The Gambler and Other Stories (Penguin ed.)

by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

  It was already morning, that is, it wasn’t light yet, but it was about six o’clock. I woke up in the same chair, my candle had burned down completely, they were asleep at the captain’s and all round was a silence that was all too rare in our apartment. First of all, I jumped up in extreme astonishment; nothing like this had ever happened to me before, even as far as the trifling details were concerned: never had I, for example, fallen asleep in my armchair like that. Then suddenly, while I was standing there, coming to my senses, I suddenly caught sight of the revolver lying before me, ready and loaded – but I pushed it away from me in a flash! Oh, now I wanted life, life! I raised my hands and called out to eternal truth; I didn’t call out, I wept; rapture, fathomless rapture inspirited my entire being. Yes, life and – preaching! That very moment I made up my mind about preaching and, of course, for the rest of my life I am going to preach, I want to preach – what? Truth, for I have seen it, I have seen it with my own eyes, I have seen it in all its glory!

  And so I’ve been preaching ever since. Moreover, I love all those who laugh at me more than all the rest. Why this is so – I don’t know and I can’t explain it, but so be it. They say that I’m already getting muddled, that is, if I’m already muddled now, then what will the future bring? It’s the simple truth: I’m muddled and it might even get worse in the future. And, of course, I’ll get muddled several times before I find out how to preach, that is, with what words and what deeds, because it’s very difficult to carry out. You know, I see it all now as clear as day, but listen: who doesn’t get muddled! But meanwhile, the end is one and the same for all, at least all aspire to one and the same thing, from the wise man to the worst brigand, only by different paths. It’s an old truth, but here’s what’s new: I can’t get very muddled. Because I have seen the truth, I have seen and know that people can be beautiful and happy, without losing the ability to live on this earth. I do not wish and cannot believe that evil is mankind’s normal state. But you see, they all laugh at this belief of mine. But how can I not believe: I have seen the truth – it wasn’t invented by my mind, I saw it, I saw it, and its living image has filled my soul forever more. I saw it in such perfect wholeness that I cannot believe that people may not obtain it. So then, how can I get muddled? I’ll digress, of course, even several times, and I’ll speak, perhaps, in somebody else’s words, but not for long: the living image of that which I have seen will be with me always and will always correct and guide me. Oh, I’m hale and hearty, I’m fresh, I’m going, I’m on my way, for a thousand years or more if need be. Do you know, at first I even wanted to conceal that I had corrupted them all, but that was a mistake – already my first mistake! But truth whispered to me that I was lying, and protected me and guided me. But how does one build paradise – I don’t know, because I don’t know how to put it into words. After my dream I lost the words. At least, all the chief words, the most necessary ones. But so be it: I’ll go and I’ll keep talking, ceaselessly, because when all is said and done I saw it with my own eyes, even though I don’t know how to convey what I saw. But that’s what the scoffers don’t understand: ‘A dream,’ they say, ‘that’s what it was, ravings, hallucinations.’ Eh! Is that so clever? But how proud they are! A dream? What is a dream? Isn’t our life a dream? I’ll even go so far as to say: even if, even if this never comes to pass and there is no paradise (you see, that I do understand!) – well, I will preach nevertheless. But meanwhile, it’s so simple: in one day, in one hour – everything could be arranged straight away! The main thing is to love others as yourself,11 that’s the main thing, and that’s all, absolutely nothing else is necessary: you’ll find out at once how everything is to be arranged. But meanwhile, this is merely an old truth, you see, one that has been repeated and read a billion times, but, you see, it hasn’t taken root! ‘Consciousness of life is higher than life, knowledge of the laws of happiness is higher than happiness’ – that’s what we need to fight against! And I will. If only everyone would want it, it could all be arranged at once!

  And I’ve tracked down that little girl … And I will go! I will!

  1877

  Notes

  It gives me great pleasure to acknowledge my very large debt to the editors of the ‘Academy’ edition of Dostoyevsky’s Complete Collected Works in Thirty Volumes (Polnoe sobranie sochinenii), as many of my notes rely heavily on material that is published in the editors’ commentary to the individual works. Quotations from Dostoyevsky’s works and other contemporary source materials (journals, newspapers, letters, etc.), unless otherwise noted, are from this edition.

  All translations of foreign-language text are from French, unless otherwise specified. Quotations from the Bible refer to the Revised Standard Version.

