Kain is a poor little Jewish pedlar. Artem, the handsome, strong, but corrupt lover of the huckstress, is tended by him when he has been half-killed by envious and revengeful rivals. In return for this nursing, and for his rescue from need and misery, Artem protects the despised and persecuted Kain. But he has grown weary of grat.i.tude--grat.i.tude to the weak being ever a burden to strong men.
And the lion drives away the imploring mouse, that saved him once from the nets that held him captive--and falls asleep smiling.
[Ill.u.s.tration: The bare-footed brigade on the Volga-quay, and Nijni Novgorod (_After a sketch by Gorki_)]
This sombre temperament determines the catastrophe of the other stories. They almost invariably close in the sullen gloom of a wet March evening, when we wonder afresh if the Spring is really coming.
In "Creatures that once were Men," Gorki"s sinister experience and pathos are essential factors in the accusing symbolism. He relates in the unpretending style of a chronicler how the corpulent citizens reside on the hill-tops, amid well-tended gardens. When it rains the whole refuse of the upper town streams into the slums.
The new romance; Sentiment and humour; Russian middle cla.s.s; The man of the future; Descriptions of nature; Superfluity of detail; The Russian proletaire; Psychology of murder; Artistic inaccuracy; Moujik and outcast; A poet"s idealism.
And yet it is just this sombre pathos and experience that compel us so often to recognise in Gorki"s types a new category of hero. They are characterised by their sense of boundless freedom. They have both inclination and capacity to abandon and fling aside all familiar customs, duties, and relations.
It is a world of heroes, of most romantic heroes, that Gorki delineates for us. But the romance is not after the recipes of the old novelists: ancient, mystic, seeking its ideals in the remote past. This is living, actual romance. Even though some of Gorki"s heroes founder like the heroes of bygone epochs of literature upon their weakness, more of the "Bitter One"s" characters are shipwrecked on a deed.
And it is this reckless parade and apotheosis of such men of action that accounts for Gorki"s huge success in comparison with many another, and with the writers of the preceding generation. It is for this that the young minds of his native country rally round him--the country that is loaded with clanking fetters.
Gorki is dominated by a characteristic pa.s.sion for strong, abnormal men. This type reappears in almost all his narratives. Here it is old Isergil, whose Odyssey of Love swells to saga-like magnitude. There we find the bold and fearless smuggler Chelkash, in the story of that name. Now it is the brazen, wanton, devoted Malva, who prefers the grown man to the inexperienced youth. Anon, the red Vaska, boots and janitor of the brothel. And there are numbers of other such t.i.tans.
Unfortunately Gorki endows many of them with a vein of sentimentality, on which account his works are compared with those of Auerbach, in certain, more particularly in the aesthetic, Russian circles . . . a reproach that is only partially justified. Emelyan, _e.g._, is a notorious and professional robber. He sallies forth to attack and plunder a merchant in the night. But he encounters a young girl of good social position on the bridge which he has chosen for the scene of his attack. She intends to make away with herself. And in talking to her he forgets everything else; she moves him so profoundly that he dissuades her from suicide and takes her back to her parents.
Despite its rank improbability and sentimental character this tale has a fine humour of its own. And there is, in particular, one sketch that is steeped in humour. This is the "Story of the Silver Clasp." Three casual labourers break into an old factory and steal a silver clasp.
One of them relinquishes his share and takes back the clasp. And all the thanks he gets is a rating from the old housekeeper.
These, of course, are only accessory productions, artistic enough, but of a lighter character. Many of the tales unfortunately suffer from a hackneyed use of situations, materials, and ideas, suggestive of the hack writer. Gorki"s cheap sentiment, and maudlin pity, often result in clap-trap and padding which are foreign to the artist proper. But this is the effect of his predilection for individuals of forcible character.
Gorki is always partial to despotic characters. And here and there he has succeeded in creating men, who take life into their own hands, instead of letting it take them in hand.
It was inevitable that a writer who makes positive affirmations about life should receive a peculiar welcome in Russia, where a gloomy pessimism has obtained the preponderance in literature. Gorki"s conception of life is expressed in the words of the engine-driver Nil, in "The Bezemenovs" . . . a sympathetic figure, even if he be something of a braggart. Nil, who is almost the only cheerful and courageous man amid a handful of weaklings and degenerates, says:
"I know that Life is hard, that at times it seems impossibly harsh and cruel, and I loathe this order of things. I know that Life is a serious business, even if we have not got it fully organised, and that I must put forth all my power and capacity in order to bring about this organisation. And I shall endeavour with all the forces of my soul to be steadfast to my inward promptings: to push my way into the densest parts of life, to knead it hither and thither, to hinder some, to help on others. It is _this_ that is the joy of life!" . . .
