[In the following essay, Barta discusses Turgenev's short story “Faust” in conjunction with the author's 1856 review of a translation of Goethe's Faust.]

Both Turgenev's fiction and his criticism reveal an unusually strong interest in great literary works of the past: Hamlet, Don Quixote, King Lear and Manon Lescaut mark important stages in Turgenev's career. At times, Goethe's Faust in particular preoccupied Turgenev. He translated part of the drama into Russian, wrote a detailed review of Mikhail Vronchenko's translation of the first part of Faust in 1844 and published his own story, entitled ‘Faust’, in the literary magazine, Sovremennik.¹ ‘Faust’ appeared in 1856, the same year as Rudin. The volume of Sovremennik in which it was published also contained A. Strugovshchikov's translation of the first part of Goethe's Faust.

Turgenev's story was highly praised by Nekrasov and Tolstoy, and a French translation appeared as early as 1856; a German translation followed in 1862.² The story is intriguing for several reasons. In the first place it occupies a position between two prose forms—the short story and the novel: Turgenev himself referred to it as ‘a novel in letters’.³ ‘Faust’ is also the first work by Turgenev to contain ‘mysterious’ elements.⁴

If a conventional and ‘obedient’ reader were to focus on the issues which the author places in the foreground, Turgenev's ‘Faust’ could be regarded as typical of fiction based on the figure of the so-called ‘superfluous man’. Such a reading would be limiting, however. The reader's selection of relevant details for the formation of a gestalt according to authorial specifications would leave on the fringes such issues as the connection between the fate of the story's heroine, Vera Nikolaevna, and the female characters in the numerous allusions to literary works in the story's plot. Turgenev's own biases and his identification with many features of the male protagonist, Pavel Aleksandrovich, are smoothly silenced in the Rahmenerzählung: the framework of the letters distances the author from the plot. However, the Ich-Erzählung format provides a strong sense of personal involvement on the part of the writer.⁵

This article will study Turgenev's ‘Faust’ in connection with Turgenev's review of the Vronchenko translation of Goethe's drama (in reality, an extensive critical study of Faust). Furthermore, we shall deal with the numerous literary texts which provide background to the story's plot. Turgenev's story and his essay on Faust reflect the ideological assumptions inherent in the texts to which the story alludes: they entrap and destroy Turgenev's heroine whose function is to throw light on the suffering, catharsis and new-found, albeit trite, wisdom of the weak and egoistic man whom she loves and who, of course, survives her. (We shall assume a broad familiarity with the content of Turgenev's novella.)

The plot, embedded in a carefully constructed fabula, contains a spatial frame: the narrator and protagonist, Pavel Aleksandrovich, keeps paying visits from his home to the neighbouring estate where Vera Nikolaevna and her family live. Semiotic signifiers abound in Pavel Aleksandrovich's estate, and these, together with his comments about the past, provide the history of his inactive and dull life. He is only in his mid-thirties but he already feels like an old man. The vicarious experiences through the literary works with which he surrounds himself help to alleviate his boredom and influence his two activities: writing long letters to his friend in St Petersburg and playing a game of seduction with the innocent and provincial Vera. With the help of fictional works, Pavel Aleksandrovich dismantles the pillars of Vera's upbringing and attempts to present himself as the romantic, fictional lover. The story his letters narrate places him in the centre of the action; we learn almost nothing about the addressee of the letters, and none of the letters Pavel Alexandrovich receives is included in this one-sided ‘epistolary novel’. We learn that his correspondent's name is Semen Nikolaevich; he formerly studied together with Pavel Aleksandrovich, and at the time of the story's action he runs an office in the capital. Pavel Aleksandrovich expresses no interest in him in the letters: his sole concern is his own emotional life. Whilst his description of himself as a lover is reminiscent of the fictional characters he reads about, it is uncertain whether at any stage of the story he is really in love with Vera: it is certain, though, that he is sorry for himself and preoccupied with his own emotions. He is unwilling to entertain the thought of accepting Vera's love for him; nevertheless he seems fascinated with himself in the role of the lover.

As a reader of Goethe's Faust, the idea of seduction in the play intrigues Pavel Aleksandrovich.⁶ Vera—married to a kind but torpid man—also finds this aspect of the drama fascinating. Pavel and Vera engage in richly ambiguous conversations about their readings: he suggests that great pleasure awaits her as they explore the world of literature, and he supposedly refers constantly to aesthetic and not sexual pleasure. He does not seem to comprehend what Vera means when cautioning that once on ‘this road, no return is available’. She, of course, talks about the seductive game whose logical conclusion is adultery. The reading of Pushkin's Eugene Onegin marks the beginning of the last phase in Pavel Aleksandrovich's game.⁷ As they are reading together, Pavel kisses Vera's hand, and in response she blushes and rushes away.⁸ It still does not suit him to acknowledge what the process is leading to. Their different interpretations of the relationship remain obscure until the end of the story where the peripeteia occurs. As Vera asks him what he has done to her, he still feigns surprise, taking the question as one pertaining to the discovery of aesthetic delights. Vera, however, can take it no longer and informs him that she is in love with him.