  All dates, unless otherwise indicated, are given according to the Julian calendar (Old Style), which remained in force in Russia until 1918. The Gregorian calendar, adopted in the West in the eighteenth century, was generally twelve days ahead.

  WHITE NIGHTS

  1. Or was … Turgenev: A quotation, with very minor variations, from the poem ‘The Flower’ (1843), by Ivan Turgenev (1818–83), best known for his novel Fathers and Sons (1862). He made the transition from poetry, for which he showed little promise, to prose in the late 1840s.

  2. dachas: Country houses.

  3. Nevsky Prospekt: The main fashionable thoroughfare in Petersburg runs from the Admiralty Building to the Moscow Rail-road Station, and then, after a turn, to the Alexander Nevsky Monastery.

  4. Fontanka: The canal, lined with the magnificent private residences of the nobility, is a branch of the Neva River that runs through central St Petersburg.

  5. Celestial Empire: An old name for Imperial China, whose flag depicted a dragon on a yellow field.

  6. Kamenny and Aptekarsky islands … Krestovsky Island: High-ranking nobility kept summer residences on Kamenny (Stone) Island, located in the Neva delta, and the Peterhof Road. The latter runs from Petersburg to the grand palace of Peter the Great (1672–1725), known as Peterhof (Peter’s Court), located 30 kilometres from the Petersburg city centre on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland; it was modelled after the road from Paris to Versailles. Aptekarsky (Apothecary) Island, located north of the narrow Karpovka River from the Petersburg Side (situated across the Neva from the Summer Garden and the Field of Mars), was considered somewhat less aristocratic; it was named for the garden of medicinal plants established by Peter the Great. Krestovsky Island (Island of the Cross), the largest of the three islands located north of the Petersburg Side in the Neva delta, was primarily parkland and forest. Pargolovo, located just north of the city, was the summer destination for those with limited means, including students and the intelligentsia in general, e.g. Vissarion Belinsky, the liberal literary critic, lived there in 1845.

  7. Chernaya River: In north-west St Petersburg, the site of the fatal duel where Alexander Pushkin was killed (see note 12 below).

  8. embankment of the canal: The Yekaterininsky Canal, now known as the Griboyedov Canal, is also the setting for much of Crime and Punishment (1866).

  9. King Solomon’s genie: In the ‘Story of the Fisherman’, one of the best-known tales from the Thousand and One Nights, the prophet Allah Suleiman (the Arabian variant of the biblical King Solomon) shuts up a disobedient genie in a pitcher with a lead stopper and throws it into the sea. Eighteen hundred years later a fisherman happens to fish it out of the water and opens it. See also Revelation 6 for the biblical account of the opening of the seven seals.

  10. “Goddess of Fantasy” … Zhukovsky: The poem ‘My Goddess’ (1809) was a free adaptation of Goethe’s ‘Meine Göttin’ (1780), by the poet and translator Vasily Zhukovsky (1783–1852).

  11. seventh crystal heaven: In ‘On the Heavens’, Aristotle writes that the heavens are made up of seven stationary crystal spheres on which the stars and planets are affixed.

  12. Hoffmann … the little house in Kolomna: The German Romantic writer E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776–1822) greatly
influenced Dostoyevsky with his fantastic stories; the slaughter of the Huguenots (French Protestants) by the Catholics began in Paris in the early hours of 24 August 1572, St Bartholomew Day, and provides the historical background for the opera Les Huguenots (1836) by Giacomo Meyerbeer (1791–1864), as well as prose works by Mérimée and Dumas père; Diana Vernon is the brave and plucky heroine of the historical novel Rob Roy (1817) by the wildly popular and prolific Scottish novelist Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832); Kazan was conquered by Ivan Vasilyevich (Ivan the Terrible, 1530–84) in 1552 after a six-week siege; Clara Mowbray and Effie Deans are characters in Walter Scott, St Ronan’s Well (1823) and The Heart of Midlothian (1818), respectively; Czech religious reformer Jan Hus (1372?–1415) was excommunicated by the Catholic Church for being a heretic and burned at the stake; the ominous music of the dead nuns rising from their graves in Meyerbeer’s Romantic opera Robert le diable (1831); Minna may refer to Zhukovsky’s poem ‘Mina’ (1818), a translation of Goethe’s ballad ‘Mignon’ from his Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship (1795–6); ‘Brenda’ (1834) is a Romantic lyrical ballad by Ivan Kozlov (1779–1840); the Battle of Beryozina signalled the final expulsion of the Napoleonic army from Russia in 1812; Yekaterina Vorontsova-Dashkova (1743–1810), president of the Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy and memoirist, also founded two journals to which she attracted some of the leading writers of the day; Georges Jacques Danton (1759–94), one of the leaders of the French Revolution in its early phase, was found guilty by the Revolutionary Tribunal and guillotined; Cleopatra and her lovers (ei suoi amante, Italian) is the theme that is proposed to the improvisatore in the tale Egyptian Nights (1835) by Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837), Russia’s greatest poet; Pushkin’s ‘The Little House in Kolomna’ (1830) has been compared to Byron’s Beppo, with its mock-heroic tone and the minimal importance of the plot.

