Petersburg, Onegin's and VN's home city, in 1924-91). The name Krug brings to mind Kogda by zhizn' domashnim krugom (if life by the domestic circle), a phrase used by Onegin as he speaks to Tatiana (EO, Four: XIII: 1):
Когда бы жизнь домашним кругом
Я ограничить захотел;
Когда б мне быть отцом, супругом
Приятный жребий повелел;
Когда б семейственной картиной
Пленился я хоть миг единый, —
То верно б, кроме вас одной,
Невесты не искал иной.
Скажу без блесток мадригальных:
Нашед мой прежний идеал,
Я верно б вас одну избрал
В подруги дней моих печальных,
Всего прекрасного в залог,
И был бы счастлив… сколько мог!
“If I by the domestic circle
had wanted to bound life;
if to be father, husband,
a pleasant lot had ordered me;
if with the familistic picture
I were but for one moment captivated;
then, doubtlessly, save you alone
no other bride I'd seek.
I'll say without madrigal spangles:
my past ideal having found,
I'd doubtlessly have chosen you alone
for mate of my sad days, in gage
of all that's beautiful, and would have been
happy — in so far as I could!
Adam Krug has the same first name as Adam Smith, Onegin's favorite author:
Высокой страсти не имея
Для звуков жизни не щадить,
Не мог он ямба от хорея,
Как мы ни бились, отличить.
Бранил Гомера, Феокрита;
Зато читал Адама Смита
И был глубокий эконом,
То есть умел судить о том,
Как государство богатеет,
И чем живёт, и почему
Не нужно золота ему,
Когда простой продукт имеет.
Отец понять его не мог
И земли отдавал в залог.
Lacking the lofty passion not to spare
life for the sake of sounds,
an iamb from a trochee —
no matter how we strove — he could not tell apart.
Theocritus and Homer he disparaged,
but read, in compensation, Adam Smith,
and was a deep economist:
that is, he could assess the way
a state grows rich,
what it subsists upon, and why
it needs not gold
when it has got the simple product.
His father could not understand him,
and mortgaged his lands. (One: VII)
Adam Krug is a celebrated philosopher. In Chapter One (XXIII: 14) of EO Pushkin calls Onegin "a philosopher at eighteen years of age:"
Изображу ль в картине верной
Уединенный кабинет,
Где мод воспитанник примерный
Одет, раздет и вновь одет?
Все, чем для прихоти обильной
Торгует Лондон щепетильный
И по Балтическим волнам
За лес и сало возит нам,
Все, что в Париже вкус голодный,
Полезный промысел избрав,
Изобретает для забав,
Для роскоши, для неги модной, —
Все украшало кабинет
Философа в осьмнадцать лет.
Shall I present a faithful picture
of the secluded cabinet,
where fashions' model pupil
is dressed, undressed, and dressed again?
Whatever, for the lavish whim,
London the trinkleter deals in
and o'er the Baltic waves to us
ships in exchange for timber and for tallow;
whatever hungry taste in Paris,
choosing a useful trade,
invents for pastimes,
for luxury, for modish mollitude;
all this adorned the cabinet
of a philosopher at eighteen years of age.
The name of the dictator of Padukgrad, Paduk brings to mind Padu li ya, streloy pronzyonnyi (Whether I fall, struck by an arrow), a line in Lenski's last poem (EO, Six: XXI: 9-14):
Паду ли я, стрелой пронзенный,
Иль мимо пролетит она,
Всё благо: бдения и сна
Приходит час определенный;
Благословен и день забот,
Благословен и тьмы приход!
Whether I fall, or death wings by,
All is well: our moments fly,
Sleep and waking have their hour,
Blessed the day of toil and care,
Blessed the tomb’s darkness there.
At the grave of Dmitri Larin (Tatiana's and Olga's father) Lenski mornfully utters "Poor Yorick!" (Two: XXXVII: 6):
Своим пенатам возвращенный,
Владимир Ленский посетил
Соседа памятник смиренный,
И вздох он пеплу посвятил;
И долго сердцу грустно было.
"Poor Yorick!"16 — молвил он уныло, —
Он на руках меня держал.
Как часто в детстве я играл
Его Очаковской медалью!
Он Ольгу прочил за меня,
Он говорил: дождусь ли дня?..»
И, полный искренней печалью,
Владимир тут же начертал
Ему надгробный мадригал.
Restored to his penates,
Vladimir Lenski visited
his neighbor's humble monument,
and to the ashes consecrated
a sigh, and long his heart was melancholy.
“Poor Yorick!”16 mournfully he uttered, “he
hath borne me in his arms.
How oft I played in childhood
with his Ochákov medal!