[Ill.u.s.tration: Love-scene between Polja and Nil (_Act III. of "The Bezemenovs"_)]
Words like these were bound to have a stimulating and invigorating effect after the despondency of the preceding epoch. This new spirit, this new man, gripped his contemporaries in full force.
The result would undoubtedly have been even more striking if Gorki"s heroes were not invariably tainted with vestiges of the old order.
They are, indeed, men of action. A totally different life pulsates in Gorki"s works; we are confronted with far more virile characters than in the works of other Russian authors. Even the engine driver Nil, however, fails to relieve any one of the sufferers from his troubles.
He removes Polja confidently enough from her surroundings--but only leaves the greater darkness behind him. Even he is as yet unable to transform the conditions of life--and he is therefore stigmatised by a little of the Russian bl.u.s.ter.
"The House of the Bezemenovs" ("The Tradespeople"), Gorki"s first dramatic work, describes the eternal conflict between sons and fathers.
The narrow limitations of Russian commercial life, its _borne_ arrogance, its weakness and pettiness, are painted in grim, grey touches. The children of the tradesman Bezemenov may pine for other sh.o.r.es, where more kindly flowers bloom and scent the air. But they are not strong enough to emanc.i.p.ate themselves. The daughter tries to poison herself because her foster brother, the engine-driver Nil, has jilted her. But when the poison begins to work she cries out pitifully for help. The son is a student, and has been expelled from the university. He hangs about at home, and cannot find energy to plot out a new career for himself. The weariness of a whole generation is expressed in his faint-hearted, listless words, as also in the bl.u.s.tering but ineffective rhodomontades of the tipsy choir-singer Teterev. All cordial relations between parents and children are lacking in this house.
It is refreshing to come upon the other characters, who are of a different breed to these shop-keepers. The vodka-loving, jolly father of Polja (Bezemenov"s niece, who is exploited and maltreated in this house), is, in his contented yet sentimental egoism, a true representative of the ordinary Russian, the common man. And Polja!
And Nil! . . . Here is the fresh blood of the future. How sure they both are in their love. "Ah! what a beautiful world it is, isn"t it?
Wondrously beautiful . . . dear friend. . . . What a glorious man you are. . . ."
Albeit this work is far from being a finished drama, it none the less has its special qualities. These men often talk as glibly as if they were essayists, they often seem to be mere vehicles for programmatic manifestoes. But as a whole they are the typical quintessence of the Russian people.
Other wild and intrepid figures are to be found in the larger works that precede "The Tradespeople"--the novels "Foma Gordeyev" and "Three Men." But Gorki"s new conception of life is less clearly and broadly formulated in these than in Nil, and other subsequent characters.
These people rather collapse from the superabundance of their vigour and the meanness of their surroundings.
In "Foma Gordeyev" Gorki flagellates the unscrupulous Russian wholesale dealer, who knows of nought beyond profit and the grossest sensual indulgence, and lets his own flesh and blood perish if they require of him to budge a hand-breadth from his egoistic standpoint. Foma, who is not built for a merchant, and who, while ambitious of command, is too magnanimous for the sordid business of a tradesman, has to give in.
And the children of his triumphant guardian can only escape poverty by accepting their surroundings.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Gambling scene (_Act II. of "The Doss-house"_)]
Despite its agonies and martyrdoms, however, there is one marvellously inspiring feature about this novel,--its gorgeous descriptions of Nature, rich in life and colour. "Foma Gordeyev" is the romance of life on the Volga.
With what intimacy, familiarity, and heart-felt emotion Gorki here describes and sees! The great River, with its diversified characteristics, its ominous events, mingles with the life of Man, and flows on past us. . . .
It is this characteristic union of the Human-All-Too-Human with his impressions of Nature in so many of Gorki"s works, that makes them at the outset desirable and readable to a large proportion of his public.
Much of his description of life beyond the social pale would be repulsive if it were not for this interpretative nature-painting.
Especially would this be the case in "Malva." This robust, free-loving, and free-living maiden attracts us by her vigorous partic.i.p.ation in Nature, when, for instance, she leaps into the water, and sports in the element like a fish.
Gorki"s countless wanderings through the Russian Steppes, his sojourns by the southern sh.o.r.es of the Russian Seas, are intimately interwoven with the course of Nature, and have given him poetic insight and motives which are ignored by other authors, who have grown up in the University, the Bureau, or the Coffee-houses of large towns. His life of poverty has made him rich. He has evolved some significant prose-poems from the life of Nature, and the contest of her forces.
