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Yevgeny Onegin (Pushkin Collection)

Page 16

by Alexander Pushkin

Is Lyubóv truthful? No, she ain’t.

  You’ll find that Auntie Pelagéya

  Still friends with Finemouche (gentilhomme),

  Still has a husband, and a pom.

  He’s still a clubman, a long-stayer,

  Still henpecked, deaf and someone who

  Still eats and drinks enough for two.

  46

  Their girls greet Tanya with embraces,

  But, there being much they want to know,

  Silently these young Moscow Graces

  Examine her from top to toe.

  They find her rather odd, provincial,

  With mannerisms strangely mincing,

  A little thin and pale withal—

  Though otherwise not bad at all.

  But nature will prevail—with passion

  They make friends, entertain her, and

  They kiss her often, squeezing hands,

  Fluffing her curls in the new fashion.

  With girlish giggles they impart

  The secrets of their girlish hearts—

  47

  Details of conquests, theirs and others’,

  Their hopes and schemes, daydreams and such,

  Flowing in guileless chat that buzzes

  With scandal (though not all that much).

  Then in return for all this chatter

  They lean on Tanya, getting at her

  To tell the stories of her heart,

  But dreamily she stands apart.

  She hears things but forgets soon after,

  For nothing heard makes any sense.

  Her feelings, private and intense,

  Her secret thoughts, her tears and laughter

  She keeps unspoken, for herself

  And shareable with no one else.

  48

  Tatyana is quite keen to listen

  To what they’re saying, but, alas,

  The room is swamped with the transmission

  Of incoherent, vulgar trash.

  It’s so banal and so insipid;

  Even the scandal’s far from gripping.

  In the dry desert of their views,

  Their queries, slurs and bits of news,

  Days pass with nothing thought-provoking,

  No twist of fate or happenstance

  To set the weary mind a-dance,

  Nothing heart-lifting, nothing jokey,

  No silly fun to be enjoyed

  Anywhere in this social void.

  49

  Young men with sinecures look at her

  In priggish, condescending ways,

  Then walk off to discuss the matter

  With nothing very nice to say.

  Among them one pathetic jester

  Found her “ideal” as he assessed her,

  And now he leans against the door

  To pen an ode. Guess who it’s for.

  Once Vyázemsky sat down beside her

  When she was at a boring aunt’s

  And captivated her, by chance.

  An old man, looking on, espied her,

  And curiously began to dig,

  While neatly straightening his wig.

  50

  But in the halls, where raging Tragedy

  Is still performed in one long wail,

  With spangled mantles wielded, waggling,

  At the full house (to no avail),

  Where Comedy lies gently napping

  And sleeps through even friendly clapping,

  Where the young public is entranced

  By nothing but the Muse of Dance—

  That’s how it was in former ages

  When you and I were in our prime—

  Tanya was cut dead all the time

  By the lorgnettes of jealous ladies

  And the eye-tubes of strutting beaux

  In boxes or the lower rows.

  51

  She’s taken on to the Assembly,

  With all its crowds, excitement, heat,

  The blaring band, the candles trembling

  As pairs sweep by with flashing feet.

  The lovely girls arrayed in flimsy,

  The galleries with their gaudy whimsy,

  And nubile girls in one wide arc—

  All this struck her and made its mark.

  Made manifest by dazzling dandies,

  Bravado gleams, and waistcoats too,

  Eyeglasses spurned but kept in view,

  Hussars on leave, fine and upstanding,

  Leap to the fore, gallop and stamp,

  Delight the eye, and then decamp.

  52

  The night has many stars, resplendent,

  Moscow has lovely girls on view,

  Yet of these friends the moon ascendant

  Outshines them all in the deep blue.

  And she… (I wouldn’t dare upset her;

  To mute my lyre would be far better…)

  Gives off her splendour, casting shade

  On every mother, every maid.

  With heavenly poise and proud composure

  She deigns to tread the earth, and breathes

  Profound bliss as her bosom heaves.

  Her eyes shine, wondrously ambrosial.

  But stop, stop. That’s enough from you.

  To folly you have paid your due.

  53

  They shout, laugh, bow and charge through dances—

  Mazurka, gallop, waltz—all night,

  But Tanya stands there with two aunties

  Behind a pillar out of sight.

  She watches things, uncomprehending,

  Repelled by this world and its frenzy.