  13. “so long and tenderly”: Quotation from Heinrich Heine’s ‘Sie liebten sich beide’ (‘They loved each other’, 1823) in a free translation by the Romantic poet and novelist Mikhail Lermontov (1814–41). True to form, Lermontov’s characters ‘love each other’ not only ‘long and tenderly’, but with ‘deep anguish and ‘terrible and stormy passion’; they part in ‘wordless and proud suffering’.

  14. Eternal City: Rome.

  15. Pavlovsk: Named for Catherine the Great’s son Paul (Pavel in Russian), this summer retreat for the imperial family and well-to-do Petersburgers is located 30 kilometres south of Petersburg. Much of Dostoyevsky’s The Idiot (1868) is set in Pavlovsk.

  16. Ivanhoe: Walter Scott’s novel (1819) is set in medieval England.

  17. The Barber of Seville: The opera by Gioacchino Rossini (1792–1868), which had its premiere in Rome in 1816, enjoyed enormous popularity in Russia and was frequently staged there.

  18. recollection passed through my mind: Count Almaviva, disguised as a poor student, hopes to make the beautiful Rosina fall in love with him – and not his money. Figaro, his former servant, helps Almaviva with his courting. The Dreamer is reminded of the similar ‘letter scene’ in Rossini’s opera when Rosina hands Figaro a note for Almaviva that she had prepared in advance.

  A CHRISTMAS PARTY AND A WEDDING

  1. con amore: With love (Italian).

  2. Yulian Mastakovich: The character with this name first appears in 1847 in Dostoyevsky’s ‘Petersburg Chronicle’ (27 April), where he is engaged to marry the seventeen-year-old Glafira Petrovna.

  3. tax-farmer: An individual who has purchased from the government the rights to collect certain taxes or the exclusive franchise to sell certain goods (salt, liquor, etc.).

  4. nankeen: Durable cotton cloth, ranging from brownish yellow to a pale yellow or buff colour, originally loomed in Nanking, China.

  5. nec plus ultra: Nothing further beyond; to the utmost (Latin).

  A NASTY BUSINESS

  1. the renaissance of our beloved fatherland: Published in 1862, the story is set in the era of the ‘Great Reforms’ of the 1860s, instituted by Alexander II (1818–81, known as Alexander the Liberator) in order to modernize a backward Russia. The most important reforms included the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, followed three years later by judicial reforms and the implementation of the zemstvo, i.e. rural self-government.

  2. Petersburg Side: Situated between Vasilyevsky Island and the Vyborg Side, this section of St Petersburg is located across the Neva River from the city centre.

  3. the rank of general: The ranks in the Russian civil service held equivalent military titles. Thus Privy Councillor Nikiforov, a civil servant of the third class, is entitled to call himself general. See Appendix II, Table of Ranks.

  4. Actual State Councillor: ‘Actual’ in this context implies a full, working member in active service.

  5. stars, even though he already had two: Stars were featured in a number of Russian Imperial orders and medals.

  6. grand-patience: Solitaire or a card game for one person.

  7. rather far away: That is, far from the city centre and ‘official’ Petersburg, where Nikiforov’s office no doubt is located.

  8. une existence manquée … parleur … phraseur: A failed life; talker, chatterbox; phrasemonger.

  9. tax-farming: See ‘A Christmas Party and a Wedding’ and note 3.

  10. new wine in new wineskins: ‘And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does, the wine will burst the skins … but new wine is for fresh skins’ (Mark 2:22).