Pavel Aleksandrovich is clearly not innocent: he has consciously made Vera fall in love with him. This fact is disguised, however, by the way information is presented in the text. Since Pavel Aleksandrovich uses Goethe's Faust to arouse Vera's interest in him, it is helpful to study his particular interpretation of the play, which reflects Turgenev's own essay on the translation of Faust. Turgenev writes that Faust is beyond the reach of people who have a mind solely for practical matters: they will understand Hamlet and Macbeth but not Faust.⁹ Thus, having met the members of Vera's circle, Pavel Aleksandrovich deliberately selects Faust for a public reading in the belief that everybody in the company except Vera will fail to keep up with the text. In particular, he knows that Priimkov, Vera's husband, will be unable to share the aesthetic experience that will affect him and Vera, since the reading is in the original German and Priimkov's German is poor. In this way, Vera will see that her husband is inferior to Pavel Aleksandrovich. Priimkov, true to the specifications of Turgenev's Faust essay, demonstrates that his mind is good only for practical banalities: he asks Pavel Aleksandrovich at an inappropriate moment when he is about to begin the reading of Faust whether he would like some sweetened water to drink. His heart filled with condescension for Priimkov, Pavel Aleksandrovich addresses his performance to the lady of the house.

But the manipulation of Vera's feelings does not end here. Pavel Aleksandrovich reads out a meticulously compiled selection of passages from Goethe's Faust. For instance, Pavel, like Turgenev, dismisses the second part of Goethe's drama because of its supposed artistic flaws. He explicitly says that he is to omit from his reading such parts as the ‘Walpurgisnacht’ and the ‘Intermezzo’. What he does not mention, however, is that he will be presenting a substantially more abbreviated version even than that. This becomes clear in the atmospheric detail provided by Turgenev. Thus, we know that the reading in the garden pavilion got under way as it was getting dark since, as they were walking towards the pavilion, a pink hue covered the cloud in front of them as the sun was setting. The reading took place on 19 June, which even according to the old calendar, is one of the longest evenings in the year. In the Orlov province in the central part of European Russia, where the estate (strongly reminiscent of Spasskoe) presumably is located, the sun would be setting some time between 8:30 and 10:00 at the present time; but in the nineteenth century this would have been two hours earlier, between 6:30 and 8:00 p.m.: St Petersburg time was one, and not two, hours ahead of Central European time and there was no daylight-saving time in the summer. We know that behind them there was an ominous black cloud, suggesting that a storm was approaching. We also know that after the reading they returned to the house for supper and there was lightning outside. Even for an experienced reader surrounded by a well-prepared audience, the first part of Goethe's Faust will take at least five and a half, perhaps six, hours of reading. If this had been the case, the company would have gathered for supper after midnight in the small hours of the morning. According to the customs which prevailed among the provincial gentry in households like Vera Nikolaevna's, this would have been rather unlikely. Nor does a giant storm cloud normally wait for six hours in north-eastern Europe in June before lightning and thunder occur. Most probably what happened was that Pavel Aleksandrovich read out an assortment of highlights from Faust, taking no more than one and a half, at the most two, hours. His intention was to steer Vera's thoughts to seduction and so he focused on those portions of the text that related to Faust and Gretchen, skipping the rest.

Pavel Aleksandrovich's attempts to make Vera fall in love with him face no obstacles. Vera is free to give in to what she mistakenly supposes to be his intention: to run away with her, or make love to her in secret. Her husband is well-meaning and unsuspecting, and can safely be ignored. In the past, her mother, Yeltsova, had forbidden Pavel Aleksandrovich to marry Vera after he limply asked for her hand, regarding him as weak and not really in love with Vera. She is now dead, and Pavel admits in a letter his satisfaction at overcoming the dead woman's will. However, his irresolute actions after being turned away by Yeltsova confirmed that she had been correct about him: he took her rejection without opposition, failed to inform Vera about his desire to marry her, departed and forgot her. During their first acquaintance, he chose not to remain alone with Vera after he noticed that she loved him. He even admits in one of his letters that Vera's type does not attract him, so presumably he proposed to marry her merely because he thought that that was the appropriate thing to do. The wise and experienced Yeltsova must have sensed that he did not love her daughter. During his second ‘courtship’ he fancies that he is in love, although he hastens to add in his letter to his friend that he knows that his love is hopeless. He fails to elaborate, however, upon the fact that the relationship is doomed not because of Vera's unwillingness, but rather his own. He is too conventional to contemplate the violating of social norms which would undoubtedly be involved were he to return Vera's love. Therefore, having falsely raised her expectations, he fails her a second time too.