He destined Olga to wed me;
he used to say: ‘Shall I be there
to see the day?’ ” and full of sincere sadness,
Vladimir there and then set down for him
a gravestone madrigal.
In his ‘Notes to Eugene Onegin’ Pushkin says:
«Бедный Иорик!» — восклицание Гамлета над черепом шута. (См. Шекспира и Стерна.)
Poor Yorick! — Hamlet's exclamation over the skull of the fool (see Shakespeare and Sterne). (Note 16)
In Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy (1759-61) the term bend-sinister is mentioned several times:
We'll go in the coach, said my father—Prithee, have the arms been altered, Obadiah?—It would have made my story much better to have begun with telling you, that at the time my mother's arms were added to the Shandy's, when the coach was re-painted upon my father's marriage, it had so fallen out that the coach-painter, whether by performing all his works with the left hand, like Turpilius the Roman, or Hans Holbein of Basil—or whether 'twas more from the blunder of his head than hand—or whether, lastly, it was from the sinister turn which every thing relating to our family was apt to take—it so fell out, however, to our reproach, that instead of the bend-dexter, which since Harry the Eighth's reign was honestly our due—a bend-sinister, by some of these fatalities, had been drawn quite across the field of the Shandy arms. 'Tis scarce credible that the mind of so wise a man as my father was, could be so much incommoded with so small a matter. The word coach—let it be whose it would—or coach-man, or coach-horse, or coach-hire, could never be named in the family, but he constantly complained of carrying this vile mark of illegitimacy upon the door of his own; he never once was able to step into the coach, or out of it, without turning round to take a view of the arms, and making a vow at the same time, that it was the last time he would ever set his foot in it again, till the bend-sinister was taken out—but like the affair of the hinge, it was one of the many things which the Destinies had set down in their books ever to be grumbled at (and in wiser families than ours)—but never to be mended.
—Has the bend-sinister been brush'd out, I say? said my father.—There has been nothing brush'd out, Sir, answered Obadiah, but the lining. We'll go o'horseback, said my father, turning to Yorick—Of all things in the world, except politicks, the clergy know the least of heraldry, said Yorick.—No matter for that, cried my father—I should be sorry to appear with a blot in my escutcheon before them.—Never mind the bend-sinister, said my uncle Toby, putting on his tye-wig.—No, indeed, said my father—you may go with my aunt Dinah to a visitation with a bend-sinister, if you think fit—My poor uncle Toby blush'd. My father was vexed at himself.—No—my dear brother Toby, said my father, changing his tone—but the damp of the coach-lining about my loins, may give me the sciatica again, as it did December, January, and February last winter—so if you please you shall ride my wife's pad—and as you are to preach, Yorick, you had better make the best of your way before—and leave me to take care of my brother Toby, and to follow at our own rates. (Chapter 2.LX.)
The action in Bend Sinister begins in November:
When the November wind has its recurrent icy spasm, a rudimentary vortex of ripples creases the brightness of the puddle. Two leaves, two triskelions, like two shuddering three-legged bathers coming at a run for a swim, are borne by their impetus right into the middle where with a sudden slowdown they float quite flat. Twenty minutes past four. View from a hospital window.
November trees, poplars, I imagine, two of them growing straight out of the asphalt: all of them in the cold bright sun, bright richly furrowed bark and an intricate sweep of numberless burnished bare twigs, old gold — because getting more of the falsely mellow sun in the higher air. Their immobility is in contrast with the spasmodic ruffling of the inset reflection — for the visible emotion of a tree is the mass of its leaves, and there remain hardly more than thirty-seven or so here and there on one side of the tree. They just flicker a little, of a neutral tint, but burnished by the sun to the same ikontinct as the intricate trillions of twigs. Swooning blue of the sky crossed by pale motionless superimposed cloud wisps.
The operation has not been successful and my wife will die. (Chapter 1)
In Chapter Four (XL: 14) of EO Pushkin mentions noyabr' (November):
Но наше северное лето,
Карикатура южных зим,
Мелькнет и нет: известно это,
Хоть мы признаться не хотим.
Уж небо осенью дышало,
Уж реже солнышко блистало,
Короче становился день,
Лесов таинственная сень
С печальным шумом обнажалась,
Ложился на поля туман,
Гусей крикливых караван
Тянулся к югу: приближалась
Довольно скучная пора;
Стоял ноябрь уж у двора.
But our Northern summer is a caricature
of Southern winters;
it will glance by and vanish: this is known,
though to admit it we don't wish.
The sky already breathed of autumn,
the sun already shone more seldom,
the day was growing shorter,
the woods' mysterious canopy
with a sad murmur bared itself,
mist settled on the fields,
the caravan of clamorous geese
was tending southward; there drew near
a rather tedious period;
November stood already at the door.