Poor Folk and Other Stories

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  Your affectionate well-wisher,

  MAKAR DEVUSHKIN

  June 20

  Makar Alekseyevich, Sir,

  I write to you in haste, I am in a hurry, trying to finish some work on time. Look, this is what I have to tell you; it is possible for you to make an advantageous purchase. Fedora says that a man-friend of hers is selling a dress uniform, as good as new, some underwear, a waistcoat and a cap, and all for practically nothing, she says; so why don’t you buy them? After all, you are not too badly off just now, you have some money; you yourself have told me so. Enough of your miserliness, now, please: I mean to say, these are all essential items. Just take a look at yourself, at the old clothes you are going about in. Shame on you! They are covered in patches. You have no new things; I know you have none, even though you assure me that you have. Heaven only knows what you have done with them. So please do as I say, and buy these clothes. Do it for me; if you love me, then buy them.

  You have sent me a gift of some linen; but listen, Makar Alekseyevich, you are ruining yourself. I mean, it’s no joke, what you have spent on me – a fearful amount of money! Oh, how you love to be extravagant! I don’t need all those things; they were quite unnecessary. I know that you love me, I am convinced of it; truly, it is superfluous to remind me of it with gifts, gifts which it is painful for me to accept from you, since I know how much they cost you. Once and for all – desist, do you hear? I beg you, I implore you. Makar Alekseyevich, you ask me to send you the continuation of my notes; you want me to finish them. I do not even know how I managed to write what I did! But I have not the strength now to talk about my past; I don’t even want to think about it; I grow frightened by all those memories. Talking about my poor mother, who left her poor child in the clutches of those monsters is most painful of all to me. My heart bleeds at the mere recollection. All that is still so fresh in my memory; I have not had time to reflect, still less to compose myself, even though it all happened more than a year ago. But you know all about it.

  I told you about the thoughts that are currently in Anna Fyodorovna’s head; she is accusing me of ingratitude and will accept no blame for her association with Mr Bykov. She wants me to go and live in her house; she says that I am living on charity, that I am on the slippery slope. She says that if I return to her she will take it upon herself to sort out everything with Mr Bykov and compel him to make amends for all that he has done to me. She says that Mr Bykov wants to give me a dowry. Let them be! I am just as happy here with you, near my good Fedora, who with her devotion to me reminds me of my old dead nurse. Even though you are only a distant relative of mine, you protect me with your name. As for them, I don’t know them; I shall put them out of my mind if I can. What more do they want of me? Fedora says that it is all just gossip, that they will eventually leave me alone. Pray God she is right!

  V. D.

  June 21

  My dove, little mother!

  I want to write to you, but don’t know how to start. I mean, it’s so strange that we are living so close to each other now. I say this because I have never before spent my days in such delight. My, it is as if the Lord had blessed me with a home and family! My child, my pretty little one! What is this you write about the four chemises I sent you? After all, you needed them – I discovered that from Fedora. Pleasing you is an especial happiness for me, little mother; that is my pleasure, and you must leave me to it, little mother; do not come near me and do not gainsay me. Never have I experienced anything like this, little mother. I have launched myself into society now. For one thing, I am living at double intensity, because you are living so close to me and making me so happy; for another, I have been invited to tea today by one of the lodgers, my neighbour, Ratazyayev, the same clerk who holds the literary evenings. There is to be one of those today; we are going to read literature. So you see how I am now, little mother – you see! Well, goodbye. I’ve really just written this without any particular purpose and solely in order to let you know how well I am. My darling, you told Teresa to tell me that you needed some coloured silk for your embroidery; I shall buy it, little mother, I shall buy you the silk, too. Tomorrow I shall have the pleasure of being able to satisfy you. I even know where to buy it. But for the moment I remain