In assuming the role of the romantic lover, the sentimental educator of the naive Vera, Pavel Aleksandrovich is encouraged to identify with Faust himself. In his seventh letter, he addresses Mephistopheles in a theatrical manner: O MiΦistоΦils! i ty mni ni pоmоgaiss.’¹⁰ Yet, while Turgenev's ‘Faust’ contains a large number of allusions to the first part of Goethe's Faust, Pavel Aleksandrovich himself has almost no Faustian qualities to speak of.¹¹ A good case in point is the occasion when Vera fails to turn up to a night-time rendezvous by the lake. Pavel Aleksandrovich wanders by her house, which has lights blazing even though it is before midnight. The reason for this is that Vera is very ill and the family are about to send for the doctor: yet Pavel tells himself that they must surely be entertaining guests and that this is the reason Vera did not come to their meeting. He ought to have realised, of course, that the determined and resourceful Vera would not stay away from their meeting merely because of guests. He probably invents reasons for himself not to have to be involved in unpleasantness inside the house for which he knows he is responsible. This scene, indeed, exhibits certain similarities with the ‘Walpurgisnacht’ episode which Pavel Aleksandrovich so carefully skipped in his reading of the play. In that episode Faust is unaware that Gretchen is in great trouble. He displays callousness, having seduced Gretchen and then left her, killed her brother and put her mother to sleep for good with the aid of the devil. But Faust is not hypocritical and untrue to himself as Pavel Aleksandrovich is. It is noteworthy that on her deathbed Vera identifies Pavel Aleksandrovich not with Faust but with Mephistopheles: as she catches sight of him, we read in Pavel Aleksandrovich's ninth letter, she quotes Gretchen's words from the final scene of Part I of Faust: ‘Cigо kоcit оn na оsvysinnоm misti, / Etоt … vоt etоt’.¹² Gretchen's original words, ‘Der! Der! Schicke ihn fort! / Was will er an dem heiligen Ort?’ (4602-3) are uttered when she catches sight of Mephistopheles as Faust implores her to escape with him from the prison cell.¹³

Indeed, Pavel Aleksandrovich's analogy with Faust is an unflattering one. Faust wants to understand the mysteries of life and seeks to experience the fullness of existence and infinity: it is because of the powerful thirst for knowledge and experience that he gives away his soul and sacrifices his salvation. Pavel Aleksandrovich pales by comparison: whereas Faust leaves Gretchen beautiful jewels to tempt her, Pavel Aleksandrovich merely points out to Vera a pinkish-coloured cloud in the sky. Instead of rebelling against human limitations, the lacklustre Pavel Aleksandrovich never violates his sense of boring propriety.¹⁴ Instead of the Faustian thirst for knowledge, boredom propels Pavel Aleksandrovich to disrupt the lives of those around himself.

In fact, Pavel Aleksandrovich seems to be unsuccessful at everything he does. Thus, he states that he prefers not to discuss why, upon his return to Berlin after the first courtship of Vera, his plans to be active failed to materialize. He also failed in Moscow society: even his own butler intimidated him and made him feel insecure. His estate is in ruins, while his servants and his house are neglected and are in a state of decay. And as he takes Vera Nikolaevna on an outing on the lake, it is Schimmel, the old German, who has to take control of the boat when the wind starts gusting and Pavel cannot handle the vessel. His very language is unoriginal and heavily cliché-laden: he came home to ‘find himself’; he complains about the impossibility of ‘starting life over again’. He writes in the seventh letter: ‘dоlznо zits s pоlszоj, s цilsy na zimli, ispоlnyts svоj dоlg, svоi dilо. I y prinylsy bylо za rabоtu … Vоt оpyts vsi razviynо, кaк vikrim!’¹⁵ Even his quotation from Pushkin's poem, ‘Razgоvоr кnigоprоdavцa s pоetоm’, is incorrect: he says ‘Я sоdrоgayss—sirdцi bоlsnо— / Mni stydnо idоlоv mоik’ instead of the correct ‘Я taк i vspyknu, sirdцu bоlsnо: / Mni stydnо idоlоv mоik’.¹⁶

The narrative, however, disguises Pavel Aleksandrovich's mediocrity. It is his viewpoint that dominates and marginalises information which could mar the desired image of the world around him. He presents himself as an exhausted, liberal Russian intellectual, paralysed by the socio-political realities of an oppressive and dictatorial Russian society, which has no room for people of his kind. His vital energies have been spent: therefore, even when he is in love, he fails to deliver the promise and disappoints the beloved woman.¹⁷ In short, he is a ‘superfluous man’, at least from the viewpoint of the dominant school of criticism in Russia.

However, I have argued elsewhere that the conventional critical concept of the ‘superfluous man’ is not useful. Its understanding as a ‘reflection’ of a social type oversimplifies the process of mimesis in writing: texts reflect other texts rather than serving as an attentive and subservient mirror, offering a thoroughly compiled copy of some kind of ‘real world’.¹⁸ Rather, it is social behaviour that reflects ideology generated by discourse in places such as novels. Calling a man such as Pavel Aleksandrovich or Rudin ‘superfluous’ implies that personal behaviour is a direct result of socio-political reality. So, whilst it lacks psychological subtlety and has firmly sexist implications, ‘superfluous man’ is convenient as a term by which an egoistical and mediocre person can be depicted more positively.