While the sketch, "Spring Voices," is a satire, bristling with tangible darts and stings, "The Bursting of the Dam" expresses the full force that rages and battles in a stormy sea. The unemanc.i.p.ated workers construct steep, rocky dams that jut out into the free, unbridled sea.
The waves that so long rolled on merrily, without fell intent, are now confined, and beat against the hard, cold, sullen rocks. The winds and tempests join in a colossal attack upon the unyielding barriers, and the rocks are shivered in fragments.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A confabulation (_Act II. of "The Doss-house"_)]
Quite different again is the romance ent.i.tled "Three Men" (or "Three of Them"). The tales and sketches published prior to this work were merely founded on episodes, catastrophes, or descriptive pa.s.sages from the author"s rich store of material. They certainly conveyed the essence of the life of his characters. They disclosed the axis of these people"s existence. But they are seldom free from a certain tiresome impressionism--and often make quite undue pretensions. The didactic is too obvious. Gorki is not always satisfied with saying, here is a bit of life. He tries to put in a little wisdom. His form is seldom clear and conclusive. His tales are overladen with detail and superfluity of minute description. In Germany, Gorki owes much to his translators. This is more especially obvious in the scholarly translation by August Scholz of "Makar Chudra," Gorki"s first published work. At first Scholz only produced a portion of this story. Later on, when all that Gorki had written had its importance, and his commercial success was established, the whole of "Makar," which is by no means free from obscurities, was translated.
In the novel, "Three Men," Gorki leaves the world of vagrants. He describes people who are intermediate between the vagabonds and the settled cla.s.ses, who find their peace and happiness neither with the tramps nor with the well-to-do. Many more than three men live in this romance through times and destinies of the utmost significance. The novel might more exactly be termed "Many Men," or even "No Men." It all depends on how you read your author. In last resort the characters of the book have all something of the humanly-inhuman about them.
This book is one of the most impressive works of our Russian author.
Its large touches portray human life as it is, not only in Russia, but everywhere. The moujik who drifts into the City proletariat suffers from the life that whispers its secrets within and around him. "Why are men doomed to torment each other thus?" It frets and consumes him, weighs him down, and flogs him on again. And from this problem, which in the hands of many would only have resulted in a satire, Gorki creates a powerful tragedy. The aspiring proletaire, be he peasant or child of the artisan, is for the most part done to death with light laughter. In this the unjustified arrogance of the academic cla.s.ses expresses itself too frequently. Too often they discover only the comic element in the men who have emerged from the ranks, and who, while gifted with uncommon energy and intelligence, can neither choose nor be chosen for any of the cultured professions. They fail to perceive that the influence of these men would have a refreshing and invigorating effect upon the whole life of the people. They miss the need of some such transfusion of "vulgar blood" into the higher forms of the body politic. They cannot admit that it is these very _parvenus_ who are the founders of new families and a new civilisation.
Nor that many chasms must for ever be left yawning. They do not appreciate the peculiar pride which Gorki expresses in this romance, in such a cla.s.sic and touching manner, in the character of the girl student. Nor do they perceive that these aspirants possess much that is lacking in themselves--and that not particularly to their credit.
Gorki knows that aspiration is not fulfilled without inward struggle and travail. And it is with a subtle psychological instinct that he endows the men who are struggling upward out of adversity with a deep craving for purity. n.o.ble souls are invariably characterised by greater sensitiveness to delicacy, and this is equally the characteristic of those who are yearning to rise above their low environment. It is not from external filth alone that a man seeks to cleanse himself, but from inward corruption also. And so he strives, and strives again, for purity--and falls the deeper in the mire.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Concluding scene (_Act III. of "The Doss-house"_)]
Few writers share the happy recklessness peculiar to Gorki. He is free from false modesty, like his young moujik, who is compelled by his desire for purity--not by any conventional remorse--to proclaim his relations with his landlady and commercial partner, the shopkeeper"s wife, before all their acquaintances, at one of her entertainments--and also to announce himself as the murderer of the old money-lender. Nor is it the guilty sense of Raskolnikov that impels this moujik to confession and reparation. It is his repugnance for the men in contrast with whom he stands out as an ideal and promising figure.
And it is here that Gorki seems to us almost to surpa.s.s Dostoevsky.
Raskolnikov is a murderer on theory, a penitent out of weakness.
Gorki"s murderer, however, kills from inward compulsion. His act, his acknowledgment of it, all is sheer nave necessity. Here is a man who feels no compunction for having crushed a worm.
Who, in last resort, is the man that repents his deeds? Of all the criminals we have encountered in doss-houses, shelters, and labour-colonies, scarce a single one. And the deed came nearly always like a flash from the blue. Implacable, dire, and for the most part unconscious compulsion, but no premeditated volition, drove them to it.