  She cannot breathe… And, starry-eyed,

  She floats back to the countryside,

  Back to the poor folk in their hovels,

  To distant parts, secluded nooks

  Busy with sparkling, babbling brooks,

  Back to her flowers and her novels,

  To lines of lime trees dark and grim,

  Where she had once encountered him.

  54

  But as her thoughts depart, dispersing

  Beyond the guests, the noisy ball,

  She is the target of one person,

  A most impressive general.

  The aunts wink at each other, touching

  Tatyana with their elbows, nudging

  Her, both of them, and hissing low,

  “Look to your left… Quick… There you go.”

  “Where on my left? What’s all this bother?”

  “Oh, never mind… Across there, that’s

  The one, leading that group. Two chaps

  In uniform… and he’s the other…

  He’s off… He stood there, sideways on.”

  “That tubby general who’s just gone?”

  55

  Congratulations on your victory,

  Lovely Tatyana, dear young thing!…

  But we must change direction quickly

  And turn to him of whom I sing…

  A subject that’s worth going into:

  I sing an old friend, whom I cling to,

  With all his idiosyncrasies.

  Bless this, my work, long as it is,

  O Muse, thou mother of the epic!

  Entrust me with thy rod and staff,

  And stand me steady on my path.

  Enough. My burden falls. I let it…

  For every classic it seems fit

  To pen a Prologue. This is it.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Fare thee well! and if for ever—

  Still for ever, fare thee well.

  BYRON

  1

  Long since, when young and at my gayest,

  Through the school gardens I would go,

  Lost in the lines of Apuleius,

  Having no time for Cicero.

  In spring I strolled secluded valleys,

  Where swimming swans sang out their challenge

  And waters glistened placidly.

  ’Twas then the Muse first came
to me.

  She lit my cell and made it precious,

  Spreading before me one great feast

  Of youthful fancies new-released,

  Singing of boyhood and its pleasures,

  Of Russia’s glory, and the art

  Of building dreams to thrill the heart.

  2

  The world smiled, finding her disarming.

  We soared on wings of young success,

  And pleased the elderly Derzhávin,

  Who blessed us just before his death.

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  3

  Submitting to a special token—

  The laws of passion and of whim—

  I threw my feelings widely open,

  And took my bright Muse where I’d been:

  To rowdy feasts and noisy quarrels,

  Midnight patrols enforcing morals—

  And to these wild, outlandish dos

  She brought her talents as a muse.

  Revelling like a young bacchante,

  She drank with us, sang with good cheer,

  And the young bloods of yesteryear

  Chased after her, raucous and frantic,

  While I turned to my friends with pride,

  With this bright mistress at my side.

  4

  But soon I called off all our meetings,

  And fled afar… But she came too.

  A ministering muse, she sweetened

  The lonely journey I came through

  With magic in her secret stories.

  She was what Bürger’s young Lenore is.

  She galloped the Caucasian heights

  Along with me in the moonlight.

  On the Crimean seashore, roaming,

  I knew with her the evening mist,

  And heard the sea, the whispered hiss

  Of nereids once known to Homer,

  The waves with their eternal skirl,

  Hymning the Father of the World.

  5

  The capital fell from her favour

  (All glitz and raucous merriment)

  And in the sadness of Moldavia

  She visited the humble tents

  Of wandering tribesmen close to nature,

  Where she became a savage creature,

  Leaving the language of the gods

  For tongues that sounded poor and odd,

  And songs the lovely steppe had taught her…

  But all of this she soon forgot,

  Becoming, in my garden plot,

  A rural landowner’s young daughter

  With sadness in her eyes, intense,

  Holding a novelette in French.

  6

  Now for the first time let us summon

  My muse to a smart party. Here,

  The charms of this wild-country woman

  I watch with jealous pride and fear.

  As diplomats crowd through the entry

  With soldiers brave and landed gentry,

  She glides in past proud party queens

  And looks on, sitting there serene,

  Enjoying all the crush and clamour,

  The gorgeous clothes, the clever talk,

  The shuffling guests, queueing to walk

  By the young hostess in her glamour,

  Ladies with men ranged at their back—

  A pretty picture framed in black.

  7

  She loves the oligarchic order

  Which fixes all the verbiage,

  The cold conceit in every corner,

  The blending in of rank and age.

  But who is this among the chosen,

  Standing in hazy silence, frozen?