Pavel Aleksandrovich wants the recipient of his letters to think highly of him. In one letter he implicitly compares himself to Hamlet, by addressing Semen Nikolaevich as ‘Horatio’. He implies that there is some analogy between his return to his home and Odysseus's nostos to Ithaca: he complains that his dog had died and failed to wait for him as Argos did for his master. His generalisations suggest that he is a wise man of the world: he pontificates without any hesitation that the second part of Faust is worthless, that every old German smells of chicory and that married women with children should show visible signs of ageing: he expresses displeasure that Vera Nikolaevna has not lost her looks as he has. Nevertheless, being with her is pleasant for him. Vera gratifies Pavel Aleksandrovich's vanity, for, rather than reminding him of his useless life, she makes him feel important by allowing him to ‘educate’ her. He looks after his own mental well-being with meticulous care: he objectifies his feelings, concerns and hopes in his letters, oblivious of the fact that Vera, on the other hand, has no one to talk or write to about her feelings. And he shows little interest in the consequences of his own behaviour for Vera: when the friend, Semen Nikolaevich, offers to come and take him away to prevent a possible tragic ending to the relationship, he turns the offer down. He asks his friend to spare his feelings, which is more than he does for Vera.

A conventional reading, which follows the important signposts placed along the reader's path, will concede that the story's basic concern is an ethical one.¹⁹ Pavel Aleksandrovich's comments at the end of the story suggest that he has matured into a wise and sad man with a sense of duty and moral integrity, an ‘Ancient Mariner’ of the nest of the gentry. According to the story's ‘message’, confirmed in numerous scholarly articles, he has learnt from his affair with Vera Nikolaevna that ‘duty’ is more important than personal aspirations.²⁰

The story's epigraph is a quotation from Goethe from the scene entitled ‘Faust's Study’: ‘Enthbehren sollst du! Sollst entbehren!’ (1549). The old scholar, Faust, utters these words with a sense of bitterness: in response to Mephistopheles's advice to don a youthful mask ‘to find out what life is all about’, he says that nothing can alter the human predicament of infinite imagination locked into transience. An aged man, he is expected to renounce the ways of the world yet he is in no mood to do so. In Turgenev's story, Pavel Aleksandrovich's last letter, set against the allusions to Goethe, implies that he has risen above supposed Faustian egoism.²¹ However, Pavel Aleksandrovich's repeated suggestions about having understood the paramountcy of duty are unconvincing if we consider his pattern of behaviour. His trite and cliché-ridden discourse does not change between the beginning and the end of the story and it is highly questionable whether his behaviour does either. In fact, by ‘performing one's duty’ what Pavel Aleksandrovich (and Turgenev) means is the performance of useful activities in the spirit of Belinsky's ‘sociality’.²²

The epigraph is not, in fact, particularly relevant in the story.²³ Its inclusion overtly invites comparisons between Faust and Pavel Aleksandrovich, yet I have implied above that the limp Pavel Aleksandrovich and Faust really have nothing in common. This fact contradicts Turgenev's apparent intention to have the story ‘Faust’ illustrate his theory about Goethe. Turgenev's essay seems to imply that Goethe is an ‘egoistic’ Romantic who sings about beauty, but this is not what Russia needs in the 1840s. Rather, according to Turgenev, this is a time for activists who are willing to effect social and political changes.²⁴ Consistent with this vision, Pavel Aleksandrovich is supposed to mature into this activist at the end of the story. As a result of his personal loss, the narrative suggests, he reaches a more advanced state of human life than Faust: he aspires to a higher purpose.²⁵ This is not altogether convincing, and we need to examine Turgenev's own character and views in order to understand why.

Features of Turgenev's own character inform Pavel Aleksandrovich's personality, and this may partly explain why he is presented with so much sympathy in ‘Faust’. For example, elements from Turgenev's essay on Goethe's Faust enter Pavel Aleksandrovich's discourse directly. Comments about the sui generis features of the old German teacher, Schimmler, echo Turgenev's own comments about Goethe's Wagner in Faust as a ‘nimiц par excellence’.²⁶ Turgenev skips ‘Walpurgisnacht’ and ‘Intermezzo’ in his essay, just as Pavel Aleksandrovich omits these in his own reading. Both the author and the character enthuse about Goethe's ‘Earth Spirit’ scene,²⁷ and they similarly disregard the entire second part of Faust. Pavel Aleksandrovich's loving memories of reading Faust in his youth in Berlin echo those of Turgenev.²⁸ Pavel Aleksandrovich's estate and its surroundings resemble the Turgenev estate at Spasskoe and his relationship with Vera Nikolaevna recalls aspects of Turgenev's friendship with Maria Nikolaevna Tolstaya, Lev Tolstoy's sister.²⁹ Indeed, Turgenev corresponded with Maria Tolstaya concerning Goethe's Faust,³⁰ and it is also of interest that Maria Tolstaya did not like to read literary works.³¹