  11. merci: Thank you.

  12. Bolshoy Prospekt: Major avenue (bolshoy means ‘big’) that crosses the Little Neva via the Tuchkov Bridge, runs the length of the Petersburg Side and spans the Karpovka River into Apothecary Island.

  13. c’est le mot … bon sens: That’s the word; good sense.

  14. quadrille: Originally of French origin, a dance performed by four couples in a square formation.

  15. Pseldonimov, the legistrator: He, as we see later, is a registrator, that is, a collegiate registrar, the lowest of the fourteen ranks. ‘Legistrator’ appears to be an invention of the policeman.

  16. his surname: Absurdly close to the Russian word for ‘pseudonym’ (psevdonim), which Ivan Ilyich brings up later. Even more absurd is that his bride is named Mlekopitayev, derived from the word for ‘mammal’.

  17. last day of Pompeii: Reference to the massive historical painting by Karl Bryullov (1799–1852), The Last Day of Pompeii (1830–33), which depicts the chaos and destruction of the city and its people caused by the volcanic eruption.

  18. inertia: See ‘The Meek One’ and note 21.

  19. Gogol: Nikolay Gogol (1809–52), master of the Russian short story and author of the novel Dead Souls (1842), has composed the portraits of some of the oddest characters in Russian literature, for example, the lowly clerk Akaky Akakievich and his tailor Petrovich in ‘The Overcoat’ (1842).

  20. lampion: Small oil lamp for the outdoors, usually with a coloured chimney; a carriage lamp.

  21. galantine … blancmange: A galantine is a dish of boned meat or fish that is poached before it is set in a mould with its own jelly or in aspic. A blancmange is a sweet dessert made from milk or cream, often flavoured with almonds, and thickened with gelatine or cornstarch; it is usually set in a mould and served cold.

  22. chaîne de dames, balancez: A figure in a quadrille: Ladies’ chain, set to your partners!

  23. Harun-al-Rashid: Caliph of Baghdad (763?–809), known for the opulence of his court and his participation in the Muslim holy war against Byzantium. According to legend, he made excursions at night around the city of Baghdad incognito, in order to become better acquainted with the life of his subjects. He is the subject of numerous songs and a cycle of tales from the One Thousand and One Nights, the collection of stories narrated by the clever Scheherazade, who captivates her murderous husband with her storytelling.

  24. pronouncing the letter ‘a’ somewhat like ‘eh’: This manner of pronouncing words indistinctly, with a poor articulation that results from speaking too quick
ly, carelessly or with one’s mouth half-closed, in this instance, reducing the full ‘a’ sound to a short ‘eh’, signals the speaker’s arrogant regard or disdain (even a disdain that is forced or assumed) for his interlocutor. Ivan Ilyich’s affected speech, aimed at maintaining distance between master and servant, is wholly inappropriate for the situation and his position as advocate of ‘humaneness’.

  25. Porfiry Petrov: Instead of giving the expected ‘Petrovich’ as his patronymic, Pseldonimov, a recent arrival from the provinces, uses the old Russian form ‘Petrov’, the more plebian abbreviated patronymic.

  26. Charmé: Charmed.

  27. Panayev: A parody of a dream-book, written by N. F. Shcherbina in 1855–7, who says about Ivan Panayev (1812–62), the writer, critic and co-editor of the journal the Contemporary: ‘Seeing Ivan Panayev in your dreams portends spilling coffee on a white waistcoat or buying a half-dozen Holland shirts at Lepter’s.’ Dream-books, or compilations of interpretations of dreams, enjoyed enormous popularity in Russia. For example, Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin, whose heroine Tatyana is engrossed in a dream-book which she has purchased from a pedlar.

  28. A new lexicon … eksposé literature: The newspaper and journal editor Andrey Krayevsky (1810–89) was made editor of the Encyclopedic Dictionary, Compiled by Russian Scholars and Litterateurs, much to the dismay of scholars and writers, since Krayevsky was neither. (His editorship ceased with volume 1 (1861).) Nikolay Alferaki (1815–63), a wealthy merchant in Taganrog, left behind a magnificent palace, which today houses the Taganrog Regional Museum. The ironic misspelling of exposé as eksposé (ablichitel’naya literatura), favoured genre of the radical camp, is repeated in Dostoyevsky’s Notes from Underground.