  He’s like a stranger with no grasp

  Of any faces that go past

  Like tedious phantoms come to visit.

  His face shows pained conceit, or spleen.

  Which is it, and what does this mean?

  Who’s this? It’s not Yevgeny, is it?

  Yevgeny? You’re not serious?

  It is him, wafted back to us.

  8

  Is he the same man? Has he mellowed

  Or is he the oddball of old?

  What has he come back for, this fellow?

  How will he play his future role?

  Who will he be? Melmoth the wanderer?

  Globetrotter? A pro-Russian thunderer?

  Childe Harold? Quaker? Hypocrite?

  What other likeness could he fit?

  Or is he just a fine young person

  Like all of us, and just as nice?

  Well, anyway, here’s my advice:

  Old styles call out to be converted.

  He’s fooled us all since long ago.

  So, do you know him? Yes and no.

  9

  Why are you so unsympathetic

  Towards Onegin as a man?

  Because we are so energetic

  In criticizing all we can?

  Charged minds are prone to indiscretion,

  Which small, smug nobodies may question

  As laughable, offensive smut.

  Wit wanders, and will not stay put.

  Small talk is cheap, and we too often

  Take it for active interest.

  Foolishness flaunts its silliness;

  Top people thrive on what is rotten.

  With mediocrity we blend,

  Treating it as our closest friend.

  10

  Blest he who, as a youth, was youthful,

  Blest he who in due time grows old

  And steadily becomes more rueful

  While finding out that life is cold,

  Who entertains no idle fancies,

  Who with the rabble takes his chances,

  At twenty, dandified hothead,

  At thirty profitably wed,

  At fifty owing not a penny

  To other people or the state,

  And who has been prepared to wait

  For reputation, rank and money,

  Of whom they’ve said throughout his span

  So-and-so’s such a lovely man.

  11

  It’s sad that youth turned out so useless,

  So futile and perfidious.

  How frequently we have traduced her,

  And she has disappointed us.

  To think we watched our strongest yearnings,

  Our purest aspirations, turning

  Successively to dark decay,

  Like leaves on a wet autumn day.

  Unbearable, the future beckons,

  With life an endless dining club

  With decent membership and grub,

  Where others lead and we come second.

  At odds with them, we tag along,

  Though we share nothing with the throng.

  12

  Unbearable (you won’t deny it)

  To suffer many a jibe and slur

  From decent folk, who, on the quiet,

  Call one an oddball, a poseur,

  Or maybe a pathetic madman,

  Or a Satanic beast, a bad man,

  Even the demon that I drew.

  Onegin, to begin anew,

  Took off after the fatal duel

  With no clear plan, living for kicks,

  Until the age of twenty-six—

  An idle life with no renewal

  Nor anything to which to cling,

  Sans work, sans wife, sans everything.

  13

  He felt a jo
lt, a sudden flurry,

  A longing for a change of air

  (The kind of agonizing worry

  That few of us would want to bear).

  He quitted his estate, thus losing

  The woods, the meadows, the seclusion,

  The places where a bleeding shade

  Arose before him every day,

  And set off on sporadic travels,

  With one idea to travel for,

  But travel soon became a bore—

  For travel, like all things, unravels.

  He’s back “like Chatsky” (someone wrote),

  “Straight to the ballroom from the boat.”

  14

  But then the throng was stirred and furrowed,

  A whisper shimmered through the hall.

  A lady neared the hostess, followed

  By an imposing general.

  Serenely she came, not stand-offish,

  Not talkative, not cold or snobbish,

  Devoid of hauteur, not too grand,

  Devoid of self-importance, and

  Without a trace of facial grimace

  Or any ingratiating glance…

  Easy and calm in her advance,

  She showed herself the very image

  Du comme il faut. (Shishkóv, forgive!

  I can’t translate the adjective.)

  15

  Ladies came up to her more closely,

  The old ones smiled as she went by,

  The men bowed lower to her, mostly

  Endeavouring to catch her eye.

  Girls up ahead lowered their voices.

  Tallest of all, and much the haughtiest,

  The general then followed her

  With nose and shoulders in the air.

  No one could say she was a beauty,

  But nothing could have been applied

  To her that might have been described,

  Out of some fashionable duty,

  By London’s loftiest citizen

  As vulgar. (Here we go again…

  16

  This is a favourite expression

  That I’m unable to translate.

  Because it is quite new in Russia

 

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