Again like Turgenev, Pavel Aleksandrovich is condescending about unsophisticated women and is drawn to Platonic relationships with married noblewomen.³² Pavel Aleksandrovich's comments and Turgenev's essay on Goethe's Faust both reflect these attitudes. The general positive evaluation of Mephistopheles in Turgenev's essay (and story) is oblivious of Mephistopheles's role in Gretchen's fate and reflects only his impact on Faust's life.³³ In this context, Turgenev is sufficiently biased against Gretchen to overlook specific textual evidence in Goethe's Faust: he suggests in his article on Faust that Gretchen is stupid in that she immediately falls in love with Faust as he decisively approaches her: ‘Φaust znaкоmitsy s nij risitilsnо i smilо, кaк vsi ginialsnyi lydi; Gritkin v nigо vlyblyitsy tоtcas.’³⁴ If we look at the scene which Turgenev analyses, it becomes evident that his reading distorts it:

FAUST:
Mein schönes Fräulein, darf ich wagen,
Meinen Arm und Geleit Ihr anzutragen?
MARGARETE:
Bin weder Fräulein, weder schon,
Kann ungeleitet nach Hause gehn. (Sie macht sich los
und ab)

(2605-8)

Faust indeed makes a strong impression on Gretchen but she unambiguously rejects his initial approach rather than showing any obvious sign of ‘immediately falling in love’.

Turgenev's condescending attitude about her is blatantly obvious in his article:

O samоj Gritkin my ni budim mnоgо rasprоstranytssy: оna mila, кaк цvitок, prоzracna, кaк staкan vоdy, pоnytna, кaк dvazdy dva-cityri; … оna, vprоcim, nisкоlsко glupa. Nо Φaust i ni tribuit оsоbinnyk umstvinnyk spоsоbnоstij оt svоij vоzlyblinnоj.³⁵

Turgenev even admonishes the Russian translator, M. Vronchenko, for suggesting that Gretchen is bright:

my tipirs zi ni mоzim ni zamitits g-nu pirivоdciкu, ctо оn, pri pirvоj vstrici Φausta s Gritkin, naprasnо zastavlyit igо gоvоrits prо nii:

Kaк nidооpustna i sкrоmna,
I, кazitsy, pritоm umna!

V pоdlinniкi sкazanо: ‘Und etwas Schnippisch doch zugleich …’ Schnippisch—nipirivоdimоi slоvо: оnо sкоrii znacit—zimanna v kоrоsim smysli … nо ni v коim slucai ni umna.³⁶

In spite of Turgenev's criticism, ‘schnippisch’ does imply wit and intellect and not ‘affectedness’ as zimanstvо does, even though the short form of the adjective umnyj does indeed put greater emphasis on intellectual potential than the original German text calls for.

As Turgenev discusses the final scene of Goethe's Faust, he suggests that Gretchen in her stupidity is morally superior to Faust: ‘Gritkin, etоt bidnyj, glupyj, оbmanutyj ribinок, v etоj sцini ni v tysycu li raz vysi umnоgо Φausta …’.³⁷ This argument strongly reminds one of the conclusion of Turgenev's article, ‘Gamlit i Dоn Kikоt’: Hamlet is brilliant but weak and inactive and ruins everything, whereas Don Quixote is positive and strong, albeit insane. The Russian Hamlet, a petty demon, stands for the Turgenevian superfluous man and Don Quixote represents the type of strong and loving female involved with the superfluous man. Her quixotic element lies in her passion and self-sacrificing heroism which take the upper hand over practical, comme-il-faut behaviour. The critical tradition which identifies Pavel Aleksandrovich as the superfluous man and Vera Nikolaevna as the strong woman accepts the ideological moorings of Turgenev's study on Hamlet and Don Quixote. In his famous article, ‘Russкij cilоviк na randivu’, Chernyshevsky confirms Turgenev's theory of the superfluous man. Describing Pavel Aleksandrovich, Chernyshevsky writes that his indecisiveness in matters of love reflects his attitude to socially useful activities. He is such an impossible lover, Chernyshevsky argues, that it is the woman who must confess her love first. Then he goes on: ‘Ni udivitilsnо, ctо pоsli taкоgо pоvidiniy lybimоgо cilоviкa, u bidnоj zinsiny sdilalass nirviciкay gоrycкa.’³⁸

In addition to the sexist assumption of the passage (namely, that nice women expect to assume a passive role in courtship), Chernyshevsky also ignores the possibilities, first, that Pavel Aleksandrovich may not have a great deal to contribute to society and, secondly, that it is Vera and not he who is superfluous. He uses Vera to the maximum: more than the object of his love, she is a means of allowing him to experience love. She gives him much-needed self-esteem and her death provides him with a purpose in life: now he can see himself as a tragic figure who, after a great crisis, will devote himself solely to the call of duty (the implication here is, of course, misleading, as Pavel Aleksandrovich did not preoccupy himself with frivolous or bohemian undertakings at the expense of ‘duty’ before the events described in the story: he was merely leading a boring life). Having made her confession to him, Vera fulfilled her useful task in complementing the male protagonist; she is now superfluous and the only useful thing for her to do is die. Were she to live, further humiliations would await Pavel Aleksandrovich instead of the opportunity to parade as a wise man of tragic grandeur.

