Pushkin, along with some of his contemporaries, realized early in his literary career that Russian prose had lagged far behind Russian poetry in its achievements. Furthermore, the flowery characteristics of much Russian poetry had infiltrated prose. As early as 1822 he comments, "Voltaire may be regarded as an excellent example of sensible style. . . . Precision, tidiness, these are the prime matters of prose. It demands thought and more thought, brilliant expressions are of no use; poetry is another business. . . . Whose prose is the best in our literature? Karamzin's: this is no great praise." Pushkin's intense interest in Vyazemaky's translation of Benjamin Constant's Adolphe, which he greatly admired, was motivated not only by the undoubted merits of the French original, but by Pushkin's feeling that Constant could point the way to what Pushkin felt was lacking in Russian literature: "metaphysical" language, as he termed it, by which he appears to have meant the language of abstract thought and of psychological analysis. In this connection Pushkin's thoughts were turned not only inward, to the needs of Russian literature, but outward, to the scene of world literature on which, he felt, Russian literature could win its right of citizenship only through prose. Thus Pushkin approached the problem of Russian prose writing—just as he approached the problem of the Russian theater—with definite theoretical views on the needs of Russian literature and the correct path to be taken. As his remarks on Voltaire indicate, Russian prose should be simple and to the point. It was essential that Russian literary prose be sharply distinguished from poetry, that it should cast off the influence poetry had hitherto exerted on it, should free itself from its Cinderella position, and establish itself in its own right. These theoretical views he sought to implement in his own work.

Pushkin himself was from his early days a master of Russian prose, as can be clearly seen from his letters. We should not forget that letter writing in Pushkin's day was, even when the letters were intended for private consumption, still considered something of a literary genre. The clarity, precision, and punch of Pushkin's letters show that he was quick to acquire deftness and authority in wielding his native language. However, in the field of strictly literary prose Pushkin was slow to make a start. His first serious attempt at literary prose dates to 1827, when he wrote his unfinished The Moor of Peter the Great. His first completed prose works were written in 1830 at Boldino. But once started, Pushkin's prose output increased steadily, and during the 1830s he wrote considerably more in prose than in verse. In the following comments we discuss briefly three of The Tales of Belkin (Povesti Belkina), The Queen of Spades (Pikovaya dama), and The Captain's Daughter (Kapitänskaya-dochka).

The Tales of Belkin consists of five short stories purportedly related to and then retold by the late Ivan Petrovich Belkin. These are "The Shot" ("Vystrel"), "The Snowstorm" ("Metel"), "The Stationmaster" ("Stantsionny smotritel"), "The Undertaker" ("Grobovshchik"), and "The Lady Turned Peasant" ("Baryshnya-krestyanka"). They were all written in the fall of 1830 at Boldino. In these unpretentious tales Pushkin rigidly follows the principles outlined above on the necessity for drawing a sharp distinction between prose and verse. The style is clear and concise, bereft of all ornamentation—to the point of austerity. The syntax is straightforward and lean; there are few subordinate clauses and few epithets. The narrative proceeds logically and rapidly, with no attempt at psychological analysis and very few comments from the narrator.

There is one aspect of The Tales of Belkin likely to elude the modern reader, which also has to do with Pushkin's views on literature. The Tales tend to lightly parody thenexisting fashions in prose. This may be intentional, but it also follows naturally from the fact that Pushkin's age was in literary matters more down-to-earth than its predecessors were. Such parody as may be claimed—and not too much should be made of it—is achieved by taking a staple literary situation and adding a new twist to expose the artificiality of the literary cliché involved. Pushkin's "twists" point invariably in the direction of common sense. For example, "The Stationmaster" is a rebuttal of the sentimentalist fallacy that poor girls are by nature innocent, that they are ensnared and deceived by rich young men, and that the results of their seduction or abduction are bound to be catastrophic. In a way Pushkin is polemicizing with Karamzin's Poor Liza. But such polemical aspects of The Tales may well have little importance for today's reader and should not, in any case, be exaggerated. For this reader then, they will fall into perspective as straightforward, lightweight anecdotes, well told, with a touch of irony, and without great literary pretensions.

The hero of "The Shot," Silvio, is a sardonic, "demonic," pseudo-Byronic character of about thirty-five. By his personality he dominates the young officers (Silvio is a civilian) whose company he keeps in the small town where their regiment is stationed. One night he is insulted at the gambling table by a newcomer, but to everyone's amazement, although he is an excellent shot, Silvio refuses to challenge the young officer. No one would have suspected Silvio of cowardice. And indeed the reason behind his inaction lies elsewhere. Six "years earlier Silvio had received a slap in the face. He had been at that time a hussar, the hardest-drinking and most pugnacious in the regiment. But when a new officer joined the regiment—a youthful, intelligent, handsome, gay, brave, high-born, immeasurably wealthy, openhanded count, Silvio's primacy was challenged, and he sought the occasion for a quarrel. The brilliant newcomer's success with women—particularly one with whom Silvio was involved—was the last straw. A remark from Silvio at a ball, a slap, and both men drew their sabers. Separated momentarily, the two were in place and ready to duel at dawn the next day—the young officer arrived late with his cap full of cherries, which he was eating. After discussion, the rivals drew for the first shot. Silvio's opponent won the draw, fired first, and put a bullet through Silvio's cap. His life was now in Silvio's hands, but Silvio could not be satisfied with killing a man who seemed not to care for life but continued to eat cherries and spit out the pits. At Silvio's suggestion that his rival leave and take a meal, the latter agreed, saying that Silvio would be entitled to his shot at any time he chose. Because of this incident Silvio retired from the regiment to bide his time, and refused to duel with the drunken young officer who insults him at the beginning of the story.

