I
Staraya Roussa, May 19, 1879.
Dear and much respected Konstantin Petrovich, although to-day is only the 19th of May, my letter will not reach you earlier than the 21st, and therefore I hasten to congratulate you on your birthday. I remember, by the way, that exactly a year ago I came to you this very day in the morning, and it seems to me that it was only a fortnight or three weeks ago, or at most a month—so impossibly quickly time passes! I have now been here a month alone with my family and have seen hardly any one. The weather has been fine on the whole, the bird-berry tree and apple tree shed their blossom long ago here, and the lilac is in full bloom. I have sat and worked, but have not done much; I sent off, however, half the book (2½ folios) [part of The Brothers Karamazov] for the May number of the Russky Viestnik, but I am sitting waiting for the proofs, and I do not know what is going to happen.
The point is that this book of the novel is the culminating one. It is entitled ‘Pro and Contra,’ and the theme of the book is: denial of God and the refutation of this denial. The denial now is finished and sent off, but the refutation will only come in the June number. The denial I described just as I felt it myself and realised it strongest, that is, just as it is now taking place in our Russia in nearly the whole upper stratum of society, and above all with the young generation. I mean, the scientific and philosophical refutation of the existence of God has been given up, it no longer occupies at all socialists of to-day (as it occupied them throughout the whole of the last century and the first half of the present one); instead, men are denying with all their might and main the divine creation, the world of God and its meaning. These are the only things which modern civilisation finds utter nonsense. I flatter myself with the hope that even in such an abstract theme I have not betrayed realism. The refutation of this (not a direct, not a face to face refutation) will appear in the last word of the dying old monk.—Many critics have reproached me because I generally choose for my novels themes that are not right, are not real, and so on. I, on the contrary, know nothing more real than just these themes… .
I sent it off all right, and yet I have a presentiment that for some reason they may suddenly decide not to publish it in the Russky Viestnik. But enough of that. One goes on talking of one’s worries. I read the newspapers here and understand nothing. They simply write of nothing. Only yesterday I read in the Novoye Vremya about the order of the Minister of Education that teachers should refute socialism in class (and therefore should enter into discussions with the pupils?). The idea is so dangerous that it passes understanding.
When I arrived here the talk was about the officer Dubrovin of the local Vilmanstrand regiment (who was hanged). They say he pretended madness up to the very rope, although it might not have been pretence, for he was incontestably mad without it. But when one begins to judge from an example before one’s eyes, one is for the hundredth time struck with two facts which with us in Russia are unchangeable. Thus: consider only the regiment in which Dubrovin was, and, on the other hand, himself. One sees such a difference between them that they appear as beings from different planets; and yet Dubrovin lived and acted in the firm belief that every one, the whole regiment, would suddenly become like himself, and would be occupied only by that which concerned him. On the other hand, we say immediately: they are mad. Yet those madmen have their logic, their doctrine, their esse, their God even, and they are planted in them as firm as firm can be. This is left out of consideration. Nonsense, people say. It is not like anything they know, therefore it is nonsense. It is culture we have not got, dear Konstantin Petrovich (the culture which exists everywhere else), and it is not there because of the nihilist, Peter the Great. It was torn out by the root. And since man does not live by bread alone, our poor, uncultured man involuntarily invents something most fantastical, most absurd, and most unlike anything. (For although he has taken absolutely everything from European socialism, yet even this he has remade so that it is unlike anything.)
Now I’ve written four pages, and see, dear Konstantin Petrovich, I’ve written you exactly what I did not want to write! But there’s nothing to be done. I press your hand closely and send you my sincere wish for all that is best, and for long, long life. I am pleased now that you will receive these words of mine and that you will read them.
If you write me even a single line, you will greatly support my spirit. In the winter too I came to you to heal my spirit.
May God send you peace of mind—I know not what to wish a man more than this in these days of ours.
My deep bow to your much respected wife.—Your absolutely devoted servant, F. DOSTOEVSKY.