Male mediocrity and vanity, then, destroy the female character. ‘Strong’ woman is a misnomer in such fiction as Rudin or ‘Faust’: the odds are so much against women in their male-dominated society that they cannot prevail. A good illustration of this is the relationship between Pavel Aleksandrovich and Vera's determined mother, Yeltsova. Pavel Aleksandrovich recalls: ‘y кaк-tо sкazal ij, ctо vsi my, sоvriminnyi lydi, nadlоmlinnyi … Nadlamyvats siby ni dly cigо,—prоmоlvila оna,—nadо vsigо siby pirilоmits ili uz ni trоgats …’.³⁹ Yeltsova's comments indicate that she sees all too clearly that Pavel Aleksandrovich attempts to put the blame for his weakness and indecisiveness on socio-political factors and also that she is not impressed by Pavel Aleksandrovich's complaints.⁴⁰ From Pavel Aleksandrovich's viewpoint, of course, it is Yeltsova who is ‘superfluous’, since her presence prevents him from luring Vera into a hopeless relationship.

Pavel Aleksandrovich's harmful influence manifests itself in the literature to which he exposes Vera and through which he counters the dead mother's wish to keep her daughter from him. There is a further interesting issue here, concerning Vera's reading matter. Her mother, Yeltsova, insisted on educating Vera solely in the exact sciences and not in literature. Moreover, so long as she obeyed her mother and stayed away from books she was contented; but once she gave in to Pavel Aleksandrovich's urgings and read the books he recommended, her demise ensued.

In order to appreciate this point, it is necessary to specify what the characters mean by ‘literature’. The influential books in question include such famous works as Faust, Eugene Onegin and the novels which surround Pavel Aleksandrovich at his estate: Prévost's Manon Lescaut, Vicomte d'Arlincourt's Le Solitaire, Restif de la Bretonne's Le paysan perverti and Voltaire's Candide. The importance of each of these texts within the consciousness of Turgenev's ‘Faust’ merits a closer look. The narrator refers to one of the pictures on the wall of his room as ‘Manon Lescaut’. The portrait of Vera's grandmother, an Italian peasant woman who wanted to elope with the man she loved and was killed for this, also reminds him of Manon. Prévost's heroine resists parental tyranny, and clearly this is also a feature of Vera, her mother and her grandmother. In Prévost's novel, the character Des Grieux, like Vera's grandfather and father, suggests that Manon should elope with him to avoid a life of restrictions. However, their life together is fraught with tremendous hardships and in the end Manon dies and is survived by a now wise, if saddened, Des Grieux. In what seems like a direct parallel, Pavel Aleksandrovich is similarly wise and sad after the untimely death of Vera.

Furthermore, the curtains in Pavel Aleksandrovich's room show scenes from Arlincourt's Le solitaire, in which a boorish-looking hermit is abducting a young woman. The hermit loves Eloide, although he has killed her father, destroyed her uncle and seduced her cousin. Faust, it will be recalled, similarly destroyed the family of the woman he loved. In Pushkin's novel, too, Eugene Onegin's boredom-induced flirtation leads to Lensky's death and Tatyana's unhappiness. The mediocre and lacklustre Pavel Aleksandrovich has killed nobody, nor is he a boor; but, like the protagonists of his readings, he thoroughly disrupts peaceful lives to no purpose. From a different perspective, Le Paysan perverti and Candide relate how wordly adventures unsettle the foundations of one's early education. In ‘Faust’, Pavel Aleksandrovich offers to Vera merely vicarious adventures from books; but these nevertheless destroy her peace of mind, founded in the education she had received from her mother. When she realises that Pavel Aleksandrovich is unwilling or unable to offer anything in return for the tranquillity she has sacrificed, her life loses its meaning. In the fictional world of the story ‘Faust’, as in Turgenev's own society, books are believed to reflect ‘reality’ mimetically, that is by imitation.⁴¹ The world the books in the story project centres on the Fausts, Onegins and Des Grieux, for whom the purpose of female figures is to illuminate and complement the males. Once they have done that, they die or disappear in boring marriages, because they have become superfluous. Why do books entrap such young female readers as Tatyana in Eugene Onegin, Natasha in Rudin or Vera in ‘Faust’?⁴² The narratives in these women's readings first of all confirm a world order which denies them their space as individuals and then induce them to accept their own position as superfluous women whose task is to admire the men who reject or destroy them before learning their lessons.

At the very moment Vera allows passion to take over, she seeks protection under her mother's lifelike portrait. She admits that she never wanted to be free from the protection of her mother, Yeltsova, who knows from her own and her mother's experience that whenever women give way to passion tragedy strikes. Yeltsova advises her daughter to be like ice and never to reveal her desire. She bans books whose plots confirm their own ideological moorings. Woman's desire is thus seen as a threat to the male-dominated social order: it is not allowed to be realised, but is to be depicted as a means for a better description of male desire. Women who, like Yeltsova, show real strength and rebel will be turned into frightening creatures with supernatural powers. Thus, rather than accusing Pavel Aleksandrovich alone of destroying Vera, the narrative implies that the mother, propelled by dark forces, like a witch, came back from the dead to haunt her daughter in order to stop her from ignoring her injunction never to read novels.