The time for Silvio's revenge comes when his carefree rival gets married. Silvio arrives at the estate of his hated rival, the now married Count, and claims his shot. The Count, no longer indifferent, in love with his wife, asks Silvio to fire quickly, but Silvio hesitates and insists they again draw lots. Once more the Count wins. He fires and misses. How had he allowed himself to be persuaded to draw lots again? What dishonor! Silvio starts to take aim, when suddenly the Countess bursts in. The Count assures her that it is only a joke. Silvio continues to take aim, and then—when the Count begs him to fire quickly—Silvio, with the Countess at his knees, refuses! "I am satisfied," he says, "I have seen you looking bad; I have witnessed your timidity; I made you take the first shot, this is my satisfaction. You will remember me. I commit you to your own conscience." Silvio was later killed fighting for the Greeks against the Turks, but he had his revenge!

"The Snowstorm" is a designedly improbable story. The heroine, Maria Gavrilovna, has been brought up on French novels and is consequently in love. Her hero, Vladimir, is a poor army ensign. The parents are opposed to a match, and the young couple decides to elope. Maria Gavrilovna is, according to plan, put in a sledge and brought to the church. On his way to the church her hero loses his way in the countryside in a snowstorm. Maria Gavrilovna returns home and falls feverishly ill. Her parents decide that love is the cause and that she should marry her beloved. She recovers, but Vladimir, in spite of the parents willingness, refuses to enter the house. He leaves for the army to take part in the 1812 campaign, and dies. Maria Gavrilovna's father also dies. She inherits his property, moves, and is besieged by suitors whom she rejects. The 1812 campaign now being victoriously concluded, she—in spite of her fidelity to Vladimir's memory—falls in love with a wounded veteran, Burmin, colonel in the hussars, and he with her. However, both are restrained in their courtship by something undivulged. The problem, it turns out, is that both are married. On the fateful night when Vladimir failed to appear, Maria Gavrilovna, without seeing the groom, had married someone else! That someone had been the then irresponsible Burmin, also lost in the storm. The problem is therefore no problem: they are already married!

"The Stationmaster," as noted above, tells of the abduction of a poor girl, the Stationmaster's daughter Dunya, by a rich young man—in this case a hussar. Dunya is a flirt, and the hussar abducts her with her full consent. The post station of which the father is master boasts pictures of the story of the prodigal son, and the fallen returning sinner clearly forms a pseudoideological background to the work. When Dunya does not return, the father falls ill. Upon recovering, he follows Dunya to Saint Petersburg "to bring home his sheep that has strayed." The hussar, Minsky, receives him after some delay, begs his forgiveness, tells him that he has no intention of returning Dunya, and gives him some money. Somehow the Stationmaster finds himself on the street. In conventional disgust he spurns the money, throws it away, has second thoughts and returns, only to find that it is gone! He makes one more unavailing attempt to penetrate Dunya's new "home," and is ejected. He returns to the station, becomes an alcoholic, and dies. Some time later a fine lady with a six-horse carriage and three children arrives at the station, asks about her father, visits his grave in sorrow, and gives money to the priest.

The Tales of Belkin are in some cases interesting for the insights they provide into Pushkin's intimate thoughts. "The Shot," for example, shows without doubt that Pushkin was, at the time of writing, taken with the problem of the value of life, insignificant perhaps at one moment, at another immeasurably enhanced by the love of a woman. The Tales are interesting, too, for the light they cast on Pushkin's views on Russian prose and his quest for extreme simplicity. They are of significance, although this has been exaggerated, for the development of Russian prose. But today's reader does best to take them for what they are—modest anecdotes skillfully told.

Pushkin's The Queen of Spades (1834) is something rather different, though its significance should not be overemphasized, either. Pushkin, as we know, loved to gamble. Pushkin was also a pioneer in describing the peculiar madness induced by Saint Petersburg, and was familiar with the works of E. T. A. Hoffmann. Out of all this arose The Queen of Spades. Critics have sometimes discovered in this story a profundity of thought that is not really there. Like The Tales of Belkin it is really an anecdote, a good yarn. The characterization, it is true, is somewhat more detailed, and the mood is different. Its syntax shows a tendency to be less austere, which only shows that Pushkin's Voltairean prose simplicity could not be expected, in the long run, to handle the psychological complexities characteristic of nineteenth-century prose. The Queen of Spades shows where Pushkin himself as a prose writer would have had to go, that he could not have produced another cycle of The Tales of Belkin.