  Your sincere friend,

  MAKAR DEVUSHKIN

  June 22

  Varvara Alekseyevna, Madam,

  I must inform you, my dear lady, that a most doleful event has taken place in our lodging-house, one that is truly, truly worthy of compassion! This morning, at about five a.m., Gorshkov’s small son died, I do not know what of; possibly it was some form of scarlet fever, but God alone knows! I paid a visit to those Gorshkovs. Oh, little mother, what poverty they live in! And what chaos! And it’s no wonder: the entire family lives in one room, which they have divided up with screens for the sake of propriety. They already have a little coffin prepared – a simple one, but quite pretty; they bought it ready-made, the boy was about nine; they say he had promise. But it is pitiful to see them, Varenka! The mother does not cry, but she is so sad, so poor. Perhaps things will be easier for them now that they have got one off their shoulders; but they still have the other two, a boy infant in arms and a little girl who must be six and a bit. There’s not really much that’s pleasant about watching a child, one’s own child, suffer and not being able to do anything about it. The father sits on a broken chair, wearing an old, grease-stained jacket. The tears stream down his face, perhaps not from grief, however, but simply from habit – his eyes are festering. What a queer fellow he is! He keeps blushing when you talk to him, he grows confused and doesn’t know what to say. The little girl, the daughter, stood leaning against the coffin – such a sad, thoughtful child, poor thing! I don’t like it when children are thoughtful, Varenka, little mother; it’s an unpleasant sight! There was some kind of rag-doll lying on the floor beside her – she wasn’t playing with it; she had her finger in her mouth, and just stood there, without making the slightest motion. The landlady gave her a sweet; she took it, but did not eat it. That was sad, Varenka, wasn’t it?

  MAKAR DEVUSHKIN

  June 25

  My dear Makar Alekseyevich!

  I am returning your book to you. It is a thoroughly worthless little item!– and not fit for decent eyes, either. Where did you manage to dig up such a treasure? Joking apart, I wonder if you really like such books, Makar Alekseyevich? The other day I was promised something to read. If you like, I will share it with you. But now goodbye. Truly, I have no time to write more.

  V. D.

  June 26

  Dear Varenka,

  The fact is that, to tell you the truth, little mother, I have not read that unpleasant book. To be sure, I did glance at a bit of it, and saw that it was whimsical stuff, written solely for buffoonery’s sake, in order to make people laugh; well, I thought, it must really be funny; perhaps Varenka will like it, too; and so I bought it and sent it to you.

  But here, Ratazyayev has promised to lend me some real literary stuff to read, so now you, too, shall have some books, little mother. Ratazyayev knows his onions, he’s a connoisseur; he writes himself. O, how he writes! He has a bold pen and oceans of style; in his each and every word, I mean – each one of them – in the most trivial, the most ordinary, vile word of the sort I might sometimes say to Faldoni or Teresa, he has style. I attend the evenings he holds in his room, too. We smoke tobacco, and he reads to us, reads for nearly five hours at a stretch and we listen all the time. It’s not literature at all, it’s a feast! It’s so lovely: like flowers, just like flowers; one can gather a bouquet from every page! He’s such a pleasant fellow, so kind and affectionate. Well, what am I compared to him, eh? Nothing. he is a man with a reputation, and what am I? Compared to him, I simply don’t exist; yet even for me he has a kind word. I’m doing some copying for him. Now, Varenka, don’t go thinking that there’s some sort of trick here, that he’s only kind to me because I’m doing his copying for him. Don’t believe gossip, little mot
her, don’t believe wicked gossip! No, I’m doing it of my own free will, because I want to please him, and if he is kind to me, then that is because he wants to please me. I understand the delicate nature of an action, little mother. he is a good-hearted, a very good-hearted man, and a peerless writer.