Turgenev's ‘Faust’ deals therefore with the consequences of violating authority, three forms of which inform the story: patriarchal, matriarchal and narratorial. This study has focused on the realist narrative's attempt to disguise the text's ability to lead the reader to reconsider socially naturalised ideological assumptions which are, by their nature, artificial constructs. They minimise the inconsistencies of the patriarchal order and marginalise matriarchal values: grandmother, mother and daughter die before their strong will and determination can change the world in which self-serving male interests prevail.

Notes

1. The review appeared anonymously; however, there seems to be little doubt that Turgenev was the author: see Elias Rosenkratz, ‘Turgenev und Goethe’, Germanoslavica, Vol.2, nos.1-4 (1932), pp.76-90 (p.77).

2. Peter Thiergen, ‘Iwan Turgenews Novelle “Faust”’, in Günther Mahal, ed., Faust-Rezeption in Rußland und in der Sowjetunion., Knittlingen: Faust-Museum, 1983, pp.65-9 (p.66).

3. Ivan Turgenev, Pоlnоi sоbranii sоcininij i pisim v dvaddati vоssmi tоmak, Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk SSSR, Moscow and Leningrad, 1960-64, vol.6 (1964), pp.357-8.

4. D. Zsuzsa Zöldhelyi, Turgenyev prozai költemenyei, Tankönyvkiadó, Budapest, 1991, p.38. Under Belinsky's influence, in the years preceding ‘Faust’, Turgenev rejected mysterious elements in literature. Because he regarded such elements as characteristic of the German ‘soul’ it is hardly surprising that the writing of his own ‘Faust’ should inspire him to change his mind about transcendental motifs: see ibid., pp.39-40.

5. Thoma Eekman, ‘Turgenev and the Shorter Prose Forms’ in Peter Alber Jensen (ed.), Texts and Contexts: Essays to Honor Nik Åke Nillson, Almqvist & Wiksell International, Stockholm, 1987, pp.42-52 (p.48).

6. E. Steffensen, ‘Giti i Turginiv (analiz rassкaza Turginiva “Φaust”)’ in S. V. Martselev, ed., Slavynsкay кulstura i mirоvоj кulsturnyj prоцiss, Nauka i tekhnika, Minsk, 1985, pp.226-30 (p.228).

7. Ibid.

8. Eugene Onegin is yet another story in which seduction is attempted. Here, however, Onegin, who rejected young and innocent Tatyana the first time, is in turn rejected by her a few years later when she is a dignified and unhappily married woman.

9. Turgenev, op.cit., vol.1 (1960), p.213.

10. Ibid., vol.7 (1964), p.40.

11. A. Bem, ‘Faust bei Turgenev’, Germanoslavica. 1932-33:2 (1-4), pp.359-68 (p.365). We find many direct allusions to Goethe's Faust. For example, as Vera Nikolaevna and Pavel Alexandrovich prepare for the reading of Faust in the Chinese pavilion in the park, Vera's daughter, Natasha, is frightened by a spider. In Faust, Mephistopheles appears before Faust for the first time in the form of a poodle. Vera is not frightened; rather, she takes the spider into her hands. Later, she explains that Mephistopheles does not terrify her as the devil but as a natural force present in humans. Schimmel's and Priimkov's trivial comments remind one of Wagner and Martha. Schimmel's presence by the side of Vera irritates Pavel Alexandrovich as Martha's company frustrated Faust in courting Gretchen. But as Schimmel is in charge of the boat carrying Pavel and Vera and sings sexually suggestive songs, he is reminiscent of Mephistopheles too.

12. Turgenev, op.cit., vol.7, p.49.

13. It is noteworthy that the young Turgenev translated the final scene of Part I of Goethe's Faust into Russian. Entitled ‘Pоslidnyy sцina pirvоj casti Φausta Giti’, the translation, signed by ‘T. L.’, appeared in Oticistvinnyi zapisкi, June 1844, vol. 34, part 1, pp.220-26. It is clearly not accidental that Turgenev is preoccupied with Gretchen. The ‘women's question’ was of great interest among Western-oriented liberal writers at the time: cf. Herzen's Ktо vinоvat?

14. V. N. Tikhomirov, ‘Tradiцii Giti v pоvisti Turginiva “Φaust”’, Vоprоsy russкоj litiratury, 1977, 1 (29), pp.92-9 (p.95); Steffenson, op.cit., p.229.

15. Turgenev, op.cit., vol.7, p.39.

16. I. A. Bityugova, ‘Φaust’, in I S. Turgenev, Pоlnоi sоbranii sоcininij …, vol.7 (1964), pp.395-414 (p.413). Inaccurate quotations are frequent both in Turgenev's letters and in his fiction. While, undoubtedly, carelessness accounts for some of these, Zsuzsa Zöldhelyi suggests that such ‘mistakes’ are frequently purposeful. Slightly altered quotations thus turn into powerful allusions: see Zsuzsa Zöldhelyi, ‘A puszta Lear Királya’, Filológiai Közlöny, 1979, nos 3-4, p.264.