The Queen of Spades opens with a scene of Russian officers gambling. Hermann, the part-German hero, invariably watches without participating in the play. "Gambling is of great interest to me," he says, "but I am not in a position to sacrifice what is necessary to me in the hope of acquiring a surplus." Tomsky—one of the gambling Russian officers—opines that Hermann is a good German: "He is calculating, that's all there is to it." Tomsky then tells of his grandmother, who had suffered catastrophic gambling losses in Paris but had recouped them by eliciting from a French nobleman a three-card formula that it seems, is bound to win but can never be repeated. Hermann is bewitched by the thought of a three-card sequence that affords the possibility of a once-in-a-lifetime coup.

The old Countess, Tomsky's grandmother, is still alive. In order to obtain her gambling secret, the ruthless Hermann is willing to woo her companion and ward, Lizaveta Ivanovna. By notes and other ploys he succeeds in this. After a ball that the Countess will be attending, Hermann and the ensnared Liza agree that he will install himself secretly in Liza's room and await her return. But no. After a long wait Hermann goes not to Liza's room, but conceals himself near the Countess's room after she returns from the ball. When the Countess is at last alone, Hermann confronts her. Will she not give up a secret that is useless to her, that would give him everything he could ever have wished? The old lady is frightened; when Hermann persists, she panics and dies. Hermann, having lost the chance of discovering the three-card formula, turns to Liza and explains his duplicity. She guides him out of the house.

Hermann is present at the funeral of the old Countess. As he approaches the coffin, in accordance with Orthodox tradition, he feels that the old Countess screws up one eye at him, and he faints. Later that night the Countess comes to him: "I have come against my own will," she says, "but I have to fulfill your wish. The three, the seven, and the ace, one after the other, will win for you—but on these conditions, that you never play more than one card in one day, and that you never gamble again. I forgive you my death on condition that you marry my ward, Lizaveta Ivanovna."

The three, the seven, and the ace. Hermann is frightened but resolute. He goes to the most exclusive gambling house in Saint Petersburg and is introduced to its owner, the distinguished Chekalinsky. Hermann asks to be allowed to play. When he announces the stake—47,000 rubles, his entire savings—excitement runs high. The three wins, and Hermann leaves. On the following night he returns; he bets 94,000 rubles, and the seven wins. On the third night his arrival is eagerly awaited by one and all. People abandon their own gambling and cluster round as Hermann approaches the table. Chekalinsky is pale, but summons up his habitual smile. The cards are played. "'The ace wins,' said Hermann, turning up his card. 'Your queen loses,' said Chekalinsky gently. Hermann trembled: in very fact he had not the ace, but the queen of spades. He could not believe his eyes, could not understand how he had pulled the wrong card. At this moment he thought he saw the queen of spades screw up her eyes and smile at him ironically. He was struck by a definite similarity. 'The old woman,' he cried out in horror."

Hermann goes mad and spends the rest of his days repeating endlessly: "Three, seven, ace! Three, seven, queen!" Liza is happily married. Tomsky is promoted and marries. The Queen of Spades is an excellent, eerie, suspenseful, well-told story.

The Captain's Daughter (completed in 1836) is a historical novel, a genre very much in fashion at that time. Indeed, The Moor of Peter the Great, mentioned above, testifies to Pushkin's earlier interest in this genre rendered popular by Walter Scott. Pushkin's novel is, in comparison with Scott's, told simply, without Scott's lengthy descriptions of person and place. The historical event on which Pushkin's novel is based is the uprising against Catherine II's regime headed by Pugachev (1773). The hero is a young officer loyal to Catherine. A multitude of events, in which Pugachev is sympathetically depicted, brings about various circumstances in which the young hero, Grinev, is now united with, now separated from his love, Maria Ivanovna, until eventually—owing to his meetings with Pugachev—he is arrested on a charge of treason. A meeting between Maria Ivanovna and Catherine II results in Grinev's vindication, and everything ends happily, in the true tradition of the sentimental romantic novel. The Captain's Daughter is excellent reading.

It would be impossible to attempt a full critical appraisal of Pushkin's prose work here. But this much is certain: not one of his prose works fails to hold the reader's attention. Pushkin as a prose writer is an excellent yarn spinner. And this, I believe, should serve as a starting point in any evaluation of his prose. The reader interested in arriving at critical insight into the artistic merits of the prose works would do well to devote less attention to the different facets of Belkin's personality, whom Pushkin is parodying or when, symbolic meanings, or other esoteric matters—all of which have a place, but a secondary one—and focus instead on things closer to the surface, primarily the narrative sequence—as, I believe, Pushkin himself did.