  Oh, literature is a wonderful thing, Varenka, a very wonderful thing; I discovered that from being with those people the day before yesterday. It is a profound thing! It strengthens people is hearts and instructs them, and – there are various other things about it all in a little book they have. It’s marvellously written! Literature is a picture, or rather in a certain sense both a picture and a mirror; it is an expression of emotion, a subtle form of criticism, a didactic lesson and a document. All that I gleaned from being with them. I will tell you quite honestly, little mother, that as I sit among them listening (I even smoke a pipe as they do, what do you think of that?), and they begin to contend and argue with one another about various matters, I simply have to declare my insufficiency – that is all that you or I, little mother, could possibly do in this setting. In this setting I am simply a dunce, an ignoramus; I am ashamed of myself, and I spend the entire evening trying to think of some little contribution to make to the general discussion, yet am unable to do even that! And then, Varenka, I feel sorry for myself, sorry that I am not as they are; that, according to the proverb, I’ve ‘grown in size but not in mind’. For what do I do in my free time now? I sleep, fool that I am. Yet instead of indulging in sleep I don’t need, I might be doing something agreeable; like sitting down and writing something. An activity useful to myself and pleasing to others. Goodness, little mother, you should just see how much money they get for it, may the Lord forgive them! Look at Ratazyayev, even – what a lot he earns! What effort does it cost him to write a printer’s sheet of prose? Indeed, some days he writes five, and he says he gets three hundred rubles a sheet. He’ll produce some little anecdote or other, or an account of some curious event, and for that it’ll cost you five hundred, which you’d better fork out, even if it bankrupts you, because if you don’t, it’s a thousand we’ll be putting away in our pocket next time! What do you think of that, Varvara Alekseyevna? I mean, he has a little exercise-book of poems – they’re not very long poems – and he’s asking seven thousand for them, little mother, seven thousand, just imagine. I mean, that is real estate, it’s a capital-investment property! He says they’re offering him five thousand, but he won’t take it. I’ve tried to reason with him, take their five thousand, man, I tell him, and spit in their faces – after all, five thousand is money, isn’t it? No, he says, let them give me seven, the swindlers. He really is a clever chap!

  You know, little mother, since we’re on the subject, I think I shall copy out a little extract from Italian Passions for you. That’s the title of one of his books. Here, read this passage, Varenka, and be your own judge:

  … Vladimir quivered, his passions bubbled up furiously inside him, and his blood seethed…

  ‘Countess,’ he cried. ‘Countess! Have you any idea how terrible is this passion, how infinite this madness? No, my dreams did not deceive me! I love you, I love you ecstatically, wildly, insanely! Not all your husband’s blood will quench the furious, bubbling ecstasy of my soul! Paltry obstacles cannot impede the all-consuming, infernal conflagration that harrows my exhausted breast. O Zinaida, Zinaida!. .’

  ‘Vladimir!’ the countess whispered, beside herself, leaning against his shoulder…

  ‘Zinaida!’ cried the ecstatic Smelsky.

  His breast exhaled a sigh. The fire leapt up with a bright flame on the altar of love and harrowed the breasts of the unhappy victims.

  ‘Vladimir!…’ the Countess whispered in rapture. Her bosom heaved, her cheeks burned crimson, her eyes were aflame…

  The new and terrible union was consummated!

  Half an hour later the old Count entered his wife’s boudoir.

  ’Now, my dear, what about having the samovar lit for our dear guest?’ he said, giving her a pat on the cheek.

  Well, little mother, having read that, what do you think? It’s a little on the free-and-easy side, that is certain, but it’s good none the less. And what’s good is good, you can’t say it isn’t. And now, if you will permit me, I shall copy out for you another little extract, this time from his novella Yermak and Suleika.

  The gist of the story, little mother, is that the Cossack Yermak, the fierce and terrible conqueror of Siberia, has fallen in love with Suleika, who is the daughter of the Siberian Tsar Kuchum, and who has been taken captive by him. An event straight from the times of Ivan the Terrible, as you will be aware. Here is the dialogue of Yermak and Suleika:

  ‘Tell me that you love me, Suleika! O tell me, tell me that you do!’

  ‘I love you, Yermak,’ Suleika whispered.