17. The well-articulated ideological charge of the narrative is obediently decoded by some critics. P. A. Kropotkin writes in Idealy i deistvitel'nost' v russkoi literature (St Petersburg, 1907, 102: ‘[V Φausti] slysitsy pоcti оtcaynii v оbrazоvannоm russкоm intilliginti, коtоryj dazi v lybvi окazyvaitsy nispоsоbnym prоyvits sinnnоi cuvstvо … ; dazi pri samyk blagоpiytnyk оbstоytilsstvak, оn mоzit prinisti lybysij igо zinsini tоlsко picals i оtcaynii’ (cited from Bityugova, op.cit, p.409).

18. Peter I. Barta, ‘Closure and Cracks in the Mirror: Narrative and Ideology in Turgenev's Rudin’, Scottish Slavonic Review, Autumn 1990, pp.31-41 (p.33).

19. See, for instance, L.N. Tokarev, ‘“Φaust” Giti v оцinкi I.S. Turginiva’, Vistniк mоsкоvsкоgо univirsitita, siriy VII, Φilоlоgiy, Zurnalistiкa, 1961, no.1, pp.65-74 (p.72).

20. Katharina Schutz, Das Goethebild Turgeniews, Bern, Verlag Paul Haupt, 1952, p.108; Tikhomirov, op.cit, pp.72-3; Bityugova, op.cit, p.402). R. L. Jackson suggests that Pavel Aleksandrovich's comment, ‘Vira pоgibla, a y uцilil’, is a parody on the beginning of the second part of Faust: ‘Das Lebens Pulse schlagen frisch lebending / Ätherische Dämmerung milde zu begrüßen’: see Robert Louis Jackson, ‘Vzaimоsvyzs Φausma Giti i Kоmipuu danti v zamysli rassкaza Turginiva “Φaust”’ in Paul Debreczeny (ed.), American Contributions to the Ninth International Congress of Slavists, Kiev, September 1983, Vol.2, Columbus, OH: Slavica, p.242.

21. Faust's interests in his personal happiness rather than the good of society has become a standard critical commonplace in Russia: see V. M. Zhirmunsky, Giti v russкоj litiraturi, Nauka, Leningrad, 1981, p., 282; he quotes Turgenev's views on the subject extensively.

22. Andre von Gronicka, ‘Goethe's Influence on I. S. Turgenev's “Faust” and “Asia” Novellae’, in John A. McCarthy (ed.), Aufnahme-Weitergabe: Literarische Impulse um Lessing und Goethe, Hamburg, Helmut Buske Verlag, 1982, pp.193-204 (p.198).

23. Bem, op.cit, p.366.

24. Zhirmunsky, op.cit., p.284.

25. Jackson, op.cit., p.241.

26. Turgenev, op.cit., vol.1, p.227.

27. Gronicka, op.cit., p.194; Schutz, op.cit, p.111.

28. See Gronicka, op.cit., p.203, note 8.

29. Bityugova, op.cit., pp.397, 399.

30. Thiergen, op.cit., p.67.

31. Bityugova, op.cit., p.399.

32. Barta, op.cit, pp.35-6.

33. Turgenev, op.cit, vol.1, p.226.

34. Ibid., p.231.

35. Ibid.

36. Ibid.

37. Ibid., p.233.

38. Cited from Bityugova, op.cit, p.408.

39. Turgenev, op.cit., vol.7, p.17.

40. All the women in Vera's family are determined in pursuing their passion and even if they fail they are stronger in their death than the men who survive them. The attempts of Vera's grandmother and mother to attain their freedom ended tragically. The grandmother, an Italian peasant woman, fell in love with a Russian nobleman and gave birth to his daughter, Vera's mother. Her jealous Italian fiancé killed her as she was fleeing with the Russian, Vera's grandfather. Bereft, Yeltsova's father devoted his life to spiritualist experiments. He did not want his daughter to leave and she had to flee from him with Yeltsov. Endowed with supernatural powers, he predicted that his daughter's life would be unhappy: sure enough, Yeltsov was accidentally shot while hunting and Yeltsova failed in her attempt to save Vera from her demise. The details about the family's past in the story's fabula contain many mysterious elements. In the sujet, too, mysterious elements play a significant role: Yeltsova seems ‘alive’ on her portrait. Furthermore, Vera's daughter shows a striking resemblance to her grandmother, as if Yeltsova were present in her granddaughter.

41. Christine Johanson, ‘Turgenev's Heroines: A Historical Assessment’, Canadian Slavonic Papers, vol.27, no.1 (1984), pp.15-23 (p.15).

42. Tatyana in Pushkin's Eugene Onegin and Francesca in the fifth canto in Dante's Divine Comedy so strongly believe what they read that they confuse the world of fiction with the reality of their own lives, suggests Riccardo Picchio: see Ricardo Picchio, ‘Dante and J. Malfilatre as Literary Sources of Tat'jana's Erotic Dream (Notes on the Third Chapter of Puskin's Evgenij Onegin)’, in Andrej Kodjak and Kiril Taranovsky (eds), Alexander Pushkin: A Symposium on the 175th Anniversary of His Birth, New York, New York University Press, 1976, p.46.