  ‘By the earth and all the heavens, I thank you! I am happy! . . You have given me all, all for which my storm-tossed spirit has striven ever since I was a lad. So it is hither you have led me, my guiding star; so this is why you have led me hither, beyond the Kamenny Poyas.* I will show my Suleika to the whole world, and men, those ferocious monsters, will not dare to accuse me! Oh, if they understood those secret sufferings of her tender soul, if they were able to see an entire poem in one single tear of my Suleika! O, let me brush away that tear with kisses, let me drink it, that divine tear… woman not of this world!’

  ‘Yermak,’ Suleika said,’the world is wicked, men are unjust! They will persecute us, they will condemn us, my dear Yermak! What will a poor maiden, who grew up in her father’s yurt amidst the snows of her native Siberia, do in your cold, icy, heartless, vain world? People will not understand me, O my desire, my loved one!’

  ‘Then the Cossack sabre will be raised, whistling, above them!’ Yermak shouted, his eyes rolling wildly.

  Now, Varenka, what do you think of this bit about Yermak when he finds out that his Suleika has had her throat cut? The blind old man Kuchum has stolen into Yermak’s tent in his absence, under cover of darkness, and has cut his own daughter’s throat, out of a desire to deal a mortal blow to Yermak, who has done him out of his sceptre and crown:

  ‘I take joy in scraping iron against stone!’ Yermak cried in a state of savage frenzy, whetting his damask steel dagger on the shaman’s stone. ‘I must have their blood, their blood! They must be carved, cut up and quartered!!’

  And after all that Yermak, unable to go on living without his Suleika, throws himself into the Irtysh, and there the story ends.

  Well, and here is a little extract, an example of the humorous-descriptive genre, written specifically in order to make people laugh:

  Do you know Ivan Prokofyevich Yellowbelly? You know, the one who bit Prokofy Ivanovich’s leg. Ivan Prokofyevich is a man of abrupt temper, but he has some rare virtues; Prokofy Ivanovich, on the other hand, is extremely fond of black radishes with honey. Now, when Pelageya Antonovna used to be friendly with him… You know Pelageya Antonovna, don’t you? The one who always puts her skirt on inside out?

  I mean, that’s killing, Varenka, simply killing! We rolled about with laughter when he read us that. He’s such a one, may the Lord forgive him! But you know, Varenka, although it’s a bit fanciful and rather too frivolous, it’s none the less innocent, without the slightest trace of free-thinking or liberal ideas. I should observe, little mother, that Ratazyayev is a man of impeccable behaviour and is for that reason a first-rate author – not like some other authors I could mention.

  You know, sometimes I have an idea… well, what if I were to write something, what would come of it? Say, for example, that quite suddenly, for no particular reason, a book were to appear with the title The Poems of Makar Devushkin? Well, what would you say then, my little angel? How would that seem to you, what would you think? As for myself, I can tell you, little mother, that as soon as my book appeared, I should certainly not dare to show my face on the Nevsky Prospekt. I mean, just think what it would be like when everyone said: ‘There’s th
e literary author and poet Devushkin’, or ‘There is Devushkin’! When that happened, what would I do about my boots, for example? They’re nearly always – I mention this in passing, little mother – covered in patches, and I have o tell you also that their soles sometimes hang open in a most unseemly manner. Well, what would happen if everyone found out that the author Devushkin’s boots were covered in patches? What if some countess or duchess or other were to learn of it – what would she say, the darling? She probably would not notice it; for, the way I imagine it, countesses don’t concern themselves with boots, particularly the boots of government clerks (because there are boots and boots, after all) – but she would be told about it, her friends would give me away. Yes, Ratazyayev would be the first to give me away; he would call on the Countess V.; he says he’s invited to every one of her receptions, and that he is almost like one of the family. She’s a real darling, he says; literary, he says, a real lady. He’s a rascal, that Ratazyayev!